Part 2

ji; may be re lied and de pended upon. It is from Al lah th at

we seek he lp and it is He in Whom we plnce our tru st; the re

is no help an d no powe r except in A ll nh , the A il -PowerfuL

the Most Wise, the Most Hi g h, th e Almi g hty.

7. In some insta nces, we have referred back to th e original

manu script in order 10 verify the wo rding of a hac/eelh

from its source. In som e cases, the author has com bined

two narration s or the same /we/eelh toget he r and so where

thi s Ims occu rred , we ha ve noted it and se parated th e two

narrati o ns. pla c in g our own wo rds between brackets, i.e. ,

(and in anothe r narration ... ) and we ha ve a lso identifi ed the

source of the addition in th e footno tes.

8. We ha ve wri llell the Qur ' anic Ve rses in the Ulhmani sc ript.

in co nfo rmity wit h th e copy oft hc Qur 'a n publi shed by A l-

Madinah A I-Munawwarah Pri nti ng Compl ex .

9. \Ve vowe li sed the words or lllany of th e ahadeeth in the

book and. in addition, the poetic verses. wherever poss ible.

10. We mentioned the meters of th e poetic verses between

II. We exp lai ned the meanin gs of some difficult or obscure

words, relying on dictionari es, books contai ni ng ghareeb (1\

(Iliac/eel" a nd narration s and ot her so urces.

12. We furni shed a bri ef biography of the author, Hafiz Ibn

Kathcc r though in reality, he req uires no introduc ti o n and

Finally, I ask All ah, Mos t Hi g h, to accept thi s humbl e work

from LIS and to ac know ledge il as hav in g been don e purely and

sin cerely wi th th e aim of'p lcas ing Him and to g rant us nnc! our

(1) Gfwreeb: A {/(Idee/II which is reponed a! one or mon.' slages in ils chai n of

narrators by a single narrator.

14 P/'(:face fO (he !?I!V;.\·;O Il

brothers, who ass isted us in the production of thi s book , pardon

and fo rgivcness in reli gioll s and secular mail ers. In addi tion,

weask Him that He include thi s work in the we ight of our good

deeds on the Day of Resurrection - a Day o n which neither

wealt h nor sons will benefit anyone - exce pt for those whom

A ll ah has blessed with pure heart s.

And o ur fina l dec laration is that all prai se and thank s are d ue

to A ll ah, and we invo ke blessings a nd pcace upon Proph et

Mu hammad and upon all hi s righteous family ~lI1d Co mpa ni ons

until the Day of Reckonin g.

The humble slave or Allah .

2nd or Dhul·Hiiiah, 1428 A. II .

Verily, all pl ·~li se and th anks arc due to Allah. We seck Hi s

aid and we ask forgiveness on-lim. We seek refu ge with Allah

from the wickedness in ourselves. Whomsoever Allah guides,

there is none who can misguide him and whomsoeve r He sends

astray, there is none who can guide him. I bear witness Ihat

none is worthy of worship excep l Allah and thaI M uhamm ad is

Hi s slave and Hi s Messenger. He sent him with gu idance and

the tme Reli gion and with the light (of truth), th e admonition

and wisdom, at a time when no Messengers we re se nt for a

long period, when th ere was little reli gious knowledge and the

peo ple had gone astray, when th e I-lour was drawing nearer.

Whoever obeys Al lah and Hi s Messenger has followed the

right course, while whoever di sobeys Allah and I-Iis Messenger

erred from it and gone far astray. To proceed:

The book AI-Bidayah (The Beginning) by th e Hafiz , the imam,

the sc holarl y criti c, Ibn Katheer is an in com parab le work

regarding th e stud y orthe even ts and their chrono log ica l order,

the knowledge of whi ch he strove hard to acquirc. He began

by desc ribing the start of crea tion ~ from the c reation of the

Throne and the Kill's; and the heavens and the Eart h and all that

is in th em and all that li es betwecn them, such as the a ngels,

thc jinn and thc devi ls and he described the manller of Adam's

creation ~ . I-Ie recounted thc stories of th e Pro phets and the

eve nts that took place thcrein, up to Ihe timcs of the Chi ld ren

o f Isra'cel a nd the Days of Ignorance, wh ich cnded with the

advent o f the final Prophe t, Muh ammad ~ . Theil he gave a

deta iled descripti on of hi s life and what happen ed after that, lip

to the tim e in whi c h he, li ved. He then wrote a separate vo lum e

ca ll ed An-N;lwyah FiI - FilCllI lVal-Malahilll (Th e End ing With

Trial s and G reat Ba ttles).

Furthennore, Allah inspired us to undertak e the noble task of

making thi s book easily access ible to both the stud ents and the

sc ho lars and then to translate it into several languages, by Allah 's

I suggested to my brother, Yoosuf AI-Hajj. the necess ity

o f sUlllma ri zing this book in a su itable manner, through the

omiss ion o r unbenefic ial repetition, weak alwdeerh, lengthy

poems, e tc. I am thankful to brother Yoosuf for assembling a

tea m that consistcd of Abdul Malik Wadih, Abu Muslim AI-

Jaza' iri , Muwa fTeq Klmleel Hammad, and himse lf. Darussalam

funded the cntire proj ect, paying each tea m member for hi s

contribution and work , A ner they compl eted thcir portion of

the proj ect, the work then we nt through numerous peop le in

th e Research Di vision of Darussalam , who met iculous ly wenl

through the work, adding and subtracting mate rials. A fter th is,

the projec t we nt through another rou nd of ed iti ng o f the Arab ic

material before it was se nt to the translation depa rtment. The

Pllhli.\ /I/'r ~ Pre/ace 17

translation was thcn checked for accuracy and thcn sent fo r

editing, resu lt ing in the fina l project that you see before YOLI. A ll

pra ise and thank s be to Alla h for allow ing us to produce such a

classical work for the fi rst time in the Engli sh language.

o A ll ah! Wc ask that You bless us with sin ce rity and success

and that You spread good ness through our hand s.

'A bdul M'l li k M uj a hid.

IlItfte N ame of A I/lift, tft e Mos t BencjiccJJl. tfte Mast Merciful

I-Ie is thc SJ/(/ikh, the 11110111, the lIajiz, ' 1mad uclcJeell Ab ul Fidn '

Isma'cel Ibn 'Ul11ar Ibn Kathccr Ibn Daw ' Ibn Katheer Ibn

Dir', origina ll y A 1-8usrawi, then Ad-Dimashqi Ash-S hafi' i.

Hc was bo rn in MijdaJ, a villagc on thc ou tskirt s of 8 usra , in

the year 70 1 A.H ., where his fat her was a khaleeb. (I)

In the ycar 706 A. 1-1 .. he moved 10 Damasclls where he studicd

Islamic Jurisprude nce ((iqh) under Shaikh Burhanuddcen

AI-Faza ri and others. I-Ie married the dau ghter AIHafi z AI-

Mizzi and re ported ma ny trad iti ons from him. I-Ie de livered

fomlal legal verdi cts, was a teac her and debated wi th ot hcr

scholars. He was a leadi ng scho lar of Islam ic Juri spmdellce,

laf\'eef and Arab ic grammar, in addi tion to wh ich he appli ed

himself ass iduo usly to the study of fijlll m and weaknesses or

(I) Klltlleeb: The olle who del ivers Ihe Friday sennon (kill/ tbah) in Ihe

(2 ) Rij'a/: Literally man: here it is used 10 re fer to the narrators of alwd(!e/h.

Bing mplly 0/ AI-/-Iaji= 1111/ Karlteel' 19

di sc repancies in alladeeili.

He was appoi nted as head of UIll Ill As-Salih Sc hool and At-

Tankaziyyah Sc hoo l, after Adh-Dhahabi.

Ad h-Dh ahabi refe rred to him in the expla natory notes of

Ta baqal AI-HIIJ Jaz, and in AI-MlI'jom AI-Mtlkhlass he said:

" He is a sound scholar of Is lam ic Juri sprudence, a ve rifi er of

I/{Ideelh , a scholar of la/seer and a critic. He has writte n many

bc neAc ial work s."

Among his written works are

I. Al-Takllleel Fee Ma',.{jcltith-Thiqaf Wal-Majaheel (The

Complete Book of Criticism and Praise and Know ledge of

the Tru stwort hy Reporters and the Unknown Reporters). It

co mbines Kitab IftTahdh eeb and AI-Meezal1 and consists

2. Jallli ' AI-Masal/eed /Vas-Sullan AI-Had; Li-Aqwom SWlml

(The Combin ed Musllods and the SWUJII Which Guide to

the Most Precious SlIIlOI/); thi s is sa id to be one of Ibn

Katheer 's fin es t works in the fi eld of hadeelh and it is one

of the last books that he wrote, though not the very last one.

He died before compl eti ng it - may All ah ha ve mercy on

him. In it, he co mbin ed the l11uSJ1od~' of Im am Ahmad , AI-

Bazzar, Abu Ya ' ia and Ibn Abi Shaibah with the Six Books.

Shaikh Muhammad Abdur-Razzaq Hamzah said in the

introduction to the book A'-8a ';Ih A '-Hatheelh:

His lineage, his birth, his te{lchers (1m/his upbringing II) :

(1) Quo(ed from A/· Mall/wl A..\·-Saji W(I/-MlIstmm Ho'd AIWaji by (he f<l-

20 /J/Ograplty of. f I-I 11Ifi= 11m Ktllfleer

' I mad ll dde ~ n Abul Fi dn' bma'ee l Ibn Ash-S haikh Abu !-I afs

Shihabuddee n . Umar - the kfrmeeb of hi s village - Ibn Kat hee r

Ibn Daw ' Ibn Ka thce r Ibn Di r' AI-Q urashi, originall y from A I-

Busraw i, then Ad -Dimashqi .

His birth, his upbrillgillg ami his educatioll:

He was born in Mijdal, n vill age o n the outskirts of the city