Perfecting a Religion

Remarks on al-Kulaynī and His Summa of Traditions

MOHAMMAD ALI AMIR-MOEZZI AND HASAN ANSARI

Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad b. Yaʿqūb b. Isḥāq al-Kulaynī al-Rāzī (d. 328 or 329/939–40 or 940–41) was al-Ṣaffār’s contemporary, though probably younger than he. It is well known that within the domain of Shi’ite Hadith and the elaboration of its immense corpus, al-Kulaynī’s influence, and that of his summa of traditions, the monumental Kitāb al-Kāfī, has been decisive. Moreover, this book will be deemed the first, and without doubt the most important doctrinally, of the authoritative Four Books (al-kutub al-arbaʿa) of Imami Hadith. Even so, aside from a few rare or brief articles devoted to our author/compiler or to particular aspects of his work, no monograph synthesis, carried out in accord with historical and critical perspectives, has yet been accorded to this great scholar and to the milieu in which his magnum opus first saw the light.¹ Here we shall attempt in a very modest way to fill this gap despite our awareness that within the compass of a single chapter it is hardly possible to present so vast a topic in any exhaustive fashion.

The Scarcity of Direct Sources of Information Amid Countless Uncertainties

Despite the man’s importance, and that of his work, we know little that is certain about al-Kulaynī’s life, and what we do know, when we attempt to reconstruct the major stages of his existence, comes mostly from the chains of transmitters (sanad, isnād) in al-Kāfī, along with other such chains and certain rare sources. As is well known, Shi’ite prosopographical works (kutub al-rijāl) have very little to say about the personal lives of the scholars whom they list. Generally speaking, the composition of independent biographical reports (tarājim), which came much later in Imami Shi’ism than in the Sunni tradition, was not practiced during the very first centuries of Islam. In addition, the Imami prosopographical, bibliographical, and historical works are quite skimpy with respect to our scholar. Nor do Sunni sources contain much information of significance about him; for the most part they do little more than repeat the information provided by the Shi’ite sources.² One of the rare exceptions is “The History of the City of Damascus” by Ibn ʿAsākir (d. 571/1175), which does offer original information, as we shall see.³ Surprisingly, despite al-Kulaynī’s renown as well as his sojourn in Baghdad—true, it was a brief stay toward the end of his life—the Fihrist of Ibn al-Nadīm (written in 377/987) makes no mention whatsoever of him, nor does the Ta’rīkh Baghdād of al-Khaṭīb al-Baghdādī (d. 463/1071).⁴

No information exists on al-Kulaynī’s ancestors: was he of Iranian stock or did he belong to those families of Arab origin who emigrated to Iran during the first two or three centuries of the Hijra? His father’s name was Yaʿqūb (Jacob) and his grandfather’s was Isḥāq (Isaac). While it is true that Muslims bore such names, it is still reasonable to wonder whether our author’s ancestors were not Christians or Jews, linked to those Syriac or Arabic-speaking families who came originally from Mesopotamia and settled in Iran at the very beginnings of Islam. His lineage on his mother’s side is less obscure, and it’s possible that the fame of our scholar in the region from Kulayn to Rayy was owing to the established situation of his mother’s family.

The date of his birth too remains unknown. We can gain an approximate idea of the date based on the death dates of certain of his masters. His place of birth, details about his childhood and youth are unknown as well. From his nisba we know that he came from the village of Kulayn, and yet even here certain later sources express doubt about the precise geographical location of this village. Conceivably, al-Kulaynī began his studies in the modest setting of his native town and within his own family, which included several religious scholars. He was obviously able to profit from the scientific milieu of the city of Rayy which at that time was one of the greatest intellectual centers in all Iran. Of his studies in Rayy we know almost nothing in detail. No direct information tells us whether they included anything else beside the science of Hadith; for example, the Qur’anic sciences of recitation and commentary, law, or even theology, all disciplines taught by several masters in the city. Nevertheless, it may be assumed that in accord with the traditional course of study, he would have commenced with Arabic letters and Qur’anic recitation, followed by other branches of the religious sciences. We are equally in the dark as to whether he attended the courses of the great Sunni scholars who dwelt in Rayy during this period; however, we do know of a certain number of his Imami masters in Hadith in this city. Moreover, keeping in mind the ample extent of the juridical chapters of the Kāfī, we may conclude that he had quite a solid formation in juridical studies and an extensive knowledge of the works and the various disciplines of the law, including Sunni law. His travels in quest of knowledge, in Iran and in Iraq, are not well known either and, apart from an exceptional report by Ibn ʿAsākir who records his presence in Syria,⁵ his education in various places can be deduced only by identification of his masters. Thus the list of these shows clearly that al-Kulaynī, probably following his initial training at Rayy, went on to further his Hadith studies at Qumm, seemingly just before 297/909–10.⁶ We know too that he attended the lessons of masters in Hadith in Kūfa and in Baghdad, very likely for the first time during a quite brief stay in Iraq with his maternal uncle ʿAllān al-Kulaynī, before 310/922–23.⁷ Some other names of masters suggest that our scholar made a trip to Khorasan, doubtless in pilgrimage to the tomb of the imam al-Riḍā, but also to attend courses with scholars in Nīshābūr⁸ as well as Samarqand.⁹

Nevertheless, it is clear that the astonishing breadth of al-Kulaynī’s education in the diverse disciplines of the religious sciences cannot be gauged solely from the chains of transmission and from his book al-Kāfī, the single work of our author that has come down to us—and from these alone. His book attests to the fact that he had a firm knowledge of such foundational disciplines as Arabic literature and philology, law, theology, as well as various Qur’anic sciences and especially exegesis. These disciplines were all taught at Rayy where al-Kulaynī could have learned them under the aegis of illustrious Sunni and Shi’ite masters. His close acquaintance with the varied circles and the religious and doctrinal movements of this city would thus have gained him intellectual riches of great profundity as well as a vast culture.

Furthermore, we know almost nothing about al-Kulaynī’s social and religious relations with the Imami communities of Rayy, Qumm, and the other urban centers of central Iran, notwithstanding that early prosopographical works named him the head of the Imamis of Rayy. The question arises in a more general manner within the framework of the nature and extent of our scholar’s relations with Imami adherents on the social, political, and doctrinal levels. Nothing is known, for example, of al-Kulaynī’s relations with the powerful families or influential individuals of his day. The same is also true for the social and political framework of his life in Rayy where numerous doctrinal tendencies intermingled. What were his relations with local power? Certainly, the disturbed tenor of the city during this period affected his life and yet perhaps the very silence of the sources on these aspects of our scholar’s life, particularly at a time charged with tension and confusion, are indicators of his frame of mind and his probable posture of aloofness regarding political affairs. Did he deliberately maintain a distance from all positive social and political activity?

So, too, it would be important to have some knowledge of his relations as one of the leading heads of the Rayy Imamis, with the central institution of the wikāla (the institution governing delegation from the hidden imam during the lesser Occultation) at Baghdad, relations that are likely but for which we possess no textual evidence. The distance between his hometown and the center of Imami activity in the Abbasid capital during the Occultation crisis may provide a reason for his absence from the annals of this institution. Even so, the compilation of a work as important as al-Kāfī may have provided a reason for establishing solid relations between al-Kulaynī and the Imami powerful men; such as, for example, his exact contemporaries, the last two “representatives” of the hidden imam during the minor Occultation. But the sources breathe not a word about all this; it appears that such relations did not even exist! As a result, only hypotheses are left us. Likewise, we know virtually nothing about the circumstances of his final journey to Baghdad, from which he never returned. Even the exact date of this journey is not known: probably shortly before 327/938–39, the very date on which the Kāfī was brought forth and taught at Baghdad.¹⁰ The scanty information that we have about this stay, together with the report of his trip to Syria as recorded in Ibn ʿAsākir’s Ta’rīkh Dimashq and the fact that he taught Hadith in Baalbek, allow us to suppose that al-Kulaynī probably left Rayy to make the pilgrimage to Mecca. Along the way he would have stopped for a time in Syria and upon his return he would have settled in Baghdad where he died and was buried. Some knowledge about the circumstances surrounding this final stay in the capital would doubtless help us better understand the circumstances at play in the presentation and reception of his work; for the time being, this remains problematic due to lack of sources.

There is a difference of opinion too about the date of his death. Since we don’t know his birthday, we cannot know how old he was; however, scrutiny of the identity and dates of his masters and disciples would reveal that he did not die at an especially advanced age but probably toward his sixtieth year.¹¹ Last, we know nothing about his family after his death, nor even whether he left descendants. The fact that he had the kunya Abū Jaʿfar does not necessarily prove that he had a son named Jaʿfar; this kunya is quite common among Shi’ites for anyone named Muḥammad in honor of the fifth imam Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad b. ʿAlī al-Bāqir.

As can be seen, a considerable amount of uncertainty surrounds our author’s life, thanks to the scarcity of direct information. In the following pages the attempt will be made, to the extent possible, to dissipate the fog that surrounds his existence and to do so by drawing on indirect information in critical fashion.

Some Historical Points of Reference

THE POLITICAL AND RELIGIOUS CONTEXTS IN SEVERAL IMPORTANT CITIES

Al-Kulaynī’s age was one in which the central power of the Abbasid caliphate was weakening while many local governments in various areas of the Islamic empire were steadily taking shape. Obviously, this fact was not unconnected with the growing strength of Shi’ite powers virtually everywhere within important parts of the empire: the coming of the Zaydis to northern Iran and the Yemen, the Ismailis in North Africa and the Maghreb, and the “infiltration” of the Abbasid caliphate, both in the capital Baghdad and especially in state finances, by powerful and influential Shi’ite families, scholars, thinkers, politicians, and highly placed functionaries.¹² In the second half of the third/ninth century, the Abbasid caliphate underwent major upheavals. At the heart of many of these crises lay the bitter conflicts produced by the two caliphates of the hostile brothers al-Amīn (from 193 to 198/809 to 814) and al-Ma’mūn (from 198 to 218 /814 to 833). The violence of these conflicts resulted in deep disturbances to the political, administrative, and military structures of the state. One big consequence of this development was the emergence of numerous local powers which a weakened central caliphate could do nothing but accept, often with great reluctance. With regard to Iran, three important local governments are worthy of note in this period: the Zaydi Alids established their government in 250/864 with control of Ṭabaristān and the Jibāl. Almost simultaneously, the Ṣaffārids came to power in eastern Iran. Last, the Sāmānids (from 261 to 389/875 to 999) inaugurated their rule over immense regions of Khorasan and Transoxiana.

The coming to power of a Shi’ite government with Zaydi tendencies, from the shores of the Caspian Sea to the north of Rayy, proved initially to be a decisive factor in the turn of the populace to Shi’ism, and afterward, for grooming the region for the subsequent rise of Shi’ite power under the Buwayhids of Daylam. The Zaydi government was founded by al-Ḥasan b. Zayd “al-Dāʿī al-Kabīr” (d. 270/884). Upon his death, his brother Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad b. Zayd (d.287/900) succeeded him. Shortly thereafter, weakened by local internal conflicts, the Zaydi Alids were overthrown by the Sunni Sāmānids (some of whose rulers, however, displayed obvious Shi’ite sympathies), and they were constrained to remain at the fringes of power for fourteen years. The links between Alids and Daylamites grew stronger under al-Ḥasan b. ʿAlī al-Nāṣir al-Kabīr Uṭrūsh (d. 304/917).¹³ Uṭrūsh restored a weakened Zaydi power and ruled from 301/914 until his death three years later. The importance of his brief reign lies mainly in the expansion of Islam into Gīlān and Daylam together with the propagation of Shi’ite doctrines among the populace of northern Iran.¹⁴

Now let us turn to the big cities where al-Kulaynī dwelt. First of all, the old city of Rayy,¹⁵ which passed from one local power to another from the middle of the third/ninth century onward.¹⁶ Up until 272/885, the city was governed by men appointed from Baghdad. In the month of Jumāda I of that year, Muḥammad b. Zayd al-ʿAlawī, who had just succeeded his brother al-Ḥasan b. Zayd, attempted an invasion of the city but was defeated by Idhkū Tekīn, a Turkish officer of the caliph who had been dispatched expressly for this purpose from Baghdad. He returned in triumph to the city and, according to the historians, exacted a huge tax on the inhabitants, at the same time installing his trusted men in various parts of the region.¹⁷ Earlier, in 268/882, the Turkish officer succeeded in defeating Aḥmad b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz b. Abī Dulaf and had taken the nearby Shi’ite city of Qumm.¹⁸ In 289/902 the Sāmānids were able to extend their power up to Rayy.¹⁹ They ruled there for several years, even though their control was broken at intervals by armies sent by the caliph or other local governments.²⁰ The chaotic situation in the city went on until the arrival of the Buwayhids (reg. 322–448/933–1056), who conquered it, however, only after al-Kulaynī’s death in 329/940–41.²¹

With regard to the establishment of Shi’ism in Rayy, according to a report by Yāqūt al-Ḥamawī,²² the residents of the city formed a Sunni majority until 275/888, the year in which, during the caliphate of al-Muʿtamid (256–279/870–892), Aḥmad b. al-Ḥasan al-Mād(h)arā’ī/Mādarānī (according to some reports, Idhkū Tekīn’s scribe),²³ conquered the city, openly declared his allegiance to Shi’ism, and forged links with influential Shi’ite circles in Rayy.²⁴ In this way Shi’ism spread throughout the city, even among great Sunni scholars; the renowned traditionist ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Ibn Abī Ḥātim al-Rāzī (d. 327/939) seems to have been constrained by the Shi’ite conqueror to compose a book on the virtues of the members of the Prophet’s family.²⁵ At the same time it is well known that prior to this date the city already had a certain number of Shi’ite scholars and traditionists—and especially Imami ones—whom the prosopographical literature mentions.²⁶ We know too that al-Kulaynī went to Rayy to collect hadiths from some masters in the discipline.²⁷ Last, it should be kept in mind that the region of Rayy, the Jibāl, was already one of the main centers of Ismaili propaganda during this period.

The city of Qumm was another important Shi’ite center in Iran; it was without doubt the principal site where al-Kulaynī’s studies took place. Qumm was the most important center for Imami hadith and it was there that our author could develop his skills in this discipline and take stock of the various traditions of hadith transmission. In this city, which had grown into an intellectual center of Shi’ism from at least the time of the imam Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq (d. 148/765),²⁸ the great family of the Ashʿarites, of Arab origin, enjoyed much social and religious power; at times its influence reached other Imami circles in other locations. Such was the case of the Yemeni Ashʿarites of Kūfa who had been compelled because of their Shi’ism to leave Umayyad Iraq at the end of the first century of the Hijra and who had settled in central Iran in the Qumm region, where little by little they acquired some measure of power with the more or less tacit agreement of the powers that be.²⁹ They enlarged and renovated the city and gradually transformed it into a solid Shi’ite enclave.³⁰ The Ashʿarites knew how to deploy their great tribal influence in order to consolidate political, social, and religious bases for Shi’ism within Iran. Their notion of Shi’ism, turned into a sort of family heritage, appears to have had some influence on the religion, not solely at Qumm and Rayy (with its strong links to Qumm) but even into Iraq and Khorasan; this was the case as much in the time of the historical imams as during the minor Occultation. Certain family members during the second and third centuries were among the important disciples of the imams who had sung their praises, according to some traditions.³¹ From the second/eighth century to the middle of the fourth/tenth, several outstanding scholars and traditionists came to be recognized in the Ashʿarite family; a relatively homogeneous religious tendency seems to have characterized them while their religious and juridical authority was acknowledged even in Iraq.³² With the fall of the Umayyads, however, strictly Arab influence began to lose its importance within the social and political structures of Islamic civilization; as other peoples—and particularly the Iranians—rose to power in the political and cultural arena after the fourth/tenth century, the historical and religious sources stop mentioning the Ashʿarites among the influential families of Qumm.³³

Even so, Qumm’s spiritual and religious heft will grow continually during the Abbasid period.³⁴ With the massive transference of the doctrinal traditions of Kūfa, Qumm witnesses the development in its very midst of all kinds of Shi’ite tendencies: both the adherents of teachings of an esoteric, initiatory, and gnostic sort as well as their adversaries who charge them with “exaggeration” (ghuluww);³⁵ both the adepts of a form of theological rationalism as well as their opponents; and even those of anthropomorphist tendencies (mushabbiha), predestinarians (jabriyya), antitranscendentalists (foes of the doctrine of tanzīh), together with those who refuted them, etc.³⁶

A word now on Baghdad, where al-Kāfī was published. The Abbasid capital played a fundamental role in the history of events and in the political and social evolution of Imami Shi’ism throughout the entire duration of the minor Occultation (260–329/874–941). After the shifts in religious policy that came about during the caliphate of Hārūn al-Rashīd (reg. 170–193/786–809) and the imprisonment of the imam Mūsā al-Kāẓim (imamate: 148–183/765–799), together with the “pro-Alid” political developments that occurred during the caliphate of al-Ma’mūn (reg. 198–218/814–833), culminating in the designation of the imam Riḍā as the successor to the caliphate as well as to his assassination, the Shi’ite imams were transferred from Medina to Baghdad and then to a military town near Surra man ra’ā, or Sāmarrā. This transfer simultaneously increased both the importance and the influence of Shi’ism in the capital to a considerable extent—not, of course, what the Abbasid caliphs had wanted.³⁷ After the death of al-Mutawakkil (reg. 232–47/847–61) and the cessation of his anti-Shi’ite policies, and coinciding with the swelling influence of certain Iranian and/or Shi’ite families toward the end of the age of the historical imams of Imami Shi’ism, Baghdad was made witness to the unprecedented weight of Shi’ism within its walls. Some Shi’ite families were able to penetrate deeply into the administrative structures of the Abbasid state and in this way prepare the political space for an ever greater infiltration of Shi’ism. This infiltration worked its way even into the Abbasid vizierate; in the bitter struggles that pitched different families against one another in an attempt to attain this desirable position, Shi’ism always had something to add during this period.³⁸ This state of affairs went on swimmingly during the minor Occultation when the representatives of the hidden imam, together with other responsible parties from the institution of the wikāla (the imams’ delegation), played a not inconsiderable political role, whether openly or covertly.³⁹

Furthermore, the Baghdad of al-Kulaynī’s day experienced a large succession of important political, social, and religious events which have prompted countless studies. By way of example, mention may be made of various urban rebellions, of conflicts between powerful Iranian and Arab families, both Shi’ite and Sunni, spiritual and religious crises such as the trial and execution of al-Ḥusayn b. Manṣūr al-Ḥallāj in 309/922 or indeed that of al-Shalmaghānī Ibn Abī al-ʿAzāqir in 322/934.⁴⁰ An important reason for the recurrent violence that shook Baghdad at this time was the activism of the Ḥanbalite traditionist and preacher al-Barbahārī (d. 329/941),⁴¹ very influential in the popular Sunni levels of the capital and, of course, especially among Ḥanbalites.⁴² He certainly played a part in the appearance of the amīr al-umarā’ (literally, “commander of the commanders,” a sort of caliphal lieutenant) and the weakening of caliphal power. His notion of the two canonical obligations to command the good (al-amr bi’l-maʿrūf) and to forbid the bad (al-nahy ʿan al-munkar), and in taking up arms to battle what he considered reprehensible innovations (bidʿa) and deviations from legal obligations, sparked countless popular uprisings against Abbasid power as well as the Shi’ite populace of Baghdad, deemed heterodox.⁴³ In fact, Shi’ites were one of the chief targets of Ḥanbalite violence, and the caliphs, in an attempt to stifle the conflagrations of religious conflicts among different religious tendencies in the capital, were constantly forced to modify their religious and political tactics and to switch their positions for or against this group or that. We possess a good number of reports about the repression exercised by the ruling powers against the Shi’ites at this time, and, in particular, the destruction of their places of assembly, most notably the mosque of Barāthā’ in 313/925.⁴⁴ Concurrently, in 323/935, in the wake of the violence stirred up by al-Barbahārī and his endeavor to become the supreme religious authority of the city, the caliph al-Raḍī (reg. 322–29/934–41) adopted a number of quite severe anti-Ḥanbalite measures.⁴⁵ A bit later, further clashes between Shi’ites and Ḥanbalites occurred around the mosque of Barāthā’, but in Shi’ite quarters as well, especially at Bāb al-Ṭāq, and these conflicts required the personal intervention of the caliph and of the amīr al-umarā’.⁴⁶

Indeed, from the time of al-Raḍī’s caliphate the actual power devolved upon the amīr al-umarā’ while the caliph became a sovereign in name alone.⁴⁷ The function of amīr was handed on from one person to another until the Buwayhid princes assumed it and retained it for almost a century. Ibn al-Rā’iq, who reigned from 324 to 326/936–38, was the first of the amīr al-umarā’. Ten years later, the Buwayhids entered Baghdad in triumph. In the meantime, during the period that separates the end of the rule of Abū al-Ḥusayn Bujkum, the successor of Ibn al-Rā’iq between 326 and 329/938–41, and the arrival of the Buwayhids, the capital underwent extremely serious crises and violent conflicts. In 329/941 (the year of al-Kulaynī’s death), Ibn al-Rā’iq once again came to power; a year later, however, he was assassinated by order of the new amīr, al-Ḥasan b. ʿAbd Allāh Nāṣir al-Dawla (reg. 324–53/936–64), the Shi’ite Ḥamdanid governor of the city of Mawṣil. In 334/945, Muʿizz al-Dawla (reg. 334–56/945–67), the youngest of the Buwayhid brothers, conquered Baghdad and assumed the title of amīr al-umarā’. Twelve days later, he coolly stripped the caliph al-Mustakfī (reg. 332–334/944–946) of his functions. The seizure of absolute power by these Iranian Shi’ite princes at the very center of the empire certainly smoothed the development and expansion of Shi’ism on a grand scale.⁴⁸

The end of the third/ninth and the entire fourth/tenth century was a historical turning point in many ways for Shi’ism. The reasons for this are tangled and complex: the political dominance of Shi’ism, with the Faṭimids, the Carmathians, or indeed the Ḥamdanids in the most important regions of the empire, not to mention the Buwayhids at the center of the caliphate; the Occultation of the last imam of the Twelvers in 329/941, according to tradition, an Occultation that brought to a close the period of the historical imams; the turn toward rationalism within Islamic thought. The combination of these historical, political, and religious factors culminated among other things in the rise of a new class of Twelver jurists and theologians who gravitated to the Buwayhid princes and sought to justify their rule. Since the Sunni Abbasid caliph remained in place and the Sunnis themselves were in the majority, these scholars felt a pressing need for legitimacy and respectability, and they set out to adopt a critical distance from their predecessors belonging to the “original esoteric and nonrationalist tradition.” This is the beginning of the development at the very heart of Twelver Shi’ism of a new “rationalistic theological and juridical” tradition that will henceforth become the dominant majority position, shunting the primitive esoteric tradition to the side.⁴⁹ As we shall see, al-Kulaynī and his work stand as the final bulwark of this earlier tradition against the politicization and rationalization of Imami doctrine in the Buwayhid period by the doctors of Baghdad.

THE SCIENCE OF HADITH IN IRAN AND IN IRAQ

From its foundation by the Abbasid caliph al-Manṣūr (reg. 136–158/754–775),⁵⁰ Baghdad appears to have been an important center for the science of Hadith, harboring different tendencies and schools of collection and transmission of traditions. As far as Sunni Islam is concerned, a large number of Hadith experts, originating from such other cities in Iraq as Kūfa, Baṣra, Wāsiṭ, and elsewhere, quickly moved to Baghdad to benefit from the instruction offered in its Schools.⁵¹ In particular, the city of Kūfa, rapidly become a great center of Shi’ite Hadith, saw its Sunni scholars forsake it for the benefits of the capital. From the beginning of the third/ninth century, many traditionists from Baghdad, or those who had emigrated there, began to compile Hadith works of the musnad sort (roughly, works ordered by the chains of hadith transmission), following the trend of the Sunni compilers of this literary genre.⁵² Thanks to such major traditionists as Aḥmad Ibn Ḥanbal (d. 241/855), Yaḥyā b. Maʿīn (d. 233/848), or Abū Bakr Ibn Abī Shayba (d. 235/850), who were especially active in the general propagation and transmission of local traditions reported from this city or that, a large number of Hadith students, coming from places as far-flung as Khorasan, Transoxania, or North Africa, inundated the capital and created a genuine new dynamism in the science of Hadith. This era coincided with the close of the period of the Abbasid “Inquisition”—the miḥna occurring between 218 and 234/833–49—the reinstatement of tradition and the renewal of traditionalist tendencies.⁵³ Over the third, fourth, and fifth/ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries, Baghdad became a very great center for Sunni Hadith and steadily thereafter, with the developing compilation of the works of the jāmiʿ type (roughly, a collection ordered in accord with the themes of the hadiths) as well as the musnad, the traditionists increased production of technical works on criticism, criteria of authenticity, the transmitters, and various other aspects of the complex subject of Hadith. Here mention might be made of two remarkable examples of such Hadith scholars: ʿAlī b. ʿUmar al-Dāraquṭnī (d. 385/995) and al-Khaṭīb al-Baghdādī (d. 463/1071).

With regard to Shi’ites, Baghdad attracted experts and transmitters of hadiths shortly after its elevation as capital of the Abbasids in 146/763. At the time of Mūsā al-Kāẓim’s imamate, the sources note the presence of several Shi’ite traditionists at Baghdad, but it is especially from the final decades of the second century Hijra that the capital seems to have drawn a large number of Imami traditionists and jurists, many of whom originated from Kūfa.⁵⁴ Scholars of every stripe were present there and were particularly active: Hishām b. al-Ḥakam (d. 179/795) and his disciples, the School of Yūnus b. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (beginning of the third/ninth century) on the one side, with Ibn Abī ʿUmayr (d. 217/832)⁵⁵ and his followers on the other.⁵⁶

It is useful to recall one important point with respect to the area of Shi’ite Hadith. The largely Shi’ite city of Kūfa appears to have been the birthplace of Hadith in which all Shi’ite tendencies are represented; and yet each of these, all the while paying due respect to their common origin and shared teachings, managed at the same time to produce their own corpus of hadiths that conveyed doctrines proper to those tendencies. At the very moment when Imami Hadith emerged in several locations, the other strains did so as well, particularly at Kūfa but in other locales too. The Zaydis of Kūfa and the Ḥijāz—but also a little later in both Iran and Yemen—brought forth monumental collections of hadiths, thanks especially to the efforts of their learned imams.⁵⁷ In al-Kulaynī’s day, the Hadith production of two Zaydi imams, al-Hādī ilā al-Ḥaqq Yaḥyā b. al-Ḥusayn (d. 298/911) and al-Nāṣir al-Ḥasan b. ʿAlī al-Uṭrūsh al-Kabīr (d. 304/917),⁵⁸ merits mention. At Rayy, the Zaydi scholar Abū Zayd ʿĪsā b. Muḥammad al-ʿAlawī (d. 326/938) was an expert in Hadith too and transmitted Zaydi traditions from renowned Zaydi traditionists, most notably Muḥammad b. Manṣūr al-Murādī (d. ca. 290/903).⁵⁹ At the same time the Ismailis had established the Fatimid empire in North Africa (in 297/909) and for obvious reasons felt the need of a coherent juridical system based on the Hadith. The monumental work of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān (d. 363/974),⁶⁰ based on the immense heritage of Shi’ite Hadith—Ismaili as well as Zaydi or Imami—is of particular interest.⁶¹

Running parallel to these tendencies throughout the minor Occultation, and as a result of the problems connected with the leadership of the community, so-called extremist currents took shape and cut themselves off from the main stem of Imami Shi’ism. Among the most important of these, the Nuṣayriyya formed their own corpus of hadiths,⁶² based both the common heritage of Imami hadiths as well as of those offshoots known as the Ghulāt and the Mufawwiḍa.⁶³ The most famous example is the work al-Hidāya al-Kubrā by al-Ḥusayn b. Ḥamdān al-Khaṣībī/Khuṣaybī (d. 334 or 358/946 or 969), considered the leading mover in the genesis of the Nuṣayrī religion as such.⁶⁴ Hence it can be asserted that the time in which al-Kulaynī lived—that is, the end of the third/ninth and the beginning of the fourth/tenth century—was decisive for the birth and the formation of the doctrinal identity and the religious legitimacy of different Shi’ite groups. The role of Hadith was fundamental to this evolution.

Biographical Elements

A LIFE OF STUDY SPENT IN IRAN AND IN IRAQ

A certain amount of biographical data about our author can be inferred from information provided by various sources.

First, the nisba Kulaynī refers to the village of Kulayn,⁶⁵ in the Pashāpūya district (rustāq) of Rayy.⁶⁶ We know that a number of Shi’ite scholars came from this village.⁶⁷ Al-Iṣṭakhrī (d. shortly after 340/951) mentions Pashāpūya as being on the outskirts (aʿmāl) of Rayy,⁶⁸ and Ḥamd Allāh al-Mustawfī (d. ca. 750/1349) includes it among the four principal regions of Rayy.⁶⁹ He writes too: “There (at Pashāpūya) are thirty villages, among which are Kūshk, ʿAlīābād, and Kīlīn…” It should be noted that here Kulayn is vocalized as Kīlīn. At the same time, al-Mustawfī is emphatic about the large surface area of this village. The name Pashāpūya still exists today. A region to the south of the Tehran area (toward Ghār) is called Fashāpūya or Fashāfūya/Fashāwiyya.⁷⁰ There is still a village by the name of Kulayn there.⁷¹ In the Varāmīn region of Tehran there is another village named Kīlīn as well,⁷² but this must not be confused with our Kulayn,⁷³ despite the fact that the latter has also been called Kīlīn at times.⁷⁴ Notwithstanding the insistence of the principal documents on the vocalization Kulayn, Imami sources are not wholly unanimous on the vocalization of our author’s name; the divergence is, of course, over the vocalization of the letter lām: Kulaynī or Kulīnī.⁷⁵ The instance of al-Samʿānī (d. 562/1167), who gives the reading Kulīnī,⁷⁶ is perhaps due to this confusion between Kulayn and Kīlīn.⁷⁷

Since we know from the sources that the parents, or at least the maternal ancestors, of our author were originally from Kulayn, it is reasonable to assume that al-Kulaynī grew up in this village.⁷⁸ His father is said to have been one of the learned men of Rayy and of Kulayn, and it is also stated that his tomb is in the latter location.⁷⁹ If this is true, it is surprising that our author reports nothing transmitted from his father in al-Kāfī, unless we assume that his father died during his son’s early infancy. Our author’s family on his mother’s side included several Shi’ite scholars who were known as traditionists; for example, al-Kulaynī’s own maternal uncle ʿAllān whose disciple he was.⁸⁰

At Rayy al-Kulaynī would have been in steady contact with a variety of intellectual and spiritual tendencies. In particular, he doubtless had intimate acquaintance with Imamis and their different tendencies, all of which were present in the city, and especially those who had undergone the influence of the neighboring city of Qumm. On the one side, there were the “pro-Muʿtazilite” rationalist theologians, like Ibn Qiba al-Rāzī (d. before 319/931),⁸¹ and on the other, traditionists of an assimilationist persuasion, like Muḥammad b. Abī ʿAbd Allāh Jaʿfar b. Muḥammad b. ʿAwn al-Asadī al-Kūfī (d. 312/924).⁸²

During this period two other Shi’ite branches—the Zaydis and the Ismailis—were present and active in Rayy. Among the former, the most noteworthy individual is surely Abū Zayd ʿĪsā b. Muḥammad al-ʿAlawī (d. 326/938) whose juridical and doctrinal writings, and especially his polemics against the Imamis on the very subject of the Occultation of the imam, were famous.⁸³ The expansion of Zaydism into northern Iran, with its strong transcendentalist tendencies and the popularity of these notions in Rayy during the second half of the third/ninth century, were not foreign to the development of the doctrine of tanzīh among the Imamis of the city. Ismaili and Carmathian activism in Rayy at this time is well known.⁸⁴ The great philosopher and propagandist Abū Ḥātim al-Rāzī (d.322/934) was al-Kulaynī’s contemporary and lived right in Rayy.⁸⁵ He stood at the very origin of the famous controversies with other thinkers on the subjects of prophecy and the law.⁸⁶ His debates with the great scholar and philosopher Muḥammad b. Zakariyyā al-Rāzī (d. 313/925),⁸⁷ another of al-Kulaynī’s contemporaries—debates that probably took place in the presence of Mardāwīj, the governor of the city—are still celebrated.⁸⁸ It should be kept in mind that this is the period when philosophy in Islam, and especially Neoplatonic philosophy, experienced its great rise. Al-Kulaynī was certainly aware of these intellectual activities, and his major work displays indisputable traces of this. Learned discussions about divine guidance or the continuance of prophecy through the imamate, such as they crop up in Ismaili thought—for example, in the work of Muḥammad al-Nasafī (d. 332/944) and his followers or in that of Abū Ḥātim⁸⁹—could not have left him indifferent, so much so that he devoted one of the most important books of his Kāfī to the concept of ḥujja (“Proof of God,” one of the imam’s titles in Shi’ism as well as a key concept in Ismaili thought).

There were, moreover, various Sunni tendencies flourishing in Rayy. As already noted, during this period the great traditionist Ibn Abī Ḥātim al-Rāzī (d. 327/939) was active and large meetings of experts in Sunni Hadith were held. Alongside these major religious tendencies, other marginal groups are also noted as present in the city by the heresiographical and historiographical sources; for example, the Najjāriyya, the Burghūthīyya, or the Zaʿfarāniyya, to mention only those sects of a theological character.⁹⁰

Muʿtazilism was still active as well; the two branches of Baṣra and Baghdad were present in both Iraq and Iran, most especially at Rayy.⁹¹ The renowned thinkers Abū ʿAlī al-Jubbā’ī (d. 303/916),⁹² Abū Hāshim al-Jubbā’ī (d. 321/933),⁹³ and Abū al-Qāsim al-Balkhī (d. 319/931),⁹⁴ all three of whom were among the earliest and most virulent critics of Shi’ite theories of the imamate, were contemporaries of our author. The great traditionist theological tendencies of Sunnim, such as the schools of Abū al-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī (d. 324/936)⁹⁵ or of Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī (d. 333/945),⁹⁶ took shape at the same time as well.⁹⁷ In the realm of the rational sciences, philosophy reached a high point in the figure of the famous Neoplatonic thinker al-Fārābī (d. 339/950–51) who with his likely Shi’ite sympathies and yet, more pointedly, philosophical leanings, especially a Neoplatonism with gnostic elements, attracted numerous followers among Ismailis.⁹⁸ In the previous chapter we saw how gnostic notions developed among Imami Shi’ites, especially among Iranian Shi’ites. As a resident of both Rayy and Qumm, al-Kulaynī was thus at the very center of this intellectual ferment.

It seems beyond doubt that toward the end of his life, having completed the pilgrimage to Mecca and dwelt for a while in Syria, al-Kulaynī settled in Baghdad where his renowned contemporary the philosopher al-Fārābī was also living. He resided there in the principally Shi’ite quarter of Darb al-Silsila, not far from the Kūfa Gate,⁹⁹ in the southwest part of the city; this is why some sources give him the nisba al-Silsilī.¹⁰⁰ In 327/938–39, he appears to have offered an instructional session (majlis) in Hadith in this quarter.¹⁰¹ Al-Kulaynī died in Baghdad; there are different opinions as to the date of his death. Al-Najāshī proposes the date 329.¹⁰² Al-Shaykh al-Ṭūsī also gives the date of Shaʿbān 329 in his Rijāl—a later work than his Fihrist¹⁰³—while in that latter work he gives 328 as the date.¹⁰⁴ Keeping in mind the preciseness of the date proposed by the Shaykh in his Rijāl, together with al-Najāshī’s rigor in his work, it appears reasonable to accept the date of 329.¹⁰⁵ It is true, however, that in some Sunni sources,¹⁰⁶ or indeed in the well-documented work of the Imami scholar Raḍī al-Dīn ʿAlī Ibn Ṭāwūs,¹⁰⁷ the date 328 also occurs. In Imami tradition the month of Shaʿbān 329 is known too as being the moment of the death of ʿAlī b. Muḥammad al-Simmarī, the final “representative” of the hidden imam during the minor Occultation, and hence the start of the major Occultation. According to this tradition, al-Simmarī’s death fell in the middle of the month.¹⁰⁸ If we accept Shaykh al-Ṭūsī’s version in his Rijāl, we are left uncertain as to who died first, al-Kulaynī or al-Simmarī. According to several reports, Abū al-Ḥasan Muḥammad b. Jaʿfar al-Ḥusaynī, known as Abū Qīrāṭ (d. 345/956), at this time chief (naqīb) of the Ṭālibites (descendants of Abū Ṭālib, father of ʿAlī, the first imam) of the city, led the prayers at al-Kulaynī’s funeral.¹⁰⁹

There are also disagreements over the location of our author’s tomb. According to the oldest sources, he was buried in the cemetery of Bāb al-Kūfa,¹¹⁰ in other words, in the quarter where he spent the final years of his life. Ibn ʿUbdūn, an Imami traditionist and prosopographer famous for his long life (d. 423/1032),¹¹¹ supposedly visited al-Kulaynī’s tomb, probably some two or three decades after his death, in the quarter that he calls Ṣirāṭ al-Ṭā’ī;¹¹² he relates that a marker with our author’s name on it, and that of his father, graced the tomb.¹¹³ Later the same scholar would tell his renowned disciple Abū al-ʿAbbās al-Najāshī that the tomb had been destroyed, most probably by a flood.¹¹⁴ Thus, according to these early reports, the tomb was located to the west of the capital in the large Shi’ite quarter of Karkh. The tomb considered for centuries to be that of al-Kulaynī, and venerated as such by Imamis, is located east of Baghdad, at al-Ruṣāfa, a Sunni quarter throughout the Middle Ages.¹¹⁵

HIS MASTERS

In this section we shall deal with al-Kulaynī’s principal masters in Shi’ite Hadith in Rayy, Qumm, and in Iraq on the basis of the chains of transmitters in the Kitāb al-Kāfī in particular. Because of its continuing intellectual connection with Rayy, the city of Qumm would have been our author’s main site for training in the science of Hadith; there he was able to put together his first collections of traditions and familiarize himself with the diverse schools and tendencies in the study and transmission of hadiths. His masters all belonged to these various streams and played roles of greater or lesser importance in the formation of the corpus of Shi’ite Hadith, displaying the progression from the compilation of simple jāmiʿ on a single theme toward more complex and voluminous jāmiʿ:

 

1. Abū ʿAlī Aḥmad b. Idrīs al-Ashʿarī al-Qummī (d. 306/918). Al-Kulaynī reports a great number of traditions on a variety of subjects from him. Among this master’s own sources mention may be made of Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. ʿĪsā al-Ashʿarī, Ḥasan b. ʿAlī b. ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Mughīra, Ḥusayn b. ʿUbayd Allāh al-Saʿdī, Muḥammad b. Ḥassān, Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Jabbār and Muḥammad b. ʿAlī b. Maḥbūb.¹¹⁶

2. Aḥmad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. Khālid al-Barqī,¹¹⁷ grandson and transmitter from the renowned Aḥmad b. Muḥammad al-Barqī (d. 274 or 280/887 or 893), who was one of the “ʿidda masters” of al-Kāfī (ʿidda min aṣḥābinā). This term denotes some of our author’s indirect masters from two generations earlier. Because their names are so often used, al-Kulaynī preferred to pass over the intermediate sources between himself and these sources and to refer to them by the term ʿidda. The use of different ʿidda is very uneven in al-Kāfī. In the prosopographical works these masters are duly identified.¹¹⁸

Through his intermediary al-Kulaynī reports from Aḥmad al-Barqī. Among these transmitters mention may be made as well of his son ʿAlī, who was the master of Shaykh al-Ṣadūq,¹¹⁹ and of al-Ḥasan b. Ḥamza al-Ṭabarī (d. 358/969).¹²⁰

3. Abū al-ʿAbbās Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. Saʿīd al-Kūfī, called al-Ḥāfiẓ Ibn ʿUqda (d. 332/944), a renowned Jārūdi Zaydi traditionist.¹²¹

4. Aḥmad b. Mihrān,¹²² and, with him as intermediary, al-Kulaynī cites ʿAbd al-ʿAẓīm al-Ḥasanī, a well-known traditionist.¹²³

5. Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥusayn b. Muḥammad b. ʿĀmir al-Ashʿarī al-Qummī.¹²⁴ He transmitted from the following scholars: Aḥmad b. Isḥāq, Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. Sayyār al-Sayyārī, author of the Kitāb al-Qirā’āt (whom we have already encountered),¹²⁵ Muʿallā b. Muḥammad al-Baṣrī, and Jaʿfar b. Muḥammad b. Mālik.

6. Abū al-Qāsim Ḥumayd b. Ziyād al-Kūfī al-Naynawā’ī (d. 310/922),¹²⁶ who transmitted from the following: al-Ḥasan b. Muḥammad b. Samāʿa (d. 263/877), al-Ḥasan b. Mūsā al-Khashshāb, and ʿUbayd Allāh b. Aḥmad b. Nahīk.

7. Saʿd b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Abī Khalaf al-Ashʿarī al-Qummī (d. 299 or 301/912 or 914), author of a Kitāb Baṣā’ir al-darajāt, now lost, and of al-Maqālāt wa-’l-firaq, which has been published.¹²⁷

8. Abū al-ʿAbbās ʿAbd Allāh b. Jaʿfar b. al-Ḥasan b. Mālik b. Jāmiʿ al-Ḥimyarī al-Qummī (d. after 297/909–10), author of the Qurb al-isnād.¹²⁸ He transmitted from Abū Hāshim al-Jaʿfarī, Ibrāhīm b. Hāshim al-Qummī, Aḥmad b. Isḥāq, Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. ʿĪsā, al-Ḥasan b. Ẓarīf, and al-Ḥasan b. Mūsā al-Khashshāb.¹²⁹

9. ʿAlī b. Ibrāhīm b. Hāshim al-Qummī (d. after 307/919), author of the famous Tafsīr. Al-Kulaynī transmits extensively from him in his work.¹³⁰

10. Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. al-Ḥusayn al-Saʿdābādī al-Qummī, one of the ʿidda of al-Kulaynī through whose mediation he transmits from Aḥmad al-Barqī.¹³¹

11. Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Muḥammad Mājīlawayh b. Abī al-Qāsim ʿUbayd Allāh Bundār b. Imrān. He too is one of the ʿidda through whom our author transmits from Aḥmad al-Barqī. In fact, he was the son of the latter’s daughter.¹³²

12. Abū al-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Muḥammad b. Ibrāhīm b. Abān al-Kulaynī, known under the name ʿAllān and the maternal uncle of our author.¹³³

13. Abū al-Ḥasan Muḥammad b. Ismāʿīl al-Nīsābūrī, intermediary between al-Kulaynī and the great scholar al-Faḍl b. Shādhān (d. 260/874).¹³⁴

14. Abū al-ʿAbbās Muḥammad b. Jaʿfar b. Muḥammad al-Qurashī al-Razzāz al-Kūfī (d. 316/928).¹³⁵

15. Abū al-Ḥusayn Muḥammad b. Abī ʿAbd Allāh Jaʿfar b. Muḥammad b. ʿAwn al-Asadī al-Kūfī, also known as Muḥammad b. Abī ʿAbd Allāh (d. 312/924), a traditionist dwelling at Rayy.¹³⁶

16. Muḥammad b. ʿAqīl al-Kulaynī,¹³⁷ one of the ʿidda of al-Kulaynī in transmitting from Sahl b. Ziyād al-Ādamī.¹³⁸

17. Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad b. Yaḥyā al-ʿAṭṭār al-Qummī, a friend of al-Ṣaffār al-Qummī (see chapter 4) from whom al-Kulaynī transmits massively.¹³⁹

 

HIS DISCIPLES AND TRANSMITTERS

Some of al-Kulaynī’s disciples, who had learned the science of Hadith from him, also possessed authorization to transmit from the Kitāb al-Kāfī.¹⁴⁰ For others we have no knowledge of such an ijāza:¹⁴¹

 

1. Abū ʿAbd Allāh Aḥmad b. Ibrāhīm b. Abī Rāfiʿ al-Ṣaymarī, an Imami traditionist residing at Baghdad. A famous transmitter of the Kāfī and the author of numerous writings, such as the Kitāb al-Nawādir, none of which has survived. He studied the Kāfī with al-Kulaynī in the Bāb al-Kūfa quarter at Darb al-silsila in 327/938–39.¹⁴²

2. Abū al-Ḥusayn Aḥmad b. Aḥmad al-Kūfī al-Kātib, another transmitter of al-Kāfī. Al-Najāshī (d. 450/1058) saw him in person.¹⁴³

3. Abū al-Ḥusayn Aḥmad b. ʿAlī b. Saʿīd al-Kūfī.¹⁴⁴ Al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā (d. 436/1044) transmits the Kitāb al-Kāfī from him.

4. Abū Ghālib Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. Sulaymān al-Zurārī (285 to 368/898 to 979).¹⁴⁵ A well-known disciple and transmitter from al-Kulaynī who resided in Baghdad.¹⁴⁶ Mīrzā Ḥusayn al-Nūrī al-Ṭabrisī lists him among those who heard the Kāfī directly from its author and who had authorization to copy and transmit it, thus allowing for its publication and distribution.¹⁴⁷ Abū Ghālib himself speaks of his personal copy of the Kāfī in his prosopographical Risāla.¹⁴⁸

5. Abū al-Ḥusayn (or Abū l-Ḥasan) Isḥāq b. al-Ḥasan b. Bakrān al-ʿAqrā’ī (or ʿAqrānī) al-Tammār, at Kūfa. Al-Najāshī knew him personally.¹⁴⁹

6. Abū l-Qāsim Jaʿfar b. Muḥammad b. Jaʿfar b. Mūsā b. Qūlūya/Qūlawayh, called Ibn Qūlawayh (d. 368 or 369/979–80 or 980–81), renowned traditionist and jurist, one of the most important disciples and transmitters of the Kāfī. He is the author of Kāmil al-ziyārāt and was one of the masters of Shaykh al-Mufīd (d. 413/1022).¹⁵⁰

7. Abū al-Ḥasan Muḥammad b. Aḥmad b. Dāwūd al-Qummī (d. 368/979), Imami traditionist and jurist residing in Baghdad.¹⁵¹

8. Abū al-Ḥusayn ʿAbd al-Karīm b. ʿAbdallāh b. Naṣr al-Bazzāz.¹⁵² He studied the Kāfī of al-Kulaynī in 327/938–39 in the Bāb al-Kūfa quarter.

9. ʿAlī b. Aḥmad (or Muḥammad) b. Mūsā b. ʿImrān al-Daqqāq al-Asadī al-Kūfī,¹⁵³ one of the intermediaries in transmission of the Kāfī to Ibn Bābawayh al-Ṣadūq (d. 381/991).¹⁵⁴

10. Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad b. Ibrāhīm b. Jaʿfar al-Kātib al-Nuʿmānī, called Ibn Abī Zaynab,¹⁵⁵ the well-known author of the Kitāb al-Ghayba and one of the most important transmitters of al-Kāfī.

11. Abū ʿĪsā Muḥammad b. Aḥmad b. Muḥammad b. Sinān al-Zāhirī, a resident of Rayy and one of the masters of Shaykh al-Ṣadūq in transmission of al-Kāfī.¹⁵⁶

12. Abū al-Mufaḍḍal Muḥammad b. ʿAbdallāh al-Shaybānī (297 to 387/910 to 997), a famous traditionist of Baghdad and transmitter of the Kāfī.¹⁵⁷

13. Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Mājīlawayh b. Abī l-Qāsim Bundār al-Barqī al-Qummī.¹⁵⁸ Ibn Bābawayh reports on his authority.¹⁵⁹ He also transmits from cerrtain of al-Kulaynī’s masters such as ʿAlī b. Ibrāhīm al-Qummī or, indeed, Muḥammad b. Yaḥyā al-ʿAṭṭār.¹⁶⁰

14. Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. ʿIṣām al-Kulaynī,¹⁶¹ one of Ibn Bābawayh’s sources in transmission of the Kāfī.¹⁶²

15. Abū Muḥammad Hārūn b. Mūsā b. Aḥmad al-Shaybānī al-Tallaʿukbarī (d. 385/995), one of the most important Imami traditionists of the fourth/tenth century in Baghdad and a renowned transmitter of al-Kulaynī’s work.¹⁶³

 

REMARKS ON HIS SOCIAL ROLE

Despite al-Kulaynī’s religious rank and the importance of his Kāfī from his own lifetime onward, not to mention his respected position among the Imamis of Rayy, no historical or religious source of the decisive period of the minor Occultation or even those relating all sorts of events of the time along with the information regarding the delegates (wakīl, pl. wukalā’) of the imam in general and the representatives of the hidden imam in particular¹⁶⁴—despite all this, no source makes the least allusion to any connection whatsoever between our author and the Imami authorities of his time or with the reigning Abbasids. Hence, we have no information on any relation on al-Kulaynī’s part with the institution of the wikāla, neither at Baghdad nor elsewhere, or indeed any role whatsoever within the religious or fiscal system of this institution. This gap is all the more astonishing in that in his Kāfī al-Kulaynī broaches the institution of the wikāla in a rather detailed way, together with a good number of written directives (tawqīʿ) ascribed to the hidden imam and to his “representatives” during the minor Occultation, directives, moreover, that have a genuine social and political bearing on the consolidation of the community of believers. This goes to show that these activities and these institutions enjoyed an official status as well as a certain importance in al-Kulaynī’s eyes.¹⁶⁵

To be sure, al-Kāfī was influential in the acceptance of these institutions by the community of the faithful, although it is hard to know the degree to which its compilation stemmed from a personal decision of its author or, indeed, from a need on the part of the community’s establishment or even a directive issued by certain Imami leaders in Baghdad.

During this troubled period, certain events that occurred within the very heart of the Imami community necessitated intervention by its leaders. The aftereffects of the claims by certain “extremists,” such as al-Shalmaghānī Ibn Abī al-ʿAzāqir (d. 322/934),¹⁶⁶ or, even earlier, the pronouncements of al-Ḥallāj (d. 309/921), prompted a massive intervention by Imami authorities of a rationalist persuasion.¹⁶⁷ Nevertheless, in contrast to many other scholars dwelling in Baghdad, al-Kulaynī is not mentioned in a single report concerning these momentous events. Was he living in Rayy at this time, far from Iraq where these crises occurred? All the more reason that an extended study of the exact period when he traveled to the capital of the empire and resided there would appear to be requisite.

One part of the problem, as has been noted, is also linked with the position of the city of Rayy in comparison with such cities as Baghdad or even Qumm. During our author’s lifetime, the most important Shi’ite cities in Iran were Qumm, Rayy, and several urban complexes in Khorasan and Transoxania, as is well known.¹⁶⁸ And yet, as is also well known, among these cities Qumm enjoyed a role, with respect to religious teaching and the production of doctrinal theories, that was dominant. It suffices simply to recall the weight that the wikāla of Baghdad accorded the scholars of Qumm in this period.¹⁶⁹ Conversely, in Rayy where al-Kulaynī mostly resided, the Imami strain was but one of many Shi’ite tendencies active in the city from the mid-third/ninth century on, and it flourished alongside Zaydi and Ismaili Shi’ites in particular. Clearly, al-Kulaynī seems to have been one of the first major representatives of the Imami doctrinal stream of thought in Rayy, but his followers must not have been particularly numerous there, all the more so since the influence of other Shi’ites—Zaydis as well as Ismailis—was far greater than that of the Imamis. It is reasonable to assume, therefore, that the effect of al-Kulaynī’s activities was less significant than that of his colleagues from Qumm who were able to influence the Imami institution during the minor Occultation even into the capital. Moreover, the fact that al-Kulaynī is often dubbed “the shaykh of the Imamis of Rayy” seems to suggest that his religious and intellectual authority did not extend to the neighboring city of Qumm; otherwise, this would have been emphasized.¹⁷⁰ In Qumm, at this point, the authority of ʿAlī b. Bābawayh al-Qummī (d. 329/941), the father of al-Ṣadūq, seems to have been predominant.¹⁷¹ At Rayy, moreover, Imamis did not adhere to a single doctrinal tendency, and there were many doctrinal differences among them, as was indeed the case everywhere at this period. Al-Kulaynī seems to have headed a “median” tendency, equally aloof from dialectical theology of the Muʿtazilite sort as well as the anthropomorphists and predestinarians (ahl al-tashbīh wa’l-jabr), midway between the intensely esotericist tendency of Kūfa (represented, for example, by al-Ṣaffār al-Qummī) and more levelheaded local tendencies.¹⁷² Even so, the true influence of our man in his own city remains unknown. The unusually turbulent political situation in Rayy during al-Kulaynī’s lifetime must also be taken into account; this produced a complex state of affairs in which any exercise of authority as well as political activity became increasingly problematic. Al-Kulaynī appears to have remained, by his own choice, on the sidelines of these disturbances in order to bring the Kitāb al-Kāfī, his life’s work, to completion.

All these reasons may help to explain the striking absence of our man from the important events of the period of the minor Occultation. As has been emphasized, it’s also possible to assume that he held back voluntarily from political life, adopting a quietist, if not indeed negative, opinion toward all positive social and political action. In this regard, he stands out distinctively from a good number of his famous contemporaries who took to the thick of political life, especially at Baghdad: such a figure as Abū Sahl al-Nawbakhtī (d. 311/923) enjoyed immense power there, and for many important reasons: his religious and intellectual authority, his kinship with al-Ḥusayn b. Rawḥ al-Nawbakhtī (d. 326/938), the “third representative” of the hidden imam, his political position with the Abbasids, his belonging to the influential family of the Nawbakhtīs of Baghdad, and, last, his intellectual part in developing the theological concept of the Occultation.¹⁷³ Again at Baghdad, another traditionist contemporary with al-Kulaynī, Ibn Hammām al-Iskāfī (d. 336/948), played a considerable part in the decisive events of the minor Occultation.¹⁷⁴ And at Qumm, as has been noted, the father of al-Ṣadūq, ʿAlī b. Bābawayh al-Qummī (d. 329/940–41, the year of al-Kulaynī’s death),¹⁷⁵ possessed genuine power in social and political decision making. Al-Najāshī calls him “the shaykh and the elder of the people of Qumm”;¹⁷⁶ from several sources we know that he stood in a close relationship with the representatives of the hidden imam while his religious authority was upheld by the wukalā’ of Baghdad.¹⁷⁷ ʿAlī b. Bābawayh personally intervened in some of the significant events of the day; for example, in the case of al-Ḥallāj. He had visited Baghdad, just as al-Kulaynī did toward the end of his life.¹⁷⁸ Moreover, ʿAlī b. Bābawayh undertook a religious work similar to that of al-Kulaynī: to address the needs of the Imami community, then suffering from the imam’s absence,¹⁷⁹ he compiled his renowned work al-Imāma wa’l-tabṣira min al-ḥayra.¹⁸⁰

Al-Kulaynī is conspicuous by his absence from the political scene, as our sources attest. This apparent effacement on the part of a scholarly and religious figure as important as he, within a historical context as troubled as his was, cannot be without its own significance. Actually, a kind of quietism, an apolitical attitude, was apparently prevailing within Imamism for quite a long time, and very probably after the drama of Karbalā’, that is, the massacre of the third imam and his family.¹⁸¹ The corpus of Imami hadiths includes a number of traditions that appear to prohibit the faithful from any positive political action, whether it be rebellion against an unjust power or the quest for any political power whatsoever, and this indeed until the End of Time and the Return of the hidden imam in his mission as qā’im.¹⁸² In a subchapter of his Kāfī, al-Kulaynī himself collects an entire series of traditions, going back to the fifth, sixth, and eighth imams, that denounce all thirst for power. This subchapter has as its title “The will to command” (ṭalab al-ri’āsa; literally, “the quest for command, for leadership”).¹⁸³ There we read the following statements: “He who seeks to command is lost”; “Beware those who command and who consider themselves to be leaders; by God, the man behind whom the sound of sandals arises (i.e., of his partisans) will perish himself and cause others to perish”; “cursed is he who believes himself to be a chief, cursed is he who strives to become one, cursed is he who proclaims himself such”; “Avoid leading (people) and avoid following people (who lead)”; “Seek power in no way; be not (like) a wolf devouring people in our name (i.e., we the imams) for God will make you wretched.”¹⁸⁴ Our author repeats a prophetic tradition reported by the imam Jaʿfar: “‘the learned (fuqahā’) are the trustworthy (umanā’) bearers of (the message) of the prophets only so long as they do not engage with the world (dukhūluhum fī’l-dunyā).’ Someone then asked, ‘What does “engagement with the world mean”?’ The Prophet: ‘It means to collaborate with power (ittibāʿ al-sulṭān).’”¹⁸⁵ Al-Kulaynī, unlike many other scholars of his time and place, chose deliberately to stand apart from all directly political activity in order to keep faith with the quietist position advocated in the hadiths that he himself transmitted.

HIS RANK AMONG THE IMAMIS

As a result of his compilation of the Kitāb al-Kāfī, Shaykh al-Kulaynī always enjoyed great respect among Imami scholars, and as much in Baghdad as in his homeland of Rayy, a respect that lasted during his own lifetime as well as later up to the present day. Al-Najāshī, the major expert of Shi’ite prosopography, presents him as the master of the Imamis and the outstanding figure in the city of Rayy during his lifetime (shaykh aṣḥābinā fī waqtihi bi’l-Rayy wa-wajhuhum).¹⁸⁶ He adds that al-Kulaynī was both the most trustworthy and the most rigorous of traditionists with respect to the collection and attribution of hadiths (kāna awthaq al-nās fī’l-ḥadīth wa-athbatahum). Al-Najāshī’s estimation was doubtless based on analysis of the text of the Kāfī as well as our scholar’s other works. Shaykh al-Ṭūsī also emphasizes the supreme scientific rank and trustworthiness of al-Kulaynī and places great weight on his knowledge of hadiths (thiqa ʿārif bi’l-akhbār/jalīl al-qadr ʿālim bi’l-akhbār).¹⁸⁷ Other Imami traditionists and scholars have also praised him in more or less similar terms as “the truthful master” (al-shaykh al-ṣadūq) or “the master whose reliability and soundness are unanimously accorded” (al-shaykh al-muttafaq ʿalā thiqatihi wa-amānatihi). ʿAlī b. Ṭāwūs (d. 664/1266), with his traditionalist leanings,¹⁸⁸ is one of the most laudatory with respect to our author.¹⁸⁹ Al-Muḥaqqiq ʿAlī al-Karakī (d. 940/1534), the famous shaykh al-islām of the Safavid Shah Ṭahmāsb, calls al-Kulaynī “the gatherer of the traditions of the Prophet’s Family” (jāmiʿ aḥādīth ahl al-bayt).¹⁹⁰ Zayn al-Dīn b. ʿAlī, the second martyr (d. 965/1558), also calls him “the master of the group (of Imamis)” (shaykh al-ṭā’ifa/ra’īs al-madhhab).¹⁹¹ The shaykh al-Ḥusayn b. ʿAbd al-Ṣamad (d. 984/1576) acknowledges al-Kulaynī as the greatest scholar of the science of Hadith among traditionists and the most rigorous of critics in this discipline.¹⁹² Muḥammad Taqī al-Majlisī (d. 1070/1660), the father of the famous al-Majlisī, author of the Biḥār, considers our author a scholar directly supported (mu’ayyad) by God.¹⁹³ Muḥammad Bāqir, his son, states that al-Kulaynī is accepted by the entire body of scholars, both Shi’ite and Sunni.¹⁹⁴ Unsurprisingly, al-Kulaynī is particularly esteemed by traditionalist (Akhbārī) scholars.¹⁹⁵ As is well known, he has been called by them “the chief of the traditionists” (ra’īs al-muḥaddithīn).¹⁹⁶ Mullā Ṣadrā (d. 1050/1640), the great philosopher of the Safavid period, admired al-Kulaynī and was easily the most renowned of his commentators.¹⁹⁷ In more recent times, praise of our man has resumed afresh.¹⁹⁸ In some Imami sources he is even called “the propagator of Imami Shi’ite doctrine during the Occultation” or even “the great traditionist” (al-ḥāfiẓ).¹⁹⁹ Al-Kulaynī’s exalted position among Imamis has even been stressed by Sunni authors, who at times have termed him “the learned jurist” (al-faqīh).²⁰⁰ According to a famous prophetic tradition, Islam has a “renewer” (mujaddid) in every century;²⁰¹ this is why, in passing from one century of the Hijra to another, a number of the most influential scholars have been upheld as the “revivers” of the time. In his Jāmiʿ al-uṣūl, in a list of scholars who fall into this category, the Sunni writer Ibn al-Athīr (d. 606/1210) considers al-Kulaynī the Shi’ite mujaddid for the year 300, just as he presents the imams al-Bāqir (d. ca. 114/732 or 119/737) and al-Riḍā (d. 203/818), along with al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā (d. 436/1044), as the “revivers” of Shi’ism for the years 100, 200, and 400, respectively.²⁰² It is noteworthy that among all the laudatory names and titles that Imamis have bestowed on al-Kulaynī the most popular appears to be thiqat al-islām, “(the master) worthy of trust in Islam.”²⁰³ This title, seemingly used only for the great Imami religious scholars, would have been first conferred upon him by Bahā’ al-Dīn Muḥammad al-ʿĀmilī, known as Shaykh Bahā’ī (d. 1030/1621), for the purpose of accentuating the unique position of al-Kulaynī in the history of Hadith and Imami jurisprudence.²⁰⁴ The title, exemplifying al-Kulaynī’s lofty rank among his contemporaries, has continued to be in use until the present day.²⁰⁵ True, it has also been granted to other scholars, such as Shaykh al-Ṭūsī and al-Ṭabrisī, the great Qur’an commentator, but these usages have never attained the popularity of al-Kulaynī’s title.²⁰⁶ The title thiqat al-islām is equivalent to the Sunni title shaykh al-islām and seems not to have been used to designate Shi’ite scholars before the Safavid period.

Observations on the Work

The prosopographical and bibliographical sources provide us with a list of al-Kulaynī’s writings.²⁰⁷ Except for al-Kāfī, our scholar’s other works seem not to have survived the passage of time:

 

1. al-Radd ʿalā ‘l-qarāmiṭa (“Refutation of the Carmathians”),²⁰⁸ a work that given the presence of Ismailis and Carmathians at Rayy at this time, had a certain importance, doubtless reflecting the conflicts among these groups and the Imamis to win the allegiance of the majority of Shi’ites. It must be emphasized that Carmathian and/or Ismaili esotericists were active in the town of Kulayn as well as in the region of Pashāpūya, al-Kulaynī’s homeland; a fact that justifies even more strongly his drafting of a refutation of them. As is known, the Ismaili daʿwa (the institutionalized propaganda) at Rayy was headed at this time by a certain Khalaf al-Ḥallāj; the Ismailis of the region were accordingly called the Khalafiyya. Khalaf is said to have stayed in Kulayn itself from whence he spearheaded his propaganda mission.²⁰⁹ This proves yet again, if proof were needed, the long-standing presence of various Shi’ite tendencies in this region. In any case, Khalaf’s effectiveness is well known since he was apparently able to convert a large number of the inhabitants of Kulayn to his faith.²¹⁰ Ghiyāth, the director of propaganda in the next generation, also originated in the Kulayn region. He headed the daʿwa at Rayy and in the Jibāl. Skilled in the science of Hadith and in Arab letters, he was author of a Kitāb al-Bayān and took part in disputes with Sunni scholars.²¹¹ It was Ghiyāth who selected as his lieutenant the renowned Ismaili scholar Abū Ḥātim Aḥmad b. Ḥamdān al-Rāzī (d. 322/934) who also came from Pashāpūya. The latter in turn became head of Ismaili propaganda in the region following Abū Jaʿfar al-Kabīr. He was extremely successful in his work and was even able to convert Amīr Aḥmad ʿAlī, the governor of Rayy between 307 and 311/919–24, to Ismailism.²¹²

2. Al-Rasā’il or Rasā’il al-a’imma, a collection of the “Letters of the Imams.”²¹³ An older version of this work, probably dating from a time close to that of al-Kulaynī, was available to Ibn Ṭāwūs (d. 664/1266).²¹⁴ In his Kāfī, al-Kulaynī occasionally gives excerpts from the “Letters of the Imams,” very probably derived from his Rasā’il al-a’imma.²¹⁵

3. Kitāb al-Rijāl (“Book of Men,” i.e., transmitters of traditions), doubtless a prosopographical work. In the Kāfī some information of a prosopographical nature occurs as well.²¹⁶

4. Kitāb mā qīla fī’l-a’imma ʿalayhim al-salām min al-shiʿr (“Book of Poems Composed About the Imams”).

5. Kitāb taʿbīr al-ru’yā (“Book of Dream Interpretation”).²¹⁷ According to information given by al-Najāshī, ascription of this work to al-Kulaynī is problematic.²¹⁸ Nevertheless, the topic of dream interpretation does occur in the Kāfī and demonstrates our author’s interest in the subject.²¹⁹

 

THE KITĀB AL-KĀFĪ (“THE SUFFICIENT BOOK”)

According to the bio-bibliographical sources, composition of the Kāfī took some twenty years.²²⁰ For later Imami tradition, this great compilation of hadiths constitutes one of the authoritative Four Books of Hadith that Imamis designate as al-kutub al-arbaʿa. Given the fact that a major portion of it is devoted to theological doctrines and beliefs (uṣūl, literally, “roots, foundations”), it can be considered the most important of the four, since the three others deal almost exclusively with jurisprudence (furūʿ, literally, “branches, derivations”) alone. The latter are the work of two other great Imami scholars, to wit, the Kitāb man lā yaḥḍuruhu al-faqīh (its correct, though little used, title is Faqīh man lā yaḥḍuruhu al-faqīh) by Shaykh al-Ṣadūq Muḥammad b. ʿAlī b. al-Ḥusayn Ibn Bābawayh al-Qummī (d. 381/991) and two books by Shaykh al-Ṭūsī Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan (d. 460/1068), namely, the Tahdhīb al-aḥkām and the more condensed work al-Istibṣār fī mā ‘khtalafa (or mā ‘khtulifa fīhi) min al-akhbār.²²¹ It is for this reason that, just as al-Kulaynī will be dubbed thiqat al-islām (as discussed earlier in this chapter), Ibn Bābawayh will gain the honorific title of “leader of the traditionists” (ra’īs al–muḥaddithīn),²²² while Shaykh al-Ṭūsī will be called “master of the group (i.e., of the Imamis)” (shaykh al-ṭā’ifa) because of his central role in the elaboration and development of Imami law.²²³

True, many of the same traditions appear in these four collections; however, the objectives, the method of composition, the themes, and the scope of each one are different, with the result that none can supplant another in the Imami religious tradition. Nevertheless, as we shall see, the attention accorded the Kāfī has been far greater than that paid to the three other works; it might even be said that al-Kulaynī’s compilation possesses a hallowed status for Imamis. Shaykh al-Kulaynī and the two other author-compilers of the Four Books, Ibn Bābawayh and Shaykh al-Ṭūsī, are beyond any doubt the most important and the most influential of Imami traditionists; together with Shaykh al-Mufīd (d. 413/1022) and his disciple al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā (d. 436/1044), they constitute the most important group of Imami scholars in the first centuries of the Hijra.²²⁴

As noted earlier, one major difference between al-Kāfī and the other three books is that the latter consist solely of juridical, or quasi-juridical, chapters whereas the Kāfī encompasses, in addition to jurisprudence, substantial and significant portions on doctrinal, theological, spiritual, moral, and historical questions; for this reason it forms a far more comprehensive collection of hadiths than the others. Last, it must be made clear that the Four Books, notwithstanding their importance and their breadth, represent only a part of the early Imami patrimony in hadith.²²⁵

While it is true that prior to the compilation of the Kāfī other attempts had been made by Imami scholars to assemble a large number of traditions,²²⁶ nevertheless al-Kulaynī’s work, thanks to the breadth of the themes broached as well as the considerable number of hadiths collected, represents without any doubt the first and greatest instance of the efforts to establish a true corpus of Imami hadiths, as much on the doctrinal and theological level as on the juridical—all the more so in that it was compiled at one of the most delicate and decisive moments in Imami religious history. It is perhaps for all these reasons that it both completed and/or abrogated most earlier hadith collections almost entirely.²²⁷

Its methodical construction, its exploitation of a dazzling range of sources, its breadth and the pertinence of its chapters on all aspects of the faith at the juridical, doctrinal, and moral levels, make al-Kāfī the most renowned, the most commented, and the most widely consulted of Imami hadith compilations.²²⁸ Without doubt the most important reason for its celebrity lies in the responses it provides to the countless questions that the faithful posed during the trying period of the Occultation crisis, rightly termed “the time of perplexity” (al-ḥayra). The reconstruction of the religious authority of Imami scholars and the legitimation of doctrine, thanks to criteria based on the Qur’an and especially on its interpretation by means of the Hadith, doubtless filled the void created by the absence of the imam, at least in part, and soothed the social and political disturbances that resulted from it—especially since the influence of Shi’ites in different parts of the empire as well as in the Abbasid state system had been increasing for some time while the need for a coherent doctrinal and juridical system was growing ever more pressing. Now in his work al-Kulaynī was able to put forth a quite voluminous and extremely coherent assemblage of doctrinal and juridical traditions that derived from the imams. He thus played a leading role in the unification as well as the consolidation of the Imami faith. It is hardly a coincidence that the representatives of the two major tendencies in Imami Shi’ism, the traditionalists (akhbāriyya) and the rationalists (uṣūliyya), take the Kāfī as their point of reference, albeit to differing degrees.²²⁹

By al-Najāshī’s time (d. 450/1058), and perhaps even at the time of al-Kulaynī himself, the work was also called Kitāb al-Kulaynī.²³⁰ Very probably this is the single work of the master that has come down to us.²³¹ There are innumerable manuscripts of it in libraries throughout the world.²³² Editions of it, both early and modern, run into the dozens.²³³ All this goes to show the huge fame and the immense popularity of the book for Imamis. Nevertheless, no truly satisfactory critical edition, especially one based on the oldest manuscripts, has yet been realized.

The Kāfī is traditionally held to be composed of three big parts: the Uṣūl (literally, “Roots,” i.e., theological doctrines and basic beliefs), the Furūʿ (literally, “Branches,” i.e., practical juridical applications), and the Rawḍa (literally, “Garden,” i.e., a miscellany of various traditions on different subjects), all of which add up to an immense gathering of 16,202 hadiths. To be sure, Imami jurists have paid greater attention to the portion of the Furūʿ, which forms a virtually complete corpus of early Imami law. The traditions that make up this part have served on countless occasions in the composition of other legal works, sometimes following a different order, though often influenced by the structure of chapters in al-Kāfī.

The two parts of the Uṣūl and the Furūʿ are divided in their turn into a number of “books” (kitāb), with each book divided into “chapters” (bāb), often but not always given a title; however, this system is not followed throughout the work. For example, the Book of Knowledge and of Ignorance (K. al-ʿaql wa’l-jahl)—see further on in this chapter for this translation—contains no chapter. The number of hadiths in each chapter depends in part upon the importance of the theme treated in the chapter and in part on the volume of traditions that al-Kulaynī was able to collect on the subject. Some chapters contain only a single tradition. Others, entitled al-nawādir (literally, “rare traditions”), are not unanimously accepted by Imami scholars both with respect to their contents and to the normative value of the traditions they contain.²³⁴

In the composition of the work, in the arrangement of the books and chapters and even in the ordering of the traditions that make up a chapter (sometimes problematic hadiths stand alongside hadiths that are certain and currently operative), al-Kulaynī seems to have followed a strictly predetermined methodology. Some researchers even believe that within each chapter our author deliberately positioned the hadiths most apposite to the chapter’s theme in first place.²³⁵

With respect to the repetitions in certain chapters or to other instances in which some disorder or illogicality is evident in the titles given to some chapters or books in the Kāfī, these may be explained by the protracted compilation period the work entailed, by the manner of composition of certain parts, and, indeed, by the modes in which the book was transmitted by the generation of al-Kulaynī’s direct disciples as well as by the occasionally negative role played by later transmitters and copyists.

The legal portion, the Furūʿ min al-Kāfī, takes up five volumes of our edition and contains 11,819 traditions, or more than 70 percent, of the entire work. This gives a sense of its breadth and its importance, and yet what is specifically Shi’ite in the book does not lie in this part.²³⁶ It contains twenty-six “books” on juridical subjects, the majority of which are commonplace in works of Imami jurisprudence. To be sure, in these the order of the chapters and their titles can shift from one book to another in accord with historical and social conditions as well as the requirements of the moment; however, their contents remain virtually identical. As examples, we shall mention the titles of several chapters: the Book of ritual purification (K. al-ṭahāra), the Book of cadavers (K. al-janā’iz), the Book of canonical prayer (K. al-ṣalāt), the Book of marriage (K. al-nikāḥ), the Book of repudiation (K. al-ṭalāq), the Book of foodstuffs (K. al-aṭʿima), the Book of inheritances (K. al-mawārīth), the Book of judgment and juridical precepts (K. al-qaḍā’ wa’l-aḥkām), etc. The order of the chapters in the Furūʿ, like the order of the hadiths within each chapter, doubtless observes the criteria of composition and compilation of the hadith collections of the period, especially those works of the old majāmīʿ and jāmiʿ type,²³⁷ but this composition no doubt also corresponds to the juridical opinions and positions of al-Kulaynī as well as his position with regard to Shi’ite juridical tradition or traditions in general and to Imami traditions in particular. The exact grasp of subjects, the classification of themes, and the arrangement of chapters and subchapters in accord with these classifications, the attention devoted to the bases and rules of hadith transmission and juridical precepts, the new names given to the chapters, all attest to the great expertise of the author-compiler in the diverse domains of jurisprudence. As one point illustrative of this mastery, mention may be made of the repetition—as apposite as it is judicious—of certain hadiths in different chapters. In some cases, al-Kulaynī has broken up the same long hadith into several parts and used each of these parts in their appropriate chapters.

Now let us turn to the Rawḍa min al-Kāfī (the Garden of the Kāfī).²³⁸ This part contains 597 traditions dealing with manners and morality, the sermons and letters of the imams, and rules bearing on daily life. Here too are exegetical hadiths, historical information and reports, the “medical” traditions of the Prophet and the imams, the interpretation of dreams, etc. Given its nature, the Rawḍa often diverges in its arrangement of chapters from the other two parts, the Uṣūl and the Furūʿ; indeed, al-Kulaynī did not divide this part of his work into books or chapters. Rather, this is an anthology, a melange of all sorts of hadiths in no particular order, and so this part is utterly unlike the rest of the work.

Finally, the most important part, that of the Uṣūl, devoted to specifically Imami doctrines. This takes up eight books, comprising three big volumes in our edition, and in its totality containing 505 chapters and 3,786 hadiths. Let us take a closer look at the contents of this part; we shall give a few judiciously selected examples, for, in fact, the chapters and subchapters are infinitely more numerous. An attempt will be made to translate terms in their technical doctrinal aspect, as was done with the Baṣā’ir al-darajāt in chapter 4, but this, of course, does not obviate their other meanings, including their obvious ones:

 

The author-compiler’s introduction, 1:2–9.

1. The Book of Knowledge and Ignorance (K. al-ʿaql wa’l-jahl), 1:10–29.²³⁹ This contains thirty-four traditions (undivided in chapters), among which is the long dialogue of the imam Mūsā b. Jaʿfar with his renowned disciple, the theologian Hishām b. al-Ḥakam on knowledge (hadith no. 12), and the quite celebrated cosmogonic hadith on the armies of knowledge and of ignorance (no. 14).

2. The Book of the Virtues of Initiatory Knowledge (K. faḍl al-ʿilm), 1:30–71.²⁴⁰ This contains 175 traditions divided into chapters (bāb), among which are “The Necessity of Seeking Knowledge,” “Description of Knowledge and of the Initiatory Sage,” “Initiatory Master and Initiated Disciple,” “Frequenting Initiatory Masters,” “Word and Act in Relation to Knowledge,” “Probative Authority (ḥujja) of the Initiatory Sage/Master,” “The Transmission of Writings and Traditions,” “Against Innovations, Personal Opinions, and Reasoning by Analogy,” “Constant Recourse to the Qur’an and the Hadith.”

3. The Book of Divine Unity (K. al-tawḥīd), 1:72–167. This contains 215 traditions divided into chapters, among which are “Creation ex nihilo of the World and a Demonstration of the Creator’s Existence,” “God May Be Called ‘Thing,’” “God Cannot Be Known Except Through Himself,” several chapters on negative theology (the unknowable nature of God’s essence, the negation of description, time, and place, vision, form, and body…), “Attributes of Essence and Attributes of Act,” “Divine Names,” “Throne and Pedestal,” “A Theological Sermon of ʿAlī on Oneness,” “Imam as a Locus of Manifestation of God’s Names and Attributes,”²⁴¹ “Divine Changeability” (badā’), “God’s Will,” “Bliss and Misery,” “Good and Evil,” “Predestination and Free Will and Something-Between-the-Two (al-amr bayn al-amrayn),” “Theory of Human Action,” “The Ontological Necessity for Binding Authority (ḥujja, i.e., the Godly Man: Prophets, Imams, and Friends of God as Proofs of God).”

4. The Book of Proof (that is, “apodictic proof of God” or “decisive authority,” i.e., the imam and his earthly manifestation) (K. al-ḥujja), 1:168–548. This contains 1,016 traditions divided into chapters, among which are “The Indispensable Character of the Proof,” “The Generations of the Allies or Friends of God: Prophets, Messengers, Imams,” “The Earth Cannot Be Devoid of the Proof,” “Recognition of the Imam/imam,”²⁴² “The Imam as Sign and as Guide to God,” “the Imam as Treasure and Treasurer of Initiatory Knowledge,” “The Imam as Threshold,” “The Imam as Light,” “The Imam as Pillar of the Universe,” “Qur’anic Allusions to the Imam,” “The Imam and Initiatory Knowledge,” “The Guides of Light and the Guides of Darkness,” “Qur’an and Imam,” “Inheritance of Knowledge,” “Sacred Scriptures of the Past and the Imam,” “The Integral Qur’an of the Imams,”²⁴³ “Supernatural Powers and Objects of the Imams,” “The Secret Books of the Imams,” “Sources of the Imams’ Knowledge,” “Knowledge of the Invisible,” “Miraculous Knowledge,” “The Heavenly Inspiration of the Imam,” “The Investiture (naṣṣ) of the Twelve Imams,” several chapters on the hidden imam, his Occultation and his messianic Return as the eschatological savior, several chapters on the nature of the imam’s body and spirit, on his faithful and his adversaries, many chapters on various aspects of the imam’s initiatory knowledge. The book ends with chapters on the lives of the twelve imams.

5. The Book of Belief and Unbelief (K. al-īmān wa’l-kufr), the entire vol. 2 (pp. 2–464).²⁴⁴ This contains 1,609 traditions divided into chapters, among which are “Creation of the Believer and the Unbeliever,” several cosmo-anthropogonic chapters, “Difference Between islām and īmān,” many chapters on the nature, practical application, and soteriological conseqences of belief, many chapters on ethics, “Duty of Keeping Secret (taqiyya),” “Believer-Initiates as a Minority,” numerous chapters on impiety and unbelief, on the nature, practices, and results of impious ignorance, on the ethical consequences of unbelief, on sin and the status of the sinner.

6. The Book of Prayer (K. al-duʿā’), 2:466–595. This contains 409 traditions divided into chapters, many of which are devoted to the numerous virtues of prayer and the various categories of invocation, on the requisite state of awareness during prayer, obligatory canonical prayer and supererogatory prayers, diverse invocations and sacred formulae.

7. The Book of the Virtues of the Qur’an (K. faḍl al-qur’ān), 2:596–634. This contains 124 traditions divided into chapters on the virtues of the practice of regular reading of the Qur’an, the categories of readers and of readings, specific virtues of certain verses and certain suras, allusions to the falsification of the official version of the Qur’an.

8. The Book of Frequenting (i.e., relations between human beings, K. al-ʿishra), 2:635–74. This contains 204 traditions divided into chapters on the ethics of relationships with others, and most especially on relationships among the Shi’ite faithful.

 

The Formation of an Entire Religion Set Apart

As its title shows, “The Sufficient Book” is intended as a complete summa of Imami articles of faith and practice. Moreover, its author-compiler states this clearly himself in his introduction.²⁴⁵ With its imposing juridical portion, the oldest and most complete synthesis of the corpus of Imami law that has come down to us, moving clearly from cultic practices to transactions while dealing with precepts and rules, and particularly with its immense doctrinal portion, moving from cosmogony to eschatology while treating theology, exegesis, ethics, religious practices, the history or even the theory of the Occultation of the last imam, this huge monument has safeguarded Twelver identity amid the countless schools of Islamic thought in an especially turbulent moment in the history of Shi’ism in general and of Twelver Shi’ism in particular. Al-Kulaynī places imamology at the center, as needs must be, to the effect that this determines and gives ultimate meaning to all other religious disciplines, thereby radically shaping Shi’ism as “the religion of the Imam.”²⁴⁶ Keeping his distance from both the ever swelling rationalism of his coreligionists in Baghdad and those Shi’ite movements of a revolutionary and gnostic sort, more levelheaded than his older contemporary al-Ṣaffār al-Qummī in presenting Imamism as a fundamentally initiatory religion (see chapter 4), and doubtless both apolitical and quietist, al-Kulaynī is indisputably one of the most decisive representatives of the primitive esoteric and nonrationalistic tradition of the Iranian schools of Rayy and Qumm just before the rationalizing theological and juristic tradition of the politicized doctors of Baghdad asserts its dominance.

With respect to doctrine—and in contrast to the K. Baṣā’ir al-darajāt—the Kāfī mitigates what might be termed occult and magical aspects, insisting less on the thaumaturgic powers of the imams, all the while emphasizing their initiatory and hermeneutical knowledge, which encompasses all headings of knowledge. Conversely, Neoplatonic echoes are more intense than with al-Ṣaffār, as shown by the development of the cosmogonic dimension and the central role that knowledge/intelligence (equivalent to the Greek nous) plays there, the way in which the doctrine of divine emanations down through preexisting worlds and metaphysical entities is made increasingly complex, the establishment of a negative theology, or, indeed, the importance placed on the centrality of the sage’s role in the economy of the sacred.²⁴⁷ It is important to keep in mind, yet again, that al-Kulaynī is the exact contemporary of al-Fārābī, the great Neoplatonist of Islam, who dwelt in the Abbasid capital at almost the same time. In a more general sense, his time is that of the rise of philosophical thought in Islam. Thus Neoplatonic gnosis, recast in accord with a monotheism that accepted creation, would tinge Shi’ite thought in a definitive fashion.

The works of al-Ṣaffār and al-Kulaynī, together with other Shi’ite sources composed during the century that runs from the middle of the third/ninth to that of the fourth/tenth century, show the formation of an integral religion. Among these sources, it is enough to cite the Qur’anic commentaries of al-Ḥibarī, Furāt ak-Kūfī, al-ʿAyyāshī, ʿAlī b. Ibrāhīm al-Qummī, the works of such authors as al-Faḍl b. Shādhān, al-Barqī, or of Ibn Bābawayh, both father and son, the major works such as the Ithbāt al-waṣiyya attributed to al-Masʿūdī or, indeed, al-Nuʿmānī’s K. al-Ghayba, or the heresiographical books by a Nawbakhtī or a Saʿd b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Ashʿarī, along with many others in numerous domains of knowledge.²⁴⁸ This integral religion possesses its own theology, cosmology, prophetology, historiography, jurisprudence, its own hermeneutical doctrine, ethics, liturgy, eschatology, and heresiography, in all their complexity, and all of it turns on an omnipresent imamology of a mystical type. Let us remind the reader yet again that almost all these works, partially integral as they are, are compilations of hadiths, that is, teachings going back to the Prophet, to Fāṭima, and, above all, to the imams.

The Shi’ite double vision of the world, at once dual and dualistic, though still rudimentary at the time of an al-Ḥibarī and the religiosity that he represents (see chapter 3), grows ever more complex and comes to be endowed with a powerful coherence. The pair ẓāhir/bāṭin (manifest/hidden, exoteric/esoteric) that characterizes the dual vision applies no longer solely to the letter and spirit of Scripture but expands to encompass other domains such as theology and prophetology. God Himself has an aspect that is forever hidden, namely his absolutely unknowable essence (dhāt), as well as a revealed aspect made manifest by his Names and Attributes (asmā’ wa-ṣifāt). The God revealed through his names has a locus of manifestation par excellence, and this is the Imam as understood metaphysically, both cosmic man and theophanic being. This heavenly Imam also displays a hidden aspect, his metaphysical dimension, and an aspect that is manifest, revealed through the earthly Guide, the man or woman who is the “ally” of God (walī, pl. awliyā’). Among terrestrial guides, the lawgiver prophets have as their mission to bring the letter of the divine message to a majority in a given community while their imams initiate a minority among the faithful into the spirit of this message. This minority of initiates are “the Shi’ites” of each religion.

In the same way, the dualistic vision goes beyond the opposition between the members of the Prophet’s family (ahl al-bayt) and their enemies to take on a universal, transhistorical dimension. In the cosmogonic writings, this opposition is the reenactment of a primordial struggle begun at the dawn of creation between cosmic knowledge and its armies on one side and cosmic ignorance and its powers on the other. This war is perpetually engaged throughout history, setting those who are initiated—represented by God’s allies and their faithfull in all ages—in opposition to the forces against initiation, incarnated in the enemies of God’s allies. All prophets and their imams, all the saints of all periods, have had to face the ignorance and violence of their adversaries. This stubborn struggle, originating in cosmogonic times, will come to a close only with the Return of the savior at the end of days when that savior will utterly vanquish the forces of ignorance and injustice.²⁴⁹