Ibn al-Nadim
Much of the information about Sulaym comes from Shia Muslim tradition. According to modern historian Mokhtar Djebeli, "the very existence of this man, and his work, should be regarded with caution, since apart from Ibn al-Nadim ... only a few Shi'is mention him, and then only in a very terse and laconic fashion". Ibn al-Nadim himself, as well as later biographers including al-Tusi, relied on the Alid writer Ali ibn Ahmad al-Aqiq (d. 911). The Sunni Shafi'i scholar Ibn Abi'l-Hadid, questioned Sulaym's existence, claiming "he had heard" certain Twelver Shi'a scholars assert that Sulaym was "pure invention of the imagination" and "his alleged book being nothing but the apocryphal work of a forger".