born 699, Kūfah, Iraq
died 767, Baghdad
Muslim jurist and theologian.
The son of a merchant in Kūfah, he gained wealth in the silk trade and studied law under the noted jurist Ḥammād. After Ḥammād's death (738), Abū Ḥanīfah became his successor. He was the first to develop systematic legal doctrines from the accumulated Islamic legal tradition. Primarily a scholar, he neither accepted a judgeship nor took direct part in court politics; he supported the successors of Alī over the ruling Umayyad and Abbāsid dynasties. His doctrinal system became one of four canonical schools of Islamic law ( Sharia ) and is still widely followed in India, Pakistan, Turkey, Central Asia, and Arab countries.