On Understanding al-Tabari’s Tafsir - I

Anyone who wishes to consult al-Tabari’s Tafsir should know that he was not particularly selective when collecting reports. He recorded in his exegetical work any reports that he was able to find. One thus should not think that he deemed reliable all the reports that he put in his Tafsir. Due to his linguistic commentaries, his book gives from time to time the impression of a lexicon as well. Moreover, the fact that he took into consideration primarily the reports heedful to determining the contexts of verses enabled him to come up most of the time with their correct meaning. Finally, although al-Tabari’s preferences mostly indicate the Sunni perspective, this does not mean at all that he had a blind sectarian inclination.