Both Abū Zurʿah and Abū Ḥātim pronounced him a liar, and he alleged that he had met a number of scholars (1). Ibn Mardawayh said: “He is somewhat weak.”
88 – Abū al-Aḥwaṣ Muḥammad ibn al-Haytham ibn Ḥammād al-Thaqafī * (q (2))
The imam, ḥāfiẓ, and firmly reliable authority, judge of ʿUkbarā (3): Abū ʿAbd Allah Muḥammad ibn al-Haytham ibn Ḥammād ibn Wāqid, the Thaqafī client from Baghdad, better known as Abū al-Aḥwaṣ.
He narrated from: Abū Nuʿaym, Muslim ibn Ibrāhīm, ʿAbd Allah ibn Rajāʾ, Saʿīd ibn Abī Maryam, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Uwaysī, Mūsā ibn Dāwūd al-Ḍabbī, Muḥammad ibn Kathīr al-Ṣanʿānī, ʿĀrim, al-Qaʿnabī, Abū al-Walīd, Saʿīd ibn ʿUfair, Abū Jaʿfar al-Nufaylī, Muḥammad ibn ʿĀʾidh the secretary, and their contemporaries.
He undertook extensive travels and possessed comprehensive knowledge.
Those who transmitted from him include: Ibn Mājah—who recorded a single hadith from him on the rain-seeking prayer (4)—Mūsā ibn Hārūn, Ibn Ṣāʿid, Abū ʿAwānah, ʿUthmān ibn al-Sammāk, Abū Bakr al-Najjād, Abū Bakr al-Shāfiʿī, Abū Bakr ibn Mālik al-Iskāfī, and others.