Makhūl ibn Abī Muslim

Abū ʿAbdallāh Makhūl ibn Abī Muslim ad-Dimashqī ( Arabic ابو عبد الله مكحول بن ابي مسلم الدمشقي, DMG Abū ʿAbdallāh Makḥūl ibn Abī Muslim Šuhrāb ad-Dimašqī ; † between 730 and 737) was an important Islamic legal scholar , Mufti and traditionalist in Syria during the Umayyad period , who is assigned to the Qadarites . In Ibn Hajar al-ʿAsqalānī he is referred to as " Imam of the people of Syria". The legal scholar Saʿīd ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz (d. 783) considered him one of the four most important scholars during the caliphate of Hishām ibn ʿAbd al-Malik .

Life

From his origin Makhūl had a precarious social position. He came from the area of Kabul , which was not yet under Islamic rule at that time, and was captured in 664 by the troops of the Arab general ʿAbdallāh ibn ʿĀmir. The names given for his father, Abū Muslim and ʿAbdallāh, are typical names of converts that served as stopgaps when the name was not known or should not be mentioned. Later he was said to have a distinguished Iranian origin and his father's name was given as Schuhrāb. His Persian origins were heard throughout his life because he could not pronounce several Arabic phonemes , including the Qāf , for example .

Makhūl was initially slave of Sa'id ibn al-'As, who I. Mu'awiya governor of Medina was. He gave it to a woman from the Hudhail tribe who lived in Egypt. She released him at an unknown time. Makhūl later claimed to have absorbed all knowledge in Egypt and Medina. He narrated from Aisha bint Abi Bakr , Abū Huraira and Ubaiy ibn Kaʿb . He traveled on to Damascus via Kufa , where he heard other traditionalists. Here he quickly built a group of students around him. Those who attended his teaching sessions included not only later well-known authorities such as al-Auzāʿī and Ibn Ishāq , but also various members of the Umayyad house. Various sources report that Makhūl took part in campaigns against the Byzantines. Muhammad ibn Saʿd reports that he received a pension ( ʿaṭāʾ ) from the divan, but is said to have put this money straight back into jihad .

Makhūl's real discipline was jurisprudence. He is said to have written books about this. Ibn an-Nadīm cites a Kitāb as-Sunan fī l-fiqh and a work of his with the title al-Masāʾil fī l-fiqh . He relied mainly on Ra'y for his opinions . When he gave opinions, he is said to have said: "There is no power or strength except with God. That is my opinion ( raʾy ). And the opinion is wrong or is right."

Makhūl was repeatedly noticed by inappropriate behavior. In a letter to the governor of Baalbek , he is said to have expanded the introductory Hamdala with a haughty formula: "Praise be to God who exalted Makhūl." On the other hand, various expressions critical of the time are ascribed to him, for example the statement: "The ummah will only become more and more miserable and the rulers will become more and more crude". Likewise, Makhūl is said to have raised some Quraish against himself. They clashed with various hadith critical of rule that he disseminated.

Positioning on the Qadar question

Makhūl is also said to have turned against predestinian formulas to justify misdeeds of the political rulers. In a public meeting he once expressed the opinion that only the good is ascribed to man by God, the bad - this must be added - but comes from himself. With this remark he aroused the displeasure of Raja 'ibn Haiwa, a partisan and courtier of the Umayyads. He is said to have cursed Makhūl and not returned his greeting.

At least for a time, Makhūl was in a close relationship with the notorious Qadaritic oppositionist Ghailān ad-Dimashqī. Similar to al-Hasan al-Basrī , however, there was a dispute with Makhūl over the question of his membership of the Qadarites. While Muhammad ibn Saʿd and Ibn Qutaiba clearly assigned him to this group and Muʿtazilite sources classified him as one of the most venerable Qadarites, there was a tendency in later Sunni sources to absolve him of the "flaw" of Qadaritism. Other authors such as Ibn Challikān , Ibn Hajar al-ʿAsqalānī and Ibn ʿAsākir report that Makhūl was initially Qadarit, but then turned away from this teaching. In several works he is quoted with anti-qadaritic hadiths. He is said to have made particularly negative comments about Ghailān after he went public with his "heresy".

literature

Arabic sources

• Abū Nuʿaim al-Iṣbahānī : Ḥilyat al-auliyāʾ wa-ṭabaqāt al-aṣfiyāʾ . 10 vols. Cairo: Maktabat al-Ḫāniǧī wa Maṭbaʿat as-Saʿāda, 1932-1938. Ed. Ṣāliḥ Aḥmad aš-Šāmī. Vol. V, pp. 177-193. Digitized
• Abū Yūsuf Yaʿqūb Ibn Sufyān al-Fasawī: Kitāb al-Maʿrifa wa-t-tārīḫ. Ed. Akram Ḍiyāʾ al-ʿUmarī. 3 Vols. Baghdad: Maṭbaʿat Aršād 1975. Vol. II, pp. 389f., 399f., 410f. Digitized
• Muhammad ibn Saʿd : Kitāb aṭ-Ṭabaqāt al-kabīr . Ed. E. Sachau. 9 vols. Leiden 1904-1940. Vol. VII, pp. 160f., 453f. Digitized

Secondary literature

• Susanne Diwald: "The report of Ibn ʿAsākir about Ġailān ad-Dimašqī" in Wolfdietrich Fischer (ed.): Festgabe für Hans Wehr. Presented by his students on his 60th birthday on July 5, 1969 . Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 1969. pp. 40-71. Pp. 48-50.
• Josef van Ess : Beginnings of Muslim Theology. Two anti-qadaritic treatises from the first century of the Hiǧra . Beirut-Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner 1977. pp. 217-221.
• Josef van Ess: Theology and society in the 2nd and 3rd centuries of the Hijra. A History of Religious Thought in Early Islam . 6 vols. Berlin: De Gruyter 1991–97. Vol. I, pp. 75-80.
• Muḥammad Rauwās Qalʿaǧī: Mausūʿat fiqh Makḥūl ad-Dimašqī . Bairūt: Dār an-Nafāʾis 2009.
• Fuat Sezgin: History of Arabic Literature . Vol. 1. Leiden: Brill 1967. p. 404.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ See Diwald 48.
2. ↑ Cf. al-Fasawī 410.
3. ↑ See van Ess 1992, 77.
4. ↑ See van Ess 1992, 78.
5. ↑ See Ibn Saʿd 161, Z. 13f and van Ess 1992, 79.
6. ↑ See Sezgin 404.
7. ↑ al-Fasawī 400, lines 5f.
8. ↑ al-Ḥamdu li-Llāhi llaḏī rafaʿa Makḥūlan . See al-Fasawī 399.
9. ↑ Cf. van Ess: Theology and Society . 1991, Vol. I, p. 76.
10. ↑ Cf. van Ess: Theology and Society . 1991, Vol. I, p. 76.
11. ↑ See Diwald 50.
12. ↑ See van Ess 1977, 220.
13. ↑ See Diwald 48-50, van Ess 1977, 219.