In Ṣafar of that same year al-Mutawakkil became incensed with the judge Aḥmad ibn Abī Duʿād, who was in charge of the maẓālim (courts of grievances). He dismissed him from that office and summoned Yaḥyā ibn Aktham, appointing him chief justice as well as supervisor of the maẓālim.

In Rabīʿ al-Awwal the caliph ordered that the landed estates of Ibn Abī Duʿād be put under precautionary control, and he seized the judge’s son, Abū al-Walīd Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Abī Duʿād. The young man was imprisoned on Saturday, the third of Rabīʿ al-Ākhir, and a decree of confiscation was issued. He thereupon produced one hundred and twenty thousand dinars and, in precious jewels, items worth a further twenty thousand dinars; the matter was finally settled at sixteen million dirhams.

Ibn Abī Duʿād himself, as we have mentioned, had been struck by paralysis (fālij); his family was then expelled in disgrace from Sāmarrāʾ to Baghdad. Ibn Jarīr (1) records that Abū al-ʿAtāhiyah composed these verses on the incident:

Had your counsel been counted among sound judgments,
and your resolve a resolve blessed with success,
The study of jurisprudence would have kept you well employed—had you been content with it—
instead of declaring: “The Book of Allah is created.”
What harm to you, when the roots of the faith unite them,
if the branches were free of discord but for ignorance and obstinacy. (2)

At ʿĪd al-Fiṭr al-Mutawakkil ordered that the head (3) of Aḥmad ibn Naṣr al-Khuzaʿī be taken down, reunited with his body, and handed over to his relatives. The people rejoiced; great crowds from the common folk attended his funeral, rubbing themselves for blessing against the bier’s timbers and the very trunk on which he had been crucified. The populace became tumultuous over the matter (4), so [al-Mutawakkil] (5) wrote to his deputy instructing him to curb them from such behaviour, and he circulated letters to the provinces forbidding any discussion of the question of the divine speech and ordering everyone to desist from asserting that the Qur’an is created. (6)

He then showed open honour to Imām Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, summoning him from Baghdad. When they met, he treated him graciously and ordered that a generous stipend be granted to him, but the Imām would accept nothing. The caliph next draped him in an elegant robe from his own wardrobe; out of courtesy Aḥmad wore it until he reached his lodgings, then tore it off roughly while weeping—may Allah have mercy on him.

[Al-Mutawakkil] (7) thereafter sent him each day a portion of the caliph’s private food, thinking that he would eat from it. The Imām