Tafsir Ibn al-Mundhir
- Author died
- 319 AH
- Editions
- Dar al-Ma'athir
Tafsir Ibn al-Mundhir (Arabic: تفسير ابن المنذر) is a classical musnad-based Quranic exegesis by the jurist and traditionist Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Ibrahim ibn al-Mundhir al-Nisaburi (d. 318 AH or 319 AH / 930–931 CE) . It is considered one of the foundational early sources of tafsir bi-al-ma'thur (tradition-based interpretation) alongside the commentaries of al-Tabari and Ibn Abi Hatim .
Composition and Title
The author referred to the work simply as Kitab al-Tafsir or Tafsir al-Qur'an in his other writings, such as al-Awsat, where he regularly cited his chains of transmission from the Tafsir . Originally a complete commentary covering the entire Quran from Surah al-Fatihah to Surah al-Nas, the full work was estimated by al-Dhahabi to have spanned more than a dozen volumes .
Method and Sources
The book is organized along the methodology of the early generation of exegetes, interpreting the Quran through Quranic verses, prophetic traditions, and attested narrations (athar) traced through connected chains of transmission (asānīd) to the Companions, the Successors, and their followers . As an independent jurist capable of legal reasoning (ijtihad), Ibn al-Mundhir also offered his own assessments and preferences on verses open to scholarly interpretation .
Among the primary teachers from whom he frequently transmitted in the work are Zakariyya ibn Dawud, Musa ibn Harun, 'Ali ibn al-Mubarak, 'Ali ibn 'Abd al-'Aziz al-Baghawi, 'Allan 'Ali ibn 'Abd al-Rahman ibn al-Mughirah, Muhammad ibn 'Ali al-Najjar, 'Ali ibn al-Hasan, Yahya ibn Muhammad ibn Yahya, and 'Ali ibn 'Abd Allah .
Scholarly Standing and Reception
Scholars held Tafsir Ibn al-Mundhir in high esteem:
- Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani wrote in the introduction to al-'Ujab fi Bayan al-Asbab that the four core exegeses around which transmitted interpretation revolved were those of al-Tabari, Ibn al-Mundhir, Ibn Abi Hatim, and 'Abd ibn Humayd .
- Al-Dhahabi remarked that the expansive size and quality of this work established Ibn al-Mundhir's foremost authority in the science of interpretation (ta'wil) .
- Al-Dawudi observed that "no work like it had been composed" .
- Later scholars who had access to complete copies, such as Ibn Hajar and al-Suyuti, quoted it extensively in their works; al-Suyuti drew heavily on it for his al-Durr al-manthur and Lubab al-nuqul .
Surviving Manuscripts and Editions
Most of the original multi-volume text is lost, but portions have survived:
- A very old manuscript consisting of 198 folios containing the commentary on Surah al-Baqarah is preserved in the research library in Gotha, Germany (MS 521) .
- An excerpted selection (muntakhab) copied in 784 AH appears in the margins of the second volume of Ibn Abi Hatim's Tafsir preserved in the Aya Sofya Library in Istanbul (MS 175, 205 folios) .
The surviving Gotha manuscript, with cross-references to the Aya Sofya marginalia, was edited by Sa'd ibn Muhammad al-Sa'd with an introduction by 'Abd Allah ibn 'Abd al-Muhsin al-Turki, and published by Dar al-Ma'athir in Medina in 1423 AH / 2002 CE across two continuously numbered volumes .
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