Manuscripts
If Hafs recitation popped up during ottoman empire then how the Mufassirin were following it before it?T he jurist were referring to it? The huffaz were reciting it? When that shift had occured, the history should have recorded the adaptation not only in few random manuscripts but at macro level across the Muslims world. That huage shift should have been like changing of dynasty from Ummayaids to Abbasids beyond any doubt. If that mega shift had occurred the scholarship needed not to tracenit through the unreliable manuscripts.
It is likely that the Hafs ‘an Asim narration was not widely known during the early centuries, as many Quranic exegeses, including those of al-Tabari, al-Zamakhshari, al-Shawkani, and the Jalalayn, did not rely on this hafs narration when explaining Quranic verses. This becomes clearer when we refer to historical sources concerning the early four jurists. According to what Ibn al-Jazari mentions in his book “ Ghayat al-Nihaya fi Tabaqat al-Qurra , Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal recited the Quran using the narration of Nafi‘ al-Madani and preferred it over that of Hafs ‘an Asim. Similarly, Imam Malik ibn Anas also recited using the Nafi‘ narration. Imam al-Shafi‘i, on the other hand, followed the reading of Ibn Kathir al-Makki, as mentioned by Abu Muhammad Abd al-Rahman al-Razi in his book “ Adab al-Shafi‘i wa Manaqibuh . The only jurist among the four Sunni Imams who adopted the Hafs ‘an Asim narration was Abu Hanifa al-Nu‘man. Even in Kufa itself, the Hafs reading was not the predominant one. Abu Bakr Ibn Mujahid states in his book “ al-Sab‘ fi al-Qira’at ” that the reading of Hamza was dominant among the people of Kufa. Furthermore, among the Kufans who did adopt Asim’s narration, the majority preferred the version transmitted by Abu Bakr Shuba ibn Ayyash over that of Hafs, despite other accounts, such as those mentioned by al-Khatib al-Baghdadi in his “ Tarikh Baghdad “,