Brother I can find you the evidences that these views are not just contemporary but also the earliest salaf held them too; some of the views such as only following the 4 madhabs is allowed, had to come later when the necessity arose, however since Islamic sources establishes that consensus is a decisive proof, then even later consensus' become part of Islam. Finding all these evidences is time consuming brother but they are all available in that link of online book I posted earlier.
About Abu Hanifa saying sahih hadith is my madhab and other statements indicating one should disregard what he says and go along with sahih hadith that contradicts his view, there is overwhelming proof that he said that to those competent for ijtihad and not to laymen. There are many other statements of his where laymen are urged to follow his and other mujtahids teachings. Again these evidences is in that link and I'll post it again at bottom of this post.
I've already explained how all madhabs are valid and it seems you couldn't grasp the understanding. There's nothing else I can say about it other than repeat myself so I'll request you read that again ... however there is 1 hadith I'd like to mention
Do you know about the hadith where 2 groups of sahaba (ra) differed over when to pray asr on their way to banu qurayzah?, later Prophet (saw) informed them that both groups were right. One group had infact prayed it after asr time had passed... so here we have an example where highly contradictory differences were approved
The madhabs were in conflict in the early days but the hadiths about consensus validated them all as eventually the consensus of Scholars as well as laymen accepted them
As mentioned earlier differences of opinions are allowed in Islam so it's only natural for Mujtahid scholars to sometimes disagree, and that's the beauty of Islam that Abu Hanifas students could disagree with him and assist in codifying a school of thought and it is still called following Abu Hanifa as the latter disagreers were HIS STUDENTS, so even their disagreement is attributed to the teacher.
There's no problem with his students disagreeing as I've been saying all along a madhab is the COLLECTIVE work of the original teacher AND his students
Well since you have put the question to me again br. I'll say yes I do think you are astray as that's what the consensus of the traditional ulema say and I've given you other reasons earlier too. I say this for your own good as this is a very serious matter. Infact the majority of the ulema hold the salafi's as a bidah group; one of the 72 groups outside ahlus sunnah, becsuse going against consensus violates aqeedah.
And regarding the obligation for non Mujtahid to follow one of the four madhabs, the following is from the majority of scholsrs' perspective too:
[Sidi Abdullah Ould Hajj Ibrahim] has said in his Maraqi as-Sa’ud:
“[taqlid] is necessary for other than the one who has achieved the rank of absolute ijtihad. Even if he is a limited [mujtahid] who is unable [to perform absolute ijtihad].”
Commenting on this line, [Sidi Abdullah] said in Nashru al-bunud,
“It means that taqlid is an obligation on anyone who is not an absolute mujtahid, even if he has achieved the limited rank of ijtihad muqayyad . . . [until he says], ‘And ask the people of the reminder, if you yourselves do not know.’”
He also said,
“[Regarding] the necessity of binding to a specific madhhab, the [scholars] have mentioned its obligation upon anyone falling short [of the conditions of ijtihad].”
He says in Nashru al-bunud,
“It means that it is incumbent for whoever falls short of achieving the rank of absolute ijtihad to follow a particular madhhab.”
Again, in Maraqi as-Sa’ud, Sidi Abdullah says,
“The consensus today is on the four, and all have prohibited following [any] others.”
He says in Nashru al-bunud,
“This means that the consensus of the scholars today is on the four schools of thought, and I mean by the schools of Malik, Abu Hanifa, Shafi’i and Ahmad. Indeed, all of the scholars have prohibited following any other school of an independent and absolute mujtahid since the eighth century when the school of Dawud adh-Dhahiri died out and until the 12th Century and all subsequent ones.”
In the chapter concerning inferential reasoning, from Maraqi as-sa’ud, [Sidi Abdullah] says,
“As for the one who is not a mujtahid, then basing his actions on primary textual evidence [Qur’an and hadith] is not permissible.”
He says in Nashru al-bunud,
“It means that it is prohibited for other than a mujtahid to base his actions upon a direct text from either the Book or the Sunna even if its transmission was sound because of the sheer likelihood of there being other considerations such as abrogation, limitations, specificity to certain situations, and other such matters that none but the mujtahid fully comprehends with precision. Thus, nothing can save him from Allah the Exalted excepted following a mujtahid
http://www.masud.co.uk/ISLAM/misc/mhfatwa.htm
Regarding who follows Rasulullsh (saw); do you just apply your own undetstandings to sahih hadiths as to how they change or fit into rulings or do you take guidance from the contemporary salafi scholars? I think it will be more of the latter than the former right?; in this case you are following bin baz and salih al Munajid and co, and in the case of the former, you are following your own laymen mind.
I suppose you can say I follow Abu Hanifa, and here's an explanation:
“Surely the following of our [rightly guided] Imams is not abandoning the Qur’anic verses or the sound hadiths; it is the very essence of adhering to them and taking our judgements from them. This is because the Qur’an has not come down to us except by means of these very Imams [who are more worthy of following] by virtue of being more knowledgeable than us in [the sciences of] the abrogating and abrogated, the absolute and the conditional, the equivocal and the clarifying, the probabilistic and the plain, the circumstances surrounding revelation and their various meanings, as well as their possible interpretations and various linguistic and philological considerations, [not to mention] the various other ancillary sciences [involved in understanding the Qur’an] needed.
“Also, they took all of that from the students of the companions (tabi’in) who received their instruction from the companions themselves, who received their instructions from the Lawgiver himself, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, divinely protected from every mistake, who bore witness that the first three generations of Muslims would be ones of virtue and righteousness. Furthermore, the prophetic traditions have also reached us through their means given that they were also more knowledgeable than us through their means given that they were also more knowledgeable than those who came after them concerning the rigorously authenticated (sahih), the well authenticated (hasan), and the weak (da’if) channels of transmission, as well as the marfu’u4, mursal5, mutawatir6, ahad7, mu’dal8 and gharib9 transmissions.
http://www.masud.co.uk/ISLAM/misc/mhfatwa.htm
Anyway this topic is far too contentious br. So it's only left for me to 'bow out' gracefully with my parting words, Assalamualikum wr wb and may Allah (swt) guide us all
https://central-mosque.com/index.php/taqleed/the-legal-status-of-following-a-madhab.html
