The Miḥna of Ibn ʿAqīl (d. 513/1119) and the Ibn al-Qushayrī (d. 514/1120)

The miḥna of Ibn ʿAqīl (d. 513/1119) and the fitnat Ibn al-Qushayrī (d. 514/1120)—two ma­jor events that took place in eleventh-century Baghdad—mark the victory of traditionalist Islam over rationalist Islam, and as such are considered as part of ‘the Sunni Revival’. The chapter unfolds the political, social, and doctrinal factors that led to these events, while focusing on the role of the leader of the Baghdadian Ḥanbalīs, the sharīf Abū Jaʿfar al-Hāshimī (d. 470/1077–8) in orchestrating the events. The first section of the chapter
summarizes Ibn ʿAqīl’s miḥna based on George Makdisi’s scholarly work, and also pro­vides a limited-scale reading in the primary sources. The second section offers new in­ sights on the fitnat Ibn al-Qushayrī based on a close reading of the primary sources, and a survey of recently published researches.