Sa'ad al-Din Masud ibn Umar ibn Abd Allah al-Taftazani also known as Al-Taftazani and Taftazani was a MuslimPersianpolymath.
Early life and education
Al-Taftazani was born in 1322 in Taftazan, Khorasan in Iran, then in the Sarbedaran state. He completed his education in various educational institutions in the cities of Herat, Ghijduvan, Feryumed, Gulistan, Khwarizm, Samarkand and Sarakhs. He mainly resided in Sarakhs. He was active during the reign of Timur, who noticed him as a promising scientist and supported his scholarship, and was part of his court. Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani famously remarked about him that "science ended with him in the East" and "no one could ever replace him". He died in Samarkand in 1390 and was buried in Sarakhs. He practiced and preached in the Hanafi and Ashari schools. He was of the Hanafi school in matters of Fiqh and an Ashari with regard to issues of Aqidah.
Career
During his lifetime, he wrote treaties on grammar, rhetoric, theology, logic, law and Quran exegesis. His works were used as textbooks for centuries in Ottoman madrasahs. and are used in Shia madrasahs to this day. He completed "Sharh-i az-Zanjani" which was his first and one of his most famous works at the age of 16. He also wrote a commentary of the Qur'an in Persian and translated a volume of Sa'adi's poetry from Persian into Turkish. But it was in Arabic that he composed the bulk of his writing. His treatises, even the commentaries, are "standard books" for students of Islamic theology and his papers have been called a "compendium of the various views regarding the great doctrines of Islam".
Legacy
said of him:
I found in Egypt numerous works on the intellectual sciences composed by the well-known person Sa'd al-Din al-Taftazani, a native of Herat, one of the villages of Khurasan. Some of them are on kalam and the foundations of fiqh and rhetoric, which show that he had a profound knowledge of these sciences. Their contents demonstrate that he was well versed in the philosophical sciences and far advanced in the rest of the sciences which deal with Reason.
Al-Fatawa al Hanaffiya.. A detailed compilation of gis juristical decisions during his juristicaal career.
Sharh ul Faraid is Sirajiyya.
Theology
Sharh 'Aqaid al-Nasafi: This is a commentary on Abu Hafs Umar al-Nasafi's treatise on the creed of Islam. Taftazani's commentary on this work soon became the most acclaimed commentary. By 17th century, there were more than fifty further commentaries that were written on Taftazani's "Sharh 'Aqaid al-Nasafi".
Hashiyye Ala al-Kashshaf.. This is an unfinished work of his.
Al Arbain.
Sharh ul Hadis ul Erbain en Neveviyye.
Hashiyat al kashaf never finished by the scholar or unknown compiled during his lifetime. There are 3 manuscripts that have shed light on the subject and are known to the public in museums and private collections. One is dated 1147AH, one dated 1209 AH, and one dated 1237AH.
