and commanded him to fight Nasr ibn Shabath, for the province’s deputy, Yahya ibn Muʿadh, had died. Before his death he had appointed his son Ahmad to succeed him, but al-Maʾmun would not endorse that choice; instead he installed ʿAbd Allah ibn Tahir over the province because of his courage and keen judgment, and urged him to wage war against Nasr ibn Shabath. From Khurasan, his father wrote him a letter enjoining him to command what is right, forbid what is wrong, and adhere to the Book and the Sunnah.
Ibn Jarir ⦗1⦘ relates the letter in full. It circulated among the people, who admired it and passed it around as a gift, until news of it reached al-Maʾmun. He ordered that it be read aloud in his presence, praised it highly, and commanded that copies be dispatched to all the governors in the provinces.
That year the pilgrimage was led by ʿUbayd Allah ibn al-Hasan, the deputy of the Two Sanctuaries.
Among the distinguished figures who died in the same year were:
• Ishaq ibn Bishr al-Kahili, Abu Hudhayfa, author of Kitab al-Mubtadaʾ ⦗2⦘;
• Hajjaj ibn Muhammad al-Aʿwar ⦗3⦘;
• Dawud ibn al-Muhabbar, compiler of Kitab al-ʿAql ⦗4⦘;
• Shababa ibn Sawwar ⦗5⦘;
• Muhadir ibn al-Muwarraʿ ⦗6⦘; and
• Qutrub, author of Al-Muthallath on language ⦗7⦘.
(1) That is, the reference is to the book of Tahir ibn al-Husayn addressed to his son ʿAbd Allah. See al-Tabari, History, vol. 8: 582–591; Ibn al-Athir, al-Kamil, vol. 6: 364–377.
(2) Ishaq ibn Bishr ibn Muhammad al-Qurashi al-Bukhari (Abu Hudhayfa), a hadith scholar accused of falsification. Ibn Hibban conflated his biography with that of Ishaq ibn Bishr al-Kahili al-Kufi. His work al-Mubtadaʾ survives in manuscript; its fourth part is held in MS 71 at the Zahiriyya. See al-Dhahabi, Siyar Aʿlam al-Nubalaʾ, vol. 9, p. 477; al-Zirikli, al-ʿAlam, vol. 1, p. 294.
(3) Hajjaj ibn Muhammad al-Aʿwar (Abu Muhammad al-Missisi), a trustworthy and reliable scholar; he died in Baghdad.
(4) Dawud ibn al-Muhabbar ibn Qahtham al-Thaqafi al-Bakrawi (Abu Sulayman al-Basri), a Baghdad resident who abandoned hadith; his Kitab al-ʿAql comprises mostly fabricated reports, as al-Hafiz Ibn Hajar notes in al-Taqrib, vol. 1, p. 234.
(5) Shababa ibn Sawwar al-Madaʾini (Abu ʿAmr al-Fazari), an authoritative imam and muhaddith. Trustworthy and a memorizer, though accused of Murjiʿah. See al-Dhahabi, Siyar Aʿlam al-Nubalaʾ, vol. 9, p. 513; Ibn Hajar, Taqrib al-Tahdhib, vol. 1, p. 345.
(6) In the printed edition “al-Mawrid” is incorrect. The proper name is Mahzar ibn al-Muwarriʿ al-Kufi, a reliable narrator prone to oddities. See Ibn Hajar, Taqrib al-Tahdhib, vol. 2, p. 230.
(7) Muhammad ibn al-Mustanir ibn Ahmad (Abu Ali), known as Qutrub—a nickname bestowed by his teacher Sibawayh and thereafter adopted. He was the first to author a treatise on al-muthallath (“the triangle”) in linguistic studies and ranks among the leading authorities in grammar and philology. See Yaqut, Muʿjam al-Udabaʾ, vol. 19, p. 52; Bughyat al-Wuʿah, p. 104; al-Zirikli, al-ʿAlam, vol. 7, p. 95.