Nasafi, Al

Nasafi, Al an Arabian theologian and poet, was born at Naksheb or Nasaf in 1069. He was of the Hanefite sect, and has written more than a hundred works, as many in prose as in verse, upon all branches of Mussulman tradition and law. He died at Samarcand in 1143. His principal works are al-Mandhuma, a work in verse upon all disputed points among the different Mussulman sects. It exists in manuscript in the Royal Library at Paris, No. 1385, and in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, No. 1243. The Mandhuma has been commented upon, in 1275, by Mahmud ben-Daud, surnamed Allului al- Bokhari Alfulhanji. This commentary is likewise found in manuscript in the Royal Library at Paris, No. 1387. Another is in the library at Leyden, in manuscript, No. 359. Nasafi afterwards wrote Akaid, a brief treatise on Moslem doctrine (manuscript, No. 407, in the Royal Library, Paris). There is a commentary of the Akaid by Saadeddin Masud ben-Omar al-Taftazani, which has in its turn been commented upon by Turkish mullahs. We have, lastly, from Nasafi a moral poem in stanzas of five distichs, treating of the vanity of this life. The verses of each stanza turn upon the same rhyme, and this runs successively through all the letters of the alphabet. This poem is found in manuscript in the Royal Library at Paris, No. 1418.