192 – Ibn Fakhr, Abū al-Karam al-Mubārak ibn Fakhr ibn Muḥammad*

The shaykh, the erudite scholar and master of grammar, Abū al-Karam al-Mubārak ibn Fakhr ibn Muḥammad ibn Yaʿqūb al-Baghdādī—the grammarian, the linguist, and an author of several works.

He was born in Rabīʿ al-Awwal of the year 431 AH.

He heard ḥadith from: the judge Abū al-Ṭayyib al-Ṭabarī, Abū Muḥammad al-Jawharī, Abū al-Ḥusayn Muḥammad ibn al-Narsī, the judge Abū Yaʿlā, and others.

He kept company with Abū al-Qāsim ʿAbd al-Wāḥid ibn Barhān and read to him numerous books and several poetic collections (dawāwīn) until he excelled in the Arabic language.

Those who studied under him include: Abū Muḥammad Sibt al-Khayyāṭ, Abū Ṭāhir al-Silafī, Abū al-Maʿmar al-Anṣārī, Abū Ṭālib Muḥammad ibn ʿAlī al-Katānī, and a number of others.

Abū ʿĀmir al-ʿAbdarī relates: Ibn Fakhr told me, “I acquired the science of Arabic from Ibn Barhān, Abū al-Qāsim al-Raqqī, ʿĪsā ibn ʿUmar ibn al-Aṣfar, and Abū al-Ḥusayn ibn Shāhūyah …” until he said:

“I also met, among the disciples of Abū Saʿīd al-Sīrāfī, Hilāl the Ṣābian, and among the disciples of Abū ʿAlī al-Fārisī, Abū al-Qāsim al-Tanūkhī and al-Jawharī.”

Ibn al-Najjār remarks: “I read, in Abū al-Karam ibn Fakhr’s own handwriting, a thabt (certified register) stating that he had heard from….”