leo
9th March 2008, 08:49 AM
Question. Scholars in our part of the world belong almost entirely to the Hanafi school of thought, but when they give fatwa on different matters, they never refer to books by Abu Haneefah, Abu Yusuf and Muhammad ibn Al-Hasan. Instead they refer to books written over 200 years later. Is their action correct? Can we rely on their fatwas?
When such scholars finish their studies, they change the type of dress they wear from the normal shirt to what is known as Jubbah, then when their knowledge has increased sufficiently, they begin to wear a turban, which is white at first then becomes green as their status goes higher. Is there any basis for such change of dress? Did scholars in the early generations of Islam do this?
Answer. You will be surprised to learn that Imam Abu Haneefah wrote no books, and Abu Yusuf wrote only one short book on financial matters. It was left to Muhammad ibn Al-Hasan to write several works documenting the original thought of the Hanafi school. However, not many of his original books have survived. Yet we have the statement of Imam Al-Shafie on his departure from Baghdad, where he lived for three years as a guest of Muhammad ibn Al-Hasan: “I carried with me a camel load of books, all of which I learned from Muhammad ibn Al-Hasan.”
A school of thought does not rely on its founder. On the contrary, the founder establishes a certain methodology which is then carried forward by his students. They will be scholars in their own right, but they follow his methodology of deduction and construction to arrive at rulings in different matters. Again their students carry this forward and teach this methodology. Over the centuries, we have a great body of scholarship based on the same principles and methodology. Moreover, some later scholars may excel their predecessors, and may even differ with them. Thus, you have a large number of Hanafi scholars who made great contributions to their school, the last of whom is perhaps Ibn Abideen. In the Sahfie school we have renowned figures like Al-Muzni, Al-Bayhaqi, Al-Ghazali and Al-Nawawi. The same applies to other schools. Ibn Taymiyah, a Hanbali scholar, has views in which he differs not only with the other schools but also with Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal. This is the beauty of Islamic scholarship.
In every generation scholars may have to deal with problems that had no equivalent in previous generations. Today, for example, we have to deal with fundamental issues related to research in reproduction, such as test-tube babies, surrogate motherhood, cloning, stem cells research, etc. These areas involve very serious moral issues. Our predecessors did not deal with these because they had no such problems. On the other hand, they might have dealt with questions where human knowledge has subsequently advanced. We are not tied by their rulings. Yet we may remain within the same school of thought.
What this means is that there is no problem with scholars referring to later books, because these may be more relevant to our times. However, strict adherence to one school of thought is not advisable because this limits the scholar and the people to one point of view.
What you mentioned about a change of attire to mark a change of status in scholarship has no basis. Early scholars used to wear the same clothes other people in their society wore. This is the proper practice. We do not have a clerical hierarchy and we do not need to have our scholars distinguished by a dress code.
Arab News
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=5§ion=0&article=107314&d=9&m=3&y=2008
When such scholars finish their studies, they change the type of dress they wear from the normal shirt to what is known as Jubbah, then when their knowledge has increased sufficiently, they begin to wear a turban, which is white at first then becomes green as their status goes higher. Is there any basis for such change of dress? Did scholars in the early generations of Islam do this?
Answer. You will be surprised to learn that Imam Abu Haneefah wrote no books, and Abu Yusuf wrote only one short book on financial matters. It was left to Muhammad ibn Al-Hasan to write several works documenting the original thought of the Hanafi school. However, not many of his original books have survived. Yet we have the statement of Imam Al-Shafie on his departure from Baghdad, where he lived for three years as a guest of Muhammad ibn Al-Hasan: “I carried with me a camel load of books, all of which I learned from Muhammad ibn Al-Hasan.”
A school of thought does not rely on its founder. On the contrary, the founder establishes a certain methodology which is then carried forward by his students. They will be scholars in their own right, but they follow his methodology of deduction and construction to arrive at rulings in different matters. Again their students carry this forward and teach this methodology. Over the centuries, we have a great body of scholarship based on the same principles and methodology. Moreover, some later scholars may excel their predecessors, and may even differ with them. Thus, you have a large number of Hanafi scholars who made great contributions to their school, the last of whom is perhaps Ibn Abideen. In the Sahfie school we have renowned figures like Al-Muzni, Al-Bayhaqi, Al-Ghazali and Al-Nawawi. The same applies to other schools. Ibn Taymiyah, a Hanbali scholar, has views in which he differs not only with the other schools but also with Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal. This is the beauty of Islamic scholarship.
In every generation scholars may have to deal with problems that had no equivalent in previous generations. Today, for example, we have to deal with fundamental issues related to research in reproduction, such as test-tube babies, surrogate motherhood, cloning, stem cells research, etc. These areas involve very serious moral issues. Our predecessors did not deal with these because they had no such problems. On the other hand, they might have dealt with questions where human knowledge has subsequently advanced. We are not tied by their rulings. Yet we may remain within the same school of thought.
What this means is that there is no problem with scholars referring to later books, because these may be more relevant to our times. However, strict adherence to one school of thought is not advisable because this limits the scholar and the people to one point of view.
What you mentioned about a change of attire to mark a change of status in scholarship has no basis. Early scholars used to wear the same clothes other people in their society wore. This is the proper practice. We do not have a clerical hierarchy and we do not need to have our scholars distinguished by a dress code.
Arab News
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=5§ion=0&article=107314&d=9&m=3&y=2008