western quarter, and he was (1) a little over eighty years of age. He was truthful, learned, eloquent, generous, chaste, ascetic, devout, and worshipful. Yet with all that he was cheerful and good-natured, never displaying arrogance or haughtiness. On occasion he would jest with his friends in a manner that was deemed commendable(2) coming from him and would have been frowned upon from anyone else.

He was the leading shaykh of the Baghdadis in his day—their wit, their ascetic, their devotee, and their authority in hadith. He provided legal instruction to the people of Iraq and held a teaching session in the Western Congregational Mosque every Friday.

Ibrāhīm b. Jābir told me: “I used to sit in the study circle of Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī, and two youths of consummate beauty and elegance in appearance and attire(3) would join us, as though they were one soul(4) in two bodies. If one rose, they both rose; and if one arrived, the other arrived with him. One Friday, however, only one of them came, the pallor clear upon his face and dejection in his eyes. The following Friday the absent one appeared, while the first did not, and the same pallor and dejection were evident(5) on his countenance. I surmised that this was due to the separation that had befallen them, while their earlier joy had stemmed from the bond that united them.

They continued to vie each Friday to reach the circle first; whichever of them arrived first, the other would not sit. Then, on one of the Fridays, one of them came and sat with us. A little later the other arrived, peered into the circle, and saw that his companion had preceded him. The one who had been outstripped was overcome by tears(6); I perceived this in the rims(7) of his eyes, and in his left hand were small slips of paper