Reflections of a Traveler

Shaykh Faraz Rabbani was asked,

What one Arabic tafsir would you recommend that a person read at least once in a life time? What four Arabic Tafsirs would you recommend for a student of knowledge to have? And could you list them in order of priority. And if there is one or two more that you would please list.

And he replied:

Walaikum assalam wa rahmatullah,

(1) I asked a number of leading Damascene scholars–including Shaykh Abd al-Halim Abu Sha`r and Shaykh Abd al-Rahman Kharsa–regarding a tafsir they’d recommend a seeker of knowledge to read cover to cover. They all recommended Imam Sawi’s Hashiya `ala al-Jalalayn, a supercommentary on Tafsir al-Jalalayn in 5 volumes.

This is summarized from Imam Jamal’s supercommentary on the same work, Hashiyat al-Jamal `ala al-Jalalayn. This work is twice the size, but also highly recommended–many scholars, including Shaykh Nuh Keller and Shaykh Adib Kallas, consider it an indespensible reference.

(2) Imam Anwar Shah al-Kashmiri mentions in his work on the principles of tafsir that there are four Qur’anic exegeses (tafasir, tafsir) that a serious researcher simply needs:

(a) In tafsir by transmission (tafsir bi’l ma’thur), Tafsir Ibn Kathir.

(b) In tafsir focussing on legal and religious deduction (tafsir ahkam al-Qur’an), Tafsir al-Qurtubi.

(c) In tafsir with focus on rational and theological discourse (tafsir fi’l ma`qulat wa’l kalam), al-Tafsir al-Kabir of Imam Fakhr al-Din al-Razi.

(d) In interpretatrive and linguistic tafsir, Tafsir Abi’l Su`ud of Shaykh al-Islam Abu Su`ud al-Imadi, arguably the greatest scholar of the Ottoman Khilafa;

(e) As an encyclopedic tafsir that excels in all the above, and also contains deep spiritual allusions throughout, Tafsir Ruh al-Ma`ani of Imam Alusi, a great 19th Century jurist, theologian, and master of Qur’anic exegesis from Baghdad (Iraq). There are all reference works, however.

In the first steps of one’s path of knowledge, one would benefit by studying shorter works first (and referring to some of the above consistently, as one’s language and understanding of the Sacred sciences deepens).

These short works would include:

(a) Safwat al-Tafasir by Shaykh Sabuni. This is a three-volume contemporary tafsir based on the major classical tafsir works, and is highly recommended by traditional ulema.

(b) Tafsir al-Nasafi of Hafidh al-Din al-Nasafi. Also in three volumes.

(c) The abovementioned Hashiyat al-Sawi `ala al-Jalalayn.

(d) The Tafsir of Ibn Juzayy of al-Andalus. And Allah alone gives success.

Wassalam, Faraz Rabbani