Jam al-Jawami al-Maruf bi al-Jami al-Kabir
- Author died
- 911 AH
- Editions
- Al-Azhar Al-Sharif
Jam' al-Jawami' (Arabic: جمع الجوامع), also known as al-Jami' al-Kabir (الجامع الكبير; "The Great Compilation"), is an encyclopedic hadith compendium compiled by the Egyptian Shafi'i scholar al-Jalal al-Suyuti (849–911 AH / 1445–1505 CE) . Al-Suyuti intended through this work to gather all accessible Prophetic traditions, assembling approximately one hundred thousand hadiths from eighty primary sources .
Purpose and Composition
Al-Suyuti designed the compendium to serve as an exhaustive reference key to the wider literature of the Musnad collections, aiming to collect every Prophetic tradition he could access across the available works of the Sunnah . Aware of the monumental scale of the project, he recorded a memorandum on the back of his manuscript listing the specific texts he had thoroughly reviewed, noting that he did so out of concern that death might overtake him before completing the work as intended, thereby enabling a later scholar to append any unexamined collections . Commentators such as Abd al-Rauf al-Munawi later noted that the claim of total exhaustiveness reflected the scope of the sources available to al-Suyuti rather than an absolute containment of all transmitted reports, as death prevented him from realizing the project in full .
Structure and Organization
Al-Suyuti organized the compilation into two principal divisions :
- The Section of Sayings (قسم الأقوال): This section contains purely verbal statements attributed directly to the Prophet ﷺ, excluding descriptions of surrounding events or interactive dialogues . It is arranged alphabetically according to the first and subsequent letters of each hadith's opening wording . Under each entry, al-Suyuti cites the original compilers who recorded the text along with the Companions who narrated it, ranging from one to ten or more narrators .
- The Section of Actions (قسم الأفعال): This section includes narrative traditions describing actions, occasions of revelation or occurrence, dialogues, and reports that combine statements with deeds or contextual background . It is arranged according to the individual Musnads of the Companions, beginning with the Ten Promised Paradise, followed alphabetically by the personal names of the remaining male Companions, then those known by their agnomens (kunya), followed by unnamed figures (mubhamaat), female Companions, and concluding with loose (mursal) reports .
Methodology and Source Grading
To streamline cross-referencing, al-Suyuti established a shorthand system of single- and multi-letter abbreviations for his source works . He also instituted systematic conventions to indicate the general reliability of a tradition based on its source attribution:
- Direct attribution to Sahih al-Bukhari, Sahih Muslim, Sahih Ibn Hibban, Al-Mukhtara of Diya al-Din al-Maqdisi, or Al-Mustadrak ala al-Sahihayn by al-Hakim al-Naysaburi indicates that the report is authentic (sahih), with al-Suyuti noting any criticized narrations in al-Mustadrak . The same presumption of authenticity applies to attributions to Malik's Muwatta, Sahih Ibn Khuzayma, Abu Awanah, Ibn al-Sakan, Ibn al-Jarud's al-Muntaqa, and the Mustakhrajat literature .
- When citing the Sunan of Abu Dawud, unremarked traditions are treated as acceptable (salih), whereas explicitly weakened reports are cited with Abu Dawud's critique . When citing al-Tirmidhi, al-Suyuti conveys al-Tirmidhi's explicit grading .
- Conversely, sole attribution to works dedicated to weak narrators or specific regional chronicles—such as al-Du'afa' by al-Uqayli, al-Kamil fi Du'afa al-Rijal by Ibn Adi, Tarikh Baghdad by al-Khatib al-Baghdadi, Tarikh Dimashq by Ibn Asakir, Nawadir al-Usul by al-Hakim al-Tirmidhi, or Musnad al-Firdaws by al-Daylami—signals that the narration is weak (da'if), sparing him the need for an individual commentary .
Abridgments and Derivative Works
Al-Suyuti produced a renowned abridgment of the verbal section titled Al-Jami al-Saghir, which he completed on 18 Rabi' al-Awwal 907 AH . In it, he confined himself to concise hadiths, applied rigorous source citations, and intentionally excluded any report narrated exclusively by known fabricators or liars . He subsequently produced a supplementary volume to the abridgment titled Ziyadat al-Jami' al-Saghir .
The Indian scholar Ali al-Muttaqi al-Hindi later restructured and synthesized al-Suyuti's collections into the thematic compilation Kanz al-Ummal, commending the original work for having assembled the primary sources of the Sunnah on an unprecedented scale .
Reception and Editions
The work was widely praised by later authorities. The Moroccan scholar Abu Abd Allah al-Qassar observed that no author had assembled such a comprehensive body of hadith with comparable ordering and categorization, noting that al-Suyuti traced previously unreferenced or loose transmissions back to full chains through other routes . The Yemeni scholar Salih al-Maqbili commended it in al-'Alam al-Shamikh, remarking that bringing together the traditions of the Sunnah in this accessible manner was a distinction preserved for al-Suyuti .
After remaining primarily in manuscript form across various international repositories for centuries , the book was edited and published through the Islamic Research Academy (Majma' al-Buhuth al-Islamiyya) at Al-Azhar based on five manuscript copies . The publication initiative began under the supervision of Grand Imam Abd al-Halim Mahmud and continued through a second revised multi-volume edition introduced by Grand Imam Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi . An edition titled Jami' al-Ahadith, which incorporated al-Suyuti's work alongside additions by al-Munawi and Yusuf al-Nabhani in an alphabetical arrangement for both sections, was published under the supervision of Ali Gomaa in 1423 AH / 2002 CE .
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