The Term al-Kāfūr in Hadith Texts: Analysis of its Distribution Based on Classical Arabic Maritime Works and Biogeographical Data

Abstract

Al-kāfūr is a botanical term mentioned in Arabic literature, particularly in Jahiliyyah poetry, the Qur'an, and hadith. Studies related to the term have been conducted extensively, involving various Islamic literary sources, but they do not refer to Arab-Islamic maritime and trade records. However, Arab merchants and sailors were the group that directly witnessed the distribution of the plant and recorded it clearly in their records as early as the 3rd century Hijri. Therefore, this study will analyse the hadiths related to al-kāfūr in Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī and Muslim by examining its distribution based on Arab maritime and trade works to identify the distribution of this plant. Data from these sources is compared with historical facts to verify its authenticity. This study is a fully qualitative analysis using library methods to collect data and applying content analysis methods to analyse the collected data. The results of the study found that there are five names of regions associated with al-kāfūr by traders, namely Bālūṣ, Fanṣūr, al-Rāmī, al-Ramnī, Lamūrī, Lambrī, and Tiyūmah, which are the original regions of al-kāfūr according to the Arabs, located in the Malay Archipelago