Tabaqat al-Mufassirin lil-Dawudi
- Author died
- 945 AH
- Editions
- Dār al-Kutub al-‘Ilmīyah
Tabaqat al-Mufassirin (The Generations of Quranic Exegetes) is a biographical dictionary of Quranic commentators authored by the Egyptian Maliki scholar and Hadith specialist Shams al-Din Muhammad ibn 'Ali al-Dawudi (d. 945 AH / 1538 CE) . It serves as one of the most comprehensive classical references devoted specifically to the biographies of Quranic commentators from the early Islamic era up to the early tenth century AH .
Background and Composition
The compilation of dedicated biographical dictionaries for exegetes emerged relatively late compared to works devoted to Hadith transmitters, jurists, or grammarians . Al-Dawudi’s teacher, Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti (d. 911 AH), had initiated a specialized biographical work under the same title, but it remained limited to 136 entries . Al-Dawudi undertook a far more extensive project, aiming to gather biographies of all accessible figures known for interpreting the Quran or authoring exegetical commentaries . The author completed the final fair copy (tabyid) of the work during the first third of Jumada al-Thaniyah in 941 AH .
Structure and Sources
The book is arranged alphabetically according to the letters of the Arabic alphabet (huruf al-mu'jam) . Each entry typically outlines the scholar's lineage, scholarly teachers and students, theological and legal orientations, notable writings in exegesis and related disciplines, and death date.
Al-Dawudi drew extensively upon earlier biographical literature across various legal and specialized traditions . At the conclusion of his book, he recorded the primary sources he consulted, which include:
- Legal biographical dictionaries such as Taj al-Din al-Subki's Tabaqat al-Shafi'iyya al-Kubra, Ibn Qadi Shuhbah's Tabaqat, Ibn Farhun's al-Dibaj al-Mudhahhab (along with Shams al-Din al-Sakhawi's arrangement and additions to it from al-Qadi 'Iyad), Abd al-Qadir al-Qurashi's al-Jawahir al-Mudiyya fi Tabaqat al-Hanafiyya, and the Hanbali biographical works of Ibn Abi Ya'la and Ibn Rajab .
- General histories and regional dictionaries, including al-Dhahabi's Tabaqat al-Huffaz and Ma'rifat al-Qurra' al-Kibar, Ibn al-Jazari's Ghayat al-Nihaya, Ibn Bashkuwal's al-Sila, Abd al-Ghafir al-Farisi's al-Siyaq, al-Mundhiri's al-Takmila li-Wafayat al-Naqala, Ibn al-Dubaythi's continuation of Tarikh Baghdad, thirteen volumes of al-Maqrizi's autograph al-Muqaffa, and Ibn Khallikan's Wafayat al-A'yan .
- Works by his teacher al-Suyuti, including Tabaqat al-Huffaz, Bughyat al-Wu'at fi Tabaqat al-Lughawiyyin wa-al-Nuhat, and Husn al-Muhadara fi Akhbar Misr wa-al-Qahira, alongside the three-volume autograph dictionary of Burhan al-Din al-Biqa'i .
Reception and Editions
The bibliographer Katip Celebi described the work in Kashf al-Zunun as "the finest work composed on the subject" . In the eleventh century AH, Ahmad ibn Muhammad al-Adanawi authored a supplementary work on the same topic, intended to supply entries that al-Dawudi had omitted .
A surviving autograph manuscript of the text, copied by al-Dawudi in 941 AH and containing 193 folios spanning from the entry for "Umar" to the end of the book, is preserved in the As'ad Efendi collection and recorded at the Institute of Arabic Manuscripts under no. 325 . The book has been published in two volumes, including an edition edited by Ali Muhammad 'Umar (Cairo: Maktabat Wahba, 1972) and an edition published by Dar al-Kutub al-'Ilmiyya in Beirut (1983) .
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