His origin lays in the Yemen region. Aḥmad judged him weak and said: “He dispatched someone to Yemen, obtained a book, and then began narrating from it.” He died in 216 AH.

Al-Nasāʾī said: “He is not strong.”

Abū Ḥātim said: “Al-Ḥasan ibn al-Rabīʿ narrated to us, saying: ‘Today Muḥammad ibn Kathīr al-Maṣṣīṣī is the most reliable of men; it is proper that people travel to him. Ḥadith were already being written down from him while Abū Isḥāq al-Fazārī was still alive, and he has been known for his uprightness from the very beginning.’”⦗1⦘

More than one transmitter related—through Muḥammad ibn Kathīr, from al-Awzāʿī—who said:

“There was among us in Beirut a fisherman who would go out to fish on Friday, undeterred by the place of the congregational prayer. One day he set out, and both he and his mule were swallowed up by the earth, ⦗2⦘ leaving nothing of it but its ears and tail.”

Ibn Saʿd said: “They report that Muḥammad ibn Kathīr al-Ṣanʿānī became confused toward the end of his life.”⦗3⦘

Muḥammad ibn ʿAwf said: “I heard Muḥammad ibn Kathīr recite:

O little Kathīr, laden with many sins—
wherever you encamp or journey, someone curses you.
O little Kathīr, two disasters have struck you—
ostentation and conceit that mingle with your heart.
O little Kathīr, you eat much and sleep much—
conduct unfitting for one who fears his Lord.
O little Kathīr, though you teach knowledge—
scant is the wool for the man who shears a dog.”

Ibn Abī Ḥātim said: “Abū Zurʿah was asked about Muḥammad ibn Kathīr, and he replied: ‘The book of al-Awzāʿī was handed to him, and in every ḥadith it said, “Muḥammad ibn Kathīr—this is his name—narrated to us,” whereupon he merely read it out.’”