Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-Tahawi
| Abu Ja'far al-Ṭaḥāwī | |
|---|---|
| Born | 853 CE / 239 AH |
| Died | 21 November 933 CE / 321 AH (aged 80) |
| Era | Abbasid Caliphate |
| Religion | Islam |
| Creed | Hanafi |
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Imam Abū Ja'far Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Ṭaḥāwī or simply al-Ṭaḥāwī (الطحاوي) was (853–21 November 933) a Sunni Islamic Scholar who was from the Hanafi madhhab.
Taḥawi was born in the village of Taha in upper Egypt to an affluent family. He began his studies with his maternal uncle Isma`il ibn Yahya al-Muzani, a leading disciple of Shafi`i. When Tahawi was about 20 years old he abandoned the Shafi'i school and transferred to the Hanafi school. Different versions are given by his biographers of his conversion to the Hanafi school, but the most probable reason seems to be that the system of Abu Hanifa appealed to his critical insight more than that of Shafi'i.
Tahawi then studied under the head of the Hanafis in Egypt, Ahmed ibn Abi Ibrahim, who had himself studied under the two primary students of Abu Hanifa, Abu Yusuf and Muhammad al-Shaybani. Tahawi next went to Syria in 268/882 for further studies in Hanafi Law and became the pupil of the chief judge of Damascus.
Tahawi gained an extraordinary knowledge of hadith in addition to Hanafi jurisprudence and consequently his study circles attracted many scholars who related hadith from him and transmitted his works. Among them were al-Da'udi, the head of the Zahiris in Khurasan and al-Tabarani well known for his biographical dictionaries of hadith transmitters.
Tahawi's extraordinary knowledge of hadith in addition to Hanafi jurisprudence is evident from his significant book Kitab ma'ani al-athar and his concise creed (aqida) has also achieved a prominent place among most Sunni scholars to this day.
The scholars of his time praised him and mentioned him as being a scholar of Hadith (Muhaddith), one whose report was reliable and an established narrator. He was viewed as a distinguished and highly proficient writer and became known as the most knowledgeable of fiqh amongst the Hanafis in Egypt. This was even though he had a share in the fiqh of all of the madhabs of fiqh and hadith, and he knew of the various sciences of Islam. Ibn Yoonus said of him, "At-Tahaawee was reliable, trustworthy, a Faqeeh, intelligent, the likes of whom did not come afterward."
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