Book

Al-Tafsir attributed to Imam al-Hasan al-Askari (peace be upon him)

Researcher

Discription of This Book

The Tafsir starts with some hadiths about the merits of the Qur'an, interpretations of it, etiquette of reciting it, and continues with hadiths about the virtues of Ahl al-Bayt (a)[1] and vices of their enemies.Overall, 379 hadiths are quoted in the book, most of which are as lengthy as several pages;[3] thus sometimes the structure of hadiths is missing or even some of them suffer from incoherence.In this Tafsir some verses are interpreted, while most of interpretations are about the miracles of Prophet Muhammad (s) and the infallible Imams (a).[4] Although the referents of verses were mentioned, less attention have been paid to the occasion of revelation and there is no mention of grammatical or rhetorical discussion.Interpretation of a verse usually starts with explanation of the words in the verse and then hadiths related to the verse are quoted. In some cases, the hadiths related to the occasion of revelation of the verse are mixed with exegetical hadiths of the verse.Meaning of Shi'a, meaning of Rafidi,[8] Taqiyya (Precautionary Dissimulation)[9] and virtues of some of the companions of Prophet Muhammad (s), including Khabbab b. Aratt and 'Ammar b. Yasir[10] are some additional topics mentioned in this Tafsir. Some exegetical points such as the interpretation of the Forbidden Tree as the tree of the knowledge of Muhammad (s) and Ahl al-Bayt (a) are only found in this book.