Sabine Schmidtke

Abū al- usayn al-Ba rī and his Transmission of Biblical Materials from Kitāb al-Dīn wa-al-Dawla by Ibn Rabban al- abarī: The Evidence from Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī's Mafātī al-ghayb

The authenticity of the Kitāb al-dīn wa-al-dawla by the Nestorian convert to Islam, Abū al- asan ʿAlī b. Sahl Rabban al- abarī (d. ca. 251/865), has been discussed since the publication of the text by A. Mingana in 1922/23. A comparison between the chapter of the Twelver Shīʿī Sadīd al-Dīn Ma mūd b. ʿAlī al- imma ī al-Rāzīs (d. after 600/1204) Munqidh min al-taqlīd discussing the biblical predictions of the Prophet Mu ammad and the corresponding sections of Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzīs (d. 606/1209) Mafāti al-ghayb reveals a substantial degree of verbal and structural agreement. It becomes evident that Fakhr al-Dīn, like al- imma ī, are using material from Ibn Rabbans Al-dīn wa-al-dawla, although they were both relying on an intermediate source, Abū al- usayn al-Ba rīs (d. 436/1045) Kitāb ghurar al-adilla.

Jewish Reception of Twelver Shīʿī kalām: A Copy of al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā’s Kitāb al-Dhakhīra in the Abraham Firkovitch Collection, St. Petersburg

‭Among the numerous kalām works by the Imāmī al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā (d. 436/1044), his Kitāb al-Mulakhkhaṣ and his Kitāb al-Dhakhīra are his most comprehensive writings in this discipline. The relation between the two works and their respective transmission is discussed. The Kitāb al-Dhakhīra is also incompletely preserved in the transcription of the Karaite scholar ʿĀlī b. Sulaymān al-Maqdisī, completed in Fusṭāṭ in Rajab 472/December 1079-January 1080 (National Library of Russia, St. Petersburg, Ms. RNL Arab. 111). The codex is described in detail, and its implications for our knowledge of the transmission of the work are analyzed.‬

Biblical Predictions of the Prophet Muĥammad among the Zaydīs of Iran

Abstract Biblical predictions of the advent of the Prophet Muĥammad are rarely adduced in the theological writings of Muʿtazilite authors and those who referred to them clearly considered this to be a secondary strategy at best. Zaydī Muʿtazilites were less hesitant than their Sunnī counterparts to employ scriptural materials. This was possibly due to the influence of the Imām al-Qāsim b. Ibrāhīm al-Rassī (d. 246/860) who was intimately familiar with Christian theological notions and with the Bible, from which he quoted freely in some of his writings. Among the Zaydīs of Iran, scriptural passages allegedly foretelling the advent of Muĥammad have been adduced by the Imām al-Muʾayyad bi-Llāh (d. 411/1020), by his companion, the later Imām al-Muwaffaq bi-Llāh (d. after 420/1029), and by Aĥmad b. Muĥammad al-Sammān (fl. early 5th/11th century). An analysis of the texts suggests that the three authors were drawing on source(s)/translation traditions preceding or parallel to that of ʿAlī b. Rabban al-Ṭabarī’s (d. 251/865) al-Dīn wa-l-dawla and Ibn Qutayba’s (d. 276/889) Aʿlām al-nubuwwa.

The literary-religious tradition among 7th/13th century Yemenī Zaydīs: The formation of the Imām al-Mahdī li-Dīn Allāh Ahmad b. al-Husayn b. al-Qāsim (d. 656/1258)*

The rich sīra literature relating to the careers of imāms is a genre characteristic for the Zaydī communities in Yemen and in Iran. These documents were composed by close companions, secretaries or other personnel in their vicinity, often inspired in structure and terminology by the sīra of the Prophet Muhammad. Their primary function was to legitimize the imāms, and describing their merits therefore formed an important element of such documents. The sīra of the Imām al-Mahdī li-Dīn Allāh Abū Tayr Ahmad b. al-Husayn (d. 656/1258) was composed by Sharaf al-Dīn Yahyā b. al-Qāsim al-Hamzī (d. 677/1278-9). The primary significance of the section of the sīra that is devoted to Ahmad b. al-Husayns formation, which is edited and analysed in the article, is that it provides a detailed picture of the intellectual scene in Yemen during the 7th/13th century and informs us about the characteristics of the formation of scholars during this period. Moreover, the document informs us about the works that were part of the transfer of knowledge from Iran to Yemen that began with the unification of the Caspian Zaydiyya and the Zaydīs in Yemen during the imamate of Abū Tālib al-akhīr (d. 520/1126) and gradually increased throughout the 6th/12th century until the death of the Imām al-Mansūr bi-llāh in 614/1217.

Abū Saʿd al-Ḫargūšī and his Kitāb al-Lawāmiʿ A Ṣūfī Guide Book for Preachers from 4th/10th century Nīšāpūr 1

Abstract Abū Saʿd ʿAbd al-Malik b. Abī ʿUtmān Muḥammad b. Ibrāhīm b. Yaʿqūb al-Ḫargūsī l-Nīsābūrī (al-wāʿiẓ al-Ḫargūsī, d. 406/1015-16 or 407/1016), a contemporary and compatriot of the well-known Ṣūfī Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021), is well known for his Kitāb Tahdīb al-asrār, a Ṣūfī manual in the form of a collection of sayings of earlier Ṣūfī authorities. Ḫargūsī is known to have written another comprehensive work that is of utmost significance for the study of the classical period of mysticism, viz. Kitāb al-Lawāmiʿ. The Vatican Library owns a unique manuscript of the work that so far seems to have escaped the attention of modern scholars. The article offers a description of the Lawāmiʿ together with a detailed table of contents.

A Twelver-Shīʿī Multi-Text Volume (16th through 18th century) Held in the New York Public Library (Ms New York Public Library, Arabic Manuscripts Collection, Manuscripts and Archives Division, Volume 51985A)

Ms New York Public Library, Arabic Manuscripts Collection, Manuscripts and Archives Division, Volume 51985A is a heavily damaged multitext volume which comprises seven individual works: An incomplete copy of Khiḍr b. Muḥammad b. ʿAlī al-Rāzī al-Ḥablirūdī’s (d. ca. 850/1447) longer commentary on the ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī’s al-Bāb al-ḥadī ʿashar, Jāmiʿ al-durar fī sharḥ al-Bāb al-ḥādī ʿashar ; several works by Ibn Abī Jumhūr al-Aḥsāʾī (d. after 906/1501), viz. Qabs al-iqtidāʾ fī sharāʾiṭ al-iftāʾ wa-l-istiftāʾ, Kāshifat al-ḥāl ʿan aḥwāl al-istidlāl , and al-Masālik al-jāmiʿiyya fī sharḥ al-Alfiyya , which were copied during the author’s lifetime; Bahāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad b. al-Ḥusayn al-ʿĀmilī’s (“al-Shaykh al-Bahāʾī”, d. 1030/1621) Tafsīr sūrat al-fātiḥa , or al-ʿUrwa al-wuthqā ; and two works by Bahāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Ḥasan al-Iṣfahānī “al-Fāḍil al-Hindī” (d. 1137/1725) which are not attested elsewhere—a commentary ( ḥāshiya ) on the chapter on the imamate of Saʿd al-Dīn al-Taftāzānī’s (d. 792/1390) Sharḥ al-Maqāṣid , and a commentary on the Nahj al-ḥaqq wa-kashf al-ṣidq by the ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī.

Al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā’s Responses to Theological Questions posed by Abū Yaʿlā Sallār [Sālār] b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Daylamī (d. 448/1057): A Critical Edition

Among the responsa collections by al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā that still remain to be edited are the Jawābāt al-masāʾil al-Sallāriyya , which consist of responsa to eight questions most of which revolve around issues related to the subtleties of kalām . On the basis of the two earliest witnesses of this text, MS Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Petermann II [Pm.] 169 and MS Mashhad, Āstān-i quds 1448, an edition has been prepared.

Philosophical Theology among Sixth/Twelfth-Century Twelver Shīʿites: From Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī (d. after 599/1201-2 or 600/1202-3) to Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī (d. 672/1274)

MS Yale, Landberg 510, a multitext volume, contains unique copies of two doctrinal works composed as it seems by an Imāmī scholar of the sixth/twelfth century, ʿAbd Allāh b. Ḥamza b. ʿAbd Allah b. Ḥamza al-Ṭūsī al-Mashhadī al-Shāriḥī al-maʿrūf bi- Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī, al-Wāfī bi-kalām al-muthbit wa-l-nāfī and al-Masʾala fī tanzīh dhāt al-khāliq ʿan al-talawwuth bi-waṣmat al-fanāʾ wa-l-ʿadam . Both tracts show the author’s close familiarity with the doctrinal systems of the followers of Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī (d. 321/933) on the one hand and Abū l-Ḥusayn al-Baṣrī (d. 436/1044) on the other. The discussions revolve around the contested Bahshamite notion that the “non-existent” ( maʿdūm ) is a “thing” ( shayʾ ), as well as the related doctrine that essences ( dhawāt , sg. dhāt ) are “real” or “actual” ( thābit ) in the state of non-existence ( ʿadam ). The paper introduces the author and the two tracts and provides critical editions.

Bibliographical Practices in Islamic Societies, with an Analysis of MS Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Hs. or. 13525

Despite the constantly growing research on the literary history of the Muslim world and related social practices, there is hardly a period or a region in the long and diverse history of the Muslim world for which we can present a clear and detailed picture as to which books were available and popular in any given discipline. Nor do we know much about the diffusion of books, the processes of survival, selection, and transmission of books, or the mechanisms and ways of including books in a teaching curriculum, or excluding them from such a curriculum. An inquiry into the “curriculum” of a specific scholarly circle or “canon” at any given time can be based on a broad range of pertinent genres of documentary sources as well as literary texts and, of course, the preserved books themselves. The article discusses main genres, viz. inventories of transmitters and chains of transmission, autobibliographical inventories and bibliographical inventories of single authors, library inventories, lists of references, and notebooks and anthologies. Moreover, MS Berlin, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Hs. or. 13525, a library endowment deed, is analysed.

The Literary-Religious Tradition among 7th/13th-Century Yemeni Zaydīs (II): The Case of ʿAbd Allāh b. Zayd al-ʿAnsī (d. 667/1269)

One of the leading figures of 7th/13th-century Zaydī scholarship in Yemen was themutakallim and legal scholar ʿAbdAllāh b. Zayd al-ʿAnsī (b. 593/1196–1197, d. Šaʿbān 667/April 1268), a prolific author in a variety of fields. According to the later biographical tradition, he has 105 titles to his credit.2 To judge from the number of extantmanuscripts, hismost popular workwas al-Iršād ilā naǧāt alʿibād, a workwith Ṣūfī tendencies, which al-ʿAnsī completed in Rabīʿ ii 632/Jan-