After the passing of the Prophet Muḥammad and the Companions who had taken their practices from him, the following generations were faced with a challenge: different Companions practised things differently, and each one attributed their practice to the sunna of the Prophet himself. In that early period before the emergence of the schools of Sunni jurisprudence as we know them, trivial differences in practice did not seem to arouse much discussion or debate. This indicates that the earlier generations may have been more accepting of differences in minutiae of practice, and that they might have thought of such differences as indicating that both transmitted practices were permissible. This makes sense because the older generations among the Followers travelled and studied with Companions in different cities and observed them doing things differently from one another. In Mecca there was Ibn ʿAbbās and his circle of students, in Kufa there was Ibn Masʿūd, and in Medina there were many different authorities such as ʿĀʾisha, Zayd ibn Thābit and Ibn ʿUmar whose practice and understanding differed from one another. Ibn Masʿūd’s students in Kufa and Ibn ʿAbbās’s students in Mecca had studied closely with Medinan Companions, too, and the Medinan Followers in turn learned from the Companions of other cities who returned to visit Medina.

Although the exchange between different centres of learning continued over the next generations, it was natural for the people of every city to be in awe of the legacy left by the giants who had lived among them. Each Companion had left a group of students who had studied with him or her diligently and heard their knowledge and arguments more closely than they heard what came from others. Those followers in turn raised after them a generation who knew them more closely than anyone else. They learned stories of their piety, the breadth of their knowledge, their intelligence, as well as from whom they took their knowledge, and came to trust and admire them. Pride in one’s teachers grew, accompanied by trust in their knowledge, scholarly lineage and methodology above all others. They learned stories of their piety, the breadth of their knowledge, their intelligence, as well as from whom they took their knowledge, and came to trust and admire them. Pride in one’s teachers grew, accompanied by trust in their knowledge, scholarly lineage and methodology above all others.