Usul al-Fiqh - Ayat wa Ahadith al-Ahkam min Amali al-Ustadh al-Imam
- Author died
- 1359 AH
- Editions
- Dar al-Ba'th li-l-Tiba'ah wa-l-Nashr
Usul al-Fiqh – Ayat wa Ahadith al-Ahkam min Amali al-Ustadh al-Imam is a collection of legal texts and hadiths compiled from the classroom dictations (amali) of the Algerian reformist scholar Abd al-Hamid ibn Badis (d. 1359 AH / 1940 CE) . It gathers the scriptural foundations—both Quranic verses (ayat al-ahkam) and prophetic traditions (ahadith al-ahkam)—that underpin Islamic jurisprudence across major chapters of law .
Composition and Context
The text originated as classroom lessons and dictations delivered by Ibn Badis to his third-year students at the Green Mosque (al-Jami' al-Akhdar) in Constantine during the 1933–1935 academic period . The material was recorded in full by his student Muhammad al-Hasan Fudala', who preserved his handwritten notebook from those sessions for fifty years before preparing it for publication . It belonged to a series of dictation-based curricula taught by Ibn Badis to nurture his students' understanding directly through foundational sources, alongside his dictations on theology (al-Aqa'id al-Islamiyya), education (al-Tarbiyya bi-al-Qur'an wa al-Sunnah), and Arabic literature .
Following the completion of this course, Ibn Badis transitioned the cohort to hadith terminology (mustalah al-hadith) and later incorporated pre-Islamic poetry, specifically the mu'allaqa of Zuhayr ibn Abi Sulma, at the students' request .
Method and Structure
The primary objective of these dictations was to anchor legal rulings directly in the Quran and the Sunnah, instilling legal reasoning (istidlal) in students and freeing them from blind adherence (taqlid) . Although Ibn Badis taught standard Maliki manuals of substantive law—including Khalil ibn Ishaq al-Jundi's al-Mukhtasar, Ahmad al-Dardir's Aqrab al-Masalik, and Ibn Abi Zayd al-Qayrawani's al-Risala—he regularly referred their derived branches (furu') back to their scriptural origins (usul) .
The work is organized systematically by traditional legal subjects, beginning with ritual purity (Kitab al-Taharah) . Each section opens by citing the relevant Quranic verses governing the topic, followed by the corresponding prophetic traditions with their source attributions, covering specific rulings such as purifying water, ablution (wudu), and wiping over footwear (al-mash 'ala al-khuffayn) .
Publication
The work was prepared and annotated by Muhammad al-Hasan Fudala', who verified its textual citations and hadiths, completing his editorial work in Algiers in Muharram 1404 AH (October 1983 CE) . It was published in Constantine by Dar al-Ba'th in 1405 AH / 1985 CE as the first volume in the series Min Athar al-Haraka al-'Ilmiyya bi-al-Jami' al-Akhdar ("From the Heritage of the Scholarly Movement at the Green Mosque") .
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