Özet:

Qāsim al-Qaysī (1876-1955) served as a mudarris, qāḍī and muftī in Iraq, and he was a member of Regulatory and Scholarly Boards, along with Boards of Appeals. At the time of his death, he was a scholar, a man of wisdom and a statesman, who was an honorary preacher in the Qādirī sect, in addition to being the mufti of Baghdād. Qaysī noted that he prepared the work titled Tārīkh al-tafsīr, which is the focus of the present study, as a textbook for his students, among whom are well-known scholars of our country as well. The content of the work is organized into three sections: the history of tafsīr, the science of the Qur’ān, his works, and the presentation of some important tafsīrs. It is apparent from what the author of the work states and and the content of the work that this work is a “textbook,” similar to the “Tafsīr Methodology and History” taught in the current theology faculties of our country. In his work, Qaysī elaborates on the types of tafsīrs, the reasons for the differences between the commentaries and the periods of the history of tafsīr. He goes on to provide information about the science of the Qur’ān and tafsīr, along with his own works. He also introduces some works of tafsīrs written and taught in madrasas, up to the period in which he lived. The present study aims to examine this work of Qaysī and to evaluate it in terms of the literature on tafsīr history. The studies on the history of tafsīr can be traced back to Jalāluddīn al-Suyūṭī (911/1505) and his work Ṭabaqāt al-mufassirīn. Qaysī's work “Tārīkh al-tafsīr was also written according to al-Suyūṭī's classification provided in his work, and it includes an introduction to tafsīr history, the sciences of the Qur’ān and some major works of tafsīrs, written until his time. It is known that this format which combines uṣūl (methodology) and history knowledge in the science of tafsīr is accepted and used in the tafsīr books written for higher religious education in today's Islamic world. Qaysī addresses tafsīrs and mufassirs in 14 hijrī centuries under the title of Ṭabaqāt al-mufassirīn, beginning with the companions of Muḥammad, up until his own time, in 14 periods. He doesn’t classify the nineteen tafsīrs that he introduces at the end of his book into periods, methods and/or schools. He provides information about these tafsīrs, such as their titles, authors, volumes, methods, the works of tafsīr that they influenced and were influenced by, their prevalence, annotations and commentaries (if any), ways of using narrations, and the views of various scholars on these works. He also offers his positive or negative evaluations about them. Although Qaysī included Islamic jurisprudential, mystical, philosophical and scientific tafsīrs in Tārīkh al-tafsīr, he does not classify these tafsīrs that he introduces in the last part, according to schools, probably because he mentions them periodically earlier. Qāsim al-Qaysī also briefly addresses the types of tafsīr and the reasons for the differences in perspectives among the mufassirs in Tārīkh al-tafsīr; he also briefly explains the concepts tafsīr, taʾwīl and tafsīr history. However, he includes neither the term translation, which has been commonplace probably since Zurqānī (1367/1948), nor the issue of the translation of the Qur’ān, which can be considered as a kind of tafsīr. Given that the issue of translation is both a form of tafsīr and a modern issue, discussed during the time when Qaysī lived, the author’s not touching upon the translation of the Qur’ān can be considered as a shortcoming. It is not possible to find methodical information about the literature on tafsīr history in the studies that have been carried out on this issue so far. Some independent studies on the history of tafsīr and its problems have recently addressed this problem. It is clear that this should be considered in future studies on the history of tafsīr, and such works should also include information on the tafsīr history literature, so that related shortcomings should be eliminated.

Anahtar Kelimeler: