Rashid al-Din Maybudis Kashf al-Asrar

656 Pages·2015·3.96 MB·English

The Unveiling of the Mysteries
and the Provision of the Pious

The Unveiling of the Mysteries
and the Provision of the Pious
Kashf al-Asrār wa ʿUddat al-Abrār

By
Rashīd al-Dīn Maybudī

SELECTIONS TRANSLATED BY
William C. Chittick

© 2015 Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought
Amman, Jordan
First published in 2015 by
Fons Vitae
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Great Commentaries on the Holy Qur’an: ISSN 1943-1821
Library of Congress Control Number: 2015930122
ISBN 978-1891785-221
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The Fons Vitae Quranic Commentary Series:
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Tafsīr al-Jalālayn by Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī
and Jalāl al-Dīn al-Maḥallī
Tafsīr Ibn ‘Abbās by Ibn ‘Abbās (attrib.)
and Muḥammad ibn Ya‘qūb al-Fīrūzābādī (attrib.)
al-Wāḥidī’s Asbāb al-Nuzūl by ‘Ali Aḥmad ibn al-Wāḥidī
Tafsīr al-Tustarī by Sahl b. ‘Abd Allāh al-Tustarī
The Immense Ocean (al-Baḥr al-Madīd) by Aḥmad ibn ‘Ajība
A Thirteenth Century Quranic Commentary on the Chapters of the All-Merciful,
the Event, and Iron
Spiritual Gems The Mystical Qur’ān Commentary ascribed
by the Ṣūfīs to the Imām Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq
Printed in U. S. A.
iv
Contents
Translator’s Introduction ix
Abbreviations xx
Surah 1: al-Fātiḥa 1
Surah 2: al-Baqara 9
Surah 3: Āl ʿImrān 99
Surah 4: al-Nisāʾ 129
Surah 5: al-Māʾida 156
Surah 6: al-Anʿām 171
Surah 7: al-Aʿrāf 191
Surah 8: al-Anfāl 218
Surah 9: al-Tawba 227
Surah 10: Yūnus 236
Surah 11: Hūd 247
Surah 12: Yūsuf 252
Surah 13: al-Raʿd 261
Surah 14: Ibrāhīm 267
Surah 15: al-Ḥijr 271
Surah 16: al-Naḥl 274
Surah 17: Banī Isrāʾīl 284
Surah 18: al-Kahf 295
Surah 19: Maryam 305
Surah 20: Ṭāhā 311
Surah 21: al-Anbiyāʾ 324
Surah 22: al-Ḥajj 334
Surah 23: al-Muʾminūn 341
Surah 24: al-Nūr 346
Surah 25: al-Furqān 359
Surah 26: al-Shuʿarāʾ 365
Surah 27: al-Naml 371
Surah 28: al-Qaṣaṣ 375
Surah 29: al-ʿAnkabūt 380
v
The Unveiling of the Mysteries and the Provision of the Pious
Surah 30: al-Rūm 384
Surah 31: Luqmān 388
Surah 32: al-Sajda 390
Surah 33: al-Aḥzāb 393
Surah 34: Sabaʾ 401
Surah 35: al-Fāṭir 405
Surah 36: Yāsīn 413
Surah 37: al-Ṣāffāt 418
Surah 38: Ṣād 425
Surah 39: al-Zumar 430
Surah 40: al-Muʾminūn 439
Surah 41: Fuṣillat 444
Surah 42: al-Shūrā 451
Surah 43: al-Zukhruf 455
Surah 44: al-Dukhān 459
Surah 45: al-Jāthiya 461
Surah 46: al-Aḥqāf 464
Surah 47: Muḥammad 466
Surah 48: al-Fatḥ 467
Surah 49: al-Ḥujurāt 468
Surah 50: Qāf 471
Surah 51: al-Dhāriyāt 478
Surah 52: al-Ṭūr 480
Surah 53: al-Najm 482
Surah 54: al-Qamar 487
Surah 55: al-Raḥmān 489
Surah 56: al-Wāqiʿa 492
Surah 57: al-Ḥadīd 495
Surah 58: al-Mujādila 498
Surah 59: al-Ḥashr 500
Surah 60: al-Mumtaḥana 501
Surah 61: al-Ṣaff 503
Surah 62: al-Jumuʿa 504
Surah 63: al-Munāfiqūn 505
Surah 64: al-Taghābun 507
Surah 65: al-Ṭalāq 510
Surah 66: al-Taḥrīm 511
Surah 67: al-Mulk 513
vi
Contents
Surah 68: al-Qalam 514
Surah 69: al-Ḥāqqa 515
Surah 71: Nūḥ 516
Surah 73: al-Muzzammil 517
Surah 74: al-Muddaththir 520
Surah 75: al-Qiyāma 522
Surah 76: al-Insān 525
Surah 77: al-Mursalāt 528
Surah 78: al-Nabaʾ 529
Surah 79: al-Nāziʿāt 530
Surah 80: ʿAbasa 532
Surah 81: al-Takwīr 533
Surah 82: al-Infiṭār 535
Surah 83: al-Taṭfīf 536
Surah 84: al-Inshiqāq 537
Surah 86: al-Ṭāriq 540
Surah 89: al-Fajr 542
Surah 91: al-Shams 544
Surah 94: al-Sharḥ 545
Surah 95: al-Tīn 547
Surah 96: al-ʿAlaq 549
Surah 98: al-Bayyina 550
Surah 101: al-Qāriʿa 551
Surah 102: al-Takāthur 552
Surah 103: al-ʿAṣr 553
Surah 104: al-Humaza 555
Surah 109: al-Kāfirūn 556
Surah 111: al-Masad 557
Surah 112: al-Ikhlāṣ 558
Surah 113: al-Falaq 561
Glossary 563
Bibliography 579
Index of Quranic Verses 580
Index of Persons 621
vii

Translator’s Introduction
The full name of this commentary is Kashf al-asrār wa ʿuddat al-abrār (“The unveiling of the
mysteries and the provision of the pious”). It is the longest Sunni commentary in the Persian
language, about as long as the longest, pre-modern Persian Shi’ite commentary, Rawḍ al-jinān wa
rawḥ al-janān (“The meadow of the gardens and the repose of the heart”) by Abu’l-Futūḥ Rāzī, a
contemporary of Maybudī.1
Practically nothing is known about Rashīd al-Dīn Maybudī, though Annabel Keeler has done
her best to come up with information in her important study of his work.2 The best guess at his
full name is Rashīd al-Dīn Abu’l-Faḍl Aḥmad ibn Abī Saʿd ibn Aḥmad ibn Mihr-i Īzad. He was
apparently born in the town of Maybud, about fifty kilometers from Yazd in central Iran. Keeler
thinks that he followed the Shafi’ite school of law because he usually gives priority to al-Shāfiʿī’s
opinion in discussions of legal issues. He shows signs of both Ash’arism and Hanbalism, so it is
not clear if he held to a specific school of Kalam. It seems that he was more concerned to provide a
range of exegetical opinions than to state his own position, which helps explain why his statements
in one place may seem at odds with what he says elsewhere.
The only thing known about Maybudī’s dates is that he began writing Kashf al-asrār in the
year 520/1126. Anyone who studies the book will quickly see that he was well-versed in the
religious sciences and had a gift for simplifying complex discussions. In an appendix, he talks
about the debate among the ulama concerning the legitimacy of the science of Qur’an commentary
and concludes that only those who have mastered ten fields of learning have a right to undertake
it. These are lexicography (lugha), the derivation of words (ishtiqāq), Arabic grammar (naḥw),
Qur’an recitation (qirāʾa), biographies (siyar), Hadith, the principles of jurisprudence (uṣūl-i
fiqh), the science of the legal rulings (ʿilm-i aḥkām), the science of transactions and interactions
(muʿāmalāt), and the science of bestowal (mawhiba).3 By the last he means knowledge that comes
not from study or acquisition (iktisāb), but rather from “divine bestowal and lordly inspiration”
(mawhibat-i ilāhī wa ilhām-i rabbānī; see under 8:29). Most commentaries deal only with some
or all of the first nine fields, and a few focus on the tenth, such as those of al-Sulamī, al-Qushayrī,
and ʿAbd al-Razzāq Kāshānī. What is distinctive about Maybudī’s work is that he addresses all
ten fields. The structure of the book, however, shows that he considered the tenth special enough
to be set apart from the others.
Maybudī translates and comments on every verse of the Qur’an in a series of 465 “sessions”
or “sittings” (majlis), a term that suggests that he wrote the book as a teacher’s guide for lecturing
on the entire Qur’an. Each session explains a few verses and takes up an average of fourteen pages
1 Kashf al-asrār was printed over a period of several years in the middle of the twentieth century by a famous literary
and political figure, ʿAlī Aṣghar Ḥikmat. The edition does not meet the standards of critical scholarship, but the editor
did use several manuscripts in preparing it. Some of the volumes have addenda listing errata, most of which are in
any case fairly obvious to careful readers; there is also a little book by Aḥmad Mahdawī-Dāmghānī listing additional
errata, though these pertain almost entirely to the Arabic parts of the text. There is a downloadable edition of the text,
without any changes to the printed version except for a few more typographical errors. In order to maintain reader
friendliness I have refrained from noting the many instances in which my translation corrects the printed edition—in
most cases, scholars of Persian will immediately see what I have done. On rare occasions I have added a footnote
because of a significant deviation from the printed text (e.g., under verses 21:33 and 50:19).
2 Sufi Hermeneutics: The Qur’an Commentary of Rashīd al-Dīn Maybudī (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).
3 Maybudī, Kashf al-asrār 10:679.
ix
The Unveiling of the Mysteries and the Provision of the Pious
in the printed edition (which consists of 6400 pages in ten volumes). Every session is then divided
into three stages called “turns” (nawba). In the first stage Maybudī provides the Arabic text of
the Qur’an broken up into phrases and clauses, each of which he translates. In the second stage he
offers a fairly standard commentary, relying on sayings of the Prophet, the Companions, and the
great early authorities and deriving much of the material from well-known sources. In the third he
demonstrates his mastery of the tenth sort of knowledge, that of bestowal and inspiration. Alto-
gether, Stage I takes up 15 percent of the text (990 pages of the Persian text), Stage II 60 percent
(3850 pp.), and Stage III 25 percent (1560 pp.).
The selections translated here represent slightly more than one-half of the third stage. The
longest consists of two-thirds of the commentary on Surah al-Baqara. I have translated the full text
only in the case of al-Fātiḥa and a handful of short surahs (60, 76, 84, 95, 103, and 113).
Maybudī almost never mentions the sources from which he draws. Keeler has shown that
in Stage II he borrows from the well-known commentaries of Mujāhid, Muqātil ibn Sulaymān,
Sufyān al-Thawrī, Ibn Qutayba, and al-Ṭabarī. In Stage III he uses the commentary of al-Qushayrī
and sometimes that of al-Sulamī. It is clear that he also used many other books, some of which
may no longer be extant, but a great deal of research needs to be done before these can be specified.
Maybudī was a compiler rather than an original thinker. What makes his commentary attrac-
tive is its comprehensiveness, its arrangement in stages, and the extent to which it employs Persian
rather than Arabic. The very act of using Persian meant that the author was not writing simply for the
ulama, all of whom knew Arabic, but also for those not proficient in the sciences. This is especially
obvious in Stage III, about eighty percent of which is in Persian (in contrast to Stage II, about half of
which is Arabic). In Stage III Maybudī singles out a few verses and explains their “allusions” (ishāra)
and “intimations” (ramz) as these have been discerned by recipients of divine bestowal and lordly
inspiration. The Persian idiom is simple, clear, and sweet, with a great deal of story-telling, imagistic
language, and poetry (Stage II also quotes poetry, but mainly in Arabic). It is clear that Maybudī did
not expect the readers of Stage III to be well versed in the sciences. Rather, he was addressing those
who have a personal desire to understand the message and gain proximity to God.
In keeping with the type of commentary that has often been called taʾwīl (though Maybudī
does not use the word in this sense), Stage III interprets tales of the prophets or mentions of the
signs of God in the natural world as references to the inner life of the reader. Thus, for example,
the Qur’an may be telling the story of Joseph, but this is a love story, and every soul is called upon
to be a lover of God, so the story pertains to each and every one of us. In other words, Maybudī is
answering a question that often occurs to readers of the Qur’an: “Well, that may be very interest-
ing, but what does it have to do with me?”
Most of the works from which Maybudī draws in Stage III were written by authors whom the
secondary literature associates with “Sufism,” a term I employ for want of a satisfactory alterna-
tive. The word has come to be used as a generic designation for an inward orientation among Mus-
lims only in relatively recent times. When used early on, it typically referred to a specific station
(maqām) on the path to God achieved by a small number of seekers. Other scholars may prefer
to talk about Sufism as “mysticism” or “esotericism,” but both of these words carry unfortunate
historical and cultural baggage and are by no means adequate to designate the many facets of the
Sufi tradition.4
In my understanding, Sufism is a broad approach to Islamic learning that can be distinguished
from three other broad approaches, namely jurisprudence (fiqh), dialectical theology (kalām), and
philosophy (falsafa). Sufi authors often dealt with the same topics that are addressed in the other
three fields and acknowledged the legitimacy of those approaches. But they held that in the last
analysis the standard sources of knowledge—transmitted reports and rational investigation—are
inadequate and need to be supplemented by what Maybudī calls “bestowal.” At the same time, it
should be kept in mind that the various approaches to knowledge were by no means mutually ex-
clusive. It was common for a single individual to master them all, as is shown by Maybudī himself
4 Concerning the problems with the word, see Carl Ernst, The Shambhala Guide to Sufism (Boston: Shambhala, 1997);
Chittick, Sufism: A Beginner’s Guide (Oxford: Oneworld, 2008).
x