al-Muttaqi li-llah Ibrahim ibn al-Muqtadir

Al-Muttaqi lillah, Abu Ishaq Ibrahim ibn al-Muqtadir, an Abbasid caliph between 329 and 333 AH. ¹

He was given the allegiance after his brother al-Radi, at the age of thirty-four. His mother was a female slave called Khulub, or it is said Zahra. Al-Suyuti describes him as much given to fasting and worship; he never drank wine, and he said he wanted no companion but the Qur'an. He had only the title, and the management was in the hands of the secretary of Bajkam. ¹

Al-Mas'udi says he was given the allegiance on the tenth of Rabi al-Awwal 329 AH, and that the Turk Abu al-Wafa Tuzun prevailed over the affair, so that he had no command or prohibition. ²

Tuzun had him blinded in 333 AH, and he was imprisoned for twenty-five years until he died in Sha'ban 357 AH. ¹

Ibn al-Athir relates that he wrote to al-Ikhshid Muhammad ibn Tughj asking him to come, and al-Ikhshid met him at al-Raqqa and honoured him, urging him to go with him to Egypt and Syria and warning him of Tuzun, but he would not accept. Then he went down to Baghdad, where Tuzun met him at al-Sindiyya, kissed the ground and then blinded him. His caliphate was three years. ³

Ibn al-Athir says he died in the middle of Sha'ban 357 AH in his house and was buried there. ⁴

Al-Mas'udi relates that he had evening literary gatherings with al-Raqqi and his boy servant. ⁵