the ʿAbādilah, Muʿāwiyah, al-Mughīrah, and Abū Hurayrah; from his mother Asmāʾ; from his maternal aunt, the Mother of the Believers ʿĀʾishah; and from Umm Salamah. A host of Successors, and multitudes besides them, narrated from him.

Muḥammad ibn Saʿd said: “ʿUrwah was trustworthy, prolific in ḥadīth, learned, reliable, and precise.”

al-ʿAjlī (1) said: “A Madinan Successor and a righteous man who never involved himself in any of the civil strifes.”

al-Wāqidī (2) said: “He was a jurist, a scholar, a memoriser—accurate, authoritative, and deeply versed in the prophetic biography. He was the very first to compose a work on the campaigns (maghāzī). He ranked among the eminent jurists of Madinah, and even the Companions of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ would consult him. He was also the most copious of people in poetry.”

His son Hishām said: “My father used to say, ‘Knowledge belongs to one of three: a man of noble lineage who adorns his pedigree with it, a man of religion who steers his faith by it, or one who is connected to authority and offers it as a gift to his ruler.’” (3)

He added: “I know of no one who combined these three qualities except ʿUrwah ibn al-Zubayr and ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz.”

ʿUrwah would recite one quarter of the Qurʾān every day and would stand in night prayer with that portion. During the date-ripening season he would breach a section of his garden wall so that people could enter, eat, and carry some away; when the season passed, he rebuilt it. (4)

al-Zuhrī said: “ʿUrwah was an ocean that cannot be drained, nor can buckets muddy it.” (5)

ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz said: “No one is more knowledgeable than ʿUrwah, and whatever he does not know, I know nothing about.” (6)

Several scholars included him among the Seven Jurists of Madinah whose verdicts were decisive, and he was also one of the ten jurists to whom ʿUmar ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz would defer during his governorship of the city. (7)

It is likewise related that he visited al-Walīd in Damascus. On his return an eating ulcer (aklah) afflicted his leg, and the physicians resolved to amputate it. They offered him a drink that would render him insensible so he would not feel the pain and they could proceed with the amputation, but he said, “I never supposed that….”