Early Islamic Law in Hadith Texts from Basra: Kitab Al-Salat (The Book of Prayer) and Kitab Al-Nikah (The Book of Marriage)

These two authentic texts, which include Islamic law topics and ḥadith of the Prophet, date from the last quarter of the 7th/1st century. As typical examples of the early Islamic literary style employed in writings about the Islamic jurisprudence and the way in which the isnads and matns (transmitters and content- main bodies of the ḥadith) are recorded, they offer present-day researchers in those fields an illustration of the way in which the ḥadith were narrated during that period. Noteworthy, van Ess's hypothesis about these texts holds plausible accuracy and helping to traces Ibadi ancestor in Basra down to early two decades of 3rd/9th century. It shows a vertically progress of the early Islamic law schools in Iraq within the regional perspective.