Al-Tabari

Al-Tabari

Muhammad ibn Jarir al-Tabari (839–923) was a scholar of religion and history who lived in the 9th century. Because he was born in Tabaristan (present-day Mazandaran), a historical region in Iran, he became famous as 'al-Tabari.'

Two of his most important works are 'Tafsir al-Tabari' (known and published in Turkey under the name 'Taberî Tefsîri'), a commentary that was much in demand in the Islamic world, and the History of al-Tabari.

Life

Abu Ja'far al-Tabari was born into a wealthy family, probably in the winter months of the year 838–9, in the city of Amul in the province of Mazandaran, which has a coast on the Caspian Sea in Tabaristan, and received his early education there. He matured early: he became a hafiz (one who has memorized the Qur'an) at the age of seven, an imam at eight, and began to memorize hadith at nine. At the age of 12 he left the homeland of his birth and, after travelling through cities and countries such as Rayy, Basra, Kufa, Medina, Syria and Egypt for the sake of learning, he settled in Baghdad, the centre of the caliphate. He studied under many scholars famous in his time in the fields of hadith, fiqh (Hanafi, Shafi'i and Maliki jurisprudence), qira'at (Qur'anic recitation), history and literature, and after he was trained he produced works in all these sciences.

In fiqh, while he initially belonged to the Shafi'i school, he later reached the rank of absolute mujtahid. The sources record that he was the imam of a school called the Jariri school, which later died out. The sources state that al-Tabari came to Baghdad in order to study under Ahmad ibn Hanbal, the founder of the Hanbali school, but was able to reach Baghdad only after his death, whereupon, rather than returning to his homeland, he continued his studies under scholars in Basra, Kufa and Wasit.

His death

He died in Baghdad on 19 February 923 and, because of the great number of his opponents, his death was kept secret and he was buried at night in the house where he had died.

His Works

Many of the works written by Abu Ja'far al-Tabari have been lost and have not reached our time. Some of al-Tabari's works are as follows:

History of the Prophets and Kings (Tarikh al-Umam wa'l-Muluk): This work is also known in short as the "History of al-Tabari" or "Tarikh-i Ja'fari." Al-Tabari is generally regarded among historians as the Herodotus of the Islamic world. This work covers history from Creation up to the year 302 AH / 315 CE. It was translated into Persian in the time of the Samanids by Bal'ami, one of the Samanid viziers. Later it was translated into Turkish several times by the Ottomans. This book is one of the principal sources of Islamic history. The chief feature of the book is that it collected and transmitted, without alteration, all the available accounts about any given event. Al-Tabari regarded altering these various accounts according to his own opinion as tantamount to falsifying history. A further feature of the work is that it avoided literary wordplay and ornate sentences. It is possible to divide this work essentially into two parts: the first part dwells on events from creation to the birth of Islam. This part also contains some superstitions that cannot withstand historical criticism. This part is based more on the traditions of the Israelites and the Zoroastrians. The important part of the work is the section extending from the birth of Islam to the year 915 CE. This part is one of the principal sources of Islamic history. Moreover, because this work recounts how Islam entered the Turkish lands by way of Transoxiana and the Caucasus, it is also important from the standpoint of our national history. This work was translated into Turkish several times in the Ottoman era. One of the translations is the work rendered from Arabic into Turkish by Matrakçı Nasuh under the title Majma al-Tawarikh.

Sources

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