Tabaqat

Tabaqat (طبقات) is a genre of Islamic biographical literature that is organized according to the century in which the notable individuals (such as scholars, poets etc.) lived. Each century or generation is known as a Tabaqah, the plural of which is Tabaqat. The Tabaqat writings depict the past of a particular tradition of religious affiliation or scholarship and follows a chronological parameter that stretch from an authoritative starting-point to the generation (tabaqa) immediately preceding the assumed author.[1]

Development

The tabaqat literature originated sometime within the late eighth and ninth centuries.[2] Another account also cited that the tabaqat format became popular during the period of early hadith transmitter critics, emerging amid the effort to identify, classify, and evaluate transmitters in the discipline known as ilm al-rijāl.[3] The Tabaqat literature were written as tools to assist the muhaddiths in their efforts to classify hadith transmitters and to determine the quality of particular isnads. The isnad as a system for authenticating the memory of the prophetic period required righteous, honest, and competent transmitters in every generation. Biographical entries in the Tabaqat literature typically offer evaluations of the personal, religious and intellectual quality of their subjects.[4]

Examples

Famous examples of Tabaqat literature include Tabaqat al-Hanabilah originally by Ibn Abi Ya'la and then by Ibn Rajab. Tabaqat ul-Mutazilah (as the title suggests, concerned with Islamic theologians of the Mutazilite school) by Ahmad bin Yahya al-Murtada, at-Tabaqat ul-Kubra (about the companions of the Prophet and their successors) by Ibn Sa'd and - more recently - Tabaqat 'Alam ul-Shi'ah (about famous Shi'a scholars] by Aqa Buzurg Tehrani. The case of Ibrahim Hafsi's compendium of works, which are based on the Tabaqat historiographical framework, also demonstrate how the genre is applied in various fields in the Arabo-Islamic civilization and religious disciplines.[5]

References

1. Mojaddedi, Jawid (2013). The Biographical Tradition in Sufism: The Tabaqat Genre from al-Sulami to Jami. Surrey: Curzon Press. p. 1. ISBN 070071359X.
2. Foot, Sarah; Robinson, Chase (2012). The Oxford History of Historical Writing: Volume 2: 400-1400. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 253. ISBN 9780199236428.
3. Andersson, Tobias (2018). Early Sunnī Historiography: A Study of the Tārīkh of Khalīfa b. Khayyāṭ. Leiden: BRILL. p. 94. ISBN 9789004383166.
4. Judd, Steven C. (2013). Religious Scholars and the Umayyads Piety-Minded Supporters of the Marwanid Caliphate. Hoboken: Taylor and Francis. p. 25. ISBN 1134501714.
5. Lucas, Scott (2004). Constructive Critics, Ḥadīth Literature, and the Articulation of Sunnī Islam: The Legacy of the Generation of Ibn Saʻd, Ibn Maʻīn, and Ibn Ḥanbal. Leiden: BRILL. p. 48. ISBN 9004133194.