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Muḥammad's first wife Khadīja bint Khuwaylid belonged to a clan of the Quraysh tribe called Asad ibn ʿAbd al-ʿUzzā. This biographical detail is crucial in the analysis of the literary evidence about her and her family. Khadīja had a well-known paternal cousin who was Christian, namely Waraqa ibn Nawfal. Another paternal cousin of hers who was Christian, ʿUthmān ibn al-Ḥuwayrith, attempted on the eve of the hijra to gain control of Mecca. The Christian faith of the cousins belongs in the discussion of Muḥammad's spiritual environment and his preparation for the Call to prophethood. After all, Muḥammad and Khadīja, both of whom were descendants of Quṣayy ibn Kilāb, were married for a quarter of a century and he must have known her family very well. During the long marriage she was his only wife and she gave birth to all of his children with the exception of Ibrāhīm whose mother was a Copt slave girl. A third paternal cousin of Khadīja who is of interest for us here was the son of a Jewish slave girl who belonged to Muḥammad's uncle ʿAbbās.
2013 •
This paper looks at the reign of Umar b. Abd al-Aziz (Umar II) as the beginning of the end of the Umayyad power. Here we are referring to the so-called "reforms" of Umar II, which directly impacted Umayyad propaganda tools; such as history, poetry, and polemics, were severally damaged. The paper shows that it was these reforms and none other, which outlasted the Umayyads by severally hampering their efforts at maintaining their hegemony on legitimacy.
Professional Mobility in Islamic Societies (700–1750): New Concepts and Approaches
Medinan Scholars on the Move: Professional Mobility at the Umayyad Court2021 •
Studies in Late Antiquity
A Holy Heretical Body: Ṭalḥa b. ʿUbayd Allāh's Corpse and Early Islamic Sectarianism2018 •
Between the seventh and ninth centuries C.E., different Muslim sectarian groups fashioned their respective communal identities through differing rituals, narratives, and conceptions of Islamic history. This article explores these early Islamic divisions through the lens of literary depictions of, and rituals involving, a strongly potent object within the late antique world: a holy person's corpse, in this case that of the prominent early Muslim Ṭalḥa b. ʿUbayd Allāh. A Companion of the Prophet Muḥammad, Ṭalḥa had a contested legacy among different Muslim groups, being venerated by Sunnīs and vilified by the Shīʿa and Khārijīs. These contesting conceptions of Ṭalḥa are reflected in the variable images of Ṭalḥa's body after his death that appear within early Islamic texts: while some stories portray Ṭalḥa as a saintly martyr whose body lay incorrupt in his grave, others depict Ṭalḥa as a decaying corpse disintegrating in the dirt. Standing in vivid contrast to one another, these variant representations of Ṭalḥa's body exemplify early Muslims' usages of the foundational narratives of Islamic history to make competing claims about politico-religious leadership and community. Yet the sectarian significance of Ṭalḥa's body was exhibited not only in texts, but was also ritually enacted through worship at Ṭalḥa's grave. A site of prayer and miracles, Ṭalḥa's grave emerged as a proto-Sunnī counterpoint to the tombs of other holy persons visited and venerated by the Shīʿa and Khārijīs. The stories and rituals involving Ṭalḥa b. ʿUbayd Allāh's body demonstrate how Islamic communal identity was mapped onto this Companion's corpse.
Many if not most of the details concerning the Jews are found in several chapters of Muḥammad’s biography dedicated to his conflict with them, namely the chapters about Qaynuqāʿ, Naḍīr, Qurayẓa and Khaybar. Naturally, these “Jewish chapters”, which include some fine examples of storytelling, are biased, but they remain indispensable for modern historians struggling to reconstruct Muḥammad’s troubled relations with the Jews. In addition to an outline of the main events, they provide information about the people, the tribes, and the places involved. The evidence is shrouded in trivia, false leads and tendentious claims, not to mention many lacunae which can sometimes be filled by reference to other types of the vast Islamic literature. The study of early Islam in general, and Jewish-Muslim relations in particular, is still rather close to its starting point. In recent years epigraphy has emerged as very promising, but for the time being the huge medieval literary output remains the main source. In order to make progress researchers need to bring into the discussion new texts–they are at hand, thanks to modern digital tools–and refine their analytical and critical tools.
• .The Eye of the Beholder: the Life of Muhammad as Viewed by the Early Muslims (a Textual Analysis)
THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER THE LIFE OF MUHAMMAD AS VIEWED BY THE EARLY MUSLIMS A T e x t u a l A n a l y s i s1995 •
Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam
VISITED PLACES ON THE PROPHET'S TRACK IN MECCA AND MEDINA2020 •
2004 •
2016 •
1989 •
Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam
Two ‘Lost’ Sūras of the Qurʾān: Sūrat al-Khalʿ and Sūrat al-Ḥafd between Textual and Ritual Canon (1st -3rd/7th -9th Centuries) [Pre-Print Version]2019 •
2011 •
Authority and Control in the Countryside. From Late Antiquity to Islam in the Mediterranean and Near East (6th-10th Century). Leiden Studies in Islam and Society.
I'll not accept aid from a mushrik ❘ لن أستعين بمشرك2018 •
_Islam at 250: Studies in Memory of G.H.A. Juynboll_, Leiden Studies in Islam and Society, eds. Petra M. Sijpesteijn and Camilla Adang, Brill. Pp. 207–234
“Will You Not Teach ruqyat al-namla to This (Woman) …?”: Notes on a Hadith’s Historical Uncertainties and Its Role in Translations of Muḥammad2020 •
2019 •
’Journal of Islamic Studies 29-3(2018): 417–448.
The Family History of Abū al-Faraj al-Iṣfahānī: the Ninth-Century ʿAbbāsid Political Elite and the Ṭālibids in SāmarrāʾJournal of the International Qurʾanic Studies Association
“Did Ḥafṣah bint ʿUmar Edit the Qurʾan? A Response with Notes on the Codices of the Prophet’s Wives,” Journal of the International Qurʾanic Studies Association 1 (2016): 93-125.2016 •
2014 •
Islamic Law and Society
Relations, Narrations, and Judgments: The Scholarly Networks and Contributions of an Early Female Muslim Jurist2015 •
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society
The Sufyānī in Early Islamic Kerygma: An Enquiry into His Origins and Early Development (Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 27, 2017, pp. 403-434)2017 •
University of Leeds
The Influence of Ḥadīth on the Architecture of Early Congregational Mosques2011 •
Studia Islamica 110 (2015) 135-164
Pre-Islamic al-Sham in Classical Arabic Literature2012 •
2021 •
2017 •