Ottoman scholar whose detailed commentary Mughnī al-ṭullāb (‘What suffices the students’) became a much-used teaching commentary on the Īsāghūjī.
Life
Very little is recorded about Maḥmūd b. Ḥasan al-Maghnīsāwī. His name links him to Manisa in western Anatolia (Arabic Maghnīsā). Adem Evmeş, who wrote a master’s thesis and an article on his , says he died in 1222 AH, and the British Library record of a printed copy of his gives the same date as 1807 or 1808.
He should not be confused with an earlier and better-known scholar of the same nisba, Abū l-Muntahā Aḥmad b. Muḥammad al-Maghnīsāwī, the Ḥanafī author of a much-copied on al-Fiqh al-akbar, whom library records place in the late sixteenth century (Qalamos gives 1592).
Adem Evmeş’s study sets out al-Maghnīsāwī’s views on , the five , , and , comparing them with al-Kātī’s . In his other articles Evmeş points out that on some questions, such as the meaning of the word , al-Maghnīsāwī reports further accounts and interpretations than al-Kātī and al-Kalanbawī do.
Uncertain or disputed
- Dates vary widely between sources. Evmeş and the British Library/University of Pennsylvania catalogue record give 1222/1807–8; the publisher’s page for the Amman edition places him around 1500. The later date is the one supported by catalogues; the earlier one may come from confusion with other scholars called al-Maghnīsāwī.
- Evmeş writes that he composed the commentary ‘in 1890’; this is evidently the date of the Istanbul printing, not of composition, which is unknown.
- His teachers, career and other works are not documented in the sources consulted.
Works
- Mughnī al-ṭullāb (Sharḥ Īsāghūjī) مُغْنِي الطُّلَّاب — on ĪsāghūjīPrinted in Istanbul ([1890], British Library copy) as Muʿallim Mughnī al-ṭullāb with a Turkish interlinear translation and marginal glosses by one Ṭayyār. Modern edition by ʿIṣām b. Muhadhdhab al-Subuʿī (cited by Evmeş as Beirut: Dār Bayrūt, 1430/2009; the same editor’s edition is also sold by Dār al-Nūr al-Mubīn, Amman). Another modern printing (Dār Nūr al-Ṣabāḥ) adds Muḥammad Fawzī’s gloss Sayf al-ghullāb in the notes.commentary
Reception
The modern editor of al-Kātī, a teacher in Baghdad, calls Mughnī al-ṭullāb one of the most precise and useful of the , says he has taught it many times, and promises that a student who understands it well, with a good teacher, will be ready for the long and difficult books of .
Its Istanbul printing with a Turkish interlinear translation suggests that it was read in Turkish-speaking classrooms; a bookseller’s description of the Amman edition says it was famously studied in Anatolia and the eastern Islamic lands.
In the nineteenth century Muḥammad Fawzī, mufti of Edirne, wrote a gloss on it, Sayf al-ghullāb ʿalā Mughnī al-ṭullāb (Istanbul 1284).
Sources (9)
- Adem Evmeş, ‘Mahmud Hasan el-Mağnîsî’nin Mantık Anlayışı’, Mantık Araştırmaları Dergisi 2 (2019)
- University of Pennsylvania Libraries: al-Īsāghūjī with Muʿallim Mughnī al-ṭullāb (British Library copy, [1890])
- Qalamos/Leipzig person record: Abū l-Muntahā Aḥmad b. Muḥammad al-Maġnīsāwī
- al-Kātī, Sharḥ matn al-Īsāghūjī, ed. Qāsim b. Naʿīm al-Ḥanafī (2015), editor’s introduction
- TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, ‘FEVZİ EFENDİ, Edirne Müftüsü’ (Mustafa İsmet Uzun)
- Dār al-Nūr al-Mubīn (Amman): Mughnī al-ṭullāb fī ʿilm al-manṭiq, ed. ʿIṣām al-Subuʿī (publisher page)
- Sifatusafwa: Mughnī al-ṭullāb with Sayf al-ghullāb (Dār Nūr al-Ṣabāḥ; bookseller page)
- Adem Evmeş, ‘Gelenbevî’nin Îsâgûcî Şerhi Üzerine’, Mantık Araştırmaları Dergisi 2 (2020)
- Adem Evmeş, comparison of al-Kātī’s and al-Fanārī’s commentaries, Bozok Üniversitesi İlahiyat Fakültesi Dergisi 17 (2020)