256 – I was unable to identify him.

257 – He may have intended by the “second rising” the rising of a created being, for Allah’s rising over the Throne is an act that belongs to Him alone. Like His essence, His attributes are eternal; it is patently impermissible to say that they were created.

The name of Abū Nuʿaym’s father is ʿAbd Allah ibn Aḥmad ibn Isḥāq, Abū Muḥammad al-Iṣbahānī. His son gives his biography in Akhbār Iṣbahān 2/93-94, stating that he was born in 281⦗1⦘ AH and died in 365 AH. Al-Shadharāt 3/50-51 adds that he travelled in pursuit of ḥadith, narrating from Abū Khalīfah al-Jumaḥī and his contemporaries; this journey took place in the year 300 AH.

270 – Al-Ḥāfiẓ Abū Nuʿaym said, “I heard my father say, ‘Abū Bakr al-Jurabī narrated to us: I heard Sahl ibn ʿAbd Allah say:

Our fundamentals are to hold fast to the Quran, follow the Sunnah, eat only what is lawful, refrain from causing harm, repent, and discharge people’s rights.’”

Sahl, the leading spiritual master of the gnostics in his day, died in Muḥarram 283 AH at the age of eighty. He met Dhū al-Nūn al-Miṣrī and several others.

105 – Abū Muslim al-Kajjī, the ḥadith master (200–292 AH)

271 – Abū Muḥammad ibn Māsī reported: Abū Muslim al-Kajjī said:

“I went out and saw that the public bath had been opened at daybreak. I asked the bath-keeper, ‘Has anyone gone in?’ He said, ‘No.’ I entered, and the moment I opened the door someone said to me, ‘Abū Muslim, embrace Islam and you will be safe,’ and then recited:

To You belongs praise, whether for a blessing bestowed
Or for a calamity You avert.
We will, and You do whatever You will;
You hear from speech what others do not hear.

“I rushed out in fright and asked the bath-keeper, ‘Did you not say there was no one inside the bath?’”