Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Century
Author(s): Khaled El-Rouayheb
Reviewed work(s):
Source: International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 38, No. 2 (May, 2006), pp. 263-281
Published by: Cambridge University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3879973 .
Accessed: 18/08/2012 18:10
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Cambridge University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to
International Journal of Middle East Studies.
http://www.jstor.org
Int. J. Middle East Stud. 38 (2006), 263-281. Printed in the United States of America
DOI: 10.1017.S0020743806382050
KhaledEl-Rouayheb
THE GATE OF VERIFICATION:
OPENING
THE
FORGOTTEN
ARAB-ISLAMIC
FLORESCENCE
OF THE 17TH CENTURY
Little research has been done on the intellectual life of the Arab-Islamic world between the 15th and 19th centuries.This scholarly neglect almost certainlyreflects the
widespreadassumptionthat intellectual life in the Arab-Islamicworld entered a long
period of stagnationor "sclerosis"after the 13th or 14th century.This state of affairs
is often believed to have lasted until the 19th century, when Europeanmilitary and
economic expansion awakenedthe Arab-Islamicworld from its dogmatic slumber,and
inaugurateda "reawakening"or "renaissance"(nahda). An influential statement of
this view of intellectual life in the Arab provinces of the OttomanEmpire before the
19th century is to be found in Gibb and Bowen's Islamic Society and the West. Although they noted that "the barrennessof the period has been greatly exaggerated,"
they still statedthatArabic scholarlyculturehad degenerated,on the whole, into a rote,
unquestioningacquisition of a narrowand religiously dominated field of knowledge.
No "quickeningbreathhad blown" on Arab-Islamicscholarshipfor centuries.Isolated
even from Persianand Turkishinfluences, it was reducedto "living on its own past."'
The intellectual "sclerosis"that has been thought to characterizethe Arab-Islamic
world between the 15th and 18th century is often portrayedas one aspect of a more
general decline. The period between 1516 and 1798 was also supposed to have been
markedby economic decline andurbandecay,as a resultof Ottoman(mis)ruleand/orthe
Europeandiscovery of the Cape of Good Hope and subsequentchanges in international
trade routes. The research of economic historians,in particularAndr6 Raymond, has
underminedthis view. Despite periodic crises and depressions, the Arab provinces
of the OttomanEmpire seem, on the whole, to have experienced both economic and
demographicgrowthin the period, and this is reflected in the substantialgrowthof the
major Arab cities of the Empire. Cairo, Aleppo, and Damascus were all substantially
largerand more populous in the late 18th centurythanthey were in the early sixteenth.2
This new view of the economic history of the Arabprovinces duringthis period should
invite a reconsiderationof the thesis of intellectualdecline or sclerosis. Sadly, this has
not yet happened.Raymondhimself contraststhe urbanand economic expansion with
what he supposes was the prevalent"culturalapathy"in the Arabprovinces.3
AND
KURDISH
VERIFYING
SCHOLARS"
In the first decade of the 17th century, the Shi'ite Safavids under Shah 'Abbas (r. 1588-
266 KhaledEl-Rouayheb
Jalal al-Din al-Dawani (d. 1501) and 'Isam al-Din al-Isfara'ini (d. 1537).12 Some of
these new works were the following:
The cited works were widely used handbooks in Ottoman scholarly circles from the
17th century, as attested by the bibliographer Katib Celebi (d. 1657).'" Older Damascene
scholars such as the previously mentioned Hasan al-Burini (1556-1615) and Najm al-Din
Muhammad al-Ghazzi (1570-1651) do not seem to have studied such works.14 Younger
Damascene scholars such as al-Muhibbi (1650-99) and Ibn al-'Imad al-Hanbali (162379), by contrast, were well aware of the later Persian scholars' "useful works in all the
disciplines."'" There is thus some reason to believe that the works of the later Persian
scholars were indeed introduced to the scholarly milieu of Damascus in the early 17th
century by Mulla Mahmud al-Kurdi. The supposition is strengthened by the fact that
some of the Damascene pupils of Mulla Mahmud, such as CAbd al-Qadir ibn 'Abd
al-Hadi (d. 1688) and 'Uthman al-Qattan (d. 1704), are known to have taught the works
of al-Dawani and al-Isfara'ini.'6
In the somewhat more cosmopolitan atmosphere of the two Holy Cities of Mecca
and Medina, the works of al-Dawani and al-Isfara'ini may have become known at an
earlier time than in Damascus. A grandchild of 'Isam al-Din al-Isfara'ini, Qadi 'Ali
al-'Isami (d. 1598-99) settled in the holy cities, and he and his nephew 'Abd al-Malik
al-'Isami (d. 1627-28) are known to have taught the works of al-Isfara'ini there."7From
western Arabia, the works of al-Isfara'ini seem to have spread to Egypt. The Egyptian
scholars Ahmad al-Ghunaymi (d. 1634) and Ahmad al-Khafaji (d. 1659) both studied
his works while they were in the Hijaz.'8 Egyptian scholars of the 17th century went
on to write commentaries and glosses on some of the "works of the Persians." For
instance, al-Ghunaymi wrote glosses on al-Isfara'ini's commentary on al-Samarqandi's
al-Risala fi al-isticarat. Al-Ghunaymi's student, Yasin al-'Ulaymi al-Himsi (d. 1651)
wrote glosses on the commentary of the Persian-born Transoxanian scholar 'Ubaydallah
al-Khabisi (fl. 1540) on Tahdhib al-mantiq by al-Taftazani. These glosses reveal that
al-'Ulaymi was acquainted with the commentary of al-Isfara'ini on the same work.19 The
Moroccan scholar 'Abdallah al-'Ayyashi (d. 1680), who passed through Egypt on his
way to the hajj, asked a local specialist in semantics-rhetoric what handbooks he used
to teach the subject. The Egyptian scholar replied that the standard handbook had long
been al-Taftazani's longer commentary, called al-Mutawwal, on Talkhis al-miftah, but
that there was now a more recent and longer commentary by 'Isam al-Din al-Isfara'ini,
268
Khaled El-Rouayheb
Al-Muhibbi linked the teaching of the "books of the Persians"to the "opening of
the gate of tahqTq."To understandwhy he did so, it should be kept in mind that the
full significance of the introductionof "the books of the Persians"may not become
apparentmerely by looking at the contents of the works themselves. The new works
were not mere additions to librarycollections but were taught initially by scholars of
Kurdishor Persianorigin.Thereis some evidence thatPersianand Kurdishscholarshad
a distinctive mannerof teaching. Al-Muhibbi described one of the scholars he met in
Istanbulas "followingthe way of the PersianandKurdishverifyingscholars(muhaqqiqT
al-'ajam wa-l-akraid) in adhering to the principles of dialectic (iadiib al-bahth)."31 A
SCHOLARS
IN THE EAST
269
270 KhaledEl-Rouayheb
Al-Sanusi's disparagement of taqlTdwas shared by his later Maghribi commentators.
Al-Yusi, who wrote influential supercommentaries on al-Sanusi's theological and logical
works, was no less intent on "going the way of the muhaqqiqTn"than his Persian and
Kurdish colleagues. For instance, in his extended treatise on the difference between
the proprium (i.e., distinct but nonessential attributes, like laughter to man) and the
differentia (i.e., essential attributes, like rationality to man), he wrote:
There will occasionally be things we write that you will not, O reader,find elsewhere, so do not
hastento disapproveof it, being misled by those who take it upon themselvesto relate whatothers
have said andpiece it together,and for whom the ultimatein knowledge and mentalexertionis to
say: so and so has said. No by God! ... For thereis no differencebetween an imitator(muqallid)
being led and an animalbeing led, so know O readerthatI have only includedin my treatmentof
this and othertopics what I believe to be true.., .and heed the words of the Imam [Fakhral-Din
al-Razi (d. 1209)]:Whatthe Prophethas said we acceptwholeheartedly,and what his companions
have said we accept partially;as to what others have said: they are men and we are men.42
The Maghribi students of al-Yusi were not the first scholars from that region to make
an impact on the Arabic-speaking parts of the Ottoman Empire. A number of Maghribi
scholars went eastward during the 17th century, many presumably seeking to escape the
political turmoil that had engulfed Morocco after the break-up of the Sa'dian dynasty in
1603. The scholar and belletrist Ahmad al-Maqqari al-Tilimsani (d. 1632), who settled in
Damascus and Cairo, is well known for his literary history of Islamic Spain, Nafh al-tib
fi ghusn al-Andalus al-ratib.43 Another Maghribi scholar who was no less renowned in
his day was the polymath Muhammad ibn Sulayman al-Rudani (d. 1683).44 He was both
a specialist in hadith and an accomplished logician, grammarian, jurist, and astronomer.
A contemporary Moroccan scholar wrote that al-Rudani traveled far and wide in search
of prominent teachers, particularly those who could impart anything relating to the
philosophical sciences (al-'ult-m al-hikmiyyah), such as astronomy, mathematics and
logic, for which al-Rudani had a particular aptitude. Al-Rudani's search eventually took
him to Algiers, where he studied with the earlier-mentioned supercommentator on alAkhdari's didactic poem on logic, Sa'id Qaddura al-Tunisi.45 He then traveled further
East, to Egypt, Turkey, the Hijaz, and Damascus, where he died. A Damascene scholar
who studied with al-Rudani is quoted as saying the following:
His knowledge of hadith and of the principles of jurisprudenceis unequalled by anyone we
have met. As for the science of belles-lettres (adab), he is the ultimate authority.And in the
philosophicalsciences: logic, physics andmetaphysics,he was the teacherwhose knowledgecould
not be acquiredthroughnaturalmeans. And he was proficient in the sciences of mathematics:
Euclid, astronomy,geometry,Almagest, calculus, algebra,arithmetic,cartography,harmony,and
geodesy. His knowledge of these fields was unique,otherscholarsknowingonly the preliminaries
of these sciences, ratherthan the advancedissues.46
Some of al-Rudani's major works include the following:
1. Jamc al-fawa'id min jamic al-usul wa-majmac al-fawa'id; an extensive topical collation of
hadith recognized by Sunni Muslims, based on two earlier partialcollections.47There has
been some interestrecentlyin the issue of whethertherewas a reinvigorationof hadithstudies
in Mecca and Medina in the 18th century.In this regard,it is significantthat al-Rudani,who
earnedthe epithet"themuhaddithof the Hijaz,"was the principalteacherof one of the central
figures in this purportedrevival, 'Abdallahibn Salim al-Basri (d. 1722).48
271
SHATTARIS,
NAQSHBANDIS,
AND
KHALWATIS
A few years before Mulla Mahmud al-Kurdi came to Damascus and started teaching
"the books of the Persians," an Indian mystic of the Shattariyya order settled in Medina.
Sibghatallah al-Barwaji (d. 1606) quickly gained renown as a Sufi master and initiated
several local scholars into his order.54He brought with him several books written by
Indian Shattari mystics such as al-Jawahir al-Khams by Muhammad Ghawth Gwaliori
(d. 1562). Al-Barwaji translated this work from Persian into Arabic, and a commentary
on it was later written by his leading disciple, the Egyptian-born Ahmad al-Shinnawi
(d. 1619). Al-Shinnawi became the successor of al-Barwaji and was in turn succeeded
by Ahmad al-Qushashi (d. 1661), who in turn was succeeded by the Kurdish-born
Ibrahim al-Kurani (d. 1690).55 Al-Shinnawi, al-Qushashi and al-Kurani were all outspoken adherents of the controversial idea of the "unity of existence" (wahdat al-wujfid),
associated with Ibn 'Arabi and his followers. Indeed one of the major Shattari texts
studied in their circle was al-Tuhfa al-mursala ila al-nabi, a work by the Indian Shattari
mystic Muhammad al-Burhanpuri (d. 1619-20) defending the idea of wahdat al-wujtid.
Ibrahim al-Kurani wrote a commentary on Burhanpuri's work and also several independent treatises expounding and defending wahdat al-wujuid. Al-Kurani's student and
disciple Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Rasul al-Barzinji (d. 1693) translated from Persian into
Arabic a work by the Persian mystic Abu al-Fath Muhammad al-Kazaruni, also known
as Shaykh Makki (fl.1518), defending this and other controversial ideas of Ibn 'Arabi.56
This open adherence to monism marks a contrast with the Arab mystics of the 16th
century whose works have come down to us, such as 'Abd al-Wahhab al-Sha'rani
(d. 1565), Muhammad ibn Abi-l-Hasan al-Bakri (d. 1585), and 'Abd al-Ra'uf al-Munawi
(d. 1622). All of these writers seem to have been uneasy with the idea of wahdat al-wujiid,
and tended to explain away the claims of earlier monist mystics as excusable ecstatic
utterances (shatahait). To be sure, such mystics defended Ibn 'Arabi against the charge
of heresy, but they did so apologetically, claiming that the Greatest Master's language
was difficult to decipher for the uninitiated and should not be judged at face value and
that many heretical statements had been interpolated into his works.'57The attitude of alShinnawi, al-Qushashi, al-Kurani, and al-Barzinji seems to have been much bolder and
272
Khaled El-Rouayheb
had since looked at Ibn 'Arabi's works and came to the conclusion that the allegorical
explanation was untenable. He then informed the reader that there were nevertheless
scholars who defended Ibn 'Arabi's thesis understood literally, such as Jalal al-Din alDawani and Muhammad ibn 'Abd al-Rasul al-Barzinji in his translation of Kazaruni's
Persian treatise.60 It is clear that the position of al-Dawani and al-Barzinji on the issue
was much bolder and less apologetic than Sha'rani's.
This straightforward espousal of the more controversial ideas of Ibn 'Arabi was apparently not received with enthusiasm by all local scholars. For instance, some indication of
resentment may be gauged from the following biographical entry on the Yemeni mystic
Muhammad al-Habashi (d. 1642):
He was preoccupiedwith the works of [the uncontroversiallyorthodox Abu Hamid] al-Ghazali
[(d. 1111)], and hence was nicknamed "al-Ghazali."Then he left for the two Holy Cities and
frequented al-Sayyid Sibghatallah and [Sibghatallah's disciples] al-Sayyid As'ad [al-Balkhi
(d. 1636)] and Shaykh Ahmad al-Shinnawi, and regularly read the works of Ibn 'Arabi and
followed his way, and would at times make ecstatic statementsand some jurists would censure
him.6'
The passage suggests that al-Habashi's enthusiasm for Ibn 'Arabi and his ensuing
problematicstatementswas a resultof his coming into contact with Sibghatallahandhis
Medinan disciples.
A similar outspoken adherence to the theories of Ibn 'Arabi seems also to have
been characteristic of a branch of the Khalwati order that spread in Damascus in the
17th century. It was introduced into the city by a Kurdish immigrant, Ahmad al-'Usali
(d. 1639), a disciple of a Khalwati master from Gaziantep.62 Al-'Usali's Damascene disciples went on to initiate a substantial number of local scholars, including the previously
mentioned scholars Muhammad Amin al-Muhibbi and Abu al-Mawahib al-Hanbali. The
latter wrote a work enumerating the scholars with whom he had studied, and included a
276 KhaledEl-Rouayheb
to be sufficiently grounded in the Qur'an and the Sunna. The 18th and 19th century
"revivalists,"naturallyenough, tendedto portraytheiropponentsas rigid andunthinking
imitators.Less understandably,a host of modernhistorians,both Westernand Eastern,
have uncritically adopted this partisanview. Consequently,the very existence of an
alternativeto both scripturalistijtihad and unthinkingimitationwas lost to sight. The
age before the 18th and 19th century "revivalist"ijtihatdmovements was accordingly
viewed as marredby rigid and unthinkingimitation.
The Damascene biographeral-Muhibbi would hardly have recognized the picture
of pervasive intellectual apathy and unthinkingimitationin the 17th century.He was
initiated into the Khalwati order that, apparentlyfor the first time, gained popularity
with Damascene scholars and promoted a bolder and more enthusiastic espousal of
the theories of Ibn 'Arabi. His teacherstold him that a Kurdishscholar who settled in
Damascusin the firstdecadeof the 17thcenturyhadintroducednew scholarlyhandbooks
by Persian scholars, thus "opening the gate of verification."He was also personally
acquaintedwith a host of intellectualluminaries.The polymathAhmadibn LutfallahalMawlawi, who wrote a universalhistory,translatedfromPersianinto Arabicthe treatise
on figurative language by Isfara'ini, and wrote a work on the medical propertiesof
Europeanherbs,was a personalacquaintance.When the MoroccanscholarMuhammad
al-Rudanisettled in Damascus, al-Muhibbiand al-Mawlawivisited him and noted the
strong impression he made on local scholars with the breadthof his knowledge and
his new astronomicalinstrument.89Al-Muhibbialso met the renownedliteraryscholar
'Abd al-Qadir al-Baghdadi (d. 1682), the authorof a still esteemed compendiumof
early Arabic poetry Khizanat al-adab, and of an Arabic commentaryon the versified
Persian-Turkishdictionaryof Ibrahimal-Shahidi (d. 1550).90The towering reputation
of the mystic and scholar Ibrahimal-Kurani,the "imam of tahqtq,"had also reached
him from Medina, and he was well aware of the intellectual standing of his fellow
Damascene 'Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulusi,"our teacher,our relative, and our blessing."91
Indeed al-Muhibbihimself was a considerable scholar, whose writings belie the idea
that Arab-Islamic scholars were parochial and feeding off their own classical past.
Al-Muhibbi's anthology of contemporarypoets, Nafhat al-rayhana is an impressive
testimony to the opposite. Not only did al-Muhibbigo to great lengths to gatherpoems
from all corners of the Arab world, but he also included contemporaryTurkishand
Persian poets in his survey and he translatedseveral of their poems into Arabic.92AlMuhibbi also wrote one of the most extensive premodernworks on foreign loanwords
in Arabic:Qasd al-sabil fimafi lughat al-'arab min dakhil.93
For some time, it has been conceded that a scholar like al-Nabulusiwas a luminous
"exception"in a dark age of "imitationand compilation."94Al-Rudani has also been
portrayedby a recent Arab historianas a lone genius in a civilization that had passed
its prime and descended into "ignorance"(jahl wa-ghafla) and "resignation"(ya's).95
More recently, Ibrahim al-Kuranihas been presented as a "revivalist"in a century
otherwisemarkedby "extremist"Sufism and a "trivializedulema discourse"that"could
no longer go any further."96
It is tempting at this point to make use of the historianof
science ThomasKuhn'sconceptof an "anomaly,"thatis, an acknowledgedfact thatdoes
not fit comfortablywith the overall assumptionsguiding a community of scientists or
scholars.As Kuhnpointed out, the multiplicationof anomaliesputs additionalpressure
on the guiding assumptions-what he calls the dominant"paradigm"-of a community
NOTES
Author'snote: I thankProfessorMichael Cook, ProfessorRob Wisnovsky,Dr. Basim Musallam,and the
anonymousreferees of IJMESfor their helpful remarkson earlierdraftsof this paper,as well as Dr. Kate A.
Bennison for kindly takingthe time to teach me how to readMaghribiscript.I also thankthe BritishAcademy
for fundingmy research.
1H. A. R. Gibb and H. Bowen, Islamic Society and the West(London: Oxford University Press, 1957),
vol. 1, partII, 159-64.
2A. Raymond, "The OttomanConquest and the Development of the Great Arab Towns,"International
Journal of TurkishStudies 1 (1980): 84-101; A. Raymond,TheGreatArab Cities in the 16th-18th Centuries:
An Introduction(New York:New YorkUniversityPress, 1984), 5-9; A. Raymond,Cairo (Cambridge,Mass.:
HarvardUniversity Press, 2000), 216-25; See also A. Abdel Nour, Introductiona l'histoire urbaine de la
Syrie ottomane,XVIe-XVIIIe(Beirut:Publicationsde l'Universit6Libanaise, 1982).
3Raymond,"The OttomanConquest,"97-98.
4M. Hodgson, The Ventureof Islam (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974), vol. 3. See also
E. Yarshater,"ThePersianPresence in the Islamic World,"in The Persian Presence in the Islamic World,ed.
R. Hovanissianand G. Sabbagh(Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress, 1997).
5See N. Levtzion and J. O. Voll (eds.), Eighteenth-CenturyRenewal and Reform in Islam (Syracuse:
SyracuseUniversityPress, 1987); J. O. Voll, "Foundationsfor Renewal andReform,"in The OxfordHistory of
Islam, ed. J. Esposito (Oxford:OxfordUniversityPress, 1999);ReinhardtSchulze, "Das islamische achtzehnte
WeltdesIslams 30 (1990): 140-59; ReinhardtSchulze, "Wasistdie islamische Aufklhrung?",
Jahrhundert,"Die
Die Weltdes Islams 36 (1996): 276-325; P. Gran,TheIslamicRoots of Capitalism:Egypt 1760-1840 (Austin,
Tex.: Universityof Texas Press, 1978).
6MuhammadAmin al-Muhibbi,Khulasat al-athar fi a'yan al-qarn al-hadi 'ashar (Cairo: al-Matba'a
al-wahbiyya,1284H), 4:329-30.
7MuhammadKhalil al-Muradi,Silkal-durarfi a'yan al-qarnal-thani 'ashar (Istanbul& Cairo:al-Matba'a
al-miriyyaal-'amira, 1291H-1301H), 3:10.
8KaraHalil (d. 1711), MehmedEminHagiyasi (Istanbul:Matbaa-iAmire 1258H), 7. For the translationof
tahqfqas "verification,"and its juxtapositionto taqlfd, see D. Gutas,Avicennaand the AristotelianTradition
(Leiden:E. J. Brill, 1988), 188-91.
9Kamal al-Din al-Ghazzi, al-Wirdal-unsi wa-l-warid al-qudsifi tarjamatal-'arif bi-llah 'Abd al-Ghani
al-Nabulusi (MS: BritishLibrary:Or.11862) 54a-b.
10Abu-al-Mawahibal-Hanbali,Mashyakha,ed. MuhammadMuti' al-Hafiz (Damascus:Dar al-fikr, 1990),
86-87.
" Al-Burini studied the semantic-rhetorical works of al-Taftazani and al-Jurjani with Isma'il al-Nabulusi
(d. 1585) and 'Imad al-Din al-Hanafi (d. 1578), see Hasan al-Burini, Tarajim al-a'yan min abna' al-zaman,
ed. Salah al-Din al-Munajjid (Damascus: al-Majma' al-'ilmi al-'Arabi, 1959-63), 2:65, 2:303.
12Ibrahim al-Kurani, al-Amam li-iqaz al-himam (Hyderabad: Matba'at majlis da'irat al-ma'arif alnizamiyya, 1328H), 104-10.
3-4).
24MehmedStireyya, Sicill-i Osmani (Istanbul:Matbaa-iAmire, 1308-15H), 1:232; Mehmed TahirBursali, Osmanl Miiellifleri (Istanbul:Matbaa-iAmire, 1333-42H), 3:142. Carl Brockelmann,Geschichteder
ArabischenLiteratur(Leiden:E. J. Brill, 1937-49), Supplement2:637.
25Encyclopaediaof lslam, 2nd ed. (Leiden:E. J. Brill, 1954), s.v. "Al-Dawani"(A. K. S. Lambton),2:174.
26HajjiKhalifa,Kashf al-zunun,2:1372.
27Jalalal-Din al-Dawani,Sharhal-'aqa'id al-Cadudiyya(Istanbul:'Arif Efendi, 1316H), 2.
28A1-Dawani,Sharh al-Caqa'idal-'adudiyya,27.
29Al-Dawani,Sharh al-'aqa'id al-Cadudiyya,28 ff.
30See A. Knysh, lhbn'Arabi in the Later Islamic Tradition(Albany, N.Y.: SUNY Press, 1999), 141-65. It
should be noted, however, that Knysh relies heavily on the tract Fadihat al-mulhidinthat has been falsely
attributedto al-Taftazani.The authorof the tractis rather'Ala' al-Din al-Bukhari(d. 1438), as shown by Bakri
Aladdin in the introductionto his edition of 'Abd al-Ghanial-Nabulusi,al-Wujudal-haqq (Damascus:Institut
Francaisde Damas, 1995), 16-30. The hostility of al-Taftazanito the theory of wahdat al-wujtd is not in
doubt, however,and is attestedby his other works.
31Al-Muhibbi,Khulasatal-athar, 2:242 (line 5).
32Al-Ayyashi, Rihla, 1:333.
33See Carl Brockelmann, Geschichte der Arabische Literatur [henceforth GALJ (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 193749), 2:208-9.
34Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti, Sawn al-mantiq wa-l-kalam 'Canfannay al-mantiq wa-l-kalam, ed. 'Ali Sami alNashshar (Cairo: Maktabat al-Khanji, n.d.), page lam of editor's introduction, citing Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti,