al-Mujam al-Latif
- Author died
- 748 AH
- Editions
- al-Mujam al-Latif
al-Mu'jam al-Latif (The Subtle Dictionary) is a concise biographical and transmission dictionary of teachers (mashyakha) compiled by the Syrian traditionist and historian Shams al-Din al-Dhahabi (673–748 AH / 1274–1348 CE) to document narrations received from his shaykhs.
Content and Structure
Al-Dhahabi compiled the work for himself as a compact index of his teachers, spanning approximately two quires (kurrasayn). Unlike his expansive biographical work al-Mu'jam al-Kabir (The Large Dictionary), he did not provide comprehensive biographical entries for each scholar, choosing instead to present a single narration—consisting mostly of prophetic hadiths and reports (athar), alongside selected textual transmissions—from each teacher.
A distinctive feature of the work is al-Dhahabi's critical evaluation of the transmitted texts; following each hadith, he appended his assessment regarding its chain and grade of authenticity. For instance, assessing a transmission from Ma'mar and Sufyan ibn 'Uyayna, he commented: هذا حديث مرسل نظيف الإسناد ("This is a mursal hadith with a clean chain of transmission").
The collection opens with a narration transmitted through Ibn al-Ni'ma al-Maqdisi, which al-Dhahabi heard from him in Damascus in 694 AH. It concludes with the didactic poem on hadith nomenclature known by its opening phrase Gharami Sahih, composed by his teacher Ahmad ibn Farah al-Ishbili, which Ibn Farah recited directly to al-Dhahabi in 695 AH.
Transmission and Publication
The text was transmitted through scholars of the eighth and ninth centuries AH. Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani read it under al-Imad Abu Bakr ibn Ibrahim ibn al-Izz al-Maqdisi, who had received it through direct audition from al-Dhahabi. A manuscript copy copied directly from al-Dhahabi's autograph by Muhammad ibn Abi Bakr ibn Abi Umar ibn Zurayq in 837 AH is preserved in the Zahiriyya Library in Damascus (MS 12/3745 'Amm). The modern bibliographer Abd al-Hayy al-Kattani examined an auditioned manuscript copy that had circulated among prominent hadith scholars.
The work was edited by Jasim Sulayman al-Dawsari and published by al-Dar al-Salafiyya in Kuwait in 1408 AH / 1988 CE, appearing both under the title Mashyakhat al-Hafiz al-Dhahabi and as part of a collection of treatises titled Sitt Rasa'il li-l-Hafiz al-Dhahabi (Six Treatises of al-Hafiz al-Dhahabi).
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