Shafaqna English- “Atlas of Shia” is a book written by “Rasul Ja’fariyan” in Persian, published in Tehran in 2008. This scholarly work, consisting of 743 pages and 12 chapters, aims to provide a geographical and historical depiction of Shia Islam from the beginning of Islam to the first decade of the third millennium. The “Atlas of Shia” has won the Book of the Year Award of the Islamic Republic of Iran and has been translated into Arabic. Shafaqna News Agency has translated sections of this significant book into English for interested readers.
Commentators on Nahjul-Balaghah
The significance of Nahjul-Balaghah, its literary stature, and the authority it gained due to containing the sayings of the Commander of the Faithful, Imam Ali (AS), led many scholars in the Islamic world to write commentaries on it. The process of commentary began in the time of Sharif Razi and has continued to the present day. These commentaries are so extensive that many scholars have researched this topic. Among them are: Mufid Al-Nuri in the conclusion of Mustadrak, Seyyed Mohsen Amin in A’yan Al-Shi’a (8/245), Allamah Amini in Al-Ghadir (in the fourth volume, with over 89 commentaries), Aqa Bozorg Tehrani in Zari’a (14/111–161), and Professor Abdul Aziz Tabatabai in Majalleh Kharathna.
Some researchers consider Seyyed Fazlollah Rawandi to be the first commentator, who traveled from Kashan to Baghdad to seek knowledge. He is said to have written his first commentary in 1117 CE, based on a manuscript in the handwriting of Sharif Razi.
The tradition of writing commentaries on Nahjul-Balaghah continued, and in modern times, two significant commentaries have been published: Bihaj Al-Sabbagha by Allamah Muhammad Taqi Testari (d. 1995) and Sharh Nahjul-Balaghah by Allamah Muhammad Taqi Jafari (d. 1998).