The beginning of all the manuscripts of Ikhtilāf uṣūl al-madhāhib consulted include a short text by al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s grandson ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Nuʿmān, who served as a judge under the Fatimid Caliph al-Ḥākim (r.. 386–411/996–1021) and was executed in 401/1010–11. This text shows that the work was passed down to him from his father, and from his grandfather, being authorized at each stage by the Imam of the age. It is therefore clear that the text as we have it derives from the recension of the grandson, which may possibly be identical with al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s original copy of the work.51
At some point during its transmission, the text was divided into nine fascicles (ajzāʾ, sing. juzʾ), and some subsequent manuscripts have incorporated into their text the notes that originally indicated the end of one fascicle and the beginning of the next. It is possible but not certain that these fascicles derive ultimately from the recension of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s grandson ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz. They do not, however, correspond to the fascicles of any of the manuscripts that I have seen. Lokhandwalla includes these fascicle breaks prominently in his edited text, and presents them in the table of contents as well. However, the breaks are to some extent arbitrary, based on length and not on content. At certain points they have confused the copyists about the breaks between the author’s chapters of the work, particularly in the chapter on consensus, which takes up several fascicles. They also render Lokhandwalla’s table of contents quite confusing to the reader. I have decided to leave them out of this edition in order to emphasize the original chapter divisions instead. Those who are interested in the exact position of these fascicle breaks may consult Lokhandwalla’s edition.
The pious formulas and blessings that occur after the names of God, the Prophet Muḥammad, ʿAlī, and the other Shiʿi Imams pose a number of problems. While it is clear that al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān did use such blessings in his original work, it is also clear from the manuscripts that later copyists have felt free to add these formulas at points where they were not originally included. In addition, copyists frequently used abbreviations for these formulas, such as ʿayn jīm for ʿazza wa-jalla, ʿayn mīm for ʿalayhi al-salam, and so on. There are often discrepancies between the forms produced in different manuscripts, one suspects either as the result of a formula being abbreviated by one copyist and then expanded by a later copyist in a slightly different form, or else by copyists’ taking the liberty to substitute one formula for another. It becomes difficult to decide whether ṣād-lām-ʿayn means ṣallā llāhu ʿalayhi wa-ʿalā ālihi or ṣallā llāhu ʿalayhi wa-ālihi or ṣallā llāhu ʿalayhi wa-ʿalā ālihi wa-sallam. In general, I have followed the text given in MS 1131 with regard to these formulas, and I have not noted the variants in these formulas from the other editions and manuscripts.
Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān uses a type of shorthand when quoting verses from the Qurʾan that is common in medieval Islamic texts. In order to save space, he will quote the beginning of a verse and then write al-āyah “the verse,” meaning that the quotation continues, virtually, until the end of the verse. It is understood that the learned reader will have the Qurʾan memorized and so be able to complete the verse to himself mentally. In these cases, I have simply quoted the entire verse in the Arabic text without indicating the underlying shorthand, and I have translated the entire verse in the English.
Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s style is complex and at times ornate. He uses sajʿ, or rhyming and rhythmical prose, quite often, and this on occasion helps the reader interpret difficult passages or restore the correct version of the text. Going against the practice of many modern editors, who generally ignore rhyme in prose texts, I have violated the modern rules of spelling in cases where this would disturb the author’s intended use of sajʿ. For example, I establish the text as . . . qārīhi instead of qāriʾihi on the grounds that it is intended to rhyme with the following phrase . . . mā fīhi.
The English Translation
I have expended a great deal of effort to render al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s prose into intelligible and fluid English, in keeping with the goals of the Library of Arabic Literature and recognizing that those who would like to consult the original Arabic will have it available on the facing page. This has not been a simple task, for two main reasons. The first is the use of the technical vocabulary of law and legal hermeneutics, which I have endeavored to translate into English terms rather than retaining the Arabic words in transliteration, a procedure often followed in Western studies of Islamic law. Because of the use of the same terms in varying contexts and on occasion with slightly different meanings, it has been necessary to modify the translation of these terms to fit the context while at the same time trying to avoid changing them so much that the continuity would be lost. This is particularly difficult when al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān stresses a certain sense of a word in order to defeat the argument of an opponent who used the word to mean something different.
The second difficulty arises from the dialectical nature of the text. Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān often argues in extremely long, drawn-out sentences, presenting an actual or hypothetical objection of an opponent, with several subsidiary parts, and then the appropriate answer to that objection, also with several subsidiary parts, in a single sentence. In translating many passages of this type, I have found it necessary for the reader’s sake to divide the sentence into more manageable pieces, for to do otherwise would have led to confusion. This has resulted in modifying the grammar of the original sentences, but my goal, throughout, has been to render clear the arguments that al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān is making rather than to reproduce his syntax.
The pious formulas of blessing that occur after mentions of God and the Prophet are so frequent that they interfere with the reader’s understanding of the English translation. They often occur a dozen or more times in close proximity, and in many cases it is clear that they were not in al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s original work but have been added by later copyists. I have omitted those that follow the name of God and the name of the Prophet in the translation, but I have retained those that occur after the names of other figures such as scholars and Imams, which are much less frequent.
Notes to the Introduction
| 1 | For an accessible account of Ismaʿili Shiʿi Islam in general, and its Nizārī and Mustaʿlī branches in particular, see Heinz Halm, Shia Islam: From Religion to Revolution, 2nd ed., trans. Janet Watson and Marian Hill (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), 160–201. For a more substantial treatment, see Farhad Daftary, The Ismāʿīlīs: Their History and Doctrines (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990). |
| 2 |
Richard J. H. Gottheil, “A Distinguished Family of Fatimide Cadis in the Tenth Century,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 27 (1906): 217–96; H. F. Hamdani, “Some Unknown Ismāʿīlī Authors and Their Works,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1933): 359–78; A. A. A. Fyzee, “Qadi an-Nuʿmān: The Fatimid Jurist and Author,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1934): 1–32; F. Dachraoui, “al-Nuʿmān,” Encyclopaedia of Islam 2, 8:117–18; Wilferd Madelung, Review of Hadi Roger Idris, La Berberie orientale sous les Zirides, Xe-XIIe siècles, Journal of the American Oriental Society 84 (1964): 424–25; S. T. Lokhandwalla, Introduction to Kitāb Ikhtilāf Uṣūli ‘l-Madhāhib of Qāḍī Nuʿmān B. Muḥammmad, Edited with a critical introduction (Simla, India: Indian Institute of Advanced Study, 1973); Ismail K. Poonawala, “Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s Works and the Sources,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 36.1 (1973): 109–15; idem, “A Reconsideration of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s Madhhab,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 37 (1974): 572–79; Wilferd Madelung, “The Sources of Ismāʿīlī Law,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 35.1 (1976): 29–40; Ismail K. Poonawala, Biobibliography
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