ʿABD-AL-FATTĀH ḤOSAYNĪ

 

ʿABD-AL-FATTĀH ḤOSAYNĪ ʿASKARĪ, Indian scholar of Persian and Arabic. He left two works. 1. Meftāḥ al-maʿānī, a commentary in six daftars on the Maṯnavī of Rūmī, was collected by the author’s pupil, Hedāyatallāh, in 1049/1639-40. (See A. Sprenger, A Catalogue of the ... Manuscripts of the Libraries of the King of Oudh I, Calcutta, 1854, no. 365; Ethé, Cat. Ind. Off., no. 1103; for other MSS of the Meftāḥ, see Marshall, Mughals in India, p. 4) 2. Dorr-e maknūn consists of selections from the Maṯnavī. Each verse chosen as the expression of a key concept is accompanied by other verses from the Maṯnavī stating the same idea and sometimes by the compiler’s observations in prose. The Lahore MS (Punjab Univ. Lib., no. 7311), fol. 40b./1, for example, cites: ʿElm čūn bar Delhi zanad yārī šavad (Maṯnavī, ed. Nicholson, I:3447). The compiler then selects verses to reveal the concept ʿelm: 40b.2 = Maṯnavī I:3446; 40b.3 = I:3448; 40b.4 = I:3451; etc. Each such cluster of verses constitutes a “hidden pearl.” ʿAbd-al-Fattāḥ expresses the wish that one Mīrzā Żīāʾ Baḵš should present the text to the emperor Awrangzēb and prefaces the work with ten verses praising the sovereign.

Bibliography: Given in the text.

 

(M. B. Badakhshani)

Originally Published: December 15, 1982

Last Updated: July 14, 2011

This article is available in print.
Vol. I, Fasc. 1, p. 107

Cite this entry:

M. B. Badakhshani, "'Abd-Al-Fattah Hosayni,” Encyclopædia Iranica, I/1, p. 107; an updated version is available online at http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/abd-al-fattah-hosayni-17th-century-indian-scholar (accessed on 12 January 2014).