Abu Ishaq al-Zajjaj

Abū Isḥāq Ibrāhīm ibn Muḥammad ibn al-Sarī al-Zajjāj (أبو إسحاق إبراهيم بن محمد بن السري الزجاج) was a grammarian of Basrah, a scholar of philology and theology and a favourite at the Abbāsid court. He died in 922 at Baghdād, the capital city in his time.

Life
Abū Isḥāq Ibrāhīm ibn Muḥammad al-Sarī (Surrī) al-Zajjāj had been a glass-grinder – al-Zajjāj means ‘the glassman’ - before abandoning this trade to study philology under the two leading grammarians, al-Mubarrad of the Baṣran school and Tha'lab of the Kufan school. As top student and class representative he advised al-Mubarrad. He studied “Al-Kitāb” of Sībawayh with the Baṣrah grammarian Abū Fahd.

Al-Zajjāj entered the Abbāsid court, first as tutor to al-Qāsim ibn ‘Ubayd Allāh, son of the vizier ‘Ubayd Allāh ibn Sulaymān ibn Wahb’s and later, as tutor to the sons of the caliph al-Mu‘taḍid.

On his succession to the vizierate, Caliph al-Mu’taḍid ordered vizier al-Qāsim to commission an exposition of the Compendium of Speech by Maḥbarah al-Nadīm. Both Tha’lab and Al-Mubarrad declined the project for lack of knowledge and old age respectively. Al-Mubarrad proposed his friend and relative novice al-Zajjāj, who was commissioned to work on just two sections as a trial of his abilities. In doing his research he consulted books on language by Tha‘lab, al-Sukkarī, et al. He was assisted by al-Tirmidhī the Younger, as his amanuensis. The bound two-section commentary greatly impressed Caliph al-Mu’taḍid and al-Zajjāj was given the work to complete the commentary for the payment of three hundred gold dīnār. The finished manuscript was kept in al-Mu’taḍid's royal library, and the issuing of any copies to other libraries was prohibited.

Winning the caliph's favour, he received a royal pension of three hundred gold dīnār from three official roles as court companion, jurist and scholar.

Among al-Zajjāj's pupils were the grammarian Abū Alī al-Fārisī and Abū ‘l-Qāsim Abd ar-Raḥmān, author of the Jumal fi ‘n-Nawhi, Ibn al-Sarrāj and ‘Alī al-Marāghī the rival of Abu al-‘Abbās Tha’lab.{{refn|group=n|Perhaps this was al-Mubarrad Abū al-‘Abbās{{citation needed|date=August 2021}}

Al-Zajjāj had a dispute with al-Khayyāṭ,{{sfn|al-Suyūṭī|1909|p=19}}{{sfn|Zubaydī (al-)|1984|loc=§9 (#38)|pp=111-112}} a grammarian-theologian of Samarqand, whom he met in Baghdād.{{sfn|al-Nadīm|1970|p=178}}

Al-Zajjāj died at Baghdād on 13 October 922 [Friday, 18th, or 19th, Jumada al-Akhirah 310 AH] - other sources give 924 and 928 [311 and 316 AH.], aged over eighty.

Selected works

 * Kitāb mā fassarahu min jāmi‘ an-nuṭq (كتاب ما فسّرة من جامع النطق); ‘Exposition of the "Compendium of Speech". Ibn Khallikān describes this as "Extracts from his complete Treatise on Logic with his own commentary";


 * Kitāb ma’ānī al-Qur’ān (كتاب معانى القرآن), ‘Meaning of the Qur’ān’; tafsir (exegesis) of ambiguities, metaphors and figurative expressions.


 * Kitāb al-Ishtiqāq (كتاب الاشتقاق); Etymology


 * Kitāb al-Qawāfī (كتاب القوافى);


 * Kitāb al-‘Arūḍ (كتاب العروض); Prosody


 * Kitāb al-farqu (كتاب الفرق); Differentiation


 * Kitāb kulq al-Insān (كتاب خلق الانسان); The nature of Man


 * Kitāb kulq al-faris (كتال خلق الفرس); The nature of the Horse


 * Kitāb mukhtaṣir nuḥw (كتاب مختصر نحو); Abridgment of Grammar


 * Kitāb Fa‘altu wa-Af‘altu (كتاب فعلت وافعلت); on the first and fourth Arabic verb forms


 * Kitāb mā yunṣarif wa-mā lā yunṣarif (كتاب ما ينصرف وما لا ينصرف); ‘What Is Inflected and What Is Not Inflected’


 * Kitāb ṣahr abyāt Sībawayh (كتاب شرح ابيات سيبويه); Commentary on the verses in the grammar of Sībawayh;


 * Kitāb an-nawādir (كتاب النوادر); Book of Rare Forms.


 * Book of Dictates;


 * Book of Anecdotes;


 * Treatise on the influence of the constellation upon the weather

Abū Alī al-Fārisī wrote a treatise in refutation of al-Zajjāj, titled Kitāb al-masā’il al-maslahat yurwiha ‘an az-Zajjāj wa-tu’raf bi-al-Aghfāl (كتاب المسائل المصلحة يرويها عن الزجاج وتعرف بالاغفال); the Aghfāl (‘Negligences’, or ‘Beneficial (Corrected) Questions’), in which he refutes al-Zajjāj in his book Maāni (Rhetoric).