The death of Imam al-Bukhari

The Commander of the Faithful in hadith, Muhammad ibn Ismaʿil al-Bukhari — author of "al-Jamiʿ al-Sahih," the most authentic book after the Book of Allah — died on the night of Eid al-Fitr at Khartank near Samarqand, a stranger far from his hometown of Bukhara.

al-Bukhari memorized hadith as a child and travelled to over a thousand shaykhs across the lands. He compiled his Sahih from six hundred thousand hadiths over sixteen years, placing no hadith in it until he had bathed and prayed two rakʿas. The Ummah received it with acceptance, and it became the most authentic book after the Qur'an.

He was tested at the end of his life: he was driven out of Nishapur because of the "utterance" controversy, then the emir of Bukhara asked him to give private instruction to him and his sons in his house. al-Bukhari refused to humiliate knowledge or carry it to the doors of rulers, so he was expelled from his town and prayed to Allah to take him.

He went to Khartank, where his relatives were, fell ill and died on the night of Saturday, the night of Eid al-Fitr, in 256 AH at sixty-two years less some days, and was buried there after the Zuhr prayer on Eid day. His grave remains a place of visitation near Samarqand.