Islam > Scholars > Imam Sufyan ath-Thawri
Biography of Imam Sufyan ath-Thawri as related by al-Dhahabi in Siyar A lam al-Nubala. He died in 62 H.
Updated on 14 September 2026 at 8:10 PM
📖 73 min readAbu al-Qasim Ibn Asakir said : Khalid was secretary to as-Saffah, after Hafs al-Khallal.
Those who narrated from him : his son Yahya ; then he was secretary to al-Mansur a year and months, then the latter appointed him governor of the land of Persia, and took after him as vizir Abu Ayyub al-Murriyani.
I say : this man was among the lords of men for prestance, subtlety and firmness, and his sons succeeded him in that.
He died in the year one hundred sixty-five, at seventy-five years.
Nb 2 : Abu al-Qasim Ibn Asakir said : Khalid was secretary to as-Saffah.
Abu al-Qasim Ibn Asakir said : Khalid was secretary to as-Saffah, after Hafs al-Khallal.
Those who narrated from him : his son Yahya ; then he was secretary to al-Mansur a year and months, then the latter appointed him governor of the land of Persia, and took after him as vizir Abu Ayyub al-Murriyani.
I say : this man was among the lords of men for prestance, subtlety and firmness, and his sons succeeded him in that.
He died in the year one hundred sixty-five, at seventy-five years.
No. 82 : Sufyan ibn Sa'id ibn Masruq ath-Thawri, may Allah be pleased with him,
son of Habib ibn Rafi ibn Abdallah ibn Muhaba ibn Ubayy ibn Abdallah ibn Munqidh ibn Nasr ibn al-Harith ibn Tha'laba ibn Amir ibn Milkan ibn Thawr
ibn Abd Manat ibn Udd ibn Tabikha ibn Ilyas ibn Mudar ibn Nizar ibn Ma'add ibn Adnan.
Ibn Abi ad-Dunya reported the same genealogy, from Muhammad ibn Khalaf at-Taymi, except that he omitted Munqidh and al-Harith, and added after Masruq Hamza ; the rest is identical.
Likewise mentioned his genealogy : al-Haytham ibn Adi and Ibn Sa'd, and that he was of the Thawr Tabikha.
Some said : he was of the Thawr of Hamdan : that is nothing.
He is the sheikh of Islam, the imam of the memorizers, the master of the acting scholars of his time, Abu Abdallah ath-Thawri, the Kufan, the mujtahid, author of the Book "al-Jami".
He was born in the year ninety-seven by consensus, and he sought knowledge while still young, under the care of his father, the truthful hadith-master Sa'id ibn Masruq ath-Thawri ; his father was of the companions of ash-Sha'bi and Khaythama ibn Abd ar-Rahman, and counted among the trustworthy of the Kufans, among the younger Successors.
The Community of the Six reported it in their collections.
Those who narrated from him : his sons ; Sufyan the imam, Umar, Mubarak ; Chu'ba ibn al-Hajjaj, Za'ida, Abu al-Ahwass, Abu Awana, Umar ibn Ubayd at-Tanafisi, and others.
He died in the year one hundred twenty-six.
Collection of the sheikhs of Abu Abdallah : Ibrahim ibn Abd al-A'la, Ibrahim ibn Uqba, Ibrahim ibn Muhammad ibn al-Muntashir, Ibrahim ibn Muhajjir, Ibrahim ibn Mayssara, Ibrahim ibn Mazyad al-Khuza'i, Ajlah ibn Abdallah, Adam ibn Sulayman, Usama ibn Zayd, Isra'il Abu Musa, Aslam al-Minqari, Isma'il ibn Ibrahim al-Makhzumi, Isma'il as-Sudi, Isma'il ibn Kathir, al-Aswad ibn Qays, Ash'ath ibn Abi ach-Cha'tha, Agharr ibn as-Sabbah, Aflah ibn Khalifa, Iyad ibn Laqit, Ayyub as-Sakhtiyani, Ayyub ibn Musa.
Al-Bakhtari ibn al-Mukhtar, Boud
ibn Sinan, Burayd ibn Abdallah ibn Abi Burda, Bachir Abu Isma'il, Bachir the companion of Ibn az-Zubayr, Bukayr ibn Ata, Bahz ibn Hakim, Binan ibn Bachr.
Tawba al-Anbari.
Thabit ibn Ubayd, and Abu al-Miqdam Thabit ibn Hurmuz, Thawr ibn Yazid, and Thowayr ibn Abi Fakhta.
Jabir al-Ju'fi, Jami ibn Abi Rashid, Jami ibn Chaddad, Jabala ibn Suhaym, Ja'far ibn Burqan, Ja'far as-Sadiq, Ja'far ibn Maymun.
Habib ibn Abi Thabit, who is among the greatest of his sheikhs ; Habib ibn ach-Chahid, Habib ibn Abi Amra, Hajjaj ibn Farafisa, al-Hasan ibn Ubaydallah, al-Hasan ibn Amr al-Fuqaymi, Husayn ibn Abd ar-Rahman, Hakim ibn Jubayr, Hakim ibn ad-Daylam, Hammad ibn Abi Sulayman, Humran ibn A'yan, Humayd ibn Qays, Humayd at-Tawil, and Hanthala ibn Abi Sufyan.
Khalid ibn Salama al-Fa'fa, Khalid al-Hadhdha, and Khusayf ibn Abd ar-Rahman.
Abu al-Jahhaf Dawud ibn Abi Awf, and Dawud ibn Abi Hind.
Rashid ibn Kaysan, Ribah ibn Abi Marouf, ar-Rabi ibn Anas, ar-Rabi ibn Sabih, Rabi'atu r-Ra'y, and ar-Rukayn ibn ar-Rabi.
Zubayd al-Yami, az-Zubayr ibn Adi, Ziyad ibn Isma'il, Ziyad ibn Ilaqa, who is among the greatest of his sheikhs ; Zayd ibn Aslam, Zayd ibn Jubayr, Zayd the blind.
Salim al-Aftas, Salim Abu an-Nadr, Sa'd ibn Ibrahim, Sa'd ibn Ishaq ibn Ka'b, Sa'id al-Jurayri, Abu Sinan Sa'id ibn Sinan ach-Chaybani the younger, his father Sa'id, Salm al-Alawi, Abu Hazim Salama ibn Dinar, Salama ibn Kuhayl, who is among their greatest ; Salama ibn Nubayt, Sulayman al-A'mash, Sulayman at-Taymi, Simak, Sumayy, and Suhayl.
Chabib ibn Ghurqada, Charik ibn Abi Namir, Chu'ba ibn al-Hajjaj, in "an-Nasa'i".
Salih ibn Salih ibn Hayy, Salih, client of at-Taw'ama, and Safwan ibn Sulaym.
Ad-Dahhak ibn Uthman, and Abu Sinan Dhirar ibn Murra.
Tariq ibn Abd ar-Rahman, Tarif Abu Sufyan as-Sa'di, Touma ibn Ghaylan, and Talha ibn Yahya.
Asim ibn Abi an-Najoud,
Asim ibn Ubaydallah, Asim ibn Kulayb, and Asim al-Ahwal.
Abdallah ibn Abi Bakr ibn Hazm, Abdallah ibn Jabir the Basrian, Abdallah ibn al-Hasan ibn al-Hasan, Abdallah ibn Dinar, Abu az-Zinad Abdallah, Abdallah ibn ar-Rabi ibn Khuthaym, Abdallah ibn as-Sa'ib the Kufan, Abdallah ibn Sa'id al-Maqburi, Abdallah ibn Choubrouma, Abdallah ibn Chaddad al-A'raj, Abdallah ibn Tawus, Abdallah ibn Abd ar-Rahman ibn Abi Husayn, Abdallah ibn Uthman ibn Khuthaym, Abdallah ibn Ata, Abdallah ibn Awn, Abdallah ibn Isa, Abdallah ibn Abi Labid, Abdallah ibn Muhammad ibn Aqil, and Abdallah ibn Abi Najih.
Abd al-A'la ibn Amir, Abd ar-Rahman ibn Tharwan, Abd ar-Rahman ibn al-Harith, Abd ar-Rahman ibn Ziyad ibn An'am, Abd ar-Rahman ibn Abis, Abd ar-Rahman ibn al-Asbahani, Abd ar-Rahman ibn Alqama, and Abd ar-Rahman ibn al-Qasim.
Abd al-Aziz ibn Rufay, Abd al-Karim ibn Malik, Abd al-Karim Abu Umayya, Abd al-Malik ibn Abi Bachir, Abd al-Malik ibn Abi Sulayman, Ibn Jurayj, and Abd al-Malik ibn Umayr.
Abda ibn Abi Loubaba, Ubaydallah ibn Abi Ziyad, Ubaydallah ibn Umar, Ubayd ibn al-Hasan, Ubayd ibn Mihran the public scribe, and Ubayd the hunter.
Uthman ibn al-Harb, Uthman ibn Hakim, Abu Hussayn Uthman ibn Asim, Abu al-Yaqdhan Uthman ibn Umayr, Uthman ibn al-Mughira, and Uthman al-Batti.
Ata ibn as-Sa'ib, Ikrima ibn Ammar, Alqama ibn Marthad, Ali ibn al-Aqmar, Ali ibn Badhima, and Ali ibn Zayd ibn Judan.
Ammar ad-Dahni, Umara ibn al-Qa'qa, Amr ibn Sa'id ibn Abi Husayn, Umar ibn Muhammad ibn Zayd, Umar ibn Ya'la, Umar ibn Dinar, Amr ibn Amir al-Ansari, Amr ibn Qays al-Mulla'i, Amr ibn Murra, who is among the elders of their sheikhs ; Amr ibn Maymun ibn Mihran, Amr ibn Yahya ibn Umara, Imran ibn Muslim ath-Thaqafi, Imran ibn Muslim al-Ju'fi, Imran al-Bariqi, Imran the short, and Umayr ibn Abdallah
al-Kath'ami.
Awn ibn Abi Jouhayfa, al-Ala ibn Khalid, al-Ala ibn Abd ar-Rahman, al-Ala ibn Abd al-Karim, Ayyach al-Amiri, Isa ibn Abd ar-Rahman, Isa ibn Abi Azza, and Isa ibn Musa al-Harachi.
Ghalib Abu al-Hudhayl, and Ghaylan ibn Jami.
Fourat al-Qazzaz, Firasa ibn Yahya, Foudhayl ibn Ghazwan, Foudhayl ibn Marzouq, and Fitr ibn Khalifa.
Qawbous ibn Abi Dhibyan, Abu Hashim al-Qasim ibn Kathir, Qays ibn Muslim, who is among their elders ; and Qays ibn Wahb.
Kulayb ibn Wail.
Al-Layth ibn Abi Sulaym.
Muharrib ibn Dithar, Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad ibn Abi Ayyoub ath-Thaqafi, Muhammad ibn Abi Bakr ibn Hazm, Muhammad ibn Abi Hafsa, Muhammad ibn Rashid al-Mak'houl, Muhammad ibn az-Zubayr al-Hanthali, Muhammad ibn Sa'id at-Ta'ifi, Muhammad ibn Tariq the Meccan, Ibn Abi Dhi'b, Ibn Abi Layla, Muhammad ibn Abd ar-Rahman, client of the family of Talha, Muhammad ibn Ajlan, Muhammad ibn Uqba, Muhammad ibn Umar ibn Ali, Muhammad ibn Amr ibn Alqama, Abu az-Zubayr Muhammad ibn Muslim, and Muhammad ibn al-Munkadir, who is among their greats.
Mukhariq al-Ahmasi, al-Mukhtar ibn Foulfoul, Mukhawwal ibn Rashid, and Muzahim ibn Zufar.
Mus'ab ibn Muhammad ibn Churahbil, and Mu'tarif ibn Tarif.
Mu'awiya ibn Ishaq ibn Talha, Mu'awiya ibn Salih, Ma'bad ibn Khalid, Ma'mar ibn Rashid, al-Mughira ibn Miqsam, al-Mughira ibn an-Nu'man, and al-Miqdam ibn Churayh.
Mansour ibn Hayyan, Mansour ibn Safiyya, and Mansour ibn al-Mu'tamir.
Musa ibn Abi Aicha, Musa ibn Ubayda, Musa ibn Uqba, Mayssara ibn Habib, Mayssara al-Achja'i, and Abu Hamza Maymoun the one-eyed.
Nousayr ibn Dhu'louq, Nahchal ibn Moujammir, and Nouh ibn Abi Bilal.
Haroun ibn Antara, Hicham ibn Ishaq, Hicham ibn Hassan, Hicham ibn A'idh, Hicham ibn Ourwa, and Hicham ibn Abi Ya'la.
Wasil al-Ahdab, Wabr ibn Abi Doulayla, Warqa' ibn Iyas, and al-Walid ibn Qays as-Sakouni.
Yahya ibn Abi Ishaq
al-Hadrami, Yahya ibn Sa'id al-Ansari, Yahya ibn Hani' ibn Ourwa, Yazid ibn Abi Ziyad, Yazid ibn Yazid ibn Jabir, Ya'la ibn Ata, and Younous ibn Ubayd.
Abou Ishaq as-Sabi'i, Abou Ishaq ach-Chaybani, and Abou Bakr ibn Abdallah ibn Abi al-Jahm.
Abou Ja'far al-Farra, Abou Hanan al-Kalbi, Abou al-Jouwayriya al-Jarmi, Abou Hayyan at-Taymi, Abou Khalid ad-Dalani, and Abou Rawq al-Hamdani.
Abou as-Sawda an-Nahdi, Abou Chihab the great dyer Moussa, Abou Aqil, client of Omar ibn al-Khattab, and Abou Farwa al-Hamdani.
Abou Malik al-Achja'i, Abou Haroun al-Abdi, Abou Hachim ar-Roummani, Abou Yahya al-Qattat, and Abou Ya'four al-Abdi.
It is said that the number of his sheikhs reached six hundred ; their elders, those who narrated to him, are : Abu Hurayrah, Jarir ibn Abdallah, Ibn Abbas, and their like.
He recited the Khatma in reading before Hamza az-Zayyat four times.
As for those who narrated from him, they are a multitude : Abu al-Faraj Ibn al-Jawzi mentions that they exceeded twenty thousand, which is rejected and refuted : if they reached a thousand, it was with difficulty ; and I know no hafiz from whom a greater number narrated than from Malik. With the unknown and the liars, they reached one thousand four hundred.
Narrated from him, among the elders of his shaykhdom and others, a great number, among them : al-A'mash, Aban ibn Taghlib, Ibn Ajlan, Khusayf, Ibn Jurayj, Ja'far as-Sadiq, Ja'far ibn Burqan, Abu Hanifa, al-Awza'i, Mu'awiya ibn Salih, Ibn Abi Dhi'b, Mus'ar, Chu'ba, Ma'mar, all of whom died before him.
Ibrahim ibn Sa'd, Abu Ishaq al-Fazari, Ahmad ibn Younous al-Yarbou'i, Ahwass ibn Jawwab, Asbat ibn Muhammad, Ishaq al-Azraq, Ibn Ulayya, and Umayya ibn Khalid.
Bachr ibn as-Sirri,
Bachr ibn Mansour, Bakr ibn ach-Chouroud, and Boukayr ibn Chihab.
Thabit ibn Muhammad the worshipper, and Tha'laba ibn Suhayl.
Jarir ibn Abd al-Hamid, and Ja'far ibn Awn.
Al-Harith ibn Mansour al-Wasiti, al-Hasan ibn Muhammad ibn Uthman, al-Husayn ibn Hafs, Housayn ibn Noumayr, Hafs ibn Ghiyath, Abu Ousama, Hammad ibn Dulayl, Hammad ibn Isa al-Jouhani, and Houmayd ibn Hammad.
Khalid ibn al-Harith, Khalid ibn Amr the Qurashi, Khalaf ibn Tamim, and Khallad ibn Yahya.
Doubays al-Mulla'i.
Rouh ibn Ubada.
Zouhayr ibn Mu'awiya, Zayd ibn Abi az-Zarqa', and Zayd ibn al-Houbab.
Soufyan ibn Uqba, Soufyan ibn Uyayna, Abu Dawud at-Tayalisi, Sahl ibn Hashim the Beirutine, and Abu al-Ahwass Sallam.
Chou'ayb ibn Ishaq, Chou'ayb ibn Harb, and Abu Asim.
Damra, Ibbad the fisherman, and Abthar ibn al-Qasim.
Abdallah al-Khouraybi, Abdallah ibn Raja' the Meccan, not the Goudani ; Abdallah ibn al-Moubarak, Abdallah ibn Wahb, Abdallah ibn Noumayr, and Abdallah ibn al-Walid the Adenite.
Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi, Abd ar-Rahim ibn Sulayman, Abd ar-Razzaq, and Abd al-Malik ibn adh-Dhimari.
Abda ibn Sulayman, Ubaydallah al-Achja'i, Ubaydallah ibn Amr ar-Raqqi, Ubaydallah ibn Musa, and Ubayd ibn Sa'id al-Umawi, brother of Yahya.
Ali ibn Abi Bakr al-Isfadhani, Ali ibn al-Ja'd, who is the seal of his soundest companions ; Ali ibn Hafs al-Madaini, and Ali ibn Qadim.
Amr ibn Muhammad al-Anqazi, and Isa ibn Younous.
Abu al-Hudhayl Ghassan ibn Umar al-Ijli, and Abu Nu'aym.
Al-Fadl as-Sinani, and Foudhayl ibn Iyad.
Al-Qasim ibn al-Hakam, al-Qasim ibn Yazid al-Jarmi, and Qabisa.
Malik, and Moubarak ibn Sa'id, his brother.
Muhammad ibn Bachr, Muhammad ibn al-Hasan al-Asadi, Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab al-Qannad, and Muhammad ibn Kathir al-Abdi.
Mus'ab
ibn Mahan, Mus'ab ibn al-Miqdam, Abu Hammam Muhammad ibn Mouhabbab, Muhammad ibn Youssouf al-Firyabi, and Makhlad ibn Yazid.
Mou'adh ibn Mou'adh, Mu'awiya ibn Hicham, and Mou'alla ibn Abd ar-Rahman al-Wasiti.
Mihran ibn Abi Amra, Abu Houdayfa Moussa ibn Mas'oud, and Mou'ammal ibn Isma'il.
Nail ibn Najih, and an-Nu'man ibn Abd as-Salam.
Haroun ibn al-Moughira.
Waki ibn al-Jarrah, and al-Walid ibn Muslim.
Yahya ibn Adam, Yahya al-Qattan, Yahya ibn Sulaym at-Ta'ifi, Yahya ibn Abd al-Malik ibn Abi Ghaniyya, Yahya ibn Yaman, Yazid ibn Abi Hakim, Yazid ibn Zouray, Yazid ibn Haroun, Ya'la ibn Ubayd, Youssouf ibn Asbat, and Younous ibn Abi Ya'four.
Abu Ahmad az-Zoubayri, Abu Bakr al-Hanafi, Abu Dawud al-Hafari, Abu Sufyan al-Ma'mari, Abu Amir al-Aqadi, and nations other than them.
Yahya ibn Ayyoub the worshipper said : Abu al-Mouthanna told us, who said :
I heard them at Merv saying : the Thawri has come, the Thawri has come.
I went out to see him : and behold a young man whose face was still beardless.
I say : he was mentioned with praise in his youth, for his quick intelligence and his memory ; and he already narrated hadiths as a young man.
Abd ar-Razzaq and others reported, from Sufyan : "I never entrusted anything to my heart but it betrayed me."
I say : the most majestic chain of the Iraqis is : Sufyan, from Mansour, from Ibrahim, from Alqama, from Abdallah.
Chu'ba, Ibn Uyayna, Abu Asim, Yahya ibn Ma'in and others said : Sufyan ath-Thawri is the emir of the believers in hadith.
Ibn al-Moubarak said : "I wrote from one thousand one hundred sheikhs, and I wrote from none better than Sufyan."
From Ayyoub as-Sakhtiyani : "I never met a Kufan whom I preferred to Sufyan."
Al-Bara ibn Rou taym said : I heard Younous ibn Ubayd say : "I never saw any better than Sufyan."
He was told : "Yet you saw Sa'id ibn Joubeïr, Ibrahim, Ata and Moujahid, and you say that ?"
He said : "That is what I say : I never saw any better than Sufyan."
Ibn al-Mahdi said : "My eyes never saw any better than four, or about four : I never saw a better memorizer of hadith than the Thawri, nor a stricter ascetic than Chu'ba, nor a more reasonable one than Malik, nor one more sincere toward the community than Ibn al-Moubarak."
Waki reported, from Chu'ba : "Sufyan retains better than I."
Abd al-Aziz ibn Abi Rizma said : a man said to Chu'ba : "Sufyan contradicted you."
He said : "You have pierced me."
Ibn al-Mahdi said : "Wouhayb preferred Sufyan to Malik for memorization."
Yahya al-Qattan said : "None is dearer to me than Chu'ba, and none replaces him with me ; but when Sufyan contradicts him, I hold the word of Sufyan."
Abbas ad-Douri said : "I saw Yahya ibn Ma'in prefer no one to Sufyan, in his time, for jurisprudence, hadith, asceticism, and everything."
Ibn Chawdhab said : "I heard Ayyoub as-Sakhtiyani say : never came to us from Kufa any better than Sufyan ath-Thawri."
Ibn al-Mahdi said : Abu Ishaq as-Sabi'i saw Sufyan ath-Thawri advancing and said : {And We gave him judgment, while he was a child} (Surah Maryam, verse 12).
It has been reported by paths, from Younous ibn Ubayd : "I never saw a Kufan better than Sufyan."
Sufyan ibn Waki said : Abu Yahya al-Himmani told us, having heard Abu Hanifa say : "Were Sufyan ath-Thawri among the Successors, he would have had among them an eminent standing."
Abu Hanifa also said : "Were Alqama and al-Aswad present, they would have need of Sufyan."
Damra reported, from al-Mouthanna ibn as-Sabbah : "Sufyan is the scholar of the community, and its worshipper."
Abu Dawud al-Hafari reported, from Ibn Abi Dhi'b : "I never saw any resembling the Successors more than Sufyan ath-Thawri."
Abu Qatan said, from Chu'ba : "Sufyan ruled the people by piety and knowledge."
Ya'qoub al-Hadrami said : I heard Chu'ba say : "Sufyan is the emir of the believers in hadith."
Ibn Uyayna said : "I never saw a man more knowing in the lawful and unlawful than Sufyan ath-Thawri."
Nu'aym ibn Hammad reported, from Ibn Wahb : "I never saw the like of Sufyan ath-Thawri."
Ibn al-Moubarak said : "Men were described to me and I found them short of their description, except Sufyan ath-Thawri."
Ahmad ibn Hanbal said : Ibn Uyayna told me : "You shall never see with your own eyes the like of Sufyan ath-Thawri before you die."
Ali ibn al-Husayn ibn Chaqiq reported, from Abdallah : "I know not on earth any more knowing than Sufyan."
Hafs ibn Ghiyath said : "We never knew the like of Sufyan, nor anything more useful than his company."
Abu Mu'awiya said : "I never saw a better memorizer of the hadith of al-A'mash than the Thawri : he would come remind me of the hadith of al-A'mash, and I never saw anyone knowing them better than he."
Muhammad ibn Abdallah ibn Ammar said : I heard Yahya ibn Sa'id say :
"Sufyan knows the hadith of al-A'mash better than al-A'mash."
Ibn Ar'ara said : I heard Yahya ibn Sa'id say : "Sufyan is more reliable than Chu'ba, and more knowing of men."
Muhammad ibn Zounbour said : I heard al-Foudhayl say : "Sufyan was, by Allah, more knowing than Abu Hanifa."
Ibn Rahawayh said : I heard Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi mention Sufyan, Chu'ba, Malik and Ibn al-Moubarak, then say : "The most knowing of them is Sufyan."
Abu Bakr ibn Abi Chayba said : I heard Yahya al-Qattan say : "I never saw a better memorizer than Sufyan, then Chu'ba."
Bachr al-Hafi said : "The Thawri was, for us, the imam of the people."
From him also : "Sufyan, in his time, is as Abu Bakr and Umar in their time."
Ibn Ma'in said : "None knew the hadith of al-A'mash, of Mansour and of Abu Ishaq better than the Thawri."
Abu Ishaq al-Fazari said : "I never saw the like of the Thawri."
Abu Bakr ibn Ayyach said : "I see the man who keeps company with Sufyan grow great in my eyes."
Warqa and a group said : "Sufyan ath-Thawri never saw his like."
Chou'ayb ibn Harb said : "I think that tomorrow Sufyan will be brought as a proof from Allah against His creatures, and it will be said to them : you reached not your prophet : you have seen Sufyan."
Abu Ubayda al-Ajourri said : I heard Abu Dawud say :
"Sufyan and Chu'ba never differ in anything but Sufyan prevails : he contradicted him in more than fifty hadiths, and the word therein is the word of Sufyan."
Yahya ibn Ma'in said : "Whoso contradicted Sufyan in anything, the word remained the word of Sufyan."
Yahya ibn Nasr ibn Hajib reported, from Warqa : "The Thawri never saw his like."
Ibn Uyayna said : "The men of hadith are three : Ibn Abbas in his time, ash-Sha'bi in his time, and the Thawri in his time."
Ali ibn al-Madini said : "I know not that Sufyan ever forged in anything, except in the name of the wife of Abu Ubayda : he said Houfayna, meaning the correct with the jim."
Al-Marwazi reported, from Ahmad ibn Hanbal, who said :
"Know you who is the imam ? The imam is Sufyan ath-Thawri : none precedes him in my heart."
Al-Khouraybi said : "I never saw any more deeply versed than Sufyan."
Ibn Uyayna said : "I sat with Abd ar-Rahman ibn al-Qasim, Safwan ibn Sulaym and Zayd ibn Aslam, and I saw not among them the like of Sufyan."
Abu Qatan said : Chu'ba told me : "Sufyan ruled the people by piety and knowledge."
Qabisa said : "Whenever I sat with Sufyan, I mentioned death : I never saw a man who mentioned death more than he."
Abdallah ibn Khoubayq reported, from Youssouf ibn Asbat :
Sufyan said to me after the isha prayer : "Hand me the ewer : I shall make ablutions."
I handed it to him : he took it with his right hand and set his left
upon his cheek, and remained pensive ; I fell asleep, then rose at the time of the fajr : and behold the ewer still in his hand. I said : "The fajr has risen."
He said : "Since you handed me the ewer I have not ceased meditating on the hereafter, until this hour."
Youssouf ibn Asbat said : the Thawri was asked a question while buying something, and he said : "Leave me : my heart is with my dirham."
Moussa ibn al-Ala reported, from Houdayfa al-Mar'achi, who said :
Sufyan said : "That I should leave ten thousand dirhams of which Allah questions me is dearer to me than needing the people."
Rawwad ibn al-Jarrah said : I heard the Thawri say : "Wealth of old was dispraised ; today it is the shield of the believer."
Abdallah ibn Muhammad al-Bahili said : a man came to the Thawri consulting him about pilgrimage.
He said : "Take not for companion him who is honored at your expense : if you share the expense with him he harms you ; and if he shows you favor he abases you."
A man looked at him, dinars in hand, and said : "O Abu Abdallah, would you withhold these dinars ?"
He said : "Silence : but for them the kings would triumph over us."
He said : Sufyan was a head in asceticism, devotion and fear ; a head in memorization ; a head in knowledge of the athars ; a head in jurisprudence : he feared not, in Allah, the blame of any blamer, among the imams of the religion. He was pardoned more than one question wherein he had exerted judgment ; there was in him a light Shiism : he would take Ali to task ; and he was also upon the doctrine of his land concerning nabidh. It is said that he returned from all
that, that he blamed the kings, and held not revolt at all.
He practiced tadlis in his narration, and sometimes narrated from the weak.
Sufyan ibn Uyayna practiced tadlis, but he was never known to practice tadlis from a weak narrator.
Ahmad said : Musa ibn Dawud told us : I heard Sufyan say, in the year one hundred fifty-eight : "I am sixty-one years old."
Waki said : Sufyan was born in the year ninety-eight, and died at sixty-three years.
Sufyan ibn Waki said : my father told us, who said :
Sufyan died leaving a hundred dinars in goods ; he made a bequest to Ammar ibn Sayf concerning his books, and he burned them. Sufyan had no descendants : he had had a son, who died before him ; he bequeathed all that was his to his sister and her children, and assigned nothing in inheritance to his brother Mubarak.
Mubarak died in the year one hundred eighty.
Ibn Ma'in said : it reached me that Charik, the Thawri, Isra'il, Foudhayl ibn Iyad and other jurists of Kufa were born in Khurasan : their fathers were sent in the delegations, settled there, some married there ; upon their return they were transferred to Kufa. Masruq, the grandfather of the Thawri, attended the Camel with Ali.
Abu al-Ayna'a reported, from Abdallah ibn Khoubayq : Youssouf ibn Asbat said : when Sufyan set about mentioning the hereafter, he passed blood in his urine.
Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi said : I heard Sufyan say :
"There never reached me a hadith of the Messenger of Allah, peace and the salutation of Allah be upon him, but I acted upon it, if only once."
Hatim ibn al-Walid al-Kirmani said : I heard Yahya ibn Abi Boukayr say : it was said
to Sufyan ath-Thawri : "Until when will you seek hadith ?"
He said : "In what good am I better than the hadith, to what else should I turn ? The hadith is the best of the sciences of the lower world."
Yahya al-Qattan said : I heard Sufyan say : "The ugliest of creatures is she who seeks the lower world by the deed of the hereafter."
Abd ar-Razzaq said : the Thawri called for food and meat : he ate ; then he called for dates and butter : he ate ; then he rose and said : "Be good to the Black, and stir his pot."
Abu Hicham ar-Rifa'i said : I heard Yahya ibn Yaman, from Sufyan, who said :
"I see a thing upon which it behooves me to speak, and I do it not : then I shed blood."
Ibn al-Mahdi said : we were sitting with the Thawri at Mecca : he sprang up suddenly and said : "The day performs its work."
From Sufyan : "A man never set his hand in the bowl of another but he became abased to him."
Ahmad ibn Younous said : I heard the Thawri a number I cannot count say : "O Allah, preserve, preserve ; O Allah, preserve us, and grant us preservation in this world and the hereafter."
Yahya ibn Yaman said : Sufyan said :
"Nothing is more execrable to me than the company of a Quran-reciter, and nothing dearer to me than the company of a young man."
Abu Hicham said : Waki told us : I heard Sufyan say :
"Asceticism is not to eat coarse food and wear rough garb : it is to shorten hope and await death."
Yahya ibn Yaman said : I heard Sufyan say :
"Wealth is the disease of this community, and the scholar its physician : when the physician draws the disease upon himself, when will he cure the people ?"
From Sufyan : "We know nothing better than seeking knowledge with sincere intention."
Al-Khouraybi reported, from Sufyan, who said : "Beware the wrath of Allah in three things : beware failing in what He commanded you ; beware that He see you while you content not yourself with what He apportioned you ; and beware asking aught of the lower world and finding it not, and bearing grudge against your Lord."
Khalid ibn Nizar al-Ayli said : Sufyan said : "Asceticism is twofold : the obligatory asceticism, and the supererogatory asceticism.
The obligatory : to forsake boasting and arrogance, vanity, hypocrisy, repute and adornment before the people.
As for the supererogatory asceticism : to forsake what Allah gave you of the lawful ; when you forsake that, it becomes binding upon you to have forsaken it only for Allah."
It is related that Abd as-Samad, the maternal uncle of al-Mansour, entered upon Sufyan to visit him : he turned his face to the wall and returned not the salam.
Abd as-Samad said : "O Saif ! I think Abu Abdallah sleeps."
He said : "I think not, may Allah set you right."
Sufyan said : "Lie not : I sleep not."
Abd as-Samad said : "O Abu Abdallah, have you need of aught ?"
He said : "Yes, of three needs : that you visit me no more ; that you attend not my funeral ; and that you invoke no mercy upon me."
Abd as-Samad, abashed, rose ; going out he said : "By Allah, I all but went not out without his head being with me."
Youssouf ibn Asbat said : Sufyan said : "Adorn knowledge and hadith by your persons, and adorn not yourselves by them."
Muhammad ibn Sa'd said : Sufyan was sought : he went out to Mecca, and al-Mahdi wrote to Muhammad ibn Ibrahim, who governed Mecca, to seek him. Sufyan was informed of it, and Muhammad said to him : "If you wish to go to those people, show yourself, until I send you to them ; else, hide."
He said : Sufyan hid himself ; Muhammad sought him, and ordered a herald who cried at Mecca : "Whoso brings Sufyan shall have this and that."
He ceased not hiding at Mecca, showing himself only to the people of knowledge and to him who feared him not.
Abu Chihab the dyer reported : the sister of Sufyan sent with me a waterskin to Sufyan, while he was at Mecca, containing kohl of sulfur and dry breads. I came, sought him ; I was told : "He sometimes sits by the Ka'ba, near the dyers."
I came to him and found him lying : I greeted him, and he burdened me not with questions, nor greeted me as he was wont. I said : "Your sister sent me with a waterskin."
He sat upright and said : "Make haste with it."
I spoke to him of that, and he said : "O Abu Chihab, blame me not : for three days I have tasted nothing therein." I found him excusable.
Ibn Sa'd said : when he feared the search at Mecca, he went out to Basra and encamped near the dwelling of Yahya ibn Sa'id, then Yahya lodged him near himself and opened between them a door : the hadith-masters of the people of Basra would come greet him and hear from him.
There came to him : Jarir ibn Hazim, Moubarak ibn Fadala, Hammad ibn Salama, Marhoum the spicer, and Hammad ibn Zayd.
Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi came to him and kept close to him.
Abu Awana would greet Sufyan at Mecca, who returned him no answer ; he was spoken to about it.
He said : "I know him not."
When Sufyan knew that his place and abode were known, he said to Yahya : "Change my lodging."
He lodged him at the dwelling of al-Haytham ibn Mansour, where he remained. Hammad ibn Zayd spoke to him of standing aloof from the powers, saying : "That is the deed of the people of innovation, and it is of them one fears."
Sufyan and Hammad then agreed to go to Baghdad, and Sufyan wrote to al-Mahdi and to Ya'qoub ibn Dawud the vizir, beginning with himself.
He was told : "They grow angry at this one."
He began with them, and the answer to his letter came to him with what he loved : drawing near, generosity, being heard and obeyed. He was about to set out to them when he was taken with fever and fell ill, and death came : he was distressed.
Marhoum ibn Abd al-Aziz said to him : "What is this distress ? You go to the Lord you worshipped."
He calmed, and said : "See who here is of ours,
of the Kufans."
They sent to Ubadan : a company came to him ; he made his bequest, then died.
His funeral was carried suddenly to the people of Basra : the multitude attended it, and Abd ar-Rahman ibn Abd al-Malik ibn Abjar prayed over him ; he was a righteous man. Khalid ibn al-Harith descended with him into his grave.
Abu Hicham ar-Rifa'i said : Waki told us, who said :
Umar ibn Hawchab, a governor, entered upon Sufyan and greeted him : he turned from him. The governor said : "O Sufyan, we are, by Allah, more useful to the people than you : we are the keepers of blood-monies, the keepers of litters, the keepers of the needs of the people and of reconciliation among them ; and you are the man of yourself."
Sufyan turned to him, began speaking with him, then rose.
Sufyan said : "His entering had weighed upon me ; and his rising from me grieved me when he rose."
Abd ar-Razzaq said : "I never saw a better memorizer of what he possessed than the Thawri."
He was told : "What hindered you from traveling to az-Zouhri ?"
He said : "I had not dirhams."
Yahya al-Qattan said : "Sufyan ath-Thawri is above Malik in everything."
Ibn al-Madini reported it from him.
Ibn al-Mahdi said : Sufyan said to me :
"Were my copybooks with me, I would have filled you with knowledge : my copybooks are with an old woman on the Nile."
Al-Koudaymi said : Abu Houdayfa told us : I heard Sufyan say :
"We would go to Abu Ishaq al-Hamdani, and Isra'il, meaning his grandson, had upon his neck a collar of gold."
Ibn al-Madini said : Ibn al-Moubarak used to say : "When these two agree upon
a thing, that is solid" : meaning Sufyan and Abu Hanifa.
Ali ibn Mouhshir reported, from Sufyan, who said :
"The memorizers of the people are four : Yahya ibn Sa'id al-Ansari, Isma'il ibn Abi Khalid, Abd al-Malik ibn Abi Sulayman, and Asim al-Ahwal."
I say : "And al-A'mash ?"
He refused to set him with them.
Ahmad ibn Younous said : I heard Za'ida, Sufyan being mentioned before him, say : "That one is the most deeply versed of the people of the world."
Waki reported, from Chu'ba : "Sufyan retains better than I."
Ibn Houmayd said : I heard Mihran ar-Razi say :
"I wrote from Sufyan ath-Thawri all his categories, and my book of blood-monies was lost. I mentioned that to him, and he said : when you find me alone, mention it to me, until I dictate it to you at leisure."
He made pilgrimage ; entered into Mecca, he circled the House and ran, then lay down : I reminded him, and he began dictating to me the book, chapter upon chapter, until he had dictated all of it from his memory.
Az-Za'farani said : I heard Ahmad ibn Hanbal ask Affan : "Which of the two errs more : Sufyan or Chu'ba ?"
He said : "Chu'ba, by far."
Ahmad said : "In the names of men."
Abd ar-Razzaq said : I heard Sufyan say : "Ask me of the knowledge of the Quran and of the rites : I know them both."
Abu Qadama said : I heard Yahya ibn Sa'id say :
"What I wrote from Sufyan, from al-A'mash, is dearer to me than what I wrote from al-A'mash himself."
Ibrahim ibn Abi al-Layth said : I heard al-Achja'i say :
"I heard from the Thawri thirty thousand hadiths."
Yahya al-Qattan said : Ibn Abi Khalid died while I was at Kufa ; Sufyan sat beside me
and we awaited the funeral, when he said :
"O Yahya, hold : I shall narrate to you from Isma'il ten hadiths of which you have heard nothing."
He narrated me ten. I was at Mecca, where al-Awza'i was ; Sufyan ath-Thawri met me upon as-Safa and said : "O Yahya, has al-Awza'i gone out this night ?"
I said : "Yes."
He said : "Sit, stir not until I narrate to you from him ten hadiths of which you have heard nothing."
I said : "And what have I heard of him ?"
He left me not until he had narrated to me from him ten hadiths, of which I had heard not one.
Al-Achja'i said : I heard Sufyan say : "Were a man minded to lie in the hadith, though he were in a house within a house, Allah would expose him."
From Ibn al-Mahdi : "I never saw a man more expert in hadith than the Thawri."
Al-Qawariri said : Yahya al-Qattan said : Sufyan ath-Thawri spent the night with me ; I narrated him two hadiths, one from Amr ibn Ubayd ; he rose to pray, I folded the prayer-rug, and behold he had written them both from me.
Abu Mouhchir reported, from Isa ibn Younous, who said :
Sufyan ath-Thawri entered upon Muhammad ibn Sa'id ibn Abi Qays al-Azdi, was kept with him, then came out to us and said : "He is a liar."
Abu Mouhchir said : Abu Ja'far slew him for manichaeism.
Abu al-Abbas ad-Daghoul said : Muhammad ibn Michkan told us ; Abd ar-Razzaq
told us, who said :
Ibn al-Moubarak said : "I would sit by Sufyan ath-Thawri, and he would narrate, and I would say : nothing remains of his knowledge but I have heard it ; then I would sit by him another session, and he would narrate, and I would say : I have heard nothing of his knowledge."
Al-Falllas said : I heard Sufyan ibn Ziyad say to Yahya ibn Sa'id al-Qattan, concerning
a hadith :
"O Abu Sa'id, four have contradicted you."
I said : "Who ?"
He said : "Za'ida, Charik, Abu al-Ahwass and Isra'il."
Yahya said : "Were there four thousand the like of these, Sufyan would be more reliable than they."
Abd ar-Razzaq said : I heard al-Awza'i say :
"Were it said : choose for this community a man who upholds in it the Book of Allah and the sunna of his prophet, I would choose for them Sufyan ath-Thawri."
Abu Hammam said : Moubarak ibn Sa'id told us, who said :
I saw Asim ibn Abi an-Najoud come to Sufyan ath-Thawri asking him a ruling, saying : "O Sufyan, we came to you young, and we find you old."
Abbas reported, from Ibn Ma'in, who said :
"None in the hadith of the Thawri resembles these : Ibn al-Moubarak, Yahya ibn Sa'id, Waki and Abd ar-Rahman."
Then he said : "And al-Achja'i : trustworthy, safe."
He said : after these, of Sufyan : Yahya ibn Adam, Ubaydallah ibn Musa, Abu Ahmad az-Zoubayri, Abu Houdayfa, Qabisa, Mu'awiya ibn Hicham, and al-Firyabi.
I say : "And Abu Dawud al-Hafari ?"
He said : "Abu Dawud : a righteous man."
Al-Fadl ibn Muhammad ach-Cha'rani said : I heard Yahya ibn Aktham say :
"There were among the people heads : Sufyan ath-Thawri was a head in hadith, Abu Hanifa a head in analogy, and al-Kisa'i a head in recitation ; today remains no head in any art of the arts."
I say : after the generation of these there were heads : Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi was a head in hadith, Abu Ubayda Ma'mar a head in language, ach-Chafi'i a head in jurisprudence, Yahya az-Zoubayri a head in readings, and Ma'rouf al-Karkhi a head in asceticism.
Then after them : Ibn al-Madini a head in hadith and its defects, Ahmad ibn Hanbal a head in jurisprudence and sunna, Abu Umar ad-Douri a head in readings, Ibn al-A'rabi a head in language, and as-Sirri as-Saqati a head in asceticism.
One could mention in every generation after that imams upon this pattern until our time : the head of the hadith-masters today is Abu al-Hajjaj al-Qouda'i al-Mizzi ; the head of the jurists, the qadi Charaf ad-Din al-Barizi ; the head of the reciters, a company ; the head of philology, Abu Hayyan the Andalusian ; the head of the worshippers, the sheikh Ali al-Wasiti. There remain therefore among the people remnants of good : praise be to Allah.
From Ibn al-Mahdi, who said : Sufyan stayed with us, and we used to sleep most of the night ; when he stayed with us we slept but little of it. When he fell ill of the belly I served him and left the congregational prayer. I asked him, and he said : "Serving a sick Muslim an hour is better than the congregational prayer."
I said : "From whom did you hear this ?"
He said : "Asim ibn Ubaydallah told me, from Abdallah ibn Amir ibn Rabi'a, from his father, who said : to serve a sick Muslim one single day is dearer to me than sixty years of congregational prayer, never missing in them the first takbir."
He said : Sufyan cried out when his illness lengthened, and said : "O death, O death !"
Then he said : "I wish it not, nor pray by it."
When the agony came he wept and was distressed. I said to him : "O Abu Abdallah, what is this weeping ?"
He said : "O Abd ar-Rahman, for the hardness of what befalls me of death : death, by Allah, is hard."
I touched him : and behold he said : "The souls of the believers come out drop by drop : that is what I hope."
Then he said : "Allah is more merciful than a tender, gentle mother : He is generous and noble ; how should I not love meeting Him, I who hate death ?"
I wept until I nearly choked, hiding my weeping from him, while he said : "Alas... alas before death."
Abd ar-Rahman said : I never heard him say alas, nor groan, except when his mind departed.
Then he said : "Welcome to the messenger of my Lord."
Then he swooned, then was silent until he spoke deliriously, then swooned : I thought he had finished ; then he came to.
He said : "O Abd ar-Rahman, go
to Hammad ibn Salama : pray him for me : I love that he attend me."
And he said : "Prompt me with the word : there is no deity but Allah." I began prompting him.
He said : Hammad came in haste, barefoot, having on him only an izar ; he entered as the cloth had been passed over his face, kissed him between the two eyes and said : "May Allah bless you, O Abu Abdallah."
He opened his eyes, then said : "Yes, my brother, welcome."
Then he said : "O Hammad, hold your fear, and beware this downfall..." And he mentioned a long chapter whose reading exceeded my weak sight.
Al-Hakim reported it, from Abu Ja'far Muhammad ibn Ahmad ibn Sa'id ar-Razi, from the original of his book : Abu Sa'id Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Abd al-Karim ach-Chaybani told us ; Muhammad ibn Hassan as-Samti told us ; Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi told us : and he mentions it.
And this chain is dark.
Part of that : the sultan entered upon Sufyan, kissed him between his two eyes, then said : "Leave me to shroud him."
We said to him : "He recommended being shrouded in the garments he wore."
The sultan thereafter shrouded him in a shroud of sixty dinars.
It is said : it was valued at eighty dinars.
Muhammad ibn Sahl ibn Askar said : Abd ar-Razzaq told us, who said :
Abu Ja'far sent the carpenters when he set out for Mecca, and said : "If you see Sufyan ath-Thawri, crucify him."
The carpenters came, raised the wood, and it was cried against him : behold his head in the lap of al-Foudhayl ibn Iyad and his legs in the lap of Ibn Uyayna. He was told :
"O Abu Abdallah, fear Allah : give not the enemies cause to gloat over us."
He advanced to the carpets, seized them and said : "I am quit of it, should Abu Ja'far enter there."
He said : Abu Ja'far died before entering Mecca ; Sufyan was informed of it, and said nothing.
This is an established grace : al-Hakim heard it from Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Ja'far al-Mouzakki : I heard it from as-Sarraj, from him.
Al-Hakim said : I heard Muhammad ibn Salih ibn Hani : I heard al-Fadl ach-Cha'rani : I heard al-Qawariri : I heard Yahya al-Qattan say :
"I saw Sufyan ath-Thawri in a dream : written between his two shoulder-blades, without ink : {Allah will suffice you against them} (Surah al-Baqara, verse 137)."
Abbas ad-Douri said : I heard Yahya ibn Ma'in : I heard Ibn Uyayna, from Sufyan ath-Thawri, who said :
"Whither would you go, when you have reached its utmost, but wish to slip out of it sparingly ?"
Abu Qadama as-Sarakhsi said : I heard Ahmad ibn Hanbal say :
"When it was said to Sufyan ath-Thawri : he was seen in a dream, he said : I know myself better than the people of dreams."
Abu Bakr ibn Ayyach said : Sufyan blamied him who said : the acts of worship are not part of faith ; and him who preferred to Abu Bakr and Umar any of the Companions, except that he preferred Ali to Uthman.
Al-Hakim reported it, from Abu Bakr ibn Ishaq : al-Hasan ibn Ali ibn Ziyad informed us ; Yahya ibn Ma'in told us : Abu Bakr heard.
Muhammad ibn Sahl ibn Askar said : Abd ar-Razzaq told us : I heard Malik, al-Awza'i, Ibn Jurayj, the Thawri and Ma'mar say :
"Faith is word and deed : it increases and decreases."
Al-Hakim said : Abu al-Fadl Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Mouzakki told us ; Ja'far
al-Firyabi told us ; Abdallah ibn Muhammad ibn Youssouf al-Firyabi told us ; my father told us : I heard Sufyan say :
"A people say : we say of Abu Bakr and Umar nothing but good, but Ali is more worthy of the caliphate than they two. Whoso says that has wronged Abu Bakr, Umar, Ali, the Muhajirun and the Ansar ; and I know not whether with that their deeds rise to heaven."
Abu Sa'id al-Achajj said : I heard Ibn Idris say :
"I never saw at Kufa a man more adherent to the sunna, nor would I wish to be in his flayed skin, from Sufyan ath-Thawri."
Zayd ibn al-Houbab said : Sufyan went out to Ayyoub and Ibn Awn, and he abandoned Shiism.
Hafs ibn Ghiyath said : I said to Sufyan :
"O Abu Abdallah, the people have spoken much of al-Mahdi : what say you of him ?"
He said : "Should he pass your door, be not at home in anything, until the people rally to him."
Mou'ammal ibn Isma'il reported, from Sufyan, who said :
"The Rafidites abandoned me, and I hate most to mention the virtues of Ali."
Al-Hakim said : I heard Abu al-Walid ; al-Hasan ibn Sufyan told us ; Haroun ibn Ziyad al-Massissi told us : I heard al-Firyabi : I heard Sufyan, a man asking him of him who curses Abu Bakr, and he said : "An unbeliever toward Allah the Most High."
He said : "Shall we pray over him ?"
He said : "No, nor honor him."
He said : the people pressed upon him until they barred me from him.
I said to him who was near him : "What said he ?"
We said : "He says : there is no deity but Allah : what shall we do with him ?"
He said : "Touch him not with your hands : raise him with wood until you lay him in his grave."
Abbas ad-Douri said : Abd al-Aziz ibn Aban told me : I heard the Thawri say :
"Whoso prefers over Abu Bakr and Umar any other has wronged twelve thousand companions of the Messenger of Allah, peace and the salutation of Allah be upon him, with whom the Messenger of Allah died well pleased."
Abbas said : Yahya ibn Ma'in told us ; Abd ar-Razzaq told us : I heard the Thawri say : "Pass the hand over them two where they touch the foot, though they be torn."
He said : so too the sandals of the Muhajirun and the Ansar were torn and rent.
Sheikhs whom the Thawri narrated from, and who narrated from him :
Muhammad ibn Ajlan, Muhammad ibn Ishaq, Ibn Abi Dhi'b, Abdallah ibn al-Moubarak, Abu Ishaq al-Fazari, al-Mu'tamir ibn Sulayman, Salama al-Abrach, Ibrahim ibn Adham, Aban ibn Taghlib, Hamza az-Zayyat, Ja'far as-Sadiq, Hammad ibn Salama, al-Hasan ibn Salih ibn Hayy, Kharja ibn Mous'ab, Khusayf ibn Abd ar-Rahman, Sulayman al-A'mash, Abu al-Ahwass Sallam ibn Sulaym, Sufyan ibn Uyayna, Chu'ba ibn al-Hajjaj, Charik the judge, al-Awza'i, Abu Bakr ibn Ayyach, Ibn Jurayj, Foudhayl ibn Iyad, Abu Hanifa, and Waki ibn al-Jarrah.
Al-Hakim named these.
Sulayman ibn Bilal reported, from Ibn Ajlan, from the Thawri.
It is reported from the Thawri : "I love that the man of knowledge live at a bare sufficiency : the plagues hasten to him fastest, and the tongues to him fastest."
Za'ida said : Sufyan was the most deeply versed of the people.
Ibn al-Moubarak said : "I know not on the face of the earth any more knowing than Sufyan."
From Ibn Uyayna : "Sufyan never saw his like."
Ibrahim ibn Muhammad ach-Chafi'i said : I said to Ibn al-Moubarak : "Have you seen the like of Sufyan ath-Thawri ?"
He said : "And did he himself see his like ?"
Al-Khouraybi said : "I never saw a hadith-master better than the Thawri."
Yahya ibn Sa'id said : "What I wrote from Sufyan, from al-A'mash, is dearer to me than what I wrote from al-A'mash."
Abu Ousama said : "Whoso tells you that he saw with his eye the like of Sufyan, believe him not."
Charik said : "We hold that Sufyan is a proof of Allah upon His servants."
Abu al-Ahwass said : I heard Sufyan say : "I would fain escape this affair chichely : nothing upon me, nothing for me."
Abu Ousama said : I heard Sufyan say :
"Seeking hadith is not of the provisions of death : it is a preoccupation wherewith a man busies himself."
I say : he said that, while saying to al-Khouraybi : "Nothing is more useful to the people than the hadith ?!"
Abu Dawud said : I heard the Thawri say : "I fear nothing that it should bring me into the Fire, except the hadith."
From Sufyan : "Would that I had recited the Quran, and stood at it, passing not beyond it to other."
From Sufyan : "Who increases in knowledge increases in grief ; did I not know, my grief would be lighter."
From him : "Would that my knowledge were erased from my breast : shall I not be questioned tomorrow concerning every hadith I related : what didst thou intend by it ?"
Yahya al-Qattan said : the Thawri had been overcome
by the craving for hadith : I fear for him nothing but his love of hadith.
I say : the love of the hadith itself, and the deed of it for Allah, are provisions sought of the abode of return ; and the love of its narration, its chains and abundance of its knowledge is blameworthy and feared : that is what Sufyan feared, and al-Qattan, and the people of watchfulness ; for much of that is a burden upon the hadith-master.
Moussa ibn Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi reported that he heard his father say :
"I saw the Thawri in sleep and I said to him : what have you found of better ?"
He said : "The hadith."
Al-Firyabi said : I heard him say : "No deed is better than the hadith, when the intention in it is sincere."
Damra said : Sufyan sometimes narrated hadiths at Ascalon, opening with them saying : "The eyes overflow !" He marveled at himself.
Mouhanna ibn Yahya said : Abd ar-Razzaq told us ; a companion of ours said for Sufyan : "Narrate to us as you heard."
He said : "No, by Allah, no way to that : they are but the meanings."
Zayd ibn al-Houbab said : I heard Sufyan say : "If you say : I narrate you as I heard, you will not believe me."
Ahmad ibn Sinan said : Ibn al-Mahdi told us, who said :
"We were with Sufyan, and he was as one set for the reckoning : we dared not speak to him ; we would turn to the mention of hadith, and that humility would depart : he would say then : so-and-so narrated to us, so-and-so narrated to us."
Abd ar-Razzaq said : I saw Sufyan at Sana'a dictating to a child, and making him dictate to him.
From Sufyan : "Had the companions of hadith not come to me, I would have gone to them."
The rest of this chapter will come.
Al-Firyabi reported, from Sufyan, who said :
"I entered upon al-Mahdi and said : it reached me that Umar, may Allah be pleased with him, spent on his pilgrimage twelve dinars ; and you, in what you are."
He grew angry and said : "You would have me be like this that you are in ?"
I said : "If it be not as that wherein I am, then below that wherein you are."
His vizir said : "Your letters have come to us, and I forwarded them."
I said : "I never wrote you anything."
Al-Khouraybi reported, from Sufyan : "I never spent a dirham on building."
Yahya ibn Yaman reported, from Sufyan :
"Did the beasts know of death what you know, you would eat of them no fat."
Ibn Yaman said then : "I never saw the like of Sufyan : the lower world advanced upon him, and he turned his face from it."
Abu Ahmad az-Zoubayri said : I was in the mosque of al-Khayf with Sufyan, and the herald crying : "Whoso brings Sufyan shall have ten thousand."
It is said : it was for the seeking that he fled to Yemen ; something was stolen there, and they suspected Sufyan.
He said : I was brought with Ma'n ibn Za'ida, to whom it had been written to seek me. It was said to him : "This one stole from us."
He said : "Wherefore stole you their goods ?"
I said : "I stole nothing."
He said to them : "Stand aside : I shall question him."
Then he turned to me and said : "What is your name ?"
I said : "Abdallah ibn Abd ar-Rahman."
He said : "I conjure you by Allah, when you gave your lineage."
I said : "I am Sufyan ibn Sa'id ibn Masrouq."
He said : "The Thawri ?"
I said : "The Thawri."
He said : "You are the desire of the emir of the believers."
I said : "Yes."
He lowered his head a while, then said : "Dwell where you will as long as you will, and depart when you will : by Allah, were you under my foot I would not lift it."
I read it before Ishaq ibn Tariq : Ibn Khalil informed us ; Ahmad ibn Muhammad informed us ; Abu Ali the reciter informed us ; Abu Nu'aym informed us ; Abu ach-Cheikh informed us ; Ibrahim ibn Muhammad ibn al-Hasan told us ; Ahmad ibn Sulayman ibn Abi Chayba told us : I heard Salih ibn Mou'adh the Basrian : I heard Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi : I heard Sufyan... and he mentions it.
Waki reported, from Sufyan, who said :
"I never tended aught harder upon me than my self : one time against me, one time for me."
Al-Khouraybi reported, from Sufyan : {We shall lead them on gradually} (Surah al-A'raf, verse 182), and (Surah al-Qalam, verse 44) : he said : "We shall overflow them with favors, and withhold from them gratitude."
Abu Ishaq al-Fazari reported, from Sufyan, who said :
"Weeping has ten parts : one part for Allah, and nine for other than Allah ; when the part of Allah comes once in the year, that is much."
Khalaf ibn Tamim said : I heard Sufyan say : "Whoso loves the thighs of women shall not prosper."
Abd ar-Rahman Rousta said : I heard Ibn al-Mahdi say : Sufyan spent the night at my house and began to weep.
He was asked, and said : "My sins are lighter to me than that."
And he lifted a little of the earth : "I fear that faith be stripped from me before I die."
From Sufyan : "Safety is to love not being known."
Rousta reported, from Ibn al-Mahdi, who said :
Sufyan came to Basra, the sultan
seeking him : he went to an orchard, hiring himself to guard its fruits. Some date-merchants passed by him, and one said : "Who are you, old man ?"
He said : "Of the people of Kufa."
He said : "Are the dates of Basra sweeter, or the dates of Kufa ?"
He said : "I never tasted the dates of Basra."
He said : "What makes you lie ! The righteous, the wicked and the dogs eat the dates at this very hour."
He returned to the governor and informed him, to please him. He said : "May your mother lose you ! Catch him : if you speak truth, it is Sufyan ath-Thawri : take him, that we may draw near by him to the emir of the believers." He returned seeking him, and could not reach him.
Chouja ibn al-Walid said : I made pilgrimage with Sufyan, and his tongue ceased not almost from the commanding of right and forbidding of wrong, going and coming.
From Sufyan : he went to Khurasan for a right due him, and hired himself to two camel-drivers.
Ibrahim ibn A'yan said : I was with Sufyan and al-Awza'i when entered Abd as-Samad ibn Ali, who was emir of Mecca, and Sufyan was making ablutions while I poured water upon him ; he seemed to slow them, saying : "Look not upon me : I am tried."
Abd as-Samad came, greeted, and Sufyan said to him : "Who are you ?"
He said : "I am Abd as-Samad."
He said : "How are you ? Fear Allah, fear Allah ; and when you proclaim the greatness of Allah, make it heard."
Yahya ibn Yaman said : I heard Sufyan say : "I see the wrong, and speak not : then I shed blood from my heels."
I say : with the majesty of Sufyan, he made licit the nabidh much of which inebriates.
Ahmad ibn Salama, scribe, informed us, from al-Labban ; al-Haddad informed ; Abu Nu'aym informed ; Ahmad ibn Ja'far ibn Salam told us ; al-Abbar told us ; Abd al-Malik al-Maymouni told us : I heard Ya'la ibn Ubayd say :
Sufyan said : "I go to invitations not desiring the nabidh : I drink it that the people see me."
Al-Mouharibi said : I heard the Thawri say to the youth he saw in the first rank : "Have you had a nocturnal emission ?"
If he said : no, he said : "Fall back."
Youssouf ibn Asbat said : I heard the Thawri say :
"Nothing is more breaker of the back of Iblis than the word : there is no deity but Allah."
From Sufyan : he was asked : what is asceticism ?
He said : "The fall of rank."
From him : "I meet a man whom I dislike, who says : how are you this morning ? My heart softens to him : how then for him whose food I eat ?"
Waki reported, from Sufyan : "Were certainty fixed in the heart, it would fly in joy, or grief, or longing for Paradise, or fear of the Fire."
Qoutayba said : "But for Sufyan, piety would have died."
Ibn al-Moubarak said : Sufyan said to me : "Beware of renown : I never came to any but he enjoined against renown."
Al-Firyabi reported : Sufyan came to Bayt al-Maqdis and abode three days, and made ribat at Ascalon forty days ; I accompanied him to Mecca.
Ahmad ibn Younous said : I heard Sufyan say : "I never saw any good for man better than to enter a burrow."
Ata ibn Muslim said : the Thawri said to me :
"When you are in Syria, mention the virtues of Ali ; and when you are at Kufa, mention the virtues of Abu Bakr and Umar."
From him : "Whoso inclines his ear to a man of innovation, knowing, has gone out of the preservation of Allah, and is committed to himself."
From him : "Whoso hears of an innovation and relates it not to his companions of session deposits it not in their hearts."
I say : most of the imams of the Ancients are upon this warning : they hold the hearts weak, and the semblances ravishing.
Muhammad ibn Muslim at-Ta'ifi said : "When you see an Iraqi, seek refuge from his evil ; and when you see Sufyan, ask Allah for Paradise."
Al-Asma'i reported that the Thawri bequeathed that his books be buried : he repented things he had written of a people.
Abdallah ibn Khoubayq said : al-Haytham ibn Jamil told us, from Moufadhdhal ibn Mouhahlil, who said :
"I made pilgrimage with Sufyan ; come to Mecca, we met there al-Awza'i. We gathered in a house, and Abd as-Samad ibn Ali commanded the season. Someone knocked the door with urgent knocks.
We said : 'Who is it ?'
He said : 'The emir.'
The Thawri rose and entered the privy ; al-Awza'i rose to meet him, who said to him : 'Who are you, O old man ?'
He said : 'I am al-Awza'i.'
He said : 'May Allah greet you with peace : your letters used to come to us, and we would fulfill your needs. What of Sufyan ?'
He said : I said : 'He entered the privy.'
He said : al-Awza'i entered at his heels and said : 'This man aimed only at you.'
Sufyan came out scowling and said : 'Peace upon you : how are you ?'
Abd as-Samad said to him : 'I am come to copy from you these rites.'
He said : 'First I direct you to what is more useful to you than them.'
He said : 'And what is it ?'
He said : 'That you forsake what you are in.'
He said : 'And what should I do with the emir of the believers ?'
He said : 'If you will, may Allah spare you Abu Ja'far.'
Al-Awza'i said to him : 'O Abu Amr, these folk content themselves not with you except by magnifying them.'
He said : 'O Abu Amr, we are not able to strike them : we educate them only by what you see.'
Moufadhdhal said : al-Awza'i turned to me,
and said to me : 'Rise, remove us from here : I trust not that this one send him who sets ropes upon our necks ; and this one, he cares not.'
Youssouf ibn Asbat said : I heard Sufyan say : 'I never saw asceticism in anything less than in preeminence : you see a man ascetic in food, drink, wealth and garments ; if preeminence were offered him, he would guard it jealously, and turn enemy.'
Abdallah ibn Khoubayq said : Ubayd ibn Jannad told us ; Ata ibn Muslim told us, who said :
When al-Mahdi was invested, he sent to Sufyan. When he entered upon him, he drew off his ring, cast it to him, and said : 'O Abu Abdallah, this is my ring : act in this community by the Book and the Sunna.'
Sufyan took the ring in hand and said : 'Permit me to speak, O emir of the believers ?'
I said to Ata : he said to him : 'O emir of the believers ?'
He said : 'Yes.'
He said : 'May I speak, I who am in safety ?'
He said : 'Yes.'
He said : 'Send not for me until I come to you, and give me not until I ask you.'
He said : he grew angry and resolved upon him. His scribe said to him : 'Have you not granted him safety ?'
He said : 'Yes.'
When he went out his companions crowded him and said : 'What hindered you, when he commanded you act in the community by the Book and the Sunna ?'
He belittled their minds and went out fleeing to Basra.
From Sufyan : 'It is not their abasement I fear : I fear their favor, so that I should see their evil no evil. I never saw for the sultan any likeness, save a likeness stamped upon the tongue of the fox.'
He said : 'I gave the dog recognition of nine tenths ; and none of those tenths is better than not seeing the dog, nor he seeing me.'
Muhammad ibn Youssouf al-Firyabi said : I heard Sufyan say : 'I was introduced to Abu
Ja'far at Mina, and I said to him : Fear Allah : you were only set in this station, and came to this place, by the swords of the Muhajirun and the Ansar ; and their children die of hunger. Umar made pilgrimage and spent only fifteen dinars, and he lodged under the tree.'
He said : 'Would you have me be as you ?'
I said : 'No : but below that wherein you are, and above that wherein I am.'
He said : 'Go out.'
Issam ibn Yazid said : when Sufyan wished to send me to al-Mahdi, I said to him :
'I am a mountain lad : I might slip in something and disgrace you.'
He said : 'O Na'iss, you see these who come to me : were I to say to one of them, he would think I had granted him a favor ; but I have been content with you : say what you know, and say not what you know not.'
He said : at my return I said : 'Whereof do you flee him, he who says : were he to come, I would go out with him to the market, and we would command and forbid ?'
He said : 'O Na'iss, until he act upon what he knows : when he has done so, we have only to go, and teach him what he knows not.'
Issam said : Sufyan wrote with me to al-Mahdi and to his vizir Abu Ubaydallah.
He said : I was introduced to him, and my speech ran. He said : 'Were Abu Abdallah to come to us, we would set our hands in his, and clothe us in a coarse cloak, and gird another, and go out to the market, and command the right and forbid the wrong. When he escaped from us, like Abu Abdallah, your reciters came to me, who are your reciters : they commanded me, forbade me, exhorted me, and wept, by Allah, over me, and I wept with them. Then none of them surprised me but I drew from his hood a paper : do with me so, and do with me so. I did so, and I hated them.'
He said : he wrote to him only because his refuge had lengthened, that he be granted safety. I came to him,
and he reached Basra in safety ; then he fell ill and died.
Abu Nu'aym said : at-Tabarani told us ; Abdallah ibn Ahmad told us ; Amr ibn Ali told me : I heard Yahya ibn Sa'id say :
"Sufyan dictated to me his letter to al-Mahdi, and said : write : from Sufyan ibn Sa'id, to Muhammad ibn Abdallah."
I said : "If you write that, he will not read it."
He said : "Write as you will."
I wrote, then he said : "Write : I thank Allah toward you, He other than whom there is no deity, blessed and most high, to Him praise is due, and He is powerful over all things."
I said : "Who would write this preamble ?"
He said : "Mansour told me, from Ibrahim : he used to write it."
Ibrahim al-Farra reported : Sufyan wrote to al-Mahdi, with Issam bearer :
"You hunted me, scattered me, frightened me ; Allah is between you and me ; and I hope Allah choose for me good before the return of the letter."
The letter returned, and he was already dead.
Ishaq al-Asadi informed us ; Ibn Khalil informed ; Abu al-Makarim at-Taymi informed ; Abu Ali al-Haddad informed ; Abu Nu'aym informed ; Ibn Hayyan told us ; al-Hasan ibn Haroun told us ; al-Hasan ibn Chadhan an-Naysabouri told us ; Muhammad ibn Mas'oud told me, from Sufyan : "I was introduced to al-Mahdi at Mina, and I greeted him with the emirate."
He said : "O this man, we sought you and you eluded us : praise be to Allah who brought you ; raise to us your need."
I said : "You have filled the earth with injustice and tyranny : fear Allah ; let that be of you a lesson."
He lowered his head, then said : "What think you, if I cannot repel it ?" He said : "You will leave it,
and others with you."
He lowered his head, then said : "Raise to us your need."
I said : "The sons of the Muhajirun and the Ansar, and those who followed them well, are at the door : fear Allah, and convey to them their rights."
He lowered his head, and Abu Ubaydallah said : "O this man, raise to us your need."
I said : "And what raise I ? Isma'il ibn Abi Khalid told me : Umar made pilgrimage and said to his steward : how much have you spent ?"
He said : "Fifteen dirhams. And I see here affairs which the mountains could not bear."
And Abu Nu'aym said : Sa'd ibn Muhammad an-Naqid told us ; Muhammad ibn Uthman told us ; Ibn Noumayr told us ; my father told us :
"The Thawri met me at Mecca, took my hand and greeted me, then went to his dwelling : and behold Abd as-Samad sitting at his door awaiting him ; he was governor of Mecca. When he saw him, Sufyan said : 'I know not among the Muslims any who covers them better than you.'"
Sufyan said : "I was at what weighed more heavily upon me than coming to you : he was preparing for prayer." Abd as-Samad informed him that people had come to him announcing they had seen the crescent, the crescent of Dhu al-Hijja ; he ordered him to make men mount the mountains and announce that to the people, his hand in his hand ; and Abd as-Samad remained sitting at the door. He brought me out a platter containing a remnant of food : crumbled bread and cheese, and we ate.
He said : Abd as-Samad took him and carried him to al-Mahdi, who was at Mina ; when he saw him he cried with his loudest voice : "What are these pavilions, what are these canopies ?"
Ata the cobbler said : I never met Sufyan but weeping. I said : "What is your state ?"
He said : "I fear being, in the Mother of the Book, a wretched one."
Ibn al-Mahdi said : "The emir of the believers dragged Sufyan to the open country, and played the fool before him, to free himself of him ; when he knew that he played the fool, he sent him away, and he himself fled" : and he mentions the account.
Muhammad ibn Ishaq ibn al-Walid reported it, from Abdallah, brother of Rousta, from him.
Ibn al-Moubarak reported, from Sufyan : "He is no jurist who holds not the trial for blessing and ease for affliction."
Ibn Wahb said : I saw the Thawri in the Sanctuary after the maghrib : he prayed, then prostrated one prostration, and raised it not until the isha was cried.
And Abu Nu'aym said : at-Tabarani told us ; Ali ibn Abd al-Aziz told us ; Arim told us, who said :
"I came to visit Abu Mansour, who said to me : Sufyan spent the night in this house, and there was here a nightingale of my son's. He said : why is this one caged ? Were it freed of it."
I said : "It is my son's, and he gives it you."
He said : "No : I give him rather a dinar."
He said : he took it and freed it : it would go and pasture, and come at evening, and stay in a corner of the house. When Sufyan died, it followed his funeral, fluttering upon his grave ; then it came nights to his grave, sometimes passing the night there, sometimes returning to the house ; then they found it dead at his grave, and buried it beside him.
Abu Mansour, who is Busr ibn Mansour as-Soulami : Sufyan was hiding with him at Basra, after leaving the house of Abd ar-Rahman ibn Mahdi.
At-Tabarani said it.
In another account : Sufyan accepted the gift of some people and requited it.
From Ibn al-Mahdi : "I could not look upon Sufyan, for shame and awe of him."
Ishaq ibn Ibrahim ibn Houmayn said : the Thawri said to us, being questioned :
"I have for it the first sleep : it sleeps as long as it will, I hinder it not ; when it wakes, by Allah, I let it not resume."
Al-Husayn ibn Awn said : I heard Yahya al-Qattan say :
"I never saw a man better than Sufyan : but for the hadith he prayed from dhuhr to asr, and from maghrib to isha ; when he heard the conversing of hadith, he left the prayer and came."
Khalaf ibn Isma'il said : I said to Sufyan :
"When you begin the hadith, you quicken and I know you not ; and when you are outside the hadith, you are as one dead !"
He said : "Know you not that speech is a fitna ?"
Mihran ar-Razi said : I saw that when the Thawri took off his garments he folded them, and said : "When they are folded, their soul returns to them."
It is said : Sufyan and al-Foudhayl met, reminded one another, and wept. Sufyan said :
"I hope that this session of ours be the greatest of sessions we have sat, in blessing."
Al-Foudhayl said to him : "But I fear it be the greatest of sessions we have sat in ill omen : have you not looked at the fairest of what you have, and adorned yourself with it for me, and I adorned myself for you, and you worshipped me and I worshipped you ?"
Sufyan wept until his wailing rose, then said : "You revived me : may Allah revive you."
Abu Sa'id al-Achajj said : I heard Abu Abd ar-Rahman al-Harithi say :
"Sufyan buried his books, and I helped him therein."
I said : "O Abu Abdallah, and buried treasure has the fifth !"
He said : "Take what you will." I drew from them a book he used to narrate to me.
From Ya'la ibn Ubayd : Sufyan said :
"Had you one who carried your hadith to the sultan, would you speak of anything ?"
We said : "No."
He said : "You have One who carries the hadith."
From Sufyan : "Asceticism from the lower world is asceticism from the people, and the first of that is your asceticism from your own self."
Abdallah ibn Abd as-Samad ibn Abi Khidach said : Zayd ibn Abi az-Zarqa told us : I heard the Thawri say :
"I went on pilgrimage, I and Chayban the shepherd, on foot. We had come part of the road when behold a lion confronted us. Chayban cried at it : it growled, and struck with its tail like a dog. Chayban took it by the ear and rubbed it. I said : what renown is this to me !"
He said : "And what renown do you see, O Thawri ? But for the hatred of renown I would have carried my provision to Mecca only on its back."
Al-Hasan ibn Ali al-Houlwani said : I asked Muhammad ibn Ubayd : had Sufyan a wife ?
He said : "Yes : I saw a son of his that his mother sent to him ; he came and sat before him, and Sufyan said : would that I were called to your funeral."
I said to Muhammad : "Did he delay to bury him ?"
He said : "Yes."
From Sufyan : "Whoso delights in the lower world, the fear of the hereafter is drawn from his heart."
From him : {and a great kingdom} (Surah al-Insan, verse 20) : he said : "the angels' seeking leave of them."
Al-Firyabi said : I heard al-Awza'i and Sufyan say, the two of them :
"When Daniyal was cast into the pit with the beasts, he said : O my Hope, by the shame and ignominy which befell us, You gave authority over us to him who knows You not."
Al-Khouraybi said : I sat by Ibrahim ibn Adham, and he seemed to blame Sufyan for leaving the raiding, saying : "This al-Awza'i campaigns, and he is older than he."
I said to Bahim : "What meant Sufyan in leaving the raiding ?"
He said : "He used to say : they neglect the obligations."
Hafs ibn Ghiyath said : "We would console ourselves for the lower world by the session of Sufyan."
Khalaf ibn Tamim said : I heard Sufyan say :
"I found my heart reconciled between Mecca and Medina, with a people estranged, companions of wool and cloaks."
From Waki, who said : the mother of Sufyan said to Sufyan :
"Go, seek knowledge, until I maintain you with my spindle ; when you have written seventeen hadiths, see whether you find in yourself increase : pursue it ; else insist not."
Al-Awza'i said : "There remained none toward whom the common people rally with contentment and soundness, except a single man at Kufa" : meaning Sufyan.
Waki said : "Sufyan was a sea."
Ibn Abi Dhi'b said : "I never saw in Iraq a man resembling your Thawri."
Ibn Idris said : "I never saw at Kufa him whose flayed skin I would wish to be in, except Sufyan."
Al-Firyabi said : "Ibn al-Moubarak visited me and said : bring me out the hadith of the Thawri."
I brought it out to him : he began weeping until his beard was wet, and said : "May Allah have mercy on him : I see not that I shall ever see his like."
Za'ida said : "Sufyan is the most deeply versed of the people of the world."
Zayd ibn Abi az-Zarqa said : al-Mou'afa exhorted the Thawri, saying : "O Abu Abdallah, what is this jesting ? This is not of the deed of the scholars" ; and Sufyan accepted it of him.
Damra reported, from Sufyan : "The lad cuts teeth at seven, has emission after seven, his stature completes after seven, his reason completes after seven : then come the trials."
Abu Ousama said : Sufyan fell ill ; I carried a hundred (dirhams) to the physician, who said :
"This is the urine of a monk : this is a man whose grief has minced his liver : he has no remedy."
Damra said : I heard Malik say :
"Iraq used to surge upon us in dirhams and garments ; then it began to surge upon us in Sufyan ath-Thawri."
Sufyan used to say : "Malik has no memorization."
I say : Sufyan said that for the strength of his memory, in the abundance of his hadith and his journeying to the horizons ; as for Malik, he had a mastery and understanding whose bottom none reaches, and a perfect memory : may Allah be pleased with them both.
Abu Hatim ar-Razi said : "Sufyan : jurist, memorizer, ascetic, imam ; he retains better than Chu'ba."
Abu Zur'a said : "Sufyan retains better than Chu'ba, in the chain and the text."
Abd al-Mou'min an-Nasafi said : I asked Salih ibn Muhammad Jazara of Sufyan and of Malik, and he said :
"Sufyan : none precedes him with me ; he is the better memorizer and the more abundant in hadith ; but Malik selected the men. Sufyan retains better than Chu'ba and is more abundant in hadith : his hadith reaches thirty thousand, and Chu'ba about ten thousand."
Ahmad ibn Hibatallah informed us, from Abd al-Mu'izz ibn Muhammad ; Zahir ibn Tahir informed ; Abu Sa'd al-Kandjaroudhi informed ; Abu Sa'id Abdallah ibn Muhammad informed ; Muhammad ibn Ayyoub informed ; Muhammad ibn Kathir informed : Sufyan ath-Thawri told us ; al-Moughira ibn an-Nu'man told me ; Sa'id ibn Joubeïr told me, from Ibn Abbas :
the Messenger of Allah, peace and the salutation of Allah be upon him, said : "You shall be assembled barefoot, naked, uncircumcised" ; then he recited : {As We began the first creation, We repeat it : a promise binding upon Us : We shall do it} (Surah al-Anbiya, verse 104). "Know that the first to be clothed on the Day of Resurrection is Ibrahim, peace be upon him. Know that men of my companions will be seized by the left side : I shall say : my companions, my companions ; and it will be said : they ceased not turning back upon their heels since you left them. I shall say as the righteous servant, Isa, said : {I was witness over them so long as I was among them}, until His word : {the Mighty, the Wise}."
Al-Bukhari reported it, from Ibn Kathir.
I read before Ahmad ibn Hibatallah, in the year ninety-three, from Abd al-Mu'izz ibn Muhammad ; Zahir ibn Tahir informed ; Abu Ya'la as-Sabouni informed ; Abu Sa'id Abdallah ibn Muhammad ar-Razi informed ; Muhammad ibn Ayyoub informed ; Muhammad ibn Kathir informed : Sufyan told us, from Aslam al-Minqari, from Abdallah ibn Abd ar-Rahman ibn Abza, from his father :
Oubayy ibn Ka'b said : the Messenger of Allah, peace and the salutation of Allah be upon him, said to me : "I was commanded to recite you a surah."
He said : I said : "O Messenger of Allah, was I named to you ?"
He said : "Yes."
I said to Oubayy : "Did you rejoice at that ?"
He said : "And what hinders me, while he says : {Say : by the grace of Allah and by His mercy : in that let them rejoice} (Surah Yunus, verse 58)."
Ibn al-Mahdi said : Sufyan had a lesson of hadith, meaning he taught his hadith.
Ali ibn Thabit al-Jazari said : I heard Sufyan say : "I sought knowledge without having intention ; then Allah granted me intention."
Yahya ibn Yaman reported, from Sufyan : "I pass before the weaver and stop my ear, fearing to retain what she says."
Al-Qattan and Abd ar-Rahman said : "We never saw a better memorizer than Sufyan."
Abu Ubayda ibn Abi as-Safar said : Abdallah ibn Muhammad al-Maflouj told us,
I heard Yahya ibn Yaman : I heard the Thawri say : "I narrate but one hadith of every ten."
Yahya said then : "I wrote from him twenty thousand."
And al-Achja'i informed me : "He wrote from him thirty thousand."
Abu Nu'aym said : I heard Sufyan say : "Faith increases and decreases."
Haroun ibn Abi Haroun al-Abdi said : Hayyan ibn Musa told us ; Ibn al-Moubarak told us : he heard Sufyan say :
"Whoso claims that {Say : He is Allah, One} (Surah al-Ikhlas, verse 1) is created has disbelieved in Allah."
Zayd ibn al-Houbab said : Sufyan preferred Ali to Uthman.
Aththam ibn Ali reported : I heard the Thawri say : "The love of Ali and of Uthman come together only in the hearts of the noble of men."
Ibn al-Moubarak reported, from Sufyan : "Treat well the people of the sunna : they are strangers."
Mou'ammal ibn Isma'il said : "Sufyan prayed not over Ibn Abi Rawwad, for his deferring of judgment."
Chou'ayb ibn Harb said : Sufyan said :
"Profit you not what you have written, until hiding {In the name of Allah, the Clement, the Merciful} in the prayer be better in your eyes than the reciting aloud."
Waki reported, from Sufyan, of the hadith : "Nothing is counted to him who aimed by it at Allah."
From him : "It behooves a man to compel his child to knowledge : he shall be questioned of it."
Abd as-Samad ibn Hassan said : I heard Sufyan say :
"The chain is the weapon of the believer,
and whoso has no weapon, with what shall he fight ?"
Qabisa said : I heard Sufyan say : "The angels are the guardians of the heaven, and the companions of hadith, the guardians of the earth."
Yahya ibn Yaman said : it was said to Sufyan : "They have no intention", meaning the companions of hadith.
He said : "Their seeking of it is an intention : had the companions of hadith not come to me, I would have gone to them into their houses."
Al-Khouraybi said : I heard Sufyan say : "Nothing is more useful to the people than the hadith."
Ma'dan, of whom Ibn al-Moubarak said : he is of the abdal, said : I asked the Thawri of His word : {and He is with you wheresoever you are} (Surah al-Hadid, verse 4). He said : "His knowledge."
Sufyan was asked of the hadiths of the attributes, and he said : "Recite them as they came."
Abu Nu'aym reported, from him : "Would that I escaped from the hadith chichely."
Abu Ousama said : Sufyan said : "Would that my hand were cut off, and I had not sought a hadith."
Muhammad ibn Abdallah ibn Noumayr said : Sufyan said : "I fear for my self nothing except the hadith."
He said : that is because he narrated from the weak.
I say : and because he practiced tadlis from them, and feared the passion, and the lack of intention in some hadiths.
Abu Nu'aym said : Sufyan dyed himself little when he entered the bath.
Qabisa said : Sufyan was a jester : I would keep behind him fearing he beguile me with his jesting.
Al-Fasawi reported, from Isa ibn Muhammad, that Sufyan laughed until he lay on his back, stretching his two legs.
Zayd ibn Abi az-Zarqa said : Sufyan said to the companions of hadith : "Advance, O assembly of the weak."
Yahya ibn Yaman said : I heard Sufyan say to a man : "Draw near me : were you rich I would not draw you near."
Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab said : "I never saw the emir nor the rich humbler than he in the session of Sufyan."
Ibn al-Mahdi said : "They claim Sufyan drank nabidh : I attest that a medicine was described to him, and I said : shall I bring you nabidh ?"
He said : "No : bring me honey and water."
Khalaf ibn Tamim said : I saw the Thawri at Mecca ; they pressed upon him, and he said :
"To Allah we belong : I fear that Allah may have lost this community, seeing the people need the like of me."
And I heard him say : "Were it not for the fear of being humbled, I would dwell among a people who know me not."
More than one reported that Sufyan was condescending in his garment : he wore worn garments.
Ahmad ibn Abdallah al-Ijli said : Sufyan hired himself to a camel-driver to Mecca : they ordered him make them a loaf ; it came not out well, and the camel-driver struck him.
When they came to Mecca the camel-driver entered : behold Sufyan, and the people had gathered around him. He asked, and they said : "This is Sufyan
ath-Thawri."
When the people dispersed from him the camel-driver advanced to him and said : "We knew you not, O Abu Abdallah."
He said : "Whoso spoils the food of the people suffers more than that."
I say : this is an account without chain ; and how should Sufyan's affair be hidden the length of the road : it is perhaps in the days of his youth.
Yahya ibn Yaman reported, from Sufyan : "Keep company with whom you will, then anger him, then slip to him one who asks him of you."
Qabisa reported, from Sufyan : "The abundance of brothers is of the largeness of religion."
From Sufyan : "Lessen the knowing of the people, and your backbiting will lessen."
Qabisa said : Sufyan, when you looked upon him, was as a monk ; and when he began the hadith you knew him not.
I say : Sufyan had been stricken with a harrowing fear, to the utmost.
Ibn al-Mahdi said : "We were with him, and he was as one set for the reckoning."
Aththam ibn Ali heard him say : "I have feared Allah a fear, and I marvel ! How shall I not die ? But I have a term : would it were lightened from me. Of the fear I fear my mind should go."
Hammad ibn Dulayl said : I heard the Thawri say : "I ask Allah to remove from me of His fear."
Ibn al-Mahdi said : "I would surprise Sufyan night after night : he would rise terrified, crying : the Fire, the Fire ! The mention of the Fire has busied me from sleep and passions."
Abu Nu'aym said : when Sufyan mentioned death, no benefit was had of him for days.
Youssouf ibn Asbat said : Sufyan passed blood in his urine from the length of his sadness and his meditation.
Abd ar-Razzaq said : when Sufyan came to us I cooked for him a pot of sikbaj : he ate ; then I brought him raisins of Ta'if : he ate ; then he said : "O Abd ar-Razzaq, feed the donkey and stir his pot."
Then he rose and prayed until the morning.
Ahmad ibn Younous said : Ali ibn al-Foudhayl told us :
"I saw the Thawri prostrate, and I spent seven short hours before he raised his head."
Mou'ammal ibn Isma'il reported : "Sufyan stayed at Mecca a year, and he slackened of worship nothing but from the asr to the maghrib : he sat with the companions of hadith, and that was worship."
From Ibn al-Mahdi : "I could not bear hearing the recitation of Sufyan, for the abundance of his weeping."
Mou'ammal said : "I entered upon Sufyan eating a tabahija with eggs : I spoke to him of it, and he said : did I command you eat no good thing ? Earn good and eat."
Ahmad ibn Younous said : "I ate at Sufyan's of khouchkanandj, and he said : that was given us as a gift."
Abd ar-Razzaq said : "Sufyan ate once dates with butter, then rose and prayed until the sun declined."
It is said : he traveled to Yemen with four thousand in commenda, and spent the profit.
Yahya ibn al-Moutawakkil reported that Sufyan said :
"When all a man's neighbors praise him, he is a man of evil : for he sometimes sees them disobeying and reproves not, and meets them with cheerfulness."
Al-Foudhayl reported, from Sufyan : "When you see a man beloved of his neighbors, know that he is a flatterer."
Yahya ibn Abd al-Malik ibn Abi Ghaniyya said : "I never saw a face more devoted to the cause of Allah than Sufyan."
From Sufyan : "These kings have left you the hereafter : leave them the lower world."
Abd ar-Razzaq said : I heard the Thawri say to Wouhayb : "By the Lord of this building, I love death."
From Ibn al-Mahdi : "Sufyan fell ill of the belly : that night he made ablutions sixty times ; when he faced the matter he descended from his bed, laid his cheek to the earth, and said : O Abd ar-Rahman, how hard is death."
"When he died I closed his eyes ; the people came in the depth of night, and knew of it."
Abd ar-Rahman said : "Sufyan used to wish death to be safe from these ; when he fell ill he disliked it, and said to me : recite me Ya-Sin : it is said it lightens the sick."
I recited, and I had not finished before it went out.
It is said : his funeral was carried out suddenly to the people of Basra : the multitude attended it, and Abd ar-Rahman ibn Abd al-Malik ibn Abjar the Kufan prayed over him, by the bequest of Sufyan, for his uprightness.
Ibn al-Madini said : "Sufyan remained in his hiding about a year."
Yahya al-Qattan said : "He died at the beginning of the year one hundred sixty-one."
I say : the sound account is his death in Chaban of the year sixty-one.
Thus dated him al-Waqidi.
Khalifa erred, saying : he died in the year sixty-two.
Youssouf ibn Asbat said : "I saw the Thawri in sleep and I said to him : which of the deeds have you found better ?"
He said : "The Quran."
I said : "The hadith ?"
He turned his face.
Bakr ibn Khalaf said : Mou'ammal told us, who said :
"I saw Sufyan in a dream and I said to him : O Abu Abdallah, what have you found of more useful ?"
He said : "The hadith."
Su'ayr ibn al-Khims said : "I saw Sufyan in a dream flying from palm to palm, reciting : {Praise be to Allah who was true to His promise} (Surah az-Zumar, verse 74)."
Abu Ousama said : "I met Yazid ibn Ibrahim at the morning of the night in which Sufyan died, and he said to me :
I was told this night in a dream : the emir of the believers has died."
I said to him who said in the dream : "Sufyan ath-Thawri has died ?"
He said : "Yes."
Mus'ab ibn al-Miqdam said : "I saw the Prophet, peace and the salutation of Allah be upon him, in sleep, holding the hand of Sufyan ath-Thawri, and he was requiting him well."
Abu Sa'id al-Achajj said : Ibrahim ibn A'yan told us, who said :
"I saw Sufyan ibn Sa'id and I said to him : what have you done ?"
He said : "I am with the scribes, the noble, the virtuous."
"The tarjama is complete, and praise be to Allah."
Depending on the sources and the transliteration styles, the name is also written: Sufyan ath-Thawri, Sufyan al-Thawri, Sufyan ibn Sa'id, Sufyan at-Thawri, Imam Sufyan ath-Thawri, Sufyan ibn Sa'id ibn Masruq. All these spellings refer to the same person, as related by the hafiz al-Dhahabi.