Zainab bint Ismaeel ibn Ibraheem ibn Al-Khabbaz was born in 659 H, corresponding to 1279 CE, i.e. three years after the fall of Baghdad, the capital of the Muslim state to the Tatars. The fall was the lowest ebb in Islamic history, because it signaled the end of central government in the Islamic world for a long time to come. Moreover, the Tatar invasion augmented the Crusaders advances and their ability to establish their own kingdoms, forts and strongholds in the Muslim world. It was a period of collaboration between two brute powers against Islam and Islamic civilization. Nevertheless, this was a period of great scholarly activity. A large number of great scholars and scientists emerged in this period, some of whom were instrumental in defending the land of Islam. Others contributed to the development of learning and scholarship. Women scholars were also putting in a very useful contribution.
When the Tatars took over Baghdad, they destroyed all libraries in the capital. It is reported that the books they threw in the Tigris, one of the main rivers in the world, formed a bridge which they used to cross from one part of the city to the other riding their horses. Yet this did not stop the progress of Islamic scholarship. The Tatars’ march was halted by the Egyptian army in the famous battle of Ein Jaloot, when they suffered a very heavy defeat. The main figure that contributed most to this famous victory was a renowned scholar with the name of Izz Al-Din ibn Abd Al-Salam.
Zainab bint Ismaeel was a scholar of the generation that followed the fall of Baghdad. This was a generation that tried hard to preserve and advance Islamic scholarship. Her learning is well documented with great detail. She is ranked among Hadith scholars of the period. She read the Hadith works by Saboor, Al-Ajiri, Ayyoob, Al-Baghawi and many others. Under Al-Karmani, she read Al-Mukhallidi’s sessions, and she attended the circle of Abdullah ibn Abu Umar Al-Maqdisi. Her education was broad indeed.
We have also a long list of the books that were read under her by many students. This list shows her to be a scholar of high achievement, with students flocking to her circle for learning. It is such documentation showing the names of scholars and the books they read as well as the teachers whom they attended that establishes the unique feature of Islamic scholarship. This feature establishes the accuracy of what is reported, particularly by scholars of Hadith. No other civilization has ever maintained such authoritative and reliable documentation.
Zainab Bint Abd Al-Rahman
Zainab bint Abd Al-Rahman ibn Al-Hassan Al-Jurjani was a Hadith scholar of high caliber. She was born in Naisapur in 524 H, corresponding to 1130 CE. As a young girl, she showed great promise and aptitude for learning.
She was able to read under a number of distinguished scholars, who certified her to report what she learned from them. Such certification is equivalent today to the degrees awarded by universities and academic institutes. Among her teachers was Ismaeel ibn Abu Al-Qassim Al-Naisapuri who was a Qur’anic scholar.
She was then certified by other figures in the Qur’an and Hadith scholarship, such as Abd Al-Ghafir ibn Ismaeel Al-Farisi and Abu Umar Mahmood Al-Zamakhshari.
Similar documentation of her students and what she taught is also available. Thus, we know that Ali Al-Maqdisi reported what he learned from her of Hadith, while Al-Hassan ibn Muhammad Al-Bakri learned from her a volume of Hadiths. Other students listened to her as she taught the third volume of a book known as Al-Zuhd by Wakie’ Al-Jarrah, and also Al-Arbaeen, which she reports as having heard from Fatimah bint Al-Baghdadi while she was certified in this book by Al-Sa’idi.
There are mere examples of what she read and taught. There is no doubt that she was a very fine scholar. She was well in her eighties when she died in Naisapur in 615 H. May God bestow His grace on her.
Safiyyah Bint Shaibah Ibn Uthman
Women scholars in our tradition are by no means a new addition. Women have always tried to acquire knowledge and they were encouraged by their families and also by scholars.
This is due to the fact that the Qur’anic address is always made to men and women alike. If there are to be men scholars, then women are encouraged in the same way to pursue scholarship. Thus, we see women scholars among the Prophet’s companions and the generation that followed them, i.e. the tabi’een, with their numbers ever on the increase.
Safiyyah bint Shaibah belonged to this early tradition. She reported the Prophet’s Hadith from a number of his companions, one of these was a slave woman married by Safiyyah’s own father, and also from the mother of Uthman ibn Abu Sufyan, as well as a few of the Prophet’s wives such as Aishah, Umm Habeebah and Umm Salamah. She also reported from Asmaa’ bint Abu Bakr, the Prophet’s sister-in-law, and others.
Among her students we read the names of a number of her close relatives, such as her son Mansoor ibn Abd Al-Rahman Al-Hajbi, her nephew, the son of her uncle Musab ibn Shaibah, her grandson, Muhammad ibn Imran, as well as many others who were not related to her.
Her reporting of Hadiths is related in some of the main Hadith collections, such as those of Abu Dawood, Al-Nassaie and Ibn Majah.
Safiyyah bint Shaibah died around 90 H, corresponding to 709 CE. May God shower His mercy on her.
Arab News Islam 10 March 2003
