Al-Khaṭīb said: Hātim ibn ʿUnwān al-Aṣamm transmitted—through a chain that goes back to Shaqīq…—and he mentioned a number of narrators.

It is related from him that he said, “I rejoice when the one debating with me is correct, and I grieve when he is mistaken.”

It is also reported that Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal went out to meet Hātim, welcomed him, and asked, “How can one keep clear of people?”
He replied, “By giving them your wealth and never taking from theirs; by fulfilling their rights and never demanding your own; by bearing what you dislike from them and never forcing them to do anything—and even then, may you be kept safe.”

Abū Turāb said, “I heard Hātim say, ‘The believer never loses sight of five things: Allah, the decree, provision, death, and Satan.’”

It is narrated from Hātim that he said, “If a news-bearer were to sit with you, you would be on your guard, yet your words are presented before Allah and you do not take precautions!”

I say: Such were the subtle insights and allusions of the gnostics, not like what the later folk invented of fanāʾ (self-annihilation), maḥw (obliteration), and jamʿ (fusion), notions that through their ignorance led to ittiḥād (unionism) and the denial of any other being.

Abū’l-Qāsim Ibn Manda and Abū Ṭāhir al-Silafī said: Hātim al-Aṣamm—may Allah have mercy on him—d. 237 AH.

129 – Aḥmad ibn Khidrawayh, Abū Ḥāmid al-Balkhī (1) *
The eminent, God-devoted ascetic, Abū Ḥāmid al-Balkhī, was one of the companions of Hātim al-Aṣamm.