Ibn Hammat al-Dimashqi
- Died
- 1175 AH
- Born in
- Damascus
Ibn Hammat al-Dimashqi (1091–1175 AH / 1680–1761 CE) was a Damascus-born Hanafi jurist, hadith scholar, and transmitter of Turkmen heritage who resided in Mecca and Constantinople .
Life and Travels
Muhammad ibn Hasan, known as Ibn Hammat or Muhammad Hammat-zadah, bore the kunya Abu Abd Allah—with Abu al-Abbas appearing in certain manuscript transmissions—and the honorific title Shams al-Din . He was born in Damascus in 1091 AH (1680 CE) into a family of Turkmen origin .
After pursuing his initial studies, he traveled to Mecca, where he took up residence for a period of scholarly devotion (mujawarah) . He subsequently journeyed to the Ottoman capital, Constantinople, and established his residence there . Ibn Hammat later traveled to Egypt, where he died in 1175 AH (1761 CE) .
Scholarly Transmission and Reception
Ibn Hammat was recognized as a traditionist (muhaddith), hadith transmitter (musnid), and legal theorist (usuli) aligned with the Hanafi school of jurisprudence . He held an extensive registry of narrations (fahrasah) from which subsequent scholars transmitted . Among those who narrated from him was the Ottoman scholar and judge of Damascus and Medina, Isma'il ibn Muhammad, known as Katib-zadah (d. 1201 AH) . The encyclopedic scholar Murtada al-Zabidi also received hadith transmission from him via written authorization (mukataba) sent from Constantinople .
In the field of hadith extraction (takhrij), he compiled Tuhfat al-rawi fi takhrij ahadith al-Baydawi, an extensive multi-volume work that documents and traces the prophetic traditions cited in the Quranic exegesis of al-Baydawi . He also wrote on hadith terminology, including a concise treatise titled Jam' ashkal al-hadith al-da'if, which categorizes the structural permutations of defective narrations .
Ibn Hammat's hadith criticism received scrutiny regarding his standards of authentication; in his assessment of the treatise al-Tankit wa-l-ifadah, Abu Ishaq al-Huwayni noted that Ibn Hammat was not among the foremost critical masters of the discipline and criticized him for strained leniency in declaring weak narrations authentic or fair .
Answer updated
List of Works
Risala fi Jam' Ashkal al-Hadith al-Da'if (Treatise on Gathering the Forms of Weak Hadith) is a concise treatise on hadith terminology that systematically categorizes the various permutations of defect that render a prophetic narration weak.