Muslim Exegesis of the Bible: The Case of Daqāʾiq al-naẓar fī ḥaqāʾiq al-bašar of ʿUmar b. Ḫiḍr b. ʿUmar al-Iṣfahānī

Ms Istanbul, Köprülü 813 is a unique manuscript (as it seems) of a polemical work directed against all those who negate the prophethood of the Prophet Muḥammad—entitled Daqāʾiq al-naẓar fī ḥaqāʾiq al-bašar of ʿUmar b. Ḫiḍr b. ʿUmar al-Iṣfahānī—which seems to have largely escaped the attention of scholars up until now. The manuscript is undated and next to nothing is known about its author, except that he also wrote another work entitled Taʿǧīz al-mustaʿǧiz which seems to be preserved in (at least) two manuscripts, copied in the 9th/15th and 10th/16th century respectively. The talk will discuss the work's structure and contents as well as its author and then focus on the rich biblical material (Hebrew Bible and New Testament) it contains, as well as the quotations gleaned from the Mishnah, with an analysis of the author's exegetical approach to those materials.