Muhammad al-Bukhari

Muhammad ibn Isma'il al-Bukhari (Arabic: محمد بن إسماعيل البخاري, romanized: Muḥammad ibn Ismāʿīl al-Bukhārī; 21 July 810 – 1 September 870) was an Islamic scholar who authored the Sahih al-Bukhari, the first of the Six Books of Sunni Islam.

Born in Bukhara to Persian scholar Isma'il ibn Ibrahim, al-Bukhari began learning hadith at a young age. He travelled across the Abbasid Caliphate and learned under influential scholars, including Ahmad ibn Hanbal and Ali ibn al-Madini. Al-Bukhari memorized thousands of hadith narrations, compiling his Sahih in 846. Apart from this, al-Bukhari's other works include al-Tarikh al-Kabir and al-Adab al-Mufrad. Al-Bukhari's views on the Quranic createdness resulted in his expulsion from Nishapur. Subsequently, he moved to Khartank, near Samarkand. His major students include Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj, al-Tirmidhi, al-Nasa'i, Ibn Khuzayma, Ibn Abi Asim and Ibn Abi al-Dunya.

Al-Bukhari is regarded as the most important hadith scholar in the history of Sunni Islam. Sahih al-Bukhari is revered as the most important hadith collection in Sunni Islam. Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim, the collection of al-Bukhari's student Muslim, are together known as the Sahihayn (Arabic: صحيحين, romanized: Saḥiḥayn) and are regarded by Sunnis as the most authentic books after the Quran.

Life

Ancestry and early life

Muhammad ibn Isma'il al-Bukhari was born after the Friday prayer on 21 July 810 (13 Shawwal 194 AH) in the city of Bukhara in Greater Khorasan in present-day Uzbekistan. He has been described as Persian and his father was Isma'il ibn Ibrahim, a scholar of hadith and a student of Malik ibn Anas, Abd Allah ibn al-Mubarak, and Hammad ibn Salamah. Isma'il died while al-Bukhari was an infant. Al-Bukhari's great-grandfather, Al-Mughirah, settled in Bukhara after accepting Islam at the hands of Bukhara's governor, Yaman al-Ju'fi. As was the custom, he became a mawla of Yaman, and his family continued to carry the nisba "al-Ju'fi."

Al-Mughirah's father, Bardizbah (Persian: بردزبه), is the earliest known ancestor of Al-Bukhari according to most scholars and historians. Bardizbah was a Zoroastrian Magi. Taqi al-Din al-Subki is the only scholar to name Bardizbah's father, who he says was named Bazzabah (Persian: بذذبه). Little is known of both of them except that they were Persian and followed the religion of their people. Historians have also not come across any information on Al-Bukhari's grandfather, Ibrahim ibn al-Mughirah (Arabic: إبراهيم ابن المغيرة, romanized: Ibrāhīm ibn al-Mughīrā).

Travels and education

According to contemporary hadith scholar and historian Al-Dhahabi, al-Bukhari began studying hadith in the Hijri year 821 CE. He memorized the works of Abd Allah ibn al-Mubarak while still a child and began writing and narrating hadith while still an adolescent. In the Hijri year 826 CE, at the age of sixteen, Al-Bukhari performed the hajj with his elder brother and widowed mother. Al-Bukhari stayed in Mecca for two years, before moving to Medina where he wrote Qadhāyas-Sahābah wa at-Tābi'īn, a book about the companions of Muhammad and the tabi'un. He also wrote Al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr during his time in Medina.

Al-Bukhari is known to have travelled to most of the important Islamic learning centres of his time, including Syria, Kufa, Basra, Egypt, Yemen, and Baghdad. He studied under prominent Islamic scholars including Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Ali ibn al-Madini, Yahya ibn Ma'in and Ishaq ibn Rahwayh. Al-Bukhari is known to have memorized over 600,000 hadith narrations.

Mihna, later years and death

According to Jonathan Brown, following Ibn Hanbal, al-Bukhari had reportedly declared that 'reciting the Quran is an element of createdness’. Through this assertion, Al-Bukhari had sought an alternative response to the doctrines of Mu'tazilites and declared that the element of creation is applied only to humans, not the Word of God. His statements were received negatively by prominent hadith scholars and he was driven out of Nishapur. Al-Bukhari, however, had only referred to the human action of reading the Qur’an, when he reportedly stated "My recitation of the Quran is created" (Arabic: لفظي بالقرآن مخلوق, romanized: Lafẓī bil-Qur'āni Makhlūq). Al-Dhahabi and al-Subki asserted that Al-Bukhari was expelled due to the jealousy of certain scholars of Nishapur. Al-Bukhari spent the last twenty-four years of his life teaching the hadith he had collected. During the mihna, he fled to Khartank, a village near Samarkand, where he then also died on Friday, 1 September 870. Today his tomb lies within the Imam Bukhari Mausoleum in Hartang, Uzbekistan, 25 kilometers from Samarkand. It was restored in 1998 after centuries of neglect and dilapidation. The mausoleum complex consists of Al-Bukhari's tomb, a mosque, a madrasa, library, and a small collection of Qurans. The modern ground-level mausoleum tombstone of Al-Bukhari is only a cenotaph, the actual grave lies within a small crypt below the structure.

Works

Sahih al-Bukhari is considered Al-Bukhari's magnum opus. It is a collection of approximately 7,563 hadith narrations across 97 chapters creating a basis for a complete system of jurisprudence without the use of speculative law. The book is highly regarded among Sunni Muslims, and most Sunni scholars consider it second only to the Quran in terms of authenticity. It is considered one of the most authentic collection of hadith, even ahead of Muwatta Imam Malik and Sahih Muslim. Alongside the latter, Sahih al-Bukhari is known as one of the Sahihayn (Two Sahihs)' and they are together part of the Kutub al-Sittah.One of the most famous stories from the Sahih al-Bukhari is the story of Muhammad's first revelation.

Al-Bukhari wrote three works discussing narrators of hadith with respect to their ability in conveying their material. These are Al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr, Al-Tarīkh al-Awsaţ, and Al-Tarīkh al-Ṣaghīr. Of these, Al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr is published and well-known, while Al-Tarīkh al-Ṣaghīr is lost. Al-Dhahabi quotes Al-Bukhari as having said, “When I turned eighteen years old, I began writing about the companions and the tabi'un and their statements. [...] At that time I also authored a book of history at the grave of the Prophet at night during a full moon." The books being referred to here were Qadhāyas-Sahābah wa at-Tābi'īn and Al-Tārīkh al-Kabīr. Al-Bukhari also wrote al-Kunā on patronymics, and Al-Ḍu'afā al-Ṣaghīr on weak narrators of hadith. Al-Adab al-Mufrad is a collection of hadith narrations on ethics and manners.

In response to the accusations levied against him during his mihna, Al-Bukhari compiled the treatise Khalq Af'āl al-'Ibād, the earliest traditionalist representation of the position taken by Ahmad ibn Hanbal, in which Al-Bukhari explains that the Quran is God's uncreated speech, while maintaining that God creates human actions, as the Sunnis had insisted in their attacks on the free-will position of Qadariyah. The first section of the book reports narrations from earlier scholars such as Sufyan al-Thawri that affirmed the Sunni doctrine of the uncreated nature of the Quran and condemned anyone who held the contrary position as a Jahmi or Kāfir. The second section asserts that the acts of men are created, relying on Qur'anic verses and reports from earlier traditionalist scholars like Yahya ibn Sa'id al-Qatlan. In the last part of his treatise, Al-Bukhari harshly condemned the Mutazilites, defending the belief that sound of the Qur'an being recited is created. Al-Bukhari cited Ahmad Ibn Hanbal as evidence for his position, re-affirming the latter's legacy and the former's allegiance to the Ahl al-Hadith.

List of works

Historical and biographical works

• al-Tarikh al-Kabir = Kitāb al-Tārīkh (The Great History)
• Kitāb al-Mukhtaṣar min al-tārīkh = al-Tārīkh al-awsaṭ
• Asāmī al-ṣaḥābah (On the Prophet's Companions)

Hadith collections and sciences

• Sahih al-Bukhari
• Al-Duʿafāʾ = al-Duʿafāʾ al-kabīr = al-Duʿafāʾ al-ṣaghīr
• Kitāb al-wuḥdān (On the Companions from whom only one hadith is transmitted) (lost)
• Kitāb al-ʿilal (lost)
• Birr al-wālidayn (hadith collection on filial piety)
• Al-Adab al-Mufrad
• Kitāb al-hiba

Fiqh and theological works

• Al-Sunan fī al-fiqh = al-Fawāʾid = al-Mabṣūṭ (lost)
• Al-Jāmiʾ al-Ṣaḥīḥ = al-Jāmiʿ al-kabīr = al-Musnad al-kabīr
• Rafʿ al-yadayn fī al-ṣalāh
• Al-Qirāʾa khalfa al-imām
• Kitāb Khalq afʿal al-ʿibād

School of law

In terms of law, scholars like Jonathan Brown assert that al-Bukhari was of the Ahl al-Hadith, an adherent of Ahmad ibn Hanbal's traditionalist school in law (fiqh), but fell victim to its most radical wing due to misunderstandings. This claim is supported by Hanbalis, although members of the Shafi'i and Ẓāhirī schools levy this claim as well. Scott Lucas argues that al-Bukhari's legal positions were similar to those of the Ẓāhirīs and Hanbalis of his time, suggesting al-Bukhari rejected qiyas and other forms of ra'y completely. Many are of the opinion that Al-Bukhari was a mujtahid with his own madhhab. Munir Ahmad asserts that historically most jurists considered him to be a muhaddith (scholar of hadith) and not a faqīh (jurist), and that as a muhaddith, he followed the Shafi'i school. The Harvard historian Ahmed el-Shamsy also asserts this, as he states that he was a student of the Shafi'i scholar al-Karabisi (d. 245/859).

Theology

According to some scholars, such as Christopher Melchert, and also Ash'ari theologians, including Ibn Hajar al-'Asqalani and al-Bayhaqi, al-Bukhari was a follower of the Kullabi school of Sunni theology due to his position on the utterance of the Quran being created. Other Kullabis, such as al-Harith al-Muhasibi, were harassed and made to relocate, a similar situation al-Bukhari found himself towards the latter years of his life by other Hanbalis. He was also known to be a student of al-Karabisi (d. 245/859), who was a direct student of Imam al-Shafi'i from his period in Iraq. Al-Karabisi was also known to have associated himself directly with Ibn Kullab and the Kullabi school of thought.

Interpretation of God's attributes

According to Namira Nahouza in her work 'Wahhabism and the Rise of the New Salafists', al-Bukhari in his Sahih, in the book entitled "Tafsir al-Qur'an wa 'ibaratih" [i.e., Exegesis of the Qur'an and its expressions], surat al-Qasas, verse 88: "kullu shay'in halikun illa Wajhah" [the literal meaning of which is "everything will perish except His Face"], he said the term [illa Wajhah] means: "except His Sovereignty/Dominance". And there is [in this same chapter] other than that in terms of ta'wil (metaphorical interpretation), like the term 'dahk' (Arabic: ضحك, lit. 'laughter') which is narrated in a hadith, [which is interpreted by] His Mercy.

Views on predestination

Al-Bukhari also rebuked those who rejected of qadar (predestination) in Sahih al-Bukhari by quoting a verse of the Qur'an implying that God had precisely determined all human acts. According to Ibn Hajar al-'Asqalani, al-Bukhari signified that if someone was to accept autonomy in creating his acts, he would be assumed to be playing God's role and so would subsequently be declared a Mushrik, similar to the later Ash'ari view of kasb (acquisition, occasionalism, and causality, which link human action with divine omnipotence). In another chapter, al-Bukhari refutes the creeds of the Kharijites. According to Badr al-Din al-'Ayni, the heading of that chapter was designed not only to refute the Kharijites but any who held similar beliefs.

Notes and references

Notes

Citations

Sources

• Abdul Qadir Muhammad Jalal et al., "Elevating Imam Al Bukhari: Affirming the Status of Imam Al Bukhari and His Sahih by Dispelling the Misconceptions Surrounding them", Lagos 2021

External links

Studies

• Ghassan Abdul-Jabbar, Bukhari, London, 2007
• Jonathan Brown, The canonization of al-Bukhari and Muslim, Leiden 2007
• Eerik Dickinson, The development of early Sunnite hadith criticism, Leiden 2001

• Scott C. Lucas, "The legal principles of Muḥammad b. Ismāʿīl al-Bukhārī and their relationship to classical Salafi Islam," ILS 13 (2006), 289–324
• Christopher Melchert, "Bukhārī and early hadith criticism," JAOS 121 (2001), 7–19
• Christopher Melchert, "Bukhārī and his Ṣaḥīḥ," Le Muséon 123 (2010), 425–54
• Alphonse Mingana, An important manuscript of the traditions of Bukhārī, Cambridge 1936