Abu Jaʿfar an-Nahhas


Abu Jaʿfar An-Nahhas was an Egyptian scholar of grammar and Qur'anic exegete during the
Abbasid period. His full name was Abū Jaʿfar Ahmad Ibn Muhammad Ibn Ismail Ibn Yūnus al-Murādi, surnamed an-Nahhās "copper-worker".

Life

Abu Jaʿfar An-Nahhas—whose full name was Abū Jaʿfar Ahmad Ibn Muhammad Ibn Ismail Ibn Yūnus al-Murādi, surnamed an-Nahhās "copper-worker" —was born in Fustat, he studied in Baghdad under the foremost grammarians of the period like al-Zajjāj who familiarised him with the Kitāb by the famed grammarian Sībawayh. He also studied philology with ʿAlī b. Sulaymān al-Akhfash al-Aṣghar and Nifṭawayh. He is the author of an influential work on abrogation, Al-Nasīkh wal-Mansūkh. He wrote a treatise on the grammatical analysis of the Qur'an and a grammatical primer known as "The Apple", besides works on poetry, including a commentary on the Mu'allaqat.

Death

According to Ibn Khallikan, An-Nahhas was of extremely niggardly and avaricious character. He was killed as he was reciting poetry sitting on the banks of the Nile in Cairo, as a passing peasant thought he was uttering a charm to prevent the rise of the Nile, "so as to raise the price of provisions" and threw him into the river.