in his Mukhtasar he would offer two rakʿahs of prayer to Allah. (1)

It is related that when the judge Bakkār ibn Qutaybah came to take up the judiciary of Egypt—he was a Ḥanafite—he met al-Muzani on one occasion. One of Bakkār’s companions asked al-Muzani, “In the hadiths we find both a prohibition and a permission regarding nabidh (fermented drink). Why have you placed the prohibition first?”

Al-Muzani replied, “No one in the pre-Islamic era considered nabidh unlawful; then it was declared permissible for us, and there is unanimous agreement that it had been lawful and was later forbidden. That sequence lends support to the hadiths that prohibit it.” Bakkār approved of this answer. (2)

I add: Moreover, the hadiths that call for prohibition are numerous and sound, whereas those that allow it are not of comparable strength.

ʿAmr ibn Tamīm al-Makki said: I heard Muḥammad ibn Ismāʿīl al-Tirmidhī say: I heard al-Muzani declare, “No one’s monotheism is sound until he knows that Allah—exalted is He—is above the Throne with His attributes.”

I asked him, “Which attributes?”

He answered, “Hearing, sight, and knowledge.”

Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī said: Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allah ibn Shādhān reported to us; I heard Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī al-Kattānī, and I heard ʿAmr ibn ʿUthmān al-Makki say: “Among all the worshippers I have met—and they are many—I have never seen anyone strive harder in devotion than al-Muzani, nor anyone more constant in worship. I have not seen anyone who held knowledge and its people in greater reverence. He was the strictest of people with himself concerning scrupulousness, yet the most accommodating toward others in that regard. He used to say, ‘I am but a trait from the character of al-Shāfiʿī.’ (3)”

I say: We have also been informed that al-Muzani—may Allah have mercy on him—had his supplications answered and was a man of deep asceticism