Constructive Critics, Hadith Literature, and the Articulation of Sunni Islam: The Legacy of the Generation of Ibn Sa'd. Ibn Ma'in, and Ibn Hanbal.

• Author: Judd, Steven
• Position: Book review

Constructive Critics, Hadith Literature, and the Articulation of Sunni Islam: The Legacy of the Generation of Ibn Sa'd. Ibn Ma'in, and Ibn Hanbal. By SCOTT C. LUCAS. Leiden: BRILL, 2004. Pp. xv + 423.

In Constructive Critics, Scott Lucas tackles the difficult but important topic of the influence of hadith critics on the formation of Sunni thought. What likely began as an attempt to explain the significance of Ibn Sad's Kitab al-tabaqat, has grown into a tour de force through the world of early Islamic hadith criticism and the voluminous literature this endeavor produced. The result is a satisfying and insightful book that will cause those of us who have used tabaqat works for various purposes to think more carefully about their compilers' objectives.

Lucas's work is divided into two sections, the first of which provides a foundation for approaching the material and the second of which offers a detailed analysis of the works of Ibn Sa'd, Ibn Ma'in, and Ibn Hanbal. In the first section, Lucas includes a helpful discussion of the technical terminology hadith critics used in their evaluations of their peers and forebears. He then provides a periodization of hadith scholarship, based largely on al-Dhahabi's Tadhkirat al-huffaz, but with copious references to Ibn al-Salah's Muqaddima as well. From his analysis of these works and others, Lucas identifies a core group of ninety-two "master critics'" who shaped the guidelines and methods of the entire hadith enterprise. He then offers brief biographies of his principal subjects. The second section of the book offers a careful comparative analysis of Ibn Sa'd's Tabaqdt, Ibn Hanbal's Musnad (along with his son's 'Ilal), and opinions of Ibn Ma'in preserved in al-Duri's Tarikh, focused primarily on their evaluation of other hadith transmitters. The first chapter of this section addresses the problems the presented for Sunni hadith scholars, who had to rationalize the collective authority they invested in the sahaba with the reality of deep divisions among them in the aftermath of the Prophet's death. The following chapter offers a quantitative comparison of his three subjects' evaluations of earlier muhaddiths. showing a surprising degree of consistency in their opinions. In his final chapter, Lucas presents a narrative of the development of hadith scholarship based on his examination of the critics' works.

This exhaustive analysis of several major (and massive) sources allows Lucas to make a number of...