Min Kalam Abi Zakariya Yahya ibn Main fi al-Rijal
- Author died
- 233 AH
- Editions
- Dār al-Ma’mūn lil-Turāth
Min Kalam Abi Zakariya Yahya ibn Main fi al-Rijal (From the Sayings of Abu Zakariyya Yahya ibn Ma'in on Narrators) is an early biographical evaluation work transmitting critical judgments on hadith narrators by the Baghdad hadith scholar Yahya ibn Ma'in (158–233 AH / 775–848 CE) .
Transmission and Nomenclature
The text represents the recension transmitted from Ibn Ma'in by his student Abu Khalid Yazid ibn al-Haytham ibn Tahman al-Daqqaq, also known as al-Naqid and al-Bada (d. 284 AH) . In scholarly literature, it is often cited under alternative titles, including Tarikh Ibn Main: Riwayat Ibn Tahman and Tarikh Ibn Main: Riwayat al-Daqqaq .
The surviving chain of transmission traces back through Abu Bakr Mukram ibn Ahmad ibn Mukram al-Bazzaz from Yazid ibn al-Haytham, down through figures including Abu Tahir al-Silafi (who read it in Alexandria in 573 AH) to Abu Sabir Hamid ibn al-Qasim ibn Ruzbah al-Ahwazi in 611 AH .
Content and Method
The work records Ibn Ma'in's direct pronouncements regarding hadith transmitters, their reliability, and their sources. It contains assessments in narrator criticism (al-jarh wa-l-ta'dil), differentiating trustworthy transmitters from weak ones and noting shifts in evaluation (such as describing Abu Ma'shar al-Bara' as weak at one time and acceptable at another) . It also includes comments on the provenance of specific compilations—such as noting that Sufyan ibn Uyayna's tafsir derived from Muqatil ibn Sulayman and Ibn Jurayj's from Harb—as well as select ethical aphorisms and reports heard by Ibn Ma'in .
Editions
The work was edited by Ahmad Muhammad Nur Sayf and published in Mecca by the Center for Scientific Research and Revival of Islamic Heritage (in conjunction with Dar al-Ma'mun li-l-Turath in Damascus) .
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