ABU HANIFAH

Abu Hanifah an-Nu'man is the great Sunni Imam and jurisconsult, and the founder of the Hanifi sect. His father, Sibit, was a silk dealer in the city of al-Kufah, and it is said his grandfather, Zuta, was a native of Kabul. He was born at al-Kafuh, A.H. 80 (A.D. 700), and died at Baghdad, A.H. 150. He is regarded as the great oracle of Sunni jurisprudence, and his doctrines, with those of his disciples, the Imam Abu Yusuf and the Imam Muhammad, are generally received throughout Turkey, Tartary, and Hindustan. It is related that Imam Malik said that the Imam Abu Hanifah was such a logician that, if he were to assert a wooden pillar was made of gold, he would prove it by argument.