Qalāʾid al-ʿIqyān fī Ikhtiṣār ʿAqīdat Ibn Ḥamdān

This course is a structured study of Qalāʾid al-ʿIqyān, the celebrated abridgement of Hanbalī creed authored by the imām, al-Balbānī, a work that stands firmly within the inherited theological tradition of the madhhab. The text itself is not an isolated composition, but a careful condensation of Nihāyat al-Mubtadiʾīn fī Uṣūl al-Dīn by Ibn Ḥamdān, one of the most authoritative creeds in the Hanbalī school. Ibn Ḥamdān’s original work represents a disciplined gathering of the transmitted positions of the early Hanbalī imāms, stretching from the direct companions of Imām Aḥmad to later jurists such as Ibn Baṭṭah, al-Qāḍī Abū Yaʿlā, Ibn ʿAqīl, and Ibn Qudāmah. It was received with widespread acceptance across the madhhab, cited and relied upon by leading authorities in every generation. Al-Balbānī’s contribution, then, is not one of innovation, but of refinement. Recognizing the pedagogical need of his time, he distilled this expansive creed into a form that…