Yahya ibn Sa'id al-Qattan

Yahya ibn Sa'id al-Qattan
يحيى بن سعيد القطان
Yahya ibn Sa'id al-Qattan rendered in Arabic calligraphy
Personal life
Born	120 AH/738 CE Basra, Umayyad Caliphate
Died	198 AH/768 CE Basra, Abbasid Caliphate
Main interest(s)	Hadith, biographical evaluation
Religious life
Religion	Islam
Muslim leader
Students Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Ali ibn al-Madini, Yahya ibn Ma'in, Ishaq ibn Rahwayh
Influenced by Sufyan al-Thawri, Shu'ba ibn al-Hajjaj, al-Awza'i, Ibn Jurayj

Yahya ibn Sa'id al-Qattan (Arabic: يحيى بن سعيد القطان, romanized: Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-Qaṭṭān; 120 AH/738 CE – 198 AH/813 CE) was a Basran hadith scholar of the tabi' al-tabi'in who is considered a progenitor of Sunni hadith criticism.[1]

Biography

Yahya ibn Sa'id was born in Basra in 120 AH/738 CE to descendants of freed slaves from Banu Tamim; his work in the cotton trade earned him the nisba al-Qattan. He travelled to Medina, Baghdad and Kufa in pursuit of hadith.[2] He audited the lessons of Shu'ba ibn al-Hajjaj for twenty years, as well as those of Sufyan al-Thawri. His other teachers included the grammarian Hammad ibn Salamah, the jurists Malik ibn Anas and al-Awza'i,[2] and Ibn Jurayj, a substantial proportion of whose extant biographical information has been transmitted through him.[3] His own students included Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Ali ibn al-Madini, Yahya ibn Ma'in,[4] and Ishaq ibn Rahwayh.[2] He reportedly authored two works which have not survived: al-Ḍuʿafā, a book of unreliable hadith narrators, and Kitāb al-Maghāzī.[2] Ibn Sa'id died in Basra in 198 AH/813 CE.[2]

Views

Ibn Sa'id was critical of hadith that he transmitted without a sahabi narrator (i.e., mursal hadith),[5] and identified tadlīs performed by hadith narrators regardless of their stature, including his teacher and celebrated jurist Sufyan al-Thawri.[6] He was known for his strict standards in biographical evaluation. He deemed several ascetics and Sufis as unreliable narrators and was sceptical of hadith transmitted through them.[2] A famous statement that can be plausibly attributed to Ibn Sa'id through isnad-cum-matn analysis comments on how the pious (al-ṣāliḥīn) were most dishonest in matters of hadith, which has been adduced as evidence of hadith forgery among some early Muslims.[1]

References

Citations

1. Little, Joshua (2022-11-09). "A Famous Report About Pious Fabrication in Hadith". Islamic Origins. Archived from the original on 2024-06-12. Retrieved 2024-12-17.
2. Ahatlı, Erdinç. "YAHYÂ b. SAÎD el-KATTÂN". İslâm Ansiklopedisi (in Turkish). Retrieved 2024-12-17.
3. Motzki 2002, p. 284
4. Motzki 2002, pp. 249-250
5. Motzki 2002, p. 249
6. Brown 2009, p. 234

Sources

• Motzki, Harald (2002). The Origins of Islamic Jurisprudence: Meccan Fiqh Before the Classical Schools. Translated by Katz, Marion H. Brill. ISBN 9004121315
• Brown, Jonathan A.C. (2009). Hadith: Muhammad's Legacy in the Medieval and Modern World. Oxford: Oneworld Publications. ISBN 9781851686636