Hafs ^[1] (706–796 AD; 90–180 Anno Hegirae),^[2][3] according to Islamic tradition, was one of the primary transmitters of one of the seven canonical methods of Qur'an recitation (qira'at). His method via his teacher Aasim ibn Abi al-Najud has become the most popular method across the majority of the Muslim world.^[4]

In addition to being the student of Aasim, Hafs was also his son-in-law.^[5] Having been born in Baghdad, Hafs eventually moved to Mecca where he popularized his father-in-law's recitation method.^[5]

Eventually, Hafs' recitation of Aasim's method was made the official method of Egypt,^[6] having been formally adopted as the standard Egyptian printing of the Qur'an under the auspices of Fuad I of Egypt in 1923.^[5] The majority of copies of the Quran today follow the reading of Hafs. In North and West Africa there is a bigger tendency to follow the reading of Warsh.^[7]

Of all the canonical recitation traditions, only the Kufan tradition of Hafs included the bismillah as a separate verse in Chapter (surah) 1.^[8]

In the 10thC, in his Kitāb al-sabʿa fī l-qirāʾāt, Ibn Mujahid mentioned the seven readings of the Quran which originally were all recited by the Prophet of Islam to his followers.^[9] Three of their readers hailed from Kufa, a centre of early Islamic learning.^[10] The three Kufan readers were Al-Kisa'i, the Kufan; Hamzah az-Zaiyyat; and Aasim ibn Abi al-Najud.

It is, alongside the Hafs 'an 'Asim tradition which represents the recitational tradition of Kufa, one of the two major oral transmission of the Quran in the Muslim World.^[11] The influential standard Quran of Cairo that was published in 1924 is based on Hafs 'an ʻAsim's recitation.

Imam Hafs ibn Suleiman ibn al-Mughirah al-Asadi al-Kufi learned from Aasim ibn Abi al-Najud al-Kufi al-Tabi'i from Abu 'Abd al-Rahman al-Sulami from Uthman ibn Affan, Ali ibn Abu Talib, Ubayy ibn Ka'b, and Zaid ibn Thabit from Muhammad.

• Khalaf al-Bazzar
• Ijazah