Note 508 — Chapter VI

Ahmed Ebn Hanbal (see Sale’s Koran, vol. I. p. 208) was born in the year of the Hejira 164 (A. D. 780) at Meru, in Khorasan, according to some, or according to others in Baghdad, where he died in the year of the Hejira 241 (A. D. 855). He could repeat no less than a million of Muhammed’s traditions. Refusing to acknowledge the Koran to be created, he was, by order of the Khalif Al Mótasem, severely scourged and imprisoned.

Ahmed Hanbal was the contemporary and friend of Muhammed Ebn Edris al Shâfei, the founder of the sect of the Shafâites. The latter was born in the year of the Hejira 150 (A. D. 767-8) either at Gaza or at Ascalone, in Palestine, and died in the year of the Hejira 204 (A. D. 819-20), in Egypt. He is said to have been the first who discoursed of jurisprudence, and reduced that science into a method (ibid., p. 207).

To the names of the three founders of sects just mentioned, I am to add the name of Abu Hanîfa al Noman Ebn Thabet, who was born at Cufa, in the year of the Hejira 80 (A. D. 699), and died in the year 150 (A. D. 767). He is the founder of the sect called the Hanefites. This sect is reckoned, in the order of time, the first of the four orthodox sects of the Sonnites, distinguished by the title of “the followers of reason,” whilst the other three are called “the followers of traditions.” Of these three last, the sect founded by Mâlik Ebn Hans is the second; that instituted by Muhammed Ebn Edris al Shâfei, the third; and that of the followers of Ahmed Ebn Hanbal, the fourth of the orthodox sects, acknowledged by the Sonnites.