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Khalīl ibn Isḥāq al-Jundī

Savant

Ḍiyāʾ al-Dīn Abū al-Mawadda Khalīl ibn Isḥāq al-Jundī was an Egyptian Mālikite jurist who died in Cairo in 776 AH (1374), according to the most commonly used date. His nickname al-Jundī, “the soldier”, comes from the fact that he wore soldiers’ clothing, like his father. A pious scholar He studied in Cairo with the great Mālikite masters of his time, notably ʿAbd Allāh al-Manūfī, with whom he was very close. He taught at the Shaykhūniyya madrasa. His biographers describe him as a humble, pious man and entirely devoted to science. It is reported that he participated in the defense of Alexandria during a Crusader attack in 1365. The Mukhtaṣar Al-Mukhtaṣar, which he spent more than twenty years writing, presents the entire Mālikite fiqh in an extremely condensed form: purification, prayer, zakât, fasting, pilgrimage, marriage, commerce, inheritance, justice... Khalīl indicates the opinion held in the school (al-mashhūr), which makes it a guide for the judge and the muftī. Its conciseness requires a master to be understood, and it has generated dozens of commentaries: al-Ḥaṭṭāb, al-Kharashī, ʿAbd al-Bāqī al-Zurqānī, al-Dardīr and al-Dasūqī, among others. In West Africa In the Koranic schools and maḥāḍir of Senegal, Mauritania, Mali and Nigeria, Mukhtaṣar is studied after introductory texts such as al-Akhḍarī and the Risāla of Ibn Abī Zayd. It remains the pinnacle of traditional legal training. Another work: al-Tawḍīḥ, great commentary on the Mukhtaṣar of Ibn al-Ḥājib. Photo: 19th century copy of Khalīl's Mukhtaṣar, from Kano (Nigeria).