Al-Marrūdhī said: I heard Abū ʿAbd Allāh say,
“The ghalla (property income) is only what provides our daily bread, and I only accept it because I believe we have a rightful share in it.”

I said to him, “A man remarked, ‘If Abū ʿAbd Allāh would give up the ghalla, and instead a friend made something for him, that would please me more.’”

He replied, “Such a hand-out is ill-gotten food; whoever gets used to it will never be able to give it up.”

Then he added, “This—meaning the ghalla—is more acceptable to me than anything else. You know it does not really sustain us, and he only took it out of sheer necessity.”

Ibn al-Jawzī said, “There were times when Aḥmad was in need, so he went out to gather liqāṭ (gleanings of left-over grain)(1).”

Al-Khallāl reported: Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥusayn narrated to me; al-Marrūdhī narrated to us, saying: Abū Jaʿfar al-Ṭarsūsī told me: the man with whom Abū ʿAbd Allāh was lodging said, “When he stayed with me, he went out to gather liqāṭ. He came back having picked up only a little, so I said to him, ‘You have eaten more than you collected!’

He replied, ‘I saw something that made me feel ashamed: I saw them gleaning, and a man would be down on all fours, while I was crawling.’”

Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Khāliq reported: al-Marrūdhī narrated to us; Abū ʿAbd Allāh said,
“I set out for the frontier region on foot and gathered liqāṭ. If only you had seen people ruining the farmers’ fields!” He added, “We used to go out to gather liqāṭ.”

I say: At times he copied manuscripts for a wage, at other times he worked at tikāk (patching clay bricks), and he even hired himself out to a camel-driver—may Allah have mercy on him.