ABSTRACT
It is often said that Islam, and thus also Islamic law, is based on the twofold source of Qurʿan and sunna and this view we find expressed in the ḥadīth that Mālik records that the Prophet said, ‘I have left among you two things, and as long as you hold fast to them you will not go astray: the Book of Allah and the sunna of His Prophet.’ 1 However, although this view is accepted as an accurate representation of the ‘classical’ picture of Islam, considerable doubt has been expressed by many Western scholars as to its validity in the pre-‘classical’ or ‘ancient’ period. It is with the position of the Qurʾan and the sunna in the ‘ancient’ schools, and particularly that of Madina as represented by Mālik in his Muwaṭṭaʾ that this chapter deals.
