Tafsir
Samarkand · 944
a
al-Maturidi
al-Maturidi
853 CE–944 CE · Samarkand
Abu Mansur al-Maturidi (Muhammad ibn Muhammad) was a Sunni theologian and Hanafi jurist of Transoxiana, the region beyond the Oxus River in what is now Uzbekistan. He is the figure for whom the Maturidi school of theology (kalam, meaning speculative or systematic theology) is named — one of the two main schools of Sunni doctrine, alongside the school named after his contemporary al-Ash'ari.
His death is well attested in 333 AH (944 CE), and he was buried in Samarqand. His birth year is not recorded by the early biographers; modern scholars estimate around 853 CE, inferred chiefly from the death dates of his teachers, so the date should be read as an informed guess rather than an established fact.
Al-Maturidi was born in Maturid, a village or quarter near Samarqand, and appears to have lived, taught, and died in the Samarqand region; no travels are documented. He followed the legal school of Abu Hanifa and is best known for two works: the Kitab al-Tawhid ("Book of Divine Oneness"), an early systematic theology, and a Qur'an commentary usually titled Ta'wilat al-Qur'an (or Ta'wilat Ahl al-Sunna).
In matters where the schools differ, his positions are described by later tradition as a middle path: against the rationalist Mu'tazila he affirmed God's eternal attributes, yet he gave reason a larger role than the Ash'ari school is generally said to. On human action he is reported to hold that God creates acts while humans have a genuine capacity and intention — a view his school frames between fatalism and full human autonomy. These characterizations come from the later Maturidi tradition and should be weighed as such.
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Stop 1 of 1944Taught And Died
SamarkandסמרקנדCentral Asia
What they did here
Lived, studied, and taught in the Samarqand region — a major centre of Hanafi jurisprudence, hadith, and kalam at the time — where he developed his theological work and trained students. He died there in 333 AH (944 CE) and was buried in Samarqand; his death date is well attested. No travels outside the region are documented in the sources.
About Samarkand
Samarkand is a city in southeastern Uzbekistan, today the country's second largest. Known to the Greeks as Marakanda, the Sogdian city was taken by Alexander the Great in 329 BCE. Umayyad forces under Qutayba ibn Muslim captured it around 710, and under the Samanids (875-999) it was one of the leading cities of the eastern Islamic world. Genghis Khan's armies sacked it in 1220, but Timur made it his capital in 1370, and his grandson Ulugh Beg built a madrasa on the Registan square and, in 1428, an astronomical observatory. The city was also home to a large Bukharan Jewish community, most of which emigrated from the 1970s on. Its historic centre is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The world in their lifetime
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Thinkers and teachers of other traditions whose lives overlapped with al-Maturidi’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.
Works(2)
Tawhid
Samarkand · 944