# Al-Qudusī al-Jāwī’s Kifāyat al-Mubtadī: The Beginner’s Sufficiency ~ part 1
al-salamu alaykum
Here is the first share Shaykh Muḥammad ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Khaṭīb al-Qudusī al-Jāwī al-Makkī’s (d. 1293 AH/1876 CE) Kifāyat al-Mubtadī (The Beginner’s Sufficiency), another text written in Arabic by an Indonesian-world scholar residing in the Ḥaramayn.
From the preface:
> Kifāyat al-Mubtadī is a concise creedal primer in the Ashʿarī tradition, composed in Mecca in 1271 AH/1854 CE by Muḥammad ʿAlī al-Qudusī al-Jāwī al-Makkī (d. 1293 AH/1876 CE), a scholar from Central Java permanently settled in Mecca. The work follows the standard post-Sanūsī schema of the fifty doctrines: twenty necessary attributes of Allah (grouped into the essential, negative, qualitative, and attributive-state categories), their twenty impossible contraries, and the single contingent attribute, followed by four necessary prophetic attributes with their contraries and the prophetic contingent. Each doctrine is stated, defined, given a rational proof, and paired with its opposite. The text then appends a substantial section on transmitted doctrines covering angels, heavenly books, eschatological realities (the intermediate realm, the reckoning, the balance, the bridge, intercession, the Garden and the Fire), the Prophet's lineage, wives, children, the ranking of the Companions and caliphs, and concludes with an analysis of the two testimonies of faith as a summary of the entire creedal system. Its content is very similar to al-Faḍālī's Kifāyat al-ʿAwāmm fī ʿIlm al-Kalām and al-Bājūrī's gloss on the same, Taḥqīq al-Maqām, and at times appears to be derived from them, though this is something requiring further study.
>
> The book is for the beginning student of theology-based creed and assumes no prior training in formal logic or theology; there is no treatment of the relationship between existence and essence, no engagement with philosophy or Māturīdī alternatives, and no discussion of formal logic. A student who completes this text would have the doctrinal vocabulary, the argumentative skeleton of each proof, and a working sense of how rational and transmitted proofs cooperate – enough to proceed to the commentary and gloss literature or to a more advanced text like al-Sanūsī's longer creed.
>
> What makes the text noteworthy is its provenance. Al-Qudusī belongs to the scholarly community of nineteenth-century Mecca – men born in the Indonesian archipelago who travelled for pilgrimage or study and remained in the Ḥijāz until death, becoming part of Mecca's own scholarly class. The same community produced Nawawī al-Bantanī (d. 1314 AH/1897 CE), Aḥmad Khaṭīb al-Minangkabāwī (d. 1334 AH/1915 CE), and Maḥfūẓ al-Tarmasī (d. 1338 AH/1920 CE). These were not visiting scholars maintaining ties with a homeland; they were Meccan scholars originating from the Indonesian archipelago, teaching in the Sacred Mosque or in their homes, writing in Arabic, and being buried there. Their books travelled back to the religious school networks of the archipelago through the pilgrimage pipeline and the book trade. Al-Qudusī's Kifāyah is one more witness to that community's confident, productive Arabic-language theological output – a teaching text composed far from Arabic’s heartland by a scholar fully embedded in its tradition.
A few things stand out when compared to Shaykh Nawawī al-Jāwī’s Tījān al-Darārī: it is a matn, not a matn plus sharḥ, which makes for cleaner prose and easier reading; it covers more material, especially in regards to matters known only through revelation – like those related to the unseen and the afterlife; it includes a brief overview of the objectives of Islam and purification of the soul.
And when compared to his Unpacking the Select Creed: it is a matn, not a matn plus sharḥ, which makes for cleaner prose and easier reading; it covers the same breadth of issues but goes into more depth – especially in that it includes proofs.
[CONTINUED IN NEXT MESSAGE]
