Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-npj9w Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-09T00:54:43.569Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Scattered Pearls: Exploring al-Suy ī's Hermeneutics and Use of Sources in al-Durr al-manthūr fī’l-tafsīr bi’l-maʾthūr 1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 February 2014

S. R. BURGE
S. R. BURGE*
Affiliation:
Institute of Ismaili Studies, London, sburge@iis.ac.uk
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abrstract

Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr fī’l-tafsīr bi’l-maʾthūr is almost unique in presenting an exegesis based entirely on adīth material, taking tafsīr bi’l-maʾthūr to the extreme. Since al-Suy ī cites a source, or multiple sources, for every single adīth that he includes in his collection, it is possible to gain some insight into his compositional method and the way in which he engages with source material. This article presents a statistical analysis of the sources in this exegesis, taking a sample of twenty-three sūras, including over 5,000 a ādīth. The source data is analysed and shows that there is a discernible pattern in al-Suy ī's use of sources and that there is much to learn from studying this source data in detail. Al-Suy ī's hermeneutical method is closely aligned with those of Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr, and this article will also examine the extent to which al-Durr al-manthūr can be viewed as the culmination of Ibn Taymmiyya's approach to tafsīr.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 24 , Issue 2 , April 2014 , pp. 251 - 296
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 2014 

Analyzing the sources of tafsīr is typically a difficult area of study for a number of reasons. First, and most crucially, Muslim scholars rarely give any indication of them. As Walid Saleh has noted, al-Thaʿlabī is a great exception and one of the few scholars to provide detailed information on his sources.Footnote 2 Tafāsīr tend not to provide references for individual ideas or ādīth. Second, the genre of tafsīr is academically ‘conservative’, in that most exegetes wish to present their tafsīr as being part of a long and unwavering tradition of Qurʾānic exegesis.Footnote 3 Being innovative was often regarded with suspicion, as one can see from the experience of al-Biqāʿī (d. 885/1480) and his use of Biblical material in his study of the Qurʾān.Footnote 4 Even tafāsīr which are bold in their approach, such as Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī's Mafātī al-ghayb,Footnote 5 continue to maintain - or at least appear to maintain - a sense of continuum with the tafsīr tradition.Footnote 6 Al-Rāzī's extended use of lexicological material frames his more controversial theological-philosophical ideas within traditional exegetical discourse.

The fifteenth century polymath Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī (d. 911/1505)Footnote 7 is different. In his magnum opus of tafsīr, al-Durr al-manthūr fī’l-tafsīr bi’l-maʾthūr (The Scattered Pearls in the Exegesis of the Qurʾān with Traditions)Footnote 8 al-Suy ī notes a source, or multiple sources, for every single adīth. This presents a great opportunity to understand how al-Suy ī organised his tafsīr, from where he took his ideas, as well as how he conceived his exegesis.Footnote 9 Thankfully, al-Suy ī also wrote many other works in the field of tafsīr, which allows for easy comparison and contextualisation.Footnote 10 This article will explore al-Suy ī's use of sources in al-Durr al-manthūr and will show that a thorough examination of this source data enables a greater understanding of al-Suy ī's methodology of adīth compilation and exegetical ideas. There are similarities between the method that al-Suy ī utlisies in al-Durr al-manthūr with Ibn Taymiyya's ‘radical Qurʾānic hermeneutics’,Footnote 11 and this article will also provide a comparison between al-Durr al-manthūr and the principle example of the use of Ibn Taymiyyan Qurʾānic hermeneutics, Ibn Kathīr's Tafsīr al-Qurʾān,Footnote 12 to assess the extent to which al-Suy ī's work can be viewed in these terms.

This article is indebted to K. E. Nolin's The Itqān and Its Sources,Footnote 13 which explores al-Suy ī's use of sources in his K. al-Itqān fī ʿūlūm al-Qurʾān. Nolin illustrates that the Itqān is reliant on al-Zarkashī's K. al-Burhān fī ʿulūm al-Qurʾān,Footnote 14 which al-Suy ī uses as a basis from which he elaborates and expands material.Footnote 15 Nolin attempts to understand how al-Suy ī wrote and worked as a scholar,Footnote 16 but there has been little advance on Nolin's ideas and even less in the way of further analysis of al-Suy ī's use of source material in any of his other works.Footnote 17 More broadly, al-Suy ī has received attention in the secondary literature, especially his K. al-Itqān,Footnote 18 and numerous other studies have been made of his thought, particularly in the Arab world.Footnote 19

Exegeses based solely on ādīth are extremely rare in the tafsīr genre. The relatively early exegeses of Ibn al-Mundhir (d. 388/930),Footnote 20 Ibn Abī ātim (d. 327/938–9),Footnote 21 and the Shīʿī exegesis of al-ʿAyyāshī (d. c. 320/932)Footnote 22 are the main examples of such a methodology. However, the methodology did not catch on and had little impact on the genre of tafsīr.Footnote 23 The method did, however, re-emerge after Ibn Taymiyya wrote his Muqaddima fī ūl al-tafsīr,Footnote 24 in which he encourages the use of ādīth in the interpretation of the Qurʾān. Ibn Kathīr was the first to attempt a complete exegesis of the Qurʾān adopting Ibn Taymiyya's methods, but whilst including a large number of ādīth, Ibn Kathīr also includes personal statements and analysis. Al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr, however, is almost unique in the tafsīr tradition in that it is comprised of only ādīth, with no direct personal comment being made at all; such that one can only infer his viewpoint indirectly through his selection and organisation of the ādīth themselves.Footnote 25

Al-Suy ī employs a large number of sources, mainly from works outside of the main tafsīr tradition, particularly works like al-Bukhārī's ī , that are normally firmly with the discipline of adīth. Exegetical ādīth are readily found in the adīth literature, and many of the canonical collections include a specific Kitāb Tafsīr al-Qurʾān,Footnote 26 but as Marston Speight has commented, the mufassir and the mu addith have a different agenda:

The mufassir was concerned primarily, if not wholly, with the elucidation of the revealed text, for whatever purpose that might serve, and to achieve that end, he was open to several possible sources of interpretation. The mu addith, on the other hand, was concerned primarily with reporting the sunna of Mu ammad, and when the reports he brought involved the Qurʾān text, his effort joined that of the mufassir.Footnote 27

Al-Suy ī takes this dichotomy between the mufassir and the mu addith and creates a work which straddles both traditions. However, the role of ādīth in non-tafsīr works as a vehicle for exegesis or interpretation is an area that is yet to be investigated in any real depth.

Al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr is a substantial work and it would be a monumental task to analyse all of the ādīth in the tafsīr, so this study takes a selection of sūras to produce a representative and manageable sample. To make the sample as objective as possible, the analysis has considered all sūras ending in a ‘1’ and a ‘6’ (i.e. Q. 1, 6, 11, 16, 21, 26, 31, 36. . ., 106, 111). This means that the survey includes twenty-three sūras, amounting to a total of 1,208 verses, which is roughly a fifth of the Qurʾānic text (19.37%). In the sample al-Suy ī includes 5,087 ādīth. Whilst it is always desirable to make the sample as large as possible, it is not feasible to attempt a study of this work in its entirety, but the quantity of data involved produces enough material from which to begin to understand how al-Suy ī employs his sources.

A General Overview of the Sample Data

The sample data (see Appendix A) show that the number of ādīth found in the exegesis of each sūra varies quite widely, but the average is two to three ādīth per verse, with the average of 4.21 in the table being augmented by the large quantity of ādīth in Q. 1. Within each sūra al-Suy ī typically treats blocks of verses rather than individual verses, and some of these blocks will generate more ādīth than others. Verses that have particular theological significance often have a great number of ādīth associated with them, as one can see from the high ratio of ādīth to verses in Sūrat al-fāti ā.Footnote 28 Conversely, some verses will have little or no comment.

The authorities of the ādīth are not the main focus of this article, but the expected companions can be found readily:Footnote 29 Ibn ʿAbbās is the authority of the greatest number of ādīth, being an authority for about a fifth of the ādīth; Qatāda and Mujāhid also feature prominently. This is not surprising, as Qatāda, Mujāhid and especially Ibn ʿAbbās, as early mufassirūn, are often the most cited authorities in tafāsīr.Footnote 30 This indicates that al-Durr al-manthūr is firmly entrenched in the wider tafsīr tradition.

The use of Prophetic ādīth is also interesting. The data shows that only a quarter of the ādīth are Prophetic. This is quite a low percentage and much lower than some of al-Suy ī's other adīth collections, in which the Prophetic ādīth usually amount to 40–50% of those included.Footnote 31 A low use of Prophetic ādīth is not unusual in tafāsīr, as much of the material, such as lexicology, is not necessarily dependent on a Prophetic attribution.Footnote 32 Generally, there also appears to be little concern for authenticity of the ādīth being cited. In the sample there are only 266 ādīth (5.23%) that have a comment regarding their strength, and these are largely incidental;Footnote 33 of these, most comments are those declaring ādīth as being sound ( ī ). Al-Suy ī does not make any statement regarding the soundness of the ādīth himself, but the comments are given on the authority of another adīth scholar. The majority of these statements, 163 out of the 266 (61.28%), are attributed to al- ākim al-Nīsābūrī (d. 406/1016).

The last matter of concern for the general overview is the question of the number of sources used for each adīth. The average for the sample is 2.26 sources per adīth,Footnote 34 and large numbers of sources for a single adīth are rare: there are only twenty-three ādīth with more than ten sources (0.452%). The adīth with the highest number of sources, sixteen, is found in Sūrat al-fāti ā.Footnote 35 The question remains why al-Suy ī thought that he needed to cite a adīth from different sources – why did one not suffice? There are number of possible reasons: (i) practicality: al-Suy ī cites a range of textual sources so that others can find particular ādīth; (ii) hubris: al-Suy ī intends to show his prowess in the adīth literature; (iii) authority: by citing a number of different sources for a adīth, al-Suy ī is able to stress the adīth's place in both the tafsīr and adīth genres. The second and third possibilities seem to be the most likely. Al-Suy ī was certainly not known for his modesty,Footnote 36 and a reader does get a sense that a particular adīth is ‘very sound’ when a long line of sources is given, presenting the adīth as mutawātir (commonly transmitted).Footnote 37

Looking at the tafsīr in a general way reveals something of the basic premise and function of the work. Al-Suy ī is attempting to compile an exegesis based not on the tafsīr tradition, but, rather, in the adīth tradition. Marston Speight comments:

The emergence of a full-blown work of tafsīr, such as the Jāmiʿ al-bayān of al- abarī (d. 310/922) [sic], from the same century as that of the great mu addithūn, is striking evidence of the difference between the concerns of a mufassir and a mu addith.Footnote 38

In al-Durr al-manthūr, al-Suy ī blurs the separation between adīth and tafsīr. Furthermore, there is a sense that al-Suy ī's wider project for Qurʾānic Studies is to attempt to realign tafsīr with the adīth sciences. This can be seen particularly strongly in his K. al-Itqān, in which many of the Qurʾānic sciences which he elaborates are intricately related to and dependent on the transmission of ādīth.Footnote 39 Al-Suy ī's use of ādīth has led to an association of the work with Ibn Taymiyyan hermeneutics, and the relationship between ādīth and tafsīr in al-Durr al-manthūr will be discussed in more detail below.

Data Analysis

The following sections will look at the range of authors mentioned in al-Durr al-manthūr and how al-Suy ī employs them, through the data taken from the sample.Footnote 40 It will look at various author profiles that can be seen in the exegesis; it will look at why particular authors are cited frequently; and lastly, why certain authors are given limited attention or not cited at all. To achieve a fair comparison between the sūras in the sample, the analysis has been based on the ‘% of ādīth used in a sūra’ (% used), i.e. the number of ādīth cited by al-Suy ī from a particular source in a sūra is represented as a percentage, rather than as the total number of ādīth. The % used figure makes a comparison between Q. 6 and Q. 106 possible and fair. For example, al-Tirmidhī is cited ten times in Q. 21 and Q. 56, but his when the % used figure is considered, there is a difference in the frequency (2.15% in Q. 21 and 3.37% in Q. 56). Another example can be seen in the use of Ibn Mardawayh in Q. 1 and Q. 96. In Q. 1 he is cited twenty times (6.80%), and although he is cited less often numerically in Q. 96 (ten times), he dominates the exegesis of that sūra (33.3%).

Author Profiles

When analysing al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr one of the most striking aspects of the data is that different authors are used in different ways. The data reveal four main author profiles. The first is of authors that are cited in every sūra, or the majority of the sūras in the sample, and who are also authors that are cited frequently in the exegesis of each indivudal sūra. There are four authors that have this profile: Ibn Abī ātim, ʿAbd b. amīd, Ibn Jarīr [al- abarī] and Ibn al-Mundhir.Footnote 41 Taking ʿAbd b. amīd as an example (see Appendices G-I), the data show that he features in all but one of the sūras, and that in fourteen of the twenty-three sūras he is used as a source for over 20% of the ādīth. In only four sūras (Q. 11, 31, 106 and 111) is he cited in less than 5% of the material. Each of the four authors in this profile wrote tafsīr works, and al-Suy ī refers to the exegeses of ʿAbd b. amīd, along with his Musnad; the exegesis of Ibn Abī ātim, as well as his al-Baʿth; the tafsīr of Ibn al-Mundhir, with no other work of his being mentioned; and to the Tafsīr of Ibn Jarīr al- abarī. Al-Suy ī also cites other exegeses, namely those of al-Firyābī, Ibn Mardawayh, Juwaybir, Mālik, Sufyān b. ʿUyanya and Wakīʿ. However, these are cited much less frequently and there is doubt as to whether some of these were extant in al-Suy ī's lifetime.Footnote 42

The second group of authors are those who are cited in many or most of the sūras, but who do not feature prominently in each sūra. This is one of the largest groups of authors and includes: al-Bayhaqī, al- ākim al-Nīsābūrī, mad b. anbal, Ibn Abī Shayba, Ibn Mardawayh, ʿAbd Allāh b. mad, al-Bukhārī, al-Dāraqu nī, Ibn Saʿd, al-Bazzār, Abū Yaʿla al-Maw ilī, amongst many others. Al- ākim al-Nīsābūrī is typical of this profile. The traditionist and critic al- ākim al-Nīsābūrī is found in all but two of the sūras (Q. 61 and 111), so has a significant presence in the tafsīr as a whole, like those with the first profile. However, unlike the authors with the first profile, al- ākim's presence in each of the sūras is much more limited, with an average % used of 5.05%, compared to ʿAbd b. amīd's 25.12%. Whilst al- ākim does not feature as prominently, he is cited regularly in each sūra, and is named as a source for over 2% of the ādīth in all of the sūras in which he is found. The authors in the first profile were all mufassirūn (despite some being more readily identified with the adīth sciences), but the authors in this second profile tend to be distinguished and well-known traditionists. Often these authors wrote works on specific Qurʾānic scienes, such as qiraʾāt, asbāb al-nuzūl and f āʾil al-Qurʾān material, which is why they are mentioned in a number of sūras, but only infrequently. These aspects of this author profile are important for understanding the overarching strategy of al-Durr al-manthūr and its reliance on the adīth sciences along with the tafsīr tradition. One can also see the implementation of the ideas of al-Suy ī's methodological ideas expressed in his K. al-Itqān, particularly the application of different modes of exegesis (i.e. the ʿulūm al-Qurʾān) to interpret the Qurʾānic text.

The third group of authors with a distinct profile are those who are not cited in many of the sūras, but are the source a large proportion of ādīth in one or two individual sūras. Abū ’l-Shaykh, al-Nasāʾī, Abū Nuʿaym and Ibn Abī ’l-Dunyā are typical of this profile. For example, Abū ’l-Shaykh does not feature in all of the sūras, and except for four sūras (Q. 6, 11, 51 and 71) his contribution is relatively limited. However, in Q. 6 and Q. 11 he is a major source for al-Suy ī's commentary, distorting his average % used somewhat: if these two sūras are discounted, his average % used figure drops from 5.98% to 2.63%. The authors with this profile are, in the main, compilers of m annaf works with particular themes. Ibn Abī ’l-Dunyā typifies this sort of author, writing a number of short to medium length non-canonical collections,Footnote 43 often incorporating non-Prophetic ādīth. In the sample al-Suy ī cites twenty-four different works compiled by Ibn Abī ’l-Dunyā.

The last profile describes those authors that are mentioned infrequently, and are present in only one or two of the sūras. Many of these authors are only cited once in the whole sample (i.e. 0.0197% of source entries). In many cases, al-Suy ī does not name the work from which he has cited these authors, so it is difficult to make any firm conclusions about their genre or specialisation. However, many of the authors are less well-known traditionists, and it is likely that an individual work, of which al-Suy ī was aware, included a adīth that was of benefit to his exegesis. It is possible that the sample has not caught some authors, but the size of the sample would suggest that those who are missing are likely to fit this fourth profile. This is, naturally, one of the problems with using a sample rather than looking at the whole text, but the size of the work makes such an approach unavoidable. However, the number of authors absent from the sample is likely to be relatively small.

By analysing the data in the sample closely it is possible to see different trends in al-Suy ī's use of sources that might not have been apparent without it. The most crucial trend is that the four main author profiles are aligned with specific genres. It should be of no surprise that the principal sources are tafāsīr. As the main sources, they each feature prominently in al-Suy ī's exegesis, but it should be stressed that there is not a single preferred author. Nolin has shown that al-Suy ī's K. al-Itqān is based on al-Zarkashī's K. al-Burhān, in this case there appears to be evidence that he based his own work on a single text;Footnote 44 al-Durr al-manthūr is slightly different in that al-Suy ī selects a quartet of authors instead of a single one. With one of the four often being the Urtext for individual sūras, to which al-Suy ī adds from the wider adīth literature, particularly texts from the supplementary genres of tafsīr.

Frequently Cited Authors and Missing Authors

Having seen the presence of four main profiles, it is now helpful to turn to specific authors: which are used the most? It has been seen that ʿAbd b. amid, Ibn Jarīr al- abarī, Ibn al-Mundhir and Ibn Abī atim are the most frequently used authors, but if the scope is widened beyond the first profile, other trends can be seen. The table below shows the ten most cited authors by number of ādīth and % used;Footnote 45 along with similar data from al-Suy ī's K. al-Itqān.Footnote 46

Quite expectedly, the four most used authors in al-Durr al-manthūr are in the first author profile. The table also shows the importance of considering the % used figure as Abū ’l-Shaykh becomes less prominent when this is taken into consideration. This reflects the fact that he is used frequently in one or two sūras, but not often in the others. Also Ibn al-Mundhir and Ibn Abī Hātim alter places after this change. The more intriguing questions arise from a comparison with al-Suy ī's K. al-Itqān. Some authors can be seen to be central in al-Suy ī's mind, particularly Ibn Abī ātim and al-Bayhaqī; and although al- ākim al-Nīsābūrī is not in the list for al-Durr al-manthūr he is also fairly common in both texts. The absence of ʿAbd b. amid and Ibn al-Mundhir is also interesting, as they become less important in al-Suy ī's methodological considerations in K. al-Itqān. The differences are quite stark: seven of the ten most used authors in K. al-Itqān are used far less frequently in al-Durr al-manthūr. Ibn al-Anbārī, whilst cited in al-Durr al-manthūr is not a major source, and al-Zarkashī, Ibn al-Jazarī, Ibn al- āʾigh and al-Zamakhsharī are not even cited at all.

This raises some important questions concerning the sources that al-Suy ī includes in his exegetical and methodological works. Why does al-Suy ī exclude some authors in one work, but not in another? Why are some important exegetes, such al-Thaʿlabī and al-Wā idī, barely featured in al-Durr al-manthūr? These are difficult questions to answer, and, at best, one can only make reasonable suggestions. However, the presence of al-Zamakhsharī is the most illustrative. Al-Zamakhsharī's al-Kashshāf Footnote 47 was widely studied by scholarsFootnote 48 and formed part of the curriculum in Mamluk colleges; yet was still, because of its heterodox theological positions, regarded with some suspicion.Footnote 49 Given this, references to al-Zamakhsharī are pertinent to a discussion of the Qurʾānic sciences, but not necessarily so in a adīth-based exegesis. The form of al-Durr al-manthūr and the aims which al-Suy ī had in composing it determines the types of sources included.Footnote 50

In his study of al-Suy ī's relatively short work on cosmology, al-Hayʾa al-saniyya fī'l hayʾa al-sunniyya, Anton Heinen places al-Suy ī's use of sources in a polemic context. For Heinen, al-Suy ī's al-Hayʾa attempts to move Islamic scholarship on astronomy away from the Greek Ptolemaic tradition towards an orthodox Islamic adīth-based context.

After the appearance of numerous kutub al-hayʾa. . .which were openly inspired by Ptolemy's Almagest, here at last was a book exclusively based on the traditional Islamic authorities. As such it may have been able to awaken the contemporary scholars to a consciousness of their Muslim heritage.Footnote 51

It is possible to view al-Durr al-manthūr in a similar, anti-tafsīr bi’l-raʾy context (as with Ibn Taymiyya). However, Heinen is, perhaps, a little overcritical of al-Suy ī's intentions for al-Hayʾa, and there is a sense that Heinen partly blames al-Suy ī for a stagnation in Islamic astronomical thought.Footnote 52 The motivation does not seem to be necessarily as polemical as Heinen suggests, and, likewise, there is nothing whatsoever to suggest that al-Durr al-manthūr should be seen as an attack on the more established and expected forms of tafsīr. If it were written in that vein, al-Suy ī does not state that that was his intention for the work; and one would largely expect him to do so, were it the case. It would seem more appropriate to see the tafsīr, as well as his al-Hayʾa, as a more general attempt to realign contemporary academic disciplines with the adīth literature.

The exclusion of certain, more heterodox exegeses from al-Durr al-manthūr would appear to be the result of an interest in establishing and promoting orthodoxy through the use of ādīth. Al-Suy ī generally avoids any works that conflict with his theological and jurisprudential world view, which would account for the absence of the mālikī exegesis of al-Qur ubī, the anbalī exegesis of Ibn al-Jawzī,Footnote 53 the muʿtazilī exegesis of al-Zamakhsharī and even al-Ba awī's more orthodox revision. Although Ibn Kathīr and al-Suy ī were both Shāfiʿīs, Ibn Kathīr shows a strong alleigence to his teacher and mentor, Ibn Taymiyya, and is not cited in al-Durr al-manthūr. Furthermore, despite being a Sufi,Footnote 54 there are very few references to Sufi works of exegesis, although al-Qushayrī is mentioned in his K. al-Itqān.Footnote 55 Al-Suy ī wrote works on Sufism,Footnote 56 including some books verging on mystical exegesis;Footnote 57 but expressly Sufi exegeses are absent from al-Durr al-manthūr. This indicates that al-Durr al-manthūr has a specific outlook and focus: although ādīth are taken from a wide range of sources, al-Suy ī appears to avoid works written by authors who approached the Qurʾān with a non- adīth based hermeneutic. The inclusion of ʿAbd b. amīd, Ibn Abī ātim and Ibn al-Mundhir is important since they wrote works in a similar style, and al-Suy ī utilises them in his own exegesis, despite being relatively unknown in the tafsīr tradition. Footnote 58 Al-Suy ī obviously found them useful for his project and held them in high regard.Footnote 59

The Temporal Distribution of the Sources

One of the questions that al-Suy ī's use of sources in al-Durr al-manthūr raises regards the periods from which al-Suy ī's sources were taken. Does al-Suy ī draw on early works written during the flourishing of adīth and Qurʾānic studies, or does he rely on later works? The sample reveals some interesting points.

The centuries from which authors are largely taken are the third, fourth and fifth centuries ijrī, but when the number of ādīth are taken into account, the fourth becomes predominant, being the era from which over half of the ādīth in the sample have been taken. A noticeable drop in the use of authors from the second and fifth centuries can also be seen when ādīth are taken into account.

This distribution of al-Suy ī's textual sources is intriguing. It shows an interest in overlooking more recent scholarship in Qurʾānic exegesis, and returning to earlier works. This would seem partly a result of al-Suy ī's wish to compose a purely adīth-based exegesis, rather than the more discursive and debate driven exegeses that can be found in the developed tafsīr tradition. It also reflects al-Suy ī's greater expertise in the adīth sciences.

Is such a reliance on material from the fourth century to be expected? In many respects the answer is yes: a great number of highly regarded works were written on the Qurʾān and the adīth at this time. However, if one turns to al-Suy ī's K. al-Itqān, he can be seen to engage with sources in quite a different way.

The K. al-Itqān shows a preference for the fourth to fifth centuries irjī, but it is not as pronounced as in al-Durr al-manthūr, and there is greater parity in the K. al-Itqān over the centuries from which the sources are taken, with the K. al-Itqān relying on many authors dating from later centuries. The data show that al-Suy ī specifically overlooked more recent scholarship in Qurʾānic exegesis and adīth, and returned to earlier works. It is only when the data is placed in a wider context that the emphasis on the formative and classical periods of adīth scholarship is made clearly apparent.

A Comparison of the Sources Employed by Ibn Kathīr and al-Suy ī

This article has, thus far, compared the use of sources in al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr and his K. al-Itqān. It will also be beneficial to analyse the source material of al-Durr al-manthūr to Ibn Kathīr's Tafsīr. Ibn Kathīr (d. 774/1373) attempted to write a Qurʾān commentary based on the principles established by Ibn Taymiyya. Ibn Taymiyya proposes what Walid Saleh has called a ‘radical hermeneutics’, namely exegesis based on internal Qurʾānic citation, and ādīth attributed to the companions of the Prophet or his companions.Footnote 60 Whilst Ibn Kathīr is often said to have begun to adopt Ibn Taymiyya's ‘radical hermeneutics’ in his Tafsīr, it did not break free from the tafsīr tradition completely, and, according to Saleh, it is not until al-Suy ī that an exegesis was written “where only inherited interpretations from the salaf are recorded, with no additions, no editorial comments, and no philological explorations”.Footnote 61 The Ibn Taymiyyan method is an attack on the vast majority, if not all, of the tafāsīr written before him; because, as Norman Calder has argued, the Ibn Taymiyyan method creates the “possibility of tafsīr bi’l- adīth which retrospectively casts the whole tradition into the shade of al-tafsīr bi’l-raʾy”.Footnote 62

The nature of the relationship between al-Suy ī, Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr needs to be examined in detail, for whilst al-Suy ī employs a ‘radical hermeneutic’ method, there are a number of elements of al-Suy ī's worldview that are incompatible with Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr. Such a discussion deserves a treatment that cannot be met fully in this article, but the use of sources in al-Durr al-manthūr will begin to highlight differences in the exegetical approaches of al-Suy ī and Ibn Kathīr.

The way in which Ibn Kathīr wrote his Tafsīr makes a direct statistical comparison with al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr extremely difficult. Ibn Kathīr does not always give the sources of his ādīth,Footnote 63 and he cites his material in a different way. The data sample taken has also been slightly smaller, comprising twelve sūras (all sūras ending in ‘1’, i.e. Q. 1, 11, 21. . . 111).Footnote 64 As with the sample taken from al-Durr al-manthūr, it is likely that some sources have not been captured, but it does provide a general overview of Ibn Kathīr's method and preferred sources.

In the data below one noticeable difference is found in the distribution of the sources between the second and fifth centuries irjī. In terms of citations, both Ibn Kathīr and al-Suy ī cite authors who died in the fourth century most frequently. However, Ibn Kathīr shows a greater preference for sources from the second and third centuries, whereas al-Suy ī relies on later sources:

This trend is largely a result of Ibn Kathīr's preference for citing from the ‘seven books’, that is the ī s of al-Bukhārī and Muslim; the Sunans of al-Tirmidhī, al-Nasāʾī, Abū Dāʾūd and Ibn Māja (i.e. the ‘six books’); and the Musnad of mad b. anbal. Al-Suy ī does cite from these works, but to a much lesser degree.

The data show the extent of Ibn Kathīr's reliance on these seven books, making up almost half of the citations in his Tafsīr (43.98%), as opposed to al-Suy ī's much less frequent reference to them (only 8%). The ratio between the extent of quotation from the seven books by the two authors reveals Ibn Kathīr's preference for the ī ayn: roughly a third of the citations from the seven books are from al-Bukhārī and Muslim (30.29%), as opposed to the lower figure of 22.4% in al-Durr al-manthūr. Likewise, al-Suy ī has a greater preference for al-Tirmidhī, Ibn Māja, Abū Dāʾūd and al-Nasāʾī. The almost identical use of Ibn anbal (28.93% and 28.52%) shows the importance of the Musnad as source for both authors. These data present a number of questions: first, why does Ibn Kathīr rely far more heavily on the seven books? Second, why does Ibn Kathīr have a greater preference for the ī ayn? Last, what do these uses of source material indicate about the hermeneutic methods employed by al-Suy ī and Ibn Kathīr?

The relationship between Ibn Kathīr and Ibn Taymiyya is much closer than that between al-Suy ī and Ibn Taymiyya. Ibn Kathīr not only attempted to implement Ibn Taymiyya's ‘radical hermeneutics’, but was closely allied with his theological and epistemological worldviews; al-Suy ī was not. Many of al-Suy ī's theological opinions were incompatible with both Ibn Taymiyyan thought and al-Suy ī's anbalī contemporaries. For example, al-Suy ī accepted the Mīlad al-Nabī celebrations,Footnote 66 and campaigned for the orthodoxy of Ibn al-Fār and Ibn al-ʿArabī.Footnote 67 It is, therefore, important to see al-Suy ī's use of Ibn Taymiyya's ‘radical hermeneutics’ as an adoption of a method, but not necessarily hand in hand with a similar worldview.

The use of ādīth establishes a link between the Ibn Taymiyyan method and al-Durr al-manthūr. However, when the types of ādīth that are included in al-Durr al-manthūr are considered, a divergence between Ibn Taymiyya and al-Suy ī can be seen. Ibn Taymiyya does not simply stress a need to return to ādīth to perform exegesis, but a need to use authentic traditions from the Prophet and the salāf. This preference for authentic traditions can be seen in Ibn Kathīr's exegesis, and the high reliance on the seven books. Al-Suy ī only uses ādīth, but, as has been seen above, he is less concerned with authenticity. It would be wrong to suggest that al-Suy ī was not at all concerned with the issue (and at times he does state whether a adīth is ī , asan, or aʿīf), but there is a far lesser desire to focus on the question of authenticity. Al-Suy ī's greater reliance on later collections outside of the six ‘canonical’ collections and the Musnad of Ibn anbal does not mean that the ādīth were not authentic, but Ibn Kathīr's continual reference to mad b. anbal, Muslim and al-Bukhārī creates an image of orthodoxy and ‘soundness’ - something with which al-Suy ī seems less concerned. As mentioned above, al-Durr al-manthūr does, on occasion, include ‘soundness clusters’, where a adīth is cited from all or most of the seven books. These are, however, relatively rare, and appear to be a means by which al-Suy ī can emphasize one particular tradition over others. Ibn Kathīr, on the other hand, is more interested in developing an ‘aura’ of soundness, running throughout his exegesis.

Al-Suy ī's exegesis is a much longer work, which accounts for the lower utilisation of the seven collections. This is a crucial difference between al-Suy ī and Ibn Kathīr. Al-Suy ī includes a great many works from the supplementary genres of tafsīr, i.e. works concerned with f āʾil al-Qurʾān, asbāb al-nuzūl, qiraʾāt etc. Al-Suy ī also includes far more ādīth from non-canonical collections. Whilst Ibn Kathīr does make use of authors such as Ibn Abī ’l-Dunyā, the presence of non-canonical collections is much reduced. The works outside of the seven books also tend to be muʿjam works written by scholars such as Ibn ajar, al- abarānī, ʿAbd al-Razzāq and al-Bazzār. Again, al-Suy ī also makes much use of these works, but, in addition, he frequently consults shorter m annaf collections, by authors such as Ibn Abī ’l-Dunyā and Abū ’l-Shaykh. It is in these additional sources that al-Suy ī's hermeneutic method can be seen to markedly different to those of Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr. Al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr marks a bridge between the ‘traditional’ or ‘main-stream’ classical tafsīr tradition and Ibn Taymiyya's ‘radical Qurʾānic hermeneutics’.

Al-Suy ī blends a adīth-based approach with the traditional Qurʾānic sciences, as expounded in his own K. al-Itqān. The work is firmly entrenched in the tafsīr tradition, which is reflected in the types of sources from which al-Suy ī draws. Comparing Ibn Taymiyya's Muqaddima (along with the introduction to Ibn Kathīr's Tafsīr) and al-Suy ī's K. al-Itqān, a distinction can be made between the Ibn Taymiyyan reliance and stress on the Qurʾān, the sunna and the salāf being used to understand the Qurʾān, and al-Suy ī's exposition of the Qurʾānic sciences as the vehicles of interpretation. A number of scholars have noted how Ibn Taymiyya uses ‘radical’ hermeneutic methods to undermine the positions taken by those with whom he disagreed,Footnote 68 and his approach to Qurʾānic studies shows similar objectives in attacking the vast body of tafsīr bi’l-maʾthūr works. The principle that separates al-Suy ī from Ibn Taymiyyan Qurʾānic hermeneutics is that al-Suy ī is working within the tafsīr tradition. He is not attacking the tafsīr tradition and this is reflected in his source materials.

Walid Saleh includes al-Suy ī alongside Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr. Perhaps unintentionally, there is the implication that all three presented a united front on how tafsīr should be done. There is much in al-Suy ī's own worldview that shows that they differed significantly on a number of different issues. Al-Suy ī was aware of Ibn Taymiyya, and cited him in some of his works. At times he agrees with Ibn Taymiyya (such as his views on logic),Footnote 69 at others they see the world quite differently. Regarding exegetical methods, al-Suy ī does cite Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr in his K. al-Itqān. Al-Suy ī refers to Ibn Tamiyya infrequently; but he does feature in al-Suy ī's section on asbāb al-nuzūl (the ‘Occasions of Revelation’).Footnote 70 Al-Suy ī includes a long citation from Ibn Taymiyya which argues that even if a verse were revealed concerning a specific incident or person, the ruling is not just applicable in that situation or to that individual. Al-Suy ī follows this with a note, stating the contrary, that there are instances of verses being revealed concerning specific persons (e.g. Abū Bakr in Q. 92:17–18). Al-Suy ī supports this with evidence from none other than Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī.Footnote 71 Ibn Taymiyya is used here as one source amongst a great many, and his thought does not appear to have had a significant impact on al-Suy ī's Qurʾānic hermeneutics. In the latter half of this chapter on asbāb al-nuzūl al-Suy ī exhibits are far more sophisticated approach to utilising this material, examining how to make judgments between competing asbāb;Footnote 72 and teasing out nuances in phraseology: for example, al-Suy ī points out that the statement ‘and he recited’ in a sabab does not mean ‘and then the verse was revealed’.Footnote 73 Al-Suy ī's engages with Ibn Kathīr to a greater extent, but, as with Ibn Taymiyya, Ibn Kathīr is one voice amongst many. At times al-Suy ī agrees with him,Footnote 74 but he often disputes with him.Footnote 75 This indicates two things: first, that al-Suyūtī, despite using a similar hermeneutic method, did not always hold the same views as Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr; and second, that al-Suy ī is thoroughly immersed in the exegetical tradition and the debates within it.

Al-Durr al-manthūr and the Sunnī Tafsīr Tradition

In his recent article on the historiography of tafsīr, Walid Saleh argues that the tafsīr genre is genealogical because of its dependence on preceeding scholarship. He rightly argues that this “inherited corpus constituted a core that was continuously cited or, if not, purposefully discarded; thus even when not present, the core was determinative since it was foundational”.Footnote 76 Importantly, Saleh goes on to comment:

There was, moreover, a constant shuffle in the hierarchy of individuals who were considered authorities. The core of cited material was also added to, refined, reassessed, or simply rejected. We also witness the development of distinctive separate cores of tafsīr material. There was a ūfī core, a Sunnī inherited core and a Shīʿī inherited core.Footnote 77

It is necessary to view Ibn Taymiyya's Qurʾānic hermeneutics as an attempt to challenge this core. The stress on the Qurʾān being used to interpret the Qurʾān is an attempt to circumvent the ‘core’ in the first instance, with some recourse to the ‘core’ when there is need to do so: “The point is that you should seek the interpretation of the Qurʾan from the Qurʾan itself, and if you do not find it there, then from the Sunna”. Footnote 78

There are problems generated by such a response to interpreting the Qurʾān, which can be seen in the later, more commonly published recension of the tafsīr, where Ibn Kathīr finds it necessary to draw “into his usual orbit the standard classical works of tafsīr (al-Zamakhsharī, al-Qur ūbī and al-Rāzī)”.Footnote 79 In essence, Ibn Kathīr found it difficult to circumvent the tafsīr tradition in its entirety. It is possible to recognise the emergence of a new core, one which al-Suy ī develops in his al-Durr al-manthūr. It is in al-Suy ī's exegesis that one can see the relationship between this new emergent adīth-orientated core and the wider Sunnī core: al-Durr al-manthūr bridges the gap. Although it is not entirely evident from the form that al-Durr al-manthūr takes, al-Suy ī is blending two distinct cores: first, the Qurʾān and adīth-based Ibn Taymiyyan method, seen in the use of scholars such as Ibn Abī ātim and Ibn Mardawayh; alongside the more mainstream tafsīr tradition, seen particularly in his use of Ibn Jarīr al- abarī. Al-Suy ī's four main sources represent both exegetical ‘cores’. However, the main core of the tafsīr tradition is also represented in the use of the supplementary genres of tafsīr, from taʾrīkh to f āʾil al-Qurʾān and lugha. The traditional Sunnī core and the ‘radical’ hermeneutics in al-Durr al-manthūr draw on a similar range of material.

Walid Saleh views al-Suy ī's exegetical output as a “triad of works on tafsīr, incorporating the Tafsīr al-Jalālayn, al-Durr al-manthūr and his unfinished ashiyya on al-Ba awī”.Footnote 80 However, it is also necessary to read al-Durr al-manthūr in the context of his work on the modes of exegesis, his K. al-Itqān. In the work it is possible to see al-Suy ī alluding to these two distinct cores (the adīth-based and tafsīr-based) quite openly. In his introduction to the K. al-Itqān al-Suy ī lists his principal sources, dividing them into different categories. He refers to

Books of tradition: the Qurʾānic commentaries of Ibn Jarīr, Ibn Abī ātim, Ibn Mardawayh, Abū ’l-Shaykh, Ibn Habbān [sic], al-Firyabi, Abd al-Razzāq, Ibn al-Mundir, Saʿīd b. Man ūr (his collection being a part of his Sunan), and al- ākim (his collection being a part of his Mustadrak); the commentary on the Qurʾān of al- āf Imād al-Dīn b. Kathīr; Fadāʾīl al-Qurʾān by Abū ʿUbayd; F āʾil al-Qurʾān by Ibn al- arīs [sic]; F āʾil al-Qurʾān by Ibn Abī Shaybah; al-Masāhif of Ibn Ashtah, al-Masāhif by Ibn Abī Dawūd; al-Radd alā man khālafa Mishaf [sic] Uthmān by Ibn Abī Bakr al-Anbārī; Akhlāq Hamalat al-Qurāʾn by al-Ājari [sic], al-Tibyān fi Ādāb Hamalat al-Qurʾān by al-Nawawī; Sharh al-Bukhārī by Ibn Hajar; and other collections of traditions and narrations too numerous to be mentioned.Footnote 81

As well as including a final section which cites a number of standard Sunnī exegeses including: al-Zamakhsharī, Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī, al-Isfahānī, al-Hūfī, Abū ayyān al-Gharnā ī, al-Qushayrī, Ibn al-Jawzī, Ibn ʿAqīl, al-Wā idī, al-Māwardī, al-Juwaynī and (interestingly) Ibn Taymiyya.Footnote 82 These two lists are essential for gaining an understanding of what al-Suy ī is trying to achieve in al-Durr al-manthūr. Notably, al-Suy ī cites the tafsīr of Ibn Kathīr, listing it under ‘books of tradition’. He also cites Ibn Taymiyya, although only his Qawāʾid al-tafsīr. Between these two groups of exegeses, al-Suy ī includes sources on: variant readings, philology and linguistics; law; ʿijāz al-Qurʾān; other subjects; orthography; and books ‘comprehensive in nature’.Footnote 83 Al-Suy ī sandwiches all of these other subjects between works on tafsīr, both standard and adīth-based. In effect, al-Suy ī includes all of these supplementary works under the rubric of tafsīr.

Saleh interprets al-Suy ī's vision of tafsīr as one in which “the place where individual atomised interpretive units are collated from the adīth literature - tafsīr is just collation of already existing narrated material”.Footnote 84 There is a need, however, to see beyond the form and structure that al-Suy ī employs in al-Durr al-manthūr, as it does the work some disservice to describe it as ‘just collation’. Saleh implies that collation precludes any argumentation, and that there is little possibility for engagement with the wider Sunnī tafsīr tradition (and the Sunnī ‘core’) and/or the development of nuanced exegetical positions. Al-Durr al-manthūr is much more complex than simply being a regurgitation or rearrangement of ādīth. There are some notable instances of al-Suy ī arguing unexpected positions, showing that al-Suy ī is not simply throwing ādīth at the Qurʾān to cobble together an exegesis, and that he deploys ādīth carefully to force the reader to come to particular conclusions,Footnote 85 in much the same way as al- abarī leads his readers to come to a specific reading - although al- abarī is often open about his own views, whereas al-Suy ī is not.

Al-Durr al-manthūr has a number of peculiar characteristics beyond the use of ādīth only. One of these is the use of prayers and prayer formulae in the work, which are found far more readily than one would normally encounter. Prayers and prayer formulae appear in unusual places in the text, places where no other exegete includes them. One such example is in al-Suy ī's treatment of the Light Verse (Q. 24:35). The first adīth that al-Suy ī includes is a prayer and its location is something that should, perhaps, be seen as being significant. The prayer is a famous one, appearing in al-Bukhārī's ī , so it is not surprising that al-Suy ī should include it in al-Durr al-manthūr; but, it has very little to do with the Light Verse itself, save a reference to God being the ‘Light of the Heavens and the Earth’. Given the long list of God's titles in the prayer, it could have easily been placed elsewhere. The prayer reads:

O God! Praise be to You! You are the Lord of the Heavens and the Earth, and that which is in them! Praise be to You! You are the Light of the Heavens and the Earth, and that which is in them! Praise be to You! You are the Support (qiyām) of the Heavens and the Earth, and that which is in them! You are the Truth; Your voice is Truth; Your promise is Truth; Your meeting (with us) is Truth; the Garden is Truth; the Fire is Truth; the Hour is Truth!. . .Footnote 86

It is extremely rare for a tafsīr of the Light Verse to begin with reference to this or any other supererogatory prayer.Footnote 87 Al-Suy ī actually includes three different prayers at the start of his exegesis of the Light Verse, before moving into his exegesis proper. Prayers are also readily found elsewhere in al-Suy ī's exegesis, particularly in his tafsīrs of verses with particular significance, such as Sūrat al-Fāti a, the Throne Verse and the Muʿawwidhatān.Footnote 88

Although often neglected as a part of his worldview, al-Suy ī was a shādhilī and an active defender of Sufism. Al-Suy ī's defence of Ibn ʿArabī is a case in point. From Ibn Taymiyya's assault on Ibn ʿArabī onwards,Footnote 89 the scholarly community had persistent concerns about his orthodoxy; a number of tracts were written in the late Mamluk period which denounced Ibn ʿArabī as a heretic, to which Sufi scholars responded and a relatively heated debate ensued.Footnote 90 Responding to an attack on Ibn ʿArabī by al-Biqāʿī in 888/1483, al-Suy ī wrote a reply entitled al-Tanbīh al-ghābī fī takh iʾat Ibn ʿArabī (The Warning to the Idiot concerning the Faulting of Ibn ʿArabī). In this work al-Suy ī defends Ibn ʿArabī's Sufism and his orthodoxy, concluding that any of his more heterodox statements can be interpreted through allusion and allegory as being orthodox, and not kufr.Footnote 91 He similarly defended Ibn al-Fār in his Qamʿ al-muʿārid fī n rat Ibn al-Fārid, which shows al-Suy ī embroiling himself in a similar public debate about the orthodoxy of Ibn al-Fār in 875/1470. Al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr was written in between these two defences of Sufism in 898/1493.Footnote 92

Is there, then, any trace of Sufism in al-Durr al-manthūr? The inclusion of prayers and prayer formulae suggest that al-Durr al-manthūr has some shādhilī leanings. The Shādhilīs are famed for their particularly strong focus on supererogatory prayers and the use of litanies.Footnote 93 This is not to say that other Sufis did not compose litanies ( zāb), but there is a great proliferation of them amongst the shādhilīs. Indeed, of the few works that have been handed down from al-Shādhilī himself all are litanies, and further litanies were composed by other Shādhilīs, such as Abū ’l-ʿAbbās al-Mur ī and Ibn ʿA āʾ Allāh al-Iskandarī. Al-Suy ī also engaged in the genre, with his K. ʿAmal al-yawm wa’l-layla, a collection of prayers possibly aimed at the Sufi community.Footnote 94 In another work of his on angels, al- abāʾik fī akhbār al-malāʾik, al-Suy ī associates set prayers with the angels and with the Prophet.Footnote 95 Prayers, then, are an important part of al-Suy ī's worldview. Although the inclusion of prayer formulae does not mean that the exegesis is ‘Sufi’, it does suggest that there is some influence of shādhilī ideas on al-Suy ī's tafsīr.

If it is acknowledged that prayers formed an important part of shādhilī dhikr, al-Suy ī's treatment of Q. 24:35 takes on a slightly different tone. Just as the prayer-dhikr is used as the entrance to mystical experience by shādhilīs, al-Suy ī, likewise, begins his exegesis of the Light Verse with a prayer. Al-Suy ī deploys ādīth to articulate particular ideas; this may be being done extremely subtly, but it is there nonetheless. Such an employment of ādīth by al-Suy ī indicates an intricate engagement with the tafsīr tradition. The exegesis is not simply “collation of already existing narrated material” but a sophisticated manipulation of individual units of ādīth to generate a specific response to the Qurʾān, with an underlying kerygmatic message hidden within it.

Another example of engagement with the tafsīr tradition can be seen in al-Suy ī's handling of lexicological material. Al-Suy ī was well acquainted with linguistic theory, writing a number of highly technical works in the field,Footnote 96 and this knowledge must surely have come to influence the way in which al-Suy ī arranges the ādīth he includes for the exegesis of a particular word. It would seem a mistake to presume that al-Suy ī had no view on what a word meant. Importantly, in some circumstances al-Suy ī's own view can be seen in the sections of the Tafsīr al-Jalālayn for which he was responsible. The Tafsīr al-Jalālayn presents a summary of lexical material, tending give only a single interpretation of a particular word, but the same word receives a full and explicated treatment in al-Durr al-manthūr. For example, al-Suy ī only gives the the interpretation of fā ir in Q. 35:1 as ‘badīʿ (originator)’ in the Tafsīr al-Jalālayn,Footnote 97 but he also gives the alternate reading of ‘khāliq’ in al-Durr al-manthūr.Footnote 98 Al- abarī and al-Suy ī often include the same debates about lexicology; it is just that the debates are harder to see in al-Durr al-manthūr. For example, the meaning of the word falaq in Q. 113:1 is discussed in most exegeses, and al-Suy ī includes all of the main theories about its meaning.Footnote 99 Surely this is a sign of engagement with the tafsīr tradition? There are many other examples, and not simply of his treatment of lexical material, but a full discussion of this cannot be made easily here.

Walid Saleh views the works of Ibn Taymiyya, Ibn Kathīr, al-Suy ī and al-Shawkānī (d. 1250/1832) as establishing a challenge to the classical Sunnī tradition, and creating a form of exegesis that almost refused to engage with it. Saleh also implies that adīth-based exegesis cannot be innovative or articulate specific ideas. This is not the case with al-Durr al-manthūr. Although the form of the work implies that it is adopting Ibn Taymiyya's method of exegesis, there is little to suggest that al-Durr al-manthūr is working outside of the tafsīr tradition. Part of the reason for this is the absence of any interpretation of the Qurʾān qua Qurʾān. This is an essential part of the Ibn Taymiyyan-Ibn Kathīrian method and it is not found in al-Durr al-manthūr. Another reason for the differences between al-Durr al-manthūr and Ibn Kathīr's Tafsīr is that by the time al-Suy ī has widened the scope of the traditions that are included in the exegetical project such a vast body of material is presented that makes the articulation of ideas possible, if not a necessity. With so many different exegetical opinions often being suggested at the same time the work would become unreadable, if there were no authorial input or control over the text. However, the work is readable, and, despite appearing as a gallimaufry of fragmentary exegetical units, provides logical and intelligible interpretations of the Qurʾān.

Conclusions

The relationship between ādīth and tafsīr has always been complex. ādīth have a role in tafsīr, and tafsīr plays a part in collections of ādīth; but they remain quite distinct genres, and were often written by very different types of scholars. The exegete uses ādīth, but only as part of a range of different methodological tools for explaining and interpreting the Qurʾānic text. The mu addith was largely focused on the sunna of the Prophet; any Qurʾānic exegesis was subsidiary, almost irrelevant. However, in reality the interaction is even more complex, as many areas of exegesis, such as naskh, asbāb al-nuzūl, qiraʾāt etc., are heavily reliant on ādīth; to which al-Suy ī's K. al-Itqān is testament. Al-Durr al-manthūr, however, takes this relationship and makes it symbiotic, rather than distinct. Al-Suy ī, as in many of his other works, appears to be attempting to reaffirm the primacy of ādīth in scholarship.

Read in conjunction with another tafsīr one can see the debates contained within the tafsīr tradition, and how such debates are played out in the adīth literature. Al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr neither spurns the predominant Sunnī exegetical tradition, nor lacks the articulation of any nuanced opinions. It is possible to read al-Durr al-manthūr as a supplement to other exegeses, and to the Sunnī tafsīr tradition. A means by which someone reading an exegesis in the Sunnī core, can easily see the relevant ādīth realted to a particular exegesis.

The use of sources reveal much about al-Suy ī's aims for the work, and it has been shown that al-Suy ī has chosen and rejected specific works. Al-Durr al-manthūr has four main sources, Ibn Abī ātim, Ibn Jarīr al- abarī, Ibn al-Mundhir and ʿAbd b. amīd, some of whom are now largely forgotten and unknown, particularly as exegetes,Footnote 100 on top of whom al-Suy ī adds further layers of exegetical interpretation from different sources. His use of sources shows that al-Suy ī was using specific texts in particular ways, showing a great deal of care in the shaping and composition of the collection. The fact that a number of authors are missing, or are infrequently cited, is also important. From other works written by al-Suy ī it is possible to see that he knew of the texts, making their absence from al-Durr al-manthūr all the more noticeable. Likewise, a comparison with al-Suy ī's K. al-Itqān, shows that al-Suy ī is specifically taking his ādīth for al-Durr al-manthūr from texts written in a particular period, namely works of the ‘silver’ age of adīth scholarship, namely the fourth and fifth centuries ijrī.Footnote 101 It is also important to acknowledge that late mediaeval and Mamlūk scholarship had moved to a book-orientated culture, to which al-Suy ī's al-Durr al-manthūr testifies in abundance.Footnote 102 In the Mamlūk period one can see a move to book citation, rather than personal citation; such a shift in academic practice undoubtedly changed the form works took in this period.

There are obvious similarities to the Qurʾānic hermeneutics of Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr, but it is necessary to acknowledge that the employment of a similar methodology does not mean that al-Suy ī shares a similar worldview. There is much in al-Suy ī's writings to suggest the contrary. Whilst al-Suy ī's decision to use ādīth (and ādīth only) in al-Durr al-manthūr established a link wih Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr, it is misleading to suggest that this signals a rejection of the rest of the tafsīr genre. Indeed, al-Durr al-manthūr shows that al-Suy ī was deeply engaged with the exegetical tradition. There is even a suggestion that al-Suy ī is taking on the Ibn Taymiyyan method and challenging it: subverting the method from within. Al-Suy ī takes a methodology that was intended to challenge and critique the Sunnī ‘core’ and makes it part of the Sunnī core itself.

Evidence of al-Suy ī's debates with the tafsīr tradition in al-Durr al-manthūr may not be overtly apparent. At first sight the work does not appear to be articulating specific kerygmatic message; but, the arrangement of the ādīth in the work, and the stress on certain themes, do show that it is possible to do so through the arrangement and selection of ādīth. Just because al-Suy ī does not say things openly does not mean that they are not being said.

Al-Suy ī differs from Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn Kathīr in a two siginificant ways. First, al-Durr al-manthūr does not use the Qurʾān to interpret the Qurʾān - one of the principles of Ibn Taymiyya's radical hermeneutics. Second, al-Suy ī casts the net of sources much more widely, including a significant increase in the number of ādīth - this enables al-Suy ī to engage with the exegetical tradition more fully.

It has not been possible to show in any great detail the ways in which al-Suy ī manipulates the ādīth in his collection to articulate a kerygmatic message, and much more research is necessary to do so. However, it has been seen that al-Suy ī does, pace Saleh, engage with the Sunnī exegetical core and the debates found within it. The analysis of the sources of al-Durr al-manthūr reveals the way in which al-Suy ī composed the work, basing it on four main sources, and adding to them from other works. The source analysis also highlights differences in the exegetical approaches of al-Suy ī and Ibn Taymiyya-Ibn Kathīr. Above all, it is necessary to read al-Durr al-manthūr with care, as much of the debate and message contained within it can only be understood through an appreciation of the way in which the ādīth are arranged by al-Suy ī.

Appendix A – General Overview of the Sample Data

Appendix B – Authorities of the ādīth

The following table shows the companions who are cited as authorities of ten ādīth or more. In the sample al-Suy ī uses over six hundred different authorities and many are just used once. The majority of the ādīth are given a single authority, but there are occasions where more than one is given.

Appendix C Named Sources in al-Durr al-manthūr

The following is a list of the authors cited by al-Suy ī in the sample taken from al-Durr al-manthūr. The first item in the list is the name used by al-Suy ī when he cites an author, followed by the author's full name and date of death. Some of the authors have been difficult to locate in biographical dictionaries,Footnote 104 and, where possible, any references to written works given by al-Suy ī in al-Durr al-manthūr have been used to corroborate an author's identity (see Appendix D). This has not been possible in all cases, and some attributions remain likely, yet unconfirmed, and in others there has been a degree of informed speculation, and these have been marked (?).Footnote 105

First Century

  • There is none.

Second Century

  • Ibn Abī Malayka; (d. 117/735-6)

  • Ibn Is āq; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Is āq b. Yasār (d. 150/767-8)

  • Juwaybir; Juwaybir b. Saʿd (d. 150/767)

  • Ibn Jurayj; ʿAbd al-Malik b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz b. Jurayj (d. 150/767-8)

  • Mālik; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mālik b. Anas b. Mālik b. Abī ʿĀmir al-A b ī (d. 179/795-6)

  • Ibn al-Mubārak; ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Mubārak b. Wādi al- a alī (d. 181/797)

  • Sufyān b. ʿUyayna; Sufyān b. ʿUyayna b. Maymūn al-Hilālī (d. 196/811-2 or 198/814)

  • Ibn Wahb; ʿAbd Allāh b. Wahb b. Muslim al-Fihrī al-Qurayshī (d. 197/812-3)

  • Wakīʿ; Wakīʿ b. al-Jarrā b. Mulay al-Ruʾāsī Abū Sufyān (d. 197/812-3)

Third Century

  • al- ayālisī; Abū Dāʾūd Sulaymān b. Dāʾūd b. al-Jārūd al- ayālisī (d. 203 or 204/818-20)

  • al-Shāfiʿī; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Idrīs b. al-ʿAbbās al-Shāfiʿī (d. 204/819-20)

  • Dāʾūd b. al-Mu abbar; Dāʾūd b. al-Mu abbar b. Q dham b. Sulaymān b. Shikwān al- āʾī (d. 206/821-2)

  • Is āq b. Bishr; Abū udhayfa Is āq b. Bishr b. Mu ammad al-Bukhārī (d. 206/821-2)

  • al-Farrāʾ; Abū Zakariyyāʾ b. Ziyād b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Ma ūr al-Daylamī al-Farrāʾ (d. 207/822-3)

  • al-Wāqidī; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. ʿUmar al-Wāqidī (d. 207/823)

  • ʿAbd al-Razzāq; Abū Bakr ʿAbd al-Razzāq b. Hammām b. Nāfiʿ al- imyārī (d. 211/827)

  • al-Firyābī; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Yūsuf b. Wāqid al-Firyābī (d. 212/827-8)

  • al- umaydī; Abī Bakr ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Zubayr b. ʿĪsā al- umaydī al-Asadī (d. 219/834-5)

  • Ādām b. Abī Iyyās; Ādām b. Abī Iyyās Abū ’l- asan al-Khurasānī al-ʿAsqalānī (d. 220/835)

  • Abū ʿUbayd; Abū ʿUbayd al-Qāsim b. Sallām (d. 224/838-9).

  • Saʿīd b. Man ūr; Abū ʿUthmān Saʿīd b. Man ūr b. Shuʿba al-Khurasānī (d. 227/841-2)

  • Musaddad; Musaddad b. Musarhad al-Asadī (d. 228/842-3)

  • Nuʿaym b. ammād; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muʿaym b. ammad b. Muʿāwiya al-Khuzāʾī (d. 228/ 843)

  • Ibn Saʿd; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Saʿd b. Māniʿ al-Ba rī al-Zuhrī Kātib al-Wāqidī (d. 230/844-5)

  • al-ʿAdanī; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Y yā b. Abī ʿUmar al-ʿAdanī al-Darāwardī (d. 234/848-9)

  • Ibn Abī Shayba; ʿAbd Allāh b. Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Abī Shayba al-ʿAbsī al-Kūfī (d. 235/849-50)

  • Ibn Rāhūyā / Ibn Rāhwayh; Abū Yaʿqūb Is āq b. Ibrāhīm b. Makhlad b. Rāhūya [Rāhwayh] al- a alī al-Marwazī (d. 238/852-3)

  • mad; Abū ʿAbd Allāh mad b. anbal (d. 241/ 855)

  • Hannād b. al-Sarī; Hannād b. al-Sarī b. M ʿab al-Dārimī al-Kūfī (d. 243/857-8)

  • Ibn Manīʿ; Abū Jaʿfar mad b. Manīʿ b. ʿAbd al-R mān al-Baghawī (d. 244/858-9)

  • ʿAbd b. amīd; Abū Mu ammad ʿAbd b. amīd b. Na r al-Kissī (d. 249/863-4)

  • amīd b. Zanjawayh (or Zanjūyah); amīd b. Mukhlad b. Zanjuya b. Qutayba al-Azdī al-Nasāʾī (d. 251/865-6)

  • Khushaysh b. A ram; Abū ʿĀsim Khushaysh b. A ram b. al-Aswad al-Nasāʾī (d. 253/867)

  • al-Bukhārī; Mu ammad b. Ismāʿīl b. Ibrāhīm b. al-Mughīra al-Bukhārī al-Juʿfī (d. 256/870)

  • al-Zubayr b. Bakkār; Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Zubayr b. Bakkār b. ʿAbd Allāh b. M ʿab al-Qurashī (d. 256/869-70)

  • Ibn ʿAbd al- akam; Abū ’l-Qāsim ʿAbd al-R mān b. ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd al- akam (d. 257/870-1)

  • Muslim; Muslim b. al- ajjāj al-Qushayrī al-Nīsābūrī (d. 261/874-5)

  • Sammūya; Abū Bishr Ismāʿīl b. ʿAbd Allāh b Masʿūd al-ʿAbdī Sammūya (d. 267/880-1)

  • Ibn Māja; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Yazīd b. Mājah al-Qazwīnī (d. 273/887)

  • Abū Dāʾūd; Abū Dāʾūd Sulaymān b. al-Ashʿath b. Is āq al-Azdī al-Sijistānī (d. 275/889)

  • al-Fāki ī; Mu ammad b. Is āq b. al-ʿAbbās al-Fāki ī (d. 275/888-9)

  • al-Tirmidhī; Abū ʿĪsā Mu ammad b. ʿĪsā b. Sawra al- akīm al-Tirmidhī (d. 279/892)

  • Ibn Abī ’l-Dunyā; Abū Bakr ʿAbd Allāh b. Mu ammad b. ʿUbayd b. Abī ’l-Dunyā (d. 281/894)

  • al-Dārimī; Abū Saʿīd ʿUthmān b. Saʿīd b. Khāid al-Sijistānī al-Dārimī (d. 282/895-6)

  • al- ārith b. Abī Usāma; Abū Mu ammad al- ārith b. Mu ammad b. Abī Usāma Dāhir al-Tamīmī al-Baghdādī (d. 282/895-6)

  • al-Qālī; Abū ʿAlī Ismāʿīl b. al-Qālī al-Qālī (d. 288/901)

  • al-Jundīsābūrī; Abū Sahl al-Sarī b. Sahl al-Jundīsābūrī (d. 289/901-2)

  • ʿAbd Allāh b. mad; Abū ʿAbd al-R mān ʿAbd Allāh b. mad b. Mu ammad b. anbal al-Shaybānī (d. 290/902-3)

  • al-Bazzār; Abū Bakr mad b. ʿAmr b. ʿAbd al-Khāliq al-Ba rī al-Bazzār (d. 292/904-5)

  • Ibn al- urays; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Ayyūb b. Y yā b. al- urays al-Bajalī al-Rāzī (d. 294/906-7)

  • Mu ammad b. Na r; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Ma r al-Marwazī (d. 294/906-7)

  • Mu ammad b. ʿUthmān; Abū Jaʿfar Mu ammad b. ʿUthmān b. Abī Shayba (d. 297/909-10)

Fourth Century

  • al-Nasāʾī; Abū ʿAbd al-R man mad b. ʿAlī b. Shuʿayb b. ʿAlī al-Nasāʾī (d. 303/915-6)

  • al- asan b. Sufyān; Abū ’l-ʿAbbās al- asan b. Sufyān b. ʿĀmir al-Nasawī (d. 303/915-6)

  • Abū Yaʿlā; Abū Yaʿlā mad b. ʿAlī b. al-Muthannā al-Tamīmī al-Maw ilī (d. 307/919-20)

  • al-Rūyānī; Abū Bakr Mu ammad b. Hārūn al-Rūyānī (d. 307/919-20)

  • Ibn Jarīr; Abū Jaʿfar Mu ammad b. Jarīr b. Yazīd al- abarī (d. 310/923)

  • Ibn Khuzayma; Abu Bakr Mu ammad b. Is āq b. Khuzayma al-Sulamī al-Nīsābūrī (d. 311/923-4)

  • Abū ’l-ʿAbbās Mu ammad b. Is āq; Abū ’l-ʿAbbās Mu ammad b. Is āq b. Ibrāhīm b. Mihrān al-Sarrāj (d. 313/925-6)

  • Abū ʿAwāna; Abū ʿAwāna Yaʿqūb b. Is āq b. Ibrāhīm al-Nīsābūrī al-Isfarāyinī al-Shāfiʿī (d. 316/928-9)

  • Ibn Abī Dāʾūd; Abū Bakr ʿAbd Allāh b. Abī Dāʾūd Sulaymān b. al-Ashʿath al-Azdī al-Sijistānī (d. 316/928-9)

  • Ibn al-Mundhir; Abū Bakr Mu ammad b. Ibrāhīm b. al-Mundhir al-Mundhirī al-Nīsābūrī (d. 318/930-1)

  • al- āwī; Abū Jaʿfar mad b. Mu ammad b. Salāma b. ʿAbd al-Malik al-Azdī al- āwī al- ajrī (d. 321/933)

  • al-ʿUqaylī; Abū Jaʿfar Mu ammad b. ʿAmr b. Mūsā b. Hammād al-ʿUqaylī al-Hijāzī (d. 322/933-4)

  • al-Kharāʾi ī; Abū Bakr Mu ammad b. Jaʿfar al-Kharāʾi ī al-Sāmarrī (d. 327/938-9)

  • Ibn Abī ātim; Abū Mu ammad ʿAbd al-R mān b. Abī ātim Mu ammad b. Idrīs b. al-Mundhir al-Tamīmī (d. 327/938-9)

  • Ibn al-Anbārī; Abū Bakr Mu ammad b. al-Qāsim b. Mu ammad b. Bishshār al-Anbārī (d. 328/940)

  • al-M āmilī; Abū ʿAbd Allāh al- usayn b. Ismāʿīl b. Mu ammad b. Ismāʿīl al-Dhabbī al-M āmilī (d. 330/941-2)

  • al- aytham b. Kulayb; Abū Saʿīd al- aytham b. Kulayb b, Shuray al-Shāshī (d. 335/946-7)

  • al-N ās; Abū Jaʿfar mad b. Mu ammad b. Ismāʿīl al-N ās (d. 338/949-50)

  • al-Marwazī; Abū Bakr mad b. Ibrāhīm al-Marwazī (d. 339/950-1)

  • Abū Saʿīd b. al-Aʿrabī; Abū Saʿīd mad b. Mu ammad b. Ziyād b. al-Aʿrabī (d. 341/952-3)

  • al- astī; Abū ’l- usayn ʿAbd al- amad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Mu ammad al- astī (d. 346/957-8)

  • Ibn Qāniʿ; Abū ’l- usayn ʿAbd al-Bāqī b Qāniʿ b. Mazrūq al-Umawī (d. 351/962-3)

  • Ibn al-Sakan; Abū ʿAlī Saʿīd b. ʿUthmān b. Saʿīd b. al-Sakan al-Mi rī al-Bazzār (d. 353/964-5)

  • Ibn ibbān; Abū ātim Mu ammad b. mad b. ibbān al-Bus ī (d. 354/965)

  • al-Ājurrī; Abū Bakr Mu ammad b. al- usayn b. ʿAlī al-Ājurrī (d. 360/970-1)

  • al-Rahmahurmūzī; Abū Mu ammad al- usayn b. ʿAbd al-R man b. Khallād al-Fārisī al-Rahmahurmūzī (d. 360/970-1)

  • Ibn Ashtah; Abū Bakr Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Ashtah al-I bahānī (d. 360/970-1)

  • al- abarānī; Abū ’l-Qāsim Sulaymān b. mad b. Ayyūb al-Lakhmī al- abarānī (d. 360/970-1)

  • Ibn al-Sunnī; Abū Bakr mad b. Mu ammad b. Is āq b. Ibrāhīm al-Dīnawarī b. al-Sunnī (d. 364/974-5)

  • Ibn ʿAdī; Abū mad ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAdī b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Jurjānī b. al-Qa ān (d. 365/975-6)

  • Abū ’l-Fat al-Azdī; Abū ’l-Fat Mu ammad b. al- usayn b. mad al-Azdī al-Maw ilī (d. 367/977-8)

  • Abū ’l-Shaykh; Abū Mu ammad ʿAbd Allāh b. Mu ammad b. Jaʿfar b. ayyān Abū ’l-Shaykh (d. 369/979-80)

  • al-Ismāʿīlī; Abū Bakr mad b. Ibrāhīm b. Ismāʿīl b. al-ʿAbbās al-Ismāʿīlī al-Jurjānī al-Shāfiʿī (d. 371/981-2)

  • al- ābūnī; Abū ʿUthmān Ismāʿīl b. ʿAbd al-R mān b. mad al- ābūnī (d. 373/983-4)

  • al-ʿAskarī; (?) Abū ʿAbd Allāh al- usayn b. Mu ammad b. ʿUbayd b. mad al-ʿAskarī (d. 375/985-6)

  • al-Dāraqu nī; Abū ’l- asan ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿUmar b. mad b. Mahdī al-Dāraqu nī (d. 385/995-6)

  • Ibn Shāhīn; Abū af ʿUmar b. mad b. ʿUthmān b. Shāhīn (d. 385/995-6)

  • al-Kha ābī; Abū Sulaymān amd b. Mu ammad b. Ibrāhīm b. al-Kha āb al-Bustī al-Kha ābī (d. 388/998)

  • Ibn Manda; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Is āq b. Manda (d. 395/1005)

  • al-Murhibī; Abū ’l-ʿAbbās ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAlī b. Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh al- ārith (d. 4th /9th century)

Fifth Century

  • Ibn Jumayʿ; Abū usayn Mu ammad b. Jumayʿ al-Ghassānī (d. 402/1011-12)

  • al- ākim; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Hamdawayh al- abbī al- ākim al-Nīsābūrī (d. 406/1016)

  • Ibn Mardawayh; Abū Bakr mad b. Mūsā b. Mardawayh b. Fūrah al-I fahānī (d. 410/1019-20)

  • Abū Saʿīd al-Naqqāsh; Mu amamd b. ʿAlī b. ʿAmr b. Mahdī al-I fahānī al-Naqqāsh (414/1023)

  • Tammām; Abū ’l-Qāsim Tammām b. Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Junayd al-Rāzī (d. 414/1023-4)

  • al-Lālakāʾī; Abū ’l-Qāsim Hibat Allāh b. al- asan b. Man ūr al- abarī al-Lālakāʾī (d. 418/1027-8)

  • al-Thaʿlabī; Abū Is aq mad b. Mu ammad b. Ibrāhīm al-Thaʿlabī (d. 427/1035)

  • Abū Nuʿaym; Abū Nuʿaym ʿAlī b. ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAlī b. Is āq al-I fahānī (d. 430/1038-9)

  • Abū Dharr al-Harawī; Abū Dharr ʿAbd b. mad b. Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh al-An ārī al-Harawī (d. 435/1043-4)

  • Abū Na r al-Sijzī; Abū Na r ʿUbayd Allāh al-Wāʾilī al-Sijzī (d. 444/1052-3)

  • al-Māwardī; Abū ’l- asan ʿAlī b. Mu ammad b. abīb al-Māwardī (d. 450/1058-9).

  • al-Bayhaqī; mad b. al- usayn b. ʿAlī al-Bayhaqī (d. 458/1065-6)

  • usayn; Abū ʿAlī al- usayn b. Mu ammad b. mad al-Marwarrūdhī al-Qā ī (d. 462/1069-70)

  • Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr; Yūsuf b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Mu ammad b. ʿAbd al-Barr al-Namrī al-Qur ubī al-Mālikī (d. 463/1070-1)

  • al-Kha īb; Abū Bakr mad b. ʿAlī b. Thābit al-Kha īb al-Baghdādī (d. 463/1071)

  • al-Wā idī; Abū ’l- asan ʿAlī b. ʿAlī b. Mu ammad b. ʿAlī b. Mattūya al-Wā idī al-Nīsābūrī (d. 468/1076)

  • Ibn al-Naqūr; (?) Abū ’l- usayn ʿAlī b. Mu ammad b. ʿAlī b. ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Naqūr al-Baghdādī al-Bazzār (470/1077-8)

  • al-Shirāzī; (?)Abū Is āq Ibrāhīm b. ʿAlī b. Yūsuf al-Shīrāzī b. Fīrūzabādī (d. 476/1083-4)

Sixth Century

  • al-Bāwardī; Abū ’l-Muzaffar Mu ammad b. Abī ’l-ʿAbbās b. mad b. Mu ammad al-Abīwardī (d. 507/1113-4)

  • al-Baghawī; Abū Mu ammad al- usayn b. Masʿūd al-Farrāʾ al-Baghawaī (d. 510/1116-7 or 516/1122-3)

  • Ibn ʿAsākir; Abū ’l-Qāsim ʿAlī b. al- asan b. Hibat Allāh Thiqat al-Dīn b. ʿAsākir (d. 571/1176)

  • al-Silafī; Abū ’l- āhir mad b. Mu ammad b. mad al-Silafī (b. Silafa) (d. 576/1180-1)

  • al-Daylamī; Shams al-Dīn Abū Thābit Mu ammad b. ʿAbd al-Malik al-Daylamī (d. 589/1193)

  • Ibn al-Jawzī; Abū ’l-Farash ʿAbd al-R mān b. ʿAlī b. Mu ammad b. al-Jawzī (d. 597/1200-1)

Seventh Century

  • ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Ru awī; Abū Mu ammad ʿAbd al-Qādir b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Ru awī al- arranī al- anbalī al- affār (d. 612/1215-6)

  • Ibn Qudāma; Muwaffaq al-Dīn Abū Mu ammad ʿAbd Allāh b. mad b. Mu ammad b. Qudāma al-Maqdisī (d. 620/1223)

  • al- iyāʾ al-Maqdisī [al- iyāʾ, or al-Maqdisī]; Abū ʿAbd Allāh iyāʾ al-Dīn Mu ammad b. ʿAbd al-W īd al-Maqdisī (d. 643/1245-6)

  • Ibn al-Najjār; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. M mūd b. al- assan b. al-Najjār Mu ibb al-Dīn al-Baghdādī al-Shāfiʿī (d. 643/1245-6)

  • Ibn Mālik; Jamal al-Dīn Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Mālik al- āʾī al-Jayjānī (d. 672/1273-4)

Eighth Century

  • al-Ashʿarī; (?) Mu ammad b. Y ya Mu ammad b. Y ya b. Abī Bakr b. Saʿd al-Ashʿarī (d. 741/1340-1)

  • al-Dhahabī; Shams al-Dīn Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. ʿUthmān b. Qaym b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Turkumānī al-Fāriqī al-Dimashqī al-Shāfiʿī al-Dhahabī (d. 748/1347-8)

Appendix D – Works Cited in al-Durr al-manthūr

The data below simply presents the authors’ names and the titles of the works as given by al-Suy ī in al-Durr al-manthūr. To see authors’ full names, see Appendix C. Each entry is followed by the number of times that the work is mentioned in the sample; however, it is important to note that the frequency that a work is cited by name does not necessarily reflect how frequently that source is actually used. Likewise, there are works that are not mentioned in the sample, such as al-Bukhārī's ī , that are not named, but are likely to be the source of many ādīth.

  • ʿAbd Allāh b. mad: (i) Zuwāʾid al-Musnad [21]; (ii) Zuwāʾid al-Zuhd [6]

  • ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Ru awī: al-Arabaʿīn [1]

  • ʿAbd al-Razzāq: al-M annaf [16]

  • ʿAbd b. amīd: (i) Musnad [4]; (ii) Tafsīr [1]

  • Abū Dāʾūd: (i) Marāsīl [3]; (ii) Nāsikh [16]; (iii) Sunan [1]

  • Abū Dharr al- arawī: F āʾil al-Qurʾān[4]

  • Abū ’l-ʿAbbās Mu ammad b. Is āq; Taʾrīkh [1]

  • Abū ’l-Shaykh: (i) al-A ama [64]; (ii) F āʾil al-Qurʾān [1]; (iii) al-Thawāb [3]

  • Abū Na r al-Sijzī: al-Ibāna [8]

  • Abū Nuʿaym: (i) al- alāʾil [16]; (ii) F āʾil al- āba [3]; (iii) al- ilya [34]; (iv) al-Maʿrifa [3]; (v) ifat al-janna [5]; (vi) Taʾrīkh I bahān [1]; (vii) al- ibb al-nabawī [1]

  • Abū Sahl al-Sarrī b. Sahl al-Jundisabūrī: adīth [1]

  • Abū Saʿīd b. al-Aʿrabī: Muʿjam [1]

  • Abū ʿUbayd: (i) F āʾil al-Qurʾān [12]; (ii) Gharīb al- adīth [1]

  • Abū Yaʿlā: Musnad [2]

  • al-ʿAdanī: Musnad [1]

  • mad: (i) al-Zuhd [40]; (ii) Musnad [5]

  • al-Ājurrī: al-Ruʿya [1]

  • al-Ashʿarī: F āʾil al- addīq [1]

  • al-ʿAskarī: (i) al-Amthāl [1]; (ii) al-Muwāʿ [1]

  • al-Baghawī: Muʿjam al- āba [4]

  • al-Bayhaqī: (i) al-Adab [1]; (ii) al-Asmāʾ wa’l- ifāt [62]; (iii) al-Baʿth [42]; (iv) al-Dakhal [1]; (v) Dalāʾil al-nubuwwa [44]; (vi) al-Khilāfiyyāt [1]; (vii) al-Maʿrifa [1]; (viii) al-Nushūr [1]; (ix) Kitāb al-Ruʾya [2]; (x) Shuʿab al-īmān [142]; (xi) Sunan [33]

  • al-Bazzār: Musnad [1]

  • al-Bukhārī: (i) al-Adab [9]; (ii) Juzʾ al-Qirāʾa [1]; (iii) Taʾrīkh [14]

  • Dāʾūd b. al-Mu abbar: Kitāb al-ʿAql [1]

  • al-Dāraqu nī: al-Afrād [5]

  • al-Dārimī: Musnad [2]

  • al-Daylamī: Musnad al-Firdaws [5]

  • al- iyāʾ al-Maqdisī: al-Mukhtāra [10]

  • al-Firyābī: Tafsīr [2]

  • al- ākim: (i) al-Kunā [4]; (ii) al-Mustadrak [3]; (iii) Taʾrīkh (Nīsābūr) [5]

  • Hannād: al-Zuhd [1]

  • al- ārith b. Abī Usāma: Musnad [1]

  • al- aytham b. Kulayb: (i) Musnad [1]; (ii) Sunan [1]

  • usayn: al-Istiqāma [2]

  • Ibn ʿAbd al-Barr: (i) Kitāb al-Masʾala [1]; (ii) Taw īd [1]

  • Ibn ʿAbd al- akam: Futū Mi r [3]

  • Ibn Abī Dāʾūd: (i) al-Baʿth [2]; (ii) al-Ma ā if [2]; (iii) al-M annaf [1]; (iv) Kitāb al-Mu t arīn [1]

  • Ibn Abī ’l-Dunyā: (i) al- wāl [2]; (ii) Kitāb al-Amal [1]; (iii) Kitāb al-ʿUqūbāt [2]; (iv) Dhamm al-gh ab [2]; (v) Dhamm al-malāhī [5]; (vi) Dhikr al-mawt [8]; (vii) al-Duʿā [1]; (viii) Kitāb al-Faraj baʿda al-shidda [2]; (ix) Kitāb usn al- ann bi’llāh [1]; (x) Kitāb al-Khāʾifīn [1]; (xi) Kitāb Makāyid al-Shay ān [1]; (xii) Kitāb al-Mamlūkayn [1]; (xiii) Kitāb Man ʿāsha baʿd al-mawt [1]; (xiv) Kitāb al-M annaf [1]; (xv) al-R ā [1]; (xvi) Kitāb al-S āb [1]; (xvii) Kitāb al- amt [1]; (xviii) Kitāb al-Shukr [1]; (xix) Kitāb al-Taqwā [1]; (xx) ifat al-janna [3]; (xxi) ifat al-nār [2]; (xxii) al-Tawba wa’l-laf [1]; (xxiii) al-Yaqīn [1]

  • Ibn Abī ātim: (i) al-Baʿth [1]; (ii) Tafsīr [2]

  • Ibn Abī Shayba: (i) al-M annaf [14]; (ii) Taʾrīkh [1]; (iii) al-Zuhd [1]

  • Ibn ʿAdī: al-Kāmil [3]

  • Ibn al-Anbārī: (i) al-Ma ā if [21]; (ii) al-M annaf [8]; (iii) al-Waqf wa’l-ibtidāʾ [11]

  • Ibn Ashtah: al-Ma ā if [2]

  • Ibn ʿAsākir: (i) Makāyid al-Shay ān [1]; (ii) Taʾrīkh (Dimashq) [3]

  • Ibn al- urays: Fadāʾil al-Qurʾān [9]

  • Ibn ibbān: (i) al- aʿafāʾ [1]; (ii) Kitāb al-Thawāb [1]

  • Ibn Jarīr: (i) al-T dhib [1]; (ii) Tafsīr [1]

  • Ibn al-Jawzī; Kitāb al- adāʾiq [1]

  • Ibn Jumayʿ: Muʿjam [1]

  • Ibn Khuzayma: Kitāb al-Basmala [1]

  • Ibn Manda: (i) Kitāb al- wāl wa’l-īmān bi-suʿāl [3]; (ii) al-Maʿrifa [1];

  • Ibn Manīʿ: Sunan [1]

  • Ibn Mardawayh: Tafsīr [4]

  • Ibn Manīʿ: Musnad [1]

  • Ibn al-Mubārak: al-Zuhd [1]

  • Ibn al-Mundhir: Tafsīr [1]

  • Ibn al-Najjār: Taʾrīkh [1]

  • Ibn Qāniʿ: Muʿjam al- āba [2]

  • Ibn Qudāma: Kitāb al-Bukāʾ wa’l-riqqa (= Kitāb al-Riqqa wa’l-bukāʾ fi akhbār al- āli īn) [1]

  • Ibn Saʿd: al- abaqāt [4]

  • Ibn Saʿīd al-Naqqāsh: Kitāb al-Q āʾ [1]

  • Ibn Shāhīn: (i) Musnad [2]; (ii) Sunan [1]

  • Ibn al-Sunnī: (i) ʿAmal al-yawm wa’l-layla [3]; (ii) al- ibb al-Nabawī [2]

  • al-I fahānī: al-Taghrīb [1]

  • Is āq b. Rahwayh: (i) Musnad [2]; (ii) Sunan [1]

  • al-Ismāʿīlī: Muʿjam [2]

  • Juwaybir: Tafsīr [1]

  • al-Kharāʾi ī: (i) Makārim al-akhlāq [1]; (ii) Masāwī al-akhlāq [6]

  • al-Kha īb: (i) Jāmiʿ [5]; (ii) Kitāb al-masʾala [1]; (iii) al-Muttafiq wa’l-muftariq [1]; (iv) Kitāb al-Nujūm [7]; (v) Taʾrīkh [12]; (vi) ālī al-talkhīs [7];

  • al-Kha abī: al-Gharīb [1]

  • Khushaysh b. A ram: al-Istiqāma [1]

  • al-Lālakāʾī: al-Sunna [2]

  • Mālik: (i) al-Muwa āʾ [1]; (ii) Tafsīr [1]

  • al-M āmilī: al-M annaf [1]

  • al-Maqdisī: ifat al-janna [1]

  • al-Mar abī: F l al-ʿilm [1]

  • al-Marwazī: (i) al-Janāʾiz [2]; (ii) Muʿjam al-shuʿarāʾ [1]

  • al-Mawārdī: Maʿrifat al- āba [1]

  • Mu ammad b. Na r: (i) Kitāb Allāh [1]; Kitāb al- alāt [4]

  • Musaddad: Musnad [5]

  • al-N ās: (i) Nāsikh [7]; (ii) Taʾrīkh [2]

  • Nuʿaym b. Hammād: al-Fitān [4]

  • al-Qālī: Amālī [1]

  • al-Rāmahurmuzī: al-Amthāl

  • al- ābūnī: al-Miʾatayn [1]

  • Saʿīd b. Man ūr: Sunan [3]

  • Sammūyah: al-Fawāʾid [1]

  • al-Shāfiʿī: al-Umm [3]

  • al-Shīrāzī: al-Alqāb [2]

  • al-Silafī: al- ayrūwāt [1]

  • Sufyān b. ʿUyayna: Tafsīr [2]

  • al- abarānī: (i) al-Awsa [34]; (ii) al-Dūʿāʾ [2]; (iii) Muʿjam al-kabīr [2]; (iv) Musnad al-Shāmī [1]; (v) al- aghīr [4]

  • Tammām: al-Fawāʾid [1]

  • al- astī: Masāʾil [1]

  • al-Tirmidhī: (i) al-Shamāʾil [1]; (ii) Nawādir al- ūl [17]

  • al-Wā idī: A bāb al-nuzūl [1]

  • Wakīʿ: (i) al-Gharar [5]; (ii) Tafsīr [4]

  • al-Zubayr b. Bakkār: (i) Akhbār al-Madīna [1]; (ii) al-Muwaffaqiyyāt [3]

Appendix E Named Sources in the Sample taken from Ibn Kathīr's al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr

Sources also cited by al-Suy ī in al-Durr al-manthūr are marked (*).

First Century

  • There is none cited.

Second Century

  • *Ibn Is āq; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Is āq b. Yasār (d. 150/767–8)

  • *Ibn Jurayj; ʿAbd al-Malik b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz b. Jurayj (d. 151/767–8)

  • al-Khalīl; Abū ʿAbd al-R mān Ahmad b. ʿAmr b. Tamīm al-Farāhīdī al-Azdī al-Y madī al-Ba rī (d. c. 175/791–2)

  • *Mālik; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mālik b. Anas b. Mālik b. Abī ʿĀmir al-A b ī (d. 179/795–6)

  • *Ibn al-Mubārak; ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Mubārak b. Wādi al- a alī (d. 181/797)

  • al-Walīd b. Muslim; Abū ’l-ʿAbbās al-Walīd b. Muslim al-Umawī al-Dismashqī (d. 195/810–11)

  • *Ibn ʿUyayna; Sufyān b. ʿUyayna b. Maymūn al-Hilālī (d. 196/811–2 or 198/814)

Third Century

  • *Abū Dāʾūd al- ayālisī; Abū Dāʾūd Sulyamān b. Dāʾūd b. al-Jārūd al- ayālisī (d. 203 or 204/818–20)

  • *al-Farrāʾ; Abū Zakariyyāʾ b. Ziyād b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Ma ūr al-Daylamī al-Farrāʾ (d. 207/822–3)

  • *ʿAbd al-Razzāq; Abū Bakr ʿAbd al-Razzāq b. Hammām b. Nāfiʿ al- imyārī (d. 211/827)

  • *al- umaydī; Abī Bakr ʿAbd Allāh b. al-Zubayr b. ʿĪsā al- umaydī al-Asadī (d. 219/834–5)

  • *Abū ʿUbayd; Abū ʿUbayd al-Qāsim b. Sallām (d. 224/838–9).

  • *Ibn Abī Shayba; ʿAbd Allāh b. Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Abī Shayba al-ʿAbsī al-Kūfī (d. 235/849–50)

  • * mad; Abū ʿAbd Allāh mad b. anbal (d. 241/855)

  • *ʿAbd b. amīd; Abū Mu ammad ʿAbd b. amīd b. Na r al-Kissī (d. 249/863–4)

  • *al-Bukhārī; Mu ammad b. Ismāʿīl b. Ibrāhīm b. al-Mughīra al-Bukhārī al-Juʿfī (d. 256/870)

  • *Muslim; Muslim b. al- ajjāj al-Qushayrī al-Nīsābūrī (d. 261/874–5)

  • Abū ʿAbd Allāh; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd al- akam (d. 268/881–2)

  • *Ibn Mājah; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. Yazīd b. Mājah al-Qazwīnī (d. 273/887)

  • *Abū Dāʾūd; Abū Dāʾūd Sulaymān b. al-Ashʿath b. Is āq al-Azdī al-Sijistānī (d. 275/889)

  • *al-Tirmidhī; Abī ʿĪsā Mu ammad b. ʿĪsā b. Sawra al-Hakīm al-Tirmidhī (d. 279/892)

  • Abū Zurʿa; ʿAbd al-R mān b. ʿAmr b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Dimashqī (d. 280/893–4)

  • *Ibn Abī ’l-Dunyā; Abū Bakr ʿAbd Allāh b. Mu ammad b. ʿUbayd b. Abī ’l-Dunyā (d. 281/894)

  • Abū anīfa al-Dīnawarī; Abū anīfa mad b. Dāʾūd al-Dīnawarī (d. 281–290/894–903)

  • *al-Dārimī; Abū Saʿīd ʿUthmān b. Saʿīd b. Khāid al-Sijistānī al-Dārimī (d. 282/895–6)

  • *al-Bazzār; Abū Bakr mad b. ʿAmr b. ʿAbd al-Khāliq al-Ba rī al-Bazzār (d. 292/904–5)

Fourth Century

  • *al-Nasāʾī; Abū ʿAbd al-R man mad b. ʿAlī b. Shuʿayb b. ʿAlī al-Nasāʾī (d. 303/915–6)

  • *Abū Yaʿlā; Abū Yaʿlā mad b. ʿAlī b. al-Muthannā al-Tamīmī al-Maw ilī (d. 307/919–20)

  • *Ibn Jarīr; Abū Jaʿfar Mu ammad b. Jarīr b. Yazīd al- abarī (d. 310/923)

  • Abū Jaʿfar al-Rāzī; (?) Abū Jaʿfar Mu ammad b. Qiba al-Rāzī (d. before 319/931–2)

  • Abū ātim al-Rāzī; Abū ātim mad b. amdān al-Rāzī (d. 322/ 933–4)

  • *Ibn Abī ātim; Abū Mu ammad ʿAbd al-R mān b. Abī ātim Mu ammad b. Idrīs b. al-Mundhir al-Tamīmī (d. 327/938–9)

  • *al- abarānī; Abū ’l-Qāsim Sulaymān b. mad b. Ayyūb al-Lakhmī al- abarānī (d. 360/970–1)

  • *Ibn ʿAdī; Abū mad ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAdī b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Jurjānī b. al-Qa ān (d. 365/975–6)

  • *al-Dāraqu nī; Abū ’l- asan ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿUmar b. mad b. Mahdī al-Dāraqu nī (d. 385/995–6)

  • al-Jarīrī; Abū’l-Faraj al-Muʿafā b. Zakariyyā al-Nahrānī al-Jarīrī (d. 390/999–1000)

Fifth Century

  • al-Jawaharī; Abū ʿAbd Allāh mad b. Mu ammad b. ʿUbayd Allāh b. al- asan al-Jawharī (d. 401/1010–11)

  • *al- ākim; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Hamdawayh al- abbī al- ākim al-Nīsābūrī (d. 406/1016)

  • *Ibn Mardawayh; Abū Bakr mad b. Mūsā b. Mardawayh b. Fūrah al-I fahānī (d. 410/1019–20)

  • *al-Kha īb; Abū Bakr mad b. ʿAlī b. Thābit al-Kha īb al-Baghdādī (d. 463/1071)

Sixth Century

  • *al-Baghawī; Abū Mu ammad al- usayn b. Masʿūd al-Farrāʾ al-Baghawaī (d. 510/1116–17)

  • *Ibn ʿAsākir; Abū ’l-Qāsim ʿAlī b. al- asan b. Hibat Allāh Thiqāt al-Dīn b. ʿAsākir (d. 571/1176)

  • *Ibn al-Jawzī; Abū ’l-Faraj b. al-Jawzī (d. 597/1200–1)

Seventh Century

  • al-Qur ubī; Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. mad b. Abī Bakr b. Faraj al-An ārī al-Khazrajī al-Andalūsī al-Qur ubī (d. 671/1272–3)

Eighth Century

  • Abū ’l-Hajjāj al-Mizzī; Jamāl al-Dīn Abū ’l-Hajjāj Yūsuf b. al-Zakīʿ ʿAbd al-R mān b. Yūsuf al-Kalbī al-Qudāʿī al-Mizzī (d. 742/1341)

  • Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. ʿUthmān; Shams al-Dīn Abū ʿAbd Allāh Mu ammad b. ʿUthmān b. Qaym b. ʿAbd Allāh al-Turkumānī al-Fāriqī al-Dimashqī al-Shāfiʿī al-Dhahabī (d. 748/1348)

Appendix F Data Sample taken from Ibn Kathīr's al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr

Appendix G - Graphs of %used for Profiles 1–3

Appendix H: Author Source Data in al-Durr al-manthūr ( ādīth cited)

Appendix I: Author Source Data in al-Durr al-manthūr (%used)

Footnotes

1

I would thank those at the Third World Congress of Middle Eastern Studies, Barcelona, July 2010, who commented on my paper, where the data in this article were first presented, and the helpful comments provided by the anonymous reviewers.

References

2 Saleh, Walid A., The Formation of the Classical Tafsīr Tradition: The Qurʾān Commentary of al-Thaʿlabī (d. 427/1035) (Leiden, 2004), pp. 67–76 Google Scholar.

3 See Gilliot, Claude, “Kontinuität und Wandel in der „klassischsen‟ islamischen Koranauslegung (II./VII. – XII/XIX Jh.),” Der Islam, LXXXV (2009), pp. 1–155 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 See Saleh, Walid A., In Defense of the Bible: A Critical Edition and an Introduction to al-Biqāʿī's Bible Treatise (Leiden, 2008)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

5 Fakhr al-Dīn Mu ammad b. ʿUmar al-Rāzī, Mafātī al-ghayb aw al-Tafsīr al-kabīr (Tehran, n.d.).

6 Another example is al-Thaʿlabī, who wishes to counter any potential criticism for his exegesis: through “the marshalling of these titles [in the Introduction], al-Thaʿlabī adopts, or wants to appear to adopt, a traditionalist hermenutiucal approach to the Qurʾān”. Saleh, The Formation of the Classical Tafsīr Tradition, pp. 68–69.

7 For a biography of al-Suy ī, see E. M. Sartain, Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī: Biography and Background (Cambridge, 1975) and Marlis J. Saleh, “Al-Suy ī and His Works: Their Place in Islamic Scholarship from Mamluk Times to the Present”, Mamlūk Studies Review, V (2001), pp. 73–89.

8 Al-Suy ī, al-Durr al-manthūr fī‘l-tafsīr bi-‘l-ma’thūr (Beirut, n.d.).

9 I have only recently been made aware of Shabir Aly's excellent thesis on al-Durr al-manthūr, which covers some similar ground to this article, but no direct statistical analysis of the data, as seen here. See Shabir Aly, ‘The Culmination of Tradition-based Tafsīr: The Qur’an Exegesis al-Durr al-manthūr of al-Suyūṭī (d. 911/1505)’. Unpublished PhD Thesis, University of Toronto, 2012.

10 E.g. al-Suy ī, [Kitāb] al-Itqān fī ʿulûm al-Qurʾān (Cairo, n.d.); idem, Lubāb al-nuqūl fī asbāb al-nuzūl (Tunis, 1981).

11 Saleh, Walid A., “Ibn Taymiyya and the Rise of Radical Hermeneutics: An Analysis of An Introduction to the Foundation of Qurʾānic Exegesis ,” in Rapoport, Yossef and Ahmed, Shahab (eds), Ibn Taymiyya and his Times (Oxford, 2010), pp. 123–162 Google Scholar.

12 Ismāʿīl b. ʿUmar b. Kathīr (ed. ʿAlī Mu ammad Bajāwī), Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿa īm (Cairo, 1978).

13 K. E. Nolin, The Itqān and its Sources: A Study of al-Itqān fī ʿulūm al-Qurʾān by Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī with Special Reference to Al-Burhān fī ʿulūm al-Qurʾān by Badr al-Dīn al-Zarkashī, Unpublished PhD. Dissertation, Hartford Seminary Foundation, 1968.

14 al-Zarkashī, [Kitāb] al-Burhān fī ʿulūm al-Qurʾān (Beirut, 1957).

15 Nolin, The Itqān and its Sources, pp. 25–31.

16 Claude Gilliot has raised concerns with some of Nolin's conclusions, however, the general principles (albeit perhaps not all of the precise details) provide an important foundation to gaining an understanding of how al-Suy ī utilised sources; see EQ, sv. “Traditional Disciplies of Qurʾānic Studies” (C. Gilliot).

17 Anton Heinen goes the furthest in considering al-Suy ī's sources, see Anton M. Heinen (ed. and tr.), Islamic Cosmology: A Study of as-Suy ī al-Hayʾa as-san a l-hayʾa as-sunn a, with Critical Edition, Translation, and Commentary (Beirut and Wiesbaden, 1982).

18 E.g. Krawulsky, Dorothea, Eine Einführung in die Koranwissenschaften: ʿUlūm al-Qurʾān (Bern, 2006)Google Scholar and McAuliffe, Jane Dammen, “Exegetical Sciences”, in The Blackwell Companion to the Qurʾān, (ed.) Andrew Rippin (Oxford, 2006), pp. 403–419 Google Scholar. Al-Suy ī's K. al-Itqān is also used exstensively in Wansbrough, John, Quranic Studies: Methods and Theories of Scriptural Interpretation (Repr. Amherst, 2004)Google Scholar.

19 E.g. Yusūf al-Sabāʿī (ed.), Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī: B ūth al-qīt fī’l-nadwa allatī aqamuhā al-majlis al-aʿlā li-riʿāyat al-fanūn wa’l-ādāb wa’l-ʿulūm al-ijtimāʿiyya bi’l-ishtirāk maʿa al-Jamīʿa al-Mi riyya li’l-dirāsāt al-tārīkhiyya 6–10 Mārs 1976 (Cairo, 1978); M mūd Shalabī, ayat al-Imām Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī (Beirut, 1998); M.J.A. Sharaf, Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī: man ajuhu wa-ārāʿuhu al-kalāmiyya (Beirut, 1981); Q.S. Dandarāwī, Adab al-Suy ī: Dirāsa naqdiyya, (Cairo, 1994); asan mad Jaghām, al-Jins fī aʿmāl al-Imām al-Suy ī, (Sūsa, 2001); and ʿAdnān M ammad Salmān, al-Suy ī al-N wī (Baghdad, 1976).

20 The work is no longer extant in its entirety, but a reconstructed text has been attempted, see Ibn al-Mundhir (ed. ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd al-M sin al-Turkī and Saʿd b. M ammad Saʿd), Kitāb Tafsīr al-Qurʾān (Medina, Dār al-Maʾāthīr, 2002).

21 Ibn Abī ātim (ed. mad Fat ī ʿAbd al-R mān al- ijāzī), Tafsīr al-Qurʾān al-ʿA īm (Beirut, Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 2006).

22 al-ʿAyyāshī, Kitāb al-Tafsīr (Qom, Chāpkhāna-yi ʿIlmiyya, 1961–1962); see also Bar-Asher, Meir M., Scripture and Exegesis in Early Imāmī Shīʿism (Leiden, 1999), pp. 56–63 Google Scholar; as a Shīʿī source al-ʿAyyāshī also includes the statements of the Imams.

23 See Saleh, Walid A., “Review: Hussein Abdul-Raof, Schools of Qurʾānic Exegesis: Genesis and Development ,” Journal of Islamic Studies, XXII (2011)Google Scholar, first published online July 8, 2011.

24 Ibn Taymiyya (ed. ʿAdnan Zarzūr), Muqaddima fī ūl al-tafsīr (Kuwait, Dār al-Qurʾān al-Karīm, 1971); some of the work has been translated by McAuliffe, Jane Dammen, “Ibn Taymiya: Treatise on the Priciples of Tafsir,” in Renard, John (ed.), Windows on the House of Islam: Muslim Sources on Spirituality and Religious Life (Berkeley, 1998) pp. 35–43 Google Scholar.

25 For discussions on the importance of the placement of ādīth in a collection, see S. R. Burge, “Reading between the Lines: The Compilation of adīṯ and the Authorial Voice”, Arabica, LVIII, 2011, pp. 168–197.

26 E.g. al-Bukhārī, ī (Riyadh, 1419/1998), K. 65 (K. Tafsīr al-Qurʾān), pp. 845–990.

27 R. Marston Speight, “The Function of adīth as Commentary on the Qurʾān, as Seen in the Six Authorative Collections”, Approaches to the History of the Interpretation of the Qurʾān, (ed.) Andrew Rippin (Oxford, 1988), pp. 63–81, p. 80.

28 Another good example is al-Suy ī's treatments of the ‘Light Verse’ (Q. 24:35) which contains 48 ādīth; and al-Suy ī's exegesis of Q. 2:185 (on awm), which includes a staggering 189 adīth. See al-Suy ī, al-Durr al-manthūr, v, pp. 47–50 and i, pp. 183–184.

29 See Appendix B; see also ʿUmar Gharāma ʿAmrawī, Fihris ādīth al-Durr al-manthūr fī’l-tafsīr bi’l-maʾthūr li-Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī (Riyadh, 1988).

30 Cf. Gilliot, Claude, “Portrait «Mythique» d’Ibn ʿAbbās”, Arabica, XXXII (1985), pp. 127–184 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

31 Cf. Bauer, Thomas, “Islamische Totenbücher. Entwicklung einer Textgattung im Schatten al-Ġazālīs”, in Studies in Arabic and Islam (Proceedings of the 19th Congress of the Union Européenne des Arabisants et Islamisants, Halle 1998), (ed.) Leder, S. et al. (Leuven, 2002), pp. 421–426, p. 424Google Scholar; and S. R. Burge, Angels in Islam: Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī's al- abāʾik fī akhbār al-malāʾik (London, 2012), pp. 21–25.

32 Cf. “There are also important (and suggestive) differences, the most prominent of which is that authority accorded to Ibn ʿAbbās in exegetical adīths is reserved for M ammad in legal adīths”. Berg, Herbert, The Development of Exegesis in Early Islam: The Authenticity of Mulsim Literature form the Formative Period (Richmond, 2000), p. 65 Google Scholar.

33 The data take into account only those ādīth with an explicit reference to soundness. Of course, the issue is slightly more complicated, in that whenever al-Suy ī cites al-Bukhārī or Muslim the implication is that a adīth is sound.

34 i.e. 11480 sources for 5087 ādīth.

35 Al-Suy ī, al-Durr al-manthūr, i, p. 6. The sources are: Mālik b. Anas (al-Muwa āʾ), Sufyān b. ʿUyayna (tafsīr), Abū ʿUbayd (f āʾil), Ibn Abī Shayba, mad (Musnad), al-Bukhārī (juzʾ al-qirāʾa), Muslim, Abū Dāʾūd, al-Tirmidhī, al-Nasāʾī, Ibn Māja, Ibn Jarīr, Ibn al-Anbārī (al-Ma ā if), Ibn ibbān, al-Dāraqu nī and al-Bayhaqī (Sunan). The authors are placed in chronological order.

36 Cf. Ignaz Goldziher, “Zur Charakteristik Gelâl ud-Dîn us-Sujû î's und seiner literarischen Thätigkeit”, in Ignaz Goldziher: Gesammelte Schriften, (ed.) Joseph Desomoggi (Hildescheim, 1969) ii, pp. 296–308.

37 See Hüseyin Hansu, “Notes on the Term Mutawātir and its Reception in adīth Criticism”, Islamic Law and Society, XVI (2009), pp. 383–408 and Wael B. Hallaq, “The Authenticity of Prophet adīth: a Pseudo-Problem”, Studia Islamica, LXXXIX (1999), pp. 75–90.

38 Speight, “The Function of adīth as Commentary”, pp. 79–80.

39 The relationship between ādīth and exegesis has been relatively understudied, save for discussions about authenticity, see Berg, The Development of Exegesis in Early Islam. Marston Speight briefly deals with the use of ādīth in exegesis; see Speight, “The Function of adīth as Commentary”, pp. 68–72.

40 See the Appendecies for details, particularly G-I.

41 For their full names and dates of death, see Appendix C.

42 Sufyān b. ʿUyayna's tafsīr is not longer extant, and was possibly not available to al-Suy ī; it may be that al-Suy ī cites this tafsīr through another text. For more on Sufyān b. ʿUyayna see EI2 , s.v. “Sufyān b. ʿUyayna b. Maymūn al-Hilālī” (Susan A. Spectorsky).

43 Cf. James A. Bellamy, The Noble Qualities of Character by Ibn Abī d-Dunyā; edited with an introduction and notes (Wiesbaden, 1973), pp. vii–x.

44 See Nolin, The Itqān and Its Sources; this seems to be a trend, for example al-Suy ī's al-Hayʾa al-saniyya is largely dependent on Abū ’l-Shaykh's K. al-ʿA ama; see Heinen, Islamic Cosmology, pp. 37–52; see also Burge, Angels in Islam, pp. 47–59.

45 See Appendices H and I for the precise figures.

46 The data-sample has been taken from Nolin, The Itqān and Its Sources, pp. 126–188. The information is not entirely comparable as it has been collected in a slightly different way, but it is similar enough to provide some useful comparison.

47 al-Zamakhsharī, al-Kashshāf ʿan aqāʾiq al-tanzīl wa ʿuyūn al-aqāwī fī wujūh al-taʾwīl (Beirut, 1987).

48 See Lane, Andrew J., A Traditional Muʿtazilite Qurʾān Commentary: The Kashshāf of Jār Allāh al-Zamakhsharī (d. 538/1144) (Leiden, 2006), pp. 86–91 Google Scholar.

49 “Despite certain reservations about the orthodoxy of all of its contents, the book was an important work of Quranic exegesis and formed a part of the curriculum of many students in the later Middle Ages. At the mosque of al-Ashraf Barsbāy, for example, it was required that the man hired as professor of anafī law be able to deliver lectures on al-Zamakhsharī's work”. Berkey, Jonathan P., The Transmission of Knowledge in Medieval Cairo: A Social History of Islamic Education (Princeton, 1992), pp. 185–186 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

50 The form of the work also has an impact on the way in which ādīth are integrated into the text. For example the nafaththāt in Q. 113:4 are treated differently in al-Durr al-manthūr and in the Tafsīr al-Jalālayn because of the form that the two exegeses take; see S. R. Burge, ‘Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī, the Muʿawwidhatān and the Modes of Exegesis,’ in Karen Bauer (ed.), The Aims and Methods of Qur’anic Exegesis (8th – 15th centuries) (forthcoming).

51 Heinen, Islamic Cosmology, p. 10.

52 Ibid., pp. 9–11.

53 Ibn al-Jawzī is cited, but only once. Many of al-Suy ī's works critique anbalī positions, particularly Ibn Taymiyya and Ibn al- ājj. Cf. al-Suy ī, usn al-maq id fī f āʾil al-mawlid; Kaptein, N. J. G., Muhammad's Birthday Festival: Early History in the Central Muslim Lands and Development in the Muslim West until the 10th/16th Century (Leiden, 1993), pp. 48–64 Google Scholar, especially pp. 58–61. However, he did agree with Ibn Taymiyya's critique of Greek logic, cf. his awn al-man iq wa’l-kalām ʿan fann al-man iq wa’l-kalām (Beirut, 1983); see Hallaq, Wael B., Ibn Taymiyya Against the Greek Logicians (Oxford, 1993), pp. xlix–xl Google Scholar; see also El-Rouayheb, Khaled, “Sunni Muslim Scholars on the Status of Logic, 1500 – 1800”, Islamic Law and Society, XI (2004), pp. 213–232 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

54 Sartain, Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī, pp. 33–37 and Geoffroy, Éric, Le Soufisme en Égypte et en Syrie: Sous les Derniers Mameloukes et les premiers Ottomans – Orientations Sprituelles et Enjeux Culturels (Damascus, 1995)Google Scholar. The influence on Sufism in al-Durr al-manthūr will be discussed in a little more detail below.

55 Al-Suy ī ( amid Algar, Michael Schub and Ayman Abdel Haleem), The Perfect Guide to the Sciences of the Qurʾān, (Reading, 2011) i, p. xxxii

56 E.g. al-Suy ī, Taʾyīd al- aqīqa al-ʿaliyya wa-tashyīd al- arīqa al-Shādhiliyya; Qamʿ al-muʿār fī n rat Ibn al-Fārid; and al-Khabar al-dāll ʿalā wujūd al-qu b wa’l-awtād wa’l-nujābāʾ wa-’l-abdal; see Sartain, Jalāl al-Din al-Suy ī, pp. 36–37.

57 E.g. al-Suy ī, Asrār tartīb al-Qurʾān (Cairo, 1376/1976).

58 Cf. Saleh, Walid A., “Prelimary Remarks on the Historiography of tafsīr in Arabic: A History of the Book Approach,” Journal of Qurʾānic Studies, XII (2010), pp. 6–40 Google Scholar.

59 Al-Suy ī's biography of Ibn Jarīr is extremely effusive about his qualities as a scholar; see Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī, abaqāt al-mufassirīn (Beirut, n.d.), pp. 82–84.

60 Saleh, “Ibn Taymiyya and the Rise of Radical Hermeneutics”, p. 125.

61 Ibid., p. 154.

62 Calder, Norman, “ Tafsīr from abarī to Ibn Kathīr: Problems in the description of a genre, illustrated with reference to the story of Abraham,” in Hawting, G.R. and Shareef, Abdul-Kader A. (eds), Approaches to the Qurʾān (London, 1993), pp. 101–140, p. 130Google Scholar.

63 Some modern scholars have attempted to find the sources, e.g. Abū ʿAbd al-R mān ʿĀdil b. Yūsuf al-ʿAzzāzī, Hidāyat al-mustansīr bi- ādīth Tafsīr Ibn Kathīr (Cairo, al-Maktaba al-Islāmiyya, 2003).

64 The data can be seen in Appendices E and F.

65 i.e. the percentage that the author is used in the work as a whole.

66 See al-Suy ī, al- usn al-maq id fī ʿamal al-mawlid; Kaptein, N. J. G., Muhammad's Birthday Festival: Early History in the Central Muslim Lands and the Development in the Muslim West until the 10th/16th Century, (Leiden, 1993), pp. 48–67 Google Scholar.

67 Th. Homerin, From Arab Poet to Muslim Saint: Ibn al-Fār , His Verse, and His Shrine (Cario, 2001), pp. 65–67.

68 Racha el Omari, “Ibn Taymiyya's ‘Theology of the Sunna’ and his Problems with the Ashʿarites,” in Rapoport and Ahmed (eds), Ibn Taymiyya and his Times, pp. 109–119, especially pp. 115–116; and Yossef Rapoport, “Ibn Taymiyya's Radical Legal Thought: Rationalism, Pluralism, and the Primacy of Intention,” in Rapoport and Ahmed (eds), Ibn Taymiyya and his Times, pp. 193–226, pp. 218–221.

69 Al-Suy ī, awn al-mantiq.

70 Al-Suy ī, The Perfect Guide to the Sciences of the Qurʾān, §9, i, pp. 55–70.

71 Ibid., i, pp. 59–60.

72 Ibid., i, pp. 63–68.

73 Ibid., i, pp. 68–69.

74 Cf. Ibid., i, p. 51 and p. 71.

75 Cf. Ibid., i, p. 12; and p. 92.

76 Saleh, “Preliminary Remarks on the Historiography of tafsīr in Arabic”, p. 18.

77 Ibid., p. 18.

78 Ibn Taymiyya, Muqaddima fī ūl al-tafsīr, p. 94; tr. McAuliffe, “Ibn Taymiya: Treatise on the Principles of Tafsir”, pp. 36–37.

79 Saleh, “Preliminary Remarks on the Historiography of tafsīr in Arabic”.

80 Ibid., p. 32.

81 Al-Suy ī The Perfect Guide to the Sciences of the Qurʾān, i, p. xxxii. [The transliteration of the names of the authors and works follows the translation, including a number of errors].

82 Ibid., i, p. xxxiii.

83 Ibid., i, pp. xxxii - xxxiii.

84 Saleh, “Preliminary Remarks on the Historiography of tafsīr in Arabic”, p. 32.

85 See S. R. Burge, “Reading Between the Lines: The Compilation of adīṯ and the Authorial Voice”.

86 Al-Suy ī, al-Durr al-manthūr, v, p. 47. [My translation].

87 Cf. Hamza, Feras, Rizvi, Sajjad with Mayer, Farhana (eds), An Anthology of Qur’anic Commentaries - Vol. 1: On the Nature of the Divine (Oxford, 2008), pp. 347–453 Google Scholar.

88 Al-Suy ī, al-Durr al-manthūr, i, pp. 2–17; i, 322–329; and vi, 416–420.

89 Knysh, Alexander D., Ibn ʿArabi in the Later Islamic Tradition: The Making of an Image in Medieval Islam (Albany, 1999), pp. 87–112 Google Scholar

90 Ibid., pp. 80–83 and 119–120; see also Homerin, From Arab Poet to Muslim Saint, pp. 55–75.

91 Knysh, Ibn ʿArabi in the Later Islamic Tradition, pp. 119–120.

92 See al-Suyūṭī, al-Durr al-manthūr, vi, p. 424. However, this may refer to a final revision, as al-Suyūṭī states in his autobiography that he sent a student to the Hijaz with his ‘tafsīr bi’l-maʾthūr’ in 879/1474, which Sartain identifies as al-Durr al-manthūr; see al-Suy ī, al-T adduth bi-niʿmat Allāh; Sartain (ed.), Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suy ī, ii, p. 157 (al-Durr al-manthūr) and i, 200. For more al-Suy ī's involvement in the Ibn al-Fār debate see, Homerin, From Arab Poet to Muslim Saint, pp. 65–75.

93 See MacGregor, Richard J. A., ‘A Sufi Legacy in Tunis: Prayer and the Shadhiliyya,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, XXIX (1997), pp. 255–277 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

94 Al-Suy ī, ʿAmal al-yawm wa-’l-layla (Cairo, 1946).

95 See Burge, Angels in Islam (throughout).

96 See Salmān, al-Suy ī al-N wī.

97 Jalāl al-Dīn al-Mahallī and al-Suy ī (tr. Feras Hamza), Tafsīr al-Jalālayn (Amman, 2007), p. 440.

98 Al-Suy ī, al-Durr al-manthūr, v, p. 244.

99 Ibid., vi, p. 418.

100 Ibn Abī Hātim is recognised more as a m addith; cf. Eerik Dickinson, The Development of Early Sunnite Hadith Criticism: The Taqdima of Ibn Abī ātim al-Rāzī (240/854–327/938) (Leiden, 2001).

101 Christopher Melchert describes the silver age as the 11th-15th centuries, and the golden period preceeding it, see Melchert, Christopher, “Review: The Canonization of al-Bukhārī and Muslim: the Formation and Function of the Sunnī adīth Canon. By Jonathan Brown,” JRAS, XVIII (2008), pp. 526–528, p. 528CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

102 Berkey, The Transmission of Knowledge in Medieval Cairo, pp. 20–25.

103 There are some ādīth which are not given an authority.

104 A range of resources have been used to locate the authors, viz. Brockelmann, Carl, Geschichte der arabischen Litteratur (Weimar, 1898–1902; Second Edition, Leiden, 1937–42)Google Scholar; Sezgin, Fuat, Geschichte der arabischen Schrifttums (Leiden, 1967–84)Google Scholar; al-Ziriklī, Khayr al-Dīn, al-Aʿlām (Cairo, 1970)Google Scholar; mad b. M ammad Ibn Khallikān; William MacGukin Slane (tr.), Ibn Khallikan's Biographical Dictionary (Paris, 1868).

105 I would like to express my gratitude to Prof. Claude Gilliot, who helped me locate some of the more obscure authors in this list, and to Dr. Karen Bauer for her comments and advice.