Short answer: The best-known scholars of Islam are the four imams who gave their names to the schools of law (Abu Hanifah, Malik, al-Shafi'i and Ahmad ibn Hanbal), the six compilers of the main hadith books (al-Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawud, al-Tirmidhi, al-Nasa'i and Ibn Majah), the Quran commentator al-Tabari and the theologian al-Ghazali. Ibn Sina and Ibn Khaldun are famous as scholars of medicine and history. Women scholars were part of this from the start: Aishah taught the Companions, and women such as Karimah al-Marwaziyyah taught Sahih al-Bukhari to the great men of their time.
The four imams
The four Sunni schools of law (madhhabs) are named after the imams whose method their students carried on. They respected each other: al-Shafi'i studied with Malik and with al-Shaybani, the student of Abu Hanifah, and Ahmad studied with al-Shafi'i. AmalKit gives the Hanafi position first and shows the others where they differ.
- Imam Abu Hanifah, al-Nu'man ibn Thabit80 to 150 AH (699 to 767 CE), Kufa and Baghdad
Founder of the Hanafi school, the most widely followed today, known for careful reasoning from the Quran and Sunnah. Most reports say he died in prison in Baghdad after refusing the post of chief judge.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Imam Malik ibn Anas93 to 179 AH (711 to 795 CE), Madinah
Founder of the Maliki school and author of al-Muwatta, one of the earliest books of hadith and law. He gave weight to the practice of the people of Madinah.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Imam Muhammad ibn Idris al-Shafi'i150 to 204 AH (767 to 820 CE), Gaza, Makkah, Baghdad and Egypt
Founder of the Shafi'i school. His al-Risalah is the first book on the principles of Islamic law (usul al-fiqh).
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal164 to 241 AH (780 to 855 CE), Baghdad
Founder of the Hanbali school and compiler of the Musnad, a collection of about 27,000 hadith. He was jailed and beaten in the Mihnah for refusing to say the Quran was created.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala
The Hanafi line
Most Muslims in South Asia, Turkey, Central Asia and the Balkans follow the Hanafi school. These scholars carried it from Abu Hanifah's circle to the books still taught today.
- Abu Yusuf, Ya'qub ibn Ibrahim113 to 182 AH (731 to 798 CE), Kufa and Baghdad
Abu Hanifah's leading student and the first chief judge of the Abbasid state, under Harun al-Rashid. He wrote Kitab al-Kharaj on taxation.
Source: Ibn Abi al-Wafa al-Qurashi, al-Jawahir al-Mudiyyah fi Tabaqat al-Hanafiyyah - Muhammad ibn al-Hasan al-Shaybani132 to 189 AH (750 to 805 CE), Kufa and Baghdad
Abu Hanifah's student who wrote down the school's core books, the Zahir al-Riwayah, and a founding work on the law of war and peace, al-Siyar.
Source: Ibn Abi al-Wafa al-Qurashi, al-Jawahir al-Mudiyyah fi Tabaqat al-Hanafiyyah - Abu Ja'far al-Tahawi239 to 321 AH (853 to 933 CE), Egypt
Hanafi jurist and hadith scholar whose short creed, al-Aqidah al-Tahawiyyah, is studied by Muslims of every school.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Burhan al-Din al-Marghinanidied 593 AH (1197 CE), Marghinan in the Ferghana valley
Author of al-Hidayah, the Hanafi law manual still taught in madrasahs from Deoband to Istanbul.
Source: Ibn Abi al-Wafa al-Qurashi, al-Jawahir al-Mudiyyah fi Tabaqat al-Hanafiyyah - Ibn Abidin, Muhammad Amin1198 to 1252 AH (1784 to 1836 CE), Damascus
His Radd al-Muhtar, known as Hashiyat Ibn Abidin, is the standard reference for the later Hanafi fatwa.
Source: Ibn Abidin's biography by his son, printed with Radd al-Muhtar
The six hadith compilers
Six collections, known together as al-Kutub al-Sittah, became the main books of hadith for Sunni Muslims. All six compilers lived in the third century of the Hijrah, and most came from Persia and Central Asia.
- Imam al-Bukhari, Muhammad ibn Isma'il194 to 256 AH (810 to 870 CE), Bukhara
Compiled Sahih al-Bukhari, chosen from a vast number of reports, which Muslims hold to be the most authentic book after the Quran.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Imam Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj204 or 206 to 261 AH (about 820 to 875 CE), Nishapur
Compiled Sahih Muslim, second only to al-Bukhari's and praised for its careful order.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Abu Dawud al-Sijistani202 to 275 AH (817 to 889 CE), Sijistan and Basra
Compiled the Sunan, the hadith on which rulings of law are built.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Abu Isa al-Tirmidhiabout 209 to 279 AH (about 824 to 892 CE), Tirmidh
Compiled the Jami, known for grading each hadith and noting which scholars acted on it.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Ahmad ibn Shu'ayb al-Nasa'i215 to 303 AH (about 830 to 915 CE), Nasa and Egypt
Compiled the Sunan known for its strict choice of narrators.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Ibn Majah, Muhammad ibn Yazid209 to 273 AH (824 to 887 CE), Qazvin
Compiled the Sunan that later scholars counted as the sixth book.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala
Read the hadith with their gradings on our hadith by topic pages.
Quran, theology and the later masters
- Al-Tabari, Muhammad ibn Jarir224 to 310 AH (839 to 923 CE), Amol and Baghdad
His Jami al-Bayan gathers the early explanations of every verse of the Quran, and his history of prophets and kings is a main source for early Islamic history.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Al-Ghazali, Abu Hamid450 to 505 AH (1058 to 1111 CE), Tus and Baghdad
Shafi'i jurist and theologian who left a professorship in Baghdad for a life of worship, then wrote Ihya Ulum al-Din, the Revival of the Religious Sciences.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Al-Nawawi, Yahya ibn Sharaf631 to 676 AH (1233 to 1277 CE), Damascus
Shafi'i scholar whose Forty Hadith and Riyad al-Salihin are among the most read books in Muslim homes.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Ibn Kathir, Isma'il ibn Umarabout 701 to 774 AH (about 1300 to 1373 CE), Damascus
Author of a tafsir widely read in English translation, and of a world history, al-Bidayah wa al-Nihayah.
Source: Ibn Hajar, al-Durar al-Kaminah - Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani773 to 852 AH (1372 to 1449 CE), Cairo
Wrote Fath al-Bari, the great commentary on Sahih al-Bukhari, and studied with women scholars of hadith.
Source: al-Sakhawi, al-Daw al-Lami
Scholars of medicine, science and history
These men are famous outside Islamic studies. They are listed for their own fields; their views on religion were not all accepted by the scholars above. Al-Ghazali, for one, wrote against some of Ibn Sina's philosophy.
- Al-Khwarizmi, Muhammad ibn Musaabout 164 to 236 AH (about 780 to 850 CE), Baghdad
Worked in the House of Wisdom. His book on al-jabr gave algebra its name, and his own name gave us the word algorithm.
Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica, al-Khwarizmi - Ibn Sina (Avicenna)370 to 428 AH (980 to 1037 CE), Bukhara and Hamadan
His Canon of Medicine was a standard medical textbook in the Muslim world and in Europe for centuries.
Source: Ibn Khallikan, Wafayat al-A'yan - Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen)about 354 to 430 AH (about 965 to 1040 CE), Basra and Cairo
His Book of Optics explained sight by light entering the eye and tested ideas by experiment.
Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica, Ibn al-Haytham - Ibn Khaldun, Abd al-Rahman732 to 808 AH (1332 to 1406 CE), Tunis and Cairo
Maliki judge in Cairo whose Muqaddimah studies why states rise and fall, and is read today as an early work of sociology and economics.
Source: Ibn Khaldun's own autobiography, al-Ta'rif
For the age they worked in, read the Islamic Golden Age and the House of Wisdom.
Women scholars of Islam
Women taught hadith and fiqh from the first generation. The scholar Mohammad Akram Nadwi gathered the lives of about 8,000 women scholars of hadith from the biographical dictionaries.1 Ibn Asakir, the historian of Damascus, had more than 80 women among his teachers, and Ibn Hajar and al-Dhahabi both studied with women.
- Aishah bint Abi Bakr, Mother of the Believersdied 57 or 58 AH (about 678 CE), Madinah
Narrated more than two thousand hadith and corrected the senior Companions on points of law; they came to her with their questions.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Hafsah bint Sirindied about 100 AH (about 719 CE), Basra
A Follower (tabi'iyyah) known for her knowledge of the Quran and hadith; the judge Iyas ibn Mu'awiyah is reported to have said he preferred no one over her, not even al-Hasan al-Basri or her brother Muhammad ibn Sirin.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Amrah bint Abd al-Rahmandied 98 or 106 AH (716 or 724 CE), Madinah
Raised and taught by Aishah, she became an authority on her hadith; Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz is reported to have ordered her knowledge written down.
Source: Ibn Sa'd, al-Tabaqat al-Kubra - Karimah al-Marwaziyyahdied 463 AH (about 1070 CE), Makkah; some give 461
The leading teacher of Sahih al-Bukhari in her time. She taught it in Makkah, and the great historian al-Khatib al-Baghdadi read it with her.
Source: al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala - Fatimah al-Samarqandiyyah6th century AH (12th century CE), Samarqand and Aleppo
A Hanafi jurist, daughter of Ala al-Din al-Samarqandi and wife of al-Kasani, author of Bada'i al-Sana'i. Her fatwas are reported to have gone out signed by her, her father and her husband.
Source: Ibn Abi al-Wafa al-Qurashi, al-Jawahir al-Mudiyyah fi Tabaqat al-Hanafiyyah - Zaynab bint al-Kamaldied 740 AH (1339 CE), Damascus
Held so many licences to teach that they were said to fill a camel's load; al-Dhahabi was among her students.
Source: Mohammad Akram Nadwi, al-Muhaddithat: the Women Scholars in Islam (Interface, 2007)
Fatimah al-Fihri, who founded the Qarawiyyin mosque in Fez in 245 AH (859 CE), is remembered as a patron of learning rather than a scholar; see the Islamic history timeline.
FAQ
Who are the four imams of Islam?
Abu Hanifah (died 150 AH), Malik ibn Anas (died 179 AH), Muhammad ibn Idris al-Shafi'i (died 204 AH) and Ahmad ibn Hanbal (died 241 AH), who gave their names to the four Sunni schools of law.
Who compiled the six main books of hadith?
Al-Bukhari, Muslim, Abu Dawud, al-Tirmidhi, al-Nasa'i and Ibn Majah, all in the third century of the Hijrah (the ninth century CE).
Were there women scholars in Islam?
Yes, from the start. Aishah taught the Companions, and later women such as Karimah al-Marwaziyyah and Zaynab bint al-Kamal taught hadith to leading male scholars, including al-Khatib al-Baghdadi and al-Dhahabi.
Who is the greatest scholar of Islam?
Muslims do not rank scholars in one list. The four imams, al-Bukhari and Muslim are among the most respected, and the Companions, led by the four caliphs, come before them all.
Was Ibn Sina an Islamic scholar?
He was a Muslim physician and philosopher, famous for the Canon of Medicine. Many religious scholars, including al-Ghazali, rejected some of his philosophical views, so he is honoured as a scholar of medicine rather than of the religion.
Not answered here? Ask our team.
Sources
- Mohammad Akram Nadwi, al-Muhaddithat: the Women Scholars in Islam (Interface, 2007), the introduction and the volumes of biographies.
- al-Dhahabi, Siyar A'lam al-Nubala, the standard biographical dictionary for most of the scholars above.
- Ibn Abi al-Wafa al-Qurashi, al-Jawahir al-Mudiyyah fi Tabaqat al-Hanafiyyah, for the Hanafi scholars.
- Ibn Khallikan, Wafayat al-A'yan; Ibn Sa'd, al-Tabaqat al-Kubra.
- Encyclopaedia Britannica entries on al-Khwarizmi, Ibn Sina, Ibn al-Haytham and Ibn Khaldun.
- Yaqeen Institute, Female Scholars in Islamic History: Revisiting Their Pivotal Role, for Zaynab bint al-Kamal and others.