Hadith Abi Ishaq al-Habbal
- Author died
- 482 AH
- Editions
- Awiqah lil-Dirasat wa-al-Nashr
Hadith Abi Ishaq al-Habbal (The Hadith Traditions of Abu Ishaq al-Habbal) is a short hadith tract (juz' hadithi) containing narrations transmitted by the Egyptian hadith scholar and traditionist Abu Ishaq al-Habbal (391–482 AH / 1001–1089 CE) from his various teachers .
Transmission and Manuscripts
The tract is transmitted through the line of Abu al-Qasim Hibat Allah ibn Ali ibn Su'ud al-Busiri (d. 598 AH), who narrated it from the Shafi'i jurist Abu al-Fath Sultan ibn Ibrahim ibn al-Musallam al-Maqdisi (known as Ibn Rasha, d. 535 AH), directly from Abu Ishaq al-Habbal .
The primary manuscript of the text is preserved at the al-Zahiriyyah Library in Damascus within the 'Umariyyah collections (Majmu' 94), copied directly following the hadith tract Juz' Ibn Tharthal . It was penned by the scribe Ali ibn Muhammad ibn Ali ibn Jamil al-Ma'afiri al-Malaqi in Fustat, Egypt, in Dhu al-Hijjah 578 AH . The manuscript includes copied audition certificates (sama'), including a session recorded by Ibrahim ibn Hatim al-Asadi where al-Busiri and other scholars heard the entire text from Sultan ibn al-Musallam in Jumada al-Akhirah 518 AH, as well as an audition noted by the endowment donor Ali ibn Mas'ud al-Mawsili dated 669 AH .
Contents and Notable Traditions
The work collects diverse transmissions and pattern-continuous narrations (ahadith musalsala) received by al-Habbal from his teachers . Among its contents are:
- The prophetic tradition narrated from Abu Hurayrah via Munir ibn Ahmad: الدُّنيا سِجنُ المؤمنِ وجَنةُ الكافرِ ("The world is a prison for the believer and a paradise for the disbeliever") .
- The hadith on companionship: المَرءُ على دِينِ خَليلِه، فليَنظُر المَرءُ مَن يُخالِلُ ("A person is upon the religion of his close friend, so let each of you look to whom he befriends") .
- An interconnected narration regarding destiny (qadar) where narrators sequentially held their beards while stating: آمنتُ بالقدَرِ خيرِهِ وشرِّهِ، حُلوِه ومُرِّهِ ("I believe in divine decree, its good and its evil, its sweet and its bitter") .
- A literary aphorism attributed to al-Asma'i on household sustenance transmitted by Bakkar ibn Qutayba through al-Jahdami .
- A report regarding ritual purity and prayer from Aisha transmitted by Karima al-Balawiyya .
- A chain-linked narration with physical contact where teachers placed their hands on their students' shoulders (musalsal bi-wad' al-yad 'ala al-katif) .
- The famous "hadith of mercy" (al-hadith al-musalsal bi-l-awwaliyya): الرَّاحِمونَ يَرحَمُهم الرَّحمنُ، ارحمَوا أهلَ الأرضِ يَرحَمْكم مَن في السَّماءِ ("Those who show mercy will be shown mercy by the Most Merciful; show mercy to those on earth, and the One in heaven will show mercy to you"), which al-Habbal recorded directly from Abu Nasr al-Wa'ili al-Sijistani in the 'Atiq Mosque in Dhu al-Qa'dah 407 AH .
Attribution and Other Transmissions
In modern bibliographical studies, Nasir al-Din al-Albani categorized the tract in al-Muntakhab min Makhtutat al-Zahiriyyah under the works of its transmitter al-Busiri; however, scholarly consensus maintains its primary attribution to Abu Ishaq al-Habbal because every tradition in the compilation represents al-Habbal's direct transmission from his own shaykhs .
Other classical bibliographers documented separate hadith compilations by al-Habbal. Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani in al-Mu'jam al-Mufahras, Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti in Ansab al-Kutub, and Ibn Tulun in al-Fihrist al-Awsat cited another juz' of al-Habbal narrated by the Baghdadi traditionist Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Abd al-Baqi al-Ansari (d. 535 AH), which appears to correspond to the tract referenced by Ibn Tarkhan in his Mashyakhah containing Nuskhat Abi Mishar .
The text was edited and published by Nabil Sa'd al-Din Jarrar within a collection titled Majmu' fihi Musannafat Tirad al-Zaynabi wa Ajza' Hadithiyya Ukhra (2019 CE / 1440 AH) .
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