Abu Aruba al-Harrani

Abu Aruba al-Harrani, al-Husayn b. Abi Ma'shar Muhammad b. Mawdud al-Sulami, was a hadith scholar of Harran, born about 222/837. The encyclopaedia's entry, signed by F. Rosenthal, says that almost nothing is known of his life beyond the names of his teachers and pupils, some of them very famous. ¹

He may have been a judge or mufti of Harran. Ibn 'Asakir, quoted by al-Dhahabi, says he was a partisan of the Umayyads. According to the Fihrist he wrote one work, a collection of traditions transmitted on the authority of his teachers, which seems to be the same as the Tabaqat that al-Dhahabi cites under his name. An excerpt from the Tabaqat on the men around Muhammad survives in Damascus. He is also credited with a history of Harran, or a collection of biographies of scholars of Harran, and with a Kitab al-Awa'il. ²