Muhammad ibn Ismaeel ibn Ibraheem ibn Al-Mugheerah Al-Jaafi was born on Friday 13 Shawwal 194 A.H., corresponding to 810 CE, in the Central Asian city of Bukhara, from which he derives his name. His father was a scholar of Hadith who studied under a number of well-known scholars such as Malik ibn Anas of Madinah, Hammad ibn Zaid and Abdullah ibn Al-Mubarak. But his father died when Al-Bukhari was still a young boy, leaving him a good fortune which enabled him to devote all his time to his studies without worrying about earning his living. He entrusted his money to an honest businessman on a partnership basis. He had a very loving mother and an elder brother named Ahmad.
It was at a very young age that Al-Bukhari began to show his promise. His mother sent him to a local school where he learnt the Qur’an and other disciplines, but he did not stay long, because he wanted to learn the Hadith. In answer to a question about when he began to study the Hadith, he says: "I was inspired to memorize the Hadith when I was still at the local school, when I was ten or perhaps less." He was gifted with excellent, sharp memory and a great thirst for knowledge which he put to a good use. Thus he began to memorize books of Hadith by earlier scholars and to learn the biographies of reporters.
Al-Bukhari combined these gifts with a brave, confident character which enabled him to correct his teachers if they misquoted a Hadith or erred in a chain of transmitters. Several reports speak of such incidents where a teacher would check a correction made by Al-Bukhari only to find that the young scholar was right. None of his teachers found that embarrassing because the boy did not boast of his knowledge. He stated his corrections in the most polite way a student should adopt with his teacher, and the teachers were men of high caliber who realized that no one is immune to error, and that a good scholar always accepts the truth, no matter who states it.
Al-Bukhari’s mother nurtured his early scholarship, and was keen that he should follow his father’s footsteps. Thus, she gave him the books his father had written to study with diligence, and the boy benefited a great deal from these. He studied under all reputable Hadith scholars in his hometown, and they all admired not only his quick memory, but also his insight. One of these, Muhammad ibn Sallam Al-Baykandi, said: "Whenever this boy comes to me, I feel apprehensive." He once said to a visiting scholar, Sulaym ibn Mujahid: "Had you been here earlier, you would have met a young lad who has learnt by heart seventy thousand Hadiths." Sulaym says: "I went out immediately seeking him. When I met him I asked him whether he knew by heart 70,000 Hadiths. He said: ‘Yes, and many more. For every Hadith I quote you attributed to a companion of the Prophet or to one of the tabieen, I would know the birth, death of most of them and where they lived. I do not report a Hadith by a companion of the Prophet or one of the tabieen without having a basis from the Qur’an or the Sunnah which I know by heart."
This answer shows how remarkable a scholar Al-Bukhari was, right from his early years. The last part of his statement refers to Hadiths where a Prophet’s companion or a reporter of the next generation does not declare that he is quoting the Prophet. Many of them were reluctant to make such a declaration for fear of any mistake or error. Al-Bukhari would accept their statements as Hadiths only when they are supported by a Qur’anic statement or an authentic Hadith duly verified and quoting the Prophet directly.
What this approach tells us is that from a very early stage in his scholarly career, Al-Bukhari was determined to devote his efforts to sorting out what is authentic in Hadith from the great bulk of reports that do not aspire to a high degree of authenticity. This was certainly a noble goal which he addressed with the greatest diligence.
A major feature of a scholar’s career at Al-Bukhari’s time was travel for learning. A scholar would travel to the main centers of learning in the Muslim world in order to read under the most distinguished scholars of that city. As Islamic scholarship flourished, there were many seats of learning in different cities, most important among these were Kufah, Basrah, Baghdad, Madinah, Makkah and Damascus. What made a city famous was the number of scholars who belonged to that city and achieved eminence that made it attractive for young scholars to come and study under them. A scholar may stay for several months, or a longer period, in one city attending the circles of its major scholars. He may then travel on, and may feel that he should go again to a city he has already visited. We know, for example, that Imam El-Shafie visited Baghdad three times, spending over three years there on his first visit. Hadith scholarship required more travels than other specialties, because Hadith relied mostly on hearing the Prophet’s statements directly from scholars, who had to state their sources in what is known as sanad, or chain of transmission leading up to the Prophet himself. A special value is added to ‘high’ sanad, which denoted the shortest possible chain of transmitters. If a scholar meets in his early years an earlier scholar who has attained to old age and was known to be in full command of his faculties and learning, and the younger scholar hears directly from the old one, this makes for a high sanad, particularly if the pattern is repeated. Needless to say, a short chain of transmission leaves less room for error. Hence the importance attached to this feature in Hadith scholarship, and the keen desire of Hadith scholars to travel and learn from their distinguished predecessors.
Al-Bukhari’s first journey took him from his Central Asian hometown, Bukhara to Makkah, when he traveled with his mother and brother for pilgrimage. He was only 16 at the time. When they had completed the pilgrimage duties, his elder brother returned home with his mother, but Al-Bukhari stayed on in Makkah, to study under the best known scholars of the time, such as Ahmad Al-Azraqi and Ismaeel ibn Salim Al-Sayigh. He then traveled on to Madinah, which was still full of scholars who paid great attention to Hadith scholarship. These scholars were the grandchildren and descendants of the Prophet’s companions.
On this visit, Al-Bukhari stayed a year in Madinah, reading under its scholars. But this year witnessed the beginning of a new stage in his career, when he started writing books. He first wrote a book putting together the rulings and statements made by the Prophet’s companions and their successors, i.e. the tabieen. Then he wrote his major book of biographies, known as Al-Tareekh Al-Kabeer, in which he mentions the names and grades of Hadith reporters. He included both categories of reliable and ‘weak’ or unreliable reporters. He mentioned later that few were the names in his book for whom he did not have an important story or significant incident to tell, which would have a bearing on their grading. However, he chose not to write these because he did not wish to make the book too voluminous. This book of biographies was a major work which received great attention by scholars of Hadith over many centuries. By the time he finished this book, Al-Bukhari was 18 or bordering on 19 years of age.
He then traveled to Basrah, where he stayed for five years, but he would go from Basrah for pilgrimage and come back, and resume writing his books, praying to God to make them beneficial for Muslims. He would also travel to different places. Thus, Al-Bukhari says, "I traveled to Syria, Egypt and the Arabian Peninsula twice each, and four times to Basrah, and stayed several years in Hijaz, but I went to Kufah and Baghdad many times to meet scholars of Hadith." In fact his travels took him to many other cities, including Wasit, Marw and Naisapur in Iran, Qaisariyah, Eskelon and Hums in greater Syria, and other distant places.
Wherever he knew of a scholar of repute, he would travel to meet him. Hence, it is not surprising to know that he recorded in writing what he heard directly from no less than 1080 scholars of Hadith.