Topic: Abu Hanifa

Nuʿmān ibn Thābit ibn Zuṭā ibn Marzubān (Arabic: نعمان بن ثابت بن زوطا بن مرزبان‎), known as Abū Ḥanīfah, (Arabic: أبو حنيفة‎) (699 — 765 CE / 80 — 148 AH) was the founder of the Sunni Hanafi school of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence).

Abu Hanifa was also one of the Tabi‘un, the generation after the Sahaba (companions), because he saw the Sahabi Anas ibn Malik, and transmitted hadiths from him and other Sahaba.

Abu Hanifa (699 — 767 CE / 80 — 148 AH) was born in Kufa, Iraq during the reign of the powerful Umayyad caliph Abd al-Malik (Abdul Malik bin Marwan). Acclaimed as Al-Imam al-A'zam, or Al-A'dham (the Great Imam), Nu’man bin Thabit bin Zuta bin Mah was better known by his kunya Abu Hanifa. It was not a true kunya, as he did not have a son called Hanifa, but an epithetical one meaning pure in monotheistic belief. His father, Thabit bin Zuta, a trader from Kabul, part of Khorasan in Persia (the capital of modern day Afghanistan), was 40 years old at the time of Abu Hanifa's birth.