nor of those who are astray.’ It is for My servant, and for My servant is whatever he requests. (1)
159 – al-Dūrī, Abū ʿUmar Ḥafṣ ibn ʿUmar * (q)
The Imām, eminent scholar, and foremost shaykh of the Qur’an reciters: Abū ʿUmar Ḥafṣ ibn ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Ṣuhbān—some said Ṣuhayb—the Azdī freedman, known as al-Dūrī, the blind scholar who resided in Sāmarrāʾ.
He was born in one of the 150s AH, during the caliphate of al-Manṣūr.
He recited to Ismāʿīl ibn Jaʿfar and also heard hadith from him. He then recited to al-Kisāʾī in his own reading, to Yaḥyā al-Yazīdī in the reading of Abū ʿAmr, and to Sulaym in the reading of Ḥamzah. He gathered the variant readings and composed works on them.
He likewise transmitted hadith from Abū Ismāʿīl Ibrāhīm ibn Sulaymān al-Muʾaddib, Ibrāhīm ibn Abī Yaḥyā, Ismāʿīl ibn ʿAyyāsh, Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, Abū Muʿāwiyah, and others.
Among those who narrated from him were the Imām Aḥmad—though they were contemporaries—and Naṣr ibn ʿAlī al-Jahḍamī, and he himself also narrated from both of them.
(1) Reported by Malik, al-Muwattaʾ, 1/84, Book of Prayer, chapter: “Reciting behind the imam in prayers said silently”; also by Muslim, no. 395 (39), Book of Prayer, chapter: “The obligation to recite al-Fatiha in every rakʿa,” through the isnad of Qutayba from Malik.
The word khadaj means “deficient” or “incomplete.”
In the saying, “I have divided the salat between Myself and My servant in two halves,” the word salat refers to the Qurʾanic recitation, as in the verse: “Do not recite your salat aloud, nor say it silently.”
(*) The narrator is mentioned in the following biographical works: al-Duʿafaʾ (fol. 98); al-Jarh wa-l-Taʿdil 3/183-184; al-Fihrist 287; Tarikh Baghdad 8/203-204; al-Ansab 5/395-396; Muʿjam al-Udabaʾ 10/216, 218; Tahdhib al-Kamal (fol. 308); al-ʿIbar 1/446; Tadhhib al-Tahdhib 1/164; Maʿrifat al-Qurraʾ al-Kibar 1/157, 159; Mizan al-Iʿtidal 1/566; Ghaya al-Nihaya 1/255, 257; Tahdhib al-Tahdhib 2/408; Tadhkirat al-Huffaz 1/406; Khulasa Tadhhib al-Kamal 87; al-Nashr fi-l-Qiraʾat al-ʿAshr 1/134; Shadharat al-Dhahab 2/111.