Abū Muʿīn al-Ḥusayn ibn al-Ḥasan al-Rāzī narrated to us; Ibn Abī Maryam narrated to us; he said:
“We were with Mālik when people began citing hadiths that the people of Madinah do not follow. Mālik said, ‘What are these reports that the people are passing around?’ Then Mālik added, ‘I wish I were struck with a lash for every hadith I have related that is not acted upon, and that I had never narrated it at all.’
Ḥamzah al-Sahmī said: Abū Nuʿaym died in Astarābād in Dhu al-Ḥijjah of the year 323 AH, at a little over eighty years of age.
Al-Ḥākim said: I heard ʿAlī ibn Muḥammad ibn Shuʿayb al-Astarābādī say, “Abū Nuʿaym died after returning from Bukhārā, in the year 322 AH.”
Al-Ḥākim also said: I heard Ismāʿīl ibn Aḥmad al-Jurjānī, who said: I heard Abū Nuʿaym, who said: I heard ʿAmmār ibn Rajāʾ, who said: I heard Yazīd ibn Hārūn—when asked about a hadith—reply, “We are Wāsiṭīs.” Meaning: “Overlook it, as though you were a man of Wāsiṭ.”
ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-Munʿim informed us, from Abū al-Yaman al-Kindī; ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd al-Salām informed us; the shaykh Abū Isḥāq narrated, saying: “Among them is Abū Nuʿaym al-Astarābādī, the companion of al-Rabīʿ.”
Abū al-Faḍl Aḥmad ibn Hibat Allāh informed us; ʿAbd al-Muʿizz ibn Muḥammad narrated to us; Zāhir ibn Ṭāhir al-Mustamli narrated to us; Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān the litterateur narrated to us,