Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥusayn ibn Mukram said, “I heard Ḥajjāj ibn al-Shāʿir, and when I mentioned to him Abū Zurʿah, Ibn Wārah, and Abū Jaʿfar al-Dārimī, he remarked, ‘In the entire East there is no one more eminent than they are.’

Ibn Abī Ḥātim said: I heard my father relate that Hishām ibn ʿAmmār once asked me, ‘Which of the adhwaʾ do you have by heart?’ I replied, ‘Dhū al-Asābiʿ (the man with the fingers), Dhū al-Jawshan (the one with the coat of mail), Dhū al-Zawāʾid (the man of the extra digits), Dhū al-Yadayn (the man with the two hands), and Dhū al-Liḥyah al-Kilābī (the bearded man of the Kilāb tribe).’ I counted six for him in all. He laughed and said, ‘We memorised three of them; you have added three more.’ (1)

The ḥāfiẓ ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Khirrāsh said, ‘Abū Ḥātim was a man of trustworthiness and deep knowledge.’

Hibat Allāh al-Lālikāʾī (2) said, ‘Abū Ḥātim was an imam, a ḥāfiẓ, and exceedingly precise.’ Al-Lālikāʾī also listed him among al-Bukhārī’s teachers.

Al-Nasāʾī declared, ‘He is trustworthy.’

Ibn Abī Ḥātim reported: I heard my father say, ‘One day Abū Zurʿah and I began discussing the evaluation and recognition of hadith. He started citing reports along with their hidden defects, and I likewise mentioned reports that were faulty together with their defects and the mistakes of the shaykhs. Then he said to me:

“O Abū Ḥātim! Few indeed understand this science—how rare it is! Once you go beyond one or two people, you will hardly find anyone proficient in it. At times I doubt something, or a misgiving about a hadith troubles me, and until I meet you I find no one who can allay my concern.”

My father added, ‘That was exactly my own experience as well.’ (3)