Hujjat al-Wada li-Ibn Hazm
- Author died
- 456 AH
- Editions
- Bayt al-Afkār al-Dawliyyah lil-Nashr wa-al-Tawzī‘
Hujjat al-Wada‘ (The Farewell Pilgrimage) is a hadith and legal monograph by the Andalusian scholar Ibn Hazm (384–456 AH / 994–1064 CE) devoted to documenting and analyzing the narrations concerning the Prophet Muhammad’s ﷺ Farewell Pilgrimage in the tenth year of the Hijra .
Subject and Method
The work focuses on gathering, evaluating, and reconciling the differing reports transmitted by the Companions regarding the nature and rites of the Prophet's ﷺ pilgrimage, particularly whether he assumed ihram for ifrad (pilgrimage alone), tamattu‘ (combining Umrah and Hajj with an interruption), or qiran (combining both without interruption) .
Ibn Hazm argues definitively that the Prophet ﷺ was a qarin (performing qiran) . He reconciles the conflicting accounts transmitted from Companions such as ‘A’ishah, Jabir ibn ‘Abd Allah, ‘Abd Allah ibn ‘Umar, and ‘Abd Allah ibn ‘Abbas by maintaining that there is no true contradiction; rather, those who reported qiran possessed an addition of knowledge (ziyadat ‘ilm), which must be accepted from reliable transmitters . According to Ibn Hazm, those who reported ifrad or tamattu‘ recorded only the part of the talbiyah they heard the Prophet ﷺ utter along his route, whereas those who reported qiran captured both rites together . He supports this conclusion with explicit verbal texts (marfu‘), citing the hadith of al-Bara’ ibn ‘Azib, in which the Prophet ﷺ stated: لكني سقت الهدي، وقَرَنْتُ ("However, I brought the sacrificial animals and combined Hajj and Umrah"), as well as narrations from Anas ibn Malik, ‘Ali ibn Abi Talib, and Hafsah .
In detailing the itinerary, Ibn Hazm records that the Prophet ﷺ set out from Medina on a Thursday when six nights remained in Dhu al-Qa‘dah in the year 10 AH . He also held that the sacrificial animals (hady) the Prophet ﷺ brought with him were voluntary offerings (hady tatawwu‘), grounded in his position that an obligatory sacrifice is binding on a mutamatti‘ but not on a qarin .
Reception and Critique
Ibn Kathir described the work as a single volume (mujallad) in which Ibn Hazm excelled across most of its discussions, though he noted that certain oversights occurred within it . Ibn al-Qayyim identified specific points of contention, criticizing Ibn Hazm's conclusion that the Prophet's ﷺ sacrificial animal was purely voluntary and disputing his view that the Prophet ﷺ assumed ihram before the Zuhr prayer . Al-Taqi al-Fasi commended the book as a venerable compilation (musannaf jalil), noting that objections had been raised against certain passages, to which he composed responses in his treatise Shari‘ al-Najah .
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