البدر التمام شرح بلوغ المرام

al-Badr al-Tamam Sharh Bulugh al-Maram

A substantial classical commentary on Imām Ibn Ḥajar al-ʿAsqalānī’s (d. 852 AH) celebrated collection of legal aḥādīth, Bulūgh al-Marām min Adillat al-Aḥkām, authored by the Yemeni scholar and judge al-Ḥusayn ibn Muḥammad ibn Saʿīd al-Lāʿī al-Maghribī (1048–1119 AH). Al-Badr al-Tamām is one of the important early commentaries on Bulūgh al-Marām and is particularly significant as the principal foundation upon which al-Amīr al-Ṣanʿānī later based his famous Subul al-Salām.

The work follows Ibn Ḥajar’s arrangement through the major chapters of Ṭahārah, Ṣalāh, Zakāh, Ṣawm, Ḥajj, transactions, marriage and divorce, criminal law, judicial matters and other chapters of Aḥādīth al-Aḥkām. For each narration, al-Maghribī explains difficult and unfamiliar expressions, clarifies the intended meaning of the ḥadīth and then examines the legal questions and rulings that arise from it. The commentary thus combines Sharḥ al-Ḥadīth with comparative Fiqh and the critical study of legal evidence.

An important feature of al-Badr al-Tamām is the author's concern with the strength and applicability of the evidence. His discussions can include the status of a narration and its transmitters, differing assessments of its authenticity, variant transmissions and the extent to which a particular report can establish or qualify a legal ruling. He then considers the positions of the jurists and their respective proofs rather than merely presenting a single madhhab's conclusion. This gives the work particular value to advanced students studying how the classical scholars moved from the text of a ḥadīth to questions of istinbāṭ, disagreement and tarjīḥ.

The book also holds an important place in the later history of Bulūgh al-Marām. Muḥammad ibn Ismāʿīl al-Amīr al-Ṣanʿānī (d. 1182 AH) explicitly based his Subul al-Salām upon al-Maghribī's commentary, abridging its more extensive discussions while adding material of his own. Al-Badr al-Tamām is therefore especially useful to readers of Subul al-Salām, since it provides access to the larger source from which a considerable part of that celebrated commentary developed.