Islamic Traditions [IO Islamic 313]

Tradition.

This manuscript is now IO Islamic 313 in the India Office collections.

[metadata: Otto Loth, A Catalogue of the Arabic Manuscripts in the Library of the India Office, (volume 1), no. 158 here with further notations and hyperlinks].

158.

313. Size 143/4 in. by 9 in.; foll. 598. Thirty-seven lines in a page.

The first volume of a large Commentary (ممزوج) on the Mishkât, by ‘ALÎ B. SULṬÂN MUḤAMMAD Harawî Ḳâri’, a Ḥanafite (d. A. H. 1014). It is entitled مرقاة المفاتیح بمشکاة المصابیح. Cf. Ḥ. Kh. v. 568.

The preface begins: الحمدلله الذی فتح قلوب العلماء بمفاتیح الایمان، و شرح صدور العرفاء بمصابیح الایقان.

The author says in it that he began to read the Mishkât with several Shaikhs of Makkah (الحرم المحترم), but found them neither critics nor in possession of a good text. He therefore exerted himself in collecting a number of correct and authentic copies, of which he gives an account. From these he has made a new, and what he hopes will become the standard edition of the text. To write also a commentary he was induced by the consideration, that almost all the labour bestowed upon the work was due to the Shâfi’ites.

This volume concludes with کتاب الوصایا. Well written, in a small hand. Richly ornamented and gilt. Foll. 50 and 57 should be transposed.

[Johnson.]