al-Sarakhsi

Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Sarakhsi (430–483 AH / 1037–1096 CE), titled Shams al-A'immah (Sun of the Imams), was the foremost Hanafi jurist of the 5th century AH and one of the greatest legal scholars in Islamic history. His magnum opus, al-Mabsut (The Extensive Work), is a thirty-volume encyclopedic commentary on al-Kafi of al-Hakim al-Shahid that covers every area of Islamic law in extraordinary depth. A celebrated story holds that he dictated much of al-Mabsut from memory to his students while imprisoned in a well by the Sultan. He also wrote Usul al-Sarakhsi, one of the foundational works of Hanafi legal theory. His analysis is characterized by rigorous logical reasoning grounded in the classical Hanafi tradition.