A Scholarly Study of Legal Standing of the Jurists in the Hanafi School of thought and the Catagorization of Issues

Abstract

The scholars of Hanafi school of thought fall into different categories as far as quality of their work is concerned as the opinions and reasoning of some scholars carry more weight than of others. Some scholars classify jurists into five categories while others divide them into seven different wings. Similarly legal juridical issues have also been identified as belonging to different groups and have been documented in books varying in terms of Quality and authenticity, but all the contents in any of those books can not be considered for passing a ruling for lack of credibility. It is essential that a scholar in Islam possesses a good knowledge of Shari’ah, so no confusion whatsoever, arises from the ruling once passed. If a scholar fails to differentiate the authentic and unauthentic sources of Islamic Jurisprudence, he may not be able to pass an accurate judgement. This is the basic requirement for the position of a Judge in Islam. This paper describes the legal requirements and qualification for a Hanafi jurist  and also elaborates on the categorization of legal issues.