mentators of the verses that deal with the disputed institution of temporary marriage in the Muslim community.
Al-Khui underscores an important prerequisite in ones approach to the Quran as a vital source for moral-spiritual guidance-namely, that there is a constant need to explain the historical setting of the revelation so as to uncover the principles that were applied in the development of Muslim society and its ever-exp nding
ethical scope. In this intellectual process of providing exegetic principles for search‌
ingfor historical precedents and for extracting the doctrinal and juridical principles from precise references in the Quran that are relevant to contemporary situations, The Prolegomena stands within a long and creative history in the development of the Quranic exegesis in Islam.

The Present Translation

This translation is based on the books first Arabic edition, which was published in Beirut in ١٩٧٤ and also contains the exegesis of the first chapter of the Quran. I have omitted that in the translation because the book is complete, in its central theme, as The Prolegomena to an Exegesis of the Quran, without that section. All the refer‌ ences have been carefully checked and collated for the accuracy of the citations and for completeness of bibliographical information. I have added my elaborations to the translation using square brackets. The citations from the Quran and other texts are part of the original text. There are a number of appendices to which the author makes references in the footnotes. However, they are, in most cases, footnotes that provide extensive references to the sources and the variations therein. Accordingly, where appropriate, I have summarized them in the endnotes.
I would like to thank some people who were directly or indirectly connected with this project. At Oxford University Press, Cynthia Read was instrumental in recog‌ nizing the scholarly worth of the work and supporting its publication wholeheart‌ edly. Cynthia Garver, with her patience and professional expertise in handling texts with complex substance and format, provided the necessary supervision in prepar‌ ing the work for publication.
The present translation would have been impossible without the moral encourage‌ ment that I received from the Ayatollah al-Khui and his son, Sayyid Muhammad Taqi al-Khui (d. ١٩٩٥). Sayyid Majid al-Khui, his younger son and the director of the Al‌ Khoei Benevolent Foundation, provided important documentation for the Ayatollah al-Khuis life and career in Najaf and the missing bibliographical information on some rare sources cited in The Prolegomena. Qf course, Sayyid Faqil al-Milani, my teacher and friend, was always there when I needed him to disentangle some textual problems connected with Ayatollah al-KlctiIs juridical style of writing.

NOTES

١. The sketchy biographical information in this book is derived from in autobiographical note on him in his Mujam rijlil al-/:tadlth (Najaf: Matbaat al-Adab, ١٩٨١), vol. ٢٢, pp. ٢٢-٢٦. On the other hand, he provides detailed information about his education, his teachers, and his own teaching in Najaf.