of Islam—its roots and its branches, its subtleties and its weighty issues—all of it save the science of Qurʾanic recitations (1). If tafsīr is mentioned, he carries its banner (2); if the jurists are counted, he is their unrestricted mujtahid; if the ḥuffāẓ are present, he speaks and they fall silent, he strings report after report while they are left dumbfounded and destitute. Should the theologians be named, he stands alone among them and they refer back to him; and if Ibn Sīnā, the vanguard of the philosophers, should appear, he bankrupts them (3), leaves them helpless, tears away their veils, and exposes their flaws (4). He also wields an outstanding mastery of Arabic grammar, morphology, and lexicography.
He is far too great for my words (5) to describe or for my pen to do justice to his rank, for his life, knowledge, insights, ordeals, and travels could (6) be adorned (7) in two full volumes.
Yet he was but a human being, liable to sin; so may Allah forgive him and grant him the highest station in Paradise. He was the spiritual guide of the community, the unique figure of his age, the bearer of the banner of the Sacred Law, and the one to whom Muslims brought their most intricate problems. He was a leader in knowledge (8), and biographers are extravagant (9) in praising his standing in
(1) F records the erroneous reading “al-Quran”.
(2) B and Q read “raaytahu” (I saw him).
(3) K reads “falsafahum”.
(4) B reads “awraihim”.
(5) F and K read “yasqih”.
(6) F and K read “tahtamil” (it may bear).
(7) B, Q, and F read “tawdaʿ” (humility).
(8) The word wa-kan (and he was) is absent from B, Q, and F. In B the term al-dhika (intelligence) replaces al-ilm (knowledge), and Q further adds “a foremost authority in intelligence”.
(9) This wording appears in all the handwritten sources, and al-Karmi cites it the same way in al-Kawakib (p. 63). Yet in his al-Shahadah al-Zakiyyah (p. 43) he also has: “regarding the matter of his standing …”. If the manuscript reading is sound, al-Dhahabi was probably alluding to the occasions when the shaykh, during disputation sessions, felt compelled to praise himself. He said: “I spoke words I had to say, such as: Who else upheld Islam in its times of need but I? Who clarified and expounded its proofs? Who fought its enemies and re-established it when it inclined, at a time when everyone else abandoned it—no one speaking up or struggling on its behalf? I rose, making its arguments manifest, striving for it, encouraging people toward it. If these people crave to speak against me, what will they do to others?” See further below in this book (p. 268) and in Majmu al-Fatawa, 3:163.