the Naysabūrī, compiler of the Great Musnad arranged by topical chapters, the History, and other works, and the brother of the ḥadith scholar Ibrāhīm and of Ismāʿīl.
He was born in 216 AH.
He met Yaḥyā ibn Yaḥyā al-Tamīmī but did not receive ḥadith from him.
Among those from whom he did study were: Isḥāq (ibn Rāhūyah); Qutaybah ibn Saʿīd; Muḥammad ibn Bakkār ibn al-Rayyān; Bishr ibn al-Walīd al-Kindī; Abū Muʿammar al-Qaṭīʿī; Dāʾūd ibn Rushayd; Muḥammad ibn Ḥumayd al-Rāzī; Muḥammad ibn al-Ṣabbāḥ al-Jarjarāʾī; ʿAmr ibn Zurārah; Abū Hammām al-Sakūnī; Hannād ibn al-Sarī; Abū Kurayb; Muḥammad ibn Abān al-Balkhī; al-Ḥasan ibn ʿĪsā ibn Mā sarjis; Muḥammad ibn ʿAmr Zunayj; Aḥmad ibn al-Miqdām; Muḥammad ibn Rāfiʿ; Mujāhid ibn Mūsā; Aḥmad ibn Manīʿ; Ziyād ibn Ayyūb; Yaʿqūb al-Dawraqī; Sawwār ibn ʿAbd Allāh; Hārūn al-Ḥammāl; ʿUqbāh ibn Mukram al-ʿAmmī; Ibn Karāmah; ʿAbd al-Jabbār ibn al-ʿAlāʾ; ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUmar ibn Abān; Abū Saʿīd al-Ashajj; ʿAbd Allāh ibn al-Jarāḥ; Aḥmad ibn Saʿīd al-Dārmī; ʿAbbād ibn al-Walīd; and many others besides them.
His transmission also extends to Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Birtī, Muḥammad ibn Ismāʿīl al-Tirmidhī, and al-Ḥasan ibn Salām.
He resided in Baghdad for a long period, teaching there, before returning to his homeland.
Those who narrated from him include: al-Bukhārī; Muslim, though only a few reports outside the two Ṣaḥīḥs; Abū Ḥātim al-Rāzī—one of his own teachers; Abū Bakr ibn Abī Dunyā; ʿUthmān ibn al-Sammāk; the ḥāfiẓ Abū ʿAlī al-Naysābūrī; Abū Ḥātim al-Bustī; Abū Aḥmad ibn ʿAdī; Abū Isḥāq al-Muzakkī; Ibrāhīm ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Aṣbahānī; Abū Aḥmad al-Ḥākim; ʿUbayd Allāh ibn Muḥammad al-Fāmī; Ḥusaynak ibn ʿAlī al-Tamīmī; Abū Muḥammad al-Ḥasan ibn Aḥmad al-Makhladī; and Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Hāniʾ.