of the year 227 AH, six days before al-Muʿtaṣim assumed the caliphate, and he was seventy-five years old.
Ibn al-Jawzī later dedicated a separate book to his merits.
In that same year there also died: Sahl ibn Bakkār al-Baṣrī (1); the ḥāfiẓ Abū al-Walīd al-Ṭayālisī (2); Saʿīd ibn Manṣūr (3), the compiler of al-Sunan; Ismāʿīl ibn Abī Uways al-Madanī (4); Muḥammad ibn al-Ṣabbāḥ al-Dūlābī (5); al-Haytham ibn Khārijah; al-ʿAlāʾ ibn ʿAmr al-Ḥanafī; Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab al-Ḥārithī; and Abū al-Aḥwaṣ Muḥammad ibn Ḥayyān al-Baghawī.
Muḥammad ibn al-Muthannā reported from Bishr: “No one loves this world without disliking death, and whoever is detached from it longs to meet his Master.”
He also related from him: “Whoever loves fame has not shown piety toward Allah.”
And he narrated that Bishr said: “Do not act so that you will be mentioned; conceal a good deed just as you conceal a sin.”
Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Sarrāj said: Muḥammad ibn al-Muthannā narrated to us, Bishr ibn al-Ḥārith narrated to us, ʿĪsā ibn Yūnus narrated to us, Hishām ibn ʿUrwah narrated to us from his brother, from ʿUrwah, from ʿĀʾishah, who said:
“The Messenger of Allah ﷺ said, ‘I have been to you as Abu Zurʿ was to Umm—’”