ABSTRACT

Abū ’l-Qāsim ʿAbd al-Karīm b. Hawāzin al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072) was born in the year 376, according to al-Khaṭīb al-Baghdādī, who claims that Qushayrī himself informed him directly of this date. It would imply that he lived for nearly ninety years. 1 The Khaṭīb also refers to the following visit by Qushayrī to Baghdad:

He came to us in the year 448. He transmitted hadiths in Baghdad and we wrote them down on his authority – he was trustworthy (thiqa). He was good at preaching and eloquent in instructing. He was educated in theology (uṣūl) according to the Ash’arite school, and in jurisprudence (furūʿ) according to the Shafi’ite school.

(al-Baghdādī, Ta’rīkh, XI, 83.5–8) It is perhaps a little surprising that, despite informing that Qushayrī was a trustworthy hadith transmitter, and a religious preacher who followed Ash’arite theology and Shafi’ite law, he does not indicate that Qushayrī was also a Sufi. 2 However, his contemporary the Sufi scholar, ʿAlī b. ʿUthmān al-Hujwīrī, includes a biography of Qushayrī in his Kashf al-maḥjūb which presents him as a Sufi authority, whilst also acknowledging that he excelled in a wide range of intellectual disciplines. 3