He was born sometime after 190 AH.
He studied ḥadith with Abū Nuʿaym, Abū al-Walīd al-Tayālisī, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Ṣāliḥ al-Kātib, Saʿīd ibn Abī Maryam, al-Qaʿnabī, and others of their generation.
Those who transmitted from him include: Ibn Mājah—who cites him in the Sunan—Mūsā ibn Hārūn, Abū ʿArūbah al-Ḥarrānī, Ibn Wahb al-Dīnawarī, ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad al-Duḥaymī, Aḥmad ibn Abī Ghānim, al-Ḥasan ibn ʿAlī ibn Saʿd, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad ibn Ḥammād al-Ṭihrānī, and many others.
Ibn Mājah’s route to him runs through Muḥammad ibn Muṣaffā al-Ḥimṣī.
Al-Bukhārī records in his Ṣaḥīḥ (1): “Abū Aḥmad related to us; Abū Ghassān Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā al-Kattānī informed us.” Some said that this Abū Aḥmad is al-Marrār; others maintained that he is Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Farrāʾ, while still others identified him as Muḥammad ibn Yūsuf al-Bīkandī.
Muḥammad ibn ʿĪsā al-Hamadhānī reported: “My father told us, Faḍlān ibn Ṣāliḥ told us: I asked Abū Zurʿah al-Rāzī, ‘Who has the better memory, you or al-Marrār?’ He replied, ‘My memory is better, but his grasp of jurisprudence is superior.’”
(1) Vol. 5, p. 239, in the Book of Contracts, chapter: “If, in a share-cropping agreement, the owner stipulates: ‘Whenever I wish, I will dismiss you.’” The chain reads: “Abu Ahmad narrated to us; Muhammad b. Yahya, Abu Ghassan al-Kattani, narrated to us; Malik, from Nafiʿ, from Ibn ʿUmar.” Al-Hafiz Ibn Hajar comments in Fath al-Bari that in most manuscripts the name “Abu Ahmad” appears without further identification. In Ibn al-Sakan’s recension transmitted from al-Firabri—followed by Abu Dharr—the wording is: “Abu Ahmad Mirar b. Humuyah narrated to us.” In his introduction (p. 236) Ibn al-Sakan explicitly names him as Mirar b. Humuyah, and this identification is affirmed by Abu Dharr al-Harawi on the authority of some of his teachers, as well as by Abu Nuʿaym in his Mustakhraj, Abu Masʿud in his Atraf, and others. Al-Hakim reports that the people of Bukhara hold that “Abu Ahmad” is in fact Muhammad b. Yusuf al-Baykandi al-Bukhari, from whom al-Bukhari relates a large number of traditions. Al-Hakim adds: “I read this hadith in the handwriting of Abu ʿAmr al-Mustamli, who wrote: ‘Abu Ahmad Muhammad b. ʿAbd al-Wahhab al-Farraʾ narrated to us, from Abu Ghassan,’ which would mean that the transmitter might be al-Farraʾ.”