“How can a path be found to win the good pleasure of those two who grew angry—though I committed no offence and know of no cause?”

Tamām’s father recounted: “I heard Yūsuf ibn al-Ḥusayn say, ‘Someone told me, “Dhu’l-Nūn knows the Greatest Name.” So I set out to meet him. When he caught sight of me—my beard was long and I was carrying an equally long water-skin—my appearance struck him as odd.

“Tamām’s father went on: ‘They used to say that Yūsuf was the most learned man of his age in kalām and in the science of the Sufis.

“‘A dialectician once arrived and debated with Dhu’l-Nūn, but he could not establish any proof against him. I pulled the man over to me, debated with him, and refuted him. Dhu’l-Nūn then realized who I was, embraced me, sat down before me, and said, “Pardon me.” After that I served him for a whole year.’”

154 – Ibn al-Jallāʾ, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Aḥmad ibn Yaḥyā*
The exemplar, the gnostic, the Shaykh of Syria: Abū ʿAbd Allāh Ibn al-Jallāʾ, Aḥmad ibn Yaḥyā—although some say his name was Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā.
People say he was originally from Baghdad. He kept company with his father, with Abū Turāb an-Nakhshabī, and with Dhu’l-Nūn al-Miṣrī, from whom he also transmitted.
Those who took knowledge from him include Abū Bakr ad-Duqqī, Muḥammad ibn Sulaymān al-Labbād, and Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥasan al-Yaqṭīnī.