his death (1) and asked him, “What has Allah done with you?”
He replied, “He has forgiven me and has ordered that I be taken to Paradise despite the confusion I had caused. He also said to me: ‘I have sworn that I shall not punish any of My servants who have reached the age of eighty.’”
This man was the first Shafiʿi ever to hold the office of qāḍī al-quḍāt (Chief Judge) in Baghdad.
Muhammad ibn Aḥmad ibn Khnab (2) ibn Aḥmad ibn Rajiyān (3), Abū Bakr al-Dihqān, originally from Baghdad but later resident in Bukhara. There he transmitted hadith from Yaḥyā ibn Abī Ṭālib, al-Ḥasan ibn Mukram, and others. He died at the age of eighty-seven (4).
Abū ʿAlī al-Khāzin (5) died in Shaʿbān of this year. In his house were discovered hidden hoards, and among the people were deposits entrusted to him, amounting in all to nearly four hundred thousand dinars.
[Then came the year 351 AH]
[The Byzantines’ incursion into Aleppo]
In this year al-Dumistak, the king of the Byzantines—may Allah curse him—entered Aleppo with two hundred thousand soldiers. This happened because he descended upon the city suddenly. Sayf al-Dawlah ibn Ḥamdān marched out against him with the companions who were present, but, overwhelmed by the size of the enemy host, he could not withstand them. A great number of Sayf al-Dawlah’s men were slain, and, being impatient by nature, Sayf al-Dawlah fled in defeat with only a handful of followers.
The first thing al-Dumistak—may Allah disfigure him—did (6) was to seize Sayf al-Dawlah’s residence outside the city, taking from it vast wealth, stores, and an uncountable quantity of military equipment. He then advanced and besieged the city wall. The townspeople fought fiercely before it and killed many Byzantines. The enemy breached the wall, making a large gap and standing within it, whereupon the Muslims charged and drove them back. When night fell, the Muslims worked tirelessly to rebuild the breach, and by morning it was as it had been, the wall being guarded with utmost vigilance.
News then reached the Muslims that infantrymen of the police were running amok inside the city, plundering houses. The people therefore returned to their dwellings to protect them, and the Byzantines seized the opportunity to gain control of the wall and scale it,