Nazrat al-Mustashriqin li al-Sunna al-Nabawiyya al-Mutahhara (Shubuhat wa Rudud)
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- Nazrat al-Mustashriqin li al-Sunna al-Nabawiyya al-Mutahhara (Shubuhat wa Rudud)
Nazrat al-Mustashriqin li al-Sunna al-Nabawiyya al-Mutahhara (Shubuhat wa Rudud) (The Orientalists' View of the Purified Prophetic Sunnah: Doubts and Responses) is a treatise authored by Muthanna al-Zaydi, the general supervisor of the Islamic educational platform al-Ilm al-Shar‘i, dedicated to examining and refuting Western Orientalist claims and criticisms directed against the Prophetic Sunnah .
Background and Scope
The author frames the Orientalist critique of the Sunnah as a calculated effort to challenge the second primary source of Islamic legislation in order to facilitate skepticism toward the Qur'an itself . Al-Zaydi argues that Western academic discourse has heavily promoted works critical of Islamic legal foundations, noting that institutions such as the University of London and the University of Cambridge historically barred dissertations aimed at critiquing Joseph Schacht’s The Origins of Muhammadan Jurisprudence, and that a faculty member at the University of Oxford was dismissed after summarizing and refuting Schacht's arguments .
Key Themes and Refutations
The treatise is structured around core thematic headings addressing specific Orientalist contentions:
- The Notion of "Sacred Custom" (Shubhat al-‘Adah al-Muqaddasa): The work examines the theory advanced by Ignaz Goldziher—and echoed by David Samuel Margoliouth and Joseph Schacht—that the Sunnah does not originate from divine guidance through the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, but rather represents pre-Islamic Arab customs, prevailing social norms (al-a‘raf al-sa'ida), and the retrospective sanctification of ancient traditions . Al-Zaydi counters this by demonstrating that obedience in Islam is commanded directly toward the Prophet ﷺ in numerous Qur'anic verses (such as يَاأَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا أَطِيعُوا اللَّهَ وَأَطِيعُوا الرَّسُولَ [al-Nisa': 59]), rather than toward inherited customs . He corroborates this with historical evidence, including Abdullah ibn Umar's prioritization of the Prophetic Sunnah over standard practice regarding Hajj al-Tamattu‘ .
- Early Inscription and Compilation (Tadwin): The text rebuts the allegation that the Sunnah underwent post-prophetic distortion or that it went unrecorded until late periods . The author clarifies the scholarly reconciliation between narrations forbidding and allowing the recording of Hadith, explaining that early prohibitions were aimed at preventing the mixing of Hadith with the Qur'an or discouraging overreliance on written notes among those with strong memories . He highlights individual written compilations produced during the Prophet's ﷺ lifetime, including the al-Sahifah al-Sadiqah of Abdullah ibn Amr ibn al-As (containing 1,000 narrations), as well as written documents preserved by Sa'd ibn 'Ubadah, Sa'd ibn Mu'adh, Amr ibn Hazm, and Ali ibn Abi Talib .
- The Continuous Chain of Transmission (al-Isnad): Under the heading "Two Chains... One is Broken" (Silsilatan... Ihdahuma Munqati‘ah), the author contrasts the unbroken chain of Hadith transmission with the groundless assertions of critics . He defines the components of Hadith transmission (isnad and matn), references classical maxims on the necessity of chains from figures such as Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak, al-Shafi'i, Muhammad ibn Sirin, and Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, and outlines the rigorous methodological rules established by Hadith scholars for scrutinizing narrators and texts—including criteria for uprightness (‘adalah), retention, and textual irregularities . The work also cites Western assessments acknowledging the uniqueness of the biographical evaluation of transmitters (ilm al-rijal), quoting the German orientalist Aloys Sprenger’s remark that Muslims documented the biographies of 500,000 men .
Sources
The author draws upon classical Islamic texts and modern apologetic literature, concluding the treatise with a list of principal references that includes Sarih al-Sunna by al-Tabari, al-Sunna wa Makanatuha fi al-Tashri‘ al-Islami by Mustafa al-Siba'i, al-Mustashriqun wa al-Sunna al-Nabawiyya by Sa‘d al-Marsafi, Hujjiyyat al-Sunna by Husayn al-Shawat, Musnad Ahmad, and studies on Orientalism by Mahmud Zaqzuq, Ahmad Abd al-Hamid Ghurab, and Mazin Mutabaqqani .
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