Murtadha Askari

Sayyid Murtada Sharif al-Askari (4 May 1914 – 16 September 2007), known as Allamah Askari, was the greatest historian of Islamic sacred historiography (ilm al-hadith) of the twentieth century, and probably of the whole modern era. The reason for this is that he was a pioneer in applying a critical and objective approach and methodology to scripture and to the texts of sacred history (the hadith report corpus), irrespective of their sectarian affiliations, and regardless of their supposed infallible and sacred status among Sunni and Shi’a historians and theologians alike. By doing so he was able to debunk false beliefs which had been held by the greatest minds of Islam for over a millennium. There are four seminal figures in 14th/ 10th century Shi’a thought. Allamah Askari is to sacred historiography and creedal beliefs (hadith, tārīkh, and ‘aqāid) what Allāmah Tabātabāī was to Quranic exegesis (tafsīr), what Ayatollah Motahhari was to fundamental theology (kalām), and what Imam Khomeini was to the political transformation of Shi’a Islam.

Allamah Askari is the Shi’a historian responsible for finally putting to rest the vicious meme that claimed that Abdullah b. Sabah, a crypto-Jew, was the person who was responsible for propagating the allegedly deviant and false sect of Shi’a Islam. The reason for the tenacity and longevity of this meme is that reports that affirm it found their way into the history books of Sunni luminaries such as at-Tabari – a source which, prior to Allamah Askari’s irrefutable debunking, was sacred and inviolable. Allamah Askari describes the origins of his method as follows. He says that in his historical research he would frequently come across hadith reports in the most reputable Sunnite sources (such as the as-sehāh as-settah and other sacred cows such as Tabari’s Tārikh or Ibn Saʻd’s Tabaqāt) that directly contradicted the obvious teachings of the Quran. He would then put these reports aside into a special category of their own, to be investigated in greater depth at a later time. As time went on, the number of these quarentined ahādīth grew, and in examining them as a whole, an interesting pattern emerged; namely, that they all had certain narrators in their chains of narration in common. Allamah Askari says that when he started to examine the biographies of the narrators in these creedaly suspect reports, it quickly became obvious that they were rootless, invented personalities that had no external or objective existence outside the books of hadith in which their supposedly “sound” reports appeared. One of these narrators was Sayf b. Omar, who was the ultimate narrator and source of the Abdullah b. Sabah meme. This is how Allamah Askari was able to prove the falsity of the Abdullah b. Sabah meme, and how he was able to publish another book that sent even more shock waves and caused a tsunami within informed Sunni scholarship. That book is his One Hundred and Fifty False Narrators of Hadith, in which over 150 of these fabrications are decisively exposed in books such as the “Sahīh”s of Bokhārī and Moslem. Another seminal book of sacred historiography in four volumes is Allamah Askari’s The Role of Āisha in History, in which the falsity of many of Āisha’s hadith reports is proven. This is what the famous Orientalist James Robson had to say about Allamah Askari’s book Abdullah b. Sabah in a letter he wrote to the Allamah thanking him for his efforts:

“This book is the strongest and most decisive study. It is a research that has been carried out with great care and with a broad vision, and it is endowed with a high quality of critical scholarship... The assertions that are made are quite plausible and convincing to me, and I am confident that all those who read this book with an open mind will appreciate and applaud the quality and power of the critical discourse that is brought to bear.”

By combining the application of critical historiography with a fair and unbiased, non-sectarian appraisal and analysis, Allamah Askari became one of those rare figures in history: someone who was truly effective in the struggle against the deviations, distortions, and superstitions that have accumulated as encrustations on the beliefs and practices of Islam.

Allamah Askari’s work is possessed of such historical depth, intellectual incisiveness, and clarity and simplicity of style that its effect is almost enchanting. His three volume work Muālim al-Madrisatayn, which is a Sunni/ Shi’a comparative analysis focused primarily on the subject of governance and leadership of the community, has caused hundreds of Sunni scholars and literati to convert to the Shi’a rite and creed. It is no doubt for this reason that the mere possession of this book carries a three-year mandatory sentence in Egypt. His extended essay, The Saqīfa, written in Persian, will undoubtedly remain the final word on this central subject for many generations to come.

There can be no doubt that the great effect that Allamah Askari’s work has had on the world of Sunni scholarship speaks to the fact that in every era, Islam stands in need of scholars like him to wipe away the cobwebs and dust of the false scholarship and creedal deviations of past generations, and to restore the resonance of the sublime truths of the teachings of the Prophet of Islam, as exemplified and explicated by the purified and inerrant Members of his House, unto all of whom be God’s peace and blessings.

Undoubtedly, the wide resonance of the Allameh’s works, and its incisive effects reflects the fact that in every age Islam stands in need of great scholars like Allamah Askari to undo the deviations that arise and counter the false accusations levelled against the priceless message of Islam, and to resonate the sublime truths of the school of the Ahl al-Bayt (unto whom be God’s peace) all over the world. It is only this pure spiritual nectar that is capable of quenching the tremendous spiritual thirst which the nations of the West have been suffering from for a very long time.

By Blake Archer Williams