Nayl al-Amani min Fatawa al-Qadi Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Amrani
- Author died
- 1442 AH
- Editions
- Nayl al-Amani min Fatawa al-Qadi Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Amrani
Nayl al-Amani min Fatawa al-Qadi Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Amrani (Arabic: نيل الأماني من فتاوى القاضي محمد بن إسماعيل العمراني) is a multi-chapter compendium of Islamic legal rulings and juristic weightings by the Yemeni judge and scholar Muhammad ibn Isma'il al-Amrani (1340–1442 AH / 1922–2021 CE), compiled by Abdullah ibn Qasim ibn Hadi Dhibyan .
Origin and Compilation
The idea for the work originated when Arif ibn Ahmad al-Sabri, a teaching assistant at Iman University, suggested gathering al-Amrani's answers to classroom questions while teaching al-Shawkani's legal treatise al-Durari al-Madiyyah so they could be distributed as a study booklet for students . Dhibyan expanded the project into a comprehensive reference work by combining these classroom questions with al-Amrani's broadcast fatwas from Sana'a Radio (إذاعة صنعاء) . Al-Amrani approved the project and provided his personal collection of recorded tapes and papers, while the rector of Iman University, Abdul-Majid al-Zandani, backed the initiative and directed the university's director, Abdul-Wahhab al-Daylami, to supply the necessary transcription, printing, and recording equipment .
The compilation proceeded in four sequential stages:
- Transcribing recordings from the lectures on al-Durari al-Madiyyah, organizing them by legal subject alongside copies of radio fatwas, and presenting the typed drafts to al-Amrani to expand upon concise classroom answers .
- Transcribing Sana'a Radio tapes, eliminating redundant rulings, and reviewing them with al-Amrani .
- Merging the broadcast rulings into the main thematic chapters, placing related questions consecutively, formulating topical headings, and establishing indexes .
- Supplementing rulings with textual evidence from the Quran and authentic hadith where al-Amrani had answered concisely without detailing the proofs, a step undertaken following a recommendation by Samir al-Shumayri .
Al-Amrani reviewed the transcribed and arranged material across four stages to verify that every ruling matched his settled, final positions . Dhibyan used the preposition min ("from") in the title to indicate that the volume represents an accessible selection rather than the totality of al-Amrani's fatwas, which spanned more than a third of a century of public answering .
Method and Scope
The collection is organized according to classical juristic chapters—including purification (al-Taharah), prayer (al-Salah), and fasting (al-Siyam)—encompassing rulings on ritual worship, financial transactions, and personal status, alongside contemporary issues (masa'il mustajaddah) . The method reflects al-Amrani's characteristic non-sectarian approach (al-istiqlal 'an al-tamadhhub), emulating the evidentiary methodology of al-Shawkani by citing the views of classical scholars and weighing them (tarjih) based on direct evidence from the Quran and sound Sunnah, predominantly relying on Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim .
Editions
A second edition of the work was introduced with a preface signed by al-Amrani in Jumada al-Akhirah 1438 AH / March 2017 CE, and finalized for publication by Dhibyan in Rabi' al-Thani 1443 AH / November 2021 CE . This revised edition incorporates approximately 20% more fatwas gathered from archival copies kept over fifteen years by al-Amrani's student Muhammad al-Jawmari (العزي محمد الجومري) . It also features a reorganized order of questions, linguistic corrections, the vocalization of hadith texts, and the removal of specific hadith concordance numbers to prevent discrepancies across varying editions of reference works .
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