door. Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal appeared and greeted us. He was asked a question, and he answered it. After he left, everyone agreed that Ismāʿīl had no visitor more learned than he. 13.103
PRAISE OF HIM BY PROMINENT SUCCESSORS WHO KNEW HIM WELL
ABŪ DĀWŪD AL-SIJISTĀnĪ
[Abū Dāwūd al-Sijistānī:] If a man loves Ibn Ḥanbal, you can be sure that he knows the sunnah. 14.1
[Abū Dāwūd al-Sijistānī:] I’ve met two hundred teachers of Hadith but none like Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal. 14.2
He never bothered with the things most people care about, but whenever Hadith was mentioned he would speak.
IBRĀHĪM AL-ḤARBĪ
[Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī:] Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal was the greatest man of his time, just as Saʿīd ibn al-Musayyab was in his own time, and Sufyān al-Thawrī in his. 14.3
[Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī:] The Hadith transmitted by the people of Medina, Kufa, Basra, and Damascus ended up in the hands of four men: Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn, Zuhayr ibn Ḥarb, and Abū Bakr ibn Abī Shaybah. Of the four, Aḥmad understood it best. 14.4
[Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Shāfiʿī:] When Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal’s son Saʿīd died, Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī went to see ʿAbd Allāh ibn Aḥmad, who rose to greet him. When Ibrāhīm protested, ʿAbd Allāh said, “Why shouldn’t I get up? By God, if my father were here, he would too.” 14.5
“If Ibn ʿUyaynah had met your father,” replied Ibrāhīm, “he would have gotten up to greet him.”
[Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī:] I’ve heard it said that people praise Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal without knowing what they’re talking about. But by God, I can’t think of a single Successor who has anything over him, nor do I know of anyone who can be the kind of Muslim he was. I knew him for twenty years; I was with him night and day, summer and winter, in the heat and in the cold, and every day he outdid what he had done the day before. The leading scholars of Islam and the learned men of every town and region used to come to see him. As long as they were outside his mosque, they carried themselves proudly, but when they went in, they became pupils all over again. 14.6
[Al-ʿUkbarī:] I heard Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī say, “The way I see it, the opinions of all the Successors have equal weight, and the last man to count as a Successor is Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, who in my view is the greatest of them all. Regarding a man who swears to divorce his wife if he does such-and-such an act and then forgets his oath and performs the act, the Successors all say that he must divorce his wife.”99 14.7
Ibrāhīm was also asked about what should happen if a group of people are shipwrecked and have to pray without proper clothing. He said, “The Successors—including Aḥmad, who is the greatest of them—say that the leader should stand with them100 and that the group should make gestures instead of kneeling and prostrating themselves. Some people may disagree with Aḥmad and the Successors about this, but I don’t care.” 14.8
[Abū l-Ḥasan Dulayl:] I heard Ibrāhīm al-Ḥarbī say, “Of the great men of this world, I’ve met three like no other. The first was Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal. I don’t think another like him will ever be born. The second was Bishr ibn al-Ḥārith, who was filled with self-restraint from the crown of his head down to the soles of his feet. The third was Abū ʿUbayd al-Qāsim ibn Sallām, who was like a mountain filled with learning.” 14.9
Of the three, Aḥmad was the only one Ibrāhīm would cite as a source for Hadith.
ABŪ BAKR AL-ATHRAM
[Al-Athram:] I once debated a man who asked me whose opinion I was citing. I replied: “Someone who has no equal anywhere.” 14.10
“Who’s that?” he asked.
“Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal,” I said.
ʿABD AL-WAHHĀB AL-WARRĀQ
[ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Warrāq:] The Prophet, God bless and keep him, said “Ask someone who knows,” and so we would ask Ibn Ḥanbal. He was the most learned man of his time. 14.11
[ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Warrāq:] Aḥmad is our guide and one of those firmly grounded in knowledge.101 When I stand before God tomorrow and He asks me who my examplar was, I’ll say “Aḥmad.” The man suffered for twenty years:102 What could there be about Islam that he wouldn’t know? 14.12
[Muḥammad ibn Jaʿfar al-Rāshidī:] I once heard ʿAbd al-Wahhāb al-Warrāq say, “I never met anyone like Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal.” 14.13
Those present asked: “So what did he know that made him different from the other scholars you met?”
“This was a man,” he replied, “who could cite an authority for sixty thousand different questions.”
MUHANNAʾ IBN YAḤYĀ AL-SHĀMĪ
[Muhannaʾ ibn Yaḥyā l-Shāmī:] I never met anyone with as much merit in all respects as Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, and I’ve met Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, Wakīʿ, ʿAbd al-Razzāq, Baqiyyah ibn al-Walīd, Ḍamrah ibn Rabīʿah, and many other men of learning. But none could match Aḥmad in knowledge, understanding, renunciation, and scrupulosity. 14.14
[The author:] I have cited only these few sources, who have only a little to say about Aḥmad’s piety, and left out those who have much more to say, as their testimony will appear later in this book, God willing. «God is sufficient for us; He is the best guardian.»103 14.15
A REPORT THAT THE PROPHET ELIJAH SENT HIM GREETINGS
[Abū Ḥafṣ al-Qāḍī:] Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal was once visited by a man from the Indian Ocean who said, “I come from the Indian Ocean. I was on my way to China when we were shipwrecked. Two men came riding toward me on a wave. One of them asked, ‘If you wish, God will save you, on condition that you greet Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal for us.’ 15.1
“‘Who’s Aḥmad?’ I asked. ‘And who on earth are you?’
“‘I’m Elijah, and this is the angel who watches over the islands in the sea. You’ll find Aḥmad in Iraq.’
“‘I agreed, and the sea spat me out onto the shore by Ubullah. So here I am with a greeting to you from the two of them.’”104
REPORTS THAT AL-KHAḌIR SPOKE IN HIS PRAISE
[Bilāl al-Khawwāṣ:] I was in the desert of the Israelites when suddenly I found a man walking beside me. I was surprised, but then I was given to realize that he was al-Khaḍir. 16.1
“I ask you by God,” I said. “Who are you?”
“Your brother al-Khaḍir.”
“I want to ask you something.”
“Go ahead.”
“What do you think of al-Shāfiʿī?”
“He’s one of the Pegs.”105
“What about Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal?”
“A