Abu Yahya ibn al-Sakkak

Abu Yahya ibn al-Sakkak al-Miknasi (full name: Abu Yahya or Abu Abd Allah Mohammed ibn Abu Ghalib ibn Ahmad ibn Mohammed ibn Abu-l-Hasan Ali ibn Mohammed ibn as-Sakkak al-Miknasi; d. 22 May 1415), was a Moroccan historian, genealogist, judge, Maliki scholar and Sufi mystic. He was born in Fez into the Ibn al-Sakkak family, a Berber family from the Miknasa tribe. He was a friend of Ibn Khaldun, they both studied under al-Sharif al-Tilimsani.[1] al-Sakkak was especially well known as author of an advice to Muslim kings, Nush muluk al-islam bi-al-tarif bi-ma yajibu alay-him min huquq ila bayt al-kiram.[2] In his advice Ibn Sakkak expressed skepticism about the divine right claimed by some rulers in his time.[3]

Ibn Sakkak is also the author of Kitab al-Uslub min-al-kalam ‘ala la hawla wa-la quwwata illa billah (known as Kitab al-Asalib), the first book about the Tariqa Shadhiliyya in Morocco, in which he used the name "Shadhili" for Ibn Abbad al-Rundi (d. 792/1377).[4]

References

1. Hajji, Mohamed (2002). "Ibn al-Sakkak, Muhammad ibn Abi Ghalib". In Toufiq, Ahmed; Hajji, Mohamed (eds.). Ma'lamat al-Maghrib (Encyclopedia of Morocco) (in Arabic). Vol. 15. al-Jamī‘a al-Maghribiyya li-l-Ta’līf wa-l-Tarjama wa-l-Nashr. p. 5028.
2. M. Ben Chekroun, La Vie intellectuelle marocaine sous les Mérinides et les Wattasides, 1974, pp. 368-72
3. Saida, Sqalli Houssini, Thesis, Contribution à l'Étude du discours politico-réligieux sous les derniers Mérinides: les Lettres d'Ibn Abbad de Ronda au Sultan Abu Faris et le Nush Muluk al-Islam d'Ibn As-Sakkak., 1992
4. Éric Geoffroy, Une voie soufie dans le monde:la Shâdhiliyya, p.75