al-Barbahārī, Abū Muḥammad al-Ḥasan b. ʿAlī b. Khalaf (d. 329/941), was a radical Ḥanbalī theologian, jurist and preacher (wāʿiẓ), who instigated several sectarian riots in Baghdad. His nisba means someone who sells a kind of Indian medicine called barbahār (al-Samʿānī, 1/307; Ibn al-Athīr, al-Lubāb, 1/133).

Although the year of his birth is not known, he must have been born in either 233/847 or 252/866, the former if we accept the account which states that he died at the age of ninety-six (lunar years), the latter, i…