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Four Schools / Founder
An extended study of his lineage, rank, journeys, legal formation, final illness, peer testimonies, and the vastness of his knowledge.
School
Shāfiʿiyyah
Legacy
Mujaddid of the second century, author of al-Risālah and al-Umm, and the Imām through whom Ahl al-Hadīth and Ahl ar-Raʾy were reconciled.
Biography sections
Choose a chapter to read the study in focused sections.
Muḥammad ibn ʾIdrīs ash-Shāfiʿī
How the scholars of his age described him, how he taught, how he divided his night, and the arc of his journeys.
Among the most remarkable testimonies to the station of ash-Shāfiʿī is that every scholar who bore witness to his greatness had themselves seen the greatest scholars of their age, making their declarations not the words of the uninformed but of those most qualified to judge. We present their testimonies here in turn.
Imām ʾAyyūb ibn Suwayd (d. 202 AH), who had seen Imām al-ʾAwzāʿī, Imām Mālik and Imām Sufyān ath-Thawrī, said upon seeing ash-Shāfiʿī, "I never thought that I would live long enough to see a man like him, and I certainly did not see anyone like him."1
Imām Musʿab ibn ʿAbdullāh az-Zubayrī (d. 236 AH), who had seen Imām Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, Imām Mālik, Imām ʿAbdullāh ibn Musʿab and other foremost scholars of Madīnah, used to say, "My eyes never saw anyone similar to him."2
Imām ʾAbū ʿUbayd al-Qāsim ibn Sallām (d. 224 AH), who had seen Imām Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, Imām ibn al-Mubārak, Imām Yahyā al-Qattān, Imām ʾAhmad ibn Hanbal and Imām Wakīʿ ibn al-Jarrāh, said, "I certainly never saw anyone more intelligent, more pious, more eloquent and more noble in opinion than ash-Shāfiʿī."3
Imām Yahyā ibn Saʿīd al-Qattān (d. 198 AH), who had seen Imām Mālik, Imām Sufyān ath-Thawrī, Imām Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah and Imām ʾAbū Hanīfah, said after reading al-Risālah of ash-Shāfiʿī, "I have not seen anyone more intelligent nor more knowledgeable in Fiqh than him."4
Imām Yahyā ibn Hassān (d. 208 AH), who had seen Imām Hammād ibn Salamah, Imām Mālik, Imām Layth ibn Saʿd and Imām ibn al-Mājashūn, often used to say, "I did not see anyone like ash-Shāfiʿī."5
Imām Yahyā ibn ʾAktham (d. 242 AH), who had seen Imām ibn al-Mubārak, Imām Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah and Imām ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ad-Darāwardī, said, "I did not see anyone more intelligent than ash-Shāfiʿī, he had a great mind."6
Imām ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAbd al-Hakam (d. 214 AH), who had seen Imām Layth ibn Saʿd, Imām Mālik, Imām ibn Wahb and Imām Muslim ibn Khālid al-Zanjī, said, "I did not see anyone similar to this man."7
Imām ʾAbū Thawr (d. 240 AH), who had seen Imām ʾAhmad, Imām Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, Imām Wakīʿ ibn al-Jarrāh and Imām ibn ʿUlayyah, said, "Neither did I see anyone like ash-Shāfiʿī, nor did ash-Shāfiʿī see anyone like himself." He also said that he did not leave Bidʿah until he saw him.8
Imām ʾAhmad ibn Hanbal (d. 241 AH), who had seen Imām Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, Imām ʾAbū Yūsuf, Imām Muhammad ibn al-Hasan ash-Shaybānī, Imām ʾIshāq ibn Rāhūyah and Imām ibn Mahdī, said, "I did not see anyone more knowledgeable in the Fiqh of the Qurʾān than this young Qurayshī."9 He also said, "Indeed, Allāh blessed us with ash-Shāfiʿī. We would study the words of the people and write their books until he came to us. When we heard his speech, we knew that he was more knowledgeable than others; we sat with him for days and nights, and we saw nothing but all goodness from him."10
Imām az-Zaʿfarānī (d. 260 AH), who had seen Imām Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah, Imām Wakīʿ ibn al-Jarrāh and Imām ʾAhmad, said, "I did not see anyone more virtuous, more generous, more kind-hearted, more pious and more knowledgeable than him."11
Imām al-Karābīsī (d. 248 AH), who had seen Imām ʾAhmad, Imām Yazīd ibn Hārūn and Imām Yaʿqūb ibn ʾIbrāhīm, said, "Neither did I see anyone like ash-Shāfiʿī, nor did ash-Shāfiʿī see anyone like himself."12
Imām Muhammad ibn ʿAbdullāh ibn ʿAbd al-Hakam (d. 268 AH), who had seen his father, Imām ʾAyyūb ibn Suwayd and Imām ibn ʾAbī Fudayk, said, "Neither did I see anyone like ash-Shāfiʿī, nor did ash-Shāfiʿī see anyone like himself."13
Imām al-Buwaytī (d. 231 AH) said, "The scholars from Ahl al-Hadīth and Ahl al-ʿArabiyyah in ʿIrāq used to say that they had never seen anyone like ash-Shāfiʿī." And it is surely not hidden from anyone that ʿIrāq had produced many major scholars during that time.14
Imām ʿAbd al-Mālik ibn Hishām an-Nahwī, after a discourse with ash-Shāfiʿī, said, "I did not think that Allāh ﷻ had created someone like ash-Shāfiʿī." He also used to call him the Hujjah in the Arabic language.15
Even those from Ahl al-Bidʿah of his time acknowledged his superiority. Bishr al-Marīsī (d. 218 AH), who had seen Imām ʾAbū Yūsuf, Imām Sufyān ibn ʿUyaynah and Imām Hammād ibn Salamah, said that he never saw anyone like ash-Shāfiʿī.16
Imām ʾIshāq ibn Rāhūyah (d. 238 AH), who had seen Imām ʾAhmad, Imām ibn Mahdī and Imām ibn al-Madīnī, said that he did not see anyone having more mastery of Fiqh, Hadīth, Qurʾān and language than ash-Shāfiʿī, and declared, "My eyes had never seen the likes of him."17
Shaykh ʾAhmad Shākir (d. 1377 AH) said, "If it were permissible for a scholar to do Taqlīd of another scholar, then to me the foremost would have been ash-Shāfiʿī, for I believe, without any exaggeration, that no one like this man appeared among the scholars of Islām in Fiqh."18
May Allāh ﷻ be pleased with them all and with all the scholars of Islām.
Imām ar-Rabīʿ ibn Sulaymān narrated, "Ash-Shāfiʿī used to begin his teaching circle after he prayed the Fajr, and that is when the scholars of the Qurʾān would come to him. Before the mid-morning, they would leave. Afterwards, the scholars of Hadīth would come and ask him about the interpretation and explanation of the Hadīths. When it was mid-morning, they would leave and the arrangements were made for critical study and discourses. When it was noon, they would leave and the scholars of Arabic language, grammar and poetry would come, who would remain there until the middle of the day approached, after which they would leave. May Allāh ﷻ have mercy on him!"19
That a single man served as the foremost reference point for scholars of the Qurʾān, scholars of Hadīth, scholars of Fiqh and scholars of the Arabic language simultaneously, each group finding in him what they could not find elsewhere, is perhaps the clearest single illustration of the breadth and depth of his knowledge. It is not hidden from anyone that ʿIrāq, the Hijāz and Egypt were teeming with major scholars during his lifetime, yet it was to his circle that they came.
Imām ar-Rabīʿ ibn Sulaymān also narrated, "Ash-Shāfiʿī would divide his night into three parts: in the first part he would write, in the second part he would pray Salāh, and in the third part he would sleep."
Imām adh-Dhahabī commented upon this, "Each of his three actions was worship due to the intentions behind them."20
Ash-Shāfiʿī was born in 150 AH in Ghazzah, where he remained for two years before his mother took him to Makkah in 152 AH. He remained there for eleven years, then departed for Madīnah in 163 AH, visiting Makkah from time to time throughout this period. He remained in Madīnah for sixteen years, then returned to Makkah in 179 AH, during which same period he also travelled to Yemen. He remained there for one year before moving to ʿIrāq in 184 AH, where he stayed for two years, then returned to Makkah in 186 AH. He remained there for eight years before departing for Baghdad in 195 AH, where he stayed for two years, then returned to Makkah in 197 AH. He remained there for less than a year before returning to Baghdad in 198 AH, where he stayed for one year, then made his final journey to Egypt in 199 AH, where he remained for five years until his death overtook him at the age of fifty-four.21
During the span of fifty-four years, and in truth during only the last four to five years of his life spent in Egypt, our Imām left behind him such a legacy and such an impact upon Islamic history that he is considered the Mujaddid of the second Islamic century by unanimous agreement. In those final years alone he authored Kitāb al-Umm and al-Risālah al-Jadīdah, established his Qawl al-Jadīd, and produced a body of work that scholars of every subsequent generation have drawn upon. May Allāh ﷻ have mercy on him.
Al-Ihtijāj bi ash-Shāfiʿī, 1/83. ↩
Al-Ihtijāj bi ash-Shāfiʿī, 1/84. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/251. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/243. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/251. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/263. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/247. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/247. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/256. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/259. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/265. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/266. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/272. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/271. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/271. ↩
Al-Ihtijāj bi ash-Shāfiʿī, 1/85. ↩
Tārīkh Dimashq, 51/330. ↩
His Tahqīq to al-Risālah, 1/5-6. ↩
Manāqib ash-Shāfiʿī li al-Bayhaqī, 2/285. ↩
Siyar ʾAʿlām an-Nubalāʾ, 10/35. ↩
ʿAbqariyyat al-Imām ash-Shāfiʿī, 1/41. ↩