Is Hisham b. Urwa a weak narrator?

Who was Hisham b. Urwa? Is there any information about his life, and was he a reliable narrator of hadith?

Dear Brother / Sister,

Abul-Mundhir (Abu Abdillah) Hisham b. Urwa b. az-Zubayr ibn Awwam al-Qurashi (d. 146/763) was a hadith scholar from Tabi’un. He was not a weak narrator; he was a trustworthy one.

He was born in Madinah in Muharram 61 (October 680). He is also known by the nisbas (surnames) Asadi and Zubayri. He met the Companions Abdullah ibn Umar, Sahl b. Sa’d, Jabir ibn Abdullah, and Anas b. Malik. When he was only ten years old, he was taken to Ibn Umar, who stroked his hair and prayed for him.

Hisham narrated hadiths from his father, his uncle Abdullah b. Zubayr, Abu Salama b. Abdurrahman b. Awf, Ibnul-Munkadir, Amr b. Shu’ayb, Ibn Shihab az-Zuhri, Abuz-Zinad, and his wife Fatima bint Mundhir. Fatima, who was thirteen years older than him and his uncle’s daughter, narrated hadiths from Asma bint Abu Bakr as-Siddiq, Umm Salama (the wife of the Prophet), and Amra bint Abdurrahman.

Prominent hadith scholars such as Ayyub as-Sahtiyani, Ma’mar ibn Rashid, Ibn Jurayj, Shu’ba b. Hajjaj, Sufyan ath-Thawri, Layth b. Sa’d, Malik b. Anas, Abdullah b. Mubarak, Sufyan b. Uyayna, and Yahya b. Sa’id al-Qattan narrated hadiths from Hisham ibn Urwa.

Hisham visited Kufa three times during the caliphate of Mansur (754-775), who held him in high regard, probably to meet with him. This gave Kufa’s students of hadith the opportunity to learn from him. It is recorded that during one visit, Hisham asked the caliph for help to pay off his debts, which had reached 100,000 dirhams. The caliph asked how a scholar like him could have accumulated such a large debt. When Hisham explained that he had trusted in Allah (or, according to one narration, in Allah and the Leader of the Believers), and had married off his children and bought them each a house, Mansur not only paid off his debt but also bestowed upon him an additional 10,000 dirhams.

Scholars such as Ibn Sa’d, Yahya b. Ma’in, and Abu Hatim ar-Razi stated that Hisham was trustworthy in terms of both justice and memory, and also noted that he narrated a large number of hadiths. Ali b. Madini said that his hadiths numbered around 400 while Dhahabi stated that it exceeded 1000.

Yaqub b. Shayba argued that Hisham was a trustworthy narrator, and that everyone accepted the hadiths he narrated before going to Iraq, but after going to Iraq, he became more lenient in his narrations and began to transmit hadiths that were attributed to his father but which he had not personally heard from him as if he had heard them directly.

It is understood that Hisham’s errors were due to the fact that he did not take the books containing his narrations to Baghdad; therefore, his hadiths narrated by the people of Madinah are considered more acceptable. (Ibn Rajab, II, 604-605)

Only Ibn al-Qattan al-Maghribi puts forward the claim that Hisham mixed up narrations in his later years; scholars such as Dhahabi and Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani, however, state that this claim is untrue and that even if his memory had weakened somewhat, he did not confuse narrations.

The hadiths narrated by Hisham are included in Kutub as-Sitta, and his most distinguished narrations are found in the work entitled al-Awali min Hadithi Hisham b. Urwa (Darul-Kutubiz-Zahiriyya, Majmua, no. 61).

Hisham b. Urwa went to Baghdad to see Caliph Mansur in 146 (763) and died there. His death date is recorded as 145 and also as 147. His janazah prayer was led by Mansur and he was buried in the Hayzuran Cemetery.

References:
Ibn Sa’d, aṭ-Ṭabaqat, VII, 321; a.a.: al-Mutammim, p. 229.
Zubayri, Nasabu Quraysh, p. 248.
Bukhari, at-Tarikhul-Kabir, VIII, 193-194.
the same writer, at-Tarikhuṣ-Saghir, II, 83.
Khatib, Tarikḫu Baghdad, XIV, 37-42.
Ibn Khallikan, Wafayat, VI, 80-82.
Dhahabi, A’lamun-Nubala, III, 381; VI, 34-47.
the same writer, Tadhkiratul-Huffaẓ, I, 144-145.
the same writer, Tarikhul-Islam: year 141-160, pp. 320-323.
the same writer, Mizanul-I’tidal, IV, 301-302.
Ibn Rajab, Sharḥu Ilalit-Tirmidhi (published by. Nuraddin Itr), Damascus 1398/1978, II, 604-605.
Ibn Hajar, Tahdhibut-Tahdhib, XI, 48-51.
Ibnul-Imad, Shadharat, I, 218-219.
See TDV İslam Ansiklopedisi, Hisham b. Urwa item.

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