Question

Assalamu 'Alaikum.
Jazakallahu Khairun for answering my question last time.

I would like to know something about the background of a scholar called Ibn al-Jazaree who wrote the rules of tajweed in a poem. Please tell me what you know about him (when and where was he based, which generation etc).  Jazakallahu Khairun

Answer

Wa alaikum assalaam wa rahmatu Allahi wa barakatuh.  Wa iyyaakum wal-muslimeen. 

We would be more than happy to give some background on this great scholar. 

 His full name is Mohammed bin Mohammed bin Mohammed bin ‘Ali bin Yusef, well known as Ibn Al-Jazaree.  His father was a trader and for 40 years had no children.  He made Hajj and drank from the water of Zamzam with the intention of a knowledgeable son.  Then he became father to this same Mohammed after Taraweeh on the night of Saturday, the 25 of Ramadhaan in the year 751 Al-Hijara.  He was raised in Damascus and completed memorization of the Qur’an when he was 13 years old, and led the prayers when he was 14.  He learned the qira’aat (ways of recitation) each by themselves when he was 15 years from the following three Shuyookh: Abdulwahhaab bin As-Sallaar and Ahmed bin Ibraheem bin At-Tahhaan, and Ahmed bin Rajab.  He recited the qira’aat together as contained in books when he was 17 years old.  He traveled to make Hajj and to Egypt numerous times and each time would meet up with the imaams of qira’aat and recite to them.  He heard hadeeth from those who were left from the companions of Ad-Dimyaatee and Al-Abraqoohee from the group of the companions of Ibn Bukhaari and others.  He studied fiqh from different scholars and was given permission to give fatwas by Sheikh al-Islam Aboo Al-Fida’ Ismaa’eel bin Katheer, Sheikh Dheaa’ ad-Deen, and Sheikh Al-Islam Al-Balqeenee.  He built a Qur’an school in Damascus and named it Dar Al-Qur’an Al-Kareem.  Many students came and recited to him the qira’aat.   He moved around during the invasion of the Romans and wherever he would travel, students would recite to him. He made Hajj again stayed around the two holy mosques for a period of time and many students recited to him there.  In Medinah Munawwarah he wrote the two volume work: An-Nashr fee Al-Qira’aat al-‘Ashr. He wrote many works and poems about the science of tajweed and the qira’aat.  Some of them are: An-Nashr fee Al-Qira’aat al-Ashr, Tayyibat An-Nashar a 1000 line poem, Ad-Durrah al-Mudhee’ah fee al-Qira’aat ath-Thalaath, and the poem that you are referring to: Al-Muqaddimaah fee maa Yajib ‘alaa Qaari’ l-Qur’an An Ya’lamah.  There are many other books and poems written by Imaam al-Jazaree, these are just a few.  He also wrote books about tafseer, hadeeth, fiqh and Arabic.

He died, may Allah have mercy on him, in 833 al-Hijara.

It is a great honor to memorize the manthoomah(poem) and get an ijaazah (permit) in it with a chain going back to the author of the manthoomah( poem), Imaam Al-Jazaree.  May Allah grant the questioner this honor and make them of the people of the Qur’an. 

The short biography of Imam Ibn Al-Jazaree was taken and translated from the introduction to Manthoomah: Al-Muqaddimah fee maa Yajib 'alaa Qaari' l-Qur'an an Ya'lamah, copied by the honorable Sheikh Dr. Ayman Rushdi Swayd.