Abu Bakr ibn al-Anbari

Abu Bakr Muhammad b. al-Qasim b. Muhammad b. Bashshar al-Anbari the grammarian; the signpost of his time in adab and its greatest memoriser — truthful, trustworthy, devout. ¹

His works treat the sciences of the Qur'an, rare hadith, the difficult, waqf and ibtida', a refutation of dissenters from the public mushaf, al-Zahir, Khalq al-insan, Khalq al-faras, al-Amthal, al-Maqsur wa'l-mamdud, al-Mu'annath wa'l-mudhakkar, a Gharib al-hadith said to fill 45,000 sheets, a commentary on al-Kafi of about a thousand sheets, al-Iqa'at, al-Addad and al-Jahiliyyat. ¹

The Encyclopaedia of Islam (2nd ed.), in its entry ANBARI, ABU BAKR (by C. Brockelmann), describes him as a disciple both of his father and of Tha'lab. He lectured in the same mosque during his father's lifetime and was famous for a phenomenal memory and for abstemiousness. He died in Dhu 'l-Hijja 328 (October 940). ²

Of his works the following survive: al-Addad, edited by Houtsma (Leiden 1881); al-Zahir; al-Idah fi 'l-Waqf wa 'l-Ibtida'; a treatise on the Qur'anic passages where ta' is written for ha'; al-Mukhtasar fi dhikr al-alifat; and al-Mudhakkar wa 'l-mu'annath. Parts of his commentary on the Mu'allaqat were published by O. Rescher (Tarafa, Istanbul 1911; 'Antara; Zuhayr). Ibn al-Athir names his Gharib al-Hadith among his sources. ²