The two qullas (qullatayn)

"The two qullas" is a measure of water named in the report of 'Abd Allah ibn 'Umar that Abu Dawud gives in the "chapter on what makes water impure": the Prophet ﷺ was asked about water and the animals and beasts of prey that come to it, and said, "When the water is two qullas it does not carry impurity." ² The report became the basis for those who set a limit to the large body of water that is not made impure merely by contact with impurity. ²

• Abu Usama relates it from al-Walid ibn Kathir, from Muhammad ibn Ja'far ibn al-Zubayr, from 'Abd Allah ibn 'Abd Allah ibn 'Umar, from his father (report 63); Abu Dawud notes that 'Uthman and al-Hasan ibn 'Ali said "from Muhammad ibn 'Abbad ibn Ja'far", "and that is correct". ³
• Muhammad ibn Ishaq relates it from Muhammad ibn Ja'far, from 'Ubayd Allah ibn 'Abd Allah ibn 'Umar, from his father, about water in open country (report 64). ⁴
• 'Asim ibn al-Mundhir relates it with the wording "it does not become impure" (report 65), and Abu Dawud notes that Hammad ibn Zayd transmitted it from 'Asim as Ibn 'Umar's own saying. ⁵

• "Does not carry impurity": it repels it, as one says of a man that he does not bear injustice. Al-Khattabi rejects the reading "is too weak to bear it and so becomes impure", since then there would be no difference between water that reaches two qullas and water that does not. ²
• The qulla: it can be a small drinking vessel such as a jug, or a large jar; the report means the large one, since the question concerned water standing in open country in cisterns and pools. ⁴
• The jars of Hajar: al-Khattabi relates through 'Abd al-Razzaq from Ibn Jurayj the addition "by the qullas of Hajar", and says these were of well-known make and fixed size, like standard measures, and the largest of jars; the dual shows that the largest is meant. ⁵
• The quantity: scholars estimated the two qullas at five waterskins; some put them at five hundred ratls. ⁶
• The chain: some faulted the chain because transmitters differ between 'Abd Allah and 'Ubayd Allah, and between Muhammad ibn Ja'far ibn al-Zubayr and Muhammad ibn 'Abbad ibn Ja'far; al-Khattabi answers that 'Abd Allah and 'Ubayd Allah both related it, that the faulty version is set aside and the correct one used, and that "it is witness enough to its soundness that the stars of the earth among the people of hadith declared it sound and held by it". ³
• What beasts leave behind: some used the report to argue that water left by beasts of prey is impure; al-Khattabi allows that the question may have been asked because beasts wade into water and urinate in it, dogs among them. ⁴

Al-Khattabi reconciles the report of the two qullas with that of the well of Buda'a, "water is pure, nothing makes it impure": the well's water reached two qullas, so each report agrees with the other, and the particular rules over the general and explains it without abrogating it. ⁷ On the report forbidding urinating in standing water he says that water becomes impure through urine only when it is less than two qullas, and that running water differs from standing water because what follows carries the impurity away. ⁸

In these pages al-Khattabi names neither those who rejected the two-qulla limit nor their arguments; the Maliki and Hanafi views on what counts as a large body of water, and modern studies of the size of the qulla, are still to be added from their own sources.