and he went on to study jurisprudence, excel, devote himself entirely to learning, and author numerous works, until the leadership in fiqh came to rest with him. He was also versed in the Qur’an’s variant readings and composed a didactic poem (urjūza) on the subject. Among those who recited the Qur’an to him was Shaykh al-Qayrawānī.

In 651 AH he performed the pilgrimage by way of Iraq. The scholars of Baghdad were astonished at his brilliance and merits, and Muḥyī al-Dīn Ibn al-Jawzī, the resident professor at the caliphal college, urged him to settle with them, but he excused himself on account of family and homeland.

I heard Shaykh Taqī al-Dīn Abū al-ʿAbbās say: “Shaykh Jamāl al-Dīn Ibn Mālik used to remark, ‘Fiqh was made pliant for Shaykh al-Majd just as iron was made pliant for David.’” Then the shaykh added: “Our grandfather did have a certain sharpness of temper.” (1)

He related that Burhān al-Marāghī once met Shaykh al-Majd and posed a subtle point to him. The shaykh replied, “It can be answered in sixty ways: the first is such-and-such, the second such-and-such…,” enumerating them to the end, and then said, “We would be satisfied if you could merely repeat these answers.” Burhān thereupon humbled himself before him, astonished.

The scholar Ibn Ḥamdān said: “I would pore over the shaykh’s lesson, leaving nothing unexplored, yet when morning came and I attended, he would cite many things I had never encountered before.”

Shaykh Taqī al-Dīn added: “Our grandfather was amazing in his fluent recital of source-texts, his retention of the various schools, and his effortless citation of them.”

Imam ʿAbd Allāh ibn Taymiyyah told me that his grandfather was raised an orphan. At the age of thirteen he travelled with his cousin to Iraq to serve him and support him. He would spend the night with him, listening as he repeated points of juristic dispute, and would memorize each issue. Fakhr Ismāʿīl said