قال أبو زرعة وسمعت سليمان ابن حرب وذكر عمرو بن مرزوق فقال...

قال أبو زرعة وسمعت سليمان ابن حرب وذكر عمرو بن مرزوق فقال جاء بما ليس عندهم فحسدوه وقال الفضل بن زياد سأل عنه أبو عبيد الله الحداني عن أحمد بن حنبل فقال ثقة مأمون فتشنا على ما قيل فيه فلم نجد له أصلا Abu Zur’ah said: I heard Ahmad b. Hanbal and I said to him that ‘Ali b. al-Madini criticized ‘Amr b. Marzuq. He said, “ ‘Amr is a righteous man. I do not know what ‘Ali says” ... Abu Zur’ah said: I also heard Sulayman b. Harb and he mentioned ‘Amr b.

Marzuq and said, “He came with what they did not have. So, they envied him.” Al-Fadhl b. Ziyad said: Abu ‘Ubayd Allah al-Hadani asked about him from Ahmad b. Hanbal and he said, “Trustworthy, reliable. We investigated what whas said about him, and we did not find any basis for it.”[^5] Then, our opponents claim through these that all the criticisms against ‘Amr were due to envy! However, this line of argument does not offer much help to our Sunni brothers. Sulayman b. Harb (d. 224 H) and Ahmad b.

Hanbal (d. 241 H) were obviously referring to the contemporaries of ‘Amr in their objections. It is possible that some of those people were indeed influenced by envy in their castigation of him. It is equally possible that Sulayman and Ahmad were heavily biased in favour of him, or were both unable to conduct…