Rusum al-Tahdith fi Ulum al-Hadith
- Author died
- 732 AH
- Editions
- Dār Ibn Ḥazm
Rusum al-Tahdith fi Ulum al-Hadith (The Forms of Narration in the Sciences of Hadith) is a treatise on Hadith nomenclature and methodology by the Shafi'i scholar and Qur'anic master Burhan al-Din Ibrahim ibn Umar al-Jabari (d. 732 AH / 1332 CE) . It is an abridgment and critical reworking of Ibn al-Salah's foundational work on Hadith sciences .
Background and Methodology
In his introduction, al-Jabari explains that because the Prophetic Sunnah constitutes an essential basis for legal rulings, jurists require a clear understanding of Hadith classifications . While earlier hadith masters composed specialized works for students, Ibn al-Salah's compilation stood out as the central synthesis of the field . Al-Jabari sought to distill its core discussions into a concise manual, refining its structure and augmenting the material with jurisprudential adjustments (tanaqih fiqhiyyah), legal-theoretical preferences (tarajih usuliyyah), and dialectical observations (talawih jadaliyyah) .
The text covers various standard branches of Hadith methodology, defining categories such as the sound (sahih), the fair (hasan), the weak (da'if), the supported (musnad), the continuous (muttasil), the attributed (marfu'), the stopped (mawquf), the severed (maqtu'), the hurried (mursal), and the broken (munqati') . Al-Jabari presents definitions concisely, often evaluating differing scholastic opinions on contentious issues such as the probative value of mursal narrations and the conditions for chains using 'an (mu'an'an) .
Transmission and Abridgment
The book circulated among al-Jabari's students during his lifetime. The Andalusian scholar Ibn Jabir al-Wadi Ashi received the work directly from al-Jabari via formal handover (munawalah) and authorization (ijazah) . Another recorded transmission includes a reading by Yahya ibn Ibrahim al-Ghazzy al-Shafi'i before the author at Hebron .
Al-Jabari also composed an even shorter condensation of the work, titled Ma'alim Usul al-Tahdith fi Ikhtisar Rusum al-Tahdith (also referred to as Ma'alim Usul al-Hadith) .
Modern Editions
The work has been published in modern scholarly editions, including:
- An edition edited by Muhammad al-Muntasir al-Zamzami al-Kattani, published by Dar al-Basa'ir .
- An edition edited by Ibrahim ibn Sharif al-Mili, published by Dar Ibn Hazm in 1421 AH (248 pages) .
- An academic edition and study prepared as a master's thesis by Ahmad Lutfi Fath Allah at the University of Jordan in 1994 .
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