did not know, so he was directed to Muḥammad ibn Sahnūn.

Muḥammad said, “Faith is more than seventy levels; the highest of them is bearing witness that there is no god but Allah.” Accordingly, the verbal profession is uncreated, whereas every other deed is created—he meant the spoken formula. As for the reality of that profession, which is the heart’s assent, it is a light that Allah casts into His servant’s heart, and that is a creation of Allah.

Aḥmad ibn Abī Masʿūd said: “I then travelled to Iraq and put the same question there, and the answer I received was identical to Muḥammad’s.” ⦗1⦘

It is also said that when Muḥammad passed away he was elegized in three hundred poems. ⦗2⦘

46 – Ibn ʿAbdūs, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm

He was the jurist of the Maghrib, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm ibn ʿAbdūs.

Abū al-ʿArab said: “He was trustworthy, an imam in jurisprudence, possessed of piety and humility, unconcerned with outward appearance. In his fiqh, asceticism, dress, and food he most closely resembled his teacher Sahnūn. He wrote beautifully and recorded material with great care. He died at the age of fifty-eight.” ⦗3⦘

Luqmān ibn Yūsuf said: “Ibn ʿAbdūs spent seven years studying, never leaving except for the Friday congregational prayer.” ⦗4⦘