Review of Dr Salah Abu 'l-Hajj's Is'ad al-Mufti

Studying the field of Usul al-Ifta/Rasm al-Mufti is not only integral for every Mufti, but also for every alim. The general qawaid of the field should be part of any alim course, as every alim needs to know how to identify the rajih view in the madhab.

The major work on the topic is Ibn Abidin’s Sharh Uqud Rasm al-Mufti, which is taught in all Dar al-Iftas. Despite the important of the book, there are very few commentaries available on it, especially in Arabic.

This work, by Dr Salah Abu ‘l-Haj of Amman, Jordan is a detailed ta’liq on the book and is more of a sharh than a tahqiq or ta’liq. The first 200 plus pages are devoted to detailed discussions on issues like following a madhab, tabaqat of the fuqaha etc.

He then presents Ibn Abidin’s Sharh al-Uqud, with his detailed footnotes that contain lengthy tarajim of a’lam, explain difficult ibarat, debate whether Ibn Abidin’s viewpoint is correct and other fawaid.

His footnotes are filled with fawaid and should be compulsory reading for anyone studying the book.

At the same time, it is imperative to note that Dr Salah holds a host of problematic views concerning Usul al-Ifta and most of these are expounded upon in his footnotes to this book.

One may then ask, “Why am I advising ifta students to study this book, when it contains his problematic views?”

The reply would be:

Firstly, if you don’t possess the ability to read critically and just lap up everything you read, then you shouldn’t be in a Dar al-Ifta.
Secondly, any decent mufti needs to be aware of these problematic positions and should prepare replies to them.
Dr Salah’s students are now propagating his erroneous views as the correct Hanafi view and if you haven’t even heard of them, how are you ever going to respond to them?

It should also be noted that I only advise this book for the commentary, which would be read out of class times. Don’t use it in class for the text, as his tahqiq of the text is very poor.

To explain: It is accepted amongst Muhaqqiqin that when mentions at the start of a book that muqabalah of this book took place against X number of manuscripts, it means that each of these manuscripts in their entirety was compared against the text of the book. If one only used them to check up certain difficult spots, then one is required to explicitly state this and one cannot claim he made muqabalah of the book on these manuscripts.

Dr Salah states on Pg. 230 of this book:
He mentions which ones and gives pictures of the start and end of them.

The reality however is that he definitely did NOT make muqabalah of the book on even one of these 3 manuscripts.

Had he done so, he would have corrected many of the errors that were found in the old edition of the book that he typed out, yet these are still found in his edition.

There is even a place where a number of lines are missing in the old edition as well as in his edition, yet these are found in the manuscripts he claims to have used.

He just resorted to checking the manuscripts when something was really unclear to him otherwise, he did not make muqabalah of the book on these manuscripts.

Ironically, there are places where he makes changes/corrections claiming that he relied on the manuscripts for these corrections, but in reality, this isn’t in the manuscripts!

This problematic manhaj in tahqiq of Dr Salah really raises red flags about the quality of his other tahqiqat. This is a booklet, with the manuscripts being just 30-40 folios, yet he was unable to make muqabalah, in spite of this book and this field being so important and one he is supposedly a specialist in.

I have received multiple complaints about the large number of typos in his other works and really wonder what manhaj of tahqiq was followed therein.

To sum it up:

The text of Sharh Uqud here isn’t the best; there are half a dozen other prints that are better than this for the text.

This commentary however is really beneficial and is a must-read for every Ifta student/Mufti, however it does contain problematic content, which should be ready with a critical mind.

Study it and find convincing replies to his arguments.

---

Reproduced, with permission, from HERE