the different modes of legal inference adopted by the scholars. Take the following example. It is rigorously authenticated that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said: “If a dog laps from the vessel of any one of you, let him pour it out and then wash it seven times.” Muslim, al-Nasaʾi and others report the tradition. Among its transmitters is Abu Hurayrah himself, yet it is also firmly established that he gave the legal opinion that the vessel need be washed only three times after a dog licks it. The majority of jurists did not adopt that opinion because it contravenes their own methodological principles. Hence Ibn al-Turkamani took al-Bayhaqi to task at this point, saying: “The school of al-Shafiʿi and the hadith scholars holds that when a narrator relates a hadith and later issues a contrary ruling, authority rests with what he transmitted, not with what he opined; his personal view is not a blemish upon the hadith. How, then, can Abu Hurayrah’s fatwa be taken as evidence for the weakness of the Prophetic report he himself related?” End quote. This is a powerful objection for which they have no answer, and it is equally telling against the Hanafis, who differ from the majority on this principle and say: “What counts is the narrator’s opinion, not his narration.” On that basis they would have to abandon the hadith—because Abu Hurayrah issued a contrary fatwa, as we have noted—and act upon his opinion instead. As for the reply offered by Abu al-Hasanat (p. 125), that Abu Hurayrah’s statement “Recite it silently to yourself” refers to the silent prayers, so that his opinion does not conflict with his narration, it is of no substance. For it is established in al-Bukhari’s tract (no. 8) and in Sunan al-Bayhaqi (2/166) that the questioner asked him about an audible prayer, with the wording: ʿAbd al-Rahman Abu al-ʿAla said, “I asked, O Abu Hurayrah, what should I do when I am behind the imam and he recites aloud?”—whereupon Abu Hurayrah gave the reply cited above. Nor can his ruling be explained by referring it to the brief pauses (saktat) of the imam, for such an interpretation would never have occurred to Abu Hurayrah, since nothing in