Question: I have read that some of the scholars of Hadeeth classified Aboo Haneefah as being weak in Hadeeth as he was from the Fuqahaa that were Murji’ah and that his Fiqh differed and contradicted from the authentic Ahadeeth. To the extent, some of them said that Aboo Haneefah didn’t accept the Sunnah, so after all this, how is he an Imaam?
Answer: He has been described as Imaam al-‘Adham. As for his view on the issue of Eemaan then his views are incorrect and rejected, and the statements of the scholars are well known. Yet he still remains to be classed as an Imaam and a Mujtahid. If he is correct he has two rewards and if he makes a mistake he has one reward. As for him being weak then there is no doubt that his memorisation is one thing and that the ruling of his ability to derive rulings is another. Therefore he has been classed as having bad memorisation yet he remains to be as those who have insight, he is an Imaam who can extract and derive rulings. If one says: he is not to be considered if this is his condition, then we say but his station remains as an Imaam. He is an Imaam in some of the areas of the religion.
Throughout the Muslim lands the Muslims recite from the narration of ‘Aasim despite there being some reservations of his memorisation. To the extent that if some of the Rawafid discredit him and they say that 'how can one whose memorisation has been classed as being poor be depending on in his reciaition, moreover he is even classed as weak in hadeeth?'
We say: He is an Imaam in recitation and this science of Quraan was made easy for him. Therefore if one wants to learn Quraan then he will go to the people who are renowned for knowing their Quraan and being experts within it, firmly grounded and precise, despite them being not so firm in other fields or sciences.
Aboo Haneefah was an Imaam in Fiqh, he had ability to derive, rather he was very strong in his ability to derive. He was strong in his level of knowledge despite his memorisation being questionable. This is similar to what we just talked about. If a person tries to open this door then we close this door on him, he is an Imaam in what he was able to do and in what he accomplished. As for anything else, then he is just a normal person. Similarly, ‘Aasim was an Imaam in recitation and nobody doubts this, he was an Imaam, accurate and precise. This is the reality. He was an example in his field. Meaning, if someone has poor memorisation and then he finds....like we do with some of the Imaams of the masjids, they are able to recite the whole of the Quraan in the same manner as they recite the Faatihah, no mistakes whatsoever, we find this, however if you ask him to narrate Umadat al-Ahkaam from his memory, you may find mistakes from the very beginning. Even if he studied it for years! This is because this isn’t his speciality, his speciality is in Quraan. And some are the opposite of this. Meaning, a person may have memorised all of the sciences in the world, yet you will find mistakes in some of these sciences that he has memorised.
So it is upon the person to account himself, be content with what Allaah has made easy for him. If something is made easy for him, he should try to become an expert in it, or an Imaam. For example, let’s take medicine as an example, some may memorise the books of medicine in the various languages they are written in, he is precise in his studies, he is accurate however if you ask him to memorise Nawawee’s forty hadeeth, he’s not able, why? Because it hasn’t been made easy for him, it’s not his speciality. So if you give this importance then you will benefit, you will be successful, however, if you give importance to what isn’t important for you, then you won’t be successful, so you need to review yourself.
Sharh Al-Fiyyah al-‘Iraaqee Fee Uloom al-Hadeeth by Shaykh Abdul-Kareem bin Abdullah al-Khudayr [May Allaah Preserve him], Tape 20 120-125 minutes
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