He transmitted ḥadith from Mālik, al-Layth, Ibn Luhayʿa, Fudayl ibn ʿIyāḍ, Salm al-Khawwāṣ, Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, and a number of others.

Those who reported from him include Aḥmad ibn Ṣabīḥ al-Fayyūmī, Rabīʿah ibn Muḥammad al-Ṭāʾī, Riḍwān ibn Muḥaymid, Ḥasan ibn Muṣʿab, al-Junayd ibn Muḥammad the ascetic, Miqdām ibn Dāwūd al-Ruʿaynī, and others.

He seldom narrated prophetic reports and, when he did, he was not precise in them.

It was said that he was a freedman attached to Quraysh, while his father was Nubian.

Al-Dāraquṭnī remarked, “He conveyed from Mālik some ḥadith that require scrutiny; he was a preacher.”

Ibn Yūnus said, “He was knowledgeable, eloquent, and wise.”

He died in Dhu al-Qaʿdah, d. 245 AH.

Al-Sulamī relates that he was carried by the state courier from Egypt to al-Mutawakkil in 244 AH so that he might exhort the caliph. Whenever people of piety were mentioned in al-Mutawakkil’s presence, the caliph would weep.

Yūsuf ibn Aḥmad al-Baghdādī said, “The people of his district used to call him a heretic, but when he died birds hovered over his funeral bier, after which they came to revere his grave.”

From Ayyūb, Dhū al-Nūn’s tutor: “A group of treasure-seekers came to Dhū al-Nūn, and while he was still a young man he accompanied them to Qifṭ (1). They dug a grave and discovered a tablet bearing al-ism al-aʿẓam (the Supreme Name of Allah). Dhū al-Nūn kept the tablet and handed over to them whatever else they had found.”

Yūsuf ibn al-Ḥusayn al-Rāzī said, “I was with Dhū al-Nūn when someone asked him, ‘Abū al-Fayḍ, what caused you to repent?’ He replied, ‘I once fell asleep in the desert. When I opened my eyes, behold—’