Abstract
Like the commentary of al-Ṭabarī (311/923), that of Ibn Abī Ḥātim, of which an important part has survived, contains the exegetical reports of the first three centuries of Islam. The extant commentary covers from Sūra 1 to the end of Sūra 13 and from Sūra 23 to the end of Sūra 29. Ibn Abī Ḥātim’s commentary has been edited and published in ten volumes by Asʽad Muḥammad al-Ṭayyib, but for several reasons this edition cannot be considered a successful work of scholarship. In al-Ṭayyib’s edition the isnāds are numbered, but the editor prefers to use a naive and misleading method of numbering: on the one hand, he numbers the isnāds contained in the existing manuscripts of this exegesis; on the other he has tried to complete the isnāds of the missing part of Ibn Abī Ḥātim’s commentary by using those later works that have benefited from Ibn Abī Ḥātim’s work. Thus the original part of this exegesis is combined with its later compilations. Further, according to this edition, the latest isnāds is given as number 19541. Although this figure is supposed to indicate the total number of isnāds in the commentary, we find that there is a fundamental mistake in the numbering, especially after isnād no. 9061, where this isnād is followed by no. 8328, and the sequence continues 8329, 8330 … and so on. Nor is this the only error. We find that the order is frequently disrupted. Because of these discrepancies in the numbering of the isnāds we will give the page number in the footnotes concerning our own findings rather than referring to the editor’s numbering system. In addition, the large number of misreadings of text and misquoted names bears witness to the insufficiency of this edition. Despite these mistakes the publisher made no corrections in its second printing (1999), although this did include four-volume indices and takhrīj prepared by Kāmil ʽUwayḍa. There thus remains an urgent need for a critical edition.
© Walter de Gruyter
