• Words of the Scholars Concerning Him
The towering scholarly standing Ibn Kathir reached through sheer diligence is attested by his teachers, pupils, and contemporaries. Among them are the following:

– Al-Dhahabi—one of his teachers—states in Tadhkirat al-Huffaz (4/508):
“I studied alongside the jurist-mufti and hadith scholar of many virtues, ‘Imad al-Din Isma‘il ibn ‘Umar ibn Kathir al-Basrawi al-Shafi‘i, born a little after the year 700 AH. He heard hadith from Ibn al-Shuhnah, Ibn al-Zarrad, and a host of others. He is devoted to the study of narrators and textual criticism and to fiqh. He produced, compiled, authored, and penned a tafsir, and he rose to prominence.”

He further says in al-Mu‘jam al-Mukhtas—his special catalogue for students:
“The unrivaled, outstanding imam, jurist, and hadith scholar ‘Imad al-Din … He knows jurisprudence, has a grasp of Arabic and the principles of the religion, and has memorized a sizable corpus of texts, tafsir, and narrator biographies with their states. He studied with me and possesses remarkable memory and knowledge.”¹

– His contemporary al-Husaini remarks in the supplement to Tadhkirat al-Huffaz (p. 58):
“The shaykh, the imam, the scholar, the proficient huffaz … He issued legal opinions, taught, debated, excelled in jurisprudence, tafsir, and grammar, and delved deeply into narrator criticism and hidden defects.”

– His pupil Ibn Haji states, as cited in al-Daras by al-Nu‘aymi (1/36) and Tabaqat al-Mufassirin by al-Dawudi (1/111):
“Of everyone we encountered, he was the most accomplished in memorizing hadith texts and the most knowledgeable about their sources, transmitters, and their sound and weak chains. His peers and teachers admitted as much. He could summon copious amounts of fiqh and history and was seldom forgetful. He was a jurist of sharp understanding and sound mind; to his last days he had al-Tanbih by heart. He participated competently in Arabic studies, composed poetry, and I do not recall ever meeting him—despite my many visits—without gaining benefit.”

– Another pupil, the eminent Taqi al-Din al-Maqrizi, says of him:
“The hafiz, jurist, and erudite scholar, our shaykh of many disciplines … He mastered numerous fields through his close companionship with Shaykh al-Islam Taqi al-Din Ibn Taymiyyah and authored beneficial works. He was a precise memorizer, fine-mannered, delightful in company, humble, and possessed of vast recall … After him, no one of his like remained.”²

– Ibn Hajar al-‘Asqalani writes in al-Durar al-Kaminah (1/400): “He enjoyed an extraordinary power of recall,…"