Salam,
Hey, how's it going? I'm doing pretty good, alhamdulillah. So, today I wanted to chat a bit about sanad ilmu—you cool with that?
I’ve got to be honest, I never really thought much about sanad before. It just wasn’t on my radar. But then we knew Sayyid, and everything changed. I started climbing into his world, reading up on things just to try and understand his world.
Back to the topic, sanad ilm.
Turns out, back in the day, in the classical Islamic education system, you didn’t have a set time for how long you studied. It wasn’t like, "Oh, four years and you're done." It was more about how many subjects you mastered and books you finished. Once you were done, your teacher would give you a sanad—kind of like a certificate, but way more meaningful. It was proof that the knowledge had been passed down to you from your teacher, who got it from their teacher, and so on. It’s like a chain that connects students to their teachers, and if you were studying hadith, that chain would trace all the way back to the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ.
Sanad is like this beautiful, unbroken link between the narrators of a hadith, stretching all the way from the last narrator back to the first Companions who heard it directly from the Prophet ﷺ. And what’s really special is that this isn’t something you find in other religious traditions—only in ours. Scholars have always placed a huge emphasis on it because it’s what keeps our knowledge pure and authentic.
Take Sayyid, for example. He received an ijazah—a sort of scholarly license—from Waly Allah, Sidi Muhammad Moulay El Hadj Al Alawi Al Hasani. This old man isn’t just any scholar; he’s a kabir, a respected Sharif and wali from Taouat, a place in North Africa that’s bursting with scholars and saints, much like Tarim. The ijazah Sayyid received was Sidi Moulay Al Hadj’s way of recognizing Sayyid’s knowledge and giving him the green light to teach others.
What Sidi Moulay Al Hadj wrote for Sayyid is poetry in motion:
In the name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate.
Alhamdulillah for all the blessings Allah has showered upon us, shielding and protecting us. May His mercy be upon us, and His light shine upon us, guiding us, and upon our Prophet Muhammad, blessings and peace be upon him and his family, and all those who follow him.
When our beloved and respected friend, Muhammad al-Idrisi al-Maghribi al-Fassi, sought permission to establish gatherings of knowledge and remembrance in his country, out of love and constant prayers, and witnessing the qualifications granted to him by Allah, the Most Merciful, I granted him this privilege.
May Allah guide him on the right path, grant him understanding of the Quran and the traditions of the Prophet ﷺ, and fill his heart with wisdom. May his gatherings be beneficial, and may Allah elevate their status. He makes hearts inclined towards him, yearning to hear his words, and by hearing them, even in the darkest of nights, Allah shows His truth. Through this, he attains this position for as long as Allah allows.
Amazing, right? And the best part? This all happened when Sayyid was still pretty young.
Check this out:
And alhamdulillah, with this blessing, Sayyid started opening up and reviving classes in the zawiyahs of Fez. Fast forward to now, and students from Kazakhstan have traveled all the way to Fez just to get an ijazah in hadith, permission to hold knowledge gatherings, and listen to words of wisdom from Sayyid.
The link:
As Abdullah bin Mubarak said,
"Sanad is part of the religion; without it, anyone could say whatever they wished."
Al-Hakim Abu Abdullah Al-Nisaburi also highlighted in Ma'rifat 'Ulum al-Hadith,
"Sanad is part of the religion. Without it, the light of Islam would diminish, and innovators could distort it. Knowledge without sanad is disconnected." Ibn Mubarak also compared it to "trying to climb a roof without a ladder."
Just like Sayyid Maula Mohamed Amine Ouradj El Hassani El Idrissi received ijazah from Waly Allah, Sidi Muhammad Moulay El Hadj Al Alawi Al Hasani, Sayyid also gave ijazah to these students from Kazakhstan. And of course, this ijazah traces back all the way to the Prophet ﷺ.
Check it out:
Because of this ijazah, the first hadith class in Kazakhstan was born. See how that chain of sanad connects? Ma sha Allah. And look at this—students from all over the world are coming to Fez to meet Sayyid, to take blessings from him, listen to his words, sit in his gatherings, hear hadith directly from him, and receive ijazah.
Link:
It’s amazing how these scholars are upholding the traditions of our religion, just like Imam Ibn al-Mubarak said:
"Sanad is part of the religion. Without it, anyone could say whatever they wished."
This mirrors the way the Salaf passed down knowledge, directly linking it back to the Prophet ﷺ. There’s that old saying,
“If you want to succeed, follow the path of those who’ve already made it.”
And that’s exactly what sanad does—it ensures that the knowledge and understanding we receive is pure, authentic, and directly connected to our noble ancestors.
In the end, sanad isn’t just about passing down information. It’s about transmitting a deep understanding of that knowledge, from one generation to the next. It’s what keeps the truth alive and protected, ensuring that our religious disciplines remain untarnished.
Last but not least, on the day of Ashura this Muharram, Sheikh Mohammed Ziad bin Omar Al-Takla, a well-known scholar from Damascus, now based in the UK, granted authorization and sanad in Hadith knowledge and various books like Al-Muthani, Majlis Asyura, Awail Al-Sab’ah, and Syamail, as well as Ibn Bahsih's poem praising Ummul Mukminin Aisha R.A. to Sayyid.
Alhamdulillah.
All the best to you dear Sayyid!
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