Urs of Hazrat Imam Azam Abu Haneefa (R.H.)

Hazrat Imam Abu Hanifa al-Nu'man ibn Thabit R.H (80–150 AH / 699–767 CE) is the founder of the Hanafi school of Islamic jurisprudence — the largest and most widely followed school of Fiqh in the Muslim world, followed by the majority of Muslims in Turkey, Central Asia, South Asia, the Balkans, and parts of the Arab world. Born in Kufa, Iraq, into a family of Persian origin engaged in the silk trade, he initially pursued commerce before dedicating his life entirely to Islamic scholarship. He was a student of Hazrat Imam Ja'far al-Sadiq R.H and the great Tabi'i scholar Hammad ibn Abi Sulayman R.H, under whom he studied for eighteen years.

He also met several companions of the Prophet ﷺ, making him a Tabi'i according to some scholars. He was known as "al-Imam al-Azam" (the Greatest Imam) for his unparalleled mastery of Islamic jurisprudence and his systematic methodology of deriving legal rulings from the Quran, Sunnah, Ijma (consensus), and Qiyas (analogical reasoning). He pioneered the use of Qiyas (analogical reasoning) and Istihsan (juristic preference) as tools of Islamic legal reasoning, establishing a comprehensive methodology that could address new situations not explicitly covered in the primary sources.

He was the first scholar to organize Fiqh into systematic chapters — from Tahara (purification) to inheritance — a structure that all subsequent Fiqh works followed. His teaching circle in Kufa functioned like an Islamic legal academy, where he would present hypothetical legal scenarios to his students and arrive at rulings through collective deliberation — a method unprecedented in his time. Among his most famous students were Imam Abu Yusuf R.H (who became the Chief Justice of the Abbasid Empire) and Imam Muhammad al-Shaybani R.H (whose works form the foundation of Hanafi jurisprudence as practiced today).

He was imprisoned and reportedly poisoned for refusing to serve as the Chief Judge under the Abbasid Caliph al-Mansur, choosing to suffer imprisonment and death rather than compromise his scholarly independence and principles. The Prophet ﷺ is reported to have said: "If knowledge were suspended at the highest point in the sky, a man from Persia would attain it" — which scholars have interpreted as referring to Imam Abu Hanifa R.H. He passed away in Baghdad in 150 AH while in prison, and his funeral was attended by approximately 50,000 people.

His tomb in the Azamiyya district of Baghdad remains a major pilgrimage site visited by millions of Muslims from across the world.