Jami Khutab Arafah li Abd al-Aziz Al al-Shaykh
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- Jami Khutab Arafah li Abd al-Aziz Al al-Shaykh
Jami Khutab Arafah (The Compendium of Arafah Sermons) is a collection of the annual Day of Arafah sermons delivered at Nimrah Mosque by the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia, Abd al-Aziz bin Abd Allah Al al-Shaykh.
Background and Compilation
On 5 Dhu al-Qi'dah 1402 AH (1982 CE), King Fahd ibn Abd al-Aziz issued a directive appointing Abd al-Aziz Al al-Shaykh to deliver the Arafah sermon on behalf of Shaykh Abd al-Aziz ibn Abd Allah ibn Hasan Al al-Shaykh. After he delivered the sermon in 1402 AH and 1403 AH, a royal directive in 1404 AH assigned him to deliver it on an ongoing basis.
The compilation was prepared by Badr ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Wuhaybi, a legal researcher in the Grand Mufti's office. Al-Wuhaybi transcribed and gathered over 8,000 pages of the Mufti's recorded lectures, lessons, fatwas, and speeches, from which Al al-Shaykh instructed him to begin publication specifically with his Arafah sermons, starting with a ten-sermon initial volume. The preparation took one year, during which the texts were audited, sourced for hadith references, read back directly to Al al-Shaykh, and adjusted with his explicit approval. Al-Wuhaybi was assisted in parts of this work by Abd al-Nafi' Zulal ibn Abd al-Hayy and Muhammad ibn Nasir al-Qahtani, alongside the General Administration for Reviewing Religious Publications at the Presidency of Scholarly Research and Ifta.
Structure and Editorial Methodology
The work opens with an introductory foreword by Al al-Shaykh addressing the significance of the Day of Arafah, the global reach of modern broadcasts of the sermon, and the development of pilgrimage infrastructure and security.
Each sermon is organized chronologically by year, beginning with the sermon of 1402 AH. The sermons are presented continuously with thematic subtitles and numbered citations, while explanatory footnotes and documentation are placed collectively at the end of each respective sermon to maintain reading flow.
For hadith documentation (takhrij), traditions found in Sahih al-Bukhari or Sahih Muslim are referenced directly to them, with al-Bukhari's narrations cross-referenced using the numbering of Fath al-Bari. Narrations not found in the Sahihayn are traced to the four Sunan collections and Ahmad ibn Hanbal's Musnad, or to other compendia and exegetical works such as Tafsir al-Tabari; repeated hadiths are cited in full upon their first appearance and referenced back subsequently.
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