Original scientific paper
Moralistic and Didactic Volume of Muslihuddin from Knin from 1609: Manuscripts of Arabic Original and Ottoman Translation
Tatjana Paić-Vukić
; Archive of CASA, Zagreb
Linda Al-Dujaily
Abstract
The article presents a collection of Arabic texts that were put together in 1609 by Shaykh Muslihuddīn, son of ‘Alī, also known as Muṣāfī. Muṣāfī was born in the town of Knin in the Dalmatian hinterland, acquired his education in Istanbul and other Ottoman towns, and finally settled in Banja Luka, where he founded a school, a madrasa, and a hanikah. After more than twenty years of teaching, he produced a pedagogical and moral-didactic work in Arabic entitled Tuḥfat al-mu‘allimīn wa hadiyyat al-muta‘allimīn (A Gift for Teachers and a Present for Those Who Study) and subsequently translated it into the Ottoman Turkish language under the title Munyetü ’ṭ-ṭālibīn ve ġunyetü ’r-rāġibīn (The Wish of Students and the Wealth of the Desirous). Both the manuscripts of the Arabic text and the Ottoman translation are housed in the Oriental Collection of the Archives of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Zagreb. Palaeographic and codicological analyses of the manuscripts indicate that that they originate from the first half of the seventeenth century, but are most probably not autographs. Examination of the Arabic text has led to the conclusion that Muṣāfī did not write it on the basis of other religious, didactic and pedagogical works, as some authors have asserted, but composed it by copying these works partially or, as is the case with al-Ġhazālī’s treatise Ayyuhā ’l-walad, in their entirety. The only original parts of his work are the introduction and conclusion. Inspection of the Ottoman version reveals that it is not a literal translation from Arabic, because Muṣāfī considerably expanded the text. In addition to the study of Muṣāfī’s work, the authors provide a translation of his autobiographical introduction and the conclusion from Arabic into Croatian.
Keywords
Muslihuddin b. Ali; Musafi; Ottoman Empire; Bosnia; Knin; Banja Luka; the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; Arabic and Ottoman manuscripts
Hrčak ID:
168302
URI
Publication date:
31.12.2015.
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