[Slonopotam845]

"You will be hard pressed to find ´ulama of the Ahl al-Bayt before the 4th century who followed any of the Four Madhhabs, nor will you find them blindly following the opinion of Imam Zayd or others."

I am not sure that before the 4th century the "following" of the madhhabs was in the manner we understand it today.

No it wasn't, but ´ulama tended to side with one of the major madhaheb and its methodology.

[xtrslots]

The conclusion of Fiqh al-Aal was that, although Sunnis didn't neglect the fiqhi positions of the Aal 'alayhim ridhwan Allah, the 12er sources agree with the sunni sources in most cases, hence we should respect the 12er religion as a valid way of worship and fiqhi madh-hab. I totally disagree.

He doesn't actually examine the asaanid, and restricts himself to fiqhi opinions mentioned by the 12er scholars. To be fair, he says that this does not necessarily hold true for beliefs, and that he is releasing another book "'Aqaa'id al-Aal" soon regarding that.

The bottom line is that mere conformity of some narrations between the sunni and shi'ah sources does not mean that they're science of hadith was up-to-scratch. Rather, their simillarity with the shafi'i madh-hab, for example, was due to political ties. The problems with their ruwwat becomes even more apparant when dealing with their beliefs which clearly do not reflect the views of the Aal 'alayhim ridhwan Allah (as the author himself alludes to).

The shi'ah are parading the book on their forums saying "This Sunni 'Alim has given victory to the madh-hab of Ahl al-Bayt (12erism)" etc

[Slonopotam845]

As-salamu ´alaykum,

It is true that the Twelver sources find agreement within the Four Madhaheb for most Fiqh issues, but it becomes problematic when they do not have a preserved Usul by the Mujtahid Imams, and the one their later scholars developed is flawed, and the practitioners (their ´ulama) are unreliable to put it mildly. Obviously, as you know, their Ulum al-Hadith is a joke... and to add to that, even Khamenei admits that their oldest and most important books of ´Ilm al-Rijal have been tampered with, and they are full of contradictions... We find the same supposed author strengthening a narrator in one place, and weakening him in another, all in the same book. Marvelous! What a foundation to stand on. Then again, ´ilm al-rijal doesn't carry that much weight with them anyway.

wassalam