It suggests that Hisham himself was a client of Bishr...

It suggests that Hisham himself was a client of Bishr, because he had purchased him, and does not suggest anything more than that. He broke his former clientage, which his father bequeathed to him, and perhaps this is the clue to the neglect by all of his biographers to mention his former, broken clientage, and their being satisfied to mention the subsequent one alone.

I do not know when Bishr purchased him, or how old he was on the day he was purchased, but it is safe to say that at that time Hisham was young; rather it is probable that he had not even reached puberty when his patron Bishr died in 75/694. It is reliably stated that Hisham was not an Imami when he was purchased, since it would have been odd for his previous patrons to have sold a Shi‘i slave to Bishr ibn Marwan, the Ummayad, who was far from being a Shi‘i.

It is even more unlikely that it be supposed that they were Shi‘i and that Bishr followed them in faith. It is clear from this that he could not then have been a Shi‘i, but that he held Ummayad beliefs after he became their client. It is evident from his opinions, which I shall mention subsequently, that he was oriented towards the hearing of hadith; it is also evident from these opinions, and due to the fact of his non- Imami upbringing, that he was oriented towards non-Imami hadith.

His views and thoughts were stamped by the hadith, which he heard, to the point where it was difficult for him to rid himself of these opinions. It is also evident that Hisham ibn Salim, after many years, perhaps when he had reached fifty years of age or more, chose the Imami School.

This is confirmed by the fact that the first of the Imams, peace be upon them, with whom he came into contact was the Imam as-Sadiq, peace be upon him (83/702–148/765), although he was alive at the time of as-Sajjad (38/659–94/712) and during the period of al-Baqir (57/676–114/733), peace be upon them, since if we establish Hisham's age at the death of Bishr in 75/694 as being ten – and in my opinion this is the lowest estimate of his age – then Hisham was fifty at the time of al-Baqir's death.

His abstention from contact with the Imam of his time during this long period, and the delay of contact until the period of the Imam as-Sadiq, peace be upon him, has no believable explanation other than that he did not believe in the Imamate until as-Sadiq's time, at which time he joined him.