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==Biography==
Tabari was born in [[Amol]], [[Tabaristan]] (some 20 km south of the [[Caspian Sea]]) in the winter of 838–39.{{sfn|Rosenthal|1989|pp=10–11}} He has been described as either of MazanderaniPersian or Arab origin.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Magdalino|first1=Paul|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gSEQ7WjngmkC&q=Persian+polymath&pg=PA279|title=The Old Testament in Byzantium|last2=Nelson|first2=Robert S.|date=2010|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-88402-348-7|page=279|language=en|quote=the Persian-born, Baghdādī polymath Abū Jaʿfar b. Jarīr al-Ṭabarī (d. 923/310) was putting the finishing ...}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last1=Daniel|first1=Elton L.|date=2000–2013|title=ṬABARI, ABU JAʿFAR MOḤAMMAD B. JARIR|url=http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/tabari-abu-jafar|publisher=ENCYCLOPÆDIA IRANICA|access-date=4 December 2016|quote=...one of the most eminent Iranian scholars of the early Abbasid era... There is thus no way of knowing for certain whether Ṭabari’s family was native to the Āol region or perhaps arrived with the wave of Muslim colonists after the Abbasid revolution, either as converts or Arab settlers.}}</ref><ref>[[Gaston Wiet]], etc, "The Great Medieval Civilizations: cultural and scientific development. Volume 3. The great medieval civilizations. Part 1", Published by Allen and Unwin, 1975. pg 722:In the meantime another author, Tabari, Persian by origin, had been unobtrusively at work on two monumental pieces of writing, a commentary on the Koran .</ref><ref>{{cite web|last1=Bosworth|first1=C.E.|title=al-Ṭabarī|date=24 April 2012|url=https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia-of-islam-2/al-tabari-COM_1133|publisher= Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition|quote=...whether the family was of indigenous stock or descended from Arab colonists in Tabaristan is unknown...}}</ref><ref>{{Citation |last=Cheung |first=Johnny |title=On the (Middle) Iranian borrowings in Qur'ānic (and pre-Islamic) Arabic |date=2016-06-06 |url=https://shs.hal.science/halshs-01445860 |language=en |access-date=2023-02-09}} "Even so, the evidence of the early philologists was so strong, that for the proponents of a “foreign free” Qur’ānic reading, the similarities between some of the Arabic forms and their foreign counterparts were just coincidental, or at least, Arabic happened to use those forms first in the Qur’ān, which is the position of the celebrated Persian historian and theologian al-Ṭabarī (839 - 923 CE) in his famous Tafsīr of the Qur’ān."</ref> [[Hafiz (Qur'an)|He memorized the Qur'an]] at seven, was a qualified [[Imam|prayer leader]] at eight, and began to study the [[hadith|prophetic traditions]] at nine. He left home to study in 236 [[Anno Hegirae|AH]]{{sfn|Rosenthal|1989|pp=15–16}} (850/1 AD), when he was twelve. He retained close ties to his hometown. He returned at least twice, the second time in 290 AH (903 AD), when his outspokenness caused some uneasiness and led to his quick departure.{{sfn|Rosenthal|1989|p=11}}
He first went to [[Ray (city)|Ray (Rhages)]], where he remained for some five years.{{sfn|Rosenthal|1989|p=16}} A major teacher in Rayy was Abu Abdullah Muhammad ibn Humayd al-Razi, who had earlier taught in Baghdad, but was now in his seventies{{sfn|Rosenthal|1989|p=17}} While in Ray, he also studied Muslim [[Fiqh|jurisprudence]] according to the [[Hanafi]] school.<ref name=devin325>[[Devin J. Stewart]], "Muhammad b. Jarir al-Tabari's ''al-Bayan 'an Usul al-Ahkam'' and the Genre of Usul al-Fiqh in Ninth Century Baghdad," p. 325. Taken from ''Abbasid Studies: Occasional Papers of the School of Abbasid Studies, Cambridge, 6–10 January 2002''. Edited by James Montgomery. [[Leuven]]: Peeters Publishers and the Department of Oriental Studies, 2004.</ref> Among other material, ibn Humayd taught Jarir Tabari the historical works of [[ibn Ishaq]], especially ''[[Sirah Rasul Allah|al-Sirah]]'', the life of [[Muhammad]].{{sfn|Rosenthal|1989|p=18}} Tabari was thus introduced in youth to pre-Islamic and early Islamic history. Tabari quotes ibn Humayd frequently, but little is known about Tabari's other teachers in Rayy.{{sfn|Rosenthal|1989|p=17}}
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