He reached the highest rank in truthfulness, scrupulousness, and pious devotion. Ibn Maʿīn and others pronounced him reliable, while al-Azdī and al-Sājī remarked: “People criticize his mode of recitation and attribute to him a blameworthy manner in it, yet he is trustworthy in hadith, though not among the most precise.”

I say: In later times a consensus formed to accept Hamzah’s reading and to censure anyone who disparages it. Some of the early scholars, however, did voice reservations. Yazīd ibn Hārūn forbade reciting according to Hamzah; Ibn al-Mahdī said, “If I had power over anyone who reads with Hamzah’s method, I would flog his back”; and Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal disliked that reading because of its excessive elongations, silent pauses, alteration of the hamzah at stops, imālah, and other such features.

I also say: Hamzah is vindicated by the testimony of an imam like Sufyān al-Thawrī, who affirmed, “Hamzah never recited a single letter without corroborating evidence.”

He died in 158 AH.