Ibn Qutaybah

Abū Muhammad Abd-Allāh ibn Muslim ibn Qutayba al-Dīnawarī al-Marwazī
Title	ibn Qutaybah
Born	828CE, 213 AH
Died	15 Rajab 276 AH/ 13 November, 889 AD
Era	Islamic golden age
Occupation	Scholar of Islam
Religion	Islam
Jurisprudence	Sunni
Main interest(s)	politics, history, Tafsir, Hadith, Kalam and Arabic literature
Notable work(s)	Training of the Secretary ‘Uyun al-akhbar Gharīb al-Qur’ān

Abū Muhammad Abd-Allāh ibn Muslim ibn Qutayba al-Dīnawarī al-Marwazī or simply Ibn Qutaybah (Arabic: ابن قتيبة‎, translit. Ibn Qutaybah‎; 828 – 13 November 889 CE / 213 – 15 Rajab 276 AH)^[1] was a renowned Islamic^[2] scholar of Persian^[3][4][5][6] origin. He served as a judge during the Abbasid Caliphate, but was best known for his contributions to Arabic literature.^[7][8] He was a polymath^[9][10][11] who wrote on diverse subjects, such as Qur'anic exegesis, hadith, theology, philosophy, law and jurisprudence, grammar, philology, history, astronomy, agriculture and botany.

Biography

His full name is Abū Muḥammad ʿAbdullāh b. Muslim ibn Qutaybah ad-Dīnawarī. He was born in Kufa in what is now Iraq.^[12][13] He was of Iranian descent; his father was from Merv. Having studied tradition and philology he became qadi in Dinawar during the reign of Al-Mutawakkil,^[8] and afterwards a teacher in Baghdad where he died.^[12][13] He was the first representative of the school of Baghdad philologists that succeeded the schools of Kufa and Basra.

Legacy

He was viewed by Sunni Muslims as a hadith Master, foremost philologist, linguist, and man of letters. In addition to his literary criticism and anthologies, he was also known for his work in the problems of Tafsir or Qur'anic interpretation.^[7] He also authored works on astronomy and legal theory.^[13][14] His book Uyun al-Akhbar, along with the romantic literature of Muhammad bin Dawud al-Zahiri and Ibn Abi Tahir Tayfur, were considered by lexocographer Ibn Duraid to be the three most important works for those who wished to speak and write eloquently.^[15][16]

There can be no government without an army,
No army without money,
No money without prosperity,
And no prosperity without justice and good administration.

— Ibn Qutaybah on good government.^[17]

Works

• Gharīb al-Qur'an also known as Mushkil al-Qur'an, on its lexical difficulties.
• The Interpretation of Conflicting Narrations (Arabic: Ta’wīl Mukhtalif al-Hadīth), where he defends and reconciles hadiths that Mu'tazilites had dismissed as contradictory or irrational.^[18]
• Adab al-Kitāb.
• al-Amwāl.
• al-Anwā’.
• al-‘Arab wa ‘Ulūmuhā on Arab intellectual history.
• al-Ashriba on alcoholic beverages.
• Dalā’il al-Nubuwwa or A‘lām al-Nubuwwa on the Proofs of Prophethood.
• Fad.l al-‘Arab ‘alā al-‘Ajam in praise of the Arabs.
• I‘rāb al-Qur’ān, a philological commentary.
• al-Ikhtilāf fī al-Lafz. wa al-Radd ‘alā al-Jahmiyya wal-Mushabbiha, a refutation of both the Allegorizers and the Anthropomorphists. This slim volume received editions in Egypt.
• al-Ishtiqāq.
• Is.lāh. Ghalat. Abī ‘Ubayd, corrections on al-Qāsim ibn Salām’s Gharīb al-H.adīth.
• Jāmi‘ al-Fiqh in jurisprudence, dispraised as unreliable by al-T.abarī and Ibn Surayj, as was Ibn Qutayba’s al-Amwāl.
• Jāmi‘ al-Nah.w al-Kabīr and Jāmi‘ al-Nah.w al-S.aghīr.
• al-Jarāthīm in linguistics.
• al-Jawābāt al-H.ād.ira.
• al-Ma‘ānī al-Kabīr.
• al-Imāma wal-Siyāsa
• al-Ma‘ārif, a slim volume that manages to cover topics from the beginning of creation and facts about the Jāhiliyya to the names of the Companions and famous jurists and h.adīth Masters.
• al-Masā’il wal-Ajwiba.
• al-Maysar wal-Qidāh. on dice and lots.
• al-Na‘m wal-Bahā’im on cattle and livestock.
• al-Nabāt in botany.
• al-Qirā’āt in the canonical readings.
• al-Radd ‘alā al-Qā’il bi Khalq al-Qur’ān, against those who assert the createdness of the Qur’an.
• al-Radd ‘alā al-Shu‘aybiyya, a refutation of a sub-sect of the ‘Ajārida ‘At.awiyya, itself a sub-sect of the Khawārij.
• al-Rah.l wal-Manzil.
• Ta‘bīr al-Ru’yā on the interpretation of dreams.
• Talqīn al-Muta‘allim min al-Nah.w in grammar.
• ‘Uyūn al-Akhbār in history.^[19][20]
• ‘Uyūn al-Shi‘r in poetry.
• al-Shi‘r wal-Shu‘arā’

See also

• List of Islamic scholars
• List of Iranian scientists and scholars
• Al-Zahiriyah Library

Notes

1. Joseph T. Shipley, Encyclopedia of Literature, Volume 1 - Page 37
2. "Ibn Qutaybah". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Retrieved 9 June 2012.
3. Rosenthal, Franz. "EBN QOTAYBA, ABŪ MOḤAMMAD ʿABD-ALLĀH". Encyclopædia Iranica. Retrieved 9 June 2012. ...he seems to refer, if the text is correctly understood, to his own Persian (ʿajam) descent and declares himself to be by nature not prejudiced for or against either Arabs or Persians. His father or family seems, indeed, to have come from Marv (hence the nesba Marvazī). He himself was, however, an eloquent spokesman for Arab civilization and in intellectual makeup was totally committed and assimilated to it
4. Adamec, Ludwig W. (May 11, 2009). Historical Dictionary of Islam (Historical Dictionaries of Religions, Philosophies, and Movements Series) (Second ed.). Scarecrow Press. p. 259. ISBN 0810861615.
5. Camilla Adang, Muslim Writers on Judaism and the Hebrew Bible: From Ibn Rabban to Ibn Hazm, BRILL (1996), p. 58
6. Arnold E. Franklin, This Noble House: Jewish Descendants of King David in the Medieval Islamic East, University of Pennsylvania Press (2012), p. 63
7. Abd Allah Abu Muhammad Abd Allah ibn Muslim al-Dinwari Ibn Qutaybah from The Oxford Dictionary of Islam. Oxford Reference, Copyright © 2013.
8. Christopher Melchert, "Qur'anic Abrogation Across the Ninth Century." Taken from Studies in Islamic Legal Theory, pg. 80. Ed. Bernard G. Weiss. Volume 15 of Studies in Islamic law and society / Studies in Islamic law and society. Leiden: Brill Publishers, 2002. ISBN 9789004120662
9. Michael Bonner, Jihad in Islamic History: Doctrines and Practice, Princeton University Press (2008), p.8
10. Issa J Boullata, Literary Structures of Religious Meaning in the Qu'ran, Routledge (2013), p. 61
11. Sean Anthony, The Caliph and the Heretic: Ibn Sabaʾ and the Origins of Shīʿism, BRILL (2011), p. 162
12. John C. Lamoreaux, The Early Muslim Tradition of Dream Interpretation, pg. 27. SUNY series in Islamic spirituality. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002. ISBN 9780791488607
13. John C. Lamoreaux, "Sources on Ibn Bahlul's Chapter on Dream Interpretation." Taken from Augustine and His Opponents, Jerome, Other Latin Fathers After Nicaea, Orientalia, pg. 555. Ed. Elizabeth A. Livingstone. Volume 33 of Studia patristica. Peeters Publishers, 1997. ISBN 9789068318685
14. Introduction to The Unity of Science in the Arabic Tradition: Science, Logic, Epistemology , pg. 22. Eds. Shahid Rahman, Tony Street and Hassan Tahiri. Volume 11 of Logic, Epistemology, and the Unity of Science Series The Unity of Science in the Arabic Tradition: Science, Logic, Epistemology and Their Interactions. New York: Springer Publishing, 2008. ISBN 9781402084058
15. Shawkat M. Toorawa, "Defing Adab by re-defining the Adib: Ibn Abi Tahir Tayfur and storytelling." Taken from On Fiction and Adab in Medieval Arabic Literature, pg. 303. Ed. Philip F. Kennedy. Volume 6 of Studies in Arabic language and literature. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2005. ISBN 9783447051828
16. Shawkat M. Toorawa, "Ibn Abi Tayfur versus al-Jahiz." Taken from ʻAbbasid Studies: Occasional Papers of the School of ʻAbbasid Studies, pg. 250. Ed. James Edward Montgomery. Volume 135 of Orientalia Lovaniensia analecta. Peeters Publishers, 2004. ISBN 9789042914339
17. The Economist, 24 May 2008. London: Economist Group.
18. A.C. Brown, Jonathan (2009). Hadith: Muhammad's Legacy in the Medieval and Modern World (Foundations of Islam series). Oneworld Publications. p. 166. ISBN 978-1851686636.
19. See: Luisa Arvide, Relatos, University of Almeria Press, Almeria 2004 (in Arabic and Spanish).
20. Arvide Cambra, L.M. (2014), "Kitab 'Uyun al-Akhbar of Ibn Qutayba (828-889)", Advances in Education Research (Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Applied Social Science,ICASS 2014), vol. 51, pp. 650-653.

References

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "^{article name needed}". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

External links

• A. Guellati, La notion d'adab chez Ibn Qutayba : étude générique et éclairage comparatiste (= Bibliothèque de l'Ecole des Hautes Etudes, Sciences Religieuses 169), Turnhout: Brepols, 2015, ISBN 978-2-503-56648-1
• Kunitzsch, Paul (2008) [1970-80]. "Ibn Qutayba, Abū Muḥammad ʿAbdallāh Ibn Muslim Al-Dīnawarī Al-Jabalī". Complete Dictionary of Scientific Biography. Encyclopedia.com.
• Imam Ibn Qutayba
• Works by or about Ibn Qutaybah in libraries (WorldCat catalog)