Al Maktaba Shamela May 2026
The development team has ambitious plans:
You can search for words regardless of diacritics (tashkeel) or spelling variations. Boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) and proximity search (find "Qadr" within 5 words of "Laylat") are standard. al maktaba shamela
For Hadith students, Shamela allows you to click on a narrator’s name and see a pop-up of their biographical entry from Taqrib al-Tahdhib or other rijāl (narrator-criticism) works. This turns reading into a dynamic research experience. The development team has ambitious plans: You can
If you are looking for a specific classical Islamic text in Arabic, Shamela is the first place you should look. It is the most comprehensive digital archive of Islamic heritage currently available to the public. This turns reading into a dynamic research experience
For advanced users: Shamela has an API (partially documented in Arabic) allowing:
You can open a primary text (e.g., Riyad al-Salihin) and simultaneously open a commentary (e.g., Nawawi’s commentary) in a split window—a feature invaluable for lesson preparation.