Jamāl al-Dīn Abū al-Ḥajjāj Yūsuf ibn al-Zakī ʻAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Yūsuf ibn ʻAbd al-Malik ibn Yūsuf al-Kalbī al-Quḍā'ī al-Mizzī, (), also called Al-Ḥāfiẓ Abī al-Ḥajjāj, was a

Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...

muhaddith A muhaddith () is a scholar specialized in the study, collection, and interpretation of hadiths, which are the recorded sayings, actions, and approvals of the Prophet Muhammad. The role of a muhaddith is central to the science of hadith (ʻilm a ...

and the foremost `Ilm al-rijāl

Islamic scholar In Islam, the ''ulama'' ( ; also spelled ''ulema''; ; singular ; feminine singular , plural ) are scholars of Islamic doctrine and law. They are considered the guardians, transmitters, and interpreters of religious knowledge in Islam. "Ulama ...

Life

Al-Mizzī was born near

Aleppo Aleppo is a city in Syria, which serves as the capital of the Aleppo Governorate, the most populous Governorates of Syria, governorate of Syria. With an estimated population of 2,098,000 residents it is Syria's largest city by urban area, and ...

in 1256 under the reign of the last

Ayyubid The Ayyubid dynasty (), also known as the Ayyubid Sultanate, was the founding dynasty of the medieval Sultan of Egypt, Sultanate of Egypt established by Saladin in 1171, following his abolition of the Fatimid Caliphate, Fatimid Caliphate of Egyp ...

emir Emir (; ' (), also Romanization of Arabic, transliterated as amir, is a word of Arabic language, Arabic origin that can refer to a male monarch, aristocratic, aristocrat, holder of high-ranking military or political office, or other person po ...

An-Nasir Yusuf An-Nasir Yusuf (; AD 1228–1260), fully al-Malik al-Nasir Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn al-Aziz ibn al-Zahir ibn Salah al-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub ibn Shazy (), was the Ayyubid Kurdish Emir of Syria from his seat in Aleppo (1236–1260), and the S ...

. From 1260 the region was ruled by the ''na'ib al-saltana'' (viceroys) of the

Mamluk Sultanate The Mamluk Sultanate (), also known as Mamluk Egypt or the Mamluk Empire, was a state that ruled Egypt, the Levant and the Hejaz from the mid-13th to early 16th centuries, with Cairo as its capital. It was ruled by a military caste of mamluks ...

. In childhood he moved with his family to the village of al-Mizza outside

Damascus Damascus ( , ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in the Levant region by population, largest city of Syria. It is the oldest capital in the world and, according to some, the fourth Holiest sites in Islam, holiest city in Islam. Kno ...

, where he was educated in Qur'ān and fiqh. In his twenties he began his studies to become a muḥaddith and learned from the masters. His fellow pupil and life-long friend was Taqī al-Dīn ibn Taymiyya. It was also Taymiyya's ideological influence, which although contrary to his own Shāfi'ī legalist inclination, that led to a stint in jail. Despite his affiliation with Ibn Taymiyya he became head of the ''Dār al-Ḥadīth al-Ashrafiyya'', a leading ḥadīth academy in Damascus, in 1319. And although he professed the Ash'arī doctrine suspicion continued about his true beliefs. He travelled across the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt,

(), and

Ḥijāz Hejaz is a historical region of the Arabian Peninsula that includes the majority of the western region of Saudi Arabia, covering the cities of Mecca, Medina, Jeddah, Tabuk, Yanbu, Taif and Al-Bahah. It is thus known as the "Western Province" ...

and became the greatest `Ilm al-rijāl () scholar of the Muslim world and an expert grammarian and philologist of Arabic. He died at ''Dar al-Hadith al-Ashrafiyyah'' in Damascus in 1341/2 and was buried in the ''Sufiyyah'' graveyard., by al-Kattani, pg. 208, ''Dar al-Basha'ir al-Islamiyyah'', Beirut, seventh edition, 2007.

Pupils

* Al-Dhahabī * 'Abd al-Wahhab al-Subkī * Ismā'īl ibn Kathīr

Ibn Kathir Abu al-Fida Isma'il ibn Umar ibn Kathir al-Dimashqi (; ), known simply as Ibn Kathir, was an Arab Islamic Exegesis, exegete, historian and scholar. An expert on (Quranic exegesis), (history) and (Islamic jurisprudence), he is considered a lea ...

married a daughter of al-Mizzī. *

Ibn al-Furat Nāṣir al-Dīn Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Raḥīm b. ʿAlī al-Miṣrī al-Ḥanafī () (1334–1405 CE), better known as Ibn al-Furāt, was an Egyptian historian, best known for his universal history, generally known as ''Taʾrīkh al-duwal wa � ...

Fozia Bora, ''Writing History in the Medieval Islamic World: The Value of Chronicles as Archives'', The Early and Medieval Islamic World (London: I.B. Tauris, 2019), p. 38; . *

Najm ad-Din al-Tufi Najm ad-Dīn Abū r-Rabīʿ Sulaymān ibn ʿAbd al-Qawī aṭ-Ṭūfī () was a Hanbali scholar and student of Ibn Taymiyyah. He referred to ibn Taymiyyah as "our sheikh." Most of his scholarship deals with Islamic legal theory and theology. His wr ...

Works

* ''Tahdhīb al-kamāl fī asmā' al-rijāl''; biographical lexicon and comprehensive reworking of

Al-Kamal fi Asma' al-Rijal ''Al-Kamal fi Asma' al-Rijal'' () is a collection of biographies of hadith narrators within the Islamic discipline of biographical evaluation by the 12th-century Islamic scholar Abd al-Ghani al-Maqdisi. Overview The author collected in this bo ...

, a collection of narrator biographies of the transmitters of '' isnāds'' in the

Six major Hadith collections (), also known as () are the six canonical hadith collections of Sunni Islam. They were all compiled in the 9th and early 10th centuries, roughly from 840 to 912 CE and are thought to embody the Sunnah of Muhammad. The books are the of al ...

and others, based upon the ''tarf'' (beginning segment) of the

hadith Hadith is the Arabic word for a 'report' or an 'account f an event and refers to the Islamic oral tradition of anecdotes containing the purported words, actions, and the silent approvals of the Islamic prophet Muhammad or his immediate circle ...

. The Tahdhīb includes ''Ruwāt kuttub al-sitta''. Al-Asqalānī and others wrote compendia of this work. * ''Tuḥfat al-ashraf bi-Ma'rifat al-Aṭraf''; alphabetically indexed encyclopaedia of the ''musnads'' of the first generation transmitters, the

Companions of the Prophet The Companions of the Prophet () were the Muslim disciples and followers of the Islamic prophet Muhammad who saw or met him during his lifetime. The companions played a major role in Muslim battles, society, hadith narration, and governance ...

. An indispensable resource for the study of Muslim tradition that comprises al-Nasā'ī's ''Al-Sunan al-kubrā''.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * *

External links

Imam al-Mizzi, his brief incarceration and the Khalq af'al al-Ibad of Imam al-Bukhari
() {{DEFAULTSORT:Jamal Din Mizzi 1256 births 1342 deaths 13th-century Arab people 14th-century Arab people Sunni Muslim scholars of Islam Shafi'is Atharis Hadith scholars People from Damascus 14th-century Muslim scholars of Islam Proto-Salafists 13th-century jurists 14th-century jurists Biographical evaluation scholars Banu Kalb