ʾAḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn Hārūn ibn Yazīd al Baghdādī (Arabic: أبو بكر الخلال) better known as Abū Bakr al Khalāl, was a Medieval Muslim jurist.[1]
Abu Bakr al-Khallal أبو بكر الخلال | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Personal | |
| Born | Ahmad bin Muhammad |
| Died | 311 AH / 923 CE |
| Religion | Islam |
| Era | Islamic Golden Age |
| Region | Mesopotamia |
| Denomination | Sunni |
| Jurisprudence | Hanbali |
| Creed | Athari |
| Main interest(s) | Fiqh |
| Muslim leader | |
Influenced by | |
Influenced | |
Al-Khallal was a student of five of Ahmad ibn Hanbal's direct students, including Ibn Hanbal's son Abdullah.[2] His documentation on Ibn Hanbal's views eventually reached twenty volumes and ultimately led to the preservation of the Hanbali school of Islamic law.[3] He was considered the principal Hanbalite scholar of his time.[4]
Life
Al-Khallal's exact date of birth is not known. He died in 923, which means that he would have been born during Ibn Hanbal's twilight years.[5] The Oxford International Encyclopaedia of Legal History estimates al-Khallal's year of birth as 848.[1]
Aside from his legal efforts, virtually nothing is known of al-Khallal's life.[1][2] During his efforts to compile the views of Ibn Hanbal, al-Khallal ended up spending periods of time living in Fars Province, Syria and Mesopotamia.[6] According to Muslim historian Al-Dhahabi, there was no such thing as an independent Hanbalite school of law prior to al-Khallal's efforts at compiling Ibn Hanbal's views.[6] Al-Khallal's status within the school was not universally accepted, and he and his students were often in conflict with fellow Hanbalite Al-Hasan ibn 'Ali al-Barbahari and his students.[7]
Reception
The historian al-Dhahabi stated that, "Before him (al-Khallal) there were no independent school of the imam's; not until he followed up Ahmed's texts, wrote them down and checked their proofs after 300."[8]
The 20th century Hanbali jurisprudent Ibn Badran called al-Khallal's collection "the very root of the Hanbali school, from which sprang all later books of Hanbali jurisprudence".[8]