LVIII. QĀẒĪ ABŪ-'L-MA‘ĀLĪ.*

He is the disciple, the spiritual successor, and also the son-in­law of the Governor* of Bukhārā (may his honoured tomb be sanctified!). The venerable Governor was so learned in law and divinity that if we may suppose that all the books on the theology of the Ḥanafī* school had disappeared from the world, he would have been able to write them afresh. It was on his account that ‘Abdu-'llāh Khān,* the king of Tūrān, put a stop to the study of logic and dialectics in his dominions, and expelled Mullā ‘Iṣāmu-d-dīn of Isfārāin with his vile pupils from Transoxiana. The circumstances were as follows: After the study of logic and dialectics had gained ground in Bukhārā and Samarqand vile and wicked students, whenever they met a pious and simple-minded man, used to say, “This fellow is an ass, for he will deny the proposition that he is an animal,* and, since the rejection of a general proposition necessarily involves the rejec­tion of particular propositions dependent on it, he necessarily denies also his humanity.” When fallacies of this nature were frequently repeated and spread abroad the Governor wrote a treatise on divinity, inciting and urging ‘Abdu-'llah Khān to banish this school, and adducing clear proofs of the unlawfulness of teaching and studying logic and philosophy. He also recorded his opinion that there was no harm in using as a torchecul paper on which logical exercises had been written, and wrote much more to the same purport.

The Qāẓī always performed the zikr-i-arra* after his prayers with his companions, and used to enroll disciples.

In the year H. 969 (A.D. 1561-62) he came to Agra, and I, as a 151 means of attaining good fortune and blessing, read some lessons with him in the beginning of the Sharḥ-i-Wiqāyah, and in truth, so far as that subject was concerned I found him to be a boundless sea of learning.