Khuzaymah arrived. The ascetic Abū ʿUthmān al-Ḥīrī thereupon rose, gathered the hadith scholars in his mosque, hung an inkwell from his own hand, and walked at their head until they reached Khān Maḥmash. There he brought al-Sarī out, seated the mustamlī (prompter), and we reckoned the gathering to contain more than one thousand inkwells. When the session ended, the scholars stood, kissed Abū ʿUthmān’s head, and the people showered them with dirhams and sugar. That was in the year 273 AH.

I say: Al-Ḥākim recorded the reports about Abū ʿUthmān in twenty-five folios, and in the midst of his discussion on trust in Allah, certainty, and contentment he said: “I heard my father say:

When Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Khujistānī—the man who had seized the provinces—killed the imam Ḥaykān (1) ibn al-Dhuhlī, he launched into oppression and tyranny. He ordered a spear to be planted at the center of the square (2), gathered the notables, and swore: ‘If you do not keep pouring silver coins until the spearhead disappears, your blood is lawful to me.’

They therefore divided the fine among themselves, and a single merchant was charged thirty thousand dirhams. He could raise only three thousand, so he brought them to Abū ʿUthmān and said: ‘O Shaykh, as you have heard, he has sworn this oath, and by Allah I can manage no more than these.’

Abū ʿUthmān asked, ‘Will you allow me to deal with them in a way that will benefit you?’
‘Yes,’ the merchant replied. So Abū ʿUthmān distributed the money and told the merchant, ‘Stay with me.’

All that night Abū ʿUthmān kept walking back and forth between the alley and the mosque until dawn broke and the call to prayer was made. He then said to his servant, ‘Go to the market and see what you hear.’

The servant went, returned, and said, ‘I saw nothing.’
‘Go again,’ Abū ʿUthmān told him, and while engaged in his whispered supplication he kept saying, ‘By Your Majesty, I will not rise until You relieve the distressed.’

His servant al-Farghānī then came and said: ‘Allah has spared…’