- Aḥmad ibn Yūnus al-Tamīmī al-Yarbuʿī al-Kūfī * (ʿ)
He was an Imām, a conclusive proof, and a ḥāfiẓ. His full name is Abū ʿAbd Allāh Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Yūnus al-Tamīmī, al-Yarbuʿī, al-Kūfī; for brevity he is usually linked to his grandfather’s name.
Birth: c. 132 AH (approximate).
He heard ḥadīth from his grandfather Yūnus ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Qays al-Yarbuʿī, and from Ibn Abī Dhiʾb, Sufyān al-Thawrī, Isrāʾīl, al-Ḥasan ibn Ṣāliḥ, Zāʾidah ibn Qudāmah, ʿĀṣim ibn Muḥammad ibn Zayd al-ʿUmarī, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn al-Mājishūn, Zuhayr ibn Muʿāwiyah, Abū Bakr ibn ʿAyyāsh, and many others.
He was well-versed in the ḥadīth of his own region.
Reported from him: al-Bukhārī, Muslim—who counted him among his senior teachers—ʿAbd ibn Ḥumayd, Abū Zurʿah al-Rāzī, Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī, Yaʿqūb al-Fasawī, Abū Ḥātim, Aḥmad ibn Yaḥyā al-Ḥulwānī, Abū Ḥuṣayn al-Wādiʿī, Ibrāhīm ibn Sharīk, and many others besides.
Al-Faḍl ibn Ziyād said: “I heard Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, and a man asked him, ‘From whom should I take notes?’ He replied, ‘Travel to Aḥmad ibn Yūnus, for he is the Shaykh of Islam.’” ⦗1⦘
Abū Ḥātim said: “He was trustworthy and precise.” ⦗2⦘