Al-Bayḍāwī

Savant

Nāṣir al-Dīn Abū Saʿīd ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿUmar al-Bayḍāwī was born in al-Bayḍāʾ, near Shiraz, Iran. He was qadi of Shiraz and died in Tabriz, around 685 AH (1286) according to the date most often retained. A complete scholar A Shafiʿite jurist and Ashʿarite theologian, al-Bayḍāwī wrote in several disciplines: exegesis, foundations of law, theology and history. Anwār al-tanzīl His exegesis, Anwār al-tanzīl wa-asrār al-taʾwīl (“The Lights of Revelation and the Secrets of Interpretation”), summarizes with great precision the contributions of al-Zamakhsharī for language and rhetoric, setting aside his Muʿtazilite positions, and those of Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī for theology. Short, dense and rigorous, this commentary has become a reference manual in madrasas, from the Ottoman Empire to India. It gave rise to hundreds of glosses (ḥawāshī), such as those of Shaykh-zāda or al-Shihāb al-Khafājī. Other works Minhāj al-wuṣūl is a much-commented summary of the foundations of law; Ṭawāliʿ al-anwār is a theological treatise; Niẓām al-tawārīkh is a universal story written in Persian. Photo: page from a manuscript of al-Bayḍāwī’s Niẓām al-tawārīkh.