The Shī’ī Fiqh Project (SFP) is an ongoing project to translate important Imāmī Shī’ī works on jurisprudence (fiqh). Given the deep role jurisprudence plays in the day to day lives of Muslims worldwide, it has been subject to some of the most comprehensive and exhaustive discussions within the school of thought. Thousands of books, treatises and commentaries have been produced by various scholars for over a millennium and various different methodological schools of thought sprung about during this period.

The aim is to render some of these discussions into English for an audience that has a scholarly interest in the material and as well as Muslims seeking to learn more about their heritage and scholarly discourse. One aspect of jurisprudential works – both classical and even many contemporary works – is that their written style is terse and concise, making it challenging to render it into English. All effort is made to stay true to the text, but on occasions, explanatory notes have been written wherever it was deemed appropriate.

All translation suggestions and corrections can be e-mailed to aalofimran [@] gmail [.] com

Reading guideline:

( ) – sentences within parenthesis are used to indicate the original text upon which a commentary is being written.

[ ] – brackets are used by the translator to include any words that are not explicitly in the original text, but are added to make the sentence flow.

Blue Text – All aḥadīth are rendered in blue.

Red Text – All Qurānic verses are rendered in red.

Works

Al-Rawḍāh al-Bahīyyah fī Sharḥ al-Lum’ah al-Dimishqīyyah by al-Shahīd al-Thānī (d. 966 / 1558)

This 16th century work is a commentary written by al-Shahīd al-Thānī on the work of al-Shahīd al-Awwal (d. 786 / 1385) titled al-Lum’ah al-Dimishqīyyah. The latter wrote the book in a prison in Damascus over a span of seven days while he had no access to any other work except Mukhtaṣar al-Nāfi’ of Muḥaqqiq al-Ḥillī (d. 676 / 1277). His goal was to compile a brief text inclusive of mainstream opinions held by Imāmī Shī’ī jurists on all the chapters of jurisprudence.

Al-Shahīd al-Thānī began writing his commentary on the work in the beginning of Rabī’ al-Awwal of 956 hijrī and completed it on the 21st of Jumādī al-Ūla of 957 hijrī. While many other commentaries were also written on the work, al-Shahīd al-Thānī’s commentary has remained seminal to the extent that dozens of commentaries and explanatory notes were written on his commentary itself. To date, the work has remained the primary text studied in seminaries at the introductory level. The book was also one of few works used as a basis to promulgate the Iranian civil law in 1928, during the time of Reza Shah.

At least thirty of these works, some limited to just the text of al-Lum’ah while others including the commentary, were originally translated by Ali Imran between September 2015 to December 2016 in class while studying them in the seminary. However, they required heavy editing and as such were not sufficient for publishing.