al-ʿUtayqī said: He was a righteous man, tireless in worship. He composed a book entitled Qūt al-Qulūb in which he cited ḥadiths that have no authentic basis, and he used to admonish the people in the congregational mosque of Baghdad.

Ibn al-Jawzī relates that his lineage was from the Jabal region; he grew up in Mecca, entered Basra after the death of Abū al-Ḥasan ibn Sālim and adopted that man’s doctrine, then came to Baghdad. People flocked to him, a chair for public exhortation was set up, and he erred in his speech. It was recorded from him that he said, “There is nothing more harmful to the creatures than the Creator.” The people therefore declared him an innovator, shunned him, and he refrained from addressing the public (1).

Abū Ṭālib was also among those who deemed samāʿ—devotional audition—permissible. ʿAbd al-Ṣamad ibn ʿAlī visited him and reproached him for this, whereupon Abū Ṭālib recited:
“O night, how much delight you hold (2) …
O dawn, would that you had never drawn near!”
ʿAbd al-Ṣamad left in anger.

Abū al-Qāsim ibn Bishrān said: “I entered upon our shaykh Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī as he lay dying and said, ‘Give me a last instruction.’ He replied: ‘If my end is sealed with goodness, scatter almonds and sugar over my bier.’ I asked, ‘How shall I know that?’ He said, ‘Sit here with your hand in mine; if I clasp your hand, know that I have been granted a good end.’ So I sat with him, my hand in his, and when the moment of departure came he gripped my hand tightly. When his coffin was lifted, I scattered almonds and sugar upon it.”

Ibn al-Jawzī states that he died in Jumādā al-Ākhira of this year, and that his grave is still to be seen near the Rāṣāfa Mosque.

Al-ʿAzīz ibn al-Muʿizz the Fatimid, ruler of Egypt (3)—his full name is Nizār ibn al-Muʿizz Maʿadd Abū Tamīm, known by the kunya Abū Manṣūr and the title al-ʿAzīz—died at the age of forty-two. He ruled after his father for twenty-one years, five months, and ten days. Authority then passed to his son al-Ḥākim—may Allah disgrace him—and it is to al-Ḥākim that the deviant, misguiding, heretical Ḥākimiyya sect traces its origin.

As for al-ʿAzīz, he had appointed as viziers a Christian named ʿĪsā ibn Nustūrūs and a Jew named Mīshā. Owing to them, the adherents of those two religions came to hold sway over the Muslims of that day, until a woman wrote to him in a certain affair and