for the ḥadīth itself is better than Ibn Ṣāʿid’s remarks.

Ibn al-Ṭuyūrī said: “I heard Ibn al-Mudhhib say, ‘I heard Ibn Shāhīn say, “I heard al-Baghawī.”’ At that point al-Baghawī’s amanuensis said to him, ‘I hope I shall be able to take dictation from you in the year 320 AH.’ He replied, ‘You have curtailed my life! I once saw in the Sacred Sanctuary a man one hundred and thirty-six years old who used to say, “I saw al-Ḥasan and Ibn Sīrīn,” or words to that effect.’”

I add: Al-Baghawī would have been even happier had the scribe said to him, “I hope to take dictation from you in the year 350 AH.”

Abū Aḥmad Ibn ʿAdī stated in his al-Kāmil (1): “Abū al-Qāsim was a ḥadīth scholar. At the beginning of his career he worked as a copy-scribe, producing manuscripts for his grandfather, his uncle, and others, and he would sell his own autograph copies whenever he could.

“I arrived in Iraq in 297 AH, and the scholars and shaykhs there were unanimous in declaring him weak. They were reluctant to attend his gatherings, and at that time I never saw in his circle more than ten or so strangers. His sons would repeatedly ask those outsiders to attend their father’s session, and he would read the text aloud to them.

“Their wags used to say, ‘There are sorcerers in Ibn Manīʿ’s house who carry Dāwūd ibn ʿUmar al-Ḍabbī, so great is the number of reports he narrates from him. I do not know anyone who has related from ʿAlī ibn al-Jaʿd more than he has.’

“Qāsim al-Maṭarriz heard him say, ‘Ḥaddathanā ʿUbayd Allah al-ʿAyshī,’ whereupon he retorted, ‘May the scorching heat of his mother be upon whoever is lying!’

“Some people criticised him and accused him of fabrication in the presence of ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd al-Warrāq, who said, ‘He is too slow-witted to lie’—meaning, he does not even know how.

“He was foul-mouthed and would speak ill of trustworthy transmitters. I heard him say, on the day Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā al-Marwazī died, ‘I myself have been…’”