al-Tanbih ala Awham Abi Ali fi Amalih
- Author died
- 487 AH
- Editions
- Matba'at Dar al-Kutub al-Misriyya bi-al-Qahira
al-Tanbih ala Awham Abi Ali fi Amalih ("Alerting to the Errors of Abu Ali in his Dictations") is a philological treatise by the Andalusian scholar Abu Ubayd al-Bakri (d. 487 AH / 1094 CE), written to identify and correct linguistic, literary, and transmission errors in al-Amali ("The Dictations") by Abu Ali al-Qali (d. 356 AH / 967 CE).
Purpose and Composition
In his introduction, al-Bakri explains that his objective was to point out the oversights in the dictations of al-Qali from an equitable and impartial standpoint rather than out of obstinacy or hypercriticism, supporting every critique with textual evidence and grammatical proofs. He emphasizes al-Qali's vast memorization, breadth of learning, and reliability in transmission, noting that no human scholar is exempt from occasional slips. Al-Bakri dedicated the work to the Abbadid ruler of Seville, al-Mu'tamid ibn Abbad.
The book is sometimes referred to in biographical sources under the title al-Tanbih ala Aghlat Abi Ali fi Amalih. Although Ibn Khayr al-Ishbili cited it as a work concerning errors in al-Qali's Kitab al-Nawadir, modern research by Abd al-Aziz al-Maymani notes that al-Tanbih does not treat the supplementary Nawadir text, but is restricted to al-Amali.
Method and Content
Al-Bakri follows the order of al-Amali, referencing specific passages, poetic lines, and linguistic explanations presented by al-Qali and evaluating them in detail. His critiques generally address several categories of philological analysis:
- Poetic Attribution and Lacunae: Identifying the true authors of verses that al-Qali cited anonymously or misattributed, and providing omitted verses to complete truncated passages.
- Vocalization and Transmission: Correcting faulty transmissions (riwayah) of poetry and lexical items, such as demonstrating alternate case endings or vocalizations that al-Qali had claimed were inadmissible.
- Semantic and Lexical Clarifications: Re-evaluating poetic interpretations where al-Qali took a metaphor or idiom in an incorrect sense, citing authorities such as Abu Nasr, Abu Ziyad al-Kilabi, Tha'lab, and Ibn al-A'rabi to elucidate bedouin customs, botanical terms, and historical contexts.
- Grammatical and Syntactic Norms: Contesting specific categorical assertions made by al-Qali, such as claims regarding the exclusive grammatical gender of certain nouns or the structure of particular phrases.
Al-Bakri later composed a comprehensive commentary on al-Qali's dictations, Simt al-La'ali fi Sharh Amali al-Qali, which absorbed and expanded upon many of the critical notes first compiled in al-Tanbih.
Publication History
al-Tanbih has frequently been printed alongside al-Qali's al-Amali. It was published in Cairo by Dar al-Kutub al-Misriyyah in 1926 and by Matba'at al-Sa'adah in 1953, and later reprinted in Beirut. Following omissions noticed by Father Antoine Salhani and editors at Dar al-Kutub, the literary scholar Mahmud Muhammad Shakir isolated and published supplementary passages to fill three manuscript lacunae of al-Tanbih by extracting the corresponding commentary from al-Bakri's Simt al-La'ali.
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