from which rulings are derived. And a passion for establishing and detailing jurisprudential branches, referring back to the sayings of the Imams and those who transmitted from them. This tendency appeared early in Al-Andalus from the third century, where a prominent jurist, Abu al-Qasim Asbagh bin Khalil, issued fatwas to people for fifty years, even though he had no knowledge of Hadith or its methods. Rather, he distanced himself from it and criticized its narrators. He was bigoted to the opinion of the followers of Malik, especially Ibn al-Qasim. It was even reported that he said: "I would rather have a pig's head in my coffin than a musnad of Ibn Abi Shaybah in it." During the Almoravid era, this tendency intensified due to the "branch-oriented" spirit upon which the state was founded, instilled by the jurist Abdullah bin Yasin. The rulers then nurtured and developed it by encouraging jurists, involving them in power, and endorsing their methodology of establishing branches upon branches without referring to the roots. This is precisely what Abd al-Wahid al-Marrakushi depicted clearly when speaking about the era of Ali bin Yusuf bin Tashfin, saying: "No one was brought close to the Commander of the Faithful and favored by him except those who knew the science of branches, meaning the branches of the Maliki school. Thus, the books of the school flourished in that era, and their contents were acted upon, and anything else was discarded. This became so prevalent that the study of the Book of God and the Sunnah of the Messenger of God was forgotten. None of the prominent scholars of that time paid them due attention." This jurisprudential, branch-oriented tendency led to the dominance of rigidity in jurisprudence and the decline of the spirit of ijtihad, which seeks to derive living jurisprudential solutions from the teachings of the Quran and Sunnah for the evolving events of changing social life. Thus, jurisprudence became... A Maliki Andalusian jurist from Cordoba, who traveled to the East and heard from Asbagh bin al-Faraj and from Sahnun in Ifriqiya. He was known for his opinion and left a mark, and fatwas revolved around him in Al-Andalus for fifty years. See his biography in: Ibn al-Faradi, Tarikh 'Ulama' al-Andalus, Vol. 1, pp. 301-302, and Ibn Farhun, al-Dibaj al-Mudhahhab, p. 70. Perhaps Asbagh was motivated in this statement by considerations he saw in the Musnad. See: Ibn al-Faradi, Tarikh 'Ulama' al-Andalus, pp. 70-71. However, the statement still indicates the importance of the origin of Hadith to him. Al-Marrakushi, al-Mu'jib, p. 236.