Early Islam

Along the lines of a reappraisal of the so-called Byzantine “Dark Ages,” this contribution addresses
the question of the re-emergence of classical culture in Byzantium in the 9th century and how Syriac
sources can throw some light on the continuation and yet transformation of late antique teaching
and scholasticism. The continuous work by Syriac scholars on Greek scientific and philosophical
texts in the 7th–10th centuries shows the availability of Greek manuscripts in the East, even beyond
the Roman-Sasanian border. Syriac literature can help understand the transformation of Hellenism
and the constitution of a cultural koine in other languages than Greek. A Christian as well as more
specifically Syrian Hellenism blended the cultural idioms of Greek and “oriental” culture. Not only
did Greek culture survive, but it spread in the Arabic polity and ultimately re-emerged in Byzantium
from the shelves of the Byzantine libraries. Oblivion of classical “pagan” literature was parallel to the
transmission of a new canonised knowledge in Syriac and then Arabic but was ultimately reversed:
not so much thanks to the “return” of Greek manuscripts and texts from the East however as from a
competition over the appropriation of ancient Greek culture beyond Christianity.

▶ L'authenticité du texte coranique repose sur l'efficacité de la tradition orale islamique, qui aurait permis de le transmettre à l'identique depuis la mort du prophète de l'islam

▶ La découverte de manuscrits coraniques anciens met en cause la plausibilité du récit de cette transmission orale, en montrant par des preuves matérielles que le texte coranique a subi tout un processus d'écriture, de correction et de réécriture

▶ L'étude critique de la tradition orale supposée qui aurait permis la transmission des hadiths révèle en fait que l'on a à faire non à une tradition orale mais bel et bien à une tradition écrite

▶ Le Coran et la tradition de l'islam procèdent en fait d'un processus d'écriture centralisée, dirigé par le pouvoir califal.

A comparative linguistic study and historical textual analysis of the word "hanif" and "hanifiyah", one of the most obscure and misunderstood words in the Arabic Quran and in translation. The study is interpreted through an evolutionary framework.

This essay presents the positivist perception of the prophetic biography (sīra) and early Islamic historiography as capable of yielding hard historical data against the background of skeptical approaches to the Islamic literary sources and compares it with external literary, epigraphic, and numismatic evidence. The essay calls for a systematic use of modern-day classifying categories, such as ‘myth’, ‘legend’, and ‘saga,’ which can be epistemologically misleading, if applied on sīra traditions in an undisciplined manner. At the end of the essay, I have attached my translation into Arabic of its part “Sīra and Poetry”.

Keywords: sira, prophetic biography, myth, legend, Geistesbeschäftigung, salvation history, isnad-cum-matn analysis, fictionalization, epigraphic evidence, numismatic evidence.
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أقارن في هذا المقال بين النظرة الإيجابية في السيرة النبوية والمصادر التاريخية المبكرة، وهي نظرة قائبة بأنّه من شأن هذه المؤلفات توفير المعلومات التاريخية الثابتة، من جهة، وبين النظرة الارتيابية في المصادر ذاتها، من جهة أخرى، مستنجدا بالقرائن الخارجية من الأدبية والنقشية والنُّمِّية. كما أني أدعو إلى الاستعمال المنضبط لمفاهيم التصنيف الأدبي كـ"الميث" و"الأسطورة" و"الساغا" التي قد تؤدي الى متاهة منهجية حالَ تطبيقها العشوائي بالنسبة للسيرة النبوية. وفي نهاية المقال يجد القارئ ترجمتي إلى اللغة العربية للفصل "السيرة والشعر".

This paper is an abject lesson in how communal memory can be formed hundreds of years after the fact through substituting knowledge with organized religion. A curious visitor read back the content of the dedicatory inscription inside the Dome of the Rock and took a transcript in Arabic – only that it happens in unexpected ways during a time far from any suspicion of a monumental fraud.

The primary evidence in this presentation demonstrates that mosaics and inscriptions are creations during the Ottoman era. The Templum Domini from the Crusades was replaced by Saladin. It also shows that architects of olden times achieved what modern architects long deemed impossible: they completely replaced the inner drum from the ground up to the cupola.

Title in English: "Studies on the the historical and doctrinal genesis of Islam - Bruno Bonnet-Eymard and the French school of scholarly skepticism"

ENG. The article presents briefly the scholarly theory on the historical and dogmatic origins of Islam by the modern French researcher Bruno Bonnet-Eymard, with an attempt to classify its place in the modern field of Islamic studies. The result of over thirty years of Bonnet-Eymard’s work is his translation of the first five Qur’anic suras into French, with their comprehensive critical edition, prepared on the basis of his own philological, historical and theological exegesis. Bonnet-Eymard, belonging to the Islamicist skeptical school, attempts to read the Arabic Qur’anic text also from the perspective of other Semitic languages - mainly Hebrew and Syriac. Regardless of the flaws and merits of Bonnet-Eymard’s exegesis it surely is a valuable source of scholarly insights, conclusions and linguistic remarks that cannot be overestimated for modern critical studies of the Qur’anic text.

PL. Artykuł przedstawia pokrótce teorię naukową współczesnego francuskiego badacza Bruno Bonnet-Eymard dotyczącą historyczno-dogmatycznej genezy islamu, wraz z jej miejscem we współczesnej islamistyce. Owocem trzydziestu lat jego pracy jest tłumaczenie kilku pierwszych sur Koranu na język francuski, wraz z ich obszernym wydaniem krytycznym, opracowanym na podstawie własnej egzegezy filologicznej, historycznej i teologicznej. Bonnet-Eymard, należący do szkoły islamistów-sceptyków, odczytuje arabski tekst koraniczny również przez pryzmat innych języków semickich – głównie hebrajskiego i syryjskiego. Niezależnie od meritum wysnutych wniosków, egzegeza Bonnet-Eymard stanowi kopalnię wartościowych spostrzeżeń, wniosków i skojarzeń językowych nie do przecenienia dla krytyczno-naukowych studiów nad tekstem koranicznym.

RESUMEN Este estudio se orienta hacia la parte menos conocida de la vida de ʿĀʾisha bint Abī Bakr, la de los años previos a la guerra civil. Me centro en su relación con lo militar en el contexto de las guerras que dieron paso al nacimiento del islam como entidad política. Y lo hago tomando como eje tres momentos en los que ella aparece como protagonista directa o indirecta, y en este último caso saltando las barreras sociales. Una ʿĀʾisha más cercana a una "señora de la guerra" que a una matrona musulmana. ABSTRACT This study deals with the lesser known part of the life of ʿĀʾisha bint Abī Bakr, namely the years prior to the civil war. I focus on her relationship with the military in the context of the wars which led to the birth of Islam as a political entity. The study revolves around three moments in which she appears as a direct or indirect protagonist, and in this last case overcoming social barriers. An ʿĀʾi-sha closer to a "lady of war" than a Muslim matron.

This document has been developed for a course on Christian-Muslim theological encounter in response to student interest in understanding the extent of similiarity/connections between the main figures of Jewish-Christian-Muslim traditions.

Please note this document is work in progress with the list of names initially derived from the Wikipedia article `List of people in both the Bible and the Quran' <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_in_both_the_Bible_and_the_Quran>

Since the beginnings of Islam, there have been women who studied their religion, took up teaching positions, acted as preachers, and contributed immensely to the consolidation and transmission of Islam. It is astonishing that this, a matter of fact in Islamic history, has hardly been noticed and has been overlooked by the wider public. This is why this chapter aims to focus on the essential contribution of the early Muslim women to the preservation and transmission of religious knowledge in order to make it more popular. The reconstruction of the depiction of women in the oldest texts of early Islam will help to analyze how women were described as religiously educated and what gender conceptions were constructed. The Source material of this analysis will be the Sira by Ibn Hisham, the Kitab al-Maghazi by al-Waqidi, the at-Tabaqat al-Kubra by Ibn Sa‘d, the hadith-collection of al-Bukhari and the Ta´rikh of at-Tabari.

https://dergipark.org.tr/en/download/article-file/1156381

Jerusalem (al-Quds) is a holy place of importance in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. According to Jews, the city became a kingdom and a center of worship with Prophet David (King David). Also, for Jews, the construction of the temple during the time of Prophet Solomon (King of Israel) provided further sacred character to the city. Additionally, Jerusalem occupies an important place for Christians. Prophet Jesus was born in this region. According to the current Gospels, the earthly life of Jesus ended in Jerusalem and he was crucified there. As for the importance of Jerusalem in Islam –even though the name of Jerusalem does not appear directly in the Qur’an – the Al-Aqsa Mosque, located in heart of Jerusalem, is seen as the holiest place to visit after the Ka‘ba in Mecca and the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina, as stated in the hadiths of Prophet Muhammad. As the original direction of prayer for early Muslims, Prophet Muhammad occasionally emphasized the importance of Jerusalem.

Talk given in Spanish at Complutense University, History department, Madrid for "De fuste e de Fierro". Armamento medieval en la Peninsula Iberica. IV International Seminar. 9-10th March, 2020 (for English translation see Archery CV  https://www.academia.edu/42644287  ) . The talk deals with use of the bow in Al-Andalus as a favored military weapon since its beginning in 711 to its demise in 1492 and by contrast its apparent absence in the northern states that confront it. Discussed are the two types of bows mentioned in an Arabic chronical reference and delves on the possible historical origin of what the sources call the 'Arab bow'. It touches also on the apparent ‘sacralization’ of the bow in the general Islamic context. Its appearance in the few pictorial references in Al-Andalus and discussed are the two very different types that appear in them. Also discussed is their relative effectiveness, construction, and the materials used and their specific differences. All this in contrast to the apparent lack of the use of the bow as a military weapon in the Christian states that were slowly formed at the north of the Iberian Peninsula. This could in part be due, it is argued, to a profound atavistic ideological rejection of the said weapon as being that of ‘the other’. The very negative ideological view of the bow is reflected and materialized in the art of the Christian north as can clearly be see in the Romanesque art of the Iberia Peninsula.

The concept of al-mahdi is an important theological idea in Shi'ism, its literary meaning being 'the rightly guided'. In Twelver Shi'ism it has come to denote the hidden Imam who will one day return to redeem his followers and restore justice on Earth, and in that sense it is akin to the Christian idea of the Messiah. Among scholars of early Islam there is near-consensus on the view that the transition of meaning from its literal meaning 'the rightly guided' to an eschatological redeemer occurred with the Shi'ite rebel leader al-Mukhtar b. Abi 'Ubayd (d. 686), when he applied it to Muhammad b. al-Hanafiyya, the son of 'Ali. In the present study I contest that view. I hold that while it can be established from the sources that Mukhtar probably spoke of Ibn al-Hanafiyya as al-mahdi, they do not support his use of this title in a messianic sense. This eschatological meaning can only be verified soon after his death. Finally, I argue that this question is methodologically rather than historically significant.

A number of recent articles have debated whether Sūrat al-Qadr refers to Christmas.  This article argues that Q 97 is much more closely modeled on Ephrem's Nativity Hymn No. 21 than is usually understood, although prior scholars (most prominently Guillaume Dye and Nicolai Sinai) have already remarked on the close relationship between these texts.  Expanding on those insights, it is argued here that the sūrah's cryptic central term 'qadr,' literally meaning 'measurement,' should be understood as an Arabic term that designated the paradoxical process of incarnation that is discussed at length in Ephrem's hymn.  The sūrah repeats the Syriac hymn's central message, which is that the Lord's descent and incarnation, a paradoxical measuring and definition of the infinite deity, has enabled his worshipers to become 'divinized', joining as companions of the angels in song when they celebrate this unique night.  From a diachronic perspective, the article further discusses how this Syriac Christian conception of the divine incarnation and its ritual celebration was transformed, rearticulated, and reinterpreted during the process of articulating Qur’ānic revelation concepts.  Particularly important here is the later interpolation that Dye and Sinai have identified in Q 97:4 which attempted to render this archaic sūrah less 'polytheistic,' meaning Christian.  Last, the article concludes with several hypotheses about the Sitz im Leben of Q 97, and discusses how this overtly-Christian text could have been incorporated into what became the Qūr'an.

[Author's note, 4/24/18: This draft article is obsolete following publication of the revised material on this subject in my book "Evolution of the Early Qur’ān: From Anonymous Apocalypse to Charismatic Prophet," in Apocalypticism: Cross-disciplinary Explorations, edited by Carlos A. Segovia, Isaac W. Oliver, and Anders K. Petersen. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc., 2018. As such, as I have removed the attached text file.]

يعدّ الفتح  الإسلامي الأول لبيت المقدس في القرن السابع الميلاديّ نقطةَ تحول كبرى في تاريخ العالم في القرون الوسطى، ذلك لأن بيت المقدس كان يرزح تحت حكم  واحدة من أقوى إمبراطوريات ذلك الزمان، ألا وهي الإمبراطورية البيزنطية. لذا كان لا بدّ أن يتطلب فتح بهذه العظمة والأهمية تحضيراتٍ كبيرةً وتخطيطًا على أعلى المستويات كي يتم الظفر به وبلوغ الغاية منه. وبينما يعزو معظم الناس، سواء كانوا من المختصين أو العامّة، الفضل في فتح بيت المقدس إلى الخليفة الراشد الثاني عمر بن الخطاب رضي الله عنه، وينسبه آخرون إلى أبي بكرٍ الصديق، خليفة المسلمين الأول، رضي الله عنه. إلا أنّه قلّما يشارُ إلى دورِ النبي محمد ﷺ وخطتِه لفتح بيت المقدس، مع أنّ تأثيره لا يخفى في الأحداث والوقائع التي أدت إلى فتح تلك البلاد المقدسة. لذا جاء هذا الكتاب ليسلط الضوء على دور النبي محمّد ﷺ في صياغة الفتح الإسلامي الأول لبيت المقدس.
يتناول هذا الكتاب فرضية مفادها أنّ النبي محمدًا ﷺ هو من خططَ بداءةً وأصالةً للفتح الإسلامي لبيت المقدس. ووفق هذه الفرضيّة، فإن أبا بكر الصديق وعمر بن الخطاب رضي الله عنهما إنّما قاما بتنفيذ خطة النبي ﷺ وتحقيق مراده. وبناءً على هذه الفرضية، فإن جميع الحملات العسكرية الإسلامية التي سبقت فتح تلك المدينة إنما كانت تطبيقًا لهذه الخطة.

In the last decades, the conservation discipline has been investigating how different worldviews and religions cope with and value their heritage. The quest for understanding the challenging position of religious values in heritage conservation also accounts for churches and mosques, which form a vast amount of this heritage. Those places of worship have broader implications for the conservation of historic buildings in general. However, despite recent advances, there is still limited understanding of how Christian and Islamic theology relates or could relate to building conservation. This dissertation, therefore, examines the way in which Christian and Islamic theology relate to conservation philosophy, the (primarily secular) conservation theory and the conservation of their churches and mosques. The examination of the primary religious texts of the Christian and Islamic faiths forms the basis of the study. Potential implications for contemporary conservation philosophy and theory are pointed out, to deepen the understanding of the place of theology in the conservation discourse as well as increasing awareness regarding the Christian and Islamic worldview and the way to deal with the conservation of their places of worship.

""Abstract:

Inherited from 19th century Orientalism and enhanced by the advent of Wahhabism and Salafism,Ibn Taymiyya’s anti-sufi reputation has continued to obscure the mystical aspect of his work. The Hanbali scholar, described as the sworn enemy of Sufism, however, would have belonged to the Qāddiriyya Sufi order. Prejudice concerning Ibn Taymiyya and his Hanbali school, as well as specific difficulties in the approach towards Islamic mysticism, have been major obstacles to a comprehensive study on the relationship of Ibn Taymiyya in Sufism. The epistle al-Ṣufiyya wa-l-fuqarā, which is the
subject of this work, reveals not only his explicit approval of Sufism, but also a vigorous defense of this discipline aimed at those who would have it condemned as such. In addition, a careful reading of this epistle, combined with historical facts and other writings of the Hanbali scholar, reveal a mystical doctrine in the tradition of great Sufi masters such as, Ğunayd, Abū Bakr al-Kalābāḏī, Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī, etc.

Résumé

Héritée de l’orientalisme du XIXe siècle, et accentuée par l’avènement du wahhabisme et du salafisme, la réputation anti-soufie d’Ibn Taymiyya n’a cessé de voiler la réalité de son oeuvre à portée mystique. Celui que l’on présente comme l’ennemi juré du soufisme aurait pourtant appartenu à la
confrérie soufie Qādiriyya. Les préjugés sur Ibn Taymiyya et son école hanbalite, d’une part, et les difficultés spécifiques à l’approche de la mystique musulmane, d’autre part, ont été des obstacles majeurs à une étude approfondie sur les relations du savant hanbalite au taṣawwuf. L’épître al-Ṣūfiyya wa-al-fuqarāʾ, qui fait l’objet du présent travail, révèle, non seulement son approbation explicite du soufisme, mais encore une défense énergique de cette discipline contre ceux qui la condamneraient
en tant que telle. En outre, une lecture attentive de cette épître, associée aux faits historiques et à d’autres écrits du šayḫ al-islām, laisse transparaître une doctrine mystique dans la lignée des grands maîtres soufis, tels Ğunayd, Abū Bakr al-Kalābāḏī, Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī, etc.""

Eulogius of Cordoba (d. 859) represents the first steps of an intellectual codification of Otherness in the Iberian Peninsula, short before the already clear Arabic chronicles and their Latin equivalent –Chronica Albendense-. In his view of the social reality of Cordoba, Eulogius highlights an increasing Arabization of public life. Departing from a theoretical overview of religious identity and self-identification in the turning point from Late Antiquity until the Middle Ages, this paper aims to highlight the construction of Otherness in the Iberian Peninsula during the Ninth Century and the tradition of religious disputation, based on the Liber Apologeticus Martyrum and the Corpus Scriptorum Muzarabicorum.

Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2017, 220 sayfa. ISBN 9780674057760 Erken İslam tarihi araştırmalarına dair gün geçtikçe zenginleşen ikincil literatüre, Bowersock'un son kitabı The Crucible of Islam ile (İslam'ın potası) önemli bir katkı daha sağlandı. Erken İslam tarihinin mevcut ikincil kaynak-larından farklı olarak, kitabının içeriğini, Ebrehe krallığının hakimiyetinden, Kubbetüssahra'nın inşasına kadar devam eden süreçle sınırlandıran Bower-sock, ele aldığı olağan dışı başlıklarıyla okuyucularına diğer kaynaklardan farklı bir değerlendirme çerçevesi çiziyor. Seçtiği bu başlıklarla konuyu, Eti-yopya, Filistin, Bizans ve Sâsânîler özelinde Geç Antikçağ'dan, İslam'ın ilerle-me sürecine doğru ele alan yazar, İslam'ın yayılış sürecindeki bütün önemli dinamikleri, İslam'ın içine doğmuş olduğu tarihsel ve coğrafî arka plan te-melinde ele alıyor. Bowersock, Empires in Collision ve Throne of Adulis adlı önemli iki diğer kitabında da genel olarak İslam öncesi dünyayı tasvir etme-ye özel olarak da Etiyopya ve Arabistan bölgesinin sosyopolitik dengelerine odaklansa da, diğerlerinden farklı olarak The Crucible of Islam'da İslam'ın tarihsel gelişimini kitabının merkezine alıyor ve bu dengeleri bu İslam'ın ge-lişiminin en büyük parçası olarak inceliyor. Bu bağlamda gayesini kitabının en başında açıklayan Bowersock, İslam'ın doğuşunu ele alan literatüre dair genel bir tarama yaptıktan sonra, çalışmasını mevcut literatüre yeni bir ek-leme yapma niyetiyle ortaya koymadığını; bundan ziyade dönemin kaotik şartlarının İslam'ın oluşumunu ve gelişimini nasıl mümkün hale getirdiğini anlamaya katkı sağlamak için yaptığını ifade ediyor. Bu sebeple, kitabın ön-celikli hedefinin, İslam'ın gelişimini daha iyi anlamak adına Yahudilik, Hris-tiyanlık ve paganlığın yaygın olduğu Arap yarımadasının sosyal ve kültürel çevresini tanımlamak olduğunu söylüyor. Bowersock, belirli bir hedef kitlesi tanımlamamış olsa da, The Crucible of Islam, bütün erken İslam tarihi okuyucularına, İslam tarihinin oluşum ve gelişim aşamalarını ele alan diğer ikincil kaynaklara nazaran daha kapsam-lı bir perspektif sunuyor. Bununla birlikte herhangi bir metodolojiye bağlı olma çabasında olmadığını belirten Bowersock, çizgisinin ne bütün kaynak-ları sorgusuz kabul etmek ne de onları tamamen göz ardı etmek olduğunu söyleyerek, sahip olduğu tek yöntemin kritik sebeplendirme ve sorgulama

Given Prophet Muhammad’s a immense impact on history, there are surprisingly few books that specifically analyse his leadership. The few that exist maintain that Muhammad was a wonderful leader because he was a wonderful man; that is, he succeeded in his mission because of his superior morality and personal qualities.

Although it is widely agreed that Muhammad was a moral and decent man, this explanation seems incomplete and almost inadequate. Joel Hayward approaches the Prophet’s leadership from a different vantage point by scrutinising ancient sources to ascertain whether Muhammad’s conscious actions, behaviour, and methods can provide any substantial and meaningful insights about the effectiveness of his strategic leadership.

Through meticulous research and rigorous analysis, Hayward demonstrates that Muhammad was an uncommonly astute and self-reflective man with the ability to create and communicate a believable strategic vision of a necessary and desirable future. This engaging yet deeply scholarly book makes a major contribution to both leadership studies and the Prophet’s biography.

The quranic Noah narratives provide a fascinating window into the making of Muhammad as an eschatological prophet. This book examines their form, content, and sources as a means of deciphering the scribal and intertextual nature of the Qur'an and the Jewish-Christian background of the messianic controversy out of which Islam emerged. The view that Muhammad was once tentatively though of as a new Messiah challenges our picture of Islam's origins.