al-Jami al-Kabir li-Muhammad ibn al-Hasan
- Author died
- 189 AH
- Editions
- Lajnat Ihya' al-Ma'arif al-Nu'maniyyah
al-Jami al-Kabir (The Great Compendium) is a foundational legal treatise on substantive jurisprudence (furu al-fiqh) by the Hanafi jurist Muhammad ibn al-Hasan al-Shaybani (131–189 AH / 748–804 CE; also reported d. 187 AH) . It is counted among the six authoritative Zahir al-Riwaya ("manifest transmission") texts, also known as the Usul, which represent the core transmitted corpus of early Hanafi doctrine .
Composition and Transmission
Al-Shaybani authored the work as an independent composition rather than as a direct transmission from his teacher Abu Yusuf . The text was transmitted in two distinct recensions . Al-Shaybani composed the first version, which was transmitted by his students, including Abu Hafs al-Kabir, Abu Sulayman al-Juzjani, Hisham ibn Ubayd Allah al-Razi, and Muhammad ibn Sama'ah . He subsequently revised the work, adding numerous chapters and legal cases and refining its phrasing, and his students transmitted this expanded second version . Following al-Jami al-Kabir, al-Shaybani authored al-Ziyadat (The Supplements) to supply further legal rulings that were omitted from this work .
Content and Method
al-Jami al-Kabir is larger in scope than al-Shaybani's al-Jami al-Saghir (The Minor Compendium) . The author restricted the sections on ritual worship (ibadat) to a limited number of cases, while treating other legal domains at extensive length . Like al-Jami al-Saghir, the text states normative rulings and branch cases directly without setting forth their scriptural evidences .
The structure of the work reflects underlying legal principles (qawa'id fiqhiyya) that govern the subsidiary cases in each chapter, though al-Shaybani left these principles implicit rather than stating them explicitly . Later scholars particularly singled out its chapter on oaths (Kitab al-Ayman) for its analytical quality .
Reception and Scholarly Attention
The work was received as an advanced authority on early Hanafi legal reasoning. The jurist Muhammad ibn Shuja al-Thalji commented that no work in Islamic jurisprudence had been composed like it, comparing al-Shaybani to a builder who erected a multi-story house with a ladder, dismantled the ladder upon completing it, and told people to climb up on their own . Akmal al-Din al-Babarti described it as an exhaustive collection of foundational transmissions and subtle legal insights . The text, alongside the other five Zahir al-Riwaya works, was later condensed by al-Hakim al-Shahid (d. 334 AH) in al-Kafi, which served as the base text for al-Sarakhsi's al-Mabsut .
Numerous scholars authored commentaries (shuruh), abridgments (mukhtasarat), and versifications (manzumat) on the text . Prominent commentaries include those by:
- Abu al-Layth al-Samarqandi (d. 373 AH; also given as 383 AH)
- Abu Zayd al-Dabbusi (d. 422 AH)
- Shams al-A'immah al-Halwani (d. 449 AH)
- Ahmad ibn Mansur al-Isbijabi (d. 480 AH)
- Fakhr al-Islam al-Bazdawi (d. 482 AH)
- Shams al-A'immah al-Sarakhsi (d. 483 AH)
- Al-Sadr al-Shahid Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz (d. 536 AH)
- Umar ibn Muhammad al-Nasafi (d. 537 AH)
- Burhan al-Din Mahmud ibn Ahmad, author of al-Muhit
- Jamal al-Din al-Hasiri (d. 636 AH), who wrote the four-volume commentary titled al-Tahrir
Commentaries and related treatments were also produced by al-Tahawi, Sibt Ibn al-Jawzi, and Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-Atabi (d. 586 AH), alongside versifications by Ahmad ibn Abi al-Mu'ayyad al-Mahmudi al-Nasafi (d. 519 AH) and abridgments such as Talkhis al-Jami al-Kabir by al-Khalati .
Editions
The work was edited by Abu al-Wafa al-Afghani in Hyderabad, India (1356 AH) and printed in Cairo, based on an Istanbul manuscript collated with a Tonk manuscript from India and Egyptian National Library holdings . It was also published in Lahore by Dar al-Ma'arif al-Nu'maniyyah in 1401 AH / 1981 CE and reprinted in Beirut .
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