Study of Imāmiyya Delegatography in the First Islamic Centuries (with Emphasis on Two Case Studies: the Delegates Sent to the Prophet, the Arab Delegates Sent to the Prophet)

With the advent of Islam, many Arab tribes sent their delegations to Medina to know about the Prophet and the new religion called Islam. The major that deals with the details of these delegates is called delegatography. Like many other Muslims, the Shiites (Imāmiyya) paid attention to this subject matter as well. The authorities cite three important works as: Wufūd (delegates), written by Hussain b. Muhammad Azdī and Mundhir b. Muhammad Qābūsī. They were all from the Shiite scholars. The very work, however, is not available and no narration, related to the issue of delegations, is reported in the Shiite canonical Hadith collections. Only a few traditions being reported from Azdī and Qābūsī are available in the Sunnite sources. Usd al-Ghāba is the first [important] work that relates traditions on delegates from Azdī and Qābūsī. Nevertheless, it does not imply that he had access to the original book. Many who have mastered rijāl [science of men] are of the view that Azdī had been from the Mashāyikh of Qābūsī. This report and the like give rise to this probability that Qābūsī’s book might have been a copy of his master’s work. This paper sheds light on Imāmiyya delegatography in the light of the writer’s analysis of the available traditions.