Ahmad bin Hanbal — on the laity deriving rulings and giving fatwa — from Ibn Hamdān’s manual on Fatwā

‘It was said by Abdullah [the son of Ahmad] “I asked my father about a man who has in his possession Books authored within which there were the sayings of The Messenger of Allah sallallahu alaihi wal-Sallam; the different views of the Sahāba (companions); the Tābi’īn (the following generation); [but] the man didn’t have any insight into Hadīth — the weak and the abandoned (matrūk), nor in terms of strong chains of transmission (isnād) from weak — was it allowed for him to act according to what he wishes and choose what he likes from it, and give religious edicts (fatwā) accordingly, and act upon it?”

He [Ahmad bin Hanbal] said: “he doesn’t act until he asks what should be taken from it, so that he may act on what is sound in this affair, and he asks this of the people of knowledge (ahl al-ilm)”.’

Taken from ‘Sifat ul-Muftī wal-Mustaftī’ of Najm ul-Dīn Ahmad Ibn Hamdān al-Harrānī al-Hanbālī, the scholar of hadīth and Qādī (Judge), and jurist, author on his manual on “The Attributes of the Muftī (jurisconsult) and seeker of religious edicts”, his manual on who and how religious edicts and judgements should be given, and their qualifications and conditions, and the rules and parameters of following qualified competent religious scholarship. He died in 1295CE/695H.

The above was narrated in the works of Masā’il Imām Ahmad from Abdullah and mentioned by Qādī Abū Ya’lā in his work on Usūl ul-Fiqh “al-Udda”; the Khatīb al-Baghdādī in his work “al-Faqīh wal-Mutafaqqih”; Ibn Taymīyya in his work on Usūl, “al-Musawadda āl-Tamīyya”; and Ibn Qayyim in his “I’lām ul-Muwaqiyyīn”.