At critical transitional moments, every civilization produces founding figures who play decisive roles. In our civilization, Abu Hanifa stands at the forefront of such figures. Witnessing the political upheavals and tensions of the late Umayyad and early Abbasid periods, Abu Hanifa brought remarkable dynamism to the field of "fiqh" (law) through innovative approaches – foremost among them "ra’y" (an Arabic term meaning opinion, personal judgment, or reasoned interpretation) – at a time when nearly every new method was dismissed as "bid‘ah" (an Arabic term meaning innovation or religious innovation). He not only laid the foundations of the Hanafi school but also made significant contributions to the formation of other schools, especially the Shafi‘i tradition. Therefore, understanding the life of such a pivotal figure, his relationship with political authority, and his contributions to the formation and development of fiqh is of vital importance. In this respect, Professor Mürteza Bedir’s book "Abu Hanifa: An Intellectual Biography" stands out as a valuable work dedicated precisely to this aim.
With the expansion of Islam through the conquests, the Islamic world began to encompass different ethnicities, religions and highly diverse cultures. Consequently, in that period it became necessary not only to generate solutions to the new problems arising from this coexistence, but also to respond to new questions emerging from these diverse cultural contexts. Providing such responses is directly related to the universality of Islam. New knowledge had to be produced. When the traditional sources (the Quran, the Sunnah and the opinions of the Companions and the Successors) did not explicitly address these emerging issues, how – and by which method – was this knowledge to be generated? Moreover, in an atmosphere where almost every new approach was often accused of being bid‘ah, how could new knowledge be produced at all? It was Abu Hanifa who, in that period, accomplished this within the framework of fiqh.
Through the ra’y approach he developed, Abu Hanifa broke the bottleneck and intellectual deadlock in the production of new knowledge. Ra’y is not an arbitrary or ordinary personal opinion; rather, it is the method-guided generation of new knowledge. In cases where no explicit ruling exists in the Quran and the Sunnah, ra’y refers to an interpretive activity that takes into account the objectives, general principles and internal coherence of the revealed texts. In this sense, it enables the production of new knowledge not in spite of the tradition but by activating the tradition’s own internal logic. In the early period, practicing fiqh through ra’y and engaging in ijtihad were largely used interchangeably: "Practicing fiqh is a human interpretive activity that requires posing questions to the Tradition and tracing those questions to ensure the consistency of the answers. It involves reflecting on the knowledge already known within the Tradition, comparing the interpretations that emerge from such reflection, and ultimately aiming to clarify the universal message of Islam embedded within the Tradition. In this form, "tafaqquh" includes drawing inferences, sometimes conducting trials, and testing interpretive activity through a process of trial and error. Early scholars called this "ra’y"; at times, ra’y came to mean practicing fiqh and later performing ijtihad."
"Qiyas" concretizes and disciplines the framework of ra’y. Imam al-Shafi‘i likewise restricted "ijtihad" to qiyas. Qiyas makes it possible to build a bridge between two cases that share the same underlying meaning and legal regularity. Its basic logic is to identify the common effective cause ("illah") between a case for which a ruling already exists and a newly emerging case, and then extend the ruling to the new situation. In this way, consistency in the law is preserved. The significance of qiyas lies in its capacity to connect a limited number of revealed texts with the virtually unlimited range of real-life situations. From this perspective, it constitutes one of the principal mechanisms that enables fiqh to respond to an expanding and increasingly complex social reality.
Qiyas yields general rulings for newly emerging cases, while the particular circumstances of those cases are addressed through "istiḥsan." In other words, istiḥsan provides the flexibility to depart from the general application of qiyas and to adopt a more suitable ruling when strict analogy would lead to difficulties in terms of justice, ease, or public interest (maslaha). This is not an arbitrary preference; rather, it is a conscious legal choice grounded in stronger evidence such as the revealed texts (nass), consensus (ijma), necessity (ḍarūra), custom (urf), or public welfare. Through istihsan, Hanafi fiqh acquired not only internal consistency but also a practical character aligned with the flow of life. In short, by means of ra’y, qiyas, and istihsan, Abu Hanifa carried the universal horizon of the revealed texts into new contexts, establishing a legal framework that was both intellectually robust and structurally flexible.
In 738, after assuming leadership of the study circle from his teacher Ḥammad, Abu Hanifa – together with his students – systematically applied these new approaches to address emerging questions one by one, thereby laying the earliest foundations of what would become the classical structure of fiqh. Moreover, this circle did not produce knowledge only in response to existing problems; through the method of hypothetical (taqdiri/faradi) fiqh, it also generated and answered prospective questions that had not yet arisen but were likely to emerge in the future. A striking feature of Abu Hanifa’s scholarly circle was both the large number of students and its broad geographic reach. As students completed their studies and returned to their homelands, they carried these new methods with them, contributing significantly to the rapid dissemination of Abu Hanifa’s views and approach. It is also possible that the attractiveness of this circle, compared to others of the time, stemmed from the fact that Abu Hanifa’s methods required more active intellectual engagement from students in the learning process.
Abu Hanifa adopted positions in several areas that were remarkably distinctive for his time. In the chapter “Abu Hanifa and Fiqh,” Mürteza Bedir presents a range of examples illustrating this point. For instance, in response to the linguistic challenges in worship that emerged with the mass conversion of Persian populations, Abu Hanifa ruled that the recitation in prayer could be performed in a language other than Arabic. In the matter of "zakat," he opposed the conventional view that zakat must be paid strictly in the same category of goods subject to almsgiving. Instead, he permitted payment in another commodity or in cash of equivalent value, thereby introducing significant flexibility and facilitating the practical flow of life. By analogy with women’s recognized authority in financial matters, he also held that an adult woman possesses the legal capacity to conclude her own marriage contract without the permission of a guardian. His view on endowments (waqf) is likewise striking. According to Abu Hanifa, since property cannot be ownerless, the waqf transaction is invalid in principle, because it removes an asset from the ownership of real persons.
On the other hand, two of Abu Hanifa’s approaches that facilitated social life in the expanding and increasingly diverse Muslim world are particularly noteworthy. The first is his distinction between faith (iman) and deeds (amal), articulated in a manner different from prevailing views. The second is his doctrine of "ahl al-qibla." Abu Hanifa held that faith and deeds are qualitatively distinct; therefore, deficiencies or omissions in practice do not invalidate one’s faith. Through this position, he effectively closed off, at an early stage, a dangerous path of discord that could lead from shortcomings in practice to doubts about faith and ultimately to "takfir" within Muslim society. The ahl al-qibla approach likewise encourages the Muslim community to seek unifying rather than divisive grounds. In his letter to Uthman al-Batti, Abu Hanifa brings these two principles together: "Know that I say this: The people of the qibla (those who face the Kaba) are believers; I do not expel them from the circle of faith because of their neglect of any obligatory duty. Whoever, together with faith, obeys Almighty God in all obligations is, in our view, among the people of Paradise. Whoever abandons both faith and deeds is an unbeliever destined for Hell. Whoever is sound in faith but neglects some obligation is a sinful believer." In short, through the distinction between faith and deeds and the doctrine of ahl al-qibla, Abu Hanifa articulated an integrative framework that limited social fragmentation within the Muslim community.
Given the conditions and tensions of the period, it was almost inevitable that a figure who acted as a founder in many fields and introduced far-reaching innovations would provoke strong reactions. Yet the smear campaigns directed at Abu Hanifa did not stem solely from his groundbreaking approaches in fiqh. His deliberately distant relationship with political authority also intensified the backlash. Abu Hanifa, whose life unfolded largely under the shadow of political instability, consistently maintained a measured distance from the ruling powers and refused to accept any official position. For this reason, he was persistently viewed with suspicion by the authorities. Considering that during both the final phase of the Umayyads and the early Abbasid period he stood among the foremost figures sought for political legitimacy, his refusal to cooperate and his principled distance from the state at times heightened this suspicion and led to his punishment. He was reportedly flogged and imprisoned, yet he did not abandon his stance.
