الجامع لما في المصنفات الجوامع من أسماء الصحابة الأعلام أولى الفضل والأحلام

الجامع لما في المصنفات والجوامع من أسماء الصحابة الأعلام أولى الفضل والأحلام – لأبي موسى عيسى بن سليمان الأندلسي الرندي (المتوفى سنة ٦٣٢) – ٦ مجلدات

This book is one of the foremost and most comprehensive books written on the topic of the Sahabah. The author, Abu Musa al-Randi, was an Andalusian muhaddith from the sixth and seventh centuries who, in this encyclopedic work, has gathered and critically assessed the writings of those before him in this field. He has not just copied  them; he analyses and evaluates their works, lending his own expertise,  making this book an invaluable authority for students of hadeeth sciences, seerah and history alike.

As is the traditional habit with authors in this field, the author mentions the names & biographies of all those individuals he discovered to have been mentioned, even if erroneously, amongst the Sahabah.  A very small amount of the manuscript remains undiscovered; the published amount contains 7,539 biographies. The fact that Ibn Hajar’s Al-Isabah – generally accepted as the most comprehensive book in this field – has not referenced this book is also noteworthy; it means that some details, including entire entries, can be found here that even Al-Isabah does not contain.

The muhaqqiq’s service of the book is also commendable. He has referenced the narrations and quotations as well as provided a very useful study of the book and its genre in the introduction, which exceeds a hundred pages.