Wahhabi Fabrication in Hashiyat asw-Swawi ‘ala Tafsir al-Jalalayn

بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ 

Tafsir al-Jalalayn is one of the most significant books of exegesis for the study of the Qur’an.  This monumental work is by Imam Jalal ad-Din Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Mahalli (q.s.), and his student, Imam Jalal ad-Din Abu al-Fadhl ‘Abd ar-Rahman ibn Abu Bakr as-Suyuthi (q.s.).  The famous Maliki scholar, Imam Ahmad ibn Muhammad asw-Swawi al-Maliki (r.a.) wrote a, hashiyat, commentary, on the above work.  This commentary is known as Hashiyat asw-Swawi ‘ala Tafsir al-Jalalayn. 

He commented on the following verse: 

سُوۡرَةُ فَاطِر

إِنَّ ٱلشَّيۡطَـٰنَ لَكُمۡ عَدُوٌّ۬ فَٱتَّخِذُوهُ عَدُوًّاۚ إِنَّمَا يَدۡعُواْ حِزۡبَهُ ۥ لِيَكُونُواْ مِنۡ أَصۡحَـٰبِ ٱلسَّعِيرِ (٦) 

Verily Satan is an enemy to you: so treat him as an enemy.  He only invites his adherents, that they may become companions of the Blazing Fire. (Surah Fathir:6) 

On the following verse, he wrote, “This ayah was revealed about the Khwarij who misinterpret the Qur’an and ahadits, legitimising the killing and confiscating the property of other Muslims under the impression that they are mushrikun and upon kufr.  As it is seen now, the equal to them are a group in the land of al-Hijaz called ‘al-Wahhabiyyah’, who think they are following the truth, but they are liars whom Shaythan overwhelmed and made them forget the dzikr of Allah.  They are the followers of Shaythan.  Surely the followers of Shaythan are the losers and we ask Allah, the Most Generous, to Amputate their origin.” 

This is found in the 1930 edition, printed in Cairo, the ‘Isa al-Babi al-Halabi edition (Vol. 3. page 255).  It is also found in the 1937 edition, printed in Cairo by Maktaba al-Mashhad al-Husayni (Vol. 3, page 307-308).  It is also found in the 1970 edition, printed in Beirut by Dar Ihya’ al-Turath al-‘Arabi (Vol. 3, page 307-308).  This is a scan of original book.  Please note the word “al-Wahhabiyyah” in the red box. 

The Wahhabis who are known for tampering with books since the beginning.  They became more active after 1980 and their oil money was used for freely distributing these fabricated books.  The Wahhabis published a new edition of the above work, from Dar al-Fikr in Beirut, an offset of the same old printing, but with a surreptitious change.  In the third volume, part of the bottom line of page 307 and the top line of 308 have been whited out, eliminating the words, “a group in the land of al-Hijaz called ‘al-Wahhabiyyah’”, deceitfully corrupting the point that Imam Ahmad asw-Swawi (r.a.) made about the modern counterparts of the Khwarij.  This is the edited Wahhabi edition in which the words, “a group in the land of al-Hijaz called ‘al-Wahhabiyyah’” has been removed. 

The deletion was virtually indistinguishable from an ordinary spacing mistake, coming as it does at the ends of the two pages, though Dar al-Fikr made up for any technical shortcomings in this respect in 1993 with a newly typeset four-volume version of Hashiyat asw-Swawi ‘ala al-Jalalayn, which its title page declares to be a “new and corrected”, munaqqahah, printing.  The above passage appears on page 379 of the third volume with the same wording as the previous cover-up, but this time in a continuous text, so no one would ever guess that Imam asw-Swawi’s (r.a.) words had been removed.