Anwar al-tanzil wa-asrar al-ta'wil [The Lights of Revelation and the Secrets of Interpretation].

Large 8vo (159 x 269 mm). 519 ff. Arabic manuscript on paper in black naskh script. Contemporary full leather with modern spine. Arabic manuscript of the "Anwar al-Tanzil wa-Asrar al-Ta'wil", better known as the "Tafsir al-Baydawi". One of the most popular classical Sunni Qur'anic interpretational works (tafsir), it was composed by the 13th-century Muslim scholar al-Baydawi (d. ca. 1319), who flourished in Persia. The Tafsir al-Baydawi is considered to contain the most concise analysis of the Qur'anic use of Arabic grammar and style to date, and was hailed early on by Muslims as the foremost demonstration of the Qur'an's essential and structural inimitability ("i'jaz ma'nawi wa-lughawi") in Sunni literature. - Due to its fame and influence, Baydawi's work has drawn many commentaries. According to the contemporary Islamic scholar Gibril Fouad Haddad, it "became and remained for seven centuries the most studied of all tafsirs" and is to be regarded as "the most important commentary on the Qur'an in the history of Islam". This copy comprises the commentary's text relating to the first half of the Qur'an, ending at Verse 111, the end of the 17th Chapter (Surah al-Isra), and was completed by the scribe Rasul Shah Pasand. - Some exterior wear and repairs; modern spine. Sans a few instances of minor soiling, interior generally bright and clean. - GAL I, 417.