Virtues of the Imam Ahmad ibn Ḥanbal. Ibn al-Jawzi

لأبي: حدّثني يا أبا عبد الله.

      فقال له: إني كنتُ قبل الحجّ بخمس ليال، أو أربع ليال، فبينا أنا نائم إذ رأيتُ النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم فقال لي: يا أحمد حُجّ.

      فانتبهتُ، وكان من شأني إذا أردتُ سفرًا جعلت في مِزْوَد لي فتيتًا ففعلتُ ذلك فلما أصبحتُ قصدت نحو الكوفة فلما تَقضّى بعض النهار إذا أنا بالكوفة فدخلتُ مسجد الجامع فإذا أنا بشابّ حسن الوجه طيّب الريح فقلت: سلام عليكم.

      ثم كبّرت أصلّي فلمّا فرغت من صلاتي قلت له: رحمك الله هل بقي أحد يخرج إلى الحجّ؟

      فقال: انتظر حتى يجيء أخ من إخواننا. فإذا أنا برجل في مثل حالي.

      فلم نزل نسير فقال له الذي معي: رحمك الله إن رأيتَ أن ترفق بنا؟

      فقال له الشابّ: إن كان معنا أحمد بن حنبل فسوف يُرفق بنا.

      قال أبو عبد الله: فوقع في نفسي أنه الخَضِر فقلت للذي معي: هل لك في الطعام؟

      فقال لي: كُل مما تعرف وآكُل مما أعرف. وإذا أصبنا من الطعام غاب الشابّ من بين أيدينا ثم يرجع بعد فراغنا فلمّا كان بعد ثلاث إذا نحن بمكّة.

      ١ ش: أن يخلو. ٢ تركي: فخَرج إليه أبي. ٣ ش: جلسنا.

      We were informed by Yaḥyā ibn al-Ḥasan, who was informed by Judge Abū Yaʿlā Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥusayn, who transcribed from the handwriting of Abū Isḥāq ibn Shāqlā, who cites his neighbor Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar ibn ʿAlī ibn Jaʿfar al-Razzāz, who reports that he heard Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad ibn al-Mawlā say that he heard Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal’s son ʿAbd Allāh say:

      [ʿAbd Allāh:] In the anteroom of our house was a bench. When my father had a visitor he wanted to sit with privately, he would offer him a seat on the bench. With other callers, he would stand in the doorway with his hands on the doorposts and talk from there. One day a man came to the house and said, “Tell your father it’s Abū Ibrāhīm the Wanderer.”

      The two of them sat down on the bench.

      “Say hello to a great Muslim,” my father told me (or “one of the best of the Muslims”). So I said hello. Then my father said, “Talk to us, Abū Ibrāhīm.”

      “I was passing through Such-and-Such a place,” he said, “near the monastery there, when I got too sick to walk. I remember thinking that if I were closer to the monastery one of the monks might treat me. Suddenly a great lion appeared, walked up to me, and carried me along gently on its back until we reached the monastery, where it let me down. When the monks saw me arrive on the back of a lion, all four hundred of them embraced Islam.

      “Now you talk to me, Abū ʿAbd Allāh!”

      “Four or five nights before the pilgrimage,” said my father, “I dreamed of the Prophet, God bless and keep him. He said, ‘Aḥmad, make the pilgrimage.’ Then I woke up. Whenever I prepare to travel, I put some crumbled bread in a bag. So I did that. The next morning, I started for Kufa, and got there later the same day. In the Friday mosque, I met a handsome young man with a pleasant scent. I greeted him and then said ‘God is great’ to begin my prayer. When I finished I asked him whether anyone was still leaving for the pilgrimage. He told me to wait until one of his brethren came along. When he came, he turned out to be a man in the same situation as I was. As we walked along, he asked the young man if we would be carried.²⁴

      “‘If Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal is with us,’ said the young man, ‘then we will.’

      “At that moment I realized that he was al-Khaḍir. Then I asked the man with me if he wanted something to eat.

      “‘Go ahead and eat your sort of food,’ he said, ‘and I’ll eat mine.’

      “Whenever we ate, the young man would disappear then return when we were done. Three days later we were in Mecca.”²⁵

      الباب الستون

      في ذكر دعائه ومناجاته

      Chapter 60

      His Extemporaneous Prayers and Supplications

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60.1

      أخبرنا المحمّدان ابن ناصر وابن عبد الباقي قالا: أخبرنا حَمْد بن أحمد قال: أخبرنا أبو نُعَيم الحافظ قال: حدثنا أبو عليّ عيسى بن محمّد الجُرَيْجي قال:

      حدثنا عبد الله بن أحمد بن حنبل قال: كنتُ أسمع أبي كثيرًا يقول في دُبر صلاته: اللهمَّ كما صُنتَ وجهي عن السجود لغيرك فَصُنْ وجهي عن المسألة لغيرك. فقلتُ له: أسمعك تُكثر من هذا الدعاء فعندك فيه أثر؟ قال: فقال لي: نعم كنتُ أسمع وَكيع بن الجرّاح كثيرًا يقول هذا في سجوده فسألتُه كما سألتني فقال: كنتُ أسمع سفيان الثوري يقول هذا كثيرًا في سجوده فسألته فقال لي: كنتُ أسمع منصور بن المُعتَمِر يقوله.

      We cite the two Muḥammads, Ibn Nāṣir and Ibn ʿAbd al-Bāqī, who cite Ḥamd ibn Aḥmad, who cites Abū Nuʿaym al-Ḥāfiẓ, who heard Abū ʿAlī ʿĪsā ibn Muḥammad al-Jurayjī report that he heard Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal’s son ʿAbd Allāh report:

      [ʿAbd Allāh:] At the end of his ritual prayers, my father often used to say, “God, you have safeguarded me from prostrating myself before any but You. Safeguard me likewise from seeking anything from any but You.”

      Finally I said, “I hear you saying that a lot. Are you following a precedent?”

      “Yes,” he answered. “Wakīʿ ibn al-Jarrāh used to say it often, so I asked him about it, just as you asked me now. He said that he heard Sufyān al-Thawrī say it and that Sufyān, when he asked him about it, said that he heard it from Manṣūr ibn al-Muʿtamir.”

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