His grandson, the great ḥadith scholar Abū Saʿīd (1) ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Aḥmad ibn Yūnus, said: “I have placed them under the nisba al-Ṣadaf (2)(3), yet he himself is neither of their lineage nor one of their clients (4).
He died on the morning of Monday, 2 Rabīʿ al-Ākhir 264 AH.
I say: he lived ninety-four years.
A number of his high-isnād reports have come down to me in al-Khilʿiyyāt and in various other sources; between our teachers and him there are five transmitters.
He was truly the delight of one’s eye, pre-eminent in knowledge, virtue, and reliability.
As for the ḥadith he alone transmitted from al-Shāfiʿī—“There is no Mahdī except Jesus (5)”—it seems the report did reach him from al-Shāfiʿī, but he concealed the intermediary (tadlīs).
I have seen an old original manuscript in which he states: “I was told on the authority of al-Shāfiʿī.”
(1) He is the author of Tarikh Misr (History of Egypt).
(2) In other words, he claims a lineage that is not actually his. The term da‘wa (with a short i on the initial d) in questions of paternity denotes attributing a child to someone other than his real father, and in matters of tribal affiliation it refers to a person ascribing himself to a father or clan to which he does not belong.
(3) Tahdhib al-Kamal describes him as saduq (reliable), the word written with the dotted thaa.
(4) Tahdhib al-Kamal, no. 1567.
(5) Reported by Ibn Majah (4039) and al-Hakim 4/441 through the chain: Yunus ibn Abd al-Ala — Muhammad ibn Idris al-Shafi‘i — Muhammad ibn Khalid al-Jundi — Aban ibn Salih — al-Hasan — Anas ibn Malik. The Prophet said: “Matters will only grow harsher, the world will keep turning its back, people will become more stingy; the Hour will not be established except upon the worst of people, and there is no mahdi except Isa ibn Maryam.” This isnad is not a valid proof: Muhammad ibn Khalid al-Jundi is unknown, al-Hasan is a mudallis and has narrated it with ‘an‘ana. Imam al-Dhahabi, in the biography of Yunus ibn Abd al-Ala in al-Mizan 4/481, calls the hadith “very munkar.” Al-Qurtubi states in al-Tadhkira that its chain is weak. The hadiths affirming that the Mahdi will arise from the Prophet’s household, from the descendants of Fatima, are sounder and therefore take precedence over this report.