the rare geniuses and the foremost of the distinguished ḥuffāẓ (1).

His student ʿImād al-Dīn Ibn Kathīr, d. 774 AH, said: “The great ḥāfiẓ, the historian of Islam, the shaykh of the hadith scholars… with him the line of hadith masters and ḥuffāẓ reached its completion (2).”

When the scholar Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Karīm, originally from Mosul and later of Ṭarābulus (3), came to Damascus in 734 AH and studied under al-Dhahabī that same year, he said of him:
“My ears have long been drawn to you, and never
Have I recalled your news but I swayed with delight.
Nor is it strange that I incline toward you—
By nature all people incline toward gold.” (4)

The ḥāfiẓ Ibn Nāṣir al-Dīn, d. 842 AH, described him as “the valiant ḥāfiẓ, the benefactor of Greater Syria, and the historian of Islam (5).”

Ibn Ḥajar al-ʿAsqalānī, d. 852 AH, wrote: “I read in al-Badr al-Nābulusī’s own hand, in his register of shaykhs: he was the luminary of his age in the knowledge of narrators and their conditions—razor-sharp in understanding, incisive, pure gold; his fame obviates the need for lengthy praise (6).”

Badr al-Dīn al-ʿAynī, d. 855 AH, said: “The shaykh, the imam, the erudite scholar, the pre-eminent ḥāfiẓ, the historian, the shaykh of the hadith scholars (7).”

Sibṭ Ibn Ḥajar, d. 899 AH, mentioned him in Rawnaq al-Alfāẓ and waxed eloquent in his praise, saying: “The shaykh, the imam, the erudite scholar, the ḥāfiẓ of his age—so much so that the title became synonymous with him. Allah be praised for such an imām of hadith! How often did he enter every branch of learning, emerge to collate, authenticate, declare trustworthy or weak, and perfect this craft. He is the imām, the master of the ḥuffāẓ, the imam of the hadith scholars, the exemplar of the critics.” And in another passage he said: