Dāwūd bin ʿAlī bin Khalaf al-Ẓāhirī ( ar, داود بن علي بن خلف الظاهري) (c. 815–883/4 CE, 199-269/270 AH) was a Persian Muslim scholar, jurist, and

theologian Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

during the

Islamic Golden Age The Islamic Golden Age was a period of cultural, economic, and scientific flourishing in the history of Islam, traditionally dated from the 8th century to the 14th century. This period is traditionally understood to have begun during the reign ...

, specialized in the study of Islamic law (''sharīʿa'') and the fields of

hermeneutics Hermeneutics () is the theory and methodology of interpretation, especially the interpretation of biblical texts, wisdom literature, and philosophical texts. Hermeneutics is more than interpretative principles or methods used when immediate ...

, biographical evaluation, and historiography of early Islam. He is widely regarded as the founder of the Ẓāhirī school of thought (''madhhab''), Joseph Schacht
Dāwūd b. ʿAlī b. Khalaf
Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. Brill Online, 2013. Reference. 9 January 2013Mohammad Sharif Khan and Mohammad Anwar Saleem, ''Muslim Philosophy And Philosophers'', pg. 34.

New Delhi New Delhi (, , ''Naī Dillī'') is the capital of India and a part of the National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, Parliament Hous ...

: Ashish Publishing House, 1994. the fifth school of thought in Sunnī Islam, characterized by its strict adherence to literalism and reliance on the outward ('' ẓāhir'') meaning of expressions in the

Quran The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation from God. It is organized in 114 chapters (pl.: , ...

and ''ḥadīth'' literature; the consensus (''ijmāʿ'') of the first generation of Muhammad's closest companions (''ṣaḥāba''), for sources of Islamic law (''sharīʿa''); and rejection of analogical deduction ('' qiyās'') and societal custom or knowledge ('' urf''), used by other schools of Islamic jurisprudence. He was a celebrated, if not controversial, figure during his time,Dr. Mohammad Omar Farooq
The Riba-Interest Equivalence
, June 2006 being referred to in Islamic historiographical texts as "the scholar of the era."

Al-Dhahabi Shams ad-Dīn adh-Dhahabī (), also known as Shams ad-Dīn Abū ʿAbdillāh Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿUthmān ibn Qāymāẓ ibn ʿAbdillāh at-Turkumānī al-Fāriqī ad-Dimashqī (5 October 1274 – 3 February 1348) was an Islamic historia ...

, , v.13, Entry 55, pg.97–108

Biography

Early life and family

Dāwūd al-Ẓāhirī's exact place of birth is not entirely clear to historians. It is disputed if he was from Kufa or Isfahan. Al-Ẓāhirī's father was

Arab The Arabs (singular: Arab; singular ar, عَرَبِيٌّ, DIN 31635: , , plural ar, عَرَب, DIN 31635: , Arabic pronunciation: ), also known as the Arab people, are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in Western Asia, ...

whereas his mother was most likely Persian. Some attribute his origin to the

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

ian city of Isfahan,

Chiragh Ali Moulví Cherágh Ali (1844-1895) (also spelled Chirágh) was an Indian Muslim scholar of the late 19th century. As a colleague of Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan he made a contribution to the school of Muslim Modernists and presented reformative thinking ...

, The Proposed Political, Legal and Social Reforms. Taken from Modernist Islam 1840–1940: A Sourcebook, pg. 281. Edited by

Charles Kurzman Charles Kurzman is a Professor of Sociology at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill who specializes in Middle East and Islamic studies. Education and employment After completing his B.A. at Harvard University in 1986, he completed his M.A. ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print book ...

, 2002.Encyclopedia of Islam, vol. II, C-G, pg. 182. Eds. Bernard Lewis, Charles Pellat and Joseph Schacht. Assist. J. Burton-Page, C. Dumont and V.L. Menage. Leiden: Brill Publishers, 1971. Photomechanical print. and he has also been referred to as "Dāwūd al-Iṣfahānī". The Muslim historians and scholars Ibn Ḥazm and

al-Dhahabī Shams ad-Dīn adh-Dhahabī (), also known as Shams ad-Dīn Abū ʿAbdillāh Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿUthmān ibn Qāymāẓ ibn ʿAbdillāh at-Turkumānī al-Fāriqī ad-Dimashqī (5 October 1274 – 3 February 1348) was an Islamic historia ...

, alongside the American scholar of Islamic studies Christopher Melchert and others, however, held that this attribution was due to the fact that al-Ẓāhirī's mother was a native of Isfahan, and that he was actually of Iraqi origins, having been born in the city of Kufa.

Devin J. Stewart Devin J. Stewart is a professor of Islamic studies and Arabic language and literature. His research interests include Islamic law, the Qur'an, Islamic schools and branches and varieties of Arabic.Bernard G. Weiss Bernard G. Weiss (10 August 1933 – 8 February 2018) was a professor of languages and literature at the University of Utah. He has an extensive publication record and is recognized as one of the foremost scholars in Islamic law, Islamic theology ...

. Pg. 114.

Leiden Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration w ...

: 2002. Brill Publishers. Christopher Melchert, The Formation of the Sunni Schools of Law: 9th–10th Centuries C.E., pg. 179. Leiden: Brill Publishers, 1997. The Hungarian scholar of Islamic studies Ignác Goldziher agreed that al-Ẓāhirī was born in Kufa, but attributed the confusion regarding his place of birth due to his father's role in the civil service of the Abbasid caliph al-Maʿmūn in Kashan, a smaller city near Isfahan. Ignác Goldziher, The Zahiris: Their Doctrine and Their History, Brill Classics in Islam Volume 3, pg.27, Brill: Boston, 2008Dr. Omar A. Farrukh
ZaharismA History of Muslim Philosophy
Ahlul Bayt Digital Islamic Library Project

Education

During his formative years, al-Ẓāhirī relocated from Kufa to

Baghdad Baghdad (; ar, بَغْدَاد , ) is the capital of Iraq and the second-largest city in the Arab world after Cairo. It is located on the Tigris near the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon and the Sassanid Persian capital of Ctesiphon ...

and studied the prophetic traditions (''ḥadīth'') and

Quranic exegesis Tafsir ( ar, تفسير, tafsīr ) refers to exegesis, usually of the Quran. An author of a ''tafsir'' is a ' ( ar, مُفسّر; plural: ar, مفسّرون, mufassirūn). A Quranic ''tafsir'' attempts to provide elucidation, explanation, in ...

(''tafsīr'') with a number of notable Muslim scholars of the time, including Abū Thawr, Yaḥyā ibn Maʿīn, and Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal. His study under renowned figures of traditionalist theology (''Atharī'') was in contrast to the views of his father, who was a follower of the less orthodox

Ḥanafī The Hanafi school ( ar, حَنَفِية, translit=Ḥanafiyah; also called Hanafite in English), Hanafism, or the Hanafi fiqh, is the oldest and one of the four traditional major Sunni schools (maddhab) of Islamic Law (Fiqh). It is named afte ...

school.Goldziher, pg.28 Indian Muslim reformist

has suggested that Ẓāhirī's school was, like that of Ibn Ḥanbal, actually a direct reaction to the Ḥanafī system of jurisprudence. Toward the end of his education, al-Ẓāhirī traveled to Nishapur in

Greater Khorasan Greater Khorāsān,Dabeersiaghi, Commentary on Safarnâma-e Nâsir Khusraw, 6th Ed. Tehran, Zavvâr: 1375 (Solar Hijri Calendar) 235–236 or Khorāsān ( pal, Xwarāsān; fa, خراسان ), is a historical eastern region in the Iranian Plat ...

in order to complete his studies with Isḥāq ibn Rāhwayh, at the time considered a champion of the traditionalist Sunnī philosophy. Ibn al-Jawzī noted that when studying with Ibn Rāhwayh, considered one of the most knowledgeable scholars in the

history of Islam The history of Islam concerns the political, social, economic, military, and cultural developments of the Islamic civilization. Most historians believe that Islam originated in Mecca and Medina at the start of the 7th century CE. Muslims re ...

, al-Ẓāhirī was willing to debate with Ibn Rāhwayh on religious topics, something no one else had ever dared to do.

Al-Khatib al-Baghdadi Abū Bakr Aḥmad ibn ʿAlī ibn Thābit ibn Aḥmad ibn Māhdī al-Shāfiʿī, commonly known as al-Khaṭīb al-Baghdādī ( ar, الخطيب البغدادي) or "the lecturer from Baghdad" (10 May 1002 – 5 September 1071; 392 AH-463 AH), wa ...

, The History of Baghdad, v.2, pg.370–371 Ibn Rāhwayh criticized Muḥammad ibn Idrīs al-Shāfiʿī , founder of the

Shāfiʿī The Shafii ( ar, شَافِعِي, translit=Shāfiʿī, also spelled Shafei) school, also known as Madhhab al-Shāfiʿī, is one of the four major traditional schools of religious law (madhhab) in the Sunnī branch of Islam. It was founded by ...

school, during one of his lessons; a debate ensued in which al-Ẓāhirī alleged that Ibn Rāhwayh didn't understand al-Shāfiʿī 's point on the topic of discussion, although Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, who was physically present for the debate, declared Ibn Rāhwayh to be the winner.Melchert, pg. 182. Al-Ẓāhirī was initially a follower of al-Shāfiʿī  in matters of jurisprudence, later branching off in terms of his principles,

Camilla Adang Camilla Adang is a Dutch associate professor of Islamic studies at Tel Aviv University in Tel Aviv, Israel. Biography Adang was born in Bussum, Netherlands in 1960.Gudrun Krämer Gudrun Krämer (born 1953) is a German scholar of Islamic history and co-editor of the third edition of the Encyclopaedia of Islam.Sabine Schmidtke.

: Brill Publishers, 2006. likely due to the influence of Ibn Rāhwayh. Describing him as "fanatical" both in his adherence to al-Shāfiʿī and to his own school later on, the ''

Encyclopedia of Islam The ''Encyclopaedia of Islam'' (''EI'') is an encyclopaedia of the academic discipline of Islamic studies published by Brill. It is considered to be the standard reference work in the field of Islamic studies. The first edition was published ...

'' describes the Ẓāhirīte school as a one-sided elaboration of Shāfiʿī te doctrine, taking the latter's rejection of juristic discretion as a principle in formulating law and applying it to all forms of human reasoning.

Teaching

After completing his studies in Nishapur, al-Ẓāhirī returned to Baghdad and began delivering his own lessons. While historians differ regarding his exact number of students, it is agreed that his following was large, with most estimates ranging between four and five hundred students who would regularly attend his '' majlis''.Abu Ishaq al-Faqih, Tabaqat al-Fuqaha, pg.92 His reputation spread outside of Baghdad, and even high-level scholars from elsewhere in the

Muslim world The terms Muslim world and Islamic world commonly refer to the Islamic community, which is also known as the Ummah. This consists of all those who adhere to the religious beliefs and laws of Islam or to societies in which Islam is practiced. I ...

began seeking al-Ẓāhirī's advice on religious topics of study. While his views were not universally accepted in his time, no attempts were made by his contemporaries to prevent him from granting religious verdicts, nor were they opposed to his teaching position. His most well-known students were his son Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn Dāwūd al-Iṣfahānī; ʿAbdullah, the son of Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal; and

al-Ṭabarī ( ar, أبو جعفر محمد بن جرير بن يزيد الطبري), more commonly known as al-Ṭabarī (), was a Muslim historian and scholar from Amol, Tabaristan. Among the most prominent figures of the Islamic Golden Age, al-Tabari ...

, Nifṭawayh, and Ruwaym. Al-Ẓāhirī was also the teacher of the Sunnī Muslim jurist ʿAbd Allāh al-Qaysī, who was responsible for spreading the Ẓāhirīte school in

Al-Andalus Al-Andalus translit. ; an, al-Andalus; ast, al-Ándalus; eu, al-Andalus; ber, ⴰⵏⴷⴰⵍⵓⵙ, label= Berber, translit=Andalus; ca, al-Àndalus; gl, al-Andalus; oc, Al Andalús; pt, al-Ândalus; es, al-Ándalus () was the M ...

Death

Al-Ẓāhirī died during the month of

Ramaḍān , type = islam , longtype = Religious , image = Ramadan montage.jpg , caption=From top, left to right: A crescent moon over Sarıçam, Turkey, marking the beginning of the Islamic month of Ramadan. Ramadan Quran reading in Bandar Torkaman, Iran. Co ...

in Baghdad, where he was buried. Encyclopaedia of Islam, vol II C-G, pg. 183. Eds. Bernard Lewis,

Charles Pellat Charles Pellat (28 September 1914, in Souk Ahras – 28 October 1992, in Bourg-la-Reine) was an Algerian-born French academic, historian, translator, and scholar of Oriental studies, specialized in Arab studies and Islamic studies. He was an edi ...

and Joseph Schacht. Assist. J. Burton-Page, C. dumont and V.L. Menage. Leiden: Brill Publishers, 1970. Photomechanical print. The exact year in which he died according to the

Gregorian calendar The Gregorian calendar is the calendar used in most parts of the world. It was introduced in October 1582 by Pope Gregory XIII as a modification of, and replacement for, the Julian calendar. The principal change was to space leap years d ...

is a matter of some dispute, with historians having stated both 883 CE and 884 CE.

Views

Creed

Al-Dhahabī Shams ad-Dīn adh-Dhahabī (), also known as Shams ad-Dīn Abū ʿAbdillāh Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad ibn ʿUthmān ibn Qāymāẓ ibn ʿAbdillāh at-Turkumānī al-Fāriqī ad-Dimashqī (5 October 1274 – 3 February 1348) was an Islamic historia ...

states that al-Ẓāhirī learnt '' kalām'' (dialectical theology) from Ibn Kullāb. Similarly to other Muslim scholars who were accused of sharing Ibn Kullāb's creed (''ʿaqīdah''), such as Ḥārit̲h̲ al-Muḥāsibī and Muḥammad al-Bukhārī, al-Ẓāhirī was repudiated by certain factions of ''ḥadīth'' authorities of his era, which accused him of holding particular creedal views relating to God's speech. Al-Ẓāhirī's understanding of the Islamic faith was described by al-Dhahabī's teacher, the Syrian Muslim historian and scholar Ibn Taymiyyah, as having been based upon the Atharī '' ʿaqīdah'', affirming the attributes of God without delving into their fundamental nature. Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Karīm al-Shahrastānī, a 12th-century Persian Muslim historian of religion and Ashʿarī

, classified al-Ẓāhirī along with Mālik ibn Anas (founder of the

Mālikī The ( ar, مَالِكِي) school is one of the four major schools of Islamic jurisprudence within Sunni Islam. It was founded by Malik ibn Anas in the 8th century. The Maliki school of jurisprudence relies on the Quran and hadiths as primary s ...

school), Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, and Sufyān al-Thawrī as early Sunnī Muslim scholars who rejected both

esoteric Western esotericism, also known as esotericism, esoterism, and sometimes the Western mystery tradition, is a term scholars use to categorise a wide range of loosely related ideas and movements that developed within Western society. These ideas ...

and anthropotheistic interpretations of God, but both Ibn Taymiyyah and al-Shahrastānī considered al-Ẓāhirī and his students, along with Mālik ibn Anas, al-Shāfiʿī , Ibn Ḥanbal, al-Thawrī, Abū Thawr, al-Māwardī, and their students to be the '' Ahl al-Ḥadīth'' ("people of the tradition"), as opposed to the '' Ahl al-Ra'y'' ("people of logic").

Analogical reasoning

This creed of not delving into the fundamental nature of the texts likely affected al-Ẓāhirī's views on literalism as well. While all the major figures of Islam were united upon the

and '' sunnah'' being the foremost sources of Islamic law (''sharīʿa''), al-Ẓāhirī held that these two sources must also be taken at the literal meanings and only applied in the particular circumstances which they described.J.H. Kramers and H.A.R. Gibb, ''Shorter Encyclopedia of Islam'', pg. 266. Ithaca:

Cornell University Press The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University; currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, making it the first university publishing enterprise in ...

, 1953. Al-Ẓāhirī rejected the principle of '' qiyās'', otherwise known as "analogical reasoning", as a method of deducing rulings in Islamic jurisprudence, regarding it as a form of ''

bidʻah In Islam, bid'ah ( ar, بدعة; en, innovation) refers to innovation in religious matters. Linguistically, the term means "innovation, novelty, heretical doctrine, heresy". In classical Arabic literature ('' adab''), it has been used as a f ...

'', which means "innovation" within the Islamic religion, which the Islamic prophet

Muhammad Muhammad ( ar, مُحَمَّد; 570 – 8 June 632 CE) was an Arab religious, social, and political leader and the founder of Islam. According to Islamic doctrine, he was a prophet divinely inspired to preach and confirm the mon ...

had not allowed. There are conflicting views regarding al-Ẓāhirī's position when the specific causality of a command or prohibition within the Quran or prophetic example was stated, due to different Muslim historians recording opposing statements. Some take the view that al-Ẓāhirī restricted the ruling to the incident or condition in which the causality arose, seeing that the causality provides a concrete law; others take the view that he would instead form a general principle in the event of a stated causality.

Consensus

Al-Ẓāhirī considered the scholarly consensus (''ijmāʿ'') to consist only of the opinions of the first generation of Muhammad's closest companions (''ṣaḥāba''), excluding all other generations after them from this definition.Goldziher, pg.34

Nature of the Quran

While al-Ẓāhirī at one time studied the ''ḥadīth'' literature under Aḥmad ibn Ḥanbal, he was later barred from study due to a dispute regarding the nature of the

; al-Ẓāhirī stated that the Quran was ''muhdath'' or "recently occurring", a stance of which Ibn Ḥanbal strongly disapproved. Ibn Taymiyyah, '' A Great Compilation of Fatwa'', v.5, pg.532 Ibn Taymiyyah, '' A Great Compilation of Fatwa'', v.6, pg.160–161 Even before that time, Ibn Ḥanbal had actually cut off contact with anyone who would study with or consult al-Ẓāhirī regarding religious matters, a habit which Ibn Ḥanbal started after witnessing Ẓāhirī's defense of al-Shāfiʿī against the attacks of Ibn Rāhwayh. The rumor regarding al-Ẓāhirī's statement about the Quran only added more fuel to the fire. The Syrian Muslim historian and scholar Ibn Taymiyyah said that the dispute was semantic in nature, arising from a confusion of al-Ẓāhirī's intended meaning—that God is unique and existent without peers (''tawḥīd'')—and the intended meaning of the

Jahmite Jahmī ( ar, جهمي) was a pejorative term used by early Islamic scholars to refer to the followers of Jahm ibn Safwan (d. 128/746). The four schools of jurisprudence (''fiqh'') reject the Jahmi belief and the fourth Imam, Ahmad ibn Hanbal was ...

and Muʿtazilite schools—that the Quran was created (''makhlūq''). Thus al-Ẓāhirī, Ibn Ḥanbal, al-Shāfiʿī, Mālik ibn Anas, al-Thawrī, Ibn Rāhwayh, al-Ṭabarī, Abū Ḥanīfa al-Nuʿmān, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Awzāʿī, Ibn Khuzaymah, ʿAbdullah ibn Mubārak, al-Dārimī, and Muḥammad al-Bukhārī—described by Ibn Taymiyyah as the leading figures of Islam at the time—all agreed that the Quran was uncreated, but a semantic misunderstanding arose when al-Ẓāhirī, al-Bukhārī, Muslim bin al-Ḥajjāj, and others used the phrase "recently occurring" to establish that God and the Quran, believed by Muslims to be the literal speech of God, are not the same thing, but rather that God's speech is an attribute. Ibn Taymiyyah, '' A Great Compilation of Fatwa'', v.12, pg.177 Modern-day scholarship has suggested, in light of the weakness in the chains of narration connecting the phrase "the Quran is recently occurring" to al-Ẓāhirī that he may have never made such a statement or held such a belief at all. Due to al-Ẓāhirī's denial of analogical reasoning and blind following—cornerstones in the other main Sunnī schools of thought—the students of those schools may have forged the statement and attributed it to al-Ẓāhirī as a means of pushing the common people away from him and his eponymous school of thought.Dr. Arif Khalil Abu Ubaida, Imam Dawud al-Zahiri and his Influence in Islamic Jurisprudence, pg.56 Abū ʿUbaida further supported his point by noting that al-Ẓāhirī and his students were actually severer in their opposition to the Muʿtazilite school and their belief that the Quran was created than Ibn Ḥanbal was, using harsh language in their written responses to such beliefs.

Usury

Al-Ẓāhirī held the view that regarding in-kind exchanges of goods, the forbidden type of

usury Usury () is the practice of making unethical or immoral monetary loans that unfairly enrich the lender. The term may be used in a moral sense—condemning taking advantage of others' misfortunes—or in a legal sense, where an interest rate is c ...

applies only to the six commodities specified by the Islamic prophet Muhammad:

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...

silver Silver is a chemical element with the symbol Ag (from the Latin ', derived from the Proto-Indo-European ''h₂erǵ'': "shiny" or "white") and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical ...

wheat Wheat is a grass widely cultivated for its seed, a cereal grain that is a worldwide staple food. The many species of wheat together make up the genus ''Triticum'' ; the most widely grown is common wheat (''T. aestivum''). The archaeologi ...

barley Barley (''Hordeum vulgare''), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains, particularly in Eurasia as early as 10,000 years ago. Globally 70% of barley p ...

, dates, and

salt Salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl), a chemical compound belonging to the larger class of salts; salt in the form of a natural crystalline mineral is known as rock salt or halite. Salt is present in vast quant ...

. Because al-Ẓāhirī rejected the use of analogical reasoning in jurisprudence, he disagreed with the majority view that the prohibition on excess gain in in-kind exchanges of all commodities, and did not consider such gains to be a form of interest. Had Muhammad intended to include commodities other than the above six, he could have done so; because he specified that usury was only prohibited in these six commodities and that Muslims were free to deal in other commodities as they liked, al-Ẓāhirī saw no basis for making an analogy to any other commodities.

Female dress

According to Muḥammad ash-Shawkānī, al-Ẓāhirī regarded the Muslim face veil to be recommended (''mustaḥabb'') rather than obligatory (''wajīb''), seeing that a woman's face could be uncovered in public but that all other body parts must be covered. Yusuf al-Qaradawi
Is Wearing the Niqāb Obligatory for Women?
, SuhaibWebb.com This was the position of Ibn Ḥanbal as well.

Traveling

If a Muslim begins traveling while

fasting Fasting is the abstention from eating and sometimes drinking. From a purely physiological context, "fasting" may refer to the metabolic status of a person who has not eaten overnight (see " Breakfast"), or to the metabolic state achieved after ...

(''ṣawm'') during the month of

, al-Ẓāhirī saw that the individual should break their fast on the day which they started their journey, a view upon which both Ibn Ḥanbal and Ibn Rāhwayh agreed. This was due to the Quranic verse allowing the traveler to skip the Ramaḍān fast and make it up when they complete their journey. If a Muslim did fast while traveling, they would still have to make up the days the skipped according to al-Ẓāhirī's view, as the verse wasn't merely an allowance for breaking the fast, but a command. Most Muslims shorten the length of their prayers while traveling as well. This "traveling" by which the Muslim shortens his prayers and breaks the fast is a topic of discussion among jurists as to its distance and duration. Al-Ẓāhirī saw that any form of traveling, regardless of distance or duration, allowed the individual to shorten their prayers.

Works

Al-Ẓāhirī was known as being a prolific author, and the Arab-Persian Muslim historian and

bibliographer Bibliography (from and ), as a discipline, is traditionally the academic study of books as physical, cultural objects; in this sense, it is also known as bibliology (from ). English author and bibliographer John Carter describes ''bibliography ...

Ibn al-Nadīm Abū al-Faraj Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq al-Nadīm ( ar, ابو الفرج محمد بن إسحاق النديم), also ibn Abī Ya'qūb Isḥāq ibn Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq al-Warrāq, and commonly known by the ''nasab'' (patronymic) Ibn al-Nadīm ...

was able to personally record the names of at least 157 of his written works, the majority on topics within

Islamic studies Islamic studies refers to the academic study of Islam, and generally to academic multidisciplinary "studies" programs—programs similar to others that focus on the history, texts and theologies of other religious traditions, such as Easter ...

. Some of these works were very long, and they covered both legal theory and all branches of positive law. He was also considered to be the first person to have written a

biography A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just the basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or c ...

of his former teacher, al-Shāfiʿī. Melchert cites Ibn al-Nadīm and Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr for his claim that Ẓāhirī's biography of al-Shāfiʿī was the not just the first biography about al-Shāfiʿī but the first major biography of any Muslim jurist ever written. None of these works have survived to the modern era in their entirety. Ibn al-Nadīm also mentions that after al-Shāfiʿī's treatise '' Al-Risala'', Ibn Ḥanbal and al-Ẓāhirī were the next major Sunnī Muslim scholars to author works on the

principles of Islamic jurisprudence Principles of Islamic jurisprudence, also known as ''uṣūl al-fiqh'' ( ar, أصول الفقه, lit. roots of fiqh), are traditional methodological principles used in Islamic jurisprudence (''fiqh'') for deriving the rulings of Islamic law (' ...

(''Uṣūl al-Fiqh''), with al-Ẓāhirī producing a number of works on various topics, including his rejection of blindly following the Islamic clergymen, the difference between general and specific verses of the Quran, the difference between succinct and detailed commands in the Islamic religion, and his views on and experiences with his former teacher, al-Shāfiʿī. Modern scholarship has pieced together chapter headings for al-Ẓāhirī's work on juristic principles from other early works in the following order: binding consensus, invalidity of blindly following the clergy, invalidity of analogical reasoning, traditions transmitted by single authorities, traditions which provide certainty, incontrovertible proof, particular vs. general scriptural texts, and specified vs. unspecified texts. The chapters—and perhaps even the information contained therein—have primarily been preserved in the Fāṭimid-era works of the Ismāʿīlī Shīʿīte jurist Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān, in addition to the passages preserved in the treatise ''

Al-Muhalla Kitab al-Muhallā bi'l Athār, also known as Al-Muhalla ("The Sweetened" or "The Adorned Treatise," ) is a book of Islamic law and jurisprudence by . It is considered one of the primary sources of the Zahirite (lit. apparent, manifest) school within ...

'' of the Sunnī Muslim historian Ibn Ḥazm, an adherent of the Ẓāhirīte school.

Contemporary evaluation

Although al-Ẓāhirī's theological views were and are considered controversial, his character and religious piety carry universal acclaim.Goldziher, pg.29 The Muslim scholars al-Khaṭīb al-Baghdādī,

, The History of Baghdad, v.2, pg.369–370

, The History of Baghdad, v.2, pg.373 al-Nawāwī, al-Suyūṭī, and Muḥammad Nāṣir al-Dīn al-Albānī all attested to his morality, humility, and personal ethics.

Sunnī views

While the Ẓāhirīte or "Dāwūdi" school, as they were known during the early history of Islam, is not as numerous today as the other four major Sunnī schools of thought, it was once a major school and encompassed

Mesopotamia Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the ...

, the

Iberian Peninsula The Iberian Peninsula (), ** * Aragonese and Occitan: ''Peninsula Iberica'' ** ** * french: Péninsule Ibérique * mwl, Península Eibérica * eu, Iberiar penintsula also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in southwestern Europe, def ...

, the Balearic Islands, North Africa, and Southern Iran. Even his contemporary critics conceded to his intellect and level of knowledge, even while rejecting his beliefs. He has been described as "the scholar of the era" by

, and the hierarchy of religious knowledge in Baghdad was considered to have ended with al-Ẓāhirī at the top. When

was asked regarding the books of Ibn Qutaybah, he answered that Ibn Qutaybah's work was "nothing", and recommended the books of the "people of jurisprudence", mentioning al-Shāfiʿī and al-Ẓāhirī by name, then "their contemporaries". Members of other schools have often criticized al-Ẓāhirī for his rejection of analogical reasoning. The early followers of al-Shāfiʿī in general held negative views of their former classmate, and the followers of the Shāfiʿīte school, al-Juwāynī in particular, were harsh upon al-Ẓāhirī himself. This is not universal, and many followers of the Shāfiʿī school have taken more accommodating views of al-Ẓāhirī's legal rulings. Al-Dhahabī defended al-Ẓāhirī and his followers, stating that just as al-Juwāynī had arrived to his views by the process of scholarly discourse, so had al-Ẓāhirī. Likewise, Ibn al-Ṣalāḥ also defended the legitimacy of al-Ẓāhirī's views and his school, listing a number of figures from the other Sunnī schools of thought who considered al-Ẓāhirī's opinions in scholarly discourse.

Shīʿa views

Shīʿa Muslims have taken a dimmer view of al-Ẓāhirī and his school. In the 1970s, Twelver Shīʿīte scholar Abdul Kareem Mushtaq accused al-Ẓāhirī of having held anthropotheistic beliefs regarding God, citing the Persian Sunnī historian and theologian al-Shahrastānī as his source. Nearly four decades later, the section of al-Shahrastānī's work was translated into English, demonstrating that al-Shahrastānī had actually stated that al-Ẓāhirī ''didn't'' hold anthropotheistic beliefs about God. al-Shahrastani had stated: :"As for Aĥmad ibn Ĥanbal, Dāwūd ibn `Alī al-Işfahānī and a group of Imāms from the predecessors, they took the methodological course of the early predecessors from the people of narrations—such as Mālik ibn Anas and Muqātil ibn Sulaymān—and followed the safe path. :They said: 'We believe in whatever is mentioned in the Book and the Sunna, and we do not come to grips with the interpretation; after we certainly know that Allāh, the Powerful and Exalted, does not resemble anything from the creation and that all what is portrayed in imagination is created and foreordained.' :And they used to guard themselves from anthropomorphism to such a degree, that they said: 'Whosoever moved his hand during the recitation of His statement: '…I created with My hands?' or pointed with his two fingers during his narration: 'The heart of the believer is between two fingers of the Merciful,' his hand should be cut and his two fingers removed." Ismāʿīlī Shīʿas have, perhaps, been more accurate in that for which they criticized al-Ẓāhirī. The Ismāʿīlī Shīʿīte jurist Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān was particularly critical of al-Ẓāhirī for rejecting analogical reasoning yet at the same time accepting inference as a valid means of logical deduction, a position for which he also criticized al-Zahiri's son and school in general.

Muʿtazilite views

Being steeped in esoteric philosophy, the Muʿtazila school were quite hostile towards al-Ẓāhirī and his school. Although some prominent figures of this school, such as the Muʿtazilite theologian Ibrāhīm al-Naẓẓām, denied the validity of analogical reasoning as al-Ẓāhirī did, they also denied literalism and the validity of consensus, and most of them found al-Ẓāhirī's ideas to be ridiculous. Ibn al-Nadim,

Kitab al-Fihrist The ''Kitāb al-Fihrist'' ( ar, كتاب الفهرست) (''The Book Catalogue'') is a compendium of the knowledge and literature of tenth-century Islam compiled by Ibn Al-Nadim (c.998). It references approx. 10,000 books and 2,000 authors.''The ...

, pg.172

References

External links

Imam Dawud al-Zahiri and His Effect
(Arabic) {{DEFAULTSORT:Dawud al-Zahiri 810s births 883 deaths 9th-century Iranian historians 9th-century Iranian writers 9th-century jurists 9th-century Muslim scholars of Islam 9th-century Muslim theologians Atharis Kullabis Mujaddid People from Kufa Persian Sunni Muslim scholars of Islam Sunni fiqh scholars Sunni imams Sunni Muslim scholars Zahiris