Salim al-Hilali Biography

Shaykh Abu Usama Salim ibn 'Eid al-Hilali is a Jordanian Salafi scholar and one of the senior surviving students of the late hadith master Shaykh Muhammad Nasir al-Din al-Albani, with whom he studied for twenty-five years. Born on 6 October 1957 / 1377 AH in al-Khalil (Hebron) in Palestine, his family — tracing its lineage to the Arabian tribe of Banu Hilal of Najd — was displaced to Jordan in the aftermath of the 1967 war. He completed his secondary education in Jordan, his bachelor's degree in Arabic at Beirut University, and his master's degree in Hadith Studies in Pakistan with a thesis on hadiths contradicted by the Qur'an and reasoning.

Al-Hilali first met al-Albani in 1394 AH / 1974 CE at the age of seventeen, attending nightlong scholarly debates in Jordan, and subsequently moved to Damascus to study formally under his teacher in 1398 AH / 1978 CE. He also obtained ijazas (chains of authorization) from senior hadith scholars in India, Pakistan, and the Hijaz, including Badi' al-Din al-Sindhi (the Muhaddith of Sindh), 'Ata Allah Hanif (the Muhaddith of Punjab), and Hammad al-Ansari (the Muhaddith of Madinah). He has authored more than one hundred books, including Bahjat al-Nadhirin Sharh Riyad al-Salihin (a three-volume commentary), Mawsu'at al-Manahi al-Shar'iyya fi Sahih al-Sunna al-Nabawiyya (a four-volume encyclopedia of prohibitions in authentic Sunna), Limadha Ikhtartu al-Manhaj al-Salafi, and many shorter works on creed, fiqh, and ethics.

Al-Hilali co-founded the Imam al-Albani Centre for Academic Researches and Methodological Studies in Jordan after his teacher's death and is a founding editor of the Salafi journal al-Asalah. He has been a frequent speaker at Salafi conferences in the United Kingdom, North America, Indonesia, and across the Arab world, and his books and translated works continue to circulate among English-speaking Salafi readers worldwide.