He first devoted himself to teaching in Tabriz, presiding over its circles of Qurʾān recitation. In 725 AH he came to Damascus and lectured at the Rawāḥiyyah, after which his fame spread to Egypt. There he authored al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr, a commentary on Ibn al-Ḥājjib’s Mukhtaṣar, and a commentary on al-Bayḍāwī’s Minhāj in the principles of jurisprudence. He died in Cairo during the plague and was buried there (1).
Ibn Kathīr also heard from a number of other scholars assorted books, mashyakhas, single-volume works, and select traditions; they are therefore rightfully counted among his teachers. They are:
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ʿĪsā ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Maʿālī ibn Aḥmad—al-Musnid, Sharaf al-Dīn, Abū Muḥammad—the real-estate broker and tree-planter, d. 719 AH. Ibn Kathīr heard from him most of the Ṣaḥīḥ, i.e., Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī (2).
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al-Qāsim ibn Muẓaffar ibn Maḥmūd ibn Aḥmad ibn al-Ḥasan ibn Hibat Allah, Bahāʾ al-Dīn Ibn ʿAsākir al-Dimashqī, the physician, d. 723 AH. In the year of his death Ibn Kathīr received from him a mashyakha that ʿIlm al-Dīn al-Barzalī compiled. In al-Bidāyah wa’l-Nihāyah he calls him “our eminent shaykh, the tireless traveller” (3).
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Yaḥyā ibn Isḥāq ibn Khalīl ibn Fāris, Muḥyī al-Dīn, Abū Zakariyyā al-Shaybānī al-Shāfiʿī, d. 724 AH. Ibn Kathīr heard from him the Sunan of al-Dāraqutnī and other works (4).
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Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar ibn ʿUthmān ibn ʿUmar, ʿAfīf al-Dīn, the Sicilian Damascene, d. 725 AH. Ibn Kathīr said of him: “He was the imām of the Raʾs Mosque, the last to transmit from Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ; he related to us portions of al-Bayhaqī’s Sunan, some of which we heard from him” (5).
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Ismāʿīl ibn al-Muslim ibn al-Ḥasan ibn al-Naṣr, Ḍiyāʾ al-Dīn, Abū al-Fidāʾ al-Dimashqī, known as Ibn al-Ḥamawī, d. 727 AH. Ibn Kathīr heard from him a mashyakha that al-Barzalī produced for him (6).