Abu Jafar al-Nahhas
- Died
- 338 AH
- Born in
- Egypt
Abu Jafar al-Nahhas (d. 338 AH / 950 CE) was an Egyptian grammarian, philologist, and Quranic scholar, renowned for his grammatical analysis and linguistic exegesis of the Quran in works such as Iʿrāb al-Qurʾān (Grammatical Analysis of the Quran) and Maʿānī al-Qurʾān (Meanings of the Quran) .
Origin and Education
His full name was Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Ismaʿil ibn Yunus al-Muradi . He was known by the nisba al-Nahhas (as well as Ibn al-Nahhas and al-Saffar), reflecting an ancestral craft of working with copper or brass wares, though he pursued scholarship from an early age and did not practice the trade . He was born in Egypt, with some scholars estimating his birth around 260 AH .
He traveled to Baghdad, where he studied Arabic grammar and philology under Abu Ishaq al-Zajjaj—with whom he read the Kitāb of Sibawayh—as well as Ali ibn Sulayman al-Akhfash al-Asghar, Niftawayh, Ibn al-Anbari, and the companions of al-Mubarrad . In hadith and other sciences, he transmitted from Egyptian and Iraqi scholars, including al-Nasa'i, Abu Ja'far al-Tahawi, Bakr ibn Sahl al-Dimyati, Muhammad ibn Ja'far ibn A'yan, Abu al-Qasim al-Baghawi, and Ja'far al-Firyabi, in addition to hearing scholars in Ramla .
Scholarly Standing and Teaching
After returning to Egypt, al-Nahhas held teaching circles that drew students from across the region, including travelers from al-Andalus and the Maghrib . His primary disciple and the principal transmitter of his books was Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Ali al-Udfuwi . The Andalusian chief judge al-Mundhir ibn Sa'id al-Balluti also attended his lectures in Egypt .
Al-Nahhas was recognized as a leading authority in Arabic grammar, poetry commentary, and Quranic disciplines, authoring works that included al-Nāsikh wa-l-mansūkh (The Abrogating and Abrogated) on Quranic legal abrogation . Abu Bakr al-Zubaydi observed that while he did not possess an impressive presence or natural eloquence in oral debate, he excelled profoundly when writing, and he regularly consulted legal jurists and scholars of theoretical inquiry on complex points in his compositions . During his studies in Baghdad, al-Zajjaj reportedly held his fellow Egyptian student Abu al-Abbas ibn Wallad in higher esteem than al-Nahhas, and the two later engaged in a grammatical disputation before a ruler in Egypt . Biographers also noted that al-Nahhas practiced extreme personal frugality, frequently cutting single gift turbans into three smaller pieces for his own use and attending to all his market errands personally .
Death
Al-Nahhas died in Dhu al-Hijjah 338 AH (with another transmission placing it on Saturday, 5 Dhu al-Hijjah, and a variant recording 337 AH) . According to classical biographical accounts, he was sitting on the steps of the Nilometer (al-Miqyās) on the banks of the Nile, scanning the metric scansion of poetic verses aloud; a passerby mistook his rhythmic utterances for a magical incantation intended to prevent the river from rising and thus inflate food prices, and kicked him into the Nile, where he drowned and his body was lost .
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List of Works
al-Qatʿ wa-al-Iʾtināf (Pausing and Resumption), also cited under the alternate title Kitāb al-Waqf wa-al-Ibtidāʾ, is a 4th-century AH treatise on the Quranic discipline of pausing and resuming recitation (al-waqf wa-al-ibtidāʾ). It is dedicated to identifying and analyzing appropriate points to pause and begin during recitation to preserve the text's intended meanings.
al-Nāsikh wa-l-Mansūkh (The Abrogating and Abrogated) is a classical treatise on Quranic abrogation. The work examines the concept, theoretical background, rules, and instances of naskh across the text of the Quran, analyzing disputed rulings, hermeneutical questions, and passages identified as abrogated or abrogating.
‘Umdat al-Kuttab (The Pillar of Scribes), also known under titles such as Sina‘at al-Kuttab and Adab al-Kuttab, is a manual on the secretarial art and administrative craft. It addresses the essential qualifications, legal knowledge, and linguistic proficiencies required of chancery scribes and state administrators, presenting secretarial practice as an application of Islamic legal principles.
I'rab al-Qur'an (Linguistic and Grammatical Analysis of the Quran) is a classical work on Quranic syntax and linguistic parsing. It provides a surah-by-surah grammatical examination of the Quranic text, clarifying syntactic structures, variant readings (qira'at), morphological forms, and dialectal variants.
Maani al-Quran is a work of linguistic Quranic exegesis composed as an independent treatise dedicated to interpretation. It explicates the meanings of verses, rare vocabulary, legal rulings, and abrogating and abrogated passages, utilizing morphological derivations, variant readings, and Arabic linguistic norms.