Known by many as the “father of Islamic jurisprudence and the founder of the science of the legal theory, properly called usool al-fiqh” (Hallaq, 1993, p. 587), Muhammad ibn Idris ash-Shafi’i (Imam Shafi’i) was born in Gaza or Asqalan (Palestine) in 150 AH (767 CE) in a poor family that traced its lineage to the prophetic tribe of Quraysh (Khadduri, 1987). After the death of his father, his mother brought him to Makkah when he was just two years old. Under the shade of well-known scholars in Hijaz like Muslim ibn Khalid az-Zanji (Mufti of Makkah), Sufyan ibn Uyaynah al-Hilaali, Ibrahim ibn Yahya, etc. (Khan, 2001), ash-Shafi’i learnt various sciences of Islam at a very young age. The most prominent teacher of ash- Shafi’i was Imam Malik (the founder of Maliki madh’hab) under whom he studied for nine years in Medina, memorizing his book al-Muwatta (the Beaten Path). Due to his extensive travelling, ash-Shafi’i acquired experience and knowledge from the scholars of different schools of thought like Muhammad ibn al Hassan ash-Shaybani in Iraq and some students of al-Layth ibn Sa’d (Imam Layth) in Egypt (Philips, 2006). He finally settled in Egypt where he dictated his works to his students like ar-Rabi’ al Muradi, Abu Yaqub al-Buwayti and Abu Yahya al-Muzani. It was in 204 AH (820 CE) that the great scholar was laid to rest in Fustat (Old Cairo) in Egypt. (Akgunduz, 2010, pp. 159-162; Khadduri, 1987, pp. 8-19).

The Old and The New Schools of Thought

Ash-Shafi’i’s legal reasoning and opinions were very much influenced by his extensive travels in the centers of knowledge like Hijaz, Iraq and Egypt. Having studied under different schools of thought, he was able to analyze the process of legal deduction from a broader perspective. His initial in-depth studies under Imam Malik in the knowledge-rich area of Hijaz gained him a strong foothold in the literal interpretations of texts, as was the case of Ahl al-Hadith school of thought. After Malik’s death, he moved to Yemen in 797 CE serving in a state job. He was accused of following the Zaydi school of thought there and deported to Iraq for trial in the court before Caliph Haroon Rashid. After freeing himself of the charges, he began studying in Iraq under the famous student of Imam Abu Hanifa, Muhammad ibn al-Hassan ash-Shaybani. During this period, he was exposed to wide opinions and arguments of Ahl ar-Rai’ in which he participated and defended his position based on his former learnings. These discussions also made him acknowledge various shortcomings of his former madh’hab (Khadduri, 1987). It was during this period that he compiled his writings and legal opinions in the form of a book called Kitab al-Hujjah (The Book of the Proof). Imam Shafi’i used to dictate the book to his students in Iraq in 195 AH (810 CE) who would put it to their memories. This era came to be known by many jurists as al-madh’hab al-qadeem or the old school of thought (Philips, 2006, p. 109). Some of the prominent transmitters of this era were:

Ash-Shafi’i’s legal reasoning and opinions were very much influenced by his extensive travels in the centers of knowledge like Hijaz, Iraq and Egypt. Having studied under different schools of thought, he was able to analyze the process of legal deduction from a broader perspective. His initial in-depth studies under Imam Malik in the knowledge-rich area of Hijaz gained him a strong foothold in the literal interpretations of texts, as was the case of Ahl al-Hadith school of thought. After Malik’s death, he moved to Yemen in 797 CE serving in a state job. He was accused of following the Zaydi school of thought there and deported to Iraq for trial in the court before Caliph Haroon Rashid. After freeing himself of the charges, he began studying in Iraq under the famous student of Imam Abu Hanifa, Muhammad ibn al-Hassan ash-Shaybani. During this period, he was exposed to wide opinions and arguments of Ahl ar-Rai’ in which he participated and defended his position based on his former learnings. These discussions also made him acknowledge various shortcomings of his former madh’hab (Khadduri, 1987). It was during this period that he compiled his writings and legal opinions in the form of a book called Kitab al-Hujjah (The Book of the Proof). Imam Shafi’i used to dictate the book to his students in Iraq in 195 AH (810 CE) who would put it to their memories. This era came to be known by many jurists as al-madh’hab al-qadeem or the old school of thought (Philips, 2006, p. 109). Some of the prominent transmitters of this era were:

The Old and The New Schools of Thought

Ash-Shafi’i’s legal reasoning and opinions were very much influenced by his extensive travels in the centers of knowledge like Hijaz, Iraq and Egypt. Having studied under different schools of thought, he was able to analyze the process of legal deduction from a broader perspective. His initial in-depth studies under Imam Malik in the knowledge-rich area of Hijaz gained him a strong foothold in the literal interpretations of texts, as was the case of Ahl al-Hadith school of thought. After Malik’s death, he moved to Yemen in 797 CE serving in a state job. He was accused of following the Zaydi school of thought there and deported to Iraq for trial in the court before Caliph Haroon Rashid. After freeing himself of the charges, he began studying in Iraq under the famous student of Imam Abu Hanifa, Muhammad ibn al-Hassan ash-Shaybani. During this period, he was exposed to wide opinions and arguments of Ahl ar-Rai’ in which he participated and defended his position based on his former learnings. These discussions also made him acknowledge various shortcomings of his former madh’hab (Khadduri, 1987). It was during this period that he compiled his writings and legal opinions in the form of a book called Kitab al-Hujjah (The Book of the Proof). Imam Shafi’i used to dictate the book to his students in Iraq in 195 AH (810 CE) who would put it to their memories. This era came to be known by many jurists as al-madh’hab al-qadeem or the old school of thought (Philips, 2006, p. 109). Some of the prominent transmitters of this era were:

• Ahmad ibn Hanbal ash-Shaybani (the founder of Hanbali madh’hab),

• Abu Ali Hassan ibn Muhammad al-Za’farani,

• Abu Ali al-Hassan ibn Ali al-Karabisi, and

• Abu Thawr Ibrahim ibn Khalid al-Baghdadi (Shafi’i Fiqh, 2015; Akgunduz, 2010).

Due to certain confrontations in Iraq and the rise of mu’tazilite philosophy of the creation of Qur’an, he finally decided to move out and settle in Egypt where he spent the rest of his life (Khadduri, 1987). In Egypt, he gained an insight of the Laythi madh’hab and combined it with his earlier studies, thus, revising his legal opinions in the form of a new book called Kitab al-Umm (The Book of the Essence or The Mother Book). This era came to be known as al-madh’hab al-jadeed or the new school of thought (Philips, 2006). Some of the prominent transmitters of this era were:

• Imam Abu Yaqub Yusuf ibn Yahya al-Buwayti,

• Imam Abu Ibrahim Ismail ibn Yahya al-Muzani,

• Imam Rabi ibn Sulayman al-Muradi,

• Rabi al-Jizi, and

• Yunus ibn Abd al-Ala (Shafi’i Fiqh, 2015; Akgunduz, 2010)

The Two Channels of Transmission or Tareeqas

After nearly a century from the death of Imam Shafi’i and during the time of the students of prominent Shafi’i scholar Abu Ishaq al-Marwazi al-Kabir, Shafi’i madh’hab split into two channels of transmission or tareeqas, depending on the center of its learning as follows:

• Baghdadi Tareeqa (طريقة البغداديين): The name was ascribed due to this channel being concentrated in Bagdad. The prime scholar or the Imam of this tareeqa was Shaykh Abu Hamid al-Isfarayini, an eclectic commentator of the Shafi’i text, Mukhtasar al-Muzani. He became pivotal in teaching Shafi’i fiqh in Iraq. Some of the prominent scholars of this channel were Muhammad ibn Ali al-Masarjisi, Qadi Abu Tayyib al-Tabari, Abu Ishaq al-Shirazi, etc. Some of the works attributed to the scholars of this era are: Ta’liqah, al-Tanbih and al-Muhadhdhab, Safwat al-Madhhab,

• Khurasani Tareeqa (طريقة الخراسانيين): This channel mostly spread in Khurasan (northeast Iran) region. The Imam of this tareeqa was Abu Bakr Abd Allah ibn Ahmad al-Qaffal al-Marwazi. Some of the prominent scholars of this tareeqa were: Abu Muhammad al-Juwayni, Abd al-Malik al-Juwayni, Abu Hamid al-Ghazzali, etc. Some of the works in this channel include: Nihayat al-Matlab fi Dirayat al-Madhhab, Zawiya al-Masail, Basit,

Finally, the two tareeqas were merged by the efforts of Imam Abu al-Qasim Abd al-Karim al-Rafi’i and Abu Zakariyya al-Nawawi and the opinions were weighed for authenticity in the seventh century CE (Shafi’i Fiqh, 2015).

In today’s times, as mentioned by Akgunduz (2010),

“the followers of this school are found in the Strait settlements, the Malayan districts of Thailand, the Hindustani (Indian) coast (Malabar and Coromandel), in southern Arabia, especially in Hadramut, in Bahrain, in the Persian Gulf states, in certain Central Asian districts, in Dagistan, and in the former German East African colonies” (p. 162).

From the above discussion, it is concluded that the development of Shafi’i fiqh as a new school of thought was a result of amalgamation of three distinct schools in three places; Maliki school in Hijaz, Hanafi school in Iraq and Laythi school in Egypt. As a result, the Shafi’i school possessed the characteristics of all the three which lead to its rapid rise in the region. It is also seen that the legal opinions were continuously revised as a result of absorption of knowledge from different regions.

References

(2015, June 15). Retrieved June 04, 2017, from Shafi’i Fiqh: http://shafiifiqh.com/3/46/a-brief-outline-of-the-shafi-i-school-s-transmission

Akgunduz, A. (2010). Introduction to islamic law. Rotterdam: IUR Press.

Cowan, J. M. (1976). The hans wehr dictionary of modern written arabic (3rd ed.). New York: Spoken Language Services, Inc.

Hallaq, W. b. (1993, November). Was al-Shaf’ii the Master Architect of Islamic Jurisprudence. International Journal of Middle East studies, 25(4). Retrieved Oct 28, 2008, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/164536

Khadduri, M. (1987). al-Shafi’i’s al-Risala fi usul al fiqh (Treatise on the foundations of Islamic jurisprudence) (2nd ed.). Cambridge: The Islamic Texts Society.

Khan, A. (2001, October 29). Biography of Imam Shafi (ra). Retrieved June 04, 2017, from http://www.islamcan.com: http://www.islamcan.com/islamic-articles/biography-of-imam-shafi-ra.shtml

Philips, A. B. (2006). The evolution of fiqh: Islamic law and the madh-habs (2nd ed.). Riyadh: International Islamic Publishing House.