and the most penetrating in insight, and the most relentless in seeking knowledge.

He also said: I heard Abū Saʿīd the tutor say, “I heard ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān remark, ‘Muhammad’s quest for hadith bore no resemblance to ours; whenever he reviewed a man’s narrations, he drained them to the very last drop.’ ”

He said: Isḥāq, the copyist of ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, related to me: ʿAbdullāh asked me for the book Al-Adab authored by Muhammad ibn Ismāʿīl, saying, “Bring it so I may look through it.” He took the volume from me and kept it for three months. When I took it back from him I asked, “Did you find in it any superfluous material or a weak hadith?”

He answered, “Ibn Ismāʿīl reads to the people only sound hadith (1). Who could take Muhammad to task?!”

He said: I heard Abū Ṭayyib Ḥātim ibn Manṣūr al-Kissī say, “Muhammad ibn Ismāʿīl is a sign from among Allah’s signs, in the sharpness of his vision and the breadth of his knowledge.”

He said: I also heard Abū ʿAmr al-Mustanīr ibn ʿAtīq relate: I heard Rajāʾ the ḥāfiẓ say, “Muhammad ibn Ismāʿīl’s excellence over the scholars is like the excellence of men over women.”

A man said to him, “Abū Muḥammad, all that in one person?!”

He replied, “He is a sign of Allah, walking upon the face of the earth (2).”

He said: I heard Muhammad ibn Yūsuf relate, “Abū ʿAbdullāh asked Abū Rajāʾ…"