The Words of the Imams: Al-Shaykh Al-Saduq and the Development of Twelver Shi'i Hadith Literature

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Ibn Babawayh also known as al-Shaykh al-Saduq was a prominent Twelver Shi'i scholar of hadith. Writing within the first century after the vanishing of the twelfth imam, al-Saduq represents a pivotal moment in Twelver hadith literature, as this Shi'i community adjusted to a world without a visible imam and guide, a world wherein the imams could only be accessed through the text of their remembered words and deeds. George Warners study of al-Saduqs work examines the formation of Shi'i hadith literature in light of these unique dynamics, as well as giving a portrait of an important but little-studied early Twelver thinker. Though almost all of al-Saduqs writings are collections of hadith, Warners approach pays careful attention to how these texts are selected and presented to explore what they can reveal about their compiler, offering insight into al-Saduqs ideas and suggesting new possibilities for the wider study of hadith.

Reviews

The study of early Twelver Shiism is rife with reductionist and deterministic analysis that emphasizes a smooth evolution from a community led by an Imam to one with its Imam in occultation. It is pleasure then to come across Warners new book on al-Shaykh al-aduq which is brimming with a complexity and nuance that is rare in the field. Utilizing the full range of al-aduqs surviving literary output, Warner paints a portrait of the development of Twelver Shiism that gives lie to the tired binary of traditionalism versus rationalism. Through it all, Warner asks all the right questions: Why did al-aduqs work survive What led to its veneration by future generations What can we learn by comparing his literary works with his legal writings Rather than a narrowly focused biography of al-aduq (as is typical), Warner uses al-aduq to shed light on a Shii community at a moment of radical transition and transformation. This book promises to rewrite our understanding of early Twelve Shiism and model a new approach to communal histories of early Islam. * Najam Haider, Barnard College, USA *
This is an excellent book and an important contribution to the study of hadith and early Twelver Shiism. It is one of the few thoroughgoing analyses of an individual Imami authors oeuvre, and it takes as its object an author whose work richly deserves to be discussed in detail. * Edmund Hayes, Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands *

Author Bio

George Warner is Research Associate in the study of West Asian Religions at the Centre for Religious Studies at Ruhr-Universitt Bochum, Germany. Previously he was a Senior Teaching Fellow at the Department of History, Religions and Philosophies at SOAS, U.K.