Modern Hadith Studies

Continuing Debates and New Approaches

Edited by Belal Abu-Alabbas, Christopher Melchert, Michael Dann

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Brings together western and Middle Eastern scholars to explore medieval and modern approaches to the study of Hadith

Explores and analyses state-of-the-art scholarship in Hadith studies in Middle Eastern and Western contexts, covering a variety of approaches and methods to studying and evaluating the Hadith corpus
Addresses several methodological issues and questions in evaluating Hadith reports
Provides a rich analysis of the global trends in Hadith studies, affording a broad understanding of the field and bringing together contributions from scholarly communities typically inaccessible to one another

This book is dedicated to examining the various methods and trends in Hadith Studies across the globe. Bringing together contributions from 10 scholars of Hadith, it addresses the subject from a variety of methodological vantage points and historical premises. It first looks at methods and approaches, and then presents five case studies focusing on specific questions and issues. Some of these authors seek to overturn, refine or reaffirm dominant paradigms within the field, while others look to expand its horizons in new directions. The global scope, and coverage of both longstanding debates and cutting edge methods and approaches, means this book will make a significant contribution to a controversial and challenging field.

Notes on Contributors

Belal Abu-Alabbas, British Academy Newton International Fellow, University of Exeter, UK and Lecturer at Al-Azhar University, Egypt.

Ali Aghaei, Postdoctoral Researcher, Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities Germany.

Maroussia Bednarkiewicz, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Innsbruck, Austria.

Michael Dann, Assistant Professor, University of Illinois, USA.

Jeremy Farrell, doctoral candidate, Emory University, USA.

Mutaz Al-Khatib, Assistant Professor of Methodology and Ethics, Centre for Islamic Legislation and Ethics (CILE), Qatar.

Fatma Kızıl, Assistant Professor of Hadith, Yalova University, Turkey.

Christopher Melchert, Professor of Arabic and Islam, Oriental Institute, UK.

Pavel Pavlovitch, Professor in Medieval Arabo-Islamic Civilization, Centre for Oriental Languages and Cultures, Sofia University St. Kliment Ohridski, Bulgaria.

Ahmad Snobar, Assistant Professor of Hadith, Istanbul 29 Mayıs University, Turkey.

Contents

Acknowledgements

Conventions

Introduction Christopher Melchert

1. Kunnā nakrahu al-kitāb: Scripture, Transmission of Knowledge, and Politics in the Second Century AH (719–816 CE)Pavel Pavlovitch

2. The History of the adhān: A View from the Hadith LiteratureMaroussia Bednarkiewicz

3. Ibn al-Mubārak, TraditionistChristopher Melchert

4. Early ‘Traditionist Sufis’: A Network AnalysisJeremy Farrell

5. The Common Link and its Relation to Hadith TerminologyAli Aghaei

6. Hadith Criticism between Traditionists and JurisprudentsMutaz al-Khatib

7. Hadith Criticism in the Levant in the Twentieth Century: From ẓāhir al-isnād to ʿilal al-ḥadīthAhmad Snober

8. The Reception and Representation of Western Hadith Studies in Turkish AcademeFatma Kızıl

9. Can Different Questions Yield the Same Answers? Islamic and Western Scholarship on Shīʿī Narrators in the Sunnī TraditionMichael Dann

Index.

Reviews

[...] a welcome contribution to the field, containing excellent, detailed, and thorough research.
– Stephen Burge, The Institute of Ismaili Studies, Journal of Qur'anic Studies 24.1 (2022)

[...] Modern Hadith Studies: Continued Debates and New Approaches, [..] is the first systematic, inclusive multi-authored study of hadith theory and method that focuses on both the pre-modern and modern periods and both Islamic and Western scholarship of hadith.
– Mourad Laabdi, Religion

The study of Hadiths only grows in importance. Hadiths are both a crucial (and highly contested) source for understanding Islam's origins and also the idiom in which Muslim scholars have expressed their commitment to their faith and constructed their relationships to each other. The volume brings together an excellent sampling of the state of the field, with senior scholars and promising young academics alike bringing the latest theories and methodologies to bear on questions of historical authenticity of Hadiths and their crucial role in the development of Islamic thought and culture.
– Jonathan AC Brown, Georgetown University

About the Author

Dr Belal Abu-Alabbas, B.A. (Al-Azhar), DPhil (Oxford), is a historian of Islamic intellectual and legal thought (7th–13th centuries). His research focuses on the hadith corpus, Islamic law and theology in the formative and classical periods. Dr Abu-Alabbas has previously held lectureships at the University of Nottingham and the University of Bristol, and a British Academy International Fellowship at the University of Exeter. He currently holds lectureships at Cambridge Muslim College and Al-Azhar University and is a Research Associate at the University of Nottingham. Among his publications are Belal Abu‑Alabbas, Christopher Melchert, and Michael Dann, eds., Modern Hadith Studies: Continuing Debates and New Approaches (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2020) and Belal Abu‑Alabbas, “The Principles of Hadith Criticism in the Writings of al‑Shāfiʿī and Muslim”, Islamic Law and Society 24:4 (2017): 311–35.

Christopher Melchert is a Professor of Arabic and Islam at the University of Oxford. He is the author of The Formation of the Sunni Schools of Law, 9th-10th Centuries C.E (Brill, 1997), Ahmad ibn Hanbal (Makers of the Muslim World) (Oneworld, 2006) and Hadith, Piety, and Law: Selected Studies (Lockwood, 2015)

Michael Dann is an Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Illinois. He has published a chapter in Songs and Sons: Women, Slavery and Social Mobility in the Medieval Islamic World, edited by Matthew Gordon and Kathryn Hain (Oxford University Press, 2015).