al-Radd ala man ittaba ghayr al-madhahib al-arbaa
- Author died
- 795 AH
- Editions
- al-Fārūq al-Ḥadīthah lil-Ṭibā‘ah wal-Nashr
al-Radd ‘ala man ittaba‘ ghayr al-madhahib al-arba‘a (The Refutation of Whoever Follows Other than the Four Schools) is a legal treatise written by the Hanbali jurist and hadith scholar Ibn Rajab al-Hanbali (736–795 AH / 1335–1393 CE) . The short work defends the necessity of adhering to the four recognized Sunni schools of jurisprudence (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi'i, and Hanbali) and argues against adopting rulings outside of them .
Background and Purpose
Ibn Rajab composed the epistle after facing criticism for denouncing individuals affiliated with the Hanbali school—and other established schools of his era—who departed from their schools' authoritative positions on specific rulings . His detractors claimed that such departures were beyond reproach, asserting that a practitioner might either be exercising legitimate independent legal reasoning (ijtihad) based on evident textual proofs or following an earlier mujtahid outside the four schools . In response, Ibn Rajab wrote the treatise to demonstrate the impermissibility of leaving the four schools in both individual practice and legal verdict .
Structure and Content
The treatise is a concise work spanning roughly fifty small-format pages . In it, Ibn Rajab addresses:
- Preservation of the Religion through the Madhhabs: The author argues that divine wisdom safeguarded the Islamic religion by establishing widely recognized imams of hadith and legal reasoning, whose principles, exceptions, and secondary rulings were comprehensively documented, verified, and transmitted by generations of jurists .
- The Defect in Following Extinct Schools: The core justification provided for prohibiting adherence to opinions outside the four schools is that opinions attributed to other early figures were neither systematically recorded nor rigorously maintained . Because isolated reports often lack contextual qualification and defenders to identify misattributions or errors, following them creates uncertainty .
- Closing the Door to Pretenders: Ibn Rajab contends that restricting valid legal derivation to the four codified schools serves as a safeguard against conceited and unqualified claimants asserting themselves as leaders of legal authority .
- Praise of Ahmad ibn Hanbal: The work concludes with dedicated praise of Ahmad ibn Hanbal and the methodology of his school .
Scholarly Reception
The core thesis of the treatise aligns with the position held by earlier jurists such as Ibn al-Salah, who similarly maintained that legal imitation (taqlid) became exclusively restricted to the four schools due to their comprehensive systematization and widespread dissemination .
The stance advocated in the treatise has also met with contemporary discussion and critique:
- Modern scholars such as Abd al-Aziz ibn Baz and Abd al-Muhsin al-Abbad disputed the absolute prohibition of departing from the four schools, asserting that obligatory obedience belongs solely to the Quran and the Sunnah, and that anyone qualified to comprehend textual proofs must follow them even if the verdict falls outside the four schools .
- Other researchers note that while the apparent wording of the epistle suggests a blanket prohibition, Ibn Rajab's own practice across his larger compilations reflected an adherence to sound textual evidence rather than rigid partisanship, suggesting his critique was aimed primarily at beginners or those lacking mastery of legal proofs .
Publication
The work was edited by al-Walid ibn Abd al-Rahman Al Faryan and published by Dar Alam al-Fawa'id in Mecca (1st edition, 1418 AH) . It is also printed within the collected treatises of Ibn Rajab (Majmu‘ Rasa'il Ibn Rajab) .
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