He was a righteous, learned, and distinguished scholar. Formerly a Hanbali, he later adopted the Shafiʿi school and taught it in several madrasas in Baghdad. Counted among the city’s accredited certifiers of testimony, he held many administrative posts. (1) A jurist well-grounded in legal theory and the sciences of doctrinal dispute, he rose high in his homeland and became greatly esteemed. Ibn Faḍlān later appointed him as his deputy in the women’s palace, (2) after which he was entrusted with teaching at the Niẓāmiyya; he received a robe of honour along with a mule, and dignitaries attended his lectures. He remained there until he died at the age of eighty and was buried at Bāb Ḥarb.

The chief judge of Baghdad, Abū al-Maʿālī ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muqbil (3) ibn al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAlī al-Wāsiṭī al-Shāfiʿī,

studied in Baghdad, attained mastery, and served as a teaching assistant in several schools. Later, the chief judge ʿImād al-Dīn Abū Ṣāliḥ Naṣr ibn ʿAbd al-Razzāq ibn ʿAbd al-Qādir (4) appointed him as his deputy during the caliphate of al-Ẓāhir ibn al-Nāṣir. He subsequently took up the chief judgeship in his own right, and after the death of the first lecturer there—Muḥyī al-Dīn Muḥammad ibn Faḍlān—he became professor at the Mustanṣiriyya. He was later removed from all these offices and assigned to the shaykhship (5) of certain ribāṭs. His death occurred in this same year. He was a virtuous, devout, and humble man—may Allah Most High have mercy on him and pardon him.

(6) Then came the year 640 AH.

Among its events:

The Caliph al-Mustanṣir Billah died and was succeeded by his son al-Mustaʿṣim Billah. (7) The death of the Caliph al-Mustanṣir Billah (8), Commander of the Faithful, occurred on the morning of Friday, the tenth of Jumada al-Ākhirah. He was fifty-one years, four months, and seven days old. His passing was kept secret until the supplication for him had already been pronounced from the pulpits that day. The length of his reign was sixteen years, ten months, and twenty-seven days. He was buried in the Dār al-Khilāfah and was later transferred to the cemeteries of al-Ruṣāfah.