Editing Al-Ghazali (section)

=== Works in Persian ===
Al-Ghazali wrote most of his works in [[Persian language|Persian]] and in [[Arabic]]. His most important Persian work is ''[[Kimiya-yi sa'adat]]'' (The Alchemy of Happiness). It is al-Ghazali's own Persian version of ''Ihya' 'ulum al-din'' (The Revival of Religious Sciences) in Arabic, but a shorter work. It is one of the outstanding works of 11th-century-Persian literature. The book was published several times in [[Tehran]] by the edition of Hussain Khadev-jam, a renowned Iranian scholar. It is translated to [[English language|English]], [[Arabic]], [[Turkish language|Turkish]], [[Urdu]], [[Azerbaijani language|Azerbaijani]] and other languages.<ref name="Kimiya">Translated into English by Mohammed Asim Bilal and available at [https://archive.org/details/KimiyaISaadatAnEnglishTranslationOfImamGhazzalisAlchemyOfEternalBlissabuHamidAlGhazali archive.org]</ref>

Another authentic work of al-Ghazali is the so-called "first part" of the Nasihat al-muluk (Counsel for kings), addressed to the Saljuqid ruler of Khurasan Ahmad b. Malik-shah Sanjar (r. 490-552/1097-1157).<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia-iranica-online/sanjar-ahmad-b-maleksah-COM_10458#|title = SANJAR, Aḥmad b. Malekšāh|date = 11 August 2020}}</ref> The text was written after an official reception at his court in 503/1109 and upon his request. Al-Ghazali was summoned to Sanjar because of the intrigues of his opponents and their criticism of his student's compilation in Arabic, al-Mankhul min taʿliqat al-usul (The sifted notes on the fundamentals), in addition to his refusal to continue teaching at the Nizamiya of Nishapur. After the reception, al-Ghazali had, apparently, a private audience with Sanjar, during which he quoted a verse from the Quran 14:24: "Have you not seen how Allah sets forth a parable of a beautiful phrase (being) like a beautiful tree, whose roots are firm and whose branches are in Heaven." The genuine text of the Nasihat al-muluk, which is actually an official epistle with a short explanatory note on al-Manḵul added on its frontispiece.<ref>Makatib-i farsi-yi Ghazali ba nam-i Faza’il al-anam min rasa’il Ḥujjat al-Islam, ed. ʿAbbas Iqbal Ashtiyani, Tehran, 1954, pp. 11-12</ref>

The majority of other Persian texts, ascribed to him with the use of his fame and authority, especially in the genre of Mirrors for Princes, are either deliberate forgeries fabricated with different purposes or compilations falsely attributed to him. The most famous among them is Ay farzand (O Child!). This is undoubtedly a literary forgery fabricated in Persian one or two generations after al-Ghazali's death. The sources used for the forgery consist of two genuine letters by al-Ghazali's (number 4, in part, and number 33, totally); both appear in the ''Fazaʾil al-anam''.<ref>Makatib-i farsi-yi Ghazali ba nam-i Faza’il al-anam min rasa’il Hujjat al-Islam, ed. ʿAbbas Iqbal Ashtiyani, Tehran, 1954, pp. 13-23, 83-85</ref> Another source is a letter known as ''ʿAyniya'' and written by Muhammad's younger brother Majd al-Din Ahmad al-Ghazali (d. 520/1126) to his famous disciple ʿAyn al-Quzat Hamadani (492-526/1098-1131); the letter was published in the ''Majmuʿa-yi athar-i farsi-yi Ahmad-i Ghazali'' (Collection of the Persian writings of Ahmad Ghazali).<ref>Majmuʿa-yi athar-i farsi-yi Ahmad-e Ghazali, ed. A. Mujahid, Tehran, 1979, 2nd ed., Tehran, 1991, pp. 191-238</ref> The other is ʿAyn al-Quzat's own letter, published in the ''Namaha-yi ʿAyn al-Quzat Hamadani'' (Letters by ʿAyn al-Quzat Hamadani).<ref>Namaha-yi ʿAyn al-Quzat Hamadani, ed. ʿAli Naqi Monzawi and ʿAfif ʿUsayran, 2 vols., Tehran, 1983, II, p.103, no 73</ref> Later, ''Ay farzand'' was translated into Arabic and became famous as ''Ayyuha al-walad'', the Arabic equivalent of the Persian title. The earliest manuscripts with the Arabic translation date from the second half of the 16th and most of the others from the 17th century.<ref>George Henry Scherer, Al-Ghazali’s Ayyuha’l-walad, Ph.D. diss., Chicago University, 1930; Beirut, 1933, p. 27</ref> The earliest known secondary translation from Arabic into Ottoman Turkish was done in 983/1575.<ref>Hilmi Ziya Ülken, Gazali’nin bazi eserlerinin Türkçe tercümeleri. Les traductions en Turc de certains livres d’al-Ghazali, Ankara Üniversitesi İlahiyat Fakültesi Dergisi 9/1, 1961, p. 61</ref> In modern times, the text was translated from Arabic into many European languages and published innumerable times in Turkey as Eyyühe'l-Veled or Ey Oğul.<ref>Günaydin, Gazâlî tercümeleri: Osmanli devri ve 1928 sonrasi için bir bibliyografya denemesi, Dîvân: Disiplinlerarası Çalışmalar Dergisi 16, 2011, pp. 70-73</ref>

A less famous Pand-nama (Book of counsel) also written in the genre of advice literature is a very late compilatory letter of an unknown author formally addressed to some ruler and falsely attributed to al-Ghazali, obviously because it consists of many fragments borrowed mostly from various parts of the Kimiya-yi saʿadat.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia-iranica-online/kimia-ye-saadat-COM_362424 |title=Kimiā-Ye Saʿādat |date=29 June 2021}}</ref>