He passed away in 497 AH, and succeeding him in the chancery bureau was his nephew, the distinguished scholar Abu Nasr.
121 – al-Tallāʿī, Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn al-Faraj al-Qurṭubī *
The shaykh, imām, erudite scholar, exemplar, mufti of al-Andalus and its foremost ḥadith authority: Abū ʿAbd Allāh Muḥammad ibn al-Faraj al-Qurṭubī, a Mālikī and the client of Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā ibn al-Tallāʿ (1).
He was born in 404 AH.
Ibn Bashkuwāl said: “He was the last of the senior shaykhs of his age and the chief of the muftis in his land.”
He related ḥadith from Yūnus ibn ʿAbd Allāh al-Qāḍī, Makkī ibn Abī Ṭālib, Abū ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿĀbid, Ḥātim ibn Muḥammad, Abū ʿAmr al-Murshānī, Muʿāwiya ibn Muḥammad al-ʿUqaylī, and Abū ʿUmar ibn al-Qaṭṭān.
He was a jurist, thoroughly versed in jurisprudence, highly skilled in issuing legal opinions, pre-eminent in the consultative council and in
(*) Al-Sila, 2/564–565; Bughyat al-Multamis, 123; al-Maghrib fi hula al-Maghrib, 165; Dawal al-Islam, 2/27; al-Ibar, 3/349; al-Wafi bi-l-wafayat, 4/318–319; Uyoun al-Tawarikh, 13/126; al-Dibaj al-madhhab, 2/242–243; Kashf al-zunun, 137; Shadharath al-dhahab, 3/407; Idah al-maknun, 2/270; Hadiyyat al-arifin, 2/78; Shajarat al-nur al-zakiyya, 123.
(1) In Barnamaj al-Tijibi, p. 56, Siraj b. Abd al-Malik—the linguist and hadith scholar—states that the correct form of the name is Ibn al-Talaʾ (with a hamza), because his father Faraja used to coat the bits and bridles with his master in the eastern suburb of Cordoba opposite Bab al-Jadid. Anyone who says Ibn al-Tallaʿ (with an ayn) is, he argues, mistaken. Abu Abd Allah b. Hisham, the grammarian of Sabta, however, affirmed that it is Ibn al-Tallaʿ with an un-dotted ayn, explaining that the nickname arose because the father used to climb the date-palms of Cordoba. Al-Tijibi adds: I found some hadith scholars who said that he was called al-Tallaʿ because his father would apply varnish with his master; if so, al-Tallaʿ and al-Talaʾ would carry the same sense. Allah knows best.