the distinctions to be made. He favoured the approach of those who boycotted al-Bukhārī and claimed that Ahmad ibn Hanbal used to say, “My utterance of the Quran is uncreated,” and that he had returned to this position.

He also denied the reports transmitted from Ahmad condemning both parties—the well-known matter involving Abū Tālib.

The matter is not as he described it. Ahmad’s condemnation of both parties is widely transmitted by those closest to him: members of his household and companions who devoted themselves to collecting Imam Ahmad’s statements, such as al-Marwazī, al-Khallāl, Abū Bakr ‘Abd al-‘Azīz, Abū ‘Abd Allāh ibn Battah, and others like them. They transmitted enough on this subject for anyone familiar with Ahmad to recognize it as among the most firmly established reports from him.

These Iraqi scholars knew Ahmad’s statements better than those in Khurāsān who identified themselves with the Sunnah and hadith, whose course Ibn Mandah, Abū Nasr, Abū Ismā‘īl al-Harawī, and others like them followed. For this reason, ‘Abd Allāh ibn ‘Atā’ al-Ibrāhīmī compiled a book about those who learned from Ahmad