CHAPTER 6

THE TRADITIONISTS

WE have met with the traditionists in many parts of this book, and the present chapter is devoted to a discussion of their movement in general. Their activity is an integral part of the development of legal theory and positive legal doctrine during the first half of the second century A.H.¹ What has been known of it so far can be summarized, with Goldziher, by saying that it started in opposition to the general use of ra'y in the ancient schools of law and was therefore secondary to it.²

The traditionists³ were distinguished from the lawyers and muftis, from the ancient schools of law and from the ahl al-kalām.⁴ They existed 'in all countries', in Iraq, Hijaz, Egypt, and Syria,⁵ and formed groups in opposition to, but nevertheless in contact with the local schools of law.⁶ Shāfi'ī who, as far as law was concerned, always considered himself a member of the school of Medina,⁷ nevertheless identified himself with the traditionists, adopted their essential thesis and claimed that a number of his foremost [Medinese] companions and a number of the foremost lawyers in the other countries had also accepted their tenets.⁸

The main thesis of the traditionists, as opposed to the ancient schools of law, is that formal traditions from the Prophet supersede the 'living tradition'. Their most important activity, the creation and putting into circulation of traditions from the Prophet, is of course seldom avowed openly, but its traces are unmistakable. It is openly confessed, for instance, in the traditions which make the Prophet say: '[Sayings attributed to me] which agree with the Koran, go back to me, whether I actually