Hasan al-Basri

Al-Hasan al-Basri
Name of Hasan al-Basri with honorifics
Tābiʿūn;
Theologian, Ascetic, Scholar;
Imām of Basra, Lamp of Basra, Leader of the Ascetics
Bornc. 21 AH/642 CE
Medina, Rashidun Caliphate
DiedFriday, 5th Rajab 110 AH/15 October 728 (aged 86)
Basra, Umayyad Caliphate
Venerated inSunni Islam, Mu'tazilism
Major shrineTomb of Ḥasan al-Baṣrī, Az Zubayr, Iraq
InfluencesUmar ibn Khattab and Ali ibn Abi Talib
InfluencedAbdul Wahid bin Zaid, Habib al-Ajami, and Harith al-Muhasibi, Amr ibn Ubayd, Abu Hanifa
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Abu Sa'id ibn Abi al-Hasan Yasar al-Basri, often referred to as Hasan of Basra or Hasan al-Basri,[a] was an ancient Muslim preacher, ascetic, theologian, exegete, scholar, and judge.[1]

Born in Medina in 642,[2] Hasan belonged to the second generation of Muslims, all of whom would subsequently be referred to as the tābiʿūn in Sunni Islamic piety.[2] He became one of "the most celebrated" of the tābiʿūn,[2] enjoying an "acclaimed scholarly career and an even more remarkable posthumous legacy in Islamic scholarship."[2]

Hasan, revered for his austerity and support for "renunciation" (zuhd), preached against worldliness and materialism during the early days of the Umayyad Caliphate, with his passionate sermons casting a "deep impression on his contemporaries."[3] His close relationships with several of the most prominent companions of Muhammad[3] only strengthened his standing as a teacher and scholar of the Islamic sciences.[3] The particular disciplines in which he is said to have excelled included exegesis (tafsīr) of the Quran,[2] whence his "name is invariably encountered in" classical and medieval commentaries on the scripture,[2] as well as theology.[2][4] Hasan became an important figure to the later founders of Sufism[4] with his name occurring "in many mystical silsilas (chains of teachers and their disciples) going back to Muḥammad" in the writings of Sunni mystics from the ninth-century onwards.[3]

Scholars have said that very few of Hasan's original writings survive, with his proverbs and maxims on various subjects having been transmitted primarily through oral tradition by his numerous disciples.[3] While fragments of his famed sermons do survive in the works of later authors, the only complete manuscripts that bear his name are apocryphal works such as the Risālat al-qadar ilā ʿAbd al-Malik (Epistle to ʿAbd al-Malik against the Predestinarians),[2] a pseudopigraphical text from the ninth or early-tenth century,[2] and another letter "of an ascetic and hortatory character" addressed to Umar II (d. 720),[2] which is likewise deemed spurious.[2]

Traditionally, Hasan has been commemorated as an outstanding figure by all the Sunni schools of thought,[3] and was frequently designated as one of the well respected of the early Islamic community in later writings by such important Sunni thinkers as Abu Talib al-Makki (d. 996),[5] Abu Nu`aym (d. 1038),[6] Ali Hujwiri (d. 1077),[7] Ibn al-Jawzi (d. 1201),[8] and Attar of Nishapur (d. 1221).[9][3] In his famed Ḳūt al-ḳulūb, the most important work of Basran mysticism, Abu Talib al-Makki says of Hasan: "Ḥasan is our Imām in this doctrine which we represent. We walk in his footsteps and we follow his ways and from his lamp we have our light".[b][3]


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  1. ^ Frye, Richard Nelson (1975-06-26). The Cambridge History of Iran. Cambridge University Press. p. 449. ISBN 9780521200936. was born in Medina in 21/642
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Mourad, Suleiman A., “al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī”, in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE, Edited by: Kate Fleet, Gudrun Krämer, Denis Matringe, John Nawas, Everett Rowson.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Ritter, H., “Ḥasan al-Baṣrī”, in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, Edited by: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs. Brill Online.
  4. ^ a b S. H. Nasr, The Garden of Truth: The Vision and Promise of Sufism, Islam's Mystical Tradition (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2008), pp. 168-169
  5. ^ Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī, Ḳūt al-ḳulūb, Cairo 1310, passim
  6. ^ Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī, Ḥilyat al-awliyāʾ wa-ṭabaqāt al-aṣfiyāʾ (Beirut 1967–8), 2:131–61
  7. ^ Ḥud̲j̲wīrī, Kas̲h̲f al-maḥd̲j̲ūb, tr. R. A. Nicholson, GMS xvii, 86 f.
  8. ^ Ibn al-Jawzī, Adab al-shaykh al-Ḥasan b. Abī l-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī, ed. Sulaymān M. al-Ḥarash, Riyadh 1993
  9. ^ al-ʿAṭṭār, Tadhkirat al-awliyāʾ, ed. Reynold A. Nicholson (London 1905–7), 1:24–34