Imām Muḥammad al-Murtaḍā al-Zabīdī

Known as:The Scholar of the Two Worlds — Lexicographer, Ḥadīth Master, and Commentator of al-Ghazālī

Early Life and Background

Imām Muḥammad al-Murtaḍā ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥusaynī al-Zabīdī al-Ḥanafī al-Miṣrī [محمد المرتضى بن محمد الحسيني الزبيدي الحنفي المصري] was born in 1145 AH / 1732 CE in Bilgram, a scholarly town near Lucknow (الهند) in northern India.^1
His family hailed from Zabīd (زبيد) in Yemen — a renowned medieval center of hadith and Arabic scholarship — from which he took his nisbah, “al-Zabīdī.”^2

Raised in a household steeped in learning, he memorized the Qurʾān at a young age and showed early mastery in Arabic, logic, and the ḥadīth sciences.
Driven by the traditional quest for knowledge (riḥlah fī ṭalab al-ʿilm – رحلة في طلب العلم), he journeyed across Hadhramawt, the Ḥijāz, and Egypt, ultimately settling in Cairo, where he achieved global renown.^3

Education and Teachers

In Cairo, al-Zabīdī studied at al-Azhar University, inheriting the post-classical intellectual legacy of Ibn Ḥajar, al-Suyūṭī, and al-Munāwī.
His major teachers included:

ʿAbd al-Raʾūf al-Munāwī’s students, through whom he received ijāzāt (إجازات) in hadith;
ʿAbd Allāh al-Shabrāmallisī (عبد الله الشبراملسي), the Shāfiʿī jurist;
Muḥammad al-Bannānī (محمد البناني), the Mālikī jurist from Morocco;
and ʿAbd al-Ghanī al-Nābulusī’s followers, who transmitted the Shādhilī and Naqshbandī Sufi chains to him.^4

He thus represented the full synthesis of Arab, Indian, and North African scholarship — a hallmark of 18th-century Cairo.

Scholarly Career

Al-Zabīdī’s reputation spread rapidly through the Muslim world for his encyclopedic memory, linguistic precision, and mastery in ḥadīth, Arabic lexicography, and taṣawwuf (spiritual science).
He became known as:

“Shaykh al-Muḥaddithīn wa Lisān al-ʿArab al-Mubīn” — “The Chief of the Ḥadīth Masters and the Living Tongue of the Arabic Language.”^5

He lectured at al-Azhar, trained students from across the Ottoman, Mughal, and Moroccan realms, and corresponded with scholars from Istanbul, Fez, and Delhi.

He declined political office, dedicating his time entirely to teaching, writing, and compiling.
His house in Cairo became a salon of knowledge, where jurists, grammarians, and Sufis gathered nightly for reading sessions of the Iḥyāʾ ʿUlūm al-Dīn and hadith commentaries.^6

Methodology and Vision

Al-Zabīdī embodied the classical synthesis of ʿilm (knowledge) and dhawq (spiritual taste) — an heir to al-Munāwī’s fusion of hadith criticism and inner purification.
His intellectual creed rested upon three pillars:

Comprehensiveness (shumūl شمول) — compiling and cross-referencing all earlier sources before judgment.
Verification (taḥqīq تحقيق) — reconciling textual variants with philological and isnād analysis.
Integration (tawfīq توفيق) — merging theology, language, and spirituality as interdependent sciences.

He described his mission as:

“To connect the heart of the scholar with the tongue of revelation.”^7

Major Works

Work	Arabic Title	Subject	Notes
Tāj al-ʿArūs min Jawāhir al-Qāmūs	تاج العروس من جواهر القاموس	Arabic lexicography	The most comprehensive Arabic dictionary ever compiled, expanding upon al-Fīrūzābādī’s al-Qāmūs al-Muḥīṭ. Includes Quranic, hadith, and poetic citations with critical philological notes.^8
Itḥāf al-Sādat al-Muttaqīn bi-Sharḥ Iḥyāʾ ʿUlūm al-Dīn	إتحاف السادة المتقين بشرح إحياء علوم الدين	Commentary on al-Ghazālī’s Iḥyāʾ	A monumental 10-volume commentary analyzing hadith authenticity, legal reasoning, and Sufi psychology — merging theology and spirituality.^9
ʿUqūd al-Jawāhir al-Munīfah fī Asānīd al-ʿUlūm al-Sharīfah	عقود الجواهر المنيفة في أسانيد العلوم الشريفة	Hadith transmission chains	Documents his complete isnād chains for Qurʾān, hadith, and taṣawwuf, linking him to the Prophet ﷺ through major lineages.^10
al-Azhar al-ʿĀṭir fī Sharḥ al-Jāmiʿ al-Ṣaghīr	الأزهر العاطر في شرح الجامع الصغير	Hadith commentary	Extends al-Munāwī’s Fayḍ al-Qadīر, offering critical hadith grading and linguistic notes.^11
Tajrīd al-Ṣaḥīḥayn	تجريد الصحيحين	Hadith compendium	A selective rearrangement of Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī and Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim for students, organized by topical clarity rather than isnād sequence.

His Relationship to Earlier Masters

Al-Zabīdī viewed himself as the inheritor of the Ibn Ḥajar – Suyūṭī – Munāwī continuum.
He wrote in the introduction of Itḥāf al-Sādat al-Muttaqīn:

“I have walked the path of the noble Imāms who joined transmitted knowledge with inner illumination — foremost among them Ibn Ḥajar, Suyūṭī, and my spiritual grandfather al-Munāwī.”^12

He quoted Fayḍ al-Qadīر over 2,000 times and frequently corrected later misinterpretations of al-Ghazālī’s Iḥyāʾ, defending it against accusations of weak hadith by rigorously cross-referencing Ibn Ḥajar’s and Suyūṭī’s criteria.

Intellectual Context: Cairo and the Global 18th Century

By al-Zabīdī’s time, Cairo stood as a cosmopolitan crossroads of scholarship — linking Ottoman Istanbul, Mughal India, and Moroccan Fez.
He was among the few scholars to be recognized by all three intellectual centers.

In his preface to Tāj al-ʿArūs, he praised God for allowing him to “serve the Arabic tongue from Hind (India) to Misr (Egypt), uniting the words of the East and West.”^13

This globalism — both linguistic and spiritual — made him a pan-Islamic scholar, a bridge between Arabic philology and Indo-Islamic Sufism.

Spiritual Life

Deeply devoted to the Qādirī and Naqshbandī orders, al-Zabīdī practiced nightly dhikr and maintained ascetic simplicity despite fame.
He believed the scholar’s heart must mirror the purity of his pen.

One of his aphorisms states:

“The ink of knowledge weighs nothing unless it flows from a heart rinsed by dhikr.”^14

He viewed hadith as not only narration (riwāyah رواية) but transformation (dirāyah دراية) — a light (nūr نور) transmitted through sincerity as much as scholarship.

Students and Influence

His students included prominent Egyptian, Moroccan, and Indian scholars such as:

Muḥammad al-Sanūsī (محمد السنوسي) of North Africa,
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Jabartī (عبد الرحمن الجبرتي), historian of Egypt,
and ʿAbd Allāh al-ʿAydarūs (عبد الله العيدروس), Sufi transmitter of his spiritual chain.

Through them, his teachings reached West Africa, the Malay world, and the Hijaz, influencing generations of hadith commentators and linguists.^15

Death

Al-Zabīdī passed away in Cairo in 1205 AH / 1790 CE, during the final years of Ottoman rule.^16
He was buried in the Bāb al-Naṣr cemetery near al-Azhar, beside other luminaries of the Egyptian scholarly revival.
His funeral was attended by students of all four madhāhib, a symbol of his universal respect.

Legacy

Imām al-Murtaḍā al-Zabīdī represents the final great encyclopedist of classical Islam, and the last to integrate language, law, hadith, and spirituality into a single coherent vision.

His Tāj al-ʿArūs remains the largest Arabic dictionary ever written, while Itḥāf al-Sādat al-Muttaqīn endures as the definitive commentary on al-Ghazālī’s Iḥyāʾ.

He concluded his introduction to Tāj al-ʿArūs with a prayer that captures his entire life’s spirit:

“O Lord, I have gathered the words of men to remember You —
so do not let me die except with Your word upon my tongue.”^17

Through him, the intellectual chain that began with Ibn Ḥajar found its full linguistic and spiritual flowering — the union of hadith precision, Sufi depth, and Arabic eloquence.

References (for footnote conversion)

Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., s.v. “al-Zabīdī.”
Aḥmad Shalabī, Tārīkh al-Fikr al-Islāmī fī al-ʿAṣr al-ʿUthmānī (Cairo: Dār al-Maʿārif, 1967), 233.
IslamicFinder.org, “Biography of Imam al-Zabidi,” accessed October 2025.
Muḥammad al-Murtaḍā al-Zabīdī, ʿUqūd al-Jawāhir al-Munīfah, Preface.
Ibn ʿĀbidīn, Radd al-Muḥtār, vol. 1 (Cairo: Dār al-Fikr, 1992), 77.
Al-Zabīdī, Itḥāf al-Sādat al-Muttaqīn, vol. 1, Introduction.
Ibid., vol. 2, 19.
Al-Zabīdī, Tāj al-ʿArūs, Preface.
Ibid., Itḥāf al-Sādat al-Muttaqīn, vol. 3, 5.
Al-Zabīdī, ʿUqūd al-Jawāhir al-Munīfah, Introduction.
Al-Zabīdī, al-Azhar al-ʿĀṭir, Preface.
Al-Zabīdī, Itḥāf al-Sādat al-Muttaqīn, vol. 1, 7.
Al-Zabīdī, Tāj al-ʿArūs, Preface.
Ibid., vol. 20, 11.
ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Jabartī, ʿAjāʾib al-Āthār fī al-Tarājim wa al-Akhbār, vol. 1 (Cairo: al-Amīriyyah, 1879), 65.
Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed.
Al-Zabīdī, Tāj al-ʿArūs, Conclusion.