تشييد المدرسة النظامية ببغداد

In 459 AH the Nizamiyya madrasa in Baghdad was completed, and Abu Ishaq al-Shirazi was appointed to teach in it. Nizam al-Mulk built it, and according to al-Dhahabi it was said to be the first madrasa built for jurists. ²

Ibn al-Jawzi says that work began in Dhu al-Hijja 457 AH, and that the remaining riverside houses at Mashra'at al-Zawaya, al-Farda, Bab al-Sha'ir and Darb al-Za'farani were demolished to make way for it. ³

When people gathered, al-Shirazi did not attend and went into hiding. Ibn al-Imad reports that a boy met him and asked: "How can you teach in a usurped place?" So Ibn al-Sabbagh, author of al-Shamil, taught instead. ⁴

The people then persuaded the sheikh until he agreed. Ibn al-Jawzi reports that he began teaching there on the tenth of Dhu al-Hijja 459 AH, twenty days after Ibn al-Sabbagh's lesson. Whenever the time for prayer came, he would leave and pray in one of the mosques. ⁵