epistle I composed as a rebuttal to the Rāfiḍa. The reason was that they used to attend the session of a certain vizier and would wax extravagant about the position of ʿAlī, so I produced this treatise (1).

I said: Even the elect have disagreed about ʿAlī; I have examined the epistle, and the rest of it is unmistakable falsehood.

78 – Hisham al-Muʾayyad bi-Allah ibn al-Mustanṣir*

He was the ruler of al-Andalus. They pledged allegiance to him while he was still a boy, but the task of consolidating the state was undertaken by the ḥājib al-Manṣūr (2) Muḥammad ibn Abī ʿĀmir, a man of his age distinguished for acumen, resolve, guile, bravery, and daring—by which I mean the ḥājib himself. At the very outset of his domination he turned to the libraries of al-Ḥakam, displayed their contents in the presence of the scholars, ordered that the works of the ancients and the philosophers—apart from books on medicine and arithmetic—be set aside, and then commanded that they be burned. They were duly burned, some even buried. He did this to curry favor with the masses and to cast the doctrine of al-Ḥakam in an unfavorable light (3).

All the while Hisham al-Muʾayyad bi-Allah remained hidden from the people, neither appearing in public nor issuing any order.

Ibn Abī ʿĀmir had pursued knowledge and literature, risen to prominence and high rank; fate assisted him, he won the princes and the army over with money, and men stood in awe of him.