He used to tell me of things before they occurred and they would always happen as he had said.

He would never pray twice in the same place in the mosque. Since none would dare openly to ask him to pray for them, whoever wished to benefit from his supplications would look to see where he would pray in the mosque and then go and pray beside him. When the Shaykh sat to make his supplications, the person desiring his help would make his own supplication aloud, to which the Shaykh would add the Amen; such was the power of his supplication. Once I asked him to pray for me which he did, starting the supplication for me, ’Praise be to God.’ He would always address me before I addressed him, for I held him in high esteem and derived great spiritual benefit from him.

With regard to his spiritual graces, I noticed that as his death approached he sent everyone away from him, saying that he wished to make a journey. He set off for his native village in Aljarafe, about six miles distant from Seville. After his arrival in that place he departed this life, may God have mercy upon him.

One day he saw a young boy with a basket of fennel on his head and the boy appeared to be very distressed. The Shaykh showed sympathy to the boy who asked for his supplication. By this time a crowd of people had gathered around them. When he asked the boy what distressed him he replied that his father had died, leaving several young children with no means of support; his mother had told him to take the fennel she had and, if it were sufficient, to sell it for a day’s supply of food. At this the Shaykh wept and, putting his hand into the basket, he took out a few grains. Then he said to the boy, This is good stuff, my boy; so go and tell your mother that your uncle from Aljarafe has taken some of it, thus putting himself in your debt. Then one of the merchants took the basket saying, The Shaykh has taken some of it, so it is full of his blessing.’ Then the merchant went off and paid the boy’s mother seventy Mu’min dinars in the basket. What the Shaykh did was intended as an act of mercy.