Abd al-Rahman ibn Nasir al-Sa'di

Shaykh Abd al-Rahman ibn Nasir ibn Abd Allah ibn Sa'di (1307–1376 AH / 1889–1957) was a scholar of Unayza in Najd and the author of the commentary Taysir al-Karim al-Rahman fi Tafsir Kalam al-Mannan. ^{1 2 3} The editor of his commentary, Abd al-Rahman ibn Mu'alla al-Luwayhiq, calls him "the teacher of our teachers, the erudite scholar", and says that in tafsir he gave most of his attention to meanings, which are the chief aim. ⁴

He taught in study circles at the Great Mosque of Unayza, where his student Abd Allah ibn Abd al-Aziz ibn Aqil heard parts of his commentary from him orally. ² Both Ibn Aqil and Muhammad ibn Salih al-Uthaymin call him "our shaykh" in their prefaces to his commentary. ^{2 5}

Al-Sa'di began his commentary in 1342 AH, as he wrote in his own hand on the cover of volume 1 of his copy; his editor remarks that a reader would think no one of his age at the time could have written it, so mature is its scholarship. ³ He wrote a single copy and then had another made. ³ He meant it to "make the meaning the aim and the wording a means to it". ⁶ In Safar 1374 AH he wrote to Shaykh Muhammad Nasif asking him to have five thousand copies of its fifth volume printed; that volume appeared in his lifetime in 1375 AH, and the rest after his death, in 1376 and 1377 AH. ^{2 7}

He died in 1376 AH; about a month before his death he wrote to his student Ibn Aqil that some quires of volume 1 of the printing had reached him, and that he had heard nothing more since; the editor says he had sent the remaining volumes to Muhibb al-Din al-Khatib, who completed the printing in 1376 AH, the fifth volume printed first having run from the middle of Surat al-Kahf to the end of al-Naml. ^{1 7} His own manuscript of the commentary remained in his possession and under his eye until his death, and al-Luwayhiq based his edition on it. ⁸