Abu Ishaq al-Isfarayini

Students Abu Ishaq specialized in Shafi'i law, legal theory, hadith and theology and would pass his extensive knowledge onto many of his students. His most famous students became world renowned of their time:

Abu al-Tayyib al-Tabari Al-Mawardi Al-Lalaka'i Al-Bayhaqi Al-Qushayri Abu Mansur al-Baghdadi Abu Ishaq al-Shirazi Al-Khatib al-Baghdadi

Death Al-Isfara'ini died in the Islamic month of Muharram in 418 AH (February 1027 CE), and was buried in Isfarayin. His tomb continued to attract pious visitors in the 6th/12th century.

Influence Almost none of Abu Ishaq's books have survived and Al-Nawawi states the reason is because his books were too vast to be contained in tomes. Abu Ishaq wrote extensively on legal theory, Shafi'i substantive law, hadith and theology, but scholars believe he devoted a great deal of his attention in debating deviant sects such as attacking the Mu'tazila beliefs. He wrote down one work entitled al-mukhtasan fi al-radd ala ahl a-i'lizal wa al-qadar (Abbreviated refutation of the Mu'tazila and those Believers in Free Will) and another named al-Jami' al-haly fi usul al-din wa al-radd ala al-mulhidin (The ornamented Concordance of the Principles of Dogma and a refutation of the Nonbelievers). In addition, Abu Ishaq engaged in multiple public debates with the Mu'tazila including Al-Qadi Abd al-Jabbar. Abu Ishaq also attacked the beliefs of the Karramiyya sect who held anthropomorphic views of God.

However, despite none of Abu Ishaq's books being preserved, his scholarly opinions were extremely valued and pop up frequently in later Shafi'i works on legal theory and major scholars like Abu Ishaq al-Shirazi and Ibn al-Salah recognized the significance of Abu Ishaq's role in formulating the Shafi'i/Ash'ari position on issues like abrogation and consensus. Later Shafi'i legal theorists such as Imam al-Haramayn al-Juwayni and Al-Ghazali have preserved Abu Ishaq's position on the issue of the epistemological yield of hadiths and the effect of consensus.