Musnad Abi Hanifa Riwayat al-Haskafi

Musnad Abi Hanifa: Riwayat al-Haskafi (The Hadith Collection of Abu Hanifa according to the Transmission of al-Haskafi) is a collection of hadiths narrated by Abu Hanifa (80–150 AH / 699–767 CE), abridged by the Hanafi jurist and judge Sadr al-Din Musa ibn Zakariyya al-Haskafi (d. 650 AH / 1252 CE) Sharh Musnad Abi Hanifa+1.

Background and Compilation

Unlike contemporary or later hadith compilers who authored their own collections, Abu Hanifa did not assemble a dedicated musnad during his lifetime; rather, he dictated legal rulings along with supporting prophetic narrations and reports from the Successors (tabi'un) to his students al-Maktaba al-Islamiyya+1. His students and later hadith scholars compiled these narrations into independent compilations organized by narrator or topical arrangement al-Maktaba al-Islamiyya+1.

Among these works was a large compilation assembled by Abu Muhammad Abd Allah ibn Muhammad ibn Ya'qub al-Harithi al-Bukhari (d. 340 AH / 951–952 CE), who arranged Abu Hanifa's narrations under his teachers al-Fikr al-Sami fi Tarikh…+1. Sadr al-Din al-Haskafi, a Hanafi judge originally from Hisn Kayfa who served as judge in Amid and died in Cairo, abridged al-Harithi's extensive work, producing the concise recension known as Riwayat al-Haskafi Diwan al-Sunna - Qism al-…+2.

Commentaries and Rearrangements

The recension gained widespread attention among Hanafi scholars:

• Mulla Ali al-Qari (d. 1014 AH / 1606 CE) authored a widely circulated commentary on it, titled Sharh Musnad Abi Hanifa (also referred to as Sanad al-Anam fi Sharh Musnad al-Imam) Diwan al-Sunna - Qism al-…+1.
• Muhammad 'Abid al-Sindi al-Madani (d. 1257 AH / 1841 CE) rearranged al-Haskafi's text according to thematic legal chapters (abwab al-fiqh) and wrote an extensive four-volume commentary titled al-Mawahib al-Latifah fi Sharh Musnad Abi Hanifa al-Maktaba al-Islamiyya+1.
• Muhammad Hasan al-Sanbali al-Hindi (d. 1305 AH / 1887–1888 CE; and reported as 1350 AH) also composed a commentary on this transmission al-Maktaba al-Islamiyya+1.

Editions

The work was printed in India in 1300 AH Talqih al-Uqul fi Fadail …. It was also published in Istanbul in 1309 AH (1891–1892 CE) on the margins of al-Bukhari's al-Adab al-Mufrad, edited by the Mufti of Medina, Abd al-Salam al-Daghistani al-Fikr al-Sami fi Tarikh…. The text has also been printed alongside Mulla Ali al-Qari's commentary, and edited separately by modern scholars such as Abd al-Rahman Hasan Mahmud al-Maktaba al-Islamiyya+1.