ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-Munʿim related to me—through Abū al-Yaman al-Kindī; ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd al-Salām informed us; and Shaykh Abū Isḥāq al-Shīrāzī said: “During the Qur’an inquisition, Muhammad was taken before Ibn Abī Dāwūd. He would not accede to what was demanded of him, so he was returned to Egypt, where pre-eminence in scholarship ultimately settled upon him.”

Another narrator reports that Ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥakam was beaten, after which he fled and went into hiding.

He later suffered a second, formidable ordeal, mentioned in our Major History under the biography of his righteous brother ʿAbd al-Ḥakam.

Abū Saʿīd ibn Yūnus says: “ʿAbd al-Ḥakam was tortured in prison; smoke was forced upon him, and he died in 237 AH after being accused of holding deposits belonging to ʿAlī ibn al-Jarawī.”

Ibn Abī Dulaym remarked, “None of the brothers was more learned in jurisprudence than ʿAbd al-Ḥakam.”

It was also said that the family of Ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥakam were made, during the affair of Ibn al-Jarawī, to pay more than one million dinars: their assets were seized and their homes plundered. Some time later, al-Mutawakkil released them, restored part of their property, imprisoned the unjust judge al-Aṣamm, shaved his beard, flogged him, and paraded him on a donkey.

Abū Saʿīd ibn Yūnus adds in his History, “Muhammad was the mufti of Egypt in his day.”

I say: He authored many works, among them a treatise refuting al-Shāfiʿī, a book entitled “Legal Rulings of the Quran,” a refutation of the jurists of Iraq, and other writings besides.

Scholars, ancient and modern alike, have always answered one another in debate and in their compositions; through such exchanges the jurist gains deeper insight and knotty problems are resolved. Yet in our time a jurist may be punished for pursuing this, owing to his corrupt intention and his thirst for prominence and self-aggrandizement.