مُقَدِّمَةُ ٱلْمُؤَلِّفِ

In the Name of Allah, The Compassionate, The Merciful

May Allah send His blessings upon our master Muḥammad and his family.

The Imam, the scholar, the Ḥāfiẓ, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wāḥid ibn Aḥmad al-Maqdisī reported to us, [the text] being recited to him while I was listening. He said: Abū Rawḥ ʿAbd al-Munʿim ibn Muḥammad ibn Abī ʾl-Faḍl al-Harawī informed us in Herat: [A separate chain of transmission.] Shaykh Abū ʾl-Barakāt al-Ḥasan ibn Muḥammad ibn Hibat Allāh al-Shāfiʿī informed us: My uncle, Ḥāfiẓ Abū ʾl-Qāsim ʿAlī ibn al-Ḥasan al-Dimashqī informed us: They said: Abū ʾl-Qāsim Zāhir ibn Ṭāhir ibn Muḥammad al-Shaḥḥāmī al-Mustamlī informed us: The teacher, Abū ʾl-Qāsim ʿAbd al-Karīm ibn Hawāzin al-Qushayrī informed us:

Praise belongs to Allah, the Supporter of His religion, the Clarifier of the Truth through His argument and proofs, He who sent His Messenger with guidance and enjoined obedience to him upon all of creation. May Allah’s blessings be upon him and upon his family, his progeny, his companions, and his cohort. To proceed:

Indeed, [when] Allah, the Glorified, made His Prophet Muhammad – may Allah’s blessings be upon him – the seal of His Prophets, He protected His community through His rightly-guided successors. He made them His heirs in protecting the sanctum of the religion and defending its domain with clear elucidation.

Indeed, the Messenger of Allah – may Allah bless him and grant him peace – said, as reported to us by al-Ḥākim Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥāfiẓ – may Allah have mercy on him – who said: Abū ʾl-Qāsim Yūsuf ibn Yaʿqūb al-Sūsī narrated to me: Abū ʾl-Ḥasan Muḥammad ibn Isḥāق ibn Ibrāhīm al-Ḥanẓalī narrated to us: Abū ʿUmayr al-Naḥḥās narrated to us: Ḍumra narrated to us, on the authority of Ibn Shawdhab, on the authority of Saʿīd ibn Abī ʿArūba, on the authority of Qatāda, on the authority of Abū Naḍra, on the authority of Abū Saʿīd al-Khudrī who said: “The Messenger of Allah – may Allah bless him and grant him peace – addressed us and did not omit a thing before the Hour except that he informed us of it. Whoever retained it, retained it, and whoever forgot it, forgot it. Then he said, ‘May Allah gladden a servant who has heard my sayings and understood them. For many a carrier of knowledge (fiqh) is not a jurist (faqīh), and it may be that a carrier of knowledge [transmits it] to one who is more astute than him.’”

He charged them with preserving what he said and transmitting it to others. He – may Allah bless him and grant him peace – also said as reported to us by al-Ḥākim Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥāfiẓ [who said]: Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥasan ibn Muḥammad al-Ṣaghānī informed us in Merv: Abū Rajāʾ ibn Ḥamdawayh narrated to us: al-ʿAlāʾ ibn Muslama narrated to us: Ismāʿīl ibn Yaḥyā al-Taymī narrated to us on the authority of Sufyān al-Thawrī, on the authority of Layth, on the authority of Ṭāwūs, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās who said: The Messenger of Allah – may Allah bless him and his family and grant them peace – said: “Whoever conveys a single Hadith to my nation, by which he establishes a Sunnah and repels an innovation, will have the Garden.”

Al-Ḥākim Abū ʿAbd Allāh – may Allah have mercy on him – informed us: Abū Muḥammad ʿAbd Allāh ibn Isḥāq al-Baghawī informed us in Baghdad: Aḥmad ibn al-Haytham al-Sāmirī narrated to us: Saʿīd ibn Dāwūd al-Zanbarī narrated to us: Mālik ibn Anas narrated to us, he said: Kathīr ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Muzanī wrote to me, narrating on the authority of his father, on the authority of his grandfather, on the authority of Bilāl ibn al-Ḥārith that he said: I heard the Messenger of Allah – may Allah bless him and grant him peace – say: “Whoever revives something of my Sunnah which had died out after me shall have the reward of whoever acts according to it, without diminishing their rewards in the least. Whoever innovates something that Allah and His Messenger are not pleased with shall have the sin of whoever acts according to it from among the people, without diminishing the sins of the people in the slightest.”

ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Karīzī al-ʿAdl – may Allah have mercy on him – informed us: Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Quraysh narrated to us: Al-Ḥasan ibn Sufyān narrated to us: Aḥmad ibn Zanjawayh narrated to us: Al-Ḥajjāj ibn Naṣīr narrated to us: Ḥafṣ ibn Jumayʿ narrated to us on the authority of Abān, from Anas who said: The Messenger of Allah – may Allah bless him and grant him peace – said: “Whoever preserves for my community forty hadiths regarding indispensable matters, Allah shall record him as a learned jurist.”

ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Karīzī informed us: Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Quraysh informed us: Al-Ḥusayn ibn Sufyān narrated to us: ʿAlī ibn Ḥajar narrated to us: Isḥāq ibn Najīḥ narrated to us on the authority of Ibn Jurayj, on the authority of ʿAṭāʾ ibn Abī Rabāḥ, on the authority Ibn ʿAbbās who said: The Messenger of Allah – may Allah bless him and his family and grant them peace – said: “Whoever preserves forty hadiths from the Sunnah for my community, I shall be an intercessor for him on the Day of Judgement.”

In light of these reports, we have set down – in this brief work – forty chapters on rectifying the servant’s conduct in matters of spiritual discipline and cultivation of good character. In each chapter we have related a report with its chain of transmission. In some chapters more than one report may be mentioned. We ask Allah Most High to guide those who hear them to implement them, to protect us from error and frivolity in [our] speech and action, and to bring [our lives] to a close with goodness, for verily He is the Guardian and the Patron.