Urf al-Anbar fi Wasf al-Minbar
- Author died
- 842 AH
- Editions
- Dār Ibn Ḥazm
Urf al-Anbar fi Wasf al-Minbar (The Fragrance of Ambergris in the Description of the Pulpit) is a specialized hadith treatise by the Syrian traditionist and historian Ibn Nasir al-Din al-Dimashqi (d. 842 AH / 1438 CE) dedicated to the prophetic pulpit (minbar) and the traditions associated with it .
Subject Matter and Method
The work compiles, analyzes, and contextualizes hadiths and historical reports concerning the pulpit of the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ and related events, including the weeping of the palm trunk (jidh' al-nakhla) upon which the Prophet used to lean before the pulpit was constructed .
In treating these narrations, Ibn Nasir al-Din employs critical hadith methodology by comparing chains of transmission (isnad) and identifying textual variants (riwayat) . For instance, after citing a narration from Kitab al-Yatima by Abu Musa al-Madini through the route of al-Tabarani narrated by Abu Basra on the authority of Jabir ibn Abd Allah, he compares it with the narration in the Musnad of Abd ibn Humayd transmitted from Abu Sa'id al-Khudri, evaluating which attribution is more probable, and adducing corroborating paths from the Fawa'id of Abu Bakr ibn al-Muqri' .
Reception and Transmission
The treatise is cited in biographical and bibliographical dictionaries, including al-Shawkani's al-Badr al-Tali', Isma'il Pasha al-Babani's Idah al-Maknun and Hadiyyat al-'Arifin, as well as Abd al-Hayy al-Kattani's Nizam al-Hukumah al-Nabawiyyah (al-Taratib al-Idariyya), which notes its inclusion in al-Rudani's bibliographic compilation Silat al-Khalaf . Later scholars of hadith, such as Murtada al-Zabidi in his commentary and verification of Abu Hamid al-Ghazali's Ihya' 'Ulum al-Din, drew directly upon Ibn Nasir al-Din's text for verifying and evaluating prophetic reports regarding the pulpit .
Manuscripts and Publication
A manuscript copy of the treatise is preserved in the Taymuriyya Library in Cairo (MS 398) . The text was edited by Misha'al ibn Bani al-Jibrin al-Mutayri and published by Dar Ibn Hazm in Beirut (1422 AH / 2001 CE) as part of a collected volume of treatises by Ibn Nasir al-Din al-Dimashqi .
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