Although Nasir b. Abi Nabhan (1192-1263/1778-1847) was the leading Ibadi scholar of Oman in his generation, his voluminous writings remain unpublished and have received scant attention in contemporary scholarship, though he is frequently cited in Nur al-Din al-Salimi’s history of Oman and in the multi-volume work on Ibadi teachings entitled Qamus al-Shari‘a. His importance was such that Sayyid Sa‘id b. Sultan, the sultan of Oman, kept Nasir by his side wherever he went, taking him with him when he moved the capital of his empire to Zanzibar in 1832. The impact of his residence in Zanzibar is reflected in his book on the healing properties of plants on the Swahili coast, and perhaps also in his fascination with Sunni scholarship. Although Nasir’s legacy is somewhat overshadowed by that of his more famous father, Abu Nabhan Ja‘id b. Khamis al-Kharusi, Nasir was a far more original thinker. While sharing his father’s concern with the promotion of Ibadi law, theology, and politics, in addition to mystical poetry, Nasir displayed a keen interest in the full range of Islamic thought and framed a number of his writings as commentaries on Sunni works. His works are not apologetic in nature, as he clearly imagined his readers to be Ibadis, but he devotes a great deal of attention to analyzing Ibadism’s place among the various schools of Islamic thought. His writings reflect the sharp intellect of a scholar who was keenly aware of his own acumen, and reveal a nuanced analysis of the teachings of both Ibadism and of other Muslim sects. This paper relies mainly on unpublished manuscripts read in Oman, in addition to Nasir’s opinions as reflected in Qamus al-Shari‘a, to analyze the state of Ibadi identity formation in the early nineteenth century, at a time when Ibadis were in greater contact than ever before with Sunni Muslims and with Western powers, but had not yet reached the phase when Ibadi scholars engaged in apologetics and the language of pan-Islamism.