Al-Jarmi

Abū ‘Umar Ṣāliḥ ibn Isḥāq al-Bajīli al-Jarmī
Born Basra
Died 840
Other names al-Jarmī
Occupation Grammarian of Basra

Al-Jarmī, full name Abū ‘Umar Ṣāliḥ ibn Isḥāq al-Bajīli al-Jarmī (d.840 CE/ 225 AH),[n 1] was an influential grammarian of the Basra school during the Islamic Golden Age, who took part in learned discussions at Baghdād.[1]

He was a jurisconsult, philologist and native of Basra who studied in Baghdād under al-Akhfash al-Awsat. His teachers in philology were Abū Ubayda, Abū Zaid al-Ansāri, al-Aṣmā’ī et al. He taught traditions and his grammatical treatise was entitled “al-Farkh” (the chicken) because it was “hatched” from Sībawayh’s great work, the Kitāb. Abū ‘l-Abbās al-Mubarrad said that al-Jarmī had told him that he had read through the “Diwan of the Hudailites” under al-Aṣmā’ī, whose expertise in that work had surpassed al-Jarmī’s, and that al-Jarmī had said that al-Aṣmā’ī said to him “O Abū Omar [al-Jarmī] if a member of the tribe of Hudail happen to be neither poet nor archer, nor runner, then he’s nothing!” Referring to a passage from the Quran, he said, “Follow not what you know, say not you have heard when you have not, or seen when you did not see, or know when you do not know; for the hearing, the sight and the heart are subjects on which you will answer to God!”. Al-Mubarrad said no one knew the Kitāb of Sībawayh better than al-Jarmī, and the great majority learned it from him. He was learned in philology and knew many passages by heart. He also wrote some original works and was highly esteemed historian of tradition and scholar of hadīth.[2] The hafiz Abū Noaim also mentions al-Jarmī.[3]

The primary account of his life is found in Al-Nadim’s “Fihrist”, where the “isnad” (chain of transmission) narrative begins with the written account of al-Khazzāz,[4] that al-Mubarrad[5][6] had said al-Jarmī was a protégé of Bajīlah ibn Anmār ibn Irāsh ibn al-Ghawth, brother to al-Azd ibn al-Ghawth."[7] Ibn Bahrīz ‘Abd Yasū Abū Sa‘īd[8] said that al-Jarmī was a protégé of Jarm ibn Rabbān. The Jarm were an Arab tribe from al-Yaman, and al-Jarmī was said to have lived for a time with this tribe from whom his name derived. Al-Jarmī studied grammar and the “Kitāb” (Book) of Sībawayh with al-Akhfash and others, and linguistics under Abū Zayd, al-Aṣma‘ī. Al-Jarmī never met Sībawayh but did meet Yūnus ibn Ḥabīb.

Works

  • Joy (Al-Faraḥ) (or Al-Faraj or Al-Farkh)
  • Structures (Al-Abnīyah); Perhaps connected with a book of this name by Sībawayh. Flügel has Commentary on the Strange in Sībawayh.
  • Prosody
  • Abridgment of the Grammar of the Learned
  • The Strange in Sībawayh
  • Kitāb fī ‘s-Siar (on the life of Muḥammad)
  • Treatise on the Forms of Verbs and Nouns
  • Explanation on the Difficulties in verses quoted by Sībawayh in the Kitāb

Titles not in the Beatty MS

  • Al-Qawāfī
  • The Dual and the Plural
  • Structures and Inflection

Successors

Abū ‘Umar al-Jarmī taught the Book of Sībawayh to al-Tawwazī [9] Shaykh Abū Sa‘īd, said that after al-Jarmī and al-Māzinī’s generation, the leading grammarian was al-Mubarrad.[10]

Ibn Durustūyah [n 2] a student associate of al-Mubarrad and Tha‘lab and distinguished adherent of al-Baṣrah school, wrote a commentary on al-Jarmī;[11]

Abū al-Ḥasan ‘Alī ibn ‘lsā al-Rummānī,the Grammarian (b.296/908-909) the most illustrious grammarian of al-Baṣrah and theologian of Baghdād, jurist, and prolific author, wrote a Commentary on the “Abridgment” of al-Jarmī;[n 3]

Abū al-Ḥasan Ibn al-Warrāq[n 4] His name was Muḥammad ibn ‘Abd Allāh wrote a commentary on the “Abridgment of Grammar” of Abū ‘Umar al-Jarmī.[13]

Notes

  1. ↑ The date is omitted in the Arabic text of “al-Fihrist”.
  2. ↑ scholar at Basra, originally from Fars. Beatty MS gives Darasutūyah, Khallikan, II, 24, says it is pronounced Durustūya; Ibn Makūla in his Kitab al-Aamal says it is Darastawaih; & Zubaydi in his Tabaqat, p127 gives Darastawayh
  3. ↑ The full title of this book by al-Jarmī is Abridgment of the Grammar of the Learned.[12]
  4. ↑ Flügel text gives a different name and different titles. The translation follows the Beatty MS.


References

  1. ↑ Khallikān, p. 629.
  2. ↑ Khallikān, pp. 629-630.
  3. ↑ Abū Noaim, History of Ispahan
  4. ↑ Dodge, p. 123.
  5. ↑ Khallikān, p. 31.
  6. ↑ Yāqūt, p. 137.
  7. ↑ Mas'udi, pp. 148-216.
  8. ↑ Wright, pp. 824-856.
  9. ↑ Dodge, p. 125.
  10. ↑ Dodge, p. 128.
  11. ↑ Dodge, p. 137.
  12. ↑ Dodge, pp. 138-139.
  13. ↑ Dodge, p. 188.
  • Kaḥḥālah, ‘Umar Riḍā (1959). A’lām al-Nisā’. 3. Damascus: Al-Hāshimī Press.
  • Khallikān (Ibn), Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad (1871) [1843]. Ibn Khallikan’s Biographical Dictionary (translation of Wafayāt al-A’yān wa-Anbā’ Abnā’ al-Zamān). 3. Translated by MacGuckin de Slane, William. London: W. H. Allen.
  • Mas’ūdī (al-), Abū al-Hasan (1869) [1861]. Kitāb Murūj al-Dhahab wa-Ma’ādin al-Jawhar (Les Prairies d’or). 9. Translated by de Meynard, C. Barbier; de Courteille, Pavet. Place: Imprimerie impéiale.
  • Nadīm (al-), Ibn Isḥāq (1970). Dodge, Bayard, ed. The Fihrist of al-Nadīm A Tenth-Century Survey of Muslim Culture. 1. Translated by Dodge, Bayard. New York & London: Columbia University Press.
  • Nadīm (al-), Abū al-Faraj Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq Abu Ya'qūb al-Warrāq (1871). Flügel, Gustav, ed. Kitāb al-Fihrist. Leipzig: Vogel.
  • Wright, William (1894). A Short History of Syriac Literature. London: Black.
  • Yāqūt, Shībab al-Dīn ibn ‘Abd Allāh al-Ḥamawī (1927) [1907]. Margoliouth, David Samuel, ed. Irshād al-Arīb alā Ma’riat al-Adīb (Yaqut’s Dictionary of Learned Men). 7. Leiden: Brill.
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