Reconstructing the past : Ibn Al-Qayyim's approach in critiquing accounts of Maghazi (battles) in his book Zad Al-Maʿad

The purpose of the present study is to assess the contribution of the renowned Mamluk-period scholar Shams al-Dīn Muhammad b. Abū Bakr, known as Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyyah (d. 751/1350) in the maghāzī and sīrah genres, by investigating and examining the features of his approach in critiquing and evaluating the authenticity of maghāzī narratives in his sīrah collection, Zād al-Maʿād fī Hadī Khayr al-ʿIbād, and to reveal the main methods that he utilised in critiquing the isnāds and the matns of these narratives. This thesis also provides a comprehensive overview of the maghāzī genre and highlights the main theories that have been put forward in both Western and Muslim scholarship, to explain its nature, emergence, development and position among other Islamic genres. This thesis includes an introduction, five main chapters and a conclusion. The first includes the introduction where the rational, objectives, research questions and the methodology of the present research are discussed; the second outlines Ibn al-Qayyim’s life and age; the third explores maghāzī literature and the work of Ibn al-Qayyim within this genre; the fourth provides an analytical survey of the main resources on which Ibn al-Qayyim built his maghāzī work; the fifth investigates first isnād criticism in the work of both Western and Muslim scholars and then analyses Ibn al-Qayyim’s approach with respect to the isnād; the sixth chapter outlines the origin of matn criticism and explores the main methods of content criticism used by Ibn al-Qayyim to evaluate maghāzī narratives; finally comes the conclusion of the whole work which provides the main results of the present research and recommendations. The present thesis suggests that Ibn al-Qayyim’s approach combines and intertwines between different methods applied by earlier traditionists, jurists and historians, by which he developed an advanced approach in critiquing and evaluating maghāzī narratives.