ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAlī related: I heard Abū ʿAmr ibn ʿUlwān, and I asked him, “Did you ever see Abū Hafs in the company of al-Junayd?”
He answered, “I was not present, but I heard al-Junayd say:
‘Abū Hafs stayed with me for a full year together with eight others. I used to serve them the finest food—and I even provided certain garments for them. When they were ready to depart I clothed them again. Then he said to me: “If you would come to Nishapur, we would teach you generosity and futuwa (spiritual chivalry).”
‘He went on: “Your hospitality involved too much ceremony. When poor people visit you, be with them without affectation: if you go hungry, let them be hungry; and if you are satisfied, let them be satisfied.”’

Al-Khuldī said: When Abū Hafs told al-Junayd, “If you were to enter Nishapur we would teach you futuwa,” someone asked him, “What did you see in him?” He replied, “He has made my companions soft; he goes to great lengths to present them with all sorts of dishes, whereas true futuwa is to abandon every form of affectation.”

It is also said that a young man in the service of Abū Hafs was known for his perpetual silence. Al-Junayd asked about him, and Abū Hafs replied, “This young man has spent one hundred thousand dinars on us and borrowed another hundred thousand; yet, out of reverence for me, he has never asked me for anything.”

Abū ʿAlī al-Thaqafī reported that Abū Hafs used to say, “Whoever does not weigh each of his states against the Book and the Sunnah, and does not regard his own thoughts with suspicion, do not count him among the people (of the path).”

In the Muʿjam of Baghdad by al-Silafī it is recorded that two sons of Abū Hafs of Nishapur came and attended a session with al-Junayd. They listened to two qawwāls (singers of devotional poetry) and died on the spot. Their father later arrived, attended a session with the same two singers, and the singers themselves fell down dead.

Ibn Nujayd said: I heard Abū ʿAmr al-Zajjājī declare, “Abū Hafs was the light of Islam in his time.”

And Abū Hafs said: “No one truly merits the name ‘generous’ who ever mentions his gift, or even notices it in his own heart.”