Sunan Ibn Majah
- Author died
- 273 AH
- Editions
- t Hadi · tahqiq Abd al-Baqi · +1
Sunan Ibn Majah is a collection of Prophetic hadith compiled by Ibn Majah (209–273 AH / 824–887 CE) and organized by chapters of jurisprudence (). It is widely regarded as the sixth of the major canonical hadith compendia ().
Composition and Structure
The book is structured according to legal themes, covering Islamic rulings, ethics, and ritual obligations (). According to the author's student and primary transmitter, Abu al-Hasan Ali ibn Ibrahim ibn Salamah al-Qattan, the compilation contains 32 books (kutub), 1,500 chapters (abwab), and approximately 4,000 hadiths ().
In the modern enumeration established by Muhammad Fu'ad Abd al-Baqi, the work contains 37 books (excluding the introductory treatise), 1,515 chapters, and 4,341 hadiths (). Of these, 3,002 hadiths are shared with some or all of the other five canonical collections, while 1,339 are unique additions (zawa'id) (). The collection also contains several three-narrator chains (thulathiyyat) ().
Inclusion in the Six Books
Early hadith scholars originally recognized five core canonical texts: Sahih al-Bukhari, Sahih Muslim, Sunan Abi Dawud, Sunan al-Nasa'i, and Jami' al-Tirmidhi (). Ibn Tahir al-Maqdisi (d. 507 AH) was the first scholar to append Sunan Ibn Majah to the Five Books in his treatises Atraf al-Kutub al-Sittah and Shurut al-A'immah al-Sittah (). He was followed by Abd al-Ghani al-Maqdisi (d. 600 AH) in his biographical dictionary al-Kamal fi Asma' al-Rijal, after which this six-book canon became standard among later scholars ().
Scholars selected Sunan Ibn Majah as the sixth collection rather than Malik ibn Anas's al-Muwatta' not due to superior authenticity, but because of its abundant unique hadiths, whereas most narrations in al-Muwatta' were already present in the other five works (). Other scholars proposed alternative six-book configurations: Razin al-Saraqusti (d. 535 AH) and Ibn al-Athir (d. 606 AH) included al-Muwatta' as the sixth, while Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani suggested Sunan al-Darimi on account of its relative scarcity of weak transmitters and anomalous narrations ().
Scholarly Assessment and Methodology
Scholars praised the collection for its clear arrangement, concise chapter headings reflecting legal understanding, and lack of repetition (). However, it occupies the lowest rank among the four Sunan because its compiler did not restrict himself to authentic and good narrations, recording reports from unknown transmitters and individuals accused of dishonesty (). Al-Dhahabi noted that its standing was lowered by its inclusion of rejected (manakir) and a small number of fabricated (mawdu'at) reports ().
Al-Mizzi maintained that the majority of narrations unique to Ibn Majah are weak, though Ibn Hajar qualified this by stating that many of these solitary narrations are authentic and that weakness often pertains to specific chains rather than the texts as a whole (). A report transmitted by Ibn Tahir claims that Abu Zur'ah al-Razi examined the work and found only around thirty flawed hadiths; Ibn Hajar and al-Dhahabi cautioned that this transmission is severed (munqati'), or that Abu Zur'ah only meant utterly discarded reports or had reviewed only a portion of the manuscript, given that he declared numerous reports in it to be defective in his other critiques ().
Commentaries and Related Works
In his study of the collection's 1,339 unique additions, Misbah al-Zujajah fi Zawa'id Ibn Majah, Ahmad ibn Abi Bakr al-Busiri (d. 840 AH) categorized 428 as having authentic (sahih) chains, 199 as good (hasan), 613 as weak (da'if), and 99 as very frail, rejected, or fabricated (). Ibn al-Mulaqqin dedicated an eight-volume commentary to these unique additions titled Ma Tamassu ilayhi al-Hajah 'ala Sunan Ibn Majah ().
Several scholars composed commentaries on the entire work, including:
- Al-Dibajah by Kamal al-Din al-Damiri (d. 808 AH), left incomplete in five volumes ().
- Misbah al-Zujajah 'ala Sunan Ibn Majah by Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti (d. 911 AH) ().
- A commentary by Ibrahim ibn Muhammad al-Halabi (d. 841 AH) ().
- A marginal commentary (hashiyah) by Muhammad ibn Abd al-Hadi al-Sindi (d. 1138 AH) ().
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