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SHIʿI JURISPRUDENCE, SUNNISM, AND THE TRADITIONIST THOUGHT (AKHBĀRĪ) OF MUHAMMAD AMIN ASTARABADI (D. 1626–27)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 February 2015

Rula Jurdi Abisaab
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Abstract

In the early 17th century, the Shiʿi juristic tradition experienced the first coherent refutation of uṣūliyya, the ijtihādī rationalism used by the mujtahids, at the hands of Mulla Muhammad Amin Astarabadi (d. 1626–27). The latter rejected the efforts of leading Iraqi and Syrian jurists to apply ijtihād (rational legal inference), hadith categorization, and dirāya (scrutiny and stratification of accounts) in deriving Shiʿi law. The main studies on Astarabadi's akhbārī (traditionist) movement treat it as a reaction to the “influence” of Sunnism on the mujtahids or to their excessive “borrowings” from it, and stress the traditionists’ abhorrence of assimilating any aspect of Sunnism. Underlining the shortcomings of these explanations, this article presents Astarabadi's thought as a discursive development within the Shiʿi juristic tradition, which is part of the grand Islamic tradition. Astarabadi became skeptical of the mujtahids’ epistemology and methodology and was concerned that they jeopardized God's law and hence the believer's salvation. He protested the Safavid monarchs’ legitimation of uṣūlī legal authority, the latter's hierarchical features, and, ultimately, the sociopolitical domination of the ʿAmili mujtahids from Jabal ʿAmil in Syria (or modern-day South Lebanon), starting with al-Muhaqqiq al-Karaki (d. 1534).

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International Journal of Middle East Studies , Volume 47 , Issue 1 , February 2015, pp. 5 - 23
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Scholars in the field of Shiʿi legal studies have presented medieval Shiʿi intellectual developments, particularly in legal theory and juristic thought, as late and conscious “borrowings” from “Sunnism,” which they have treated as a monolithic entity.Footnote 1 A number of scholars have also presented certain developments in medieval Shiʿi jurisprudence as pure reactions to sectarianism and Sunni political domination. This conceptual framework has dominated modern scholarship on Astarabadi's traditionistFootnote 2 movement, which left its imprint on hadith, jurisprudence, and law in Iran, Iraq, Bahrain, Mecca, Medina, and Syria over centuries. An adequate understanding of the rise and formation of this movement must address basic questions about the Shiʿi juristic tradition during Astarabadi's time and its relationship to its Sunni counterpart. It must also account for the transmission and transformation of juristic knowledge across the locales and communities that form the grand Islamic tradition. A close assessment of the primary sources on Astarabadi's life and intellectual make-up reveals several flaws in the above conceptual framework and offers new ways of interpreting his attack on ijtihādī rationalism and the mujtahids. This article uses Talal Asad's notion of “discursive tradition” as a framework for understanding the main arguments and aims of the early traditionist movement.

The article begins by considering the main features of a discursive tradition and then illustrates how Astarabadi's traditionist thought can be viewed as a discursive development within the Shiʿi juristic tradition. This development responded primarily to problems internal to that tradition, which clearly shares fundamental elements with its Sunni counterpart. Collective and incremental legal-juristic activities formed an Islamic tradition that was confined by collective textual references and interpretive approaches.Footnote 3 The scholars who developed this tradition accorded these references and approaches the power of discursive change. In this way, the tradition was simultaneously a site of preservation and of transformation. Pedagogical practices tied to a set of foundational texts like the Qurʾan and the hadith—receiving extensive commentary over a period of centuries—and the activities of exemplary individuals, such as the imams and their companions, provided a conceptual link between past and present.Footnote 4

This notion of discursive tradition allows us to capture the interconnections between texts, practitioners (hadith scholars, jurists, exegetes, etc.), and historical context. Moreover, it helps us to see how a tradition is permeated by relations of power that shape the ideas of jurists at particular moments in time. As Asad has suggested, power plays an important role in shaping a tradition, especially legal power that defines (and is defined by) institutions and a range of practices.Footnote 5 Relations of power determine how a tradition is situated in relation to other traditions and which legal approaches and practices become hegemonic.Footnote 6 While all Shiʿi jurists across time and place held legal power, Astarabadi considered ijtihādī rationalism as practiced by the mujtahids in Safavid Iran to be politically and socially hegemonic. Ijtihādī rationalism had indeed become the dominant framework for deriving the law in Iran during the 16th and early 17th centuries.

The “discourses” of the Shiʿi juristic tradition, whether rationalist (those of the mujtahids) or traditionist (those of Astarabadi), attempt to furnish orthodoxy and orthopraxy. This process is shaped by historical conditions and, dialectically, shape them. Particular intellectual streams contributed to Astarabadi's traditionist thought, as did sociopolitical changes in Safavid Iran. Astarabadi's education in Shiraz and Najaf (and probably earlier in Astarabad) were critical to his intellectual make-up, exposing him to central debates in hadith scholarship, kalām (doctrinal theology), and jurisprudence, but also to criticisms that several Iranian and Iraqi scholars directed toward al-Muhaqqiq al-Karaki and, to a lesser extent, al-Shahid al-Thani (d. 1558), another outstanding ʿAmili mujtahid. Meanwhile, the most important sociopolitical change was the rise of the Safavid state in 1501. Embracing Twelver Shiʿism as its official religion, the Safavid state attracted numerous ʿAmili mujtahids to work within its rubric, ensuring a proper implementation of the shariʿa and conformity to Shiʿi doctrine and rituals. For the first time in Shiʿi history, the state was playing a critical role in the promotion of certain jurists and legal approaches and the marginalization of others. Astarabadi's thought was partially a reaction to the intrusions of the state, which had facilitated the prevalence of ijtihādī rationalism among the ʿulamaʾ since the time of Shah Tamasb, the second Safavid sovereign (r. 1524–76). The latter played an important role in promoting al-Muhaqqiq al-Karaki and supported his claims to exclusive legal authority.

The Shiʿi juristic tradition treats the Qurʾan and hadith as originary sacred texts and the primary bases for deriving God's law. Shiʿi jurisprudence (uṣūl al-fiqh) is furthermore bound by the foundations of religion (uṣūl al-dīn), namely, the oneness of God, prophethood, the imamate, resurrection, and justice, which are the least amenable of all doctrines to alteration. The authority of the Prophet and the imams is integral to this tradition as it emerged in the early Islamic period. The ʿAlids and later Shiʿi sympathizers designated the imams as legatees of the Prophet, thus stressing their genealogical and divine link to him. The significance of this link is conveyed through the words of Imam Jaʿfar al-Sadiq (d. 765): “My hadith is my father's hadith, my father's hadith is my grandfather's hadith . . . and the Prophet's hadith is God's word.”Footnote 7 The early jurists treated Imams ʿAli, al-Baqir, and al-Sadiq as transmitters of the seminal principles of the tradition, validating a particular use of ʿaql (reason) and ijmāʿ (pl. ijmāʿāt, consensus) but rejecting qiyās (understood as unjustified analogy) and raʾī (discretionary opinion).Footnote 8 In turn, the imams’ companions transmitted these principles to a Shiʿi public.Footnote 9 Early hadith scholars such as al-Kulayni (d. 941) and al-Saduq (d. 991–92) were concerned with the preservation and transmission of the originary statements of the imams. At the same time, they used a measure of reasoningFootnote 10 to convey some of the textual proofs for discerning Shiʿi law.Footnote 11 The social demand for pious interpreters of the imams’ originary statements extended power to the Shiʿi scholars and jurists as agents of orthodoxy and orthopraxy. Jurists as well as other scholars came to organize legal knowledgeFootnote 12 about acts of worship and social contracts—knowledge understood to approximate God's intended law.

By the 11th century, the paradigmatic elements of the Shiʿi juristic tradition took form. The law was derived from the originary texts through legally revealing verses and imami accounts, considered to be embodiments of uṣūl, or precedents, guiding the approach to succeeding legal questions. The latter were treated as furūʿ, antecedents or branches of the law. The derivation of the law necessitated fundamental knowledge of Arabic grammar,Footnote 13 the Qurʾanic verses subject to abrogation,Footnote 14 and exegesis of sections of the QurʾanFootnote 15 and hadith that bear on law.Footnote 16 The derivation of the law also required knowledge of the conditions and rules of consensus. If it became apparent that the ʿulamaʾ had reached consensus on the ruling of a particular question, this ruling would be enforced in succeeding contexts and periods.Footnote 17 Starting in the 13th century (though consolidated only in the 14th century), the rational principles of ijtihād served as another source for the derivation of the law.Footnote 18 Among the ijtihād principles adopted by Shiʿi jurists was istiṣḥāb al-ḥāl, the presumption of continuity in a legal situation until a new condition or reason appears to prompt a change in this presumption.Footnote 19 The jurist utilized all of these sources to decide whether a legal act should be deemed obligatory (wājib), abhorrent (makrūh), recommended (mandūb), permissible (mubāḥ), or prohibited (ḥarām).Footnote 20 He could also decide to suspend the ruling on a legal act. As Wael Hallaq has noted, a “wide spectrum of interpretive possibilities” existed “within the divine limitations of the law.”Footnote 21 Juristic activity encompassed diverse interpretive techniques, orientations, epistemic justifications, and methodologies, which ranged from linguistic-based hermeneutics to complex forms of reasoning and Greek logic. Legal practices were legitimized through recourse to the imams, foundational texts, and exemplary scholars.Footnote 22

Approaching Shiʿi legal-juristic activities as a “discursive tradition”Footnote 23 allows us to revisit traditionism in light of the shared spaces of the Shiʿi and Sunni traditions and in light of their boundaries. It also helps us to reassess Astarabadi's objection to the mujtahids’ use of Sunni concepts and tools, which he saw as undermining the sacred texts of the Shiʿi tradition and hence the coherence of the tradition itself. Finally, it illuminates Astarabadi's challenge to the mujtahids’ legal power and dominance in Iran. Challenging their legal power went hand in hand with the denunciation of ijtihādī epistemology.

THE HILLI-ʿAMILI DISCURSIVE DEVELOPMENT

The demise of the Abbasid Caliphate and the decentering of political Sunnism under the Il-Khanids (r. 1256–1335) brought about a practical association between the rulers and Shiʿi ʿulamaʾ such as Ibn Tawus (d. 1266), Nasir al-Din Tusi (d. 1274), and al-ʿAllama al-Hilli (d. 1325).Footnote 24 Patronized by the Il-Khanids, the scholars of the city of Hilla were expected, much like their Sunni counterparts, to implement the shariʿa and organize the sociolegal life of Muslims. This expectation encouraged the expansion of the law and the justification of its sources, leading the scholars to reconsider previously rejected forms of legal reasoning and to examine the body of imami akhbār (accounts). Meanwhile, confusion emerged among the jurists over the role of imami consensus and the scope of syllogistic reasoning in the derivation of the law. Disagreement over the certainty of some imami accounts and their use in legal inference needed to be resolved. For reasons I will highlight in the following section, the methods used in kalām and certain features of Shafiʿi Sunni jurisprudence seemed useful in such circumstances.

During the 13th century, two areas of scholarship, namely, hadith and rijāl (biographical analysis, lit. the study of men), opened to new discursive possibilities. Ibn Tawus, for instance, attempted to stratify imami accounts on the basis of empirical criteria, an effort beyond anything attempted by al-Shaykh al-Tusi (d. 1067).Footnote 25 Meanwhile, al-Muhaqqiq Najm al-Din al-Hilli (d. 1277) paved the way for a reorganization of juristic tools and resources using systematic forms of legal reasoning.Footnote 26 After al-Muhaqqiq, al-ʿAllama identified a set of rationalist procedures or principles used in ijtihād to derive the law and revised the conditions of imami consensus.Footnote 27 To be sure, al-ʿAllama rejected some Shafiʿi legal concepts and tools readily available to him through the grand Islamic tradition, but he adopted those needed by the Shiʿi tradition at that historical juncture.Footnote 28 The legal authority of the jurist also underwent change. Common believers were now expected to become muqallidūn (emulators) of the mujtahid(s) in regard to various areas of Shiʿi substantive law.Footnote 29 The principles of ijtihād and taqlīd (emulation) helped to secure methodological and theoretical integrity for the tradition, defining the new features of Shiʿi legal orthodoxy.Footnote 30 Among the specific requirements delineated by al-ʿAllama for the practice of ijtihād was the scholar's knowledge of and conformity with all legal rulings supported by an imami consensus.Footnote 31 By al-ʿAllama's time, ijtihād had achieved an authoritative place in Shiʿi jurisprudence.

During the 14th century, the madrasas of Jabal ʿAmil in southern Syria formed a major center of discourse on the scholarship of Hilla. This development reached its peak in the 16th century, when leading ʿAmili scholars turned their attention to the verification of the four hadith collections, the organization of juristic sources, and the development of substantive law and its principles.Footnote 32 In his major work on Shiʿi law, the ʿAmili jurist al-Shahid al-Awwal (d. 1384) adapted the thematic organization of al-Mukhtasar al-Nafiʿ (The Useful Summary) by al-Muhaqqiq al-Hilli. ʿAmili scholars such as al-Shahid al-Thani (d. 1558), al-Karaki, and Sahib al-Maʿalim (d. 1602) applied diverse aspects of al-ʿAllama's ijtihādī legal thought and methods of hadith verification, as well as those of Ibn Tawus, who distinguished between ṣaḥīḥ (sound), ḥasan (good), muwaththaq (reliable), and ḍaʿīf (weak) accounts,Footnote 33 thereby shaping the “science” of dirāyat al-ḥadīth and developing its link to the juristic tradition.Footnote 34Kalām and logic received a more selective and varied assessment from uṣūlī scholars in Hilla and Jabal ʿAmil. For instance, Ibn Tawus did not consider the study of kalām necessary for the jurist.Footnote 35 Unlike al-ʿAllama, the ʿAmili jurists considered kalām and logic to be fields that depend on legal studies, that is, that serve the development of the tools and methods associated with ijtihād. Al-Shahid al-Thani, for his part, argued that logic is not fully reliable and that its study has limited benefits.Footnote 36 He integrated only some categories of logic into his line of ijtihādī rationalism. Meanwhile, he was faced with contradictions in more than one consensus upon which many rulings in Shiʿi law were based.Footnote 37 He grew skeptical of such consensuses, reaching the conclusion that they were invalid because they had not been established for all eras and their tawātur, or ability to provide certitude, could not be proven.Footnote 38 Instead, he maintained, scholars had to reexamine ijmāʿ al-imāmiyya (imami consensus) in order to determine if a given imam's opinion is reflected in it.Footnote 39 By this time, and following these discursive streams in areas of hadith, law, and kalām, ijtihādī rationalism had brought more coherence to the Shiʿi juristic tradition.Footnote 40 It also had given the mujtahids significant authority, which surpassed the authority claimed by past jurists through consensus.Footnote 41 The mujtahids confirmed the verified consensus of the early ʿulamaʾ through the ages, yet they called other incidents of consensus into question.

These developments had important implications for the Shiʿi tradition and the legal authority of the mujtahids. The opinions of a deceased mujtahid were theoretically inadmissible for future legal inference, encouraging the constant renewal of the law through ijtihād.Footnote 42 What is more, the Safavid state, through its espousal of Shiʿism and its patronage of the ʿAmili mujtahids during the 16th century, gave these latter the opportunity to apply Shiʿi law officially as well as to expand their sociopolitical roles in society. Consequently, Shiʿi law was placed in closer and clearer relationship to legal theory.Footnote 43 Unsurprisingly, the first works devoted to al-qawāʿid al-fiqhiyya (legal principles) appear with the ʿAmilis.Footnote 44 These works reflected a practical need for making available to the jurist the widest range of legal cases possible and the diverse rulings on these cases, as well as the need to address new ones.Footnote 45

Thus, uṣūliyya or ijtihādī rationalism (as I called it earlier) came to dominate Shiʿi legal culture and the madrasas from the 14th century onward, largely through the efforts of al-ʿAllama al-Hilli and his students and followers. Through the labors of the ʿAmili mujtahids in Iran and Iraq and their service to the Safavid state, ijtihād became the basis for a wide range of legal rulings.

However, the domination of the mujtahids did not go unchallenged during the Safavid period. A growing skepticism about uṣūlī epistemology emerged in a few circles of learning in Iraq, Iran, and the Hijaz in the late 16th century. This skepticism intersected with a resistance to the mujtahids’ legal authority. Astarabadi carried out the earliest and most potent attack on the mujtahids in Iran in his al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya (Medinese Benefits). The traditionism he promoted, much like its dialectical opposite, the uṣūliyya, emerged out of discursive developments in several intertwined Islamic fields, especially hadith, law, kalām, and logic. Astarabadi challenged the epistemic authority claimed by the mujtahids, striving for a different “orthodoxy” based directly on the corpus of imami hadith. In order to dislodge the role of ijtihād in deriving Shiʿi law, Astarabadi had to debunk the use of Greek logic and theological reasoning in acquiring knowledge of God's law and legal action based upon this knowledge. To understand how Astarabadi pursued this goal we must first turn to his life and scholarly background.

ASTARABADI: SCHOLARLY FORMATION AND SOCIAL DISSENT

The early schooling of Astarabadi in the Islamic sciences probably started in his home in Astarabad in northeastern Iran, where Shiʿism was well established.Footnote 46 Between 1598 and 1601–2, he obtained ijāzas (certificates) from Muhammad Sahib al-MadarikFootnote 47 (d. 1600) and Hasan Sahib al-Maʿalim, two ʿAmili mujtahids who resided in Najaf.Footnote 48 Astarabadi studied hadith and rijāl with these scholars and became well acquainted with intra-uṣūlī differences in approaching hadith, including those centering on aspects of al-ʿAllama's and al-Shahid al-Thani's methods. Shortly after (in 1601–2), Astarabadi was in Shiraz, where he spent another four years studying jurisprudence and possibly kalām with Shah Taqi al-Din Muhammad al-Nassaba al-Shirazi (d. 1610–11).Footnote 49 Many of the young mutakallimūn (theologians) of Shiraz had taken part in the polemical divide between Jalal al-Din Dawwani (d. 1502) and Sadr al-Din Dashtaki Shirazi (d. 1498).Footnote 50 Astarabadi, however, refuted the arguments of both scholars on questions of ontology and the nature of God's knowledge.Footnote 51

The scholars of Shiraz gradually found themselves competing with the legal scholarship and authority of the early ʿAmili mujtahids, particularly al-Karaki. Ghiyath al-Din, the son of Sadr al-Din Dashtaki, clashed with al-Karaki over his calculation of the qibla (the direction of prayer), while others challenged al-Karaki's ruling on Friday prayer.Footnote 52 With respect to Friday prayer, al-Karaki considered its performance optional rather than obligatory in the absence of the Imam. He insisted, however, that designated mujtahids qualified to act as the deputy of the Hidden Imam—like himself—must lead Friday prayer. The scholars of Shiraz were growing resentful of al-Karaki's claim to exclusive legal authority, which was endorsed by Shah Tahmasb (r. 1524–76), and were questioning the state's patronage of the mujtahids.Footnote 53

In addition to kalām, hadith scholarship was finding its way to Shiraz at the time and played a significant role in discursive developments within jurisprudence itself. It is unclear how Shiraz started to host hadith scholars from Bahrain, but these scholars’ approaches to hadith scholarship were at odds with hadith categorizations promoted by the ʿAmili mujtahids. A pioneer in hadith study, Majid al-Sadiqi al-Bahrani (d. 1619) emigrated from Bahrain to Shiraz and lived there until his death.Footnote 54 ʿAli b. Sulayman b. Hasan al-Qadami al-Bahrani (d. 1654), known in Iran as “Um al-Hadith” (proficient hadith scholar), studied closely with Shaykh-i Bahaʾi (d. 1621) in Isfahan and then imparted his knowledge of imami reports to students and scholars in Shiraz, which he visited many times.Footnote 55 The importance of hadith collection and editing grew after this period not only in Shiraz but also in other Iranian locales. Out of all these diverse and discursive streams grew Astarabadi's skepticism about ijtihādī rationalism, only to be sharpened by a concern for the status of the foundational texts in the hands of the mujtahids and under a Shiʿi-based state.

Between 1606 and 1616, Astarabadi was in Mecca where he studied fiqh, hadith, and rijāl with the last of his teachers, Mirza Muhammad b. ʿAli Astarabadi (d. 1616), known as Sahib al-Rijal.Footnote 56 Astarabadi highlighted how he and Mirza Muhammad envisaged a prophetic role for themselves in “reviving” traditionism and removing “all the confusions obstructing its way, for I [Mirza Muhammad Astarabadi] had this aim in mind but God Almighty has decreed that such an aim be accomplished through your [Astarabadi’s] pen.”Footnote 57 In 1616 or after, Astarabadi moved to Medina where he devoted himself to editing imami hadith.Footnote 58 Around seven years later he returned to Mecca, where he passed away in 1626–27.Footnote 59

Astarabadi's skepticism about ijtihādī rationalism was accompanied by antipathy toward the Arab émigrés, namely, the ʿAmili mujtahids, starting chronologically with al-Karaki and ending with Shaykh-i Bahaʾi. Writing several decades after al-Karaki's death, Astarabadi evoked the qibla issue, siding in this instance with Mir Giyath al-Din Dashtaki.Footnote 60 Al-Karaki, he argued, committed “many errors,” including the “destruction of the qiblas present in the land of the ʿajam (Persians) since the time of the imams’ companions. These qiblas were established by pious scholars who were experts in the mathematical sciences, such as al-Fadl ibn Shadhan,” a 9th-century Iranian theologian and hadith transmitter praised by the eleventh imam, al-Hasan al-ʿAskari (d. 874).Footnote 61 Also during the reign of Shah Tahmasb, the scholar and ṣadr (administrator of religious endowments) Mir Jamal al-Din Muhammad Astarabadi (d. 1524–25) became estranged from al-Karaki.Footnote 62 Despite Astarabadi's objection to Mir Jamal al-Din's uṣūlī leanings, he described him with deference as “al-sanad al-ʿallāma al-awḥad al-sayyid . . . qaddasa allah sirrahu” (the pillar, unique scholar, and sayyid . . . May God sanctify his soul). This description contrasts with his description of al-Karaki whom he simply referred to as “al-fāḍil al-shaykh ʿAli” (the virtuous Shaykh ʿAli).Footnote 63 Elsewhere, Astarabadi cited a hadith praising the virtues of the Persians and stressing their superiority over the Arabs:

Renowned reports from the pure imams—God bless them—stated that the Imam of the age, the law of the era and time—May God pray for him and greet him—will bring a new revelation that will have harsh consequences for the Arabs. Most of his [the Imam’s] soldiers will be of Persian descent. This is a God-given virtue, which He offers to whomever He wishes. [Surely,] those who are God-fearing receive benefits.Footnote 64

In the same vein, Astarabadi cited a hadith by Imam al-Sadiq: “Had the Qurʾan been revealed to the Persians, the Arabs would not have believed in it. It was, however, revealed to the Arabs and the Persians believed in it. This demonstrates the virtue of the Persians.”Footnote 65 Clearly, Astarabadi's refutation of the ʿAmili mujtahids, which started as a scholarly disagreement, took on personal and ethnic overtones. He seemed also to have protested the dominance of the mujtahids’ methods and ideas in Iranian circles. Astarabadi stated explicitly to one of his students that scholars in Iran did not dare express opinions at odds with the powerful jurists who possessed “a cursory knowledge” of hadith.Footnote 66 Under these conditions, taqiyya (dissimulation), he maintained, was necessary in the “land of the Persians (ʿajam)”! Evidently, diverse social and intellectual streams shaped scholarly resistance to the mujtahids and contributed to the nascent akhbārī-uṣūlī conflict.

ASTARABADI’S AKHBĀRĪ EPISTEMOLOGY

In al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya (Medinese Benefits), Astarabadi laid claims to the imami juristic tradition and called for a break with the uṣūlī Hilli-ʿAmili trend and its legal orthodoxy. New arguments and interpretations do not always lead to a break with the existing tradition. Astarabadi never challenged imami doctrine or the basic textual sources of the Shiʿi juristic tradition, namely, the Qurʾan and the imami hadith preserved in the collections of al-Kulayni, al-Saduq, and al-Shaykh al-Tusi. Needless to say, some of these textual sources, paradigmatic tools, and methods of interpretation are shared (discursively) by various Sunni traditions. Diverse traditionist scholars emerged in Iran and other Shiʿi societies but, similar to Astarabadi, they remained largely within the fold of the Shiʿi juristic tradition.

In this section, I shed light on how Astarabadi used intra-uṣūlī disagreements to challenge the epistemic foundations of uṣūlism itself. Central to the uṣūlīs’ syllogistic reasoning was the understanding that establishing certainty (ʿilm, yaqīn, qaṭʿ) about an act excludes the possibility that its opposite may occur, namely, doubt or ignorance (jahl), which leads to error.Footnote 67 But several traditionists objected to this definition of yaqīn as a new usage introduced by logicians who equated it with absolute certainty.Footnote 68 In the legal domain, Astarabadi argued, only revelation and the imams’ sayings are known with absolute certainty, whereas the rest is known with conventional certainty (al-yaqīn al-ʿādī)—that is, the most common form of certainty.Footnote 69 Common or conventional certainty overlaps with one dimension of the term ẓann as used by the mujtahids, namely, probative knowledge. This debate had important ramifications for the understanding of human acquisition of language and God's role in it. Ibn Shihab al-Din al-Karaki, a moderate traditionist, rephrased Astarabadi's view on human utterances and their meanings.Footnote 70 He argued that human knowledge is divided into two types, the absolutely certain (yaqīnī) and the conventional (ʿādī), “so if you wish you can call it ʿilm and if not you can call it ẓann, for there is no problem in the linguistic usage after you know that it [human knowledge] is sufficient for verifying legal rulings.”Footnote 71 Robert Gleave notes that the “epistemological difference between the two approaches,” namely the uṣūlī and the akhbārī, is “in part, terminological.”Footnote 72 Yet, Ibn Shihab al-Din's statement can be deceptive, not least because he tried to find common ground between the two groups. In reality, disagreements over terminology derived from deep differences over the relationship between knowledge, authority, and the Shiʿi juristic tradition.Footnote 73 Traditionists like Astarabadi contested the uṣūlīs’ manner of defining terms such as ʿilm or ijtihād, based on logic and philosophical reasoning.Footnote 74 A traditionist scholar, according to Ibn Shihab al-Din, would not object to the term ijtihād if it simply meant “striving” to obtain legal rulings on the basis of God's words and those of the Prophet and the imams.Footnote 75 Astarabadi questioned the mujtahids’ adaptation of rules of practical reason and correlation (mulāzama) favored by logicians, such as the impossibility that God would prescribe something and its opposite.Footnote 76 The reasoning of the jurists could not, in Astarabadi's view, replace the textual evidence provided by the hadith. He did not hesitate to support the silence of the law, that is, the suspension of a ruling (tawaqquf) on human acts, which are concealed in the hadith. It was impermissible, in his view, to issue a legal opinion on the basis of reason in the absence of an imami account supporting such an opinion.Footnote 77 As such, Astarabadi stressed the “sanctity” of these imami accounts preserved in the early hadith collections, and strived to canonize them.Footnote 78 We should keep in mind, however, that Astarabadi was not opposed to rationalism per se or philosophical reasoning in the area of kalām, for it is well known that he wrote a number of kalām works. This position can be explained by the fact that, unlike his view of the shariʿa, God's law, Astarabadi did not consider kalām integral to human salvation. Consequently, he considered the struggle over the definition of juridical terms such as ʿilm and ijtihād to be a struggle over the essence of God's law and, as such, metaphysics.Footnote 79

Astarabadi further challenged several ijmāʿāt that had emerged among the mujtahids and their use in legal inference. The teacher of Astarabadi, Sahib al-Madarik, integrated features of the methodology of al-Muqaddas al-Ardabili (d. 1585), who, on the basis of a rational argument, questioned the exclusion of any imami report.Footnote 80 On the question of consensus Sahib al-Madarik noted that if it could not be ascertained that the imam's statement is reflected in the agreement of the ʿulamaʾ, this agreement did not constitute a consensus.Footnote 81 Legal proof, he added, is confined to the Qurʾan, the Sunna, and al-barāʾa al-aṣliyya, the continued annulment of a legal state until an indicant about it appears. The general agreement of the ʿulamaʾ does not constitute proof.Footnote 82 Astarabadi agreed with his teacher's doubts about the legitimacy of the consensus of later ʿulamaʾ, but he rejected categorically the idea that barāʾa was a principle of legal reasoning, explaining that it “excludes any legal obligation where it is not known if there is such an obligation.”Footnote 83 Lack of knowledge that an act is obligatory or the absence of evidence that it is obligatory is not proof that such an act is legally unbinding, as the mujtahids argued.Footnote 84 The act may still be recommended. Astarabadi found the assumptions and conclusions of the mujtahids misleading and rejected the procedural principles of ijtihād.Footnote 85

In the area of hadith, Astarabadi objected to the stratification of imami accounts at the hands of the uṣūlīs, starting with al-ʿAllama.Footnote 86 He pointed to the view of Sahib al-Maʿalim that it is of little benefit to try to implement new terms for categorizing the accounts when the meanings of these terms have not occurred in the accounts themselves.Footnote 87 Yet Astarabadi went further than Sahib al-Maʿalim in attacking the whole endeavor of hadith verification, or dirāya, and the approach to khabar al-wāḥid, that is, an account which does not provide certitude.Footnote 88 He argued that the early ʿulamaʾ, such as al-Murtada, Ibn Idris, and al-Muhaqqiq al-Hilli, used khabar al-wāḥid when it was supported by al-qarīna al-mūjiba li-l-qaṭʿ al-ʿādī, namely, a proof that provides conventional certainty that it issued from the Imam.Footnote 89 Otherwise, khabar al-wāḥid is inadmissible as a source for deriving legal opinions. Astarabadi pointed approvingly to Sahib al-Maʿalim's view that most of the accounts found in the early hadith compendiums were sound even when they appeared to be of the khabar al-wāḥid type.Footnote 90 In another instance, however, Astarabadi took Sahib al-Maʿalim to task for accusing the early hadith scholars of relying on khabar al-wāḥid in legal principles and substantive law.Footnote 91 Upon reflection, Astarabadi denied the possibility that the early ʿulamaʾ, who were closer to the time of the imams, could have relied on nonauthoritative accounts. He rejected the mujtahids’ attempts to scrutinize these accounts on the basis of empirical criteria or rational arguments and attacked Shaykh-i Bahaʾi on this question.Footnote 92 By doing so, he hoped to re-establish the canonic status of the early hadith collections.

Finally, Astarabadi rejected claims that the mujtahids were necessary models of legal emulation for the common believer, citing an account traced back to Imam al-Sadiq that states that, “[w]e are to impart to you the general principles (uṣūl) and you have to derive (tufarriʿū) their particulars.”Footnote 93 For the mujtahids, “we” referred to the imams and “you” referred to the mujtahids as legal experts obligated to derive the furūʿ (substantive law) from general principles for the benefit of the believer.Footnote 94 The farʿ, or branch of law, shares an attribute with the aṣl (pl. uṣūl), the legal root, so to speak, which embodies the original norm and legal example.Footnote 95 The mujtahids worked to identify the ratio legis, or the common attribute, between the two, allowing the ruling in the original case to be carried over into the new case. Astarabadi argued that the hadith from Imam al-Sadiq addressed Shiʿi believers as a whole rather than the mujtahids, and showed that God provided believers with general religious rules (qawāʿid kulliyya). The believers—and not the mujtahids—were therefore responsible for deriving opinions about questions pertaining to them.Footnote 96 On this basis, Astarabadi argued that the laity (raʿiyya) must all be emulators of the infallible Imam. No one is permitted to turn to a self-acclaimed mujtahid for a ruling on a particular issue if this ruling lacks the support of a sound tradition.Footnote 97

Astarabadi's traditionist response to the mujtahids was also partly motivated by his view that ijtihād had created social and political divisions due to the derivation of contradictory rulings on one and the same question.Footnote 98 He accommodated only limited differences among the muftis, who were themselves qualified ruwāt (hadith transmitters). These differences resulted from vague linguistic points and contradictory accounts in instances where the imams practiced dissimulation (taqiyya), concealing their true ruling on a legal matter.Footnote 99 Yet mujtahids, in Astarabadi's view, relied on their own probabilistic inference in preferring one ruling over another.Footnote 100 In his view, rationalist legal procedures promised certainty when in fact they were arbitrary and deceiving.

Ultimately, Astarabadi declared the mujtahids to be beyond the pale of Shiʿism and relegated them to a state of eternal damnation.Footnote 101 Astarabadi's tone took the form of a premonition in which he implored the Shiʿa to save their souls from the deluge of the mujtahids’ legal heresy. Challenge to “orthodoxy” is indeed a feature of maintaining as well as changing a tradition, as discussed in the first section of this article. Astarabadi accused the dominant practitioners within the tradition, namely the mujtahids, of heresy and thus the violation of “orthodoxy” as he defined it. He found fault in the mujtahids’ attempt to weaken several reports in the hadith corpus and verify others through rational arguments. It was not adaptations from Sunnism per se that were at stake for Astarabadi, but rather how such adaptations undermined the imams’ hadith as a source of law and as the key to understanding the Qurʾan itself. This rift was shaped by the rise of the Safavid state and its support for a systematic conversion to Twelver Shiʿism based on the shariʿa.

THE SAFAVID STATE, LEGAL AUTHORITY, AND THE JURISTIC TRADITION

In the earlier sections, I highlighted central elements of Astarabadi's traditionist thought and the general intellectual streams that shaped it. I will examine these elements and streams at length in a future study. Here, suffice it to note that Astarabadi built upon intra-uṣūlī disagreements to develop his attack on the epistemic and metaphysical features of ijtihādī rationalism.Footnote 102 Disputes over the integrity of the juristic tradition were also shaped by the structure of power under the Safavids as well as social and scholarly conflicts. These conflicts revolved around four main points. First, the state's espousal of ijtihādī rationalism and its patronage of the ʿAmili mujtahids set in motion new historical processes. Ijtihādī rationalism claimed an important epistemic status while a hierarchical form of legal authority privileging the mujtahids emerged during the 16th century. The Safavid state disrupted the informal negotiations of legal authority that existed among various ʿulamaʾ prior to the 16th century, indirectly politicizing some of the scholarly debates within and outside the madrasas.

Second, several 16th-century scholars and landed elites rejected the ʿAmili mujtahids’ domination of important clerical posts in Iran.Footnote 103 S. A. Arjomand has illuminated the social base of some of the early critics of the ʿAmilis, which, although unnecessary to repeat here, adds an important layer to the sociopolitical struggles of the time.Footnote 104 Suffice it to mention that the jurists and mutakallimūn who challenged al-Karaki protested against a range of legal rulings on questions about, for example, the direction of prayer, land tax, acceptance of the ruler's gifts, and Friday prayer.Footnote 105 Astarabadi's skepticism about ijtihād became entangled with power struggles and personal antagonisms.Footnote 106 He tended to group the “Arab” jurists together, holding them collectively responsible for corrupting the juristic tradition.Footnote 107 The hadith, he pointed out, sang of the “the virtues of the Persians” as the true preservers of originary Shiʿism.

Third, Astarabadi, Ibn Shihab al-Din, and al-Fayd, who were very different kinds of traditionists, all stressed the moral responsibility of the mujtahids for causing social divisions and public confusion due to their issuance of multiple and contradictory rulings on one and the same legal question, such as that related to Friday prayer.Footnote 108 The mujtahids had in fact expressed diverse views on Friday prayer, supporting its obligatory or optional performance with or without the presence of a designated jurist.Footnote 109 Astarabadi blamed ijtihādī rationalism for public confusion, arguing that during the early Islamic period, reliance on one's independent reasoning caused sedition and wars among Muslims.Footnote 110 Consequently, he feared that the mujtahids’ legal authority would destroy the religion.Footnote 111

Fourth, Astarabadi contested the orthodoxy of the uṣūlī tradition on the basis that hadith scrutiny and ijtihād would render foundational texts and exemplary scholars superfluous. Such disputes appear to be common when discursive traditions are defended or renewed, or when new ones appear. Astarabadi's outrage at the mujtahids’ attempt to sift the hadith may support Mohammad Tavakoli-Targhi's suggestion that his traditionist movement was concerned with the canonization of early hadith sources.Footnote 112 Astarabadi's views resonated with some scholars who feared that the exclusion of the opinions of earlier jurists would diminish the authority of the exemplary scholars—those ʿulamaʾ who were closer to the imams’ time—and their texts. This sentiment motivated al-Muqaddas to question al-Karaki's view that emulating a dead mujtahid was impermissible.Footnote 113 Al-Muqaddas’ student, ʿAbd Allah b. Husayn al-Tustari (d. 1612), seemed unsettled about holding Friday prayer, practicing ijtihād, or for that matter sifting and categorizing the accounts.Footnote 114 A number of scholars in Najaf, ʿAtabat, and Hindustan came thus to question the mujtahids’ views, refocusing their efforts on revalidating the accounts in the early hadith collections.Footnote 115

The picture I have offered thus far about the rise of traditionism in Safavid Iran can now be compared to earlier accounts of traditionism.

WAS TRADITIONISM A “REACTION” TO SUNNISM?

Traditionism never really fell outside the boundaries of the Shiʿi juristic tradition or lost its vital connections to the grand Islamic tradition. As a discursive Islamic tradition, Shiʿi jurisprudence must, then, naturally expect practitioners to adapt, reformulate, ignore, or debunk positions readily available to them through Sunni jurisprudence. The Shiʿa's polemic with the Sunnis was part and parcel of a creative process, namely, bringing inner coherence to their own tradition and laying claims to the grand Islamic tradition. This point is illustrated by Michael Cook's observation that just as al-Shahid al-Awwal was adapting “a work of the Maliki Qarafi (d. 1285),” he “refutes his arguments on this question, one by one.”Footnote 116

In the last decade, several scholars have tried to provide an explanation for the rise of traditionism. In a brief statement in Inevitable Doubt, Robert Gleave suggests that, “[t]he reasons for the erosion of this adherence to certainty can be traced to practical necessity from juristic difference, or the need to enhance scholarly authority, or an emerging feeling that the adherence was intellectually untenable, or the influence of Sunni legal theory upon Shiʿism.”Footnote 117 Juristic difference, one should note, has always been part and parcel of the discursive activities of jurists within the tradition. The main question is, how does a “difference” turn into a distinct legal movement that poses a challenge to an authoritative trend within the tradition? Is the difference a break with the tradition itself? As for “the need to enhance scholarly authority,” Gleave leaves it largely unexplained. This picture is further compounded by the absence of a social context for traditionism or reference to any historical condition that could have shaped “scholarly authority.”Footnote 118 Strangely, Gleave tends to look for one broad explanation for the emergence of all of the diverse traditionist writings. The third tentative reason provided by him for traditionist skepticism—a “feeling” that certainty about the prevalent juristic system had become “intellectually untenable”—is not only vague but also cyclical. The last possibility, namely, the “influence of Sunnite legal theory,” is repeated elsewhere in Gleave's book but without further elaboration.Footnote 119 It ties in with Gleave's overall view that major developments in the Shiʿi juristic tradition were either an emulation of “Sunnism” or a reaction to it.Footnote 120

In comparison with Gleave, Devin Stewart offers an elaborate account of the rise of traditionism, which he attributes to a fear of “any scholarly interchange between the two groups [Sunnis and Shiʿa] that would lead Shiʿis to think highly of the Sunnis’ works or doctrines.”Footnote 121 It is hardly possible that Astarabadi's insistence on the primacy of the imams’ transmitted words and his doubts about the accuracy of the mujtahids’ rational inferences could have been caused by such a superficial concern. Unlike ijtihādī rationalism, traditionism, Stewart maintains, moved further away from “Sunnism.” Moojan Momen, however, argues that had traditionism “succeeded” in Safavid Iran, it would have brought Shiʿism closer to Sunnism.Footnote 122 These contradictory views do not distinguish between the diverse forms of Shiʿi traditionism and treat Shiʿism and Sunnism as monolithic entities. Hasan Ansari, Robert Gleave, and I each have discussed various differences that existed between traditionist scholars.Footnote 123 Furthermore, among the traditionists were those who expressed positions that resonated with distinct Sunni ones. This fact is hardly surprising given the profound connections that Sunnis and Shiʿa have to the grand Islamic tradition, despite their varied relations to the structure of power and shifts in their legal orthodoxies. For his part, Astarabadi seems to uphold a view expressed by the Ashʿari scholar Badr al-Din al-Zarkashi (d. 1392) that obligation and prohibition for legal actions can only be known through the shariʿa and that what is enjoined or rejected by reason may not conform to scripture.Footnote 124 Despite the differences between Astarabadi's and Ibn Taymiyya's approaches to kalām, they clearly shared a pious fear of the “heretical” implications of logic and forms of syllogistic reasoning, stressing their threat to the faith.Footnote 125 The discursive connection between these two scholars becomes even more interesting when one learns that Ibn Taymiyya, as Wael Hallaq has argued, had thorough knowledge of the arguments of the Shiʿi scholar Hasan al-Nawbakhti's (d. 912–22) refutation of logic.Footnote 126

In the area of Qurʾanic exegesis, Todd Lawson has argued that the structure of exegetical works written by Safavid traditionists resembled to a great extent a Sunni category of exegesis known as al-tafsīr bi-l-maʾthūr that relies on the Qurʾan, the reports, and earlier exegetes’ explanations rather than personal opinion.Footnote 127 Other Safavid traditionists engaged with the works of Sunni scholars such as al-Ghazali and Ibn ʿArabi. The work al-Mahajja al-Baydaʾ fi Tahdhib al-Ihyaʾ (The Pilgrim's White Path in the Refinement of the Book of Revival), written by the traditionist scholar Muhsin Fayd Kashani (d. 1680–81), was profoundly inspired by al-Ghazali's Ihyaʾ ʿUlum al-Din (Revival of the Religious Sciences).Footnote 128 This did not prevent Fayd from criticizing certain aspects of Ihyaʾ through an enhancement (rather than a refutation) of it. Fayd's criticisms of al-Ghazali must be seen in light of his belief that al-Ghazali wrote Ihyaʾ before converting to Shiʿism. Muhammad Taqi Majlisi (d. 1659–60), another traditionist scholar, expressed admiration for Ibn ʿArabi and considered him a Shiʿa.Footnote 129 ʿAli al-Shahidi, a mujtahid, was convinced that Astarabadi's writings and Fayd's Safinat al-Najat (Ark of Salvation) were stimulated by Ihyaʾ.Footnote 130 In other words, the mujtahids accused the traditionists of Sunni “influence” in the same way as some traditionists accused the Hilli and ʿAmili mujtahids of Sunni “influence.”

How do we make sense, then, of the discourse of “Sunnitization” leveled by the traditionists against the mujtahids? It is part and parcel of scholars advancing new claims to the Shiʿi juristic tradition and distancing themselves from the ijtihādī legal orthodoxy that dominated Iran during the first half of the 17th century. Accusations of Sunnitization can be illuminated by Talal Asad's suggestion that “[w]henever Muslims have the power to regulate, uphold, require, or adjust correct practices, and to condemn, exclude, undermine, or replace incorrect ones, there is the domain of orthodoxy.”Footnote 131 The integrity and authority of the juristic tradition, in Astarabadi's view, can be sustained not through ijtihād but rather through the certainty derived from the hadith itself as the embodiment of the words of the imams.Footnote 132 This certainty can be lost once the hadith is empirically scrutinized on a par with its Sunni counterparts.Footnote 133 In Astarabadi's view, the methods used by the uṣūlīs for hadith verification were tantamount to legal heresy, an abandonment of originary Shiʿism.Footnote 134

By adopting Asad's notion of “discursive tradition” we can view Astarabadi's traditionism as a set of discourses aiming to base the authority of the Shiʿi juristic tradition on the original hadith of the imams. His traditionist thought set the Shiʿi juristic tradition further apart from the Shafiʿi one, upon which the mujtahids drew, but it nonetheless converged with other significant Sunni positions evident in the grand Islamic tradition.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

In this paper, I discussed the Shiʿi juristic tradition as a discursive entity regulated by particular conventions, practices, methods of interpretation, and modes of reasoning. I addressed the conceptual limitations of presenting traditionism as a reaction to Sunni “influence” or “emulation.” Traditionism emerged at a time when the Shiʿi juristic tradition had achieved relative coherence and authority vested in the mujtahid-muqallid relationship.Footnote 135 Astarabadi presented his dialectic break with rationalism as a “revival” or re-admission of pure and originary imamism. To be sure, traditionism maintained discursive ties to earlier trends within the Shiʿi and grand juristic tradition of Islam.Footnote 136 Astarabadi's traditionism was not, however, a mere resumption of past leanings in legal, hadith, and rijāl scholarship, since it was concerned with refuting ijtihād, which was not developed before the 13th century.Footnote 137 As Asad's understanding of discursive tradition helps us to see, the Safavid traditionists who saw themselves as “reviving” the past were in fact asserting new positions about “what is apt performance” and “how the past is related to present practices.”Footnote 138

Astarabadi's traditionism had important implications for the orthodoxy of the juristic tradition, the role of the state in legal authority, and the believer's responsibility in emulating the mujtahid. God's law was to be confined to those areas and cases illuminated by the imami accounts; a ruling had to be suspended when in doubt. The mujtahids, by comparison, considered most areas of human legal behavior more or less governable.Footnote 139 More importantly, uṣūlī epistemology, in Astarabadi's view, interfered with metaphysics. The divine intention of the law compels the mufti to constrain the boundaries of substantive law and thus proclaim the failure of logic and syllogistic reasoning in recovering God's law. In certain ways, this attack on the mujtahids was also a protest against the Safavid state, which tied itself to them during the 16th century, endorsing their legal authority and rewarding them with economic gains and social influence.

Footnotes

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References

NOTES

1 See Calder, Norman, “Doubt and Prerogative: The Emergence of an Imami Shiʿi Theory of Ijtihad,” Studia Islamica 70 (1989): 61–62, 67Google Scholar. On the one hand, Calder insisted that the seminal phase of ijtihādī rationalism “owed much if not everything to Sunni tradition.” On the other hand, he accurately noted that this phase was shaped by an internal need to refine Shiʿi legal authority. By contrast, Devin Stewart and Robert Gleave presented such adaptations as passive borrowings from Sunnism. Stewart argued that Astarabadi rejected such “borrowings” due to his hostility toward Sunnism and his fear that the Shiʿa would find some merit in Sunni works. See Stewart, Devin J., Islamic Legal Orthodoxy: Twelver Shiite Responses to the Sunni Legal System (Salt Lake City, Utah: University of Utah Press, 1998), 127Google Scholar; Stewart, , “The Genesis of the Akhbari Revival,” in Safavid Iran and Her Neighbors, ed. Mazzaoi, Michel M. (Salt Lake City, Utah: Utah University Press, 2003), 170–71, 184Google Scholar; and Stewart, “Notes on Zayn al-Din al-ʿAmili's Munyat al-Murid fi Adab al-Mufid wa-l-Mustafid,” Journal of Islamic Studies 21 (2010): 235–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See Gleave, Robert, Scripturalist Islam: The History and Doctrines of the Akhbari Shiʿi School (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 6, 12, 157CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Gleave, , “Imami Shiʿi Refutations of Qiyas,” in Studies in Islamic Legal Theory, ed. Weiss, Bernard G. (Leiden: Brill, 2002), 274Google Scholar.

2 The term traditionist is used in this paper specifically to mean akhbārī.

3 Asad, Talal, “The Idea of an Anthropology of Islam,” Occasional Papers Series (Washington, D.C.: Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown University, 1986), 14–17Google Scholar; Asad, , Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and Islam (Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993), 38–39, 53Google Scholar; Anjum, Ovamir, “Islam as a Discursive Tradition: Talal Asad and His Interlocutors,” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 27 (2007): 659, 661–62CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On the development of the concept of “tradition” in the works of Alasdair MacInytre and Talal Asad, see Porter, Jean, “Tradition in the Recent Work of Alasdair MacIntyre,” in Alasdair MacIntyre, ed. Murphy, March C. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 39–43Google Scholar. A number of scholars, including some of Asad's students, have explored distinct aspects of “discursive tradition.” See Haj, Samira, Reconfiguring Islamic Tradition: Reform, Rationality, and Modernity (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2009)Google Scholar; Hirschkind, Charles, “Heresy or Hermeneutics: The Case of Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd,” Stanford Humanities Review 5 (1996): 35–50Google Scholar; Hirschkind, , The Ethical Soundscape: Cassette Sermons and Islamic Counterpublics (New York: Columbia University Press, 2006)Google Scholar; Ismail, Salwa, Rethinking Islamist Politics: Culture, the State and Islamism (London: I. B. Tauris, 2003)Google Scholar; and Mahmood, Saba, Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2005)Google Scholar.

4 Asad, “The Idea of an Anthropology of Islam,” 14–17.

5 See Anjum's assessment of Asad's ideas in “Islam as a Discursive Tradition,” 659, 661–62.

6 See Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 115–17.

7 Yaʿqub al-Kulayni, Muhammad b., Usul al-Kafi, vol. 1 (Beirut: Dar al-Taʿaruf li-l-Matbuʿat, 1990), 53Google Scholar; al-Mufid, , al-Irshad, vol. 2 (Beirut: Dar al-Mufid, 1993), 186–87Google Scholar. See also Calder, “Doubt and Prerogative,” 59.

8 Khalid al-Barqi, Ahmad b. Muhammad b., al-Mahasin, vol. 1 (Qum: al-Majmaʿ al-ʿAlami li-Ahl al-Bayt, 1995), 338Google Scholar; al-Kulayni, Usul al-Kafi, 1:56–58. On al-Baqir, see Lalani, Arzina, Early Shiʿi Thought: The Teachings of Imam Muhammad al-Baqir (London: I. B. Tauris, 2004), 116–18Google Scholar.

9 See Modarressi, Hossein, Tradition and Survival: A Bibliographical Survey of Early Shiʿi Literature (Oxford: Oneworld, 2003), 153, 160, 186–87, 191, 228, 245–47, 317–18, 323–24Google Scholar; and Lalani, Early Shiʿi Thought, 114–25.

10 For a nuanced account of methods and ways of reasoning nurtured within the early Shiʿi tradition, see Aun Hasan Ali, “Imamite Rationalism in the Buyid Era” (master's thesis, McGill University, 2006), 13–35.

11 Al-Saduq wrote numerous jawābāt (responsa) to legal questions raised by Shiʿa in regions like Wasit, Basra, Kufa, Baghdad, Nishapur, and Egypt. See also Man La Yahduruhu al-Faqih, vol. 1 (Mashhad: Majmaʿ al-Buhuth al-Islamiyya, 1988), 2–3. Al-Saduq conveyed the ʿilla (reason) for doctrines and legal obligations through the aḥādīth. See al-Saduq, ʿIlal al-Sharaʾiʿ (Beirut: Manshurat al-Fajr, 2007), 194–214Google Scholar.

12 Wilfred Madelung delineated an early Shiʿi self-awareness on questions of Islamic law, which played an indirect role in the verification of legal sources. See Madelung, Wilfred, The Succession to Muhammad: A Study of the Early Caliphate (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 108Google Scholar. See also Modarressi, Tradition and Survival, 153–55.

13 Al-ʿAllama, , Mabadiʾ al-Wusul ila ʿIlm al-Usul, ed. ʿAli Baqqal, ʿAbd al-Husayn Muhammad (Tehran: al-Matbaʿa al-ʿIlmiyya, 1984), 64–88Google Scholar; al-Thani, al-Shahid, Munyat al-Murid fi Adab al-Mufid wa-l-Mustafid, ed. al-Mukhtari, Rida (Qum: Maktab al-Iʿlam al-Islami, 1989), 289–90, 365–83Google Scholar.

14 See al-Karaki, al-Muhaqqiq, Tariq Istinbat al-Ahkam, ed. al-Fadli, ʿAbd al-Hadi (Najaf: Matbaʿat al-Adab, 1971), 8–16Google Scholar.

15 Al-Karaki, Tariq Istinbat, 9.

16 Logic was a main area of study among the scholars of Hilla during the 13th and 14th centuries. Al-Jawhar al-Nadid, al-ʿAllama's commentary on the section dealing with logic in Nasir al-Din Tusi's Tajrid al-Iʿtiqad, was studied at the Shiʿi madrasas. On works of logic, see Haydar Watwat al-Husayni, “Madrasat al-Hilla wa-Tarajim ʿUlamaʾiha min al-Nushuʾ ila al-Qimma (500–950 H),” part 5, Turathuna, nos. 3 & 4 [99–100], Year 25 (Qum, 1430), 204, 207–8.

17 Al-Karajaki, Kanz al-Fawaʾid, 29–30; Mufid's, Shaykhal-Iʿlam (bi-ma Ittafaqat ʿalayhi al-Imamiyya min al-Ahkam al-Sharʿiyya) (Qum: Kungareh-yi Jahani-yi Shaykh Mufid, 1992)Google Scholar is a comprehensive account of Sunni and Shiʿi instances of consensus. On conditions of consensus, see al-ʿAllama, Mabadiʾ, 195–98.

18 Al-ʿAllama, Mabadiʾ, 219; al-Karaki, Tariq Istinbat, 17.

19 Hallaq, Wael, A History of Islamic Legal Theories: An Introduction to Sunnī Usūl al-Fiqh (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 113–15Google Scholar. One type of istiṣḥāb is al-barāʾa al-aṣliyya, namely, the continued annulment of a legal state until an indicant about it appears. See also Modarressi, Hossein, Introduction to Shiʿi Law (London: Ithaca Press, 1984), 10Google Scholar; and al-ʿAllama, Mabadiʾ, 242, 250–52.

20 See al-Shaykh al-Tusi, al-Istibsar, 1:97–98; al-Shaykh al-Tusi, al-Istibsar, 2:165–66; al-Shaykh al-Tusi, al-Istibsar, 3:60; al-ʿAllama, , Kitab Nahj al-Haqq wa-Kashf al-Sidq (Qum: Muʾassasat al-Tibaʿa wa-l-Nashr Dar al-Hijra, 2001), 379Google Scholar; and Aun Ali, “Imamite Rationalism,” 9–11, 61–77.

21 Hallaq, Wael, “Usul al-Fiqh: Beyond Tradition,” in Hallaq, Law and Legal Theory in Classical and Medieval Islam, vol. 12 (Burlington, Vt.: Ashgate, 1994), 178Google Scholar.

22 This was evident through al-Shaykh al-Tusi's verification of consensus as a source for the law and al-ʿAllama's development of ijtihād.

23 The approach to “discursive tradition” developed in this paper owes no small part to my conversations with my students, Aun Ali and Pascal Abidor.

24 Lane, George Edmund, Early Mongol Rule in Thirteenth-Century Iran: A Persian Renaissance (New York: Routledge, 2003), 32–35, 220–23, 250–52Google Scholar; Spuler, Bertold, The Muslim World: The Mongol Period, trans. Bagley, F.R.C. (Leiden: Brill, 1969), 19–43Google Scholar.

25 al-Gharifi, Muhyi al-Din al-Musawi, Qawaʿid al-Hadith (Qum: Muʾassasat Al al-Bayt, 1988), 15–16Google Scholar; al-Aʿraji, “Tarikh al-Nazariya al-Fiqhiyya,” 270–71.

26 Al-Muhaqqiq al-Hilli, Maʿarij al-Usul, 179–85.

27 Calder, “Doubt and Prerogative,” 61–67.

28 Al-ʿAllama, Mabadiʾ, 215–17, 223–24, 244–45. The adaptation of particular Shafiʿi features was facilitated by the similarities between the Jaʿfari and the Shafiʿi schools of law. See al-Karaki, Husayn b. Shihab al-Din, Hidayat al-Abrar ila Tariq al-Ayimma al-Athar, ed. al-Din, Raʾuf Jamal (Baghdad: Muʾassasat Ihyaʾ al-Ahyaʾ, 1977), 152–53Google Scholar.

29 Al-ʿAllama, Mabadiʾ, 246–47.

30 Compare Shiʿi jurisprudence to its Sunni counterpart. See Hallaq, Wael, Authority, Continuity, and Change in Islamic Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 85, 121–22CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

31 ʿAllama, Mabadiʾ, 240. If an Imami jurist is silent on a particular ruling, the consensus of his contemporaries is void.

32 Tabatabaʾi, ʿAli, Riyad al-Masaʾil, vol. 1 (Qum: Muʾassasat al-Nashr al-Islami, 1992), 77–82Google Scholar.

33 Ibid., 78–97. On the works of Ibn Tawus, see Kohlberg, Etan, A Medieval Muslim Scholar at Work: Ibn Tawus and His Library (Leiden: Brill, 1992)Google Scholar.

34 al-Thani, Al-Shahid, al-Diraya (Tehran: al-Majmaʿ al-ʿIlmi al-Islami, 1984), 4–8Google Scholar; al-Bahaʾi, al-Wajiza fi al-Diraya, ed. Majid al-Gharbawi, no. 32 & 33, Year 8 (Qum, 1992), 387–439.

35 Kohlberg, A Medieval Muslim Scholar, 55.

36 al-Thani, Al-Shahid, Rasaʾil al-Shahid al-Thani, ed. al-Mukhtari, Rida, vol. 2 (Qum: Markaz al-Abhath wa-l-Dirasat al-Islamiyya, 2001), 762–67Google Scholar.

37 Al-Shahid al-Thani, “Tahqiq al-Ijmaʿ fi Zaman al-Ghayba,” in Rasaʾil, 2:841–42.

38 Al-Shahid al-Thani notes other reasons for the invalidity of their consensus. See “Mukhalafat al-Shaykh al-Tusi li-Ijmaʿat Nafsihi,” 847–58.

39 Al-Shahid al-Thani, “Tahqiq al-Ijmaʿ,” 843.

40 Al-Shahid al-Thani, “Takhfif al-ʿIbad fi Bayan Ahwal al-Ijtihad,” eds. Rida al-Mukhtari and Husayn al-Shafiʿi, in Rasaʾil, 1:10–12; al-Shahid al-Thani, “Taqlid al-Mayt,” eds. Rida al-Mukhtari and Abbas al-Muhammadi, 34–35. In agreement with al-ʿAllama, al-Shahid al-Thani argued that it was permissible to emulate a dead mujtahid whenever living jurists are prevented from practicing ijtihād. See pp. 20–21.

41 See Asad's discussion of power and shifts in orthodoxy in “The Idea,” 14–17.

42 Al-Karaki, Tariq Istinbat, 18; al-Shahid al-Thani, “Takhfif al-ʿIbad,” 20–21.

43 Modarressi, Introduction, 49–51.

44 Tabatabaʾi, Riyad al-Masaʾil, 1:78–79.

45 See al-Shahid al-Awwal, al-Qawaʿid wa-l-Fawaʾid. It is useful to compare it with al-Mabsut by Shaykh al-Taʾifa.

46 Munshi, , ʿAlam-arayi ʿAbbasi, ed. Rizvani, M. I., vol. 1 (Tehran: Dunya-yi Kitab, 1998–99), 237–40Google Scholar; C. E. Bosworth and S. Blair, Encyclopedia Iranica, s.v. “Astarabad,” vol. 2, Fasc. 8, 838–39; Jaʿfariyan, Rasul, Kavishha-yi Tazeh dar Bab-i Ruzgar-i Safavi (Qum: Markaz-i Tahqiqat-i Adyan va-Madhahib-i Howzeh-yi ʿIlmiyyah, 1964–65), 269–300Google Scholar.

47 The scholarship of al-Muqaddas al-Ardabili, the teacher of Sahib al-Madarik, shaped the latter's critique of some features of the uṣūlīs’ approach to hadith.

48 Astarabadi, Muhammad Amin, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya (Qum: Mu’assasat al-Nashr al-Islami, 2005), 13–14Google Scholar; al-Isbahani, Mirza Afandi, Riyad al-ʿUlamaʾ wa-Hiyad al-Fudalaʾ, ed. al-Husayni, al-Sayyid Ahmad, vol. 2 (Qum: Matbaʿat al-Khayyam, 1981), 44, 399Google Scholar; Mirza Afandi al-Isbahani, Riyad al-ʿUlamaʾ, 5:35–37; Ansari, Hasan, “Zindigi-namah va-Athar-i ʿAllama Muhammad Amin Astarabadi,” in Daʾirat al-Maʿarif Buzurg Islami, vol. 10, no. 4002 (Tehran: Markaz-i Daʾirat al-Maʿarif Buzurg Islami, n.d.)Google Scholar.

49 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 27–28; Isfahani, Muhammad Yusuf Walih, Khuld-i Barin: Iran dar Ruzgar-i Safaviyyan, ed. Muhaddith, Mir Hashim (Tehran: Bunyad-i Mawqufat-i Duktur Mahmud Afshar, 1993), 412Google Scholar; Khatunabadi, Sayyid ʿAbd al-Husayn, Waqaʾiʿ al-Sinin wa-l-Aʿwam (Tehran, 1973), 489Google Scholar.

50 Pourjavady, Reza, Philosophy in Early Safavid Iran: Najm al-Din Mahmud al-Nayrizi and His Writings (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 1–24CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

51 Muhammad Amin Astarabadi, “Danishnamah-yi Shahi,” Kitabkhana-yi ʿUmumi-yi Marʿashi Najafi, Qum, MS no. 10144, 10–21. Astarabadi discusses questions of ontology (existence and essence) and epistemology (mental existence, the thing in and of itself [nafs al-amr]) defending the commentary of Qushchi on Tusi's Tajrid al-Iʿtiqad and Jurjani's glosses on Qutb al-Din al-Razi's commentary on Urmawi's Mataliʿ al-Anwar. See Reza Pourjavadi, Philosophy in Early Safavid Iran, 97n85.

52 Rula Jurdi Abisaab, “Karaki,” Encyclopedia Iranica, vol. 15, Fasc. 5, 544–47.

53 Abisaab, Rula Jurdi, Converting Persia: Religion and Power in Safavid Iran (London: I. B. Tauris, 2004), chap. 1 and 2Google Scholar.

54 al-Biladi, ʿAli b. al-Hasan, Anwar al-Badrayn fi Tarajim ʿulamaʾ al-Qatif wa-l-Ahsaʾ wa-l-Bahrayn, ed. al-Tabsi, M. (Najaf: Matbaʿat al-Nuʿman, 1957–58) 119–20Google Scholar.

55 Ibid., 85–88; al-Bahrani, Yusuf, Luʾluʾat al-Bahrayn, ed. al-ʿUlum, M. S. Bahr (Manama: Maktabat Fakhrawi, 2008), 15–17Google Scholar.

56 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 59.

57 Astarabadi, “Danishnamah-yi Shahi,” 5.

58 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 28.

59 See Ansari, “Zindigi-namah,” 1–2.

60 Ibid., 2.

61 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 364–65.

62 The quarrel between Mir Jamal al-Din and al-Karaki took place around the time when the latter was advancing his commentary on al-ʿAllama's al-Qawaʿid. See Jaʿfariyan, Kavishha-yi Tazeh, 287.

63 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 49–50, 78.

64 Ibid., 542. See also pp. 532–34.

65 Ibid., 542.

66 Ibid., 573.

67 Rula Jurdi Abisaab, “Epistemic and Legal Questions: the akhbārism of Mulla Muhammad Amin Astarabadi (d. 1626–7)” (paper presented at the ISIS Biennial Conference, Los Angeles, Calif., 27–29 May 2010).

68 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 183; Ibn Shihab al-Din, Hidayat al-Abrar, 12–13.

69 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 105–6.

70 Gleave, Scripturalist Islam, 276. Gleave highlighted Ibn Shihab al-Din al-Karaki's view that humans supplement God's original role in assigning meaning to utterances on the basis of madhhab al-tawzīgh (al-tawzīʿ) (“allotment”—i.e., God and humanity are “allotted” certain roles in the development of language). “He [Astarabadi] claims it to be the chosen opinion of most scholars (akhtārahu [ikhtārahu] al-akthar).” See Hidayat, 240–41.

71 Ibn Shihab al-Din, Hidayat, 14.

72 Gleave, Scripturalist Islam, 88.

73 The traditionist jurist, al-Hurr al-ʿAmili (d. 1692–93) did not consider the akhbārī-uṣūlī disagreement to be terminological. See his al-Fawaʾid al-Tusiyya (Qum: al-Matbaʿa al-ʿIlmiyya, 1983), 445–50.

74 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 258–59.

75 Hidayat, 193–94.

76 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 456–68; Modarressi, Introduction to Shiʿi, 3–4.

77 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 104–5.

78 In private discussions with the author, Mohammad Tavakoli-Targhi made an interesting connection between 19th- and 20th-century akhbārī trends and canonization as a response to the powers of the state.

79 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 569–71; Astarabadi, “Danishnamah-yi Shahi,” 9.

80 Modarressi, Introduction to Shiʿi, 53.

81 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 59.

82 Ibid.

83 Ibid.; Jurdi Abisaab, “Epistemic and Legal Questions.”

84 Modarressi, Introduction to Shiʿi, 10.

85 Al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 100, 230, 276–77, 289.

86 Ibid., 122–23; Sahib al-Maʿalim developed the categorization of hadith formally started by Ibn Tawus. See al-Maʿalim, Sahib's work, Maʿalim al-Din wa-Maladh al-Mujtahidin, ed. al-Hakim, Sayyid Mundhir (Qum: Muʾassasat al-Fiqh li-l-Tibaʿa wa-l-Nashr, 1997–98)Google Scholar; Tabatabaʾi, Riyad al-Masaʾil, 1:78–79; Astarabadi, , “al-Hashiya ʿala Usul al-Kafi,” collected by Mawla Khalil Qazvini and ed. Fadili, ʿAli, Mirath-i Hadith-i Shiʿa, vol. 8 (Qum: Muʾassasa-yi Farhangi-yi Dar al-Hadith, 1961–62): 262Google Scholar.

87 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-madaniyya, 128.

88 Khabar al-wāḥid is translated at times as “a solitary account.” Al-Shaykh al-Tusi accepted khabar al-wāḥid, arguing that if it is supported by a dalīl qatʿī, a proof that provides certainty, then it is possible to derive God's law on its basis. al-Tusi, Al-Shaykh, ʿUddat al-Usul, ed. Najaf, Muhammad Mahdi, vol. 1 (Qum: Muʾassasat Al al-Bayt, 1982–83), 337, 367–72Google Scholar. Al-ʿAllama presented this position in Mabadiʾ, 205.

89 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 479.

90 Ibid., 135.

91 Ibid., 132–37.

92 Ibid., 495.

93 Ibid., 312.

94 See al-Shahid al-Thani, “al-Iqtisad wa-l-Irshad ila Tariq al-Ijtihad fi Maʿrifat al-Mabdaʾ wa-l-Maʿad wa-Ahkam Af ʿal al-ʿIbad,” in Rasaʾil, 2:776, 779–81.

95 Hallaq, A History of Islamic Legal Theories, 83–86.

96 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 313.

97 Ibid., 313–14. Compare to al-Shahid al-Thani, “al-Iqtisad,” Rasaʾil, 2:779–81.

98 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 319.

99 Ibid., 301, 318–25.

100 Khwansari, Rawdat, 1:316.

101 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 195–98. Astarabadi also quotes several hadith from al-Mahasin and Basaʾir al-Darajat stressing the moral implications of issuing legal opinions without certainty not only for the believer but also for the mufti. Bahrani, , Luʾluʾat al-Bahrayn, ed. al-ʿUlum, M. S. Bahr (Beirut: Dar al-Adwaʾ, 1986), 117–19Google Scholar.

102 ʿAllama, Mabadiʾ, 248; al-Shahid al-Thani, “Takhfif al-ʿIbad,” 1:10–12; al-Shahid al-Thani, “Taqlid al-Mayt,” 34–35. In agreement with al-ʿAllama, al-Shahid al-Thani argued that it was permissible to emulate a dead mujtahid whenever living jurists are prevented from practicing ijtihād. See pages 20–21.

103 Rula Jurdi Abisaab, “al-Karaki,” Encyclopedia Iranica, 544–47; Ansari, “Zindiginamah va Athar-i Allama Muhammad Amin Astarabadi,” 2.

104 Arjomand, S. A., The Shadow of God and the Hidden Imam (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), 126–31CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Rasul Jaʿfariyan, Kavishha-yi Tazeh, 86–90.

105 Abisaab, “al-Karaki.”

106 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 495.

107 Ibid., 532–34, 542.

108 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 573; al-Kashani, Fayd, Dah Risalah, ed. Jaʿfariyan, Rasul (Isfahan, 1992), 281Google Scholar; Shihab al-Din al-Karaki, Hidayat al-Abrar, 3–4. See also Newman, “Fayd al-Kashani and the Rejection of the Clergy/State Alliance,” in The Most of the Shiʿa: The Institution of Marjaʿ al-Taqlid, ed. Walbridge, Linda (London: Oxford University Press, 2001), 34–52Google Scholar.

109 Abisaab, “Karaki,” Encyclopedia Iranica; al-Karaki, “Salat al-Jumʿa,” in Rasaʾil al-Muhaqqiq al-Karaki, ed. al-Hassun, M., vol. 1 (Qum: Muʾassasat al-Nashr al-Islami, 1988), 158–60Google Scholar; al-Shahid al-Thani, “Salat al-Jumʿa,” ed. R. Mukhtari and G. al-Qaysari, in Rasaʾil, 1:1–78; “al-Hath ʿala Salat al-Jumʿa,” ed. M. al-Nawruzi, in Rasaʾil, 1:3–31; Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 557, 573.

110 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 190–91, 204–30.

111 See al-Bahrani, Luʾlu ʾat, 117–18.

112 Private discussions with the author.

113 Jaʿfariyan, Kavishha-yi Tazeh, 42.

114 Al-Amin, Aʿyan al-Shiʿa, 3:82–83; Modarressi, Hossein, “Rationalism and Traditionalism in Shiʿi Jurisprudence: A Preliminary Survey,” Studia Islamica 59 (1984): 155Google Scholar.

115 Majlisi, Muhammad Taqi, Lawamiʿ-i Sahibqarani (Qum: Ismaʿiliyan, 1994–99), 38Google Scholar.

116 Cook, Michael, Commanding Right and Forbidding Wrong in Islamic Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004)Google Scholar, 294n276, 294n279, 295n284, 296n296.

117 Gleave, Robert, Inevitable Doubt: Two Theories of Shiʿi Jurisprudence (Leiden: Brill, 2000), 247–48Google Scholar.

118 See Gleave, Scripturalist Islam, xix–xx, 156–57, 296.

119 Gleave, Inevitable Doubt, 4.

120 Ibid., 2–3, 32; Gleave, Scripturalist Islam, 6, 12, 156–57, 157n67; and Gleave, “Imami Shiʿi Refutations,” 274.

121 Stewart, “The Genesis of the Akhbari Revival,” in Safavid Iran and Her Neighbors, ed. Michel M. Mazzaoui (Salt Lake City, Utah: Utah University Press, 2003), 184. See also p. 169.

122 Momen, Moojan, Introduction to Shiʿi Islam (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1985), 222Google Scholar.

123 Rula Jurdi Abisaab, Converting Persia, 107–14; Hasan Ansari, “Jayigah-i Fiqhi/Usuli-yi Sayyid ʿAbdu-llah Shubbar wa Sahm-i u dar Nizaʿ-i Usuli/Akhbari,” accessed 2 January 2013, http://ansari.kateban.com/entry1878.html; Ansari, “Jayigah-i al-Kafi dar mayan-i Imamiyya,” accessed 2 January 2013, http://ansari.kateban.com/entry842.html; Gleave, Scripturalist Islam, 237–44.

124 Astarabadi, Muhammad Amin, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya (wa-bi-Dhaylihi al-Shawahid al-Makkiyya by Nur al-Din al-Musawi al-ʿAmili) (Qum: Muʾassasat al-Nashr al-Islami, 2005), 328–29Google Scholar. See al-Zarkashi, Badr al-Din, Tashnif al-Masamiʿ bi-Jamʿ al-Jawamiʿ, ed. b. ʿAbd al-Rahim, Abi ʿAmr al-Husayni b. ʿUmar, vol. 1 (Beirut: Dar al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 2000), 45–48Google Scholar; and al-Subhani, Jaʿfar, Risala fi al-Tahsin wa-l-Taqbih al-ʿAqliyayn (Qum: Muʾassasat al-Imam al-Sadiq, 1999–2000), 127–29Google Scholar.

125 See Hallaq, Wael, Ibn Taymiyya against Greek Logicians (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, introduction; Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 34, 192–93, 256–58.

126 See Hallaq, Ibn Taymiyya, xlii–xliii.

127 Lawson, Todd, “Akhbari Shiʿi approaches to tafsīr,” in Approaches to the Qurʾan, ed. Hawting, G. R. and Shareef, A. A. (New York: Routledge, 1993), 176, 186–87Google Scholar.

128 See Kashani, Muhsin Fayd, al-Mahajja al-Baydaʾ fi Tahdhib al-Ihyaʾ, ed. al-Ghaffari, ʿAli Akbar (Qum: Muʾassasat al-Nashr al-Islami, 1994), 1Google Scholar.

129 See al-Husayni, Muhammad, al-Ruh al-Mujarrad (Tehran: n.p., 2002), 326Google Scholar; ʿAli al-Shahidi, “al-Siham al-Mariqa,” fol. 8a–12b.

130 al-Shahidi, ʿAli, “al-Siham al-Mariqa min Aghrad al-Zanadiqa,” MS, in al-Husayni, Ahmad, Fihrist-i Nuskhaha-yi Khatti-yi Kitabkhana-yi ʿUmumi-yi Marʿashi, collection 1576 (Qum, 1975)Google Scholar, fol. 8a–12b; Sabzavari, Muhammad ʿAli Muʾadhdhin, Tuhfah-yi ʿAbbasi: The Golden Chain of Sufism in Shiʿi Islam, trans. Faghfoory, M. H. (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 2008), 157n37Google Scholar.

131 Asad, “The Idea,” 15–16.

132 Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 136–39.

133 He argued that the hadith of various Sunnite groups lacked certainty, that is, being of the khabar al-wāḥid type. See Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 123.

134 Al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 98–99, 104–5, 192–201.

135 Abisaab, Converting Persia, 106–9.

136 Madelung considered Kitab al-Naqd by ʿAbd al-Jalil al-Qazwini (d. 12th century) to be proof for an akhbārī-uṣūlī division at least since the 12th century. See Madelung, , “Imamism and Muʿtazilite Theology,” in Le Shiʿisme Imamite, ed. Fahd, T. (Paris: Paries Presses Universitaires de France, 1970), 13–30Google Scholar. Stewart accepted Madelung's position in Islamic Legal Orthodoxy (pp. 182–84) but in “The Genesis,” he attributed the division to al-Shahid al-Thani's Sunni “borrowings” (pp. 170–71). Newman argued earlier that the akhbārī-uṣūlī division existed during the 9th century, noting its political significance. See Newman, “The Akhbari/Usuli Dispute in Late Safawid Iran, Part 2,” BSOAS 55 (1992): 250–53, 259–60.

137 Ibn Abi ʿAqil, for instance, is described as “awwal-i kesī ast az mujtahidān-i Imāmiyya” (one of the first imami mujtahids) and someone who used syllogistic reasoning even if he did not develop Shiʿi ijtihād as we know it. See Shushtari, Qadi Nurullah, Majalis al-Muʾminin (Tehran: Kitabfurushi-yi Islamiyya, 1955), 427–28Google Scholar; al-Fiqhi, Markaz al-Muʿjam, Hayat ibn Abi ʿAqil al-ʿUmani (Qum: Sharaf, 1992), 6–8Google Scholar; and Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 91, 97, 111–13. In Rijal al-ʿAllama, Muhammad b. Zakariyya b. Dinar (d. 910) is described as an “akhbārī” though he was distinguished from narrators of hadith (p. 156). To be sure, the meanings of akhbārī and ūṣūlī changed over time and across genres and scholarly contexts, but they gained a specific meaning in the Safavid period.

138 Asad, “The Idea of an Anthropology,” 14–15.

139 See Astarabadi, al-Fawaʾid al-Madaniyya, 104–5, 325–27, 332–40.