Abū’l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Abī ʿAlī b. Muḥammad b. Sālim al-Sālibī Shaykh Sayf al-Dīn al-Āmidī al-Ḥamawī al-Dimashqī. He authored works on the principles of jurisprudence (uṣūl al-fiqh) and its branches (furūʿ). He also composed works on other sciences. Among these are Abkār al-Afkār fī’l-Kalām, Daqāʾiq al-Ḥaqāʾiq fī’l-Ḥikma, and Iḥkām al-Aḥkām fī Uṣūl al-Fiqh. He belonged to the Ḥanbalī school of law, but later adopted the Shāfiʿī school. He became a logician, dialectician, and specialist in legal disputation. He was a person of good character, a pure heart, one who wept much, and was tender-hearted. Some things were alleged against him. Allah knows the truth of these, but we are of the opinion that they are not true. The Ayyūbid rulers, such as al-Muʿaẓẓam and al-Kāmil, even if they did not love him, would still show him honor. Al-Muʿaẓẓam appointed him as a teacher at the ʿAzīziyya madrasa. When al-Ashraf came to power, he dismissed him from this post and announced that in the madrasas, no one should occupy themselves with any science other than tafsir (Qur’anic exegesis), hadith, and fiqh, and that those who engaged in philosophy would be exiled. Shaykh Sayf al-Dīn then secluded himself in his house until he died in the month of Ṣafar of that year in Damascus. Upon his death, he was buried in his mausoleum at the foot of Mount Qasyūn.
According to what Qāḍī Ibn Khallikān related, Abū’l-Ḥasan Shaykh Sayf al-Dīn studied fiqh in Baghdad with Abū’l-Fatḥ Naṣr b. Futyān b. Minā al-Ḥanbalī. He then adopted the Shāfiʿī school and learned Shāfiʿī fiqh from Ibn Faḍlān and others. He memorized the works Ṭarīqat al-Khilāf by al-Sharīf and Zawāʾid al-Ṭarīqa by Asʿad al-Mihanī. Afterwards, he went to Damascus, where he engaged in rational sciences. Later, he traveled to Egypt and served as an assistant at the Shāfiʿī madrasa in al-Kurāfa al-Ṣughrā. He taught at the Ẓāfirī Mosque. His fame and virtues spread everywhere, and he became well known. Some people envied him, worked against him, claimed that he was engaged in philosophy, did not perform his acts of worship, and was in a state of religious dissolution, and they even sought someone to testify to this. However, that person composed the following poem:
"They envied the brave man, for they could not match his performance. The people became his adversaries and enemies!"
Abū’l-Ḥasan Sayf al-Dīn migrated to Ḥamā. Later, he went to Damascus. He taught at the ʿAzīziyya madrasa. After being dismissed from this post as well, he secluded himself in his house until his death that year. He died at the age of eighty. May Allah forgive him and have mercy on him.