al-Mawsua al-Hadithiya - Diwan al-Waqf al-Sunni
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- Dīwān al-Waqf al-Sunnī
al-Mawsu‘a al-Hadithiyya (Arabic: الموسوعة الحديثية, lit. 'The Hadith Encyclopedia'), also subtitled al-Musnad al-Muhit al-Mu‘allal (المسند المحيط المعلل, 'The Comprehensive and Critical Musnad'), is an extensive hadith compilation authored by Abd al-Latif al-Humaym and published by the Sunni Endowment Diwan (ديوان الوقف السني) in Iraq. The work aims to serve as a comprehensive reference work that gathers narrated prophetic traditions, analyzes their transmission chains, evaluates their authenticity, and identifies textual and transmitter defects (‘ilal).
Background and Objectives
The initial conception of the encyclopedia preceded its formal launch by fourteen years. Active research and compilation commenced on July 13, 2001, organized under a structured research program in al-Anbar Governorate and Baghdad that involved training teams of researchers, which at times numbered over one hundred contributors.
The declared purpose of the project was to provide a balanced and objective scholarly reference for the Muslim community, bridging the study of hadith criticism with Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh). By compiling all transmitted hadiths regardless of their initial status, the project aimed to gather the primary textual evidence relied upon by different schools of Islamic jurisprudence and evaluate their relative strength or weakness according to traditional hadith standards.
Scope and Sources
The encyclopedia's corpus was drawn from an extensive survey of classical Islamic literature:
- Source Base: Although the project originally aimed to incorporate over 600 classical works, 488 primary sources were acquired and inventoried, covering multiple print editions and available manuscripts.
- Material Extracted: The inventory covered more than 2,400 volumes comprising over 1,500,000 pages, yielding over 1,534,000 index cards of individual chain records (asānīd).
- Textual Scope: The compilation includes connected narrations traced directly to the Prophet Muhammad (marfū‘), as well as mursal narrations from the Successors (al-tābi‘ūn). It covers verbal sayings (al-sunna al-qawliyya), actions (al-sunna al-fi‘liyya), tacit approvals (al-sunna al-taqrīriyya), occasions of Quranic revelation (asbāb al-nuzūl), accounts of the unseen, Companion exegesis of the Quran, and descriptions of the Prophet's traits (shamā’il).
Methodology and Structure
The work is organized primarily as a musnad, grouping traditions under the names of the Companion narrators who transmitted them, with each Companion's section opening with a detailed biography. Within each individual Companion's musnad, traditions are further categorized under relevant jurisprudential subject headings (abwāb fiqhiyya).
The preparation of entries followed a systematic procedure:
- Transmission Trees: Researchers constructed diagrammatic isnad trees (shajarat al-hadīth) tracing every line of transmission from individual source authors up to the common narrators and the Companion.
- Text Selection and Commentary: The primary matn was transcribed from the most comprehensive wording, or from the earliest source author in cases of identical wording. Difficult vocabulary (gharīb) was explained, variant readings affecting meaning were noted, and scribal corruptions (taṣḥīf and taḥrīf) in chains and texts were flagged.
- Critical Grading: Chains were classified as authentic (ṣaḥīḥ), fair (ḥasan), or weak (ḍa‘īf) based on established hadith methodology, incorporating classical rulings while providing independent evaluations where classical scholars differed or had not explicitly ruled.
- Indexing: The project was designed with specialized indexes, including indexes of hadith openings (aṭrāf), legal rulings, terminology, rare words, abrogating and abrogated narrations (al-nāsikh wa-l-mansūkh), occasions of transmission, narrator outputs, and hidden defects (‘ilal).
Publication
The work was published in Baghdad by the Sunni Endowment Diwan through its Scientific Advisory Board (الهيئة العلمية الاستشارية) and the Center for Research and Islamic Studies (مركز البحوث والدراسات الإسلامية). The initial multi-volume run was released in successive installments from 1434 AH / 2012 CE through 1437 AH / 2015 CE, with each large physical volume containing two constituent parts (ajzā’).
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