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1 |
These words are written in Maghribi script in B and C. MSS
written later in Ibn Khaldun's life are more effusive. A already
has: "The Shaykh,
jurist, imam, (religious) scholar, chief judge,
Wali-ad-din'Abd-ar-Rahman b. Khaldun-God lengthen his life-has
said...." C adds in the margin: "This is the Muslim Judge, Wali-ad-din
Abu Zayd al-Malikl." D reads: "Our Lord and Master, the servant
of God who needs God, Wali-ad-din, the Muslim Judge, Abu
Zayd'Abd-ar-Rahman b. Khaldun al-Hadrami al-Maliki -God lengthen
his days and strengthen his judgments and repair all his powers
[cf. n, 145, below] and seal his actions with good deeds in His
excellence and and generosity, for He is likely and able to do
that, and He 'has power over everything'-has said...." |
2 |
These terms (mulk
and malakut)
are commonly used to refer to the natural and
supernatural worlds, respectively. |
3 |
The root 'mr,
from which 'umran
"civilization" is derived, is used
here. It is the purpose of the khulbah
"invocation" of Arabic works to
summarize the main theme of the work, and this is what Ibn
Khaldun attempts to do here in two paragraphs.
The word "races," Arabic ill, may also mean
"generations." It is occasionally translated by "groups." See p.
249, 1. 2, below. |
4 |
Bulaq adds "illiterate." |
5 |
In
the medieval polemics between Muslims and Christians and Muslims
and Jews, an important subject of discussion was the references
to Muhammad that, according to Muslim theologians, could be
found in Scripture. Cf., for instance, Maimonides, Epistle to
Temen, ed. and tr. A. S. Halkin and B. Cohen (New York,
1952), p. viii; J. Horovitz in El, s.v. "Tawrat"; W. M.
Watt, "His Name is Ahmad," in The Muslim World, XLIII
(1953), 110-17. |
6 |
Muhammad existed prior to time and space, if not
in body at least in soul and through the divine light of
prophecy, which, as something divine, was also primeval. The
(Neo-Platonic, mystic, Shi'ah) theory of the primeval prophetic
light was common in orthodox Islam long before Ibn Khaldun's
time and had been spread mainly through the medium of Sufism.
Cf. T. Andrae, Die Person Muhammeds in Lehre and Glauben
seiner Gemeinde (Stockholm, 1917), pp. 313 fl.; L. Massignon
in El, s.v. "Nur
Muhammadi."
Saturn occupies the seventh heaven and,
therefore, represents the most remote distance, Cf. W. Hartner
in El, s.v. "Zubal."
.Al-Bah(a)mut is the
Biblical Behemoth of Job 40:15, which Jewish tradition
identified with Leviathan. Some commentators of Qur'an 68.1 (1)
(cf. al-Baydawi and the references given by de Slane) identify
the mythological fish upon which the earth rests with Behemoth. |
7 |
When
Muhammad left Mecca to go to Medina, he stayed in a cave for
some time. Meccans who went after him saw that two pigeons had
built a nest over the entrance to the cave, and/or a spider had
spread a web over it. They concluded that no one could have used
the cave recently. This famous legend, which is mentioned by the
commentaries on Qur'an 9.40 (40), is of rather late origin and
was considered with some suspicion even by medieval biographers
of the Prophet. Cf. Ibn Kathir, Biddyah (Cairo,
1351-581932-40), III, 181 f. |
8 |
Sahbatihl, as in B and D. A, C, and E
have mahabbatihi "loving him." |
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