Arab lexicographer, philologist and grammarian
Abū Manṣūr Muḥammad ibn Aḥmad al-Azharī (Arabic: أبومنصور محمد بن أحمد الأزهري; 282–370 AH/895–980 AD) or simply known as Abu Mansur al-Azhari (أبومنصور الأزهري), was a lexicographer, philologist and grammarian of Arabic.[1][2] a prominent philologist of his time, known for his talents and the transmitting of philological knowledge.[3] His most important work is Tahdhib al-Lughat (تهذيب اللغات; The Concise Guide of Languages).
Biography
Al-Azhari was born in the city of Herat in Khorasan, at the time controlled by the Samanid dynasty. He is known as al-Azhari after an ancestor whose name is Azhar and nothing is known about him.[2] In his youth, al-Azhari travelled to the city of Baghdad, which was considered a center of science, the city was still under the Abbasid rule. Studying in Baghdad, he met the famous contemporary grammarian of the Abbasid court Ibn al-Sari al-Zajjaj (d. 923).[1] According to Ibn Khallikan, Al-Azhari also met another leading grammarian of the time, Ibn Duraid. As a lexicographer, he was one of the first to recognize the probable Syriac origin of words like zakāt and ṣalāt.[4]
In his travels to acquire knowledge of the Arabic language, he left Baghdad to go to Mecca.[3] Around this time, the Qarmatians were causing havoc in Arabia after revolting against the Abbasids. In 924 AD, as al-Azhari was returning from Mecca to Baghdad accompanied by a caravan of pilgrims on their way back from Hajj, they were attacked by the Qarmatians led by Abu Tahir al-Jannabi. Many of the pilgrims were slaughtered and their belongings stolen. Al-Azhari however was taken as a prisoner, living his next two years in captivity.[1] While he lived among the Bedouin Qarmatians, he recorded in his book Tahdhib al-Lughat their way of living and learned their idioms and expressions. Al-Azhari died in his native city of Herat in the year 980 AD.[3]
