NOTES
Author's note: This article represents an expanded version of two lectures delivered at the MESA annual meeting in New Orleans (19–22 November 1985) and at the University of Chicago (5 November 1987).
1 See Schacht, Joseph, The Origins of Muhammadan Jurisprudence (Oxford, 1975).
2 Shākir, Aḥmad Muḥammad, ed. (Cairo, 1892). For the original title of the work and the presumed reasons for its composition, see Khadduri, Majid, trans., Al-Imām Muḥammad ibn Idrīs al-Shāfiʿ ī's al-Risālafi Uṣūl al-Fiqh, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 1987), 19 ff.; al-Dīn, Fakhral-Rāzī, Muḥammad ibn ʿUmar, Irshād al-ṭālibin ilā al-minhāj al-qawim fī bayān manāqib al-imām al-Shāfiʿi, ed. al-Saqqā, Ahmad (Cairo, 1986), 153;Makdisi, George, “The Juridical Theology of Shāfiʿī: Origins and Significance of Uṣūl al-Fiqh” Studia Islamica 59 (1984): 6, 9.
3 See, for example, Goldziher, Ignaz, The ẓāhirīs: Their Doctrine and Their History, trans. Behn, W. (Leiden, 1971), 20–21;Coulson, N. J., A History of Islamic Law (Edinburgh, 1964), 56;Schacht, Joseph, An Introduction to Islamic Law (Oxford, 1979), 48.
4 See Khadduri's, introduction to his translation of the Risāla, 42.
5 See, for example, Rāzī, , Irshād, 156;Coulson, , History, 61
6 Coulson, , History, 53.
7 al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist (Beirut, 1978), 286.
11 al-Subkī, Tāj al-Din, Ṭabaqāt al-shāfiʿiyya al-kubrā, 6 vols., 2nd ed. (repr., Beirut, n.d.), 1:277.
12 See n. 13 as well as Hidāyat, Abū Bakral-Ḥusaynī, Allāh, Ṭabaqāt al-shāfiʿiyya, ed. Nuwayhiḍ, ʿādil (Beirut, 1979), 90, where a reference is made to the chapter on ablution, a chapter that has no place in uṣūl al-fiqh works.
13 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:227. The work clearly treats positive law because Subki remarks that he has in his possession an incomplete copy of the work “up to the chapter on bankruptcy (taflī).”
14 Subkī (ibid., 2:226) characterizes the work as one concerned with “fiqh and khilāfiyyāt”; see also Allāh, ʿAbdal-Marāghī, Muṣṭafā, al-Fatḥ al-mubīn fī ṭabaqāt al-uṣūliyyīn, 3 vols. (Cairo, n.d.), 1:177.
15 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:108. We ought to mention that the term uṣūl is at times used to mean “standard” or “classical” works; see al-Dhahabī, Shams al-Dīn, Siyar aʿlām al-nubalāʾ, ed. al-Arnāʾūt, Shuʿayb and al-Būshī, Akram, 23 vols. (Beirut, 1986), 15:438, who speaks of a certain Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Miṣrī as having usurped 500 uṣūl volumes from the library of a colleague.
16 It is to be noted here that Shāfiʿī does not know the designation uṣūl al-fiqh, and his use of the term aṣl or uṣūl does not carry the connotation attached to it later. He seems to have given his treatise the title al-Kitāb. Only later did it come to be known as al-Risāla, probably going through a period of transition in which it was known as Kitāb al-risāla. For evidence of the original title of the work, see Khadduri, , trans., Risala, pars, 96, 332, 573, passim.
17 Ikhtilāf uṣūl al-madhāhib, ed. Ghālib, Muṣṭafā (Beirut, 1973).
18 al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist, 289.
19 Subki, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:78.
20 Goldziher, , ẓāhirīs, 34–35.
21 al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist, 303
22 Ibid., 306; see also Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:46.
23 The exception is the case of Ḥusayn ibnʿAli al-Karābisī (d. 859 or 862) who is described by al-ʿAbbādī, Abū ʿāṣim in Ṭabaqāt al-fuqahāʾ al-shāfiʿiyya (ed. Vitestam, Gästa [Leiden, 1964], 24–25) as “one of the early jurists who was knowledgeable in uṣūl” and by al-Shīrāzī, Abū Isḥāq in Ṭabaqat al-fuqahāʾ (ed. ʿAbbās, Iḥsān [Beirut, 1970], 102) as having “written many works on uṣūl al-fiqh and furūʿ”; see also Dhahabī, , Siyar, 12:79–81. It is to be noted, however, that later sources report no work written by Kārābīsī on the subject. In fact, the most detailed biographical account on Kārabīsī provided by Subkī, (Ṭabaqāt, 1:251–56) does not associate him with uṣūl al-fiqh, either as an author or as a scholar.
24 Abī, Muḥammad ibnal-Rāzi, Ḥātim, ādāb al-Shāfiʿi wa-manāqibuhu, ed. al-Khāliq, ʿAbd al-Ghanī ʿAbd (Cairo, 1953), 61–62.
25 Abī, Muḥammad ibnal-Farrāʾ, Yaʿlā Ibn, Ṭabaqāt al-ḥanābila, ed. Fiqī, M. H., 2 vols. (Cairo, 1952), 1:57.
26 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 1:250–1.
27 See, for example, al-Ḥusayn, Ahmad ibnal-Bayhaqī, Abū Bakr, Manaqib al-Shāfīʿi, ed. Ṣaqr, Aḥmad, 2 vols. (Cairo, 1971), 1:236;Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 1:242.
28 Muzanī's, commentary is edited and translated by Brunschvig, Robert in “Le livre de l'ordre et de la défense d'al-Muzani,” Bulletin d'études orientates 11 (1945–1946):145–94; Arabic text, 153–63.
29 Najjār, Mzuḥammad Zahrī, ed., 8 vols. (Cairo, 1961), 7:291–92.
30 Only pp. 153–56 (line 4) of Kitāb al-amr wa-al-nahy treat the purported meaning (ʿalā maʿnā) of Shāfiʿ ī's doctrine, although it is highly likely that even pp. 153 (line 20)–56 represent Muzanī's own views, not those of Shāfiʿī.
31 On the traditionalists (ahl al-ḥadīth) and the rationalists (ahl al-raʾy), see Goldziher, , ẓāhirīs, 6–19;Schacht, , Origins, 36–81, 253–57, passim.
32 al-Dīn, ZaynQuṭlūbughā, Qāsim ibn, Tāj al-tarājim fī ṭabaqāt al-ḥanafiyya (Baghdad, 1962), 19–20.
33 Dhahabī, , Siyar, 12:500;Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 1:224. Most biographical works attribute al-Miṣrī's critical attitude toward Shāfiʿī to a personal conflict between the two.
34 So must we take Abū Zakiriyyāʾ al-Kinānī's (d. 902) al-Ḥujja fi al-radd ʿalā al-Shāfiʿi; see Sezgin, Fuat, Geschichte des arabischen Schrifttums, 9 vols. (Leiden, 1967–), 1:475, 485.
35 It is interesting to note the change in the title of Khadduri's translation of the Risalā. When it was first published in 1961, the title read Islamic Jurisprudence: Shāfiʿi's Risāla. In the 1987 edition, however, it was entitled, significantly, Al-Shāfiʿi's Risāla fī Uṣūl al-Fiqh: Treatise on the Foundations of Islamic Jurisprudence.
36 Khadduri, , al-Risāla, 41.
38 In his Irshād, 157, al-Fakhr al-Rāzī apologizes for the defects in Shāfiʿī's Risāla, saying in effect that all pioneering works entail some shortcomings.
39 ʿAlī, Muḥammad Amjad, trans. (Karachi, 1968).
41 al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist, 295: “al-Shāfiʿl was a staunch advocate of Shīʿism” (wa-kāna al-Shāfiʿiyyu shadīdan fi al-tashayyuʿ).
42 Rāzī, , Irshād, 44, 104; on 66, Rāzī speaks of Shāfiʿi's outstanding knowledge of dialectic, speculation and disputation-qualities that were entirely absent in the camp of the traditionalists. See also Yaḥyā, Aḥmad ibnal-Murtaḍā, Ibn, Ṭabaqāt al-muʿtazila, ed. Diwald-Wilzer, S. (Wiesbaden, 1961), 43.
44 Cited in Subkī, , Ṭabaqat, 2:149.
46 Rāzī, , Irshād, 228–29.
47 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:4;Rāzī, , Irshād, 230.
49 al-Farrāʿ, Ibn, Ṭabaqāt, 1:38.
50 On Shāfiʿ'ī's opposition to the traditionalists, see Schacht, , Origins, 128–29.
51 Qutayba, ʿAbd Allāh Ibn, al-Maʿārif (Karachi, 1976), 216–30.
53 Rāzī, , Irshād, 138. Also, alludes, Subkī to Muʿtazilite, Muzanī's tendency (Ṭabaqāt, 1:241). On his kill as a dialectician and lack of qualifications as a traditionist, see Dhahabī, , Siyar, 12:492–93; 14:371. That he was not, strictly speaking, a Muʿtazilite is evidenced by the fact that he is not included in Muʿtazilite biographical works. See, for example, Ibn al-Murtaḍā, Ṭabaqāt al-muʿtazila.
55 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 1:251–55.
56 Shīrāzī, , Ṭabaqāt, 102.
57 Reported by Subkī on the authority of al-Baghdādī, al-Khaṭīb (Ṭabaqāt, 1:252).
58 It is significant that at this time titles carrying the term furūʿ also begin to appear, furūʿ and uṣūl being now dichotomous; see, for example, Kitāb al-furūʿ by Ibn al-Ḥaddād al-Miṣrī, who died in 956; Dhahabī, , Siyar, 15:446.
The evidence in our sources thus indicates that the appearance of the designation uṣūl al-fiqh as well as of complete works on the subject belongs to the beginning of the 10th century, not to the end of it, as Makdisi seems to suggest; see his “Juridical Theology of Shāfiʿ ī,” 5, 13–14.
59 ʿAbbādī, , Ṭabaqāt, 55;Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:242–43.
60 Dhahabī, , Siyar, 15:217–18;al-Nadīm, Ibn (Fihrist, 245–46) states that the author did not complete the work.
61 al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist, 300;al-Ḥayy, ʿAbdal-ʿImād, Ibn, Shadharāt al-dhahab fī akhbār man dhahab, 8 vols. (Cairo, 1931–1932), 2:325;ʿAbbādī, , Ṭabaqāt, 69;Abbās, Abū al-ʿibn, AḥmadKhallikān, Muḥammad Ibn, Wafayāt al-aʿyān wa-anbāʾ abnāʾ al-zamān, ed. Abbās, Iḥsān ʿ, 8 vols. (Beirut, 1977), 4:199;Shīrāzī, , Ṭabaqāt, 111.
62 al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist, 283.
63 Quṭlūbughā, Ibn, Tāj al-tarājim, 59.
64 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:103;Shīrāzī, , Ṭabaqāt, 111.
65 Shīrāzī, , Ṭabaqāt, 112;Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:176 ff.;Khallikān, Ibn, Wafayāt, 4:200–201.
66 Quṭlūbughā, Ibn, Taj al-tarājim, 86.
67 Shīrāzī, , Ṭabaqāt, 112.
68 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:159.
69 al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist, 330.
70 al-Dīn, Jamālal-Rahīm, ʿAbdal-Asnawī, , Ṭabaqāt al-shāfīʿyya, ed. al-Jubūrī, ʿAbd Allāh, 2 vols. (Baghdad, 1970–1971), 2:123;Subki, , Tabaqat, 2:81–82.
72 Shīrāzī, , Ṭabaqāt, 115;Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:217.
73 al-Murtadā, Ibn, Ṭabaqāt, 102.
75 ʿAbbādī, , Ṭabaqāt, 69.
76 Shīrazī, , Ṭabaqāt, 112.
77 Asnawī, , Ṭabaqāt 2:472;Ḥusaynī, , Ṭabaqāt, 245–46.
78 Khadduri, , al-Risāla, 42.
79 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 3:186, 208.
80 Khallikān, Ibn, Wafayāt, 3:219 ff.
81 Dhahabī, , Siyar, 15:328.
82 Ṣayrafī not only commented on the Risāla but also wrote a rebuttal against al-Kātib's refutation of the work; see al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist, 300. It was not possible to establish al-Kātib's identity. We must note that the sources report at least three other critiques of Shāfiʿī by two Mālikites and a Ḥanbalite. The two Mālikites are Bakr ibn MuḤammad al-Qushayrī (d. 955) and Abū Bakr al-Dīnawarī (d. after 940); see Dhahabī, , Siyar, 4:427, 537. The Ḥanbalite is Ghulām al-Khallāl (d. 947); see al-Farrāʾ, IbnṬabaqāt, 2:119–20. However, it cannot be established whether the object of these critiques was Shāfiʿī's positive law or legal theory.
83 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:241.
84 On Ibn Surayj, see ibid., 2:87–96; Dhahabī, , Siyar, 14:201–4;Khallikān, Ibn, Wafayāt, 1:66–67;ʿAbbādī, , Ṭabaqāt, 62–63;al-ʿImād, Ibn, Shadharāt, 2:247–48.
85 Reported, by Subkī, (Ṭabaqāt, 2:307) on the authority of the historian ʿAlī ibn Ḥusayn al-Masʿūdī. Subkī had in his possession a copy of the epistle.
86 Shīrāzī, , Ṭabaqāt, 109.
87 On Ibn Ḥaykuwayh, see Dhahabī, , Siyar, 15:379. On al-Marwazī, Ibn al-Qāṣṣ, Ṣayrafī, and Shāshī, see Shīrazī, , Ṭabaqāt, 111–12;al-ʿImād, Ibn, Shadharāt, 2:339;Khallikān, Ibn, Wafayāt, 4:199. On Abū Bakr al-Fārisī, see al-Murtaḍā, Ibn, Ṭabaqāt, 102.
88 Khallikān, Ibn, Wafayāt, 4:199;Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 2:170.
89 Khallikān, Ibn, Wafayāt, 4:200–201.
90 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 3:208;al-ʿImād, Ibn, Shadharāt, 3:261–62.
91 That a jurist of the 10th century combined a proficient knowledge of rationalist and traditionalist disciplines was still considered remarkable even in the 14th century. Subkī, for instance, clearly makes a point of mentioning such a combination; see his Ṭabaqāt, 2:79, 81.
92 Spectorsky, Susan, “Aḥmad Ibn Ḥanbal's Fiqh,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 102 (1982): 461–65.
93 For a brief account of Dawūd's teachings, see Goldziher, , ẓāhirīs, 27–39.
94 See Hallaq, W. B., “Was the Gate of Ijtihad Closed?” International Journal of Middle East Studies 16 (1984): 7–10. On the Ḥashwiyya, see Halkin, A. S., “The Ḥashwiyya,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 54 (1934):12.
95 Subkī, admits (Ṭabaqāt, 1:285, 2:18–20) that he includes the biographies of those who are worthy of mention because “there is no sense in mentioning the others, for it would be a waste of ink.”
96 Ibid., 1:186–285. On Ibn al-Ḥakam, Abū Thawr, and Ibn Rāhawayh, see ibid., 1:223–24, 227 ff.,232 ff. For more on Abū Thawr, see al-Nadīm, Ibn, Fihrist, 297.
97 Subkī, , Ṭabaqāt, 1:285–301; 2:2–79.
98 Ibid., 2:79–322. The rapid increase in the number of Shāfiʿites during the 10th century must be ingood part attributed to Ibn Surayj, under whom, as we have seen (section IV), the major figures of the Shāfiʿite school have studied. Ibn Surayj's numerous students have in turn become influential and have attracted, in various parts of the Muslim world, a great number of disciples; see sources cited in nn. 86–89.
99 ibid., 1:244, 247; Asnawī, , Ṭabaqāt, 1:34–35.
100 Muzanīs position vis-à-vis Shāfiʿi's doctrine is well illustrated in an anecdote that, even if notgenuine, also portrays Ibn Surayj's attitude towards Muzanī as Shafiʿ ī 's chief student. Ibn Surayj isreported to have said that “on the Day of Judgment Shāfiʿ īwill appear [before God] and Muzan ī will follow on his heel. Shāfiʿ ī will say: O God, this man [Muzan ī] has corrupted my sciences (ʿulūmī).Thereupon, I (Ibn Surayj) shall say to him: Go easy on Abū Ibrāh ī m [al-Muzan ī] for I have mendedwhat he had adulterated.” If this anecdote truly illustrates Ibn Surayj's view of Muzan ī, it must be takento refer to Muzan ī 's rationalist inclination on certain matters of u ṣ ū l, not fur ū ʿ, because we know thatIbn Surayj admired his works on positive law and, in fact, wrote in verse to extol them; see Subkī, , Ṭ abaqāt, 2:87, 92–93.
101 ʿAbbādī, , Ṭabaqāt, 62.
102 See Makdisi, , “Juridicial Theology of Shāfiʿi,” 6–7.
103 Rāzī, , Ādāb al-Shāfiʿī, 231–37.
105 Bayhaqī, , Manāqib, 1:368–84.
108 Rāzī, , lrshād, 153–88, 189–268.
