years, and how he was released at the time when al-Muqtadir was deposed. When the caliphate was restored to al-Muqtadir, they consulted him about the matter, and he said, “Leave him be, for it was through his own handwriting that we were harmed.”
His standing remained as high as ever until he died in 326 AH, and his affair had almost come out into the open.
I say: Yet Allah spared us the evil he intended, for he was secretly bent on splitting the ranks.
It is also said that he was corresponding with the Qarmaṭians, urging them to come to Baghdad and lay siege to it.
The Imāmīs used to lavish money upon him, and he would subtly defend their cause with eloquent turns of phrase that testified to his rhetoric and sound intellect.
He was the mufti of the Rāfiḍīs and their exemplar, enjoying an extraordinary aura.
He is the one who refuted al-Shalmaghānī when he learned of his moral dissolution.
- Ibn Muqla, Abū ʿAlī Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī ibn Ḥasan*
The great vizier, Abū ʿAlī Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī ibn Ḥasan (1) ibn Muqla.
He was born after the year 270 AH (2).
He transmitted from Abū al-ʿAbbās Thaʿlab and Abū Bakr ibn Durayd.
Narrations are reported from him by ʿUmar ibn Muḥammad ibn Sayf and Abū al-Faḍl Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥasan.