nothing was left of it.(1) He then ordered that the man’s head be shaved—he had grown abundant hair—and that his fingernails, which were exceptionally long, be trimmed. He also had his drooping moustache, which covered his mouth in violation of the sunnah, clipped. Moreover, he compelled him to repent of obscene speech and of consuming mind-altering hashish, as well as other prohibited items.

After him, Shaykh Muḥammad al-Khabbāz al-Balāsī was summoned, and he too was made to repent of eating unlawful foods and associating with the ahl al-dhimma (non-Muslim subjects). A written pledge was drawn up for him stipulating that he would not speak about the interpretation of dreams(2) or any other matter of which he had no knowledge.

During that same month Shaykh Taqī al-Dīn Ibn Taymiyyah went to the Naranj Mosque(3) and instructed his companions—accompanied by several stone-cutters—to demolish a boulder situated in the Qulūṭ River which people used to visit and to which they would make votive offerings.(4) They smashed it, thereby relieving the Muslims of it and of the shirk associated with it, removing from them a cause of doubt whose evil had been great. Because of this and similar actions they envied him and manifested hostility toward him; they also begrudged him for his criticisms of Ibn ʿArabī and his followers. Envy therefore led them to oppose him, yet for the sake of Allah he feared no critic: he paid them no heed, and they were unable to harm him. The most they achieved was to have him imprisoned, even though he never ceased teaching, whether in Egypt or in Syria. They could find nothing disgraceful to attach to him; they detained him only through influence, as will be mentioned later. To Allah is the return of creation, and before Him is their reckoning.(5)

In Rajab, Chief Qāḍī Najm al-Dīn ibn Ṣaṣrā took his seat in the Great ʿĀdiliyya Madrasa. Benches were set up after the building had been restored, for no one had judged there since the campaign of Ghazan because of the devastation it had suffered.(6) A decree then appointed Shaykh Burhān al-Dīn al-Fazārī to the wakāla of the bayt al-māl,(7) but he declined. The supervision of the khizāna was offered to Shaykh Kamāl al-Dīn ibn al-Zamlakānī; he accepted and was invested with a robe of honour (ṭarḥ).(8) He attended the institution on Friday. Both of these posts had previously been held by Najm al-Dīn ibn Abī al-Ṭayyib,(9) who has passed away—may Allah have mercy upon him.

In Shaʿbān, certain individuals sought to abolish the bonfires lit on the night of mid-Shaʿbān. They gathered written endorsements from the scholars and spoke with the deputy of the sultanate, but to no avail; the fires were lit nonetheless, and the prayer customarily performed on that night was also observed.