Shihab al-Din al-Qarafi

Shihāb al-Dīn al-Qarāfī
Personal
Born	1228 Bahfashīm, Ash'ari[1]
Muslim leader
Influenced by Izz al-Din ibn 'Abd al-Salam

Shihāb al-Dīn Abu ’l-Abbās Aḥmad ibn Abi ’l-ʿAlāʾ Idrīs ibn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Yallīn al-Ṣanhājī al-Ṣaʿīdī al-Bahfashīmī al-Būshī al-Bahnasī al-Miṣrī al-Mālikī (

.

Biography

He was born in Bahfashīm, a village in the province of Bahnasa in 1228. This village belonged to the district of Būsh, a town just a few miles to the north of Beni Suef.^[2] He apparently grew up in al-Qarafa in Old Cairo, whence his sobriquet of al-Qarafi.^[3][4] He was of Berber origin, from the Sanhaja tribe.^[3][5][4]

He is considered by many to be the greatest Maliki legal theoretician of the 13th century; his writings and influence on

) and custom provide means to accommodate the space-time differential between modern and premodern realities.

Works

The most important of his many works are Al-dhakhirah (The Stored Treasure), Al-furuq (Differences), Nafais al usul (Gems of Legal Theory), and Kitab al-ihkam fi tamyiz al-fatawa an al-ahkam wa tasarrufat al-qadi wal-imam (The Book of Perfecting the Distinction Between Legal Opinions, Judicial Decisions, and the Discretionary Actions of the Judge and the Caliph).

His work Al-dhakhirah is one of the most important works in the

in detail and has a strong personality in the way he presents the school.

His Ajwiba l-fākhira ʿan al-as’ila l-fājira fī l-radd ʿalā l-milla l-kāfira ('superb answers to shameful questions in refutation of the unbelieving religion') is a hefty apologetic work against Christian and Jews. The first part is a response to Paul of Antioch's Letter to a Muslim Friend.

See also

• List of Ash'aris and Maturidis
• List of Muslim theologians

References

Bibliography

• Aydin M. Sayili, "Al Qarafi and His Explanation of the Rainbow," Isis, Vol. 32 (Jul. 1940): 16-26.
• Diego R. Sarrió Cucarella, Muslim-Christian Polemics Across the Mediterranean: The Splendid Replies of Shihāb al-Dīn al-Qarāfī (d. 684/1285). Leiden-Boston: Brill, 2015.
• Diego R. Sarrió Cucarella, “Se battre pour la cause de Dieu : vice ou vertu ? Vues de Shihāb al-Dīn al-Qarāfī (d. 1285)”,
  Islamochristiana
  41 (2015): 95-107.
• Sherman A. Jackson, Islamic Law and the State: The Constitutional Jurisprudence of Shihāb al-Dīn al-Qarāfī, Leiden: Brill, 1996.