Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s Legal Legacy in the Cairo Geniza
When you think you have uncovered the secrets trapped in the trove of the Cairo Geniza, new discoveries continue to be made which fascinate the researchers and the conservators alike. One such discovery was the recent surfacing of two folios from a Fatimid legal manual entitled the Kitāb al-Iqtiṣār, penned in Ifrīqiya by the chief Fatimid jurist of the 10th-century, al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān (d. 974).1
Both fragments are from the as-yet unconserved and undigitized part of the Jacques Mosseri Genizah Collection (Mosseri IX2.24 + Mosseri Xa 3.43),2 and are presently housed at the Cambridge University Libraries.3
The first folio, Mosseri IXa 2.24, is measured 9.2 cm x 15.8 cm, with the maximum length measuring 12.9 cm. The folio is a section from the chapter on warfare (bāb al-jihād), and discusses three issues chiefly:
1) Apostasy and Heresy: The punishment for apostasy (irtidād) and heresy (zandaqa).
2) Moral Agency and Defense: The section on banditry distinguishes between those who defend property (and are martyred) and those who do not, showing a practical understanding of legal permissibility without enforcing obligation.
3) Children’s Religion: Assigning children the religious status of the mother if the father has apostatized.
Fig. 1. Cambridge University library, Mosseri IXa 2.24 (recto). Reproduced by the permission and courtesy of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library
Fig. 2. Cambridge University Library, Mosseri IXa 2.24 (verso). Reproduced by the permission and courtesy of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library
Before presenting an edition and translation of the preserved folios, it should be noted that there are no textual variations between the edited version of the Iqtiṣār4 when compared with the text on these folios. This indicates the stability of the text.
The section of the preserved text is as follows:
Mosseri IXa 2.24, verso
1. [ومن انكر فريضة او شريعة من شرايع الاسلام او فرايضه او امتنع من ادايها]
2. الَىْ اَهْلِهَا مُكَذّباً بِفَرْضِها اَوْ مُدَافِعاً لِهاْ وَجَبَ قتالهُ وَقتلَه
3. اذا قَدِر عَليهِ5 الّاَ اَن يَتُوبَ وَكُل من حَالَ6 دُوْن حَدٍّ7 من حدُوْدِ8
4. اللهِ9 وَجَبه جهَادُهُ Ꙩ وَاللصُوْص10 اذا عَارضوا11 أمْوَالَ
5. المسلمِينَ فَواجِبٌ قتِالهُمْ12 وَدَفعهُم عَنْهَـ[[ـاْـ]]ـم وَقتلهُمْ في ذَلكَ وَمَنْ
6. قتلوْهُ دُوْنَ مالِه اَوْ مَال غيرهِ من المسلمِين فهُوَ شهِيْدٌ وَان
7. [ترك ذلك] وسلمهُ لهُم وَلَم يقاتِلهُمْ دُوْنَ مَاله فَلاْ شَي
8. [عليه وسلب اللصوص إذا ظفر بهم يُنـ]ـظر الَيْهِ فان عُرِفَ
9. [اربابه دفع إليهم وان لم يعرفه اربابه دفع] الىْ الامَامِ
Mosseri IXa 2.24 recto
1. [ويقاتل اهل الردة واذا ارتد منهم نساءهم وحصلوا في موضع قتل]
2. الرّجَالُ وَسُبِيَ النِّسَاُ وَالذّرَارِيْ وَضُرِبت عَلَيْهم السّهَامُ وَاذا
3. ارتَدُّوا وَكانوا في مدينةٍ وَمَعَهُمْ13 مُسلِمُوْن قتل الرّجَالُ وحُبِس
4. النِّسَاُ وَاستُوفي بالأطفالِ14 حَتّى يبْلغوا فمن اَسْلمَ مِنْهُمْ فَهُوَ
5. حُرَّ15 وَانْ لَمْ يسلِمُوا قتِل الرّجَال وَحُبس النِسَا وَان ارتدّ الرّجَالُ
6. دُوْنُ النِسا قتل الرّجَالُ وَكَاْنَ الأطفالُ عَلىْ اَدْيان امّهَاتهِمْ
7. اذاْ كُنّ مُسْلِمات Ꙩ [ويستتاب الزنادقة]
8. فإِن لَمْ يَتُوْبُوا [قتلوا وأحرقوا النار بعد القتل]
Translation:
Mosseri IXa 2.24, verso:
1. [Whoever defies an act of obligatory practice, or a ritual from the rituals of Islam, or refuses from fulfilling his obligation to the rightful]
2. people, by virtue of denying the obligation or rejecting it, warrants his killing, and punitive measures being appointed against him
3. when possible, unless he repents and seeks forgiveness.
4. And everyone who obstructs the implementation of one of the legal punishments (ḥudūd)
5. of God, it is obligatory to wage jihād against him. As for bandits (luṣūṣ), if they attack the property
6. of Muslims, it is obligatory to wage jihād against them, prevent them from infringing it, and kill them against this pretext. Whoever
7. is killed defending his own wealth or that of another Muslim is a martyr (shahīd). However,
8. [if he refrains from defending his own property and surrenders without resisting], there is no blame upon him
9. [As for the stolen property recovered from the bandits; if they are captured, then its return depends: if the owners are known, it is repatriated to them; if the owners are unknown, it is to be delivered to the Imām.]
Mosseri IXa 2.24, recto:
1. [The apostates (ahl al-ridda) are to be killed. In a situation where their womenfolk commit apostasy and are confined to a place,]
2. the men are to be killed and the women and children are to be held in captivity. They should later be subjected to the division of spoils. When
3. the women and men have apostasized and are in a city where there is a Muslim population, the men are to be killed,
4. the women imprisoned, and the children held until they reach the age of puberty. Whoever among them embraces Islam is
5. free; and if they do not embrace Islam, the men are to be killed and the women imprisoned. If only the men apostatize
6. and the women refrain, the men are to be killed, and the children retain the Muslim status of their mothers,
7. if they embrace Islam. [The heretics (zanādiqa) are to be called to seek forgiveness,
8. and if they fail to do so, they are to be killed and burned with fire after execution].
The second folio is a smaller fragment in comparison to the first one, and measures 15.8 cm x 7.1 cm. The folio is a section from the near beginning of the chapter on sales (bāb al-buyūʿ), which is the subsequent chapter after the bāb al-jihād as per the order of chapters in kitāb al-iqtiṣār. Technically, the bāb al-jihād is in the first volume of the Iqtiṣār, and the bāb al-buyūʿ in the second. It is not clear if the owner of the folios possessed both volumes of the work, or only a few unbound folios from each before they were jettisoned for Geniza disposal. The present fragmented folios do not evidently have any thread holes or traces of binding, which may indicate that they were unbound. The discussion in the preserved fragment revolves around four key issues:
1) Sale of foodstuffs and emphasis on the sale’s materialization after the commodity has been delivered.
2) Prohibition on hoarding (ḥukra) and fixed pricing (tasʿīr) in the times of famine and food shortage.
3) Prohibition on usury.
4) Legal rulings on the exchange of commodities.
Fig. 3. Cambridge University Library, Mosseri Xa 3.43, recto. Reproduced by the permission and courtesy of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library
Fig. 4. Cambridge University Library, Mosseri Xa 3.43, verso. Reproduced by the permission and courtesy of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library
An edition of the preserved text is as follows:
Mosseri Xa 3.43, recto:
1. [ولا يصلح بيع الطعام حتى يقبض ولا باس بالتولية فيه ولا باس بذلك]
2. في سايِر السِّلَعِ16 Ꙩ وَلْا بَاسَ بشرَىْ الطَعَامِ وَان
3. يقبضه المشتري اذا صدَّقهُ بكَيْلِ17 البايع18 Ꙩ وَنَهَوْا
4. عَن الحُكرهِ اذا عَز الطَعَامُ19 وَعَن التسعِيرꙨ وَنَهَوْا
5. عَنِ20 الرّبا وَجأ فيهِ21 تغليط22 شديْدٌ وَان ذلكَ عَلى من
6. اصَابَهُ23 متَعمّداً اوَمَن تابَ منْهُ اخذ رَاس[ ماله ورد الفضل
Mosseri Xa 3.43, verso:
1. اذا اتفقا عَلي ذَلِكَ وَمَنْ اَسْلفَ دَرَاهِمَ اَوْ دَنانير
2. فَاُعطِي24 اجْوَدَ مِنهَا فلاْ باس اذا لَمْ يَشترِطْꙨ وَلاْ بَاسَ
3. //بذلك// بالتفاضُلِ بيْنَ النوْعَيْن اذا اختلفا وَالبُرُّ وَالشعيْر نَوْعٌ
4. وَاحد لا يَجُوْزُ التفاضُل بينهُما وَكذلِكَ الحِنطَهُ25
5. والسويق و]الدقيقꙨ وَيُكْرَهُ بيعُ الرُطَبِ26 بالثمْن
Translation:
Recto:
1. [The sale of foodstuffs is not permitted unless the commodities have been delivered in full. However, it is permitted to sell them [before their full delivery] without a profit (tawliya),27 and the same ruling applies
2. ] to all commodities. It is permitted to purchase foodstuffs, and the
3. buyer shall make his purchase once he has validated the weight of the
4. seller’s measurement (kayl al-bāyiʿ). The practice of iḥtikār (hoarding) is prohibited when food becomes scarce, and the practice of price-fixing (tasʿīr) has also been prohibited.
5. Usury (ribā) is also forbidden and there is a severe censure regarding it. This applies to anyone who engages in it deliberately.
6. As for one who repents from it, he may take back only his capital, and the excess (al-faḍl) must be returned
Verso:
1. if both parties agree to it, and there is no objection. Whoever advances (aslaf) dirhams or dinars [as a loan],
2. and is then repaid in better (i.e., newer or higher quality) coins, there is no objection—provided that this was not stipulated in advance.
3. There is also no objection to exchanging unequal amounts (tafāḍul) between different types [of commodities] if they are of different kinds. Wheat (al-burr) and barley (al-shaʿīr) are, however, considered a single
4. type (nawʿ wāḥid), and it is therefore not permissible to exchange them with disparity. The same applies to wheat (ḥinṭa),
5. flour (daqīq), and groats (sawīq). It is disliked (yukrahu) to sell fresh dates (ruṭab) for dried dates (thamar).
Visual Features and Paleography
The fragments of the Iqtiṣār have some visual features that I would like to delineate. The writing support is paper, with moderate water staining and uneven discoloration, especially toward the edges, owing to storage conditions. There are prominent (mostly) horizontal creases visible, indicating repeated folding. It appears that the nib of the scribe’s pen has a shallow cut. In certain places, the nib also demonstrates an execution similar to a flex nib, where the thickness of the nib varies when extra pressure is applied.
The scribal hand seems to be a 10th-century (or early 11th-century) Egyptian hand because of paleographic features. As for the script, the dominant style of writing is Naskh, but slightly leans towards the early Maghribi calligraphic style. This is mainly discernible in the letter kāf of dhālika and kadhālika.
Fig. 5. The terminal kāf in dhālika and kadhālika in Mosseri Xa 3.43, verso, that leans towards the Maghribi style.
The script also exhibits some features of the Rayḥānī style.28 This feature is noticeable in the broad and shallow bowls of the letters sīn, nūn, lām, and yāʾ.29
Fig. 6. Broad and shallow bowls of the letters sīn, nūn, lām, and yāʾ that resemble the Rayḥānī style of Arabic calligraphy as observable in Mosseri IXa 2.24 (recto).
Fig. 7. A Quranic folio in the Naskhī and Rayḥānī script in the hand of Ibn al-Bawwāb, Chester Beatty Library, Is 1431 (14f:9v).
In more general terms, the script on the fragments begins consistently at a fixed vertical point, suggesting the use of a masṭara and light dry-point ruling, as also evidenced by the nearly uniform line spacing. However, the line endings are irregular and show no attempt at justification, reflecting a functional rather than embellished scribal practice. The alifs and the lāms are longer in proportion to the rest of the letters, and the characters of the script usually dip much deeper than the baseline. The scribe also marks subject endings with circumpuncts (Ꙩ) to indicate the end of a subject, often used as verse endings in Quranic manuscripts. However, circumpuncts are also attested in Jewish texts in the Geniza and in non-Qurʾanic Muslim manuscripts, e.g. in the Invisible East corpus.
Fig. 8. Three subject endings marked with circumpuncts (Ꙩ) as observable on the recto of Mosseri Xa 3.43.
Fig. 9. Folio of a transliterated version of the Book of Exodus in Arabic with punctuation marks in Hebrew. The scribe uses circumpuncts to mark subject endings. British Library, Or. 2540, fol. 15, verso.30
Fig. 10. Draft phrasebook of Arabic phrases with Persian translations of terms dealing with fruits, physical characteristics of people, doors and pens. Circumpuncts are used by the scribe to mark subject endings. NLI, MS Heb. 8333.189.31
The most noteworthy feature of the manuscript is its heavy vocalization and dotting. Almost all letters are dotted and vocalized. However, astonishingly, some kasra are marked in reverse (eg. Mosseri Xa, 2.24 r, l.3, “bi l-aṭfāl”, l.6, “muslimāt”). The scribe has also used ihmāl32 to indicate certain letters, especially hamza, ḥāʾ, and ʿayn.
Fig. 11. Reverse kasra.
Fig. 12. The ihmāl marking of “صـ” below the letter “ṣād”.
Despite these features, the manuscript overall does not appear to be very elegant in terms of production, and seems to be commissioned more for a functional use than ceremonial, as is often common with legal and jurisprudential works.
The Kitāb al-Iqtiṣār in Islamic legal law and Fatimid jurisprudence
The Kitāb al-Iqtiṣār is a super abridgement (or abridgment of an already abridged work) of one of the earliest Fatimid legal works to be written, and entitled Kitāb al-Īḍāḥ (the book of explications), authored by al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān. As al-Nuʿmān himself states in the introduction to the Kitāb al-Iqtiṣār, the Īḍāḥ was the result of an extensive survey of numerous legal sources attributed to the Ahl al-Bayt (the Prophet’s family). From these sources, he sought to extract what he regarded as the most accurate and reliable legal opinions, producing a monumental compilation that reportedly extended to approximately 3,000 pages. Al-Nuʿmān subsequently composed a more concise version, focusing exclusively on points of agreement and disagreement among jurists regarding legal rulings, while omitting the chains of transmission (asānīd). This intermediate work, which he entitled Kitāb al-Ikhbār fī al-Fiqh (The Book of Legal Reports), amounted to roughly 300 pages.33 The Iqtiṣār, is thus, a shortened and abridged version of the Ikhbār, to make it more accessible to the readers. Al-Nuʿmān states:
[After authoring the Ikhbār,] I resolved, through divine assistance, to confine myself (from the legal opinions presented in the Īḍāḥ and Ikhbār) to what is firmly established (al-thābit), namely that upon which there is consensus (ijmāʿ), and to what has been disputed (ikhtilāf), presenting it concisely so as to make it more accessible and easier to comprehend. This endeavor turned into fruition in the present book, entitled Kitāb al-Iqtiṣār (“The Book of Abridgement”). In it, Lord willing, is sufficient guidance for anyone who restricts himself to it, if Lord, the exalted and majestic, wills to grant him the understanding of it.34
Al-Nuʿmān later versified the Iqtiṣār and entitled it Kitāb al-Muntakhaba fī al-Fiqh (The Book of Selective Traditions in Jurisprudence), intended for those who sought to memorize its legal rulings. Producing four consecutive iterations of a single authoritative work on Islamic law by the same jurist, either as abridgements or versified prose, is indeed a unique and noteworthy phenomenon. Al-Nuʿmān is probably the only jurist until the 10th century to have endeavoured to accomplish this feat.35
Another thing to note about al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s works is that all of them, thought to be around 200, were produced during his time in Ifrīqīya, as he passed away in less than a year after the transfer of the Fatimid capital from al-Manṣūriya (near al-Qayrawān) to Cairo in 973.
Despite this, his intellectual legacy was continued by his descendants, some of whom like al-Nuʿmān himself also rose to the rank of the chief jurist (al-qāḍī al-quḍāt) under the Fatimids. His works were disseminated in Cairo and were received with the same reverence as they once did in Ifrīqiya.36 About the transmission of al-Iqtiṣār in Cairo, al-Maqrīzī (d. 1442) reports:
[Ibn Zulāq reports that in the year 365/975]37 the jurist ʿAlī b. al-Nuʿmān congregated in the Jāmiʿ al-Qāhira (i.e., al-Jāmiʿ al-Azhar), and read the abridgement of his father on the fiqh of Ahl al-Bayt to the audience. This abridgement is entitled al-Iqtiṣār (the abridgement), and is a praiseworthy effort.38
Conclusion
The discovery of these folios demonstrates not only the enduring authority of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s legal tradition but also the extraordinary cross-cultural afterlife of Fatimid scholarship. The fact that the only surviving witnesses to al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s Iqtiṣār in Cairo are two Geniza fragments is, in itself, remarkable.39 It is a fitting irony that the Fatimid chief jurist, whose abridgement was once read aloud in the very heart of Fatimid Cairo, now speaks to us from the discarded papers of a Jewish communal repository. The Geniza, it seems, still guards the legal and administrative memory of the Fatimids, piece by fragile piece.
Acknowledgements: The author would like to thank Athina Pfeiffer for her help in editing and identifying the work, and Matthew Dudley for his helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article.
Footnotes
1 I would like to thank Lorenzo Bondioli for passing the photograph of the first folio, which sparked the impetus for finding more fragments of the work, and eventually led to the discovery of the second folio.
2 For its catalogue record on the Princeton Geniza Project website, see: Cambridge University Library, Mosseri, Moss. Xa 3.43 + Cambridge University Library, Mosseri, Moss. IXa 2.24. Available online through the Princeton Geniza Project at https://geniza.princeton.edu/documents/40831/, accessed August 1, 2025.
3 About the Mosseri Collection, see: https://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/departments/taylor-schechter-geniz..., and https://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/genizah-fragments/posts/future-egypts-past-mosseri-collection. See also Rebecca Jefferson, The Cairo Genizah and the Age of Discovery in Egypt - The History and Provenance of a Jewish Archive (New York: I. B. Tauris, 2022). Pg. 186.
4 Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān, Kitab al-Iqtiṣār. Ed. Muḥammad Waḥīd Mirzā (Damascus: al-Maʿhad al-Faransī li al-Dirāsāt al-ʿArabiyya, 1376/1957). While the editor does not specify the manuscripts that were used to prepare this edition, it seems that the edition is based on a manuscript of Indian provenance.
5 Small ʿayn under ʿayn.
6 Small ḥā under the ḥā.
7 Small ḥā under the ḥā
8 Small ḥā under the ḥā.
9 Reversed kasra.
10 Small ṣad under initial ṣad.
11 Small ʿayn under ʿayn.
12 Small ʿayn under ʿayn
13 Small ʿayn under the ʿayn
14 Reversed kasra.
15 Small ḥā under the ḥā.
16 Reverse kasra below the ʿayn.
17 Reverse kasra the lām.
18 Hamza under the yā.
19 Hamza under the yā.
20 Reverse kasra below the nūn.
21 Reverse kasra below the hā.
22 Scribal error وتغليظ.
23 Ihmāl below the ṣād.
24 Ḥamza under ʿayn.
25 Ihmāl marking under the ḥā.
26 Reverse kasra below the bā.
27 Tawliya in Islamic legal terms refers to the practice of selling a commodity at the price at which a seller acquired the commodity, without a profit or loss. This legal ruling is derived from the Prophetic tradition: “التولية والاقالة والشركة سواء لا باس به”. See Abū Zakariyya Muḥyu al-Dīn Yaḥya b. Sharaf al-Nawawī, al-Rawḍa al-Ṭālibiyīn wa-ʿumdat al-muftīyīn (Beirut: al-Maktab al-Islāmī, 1991), pg. 509. I thank Huzaifa Shakir for this reference.
28 Khaṭṭ Rayḥānī is a specific style of Arabic calligraphy known for its elegance and refined appearance, similar to the precious incense known as rayḥān. It is one of the six major calligraphic scripts, or al-aqlām al-sitta (the Six Pens), and is characterized by its distinct proportions, often featuring characters that are more densely packed than the related muḥaqqaq script.
29 I thank Moiz Nagpurwala for this insight.
30 I thank Moshe Yagur for this information.
31 This document is part of the Invisible East Corpus: https://www.invisible-east.org/corpus/1285/?tab=details&textfolio=580. I thank Nadia Vidro for this reference.
32 For a good understanding of the ihmāl in Islamic manuscripts, see Jan Just Witkam, “The Neglect Neglected. To Point or Not to Point, That Is the Question,” Journal of Islamic Manuscripts 6, nos. 2–3 (2015): 376–408, pg. 376. He defines the ihmāl as: [“Ihmāl—meaning “neglect”—is the omission of dots from certain letters of the Arabic alphabet. It applies specifically to those letters that are not provided with punctuation, as opposed to the letters that carry dots. The opposite of Ihmāl is Iʿǧām. The maṣdar Ihmāl as a technical term is probably rather modern as it is not found in the earliest sources. Letters without diacritical dots are called Muhmala, “neglected” or “undotted”. The word Ihmāl also refers to the writing of marks on top and underneath Arabic letters in order to indicate that they are undotted, i.e. that the dots have not accidentally been omitted. This should exclude all possible confusion between morphemes that are based on one and the same grapheme but only distinguished from one another by dots.”]
33 Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān, Kitab al-Iqtiṣār. Ed. Muḥammad Waḥīd Mirzā (Damascus: al-Maʿhad al-Faransī li al-Dirāsāt al-ʿArabiyya, 1376/1957), Pg. 9-10.
34 Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān, Kitab al-Iqtiṣār. Pg. 10.
35 This is indeed a very unique and uncommon phenomenon in the Islamic canon and to the best of my knowledge only the Ḥanbalite Ibn Qudāma al-Maqdisī (d. 1223) comes close producing a five-tiered iteration of his legal work entitled (in order): al-Mughnī, al-kāfī, al-muqniʿ, al-ʿumda, and al-hādī. The theologian al-Ghazālī (d. 1111) and the exegete al-Wāḥidī (d. 1076) also wrote three iterations of their work with similar titles, namely “al-Basīṭ”, “al-Wasīt”, and “al-Wajīz”. I thank Prof. Michael Cook for this insight.
36 Another example of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s legal works disseminated in Cairo is recorded in a Fatimid report dated to the 11th century. See Cambridge University Library, Taylor-Schechter, T-S Ar.42.134 + Cambridge University Library, Taylor-Schechter, T-S Ar.49.151 + Cambridge University Library, Taylor-Schechter, T-S Ar.42.156. Available online through the Princeton Geniza Project at https://geniza.princeton.edu/documents/21103/, accessed July 21, 2025. For a discussion, edition and translation of the document, see S. M. Stern, "Cairo as the Centre of the Ismaili Movement," Colloque international sur l'histoire du Caire, 27 mars-5 avril 1969 (Cairo: n.p., 1972), 437–50.
37 This is approximately a year following the demise of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān in 364/974.
38 Taqī al-Dīn Aḥmad b. ʿAlī al-Maqrīzī, Ittiʿāẓ al-Ḥunafāʾ fī Akhbār al-ʾAimmat al-Fāṭimiyīn al-Khulafāʾ, 3 vols, (Cairo: al-Majlis al-ʾAʿlā li al-Shuʾūn al-Islāmiyya). I: 227.
39 There are several fragments of Islamic legal texts that have survived in the Geniza. For instance: JRL Gaster ar. 541, JRL Gaster ar. 651, T-S AS 184.371 + T-S AS 184.372, T-S NS 297.92, ENA 3931.10, and ENA 3944.17.
If you enjoyed this Fragment of the Month, you can find others here.
Contact us: genizah@lib.cam.ac.uk
The manuscripts in this article are part of the Cairo Genizah Collection in Cambridge University Library. To see more items from this collection visit: https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/collections/genizah/1