Muslims, Jews, and Pagans: Studies on Early Islamic Medina

200 Pages·1995·9.39 MB·English

by  Michael Lecker

Muslims,
Jews & Pagans
Studies on
Early Islamic Medina
by
Michael Lecker
jlil
E.J.BRILL
Muslims, Jews and Pagans examines in much
detail the available source material on the
cAliya area south of Medina on the eve of
Islam and at the time of the Prophet Muham­
mad. It provides part of the necessary back­
ground for the study of the Prophet’s history
by utilizing in addition to the Prophet’s
biographies, various texts about the history,
geography and inhabitants of this area.
The topics include the landscape, especially
the fortifications, the delayed conversion to
Islam of part of the Aws tribe, the Quba3 vil­
lage and the incident of Masjid al-Dirar in
9 ah. The three appendices deal with histori­
cal apologetics, pointing to the social context
in which the Prophet's biography emerged
during the first Islamic century.
Michael Lecker, Ph. D. (1983) in Arabic,
Hebrew University of Jerusalem, is Senior
Lecturer at the Department of Arabic of the
Hebrew University. He has published exten­
sively on the Prophet Muhammad's biography
and the Arabian Jewry in early Islam.
MUSLIMS, JEWS
AND PAGANS
ISLAMIC HISTORY
AND CIVILIZATION
STUDIES AND TEXTS
EDITED BY
ULRICH HAARMANN
VOLUME 13
MUSLIMS, JEWS
AND PAGANS
Studies on Early Islamic Medina
BY
MICHAEL LECKER
' > 6 8 "!> '
E.J. BRILL
LEIDEN • NEW YORK • KOLN
1995
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the
Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library
Resources.
This book was produced using LATEX software.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Lecker, Michael.
Muslims, Jews, and pagans : studies on early Islamic Medina / by
Michael Lecker.
p. cm. — (Islamic history and civilization. Studies and
texts, ISSN 0929-2403 : v. 13)
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.
ISBN 9004102477 (alk. paper)
1. Medina (Saudi Arabia)— History. 2. Islam— Saudi Arabia-
-Medina— History. I. Title. II. Series.
DS248.M5L43 ' 1995
953.8— dc20 95-9833
CIP
Die Deutsche Bibliothek - CIP-Einheitsaufnahme
Lecker, Michael:
Muslims, jews, and pagans : studies on early Islamic Medina /
by Michael Lecker. - Leiden ; New York ; Koln : Brill, 1995
(Islamic history and civilization ; Vol. 13)
ISBiN 90-04-10247-7
NE: GT
ISSN 0929-2403
ISBN 90 04 10247 7
© Copyright 1995 by E.J. Brill, Leiden, The Netherlands
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written
permission from the publisher.
Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal
use is granted by E.J. Brill provided that
the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright
Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910
Danvers A1A 01923, USA.
Fees are subject to change.
PRINTED IN THE NETHERIANDS
Contents
Preface............................................................................................... vii
Introduction..................................................................................... ix
1 The ‘Aliya: orchards and fortresses..................................... 1
2 The Aws Allah clans................................................................. 19
3 Quba’: Muslims, Jews and pagans....................................... 50
4 The Dirar Mosque (9 A.H.).................................................... 74
Concluding remarks........................................................................147
Appendices.......................................................................................150
A Mujammi' b. Jariya and the Dirar Mosque.................150
B The image problem of Abu Qays b. al-Aslat.............154
C Abu Qays nearly embraces Islam.................................156
Bibliography.....................................................................................165
Index..................................................................................................171
PREFACE
This study is an analysis of the evidence on Upper Medina (al-
‘ Aliya in Arabic) and its inhabitants on the eve of the Islamic era
and during the early days of Islam. The conclusions reached in it
should be considered part of the preparatory work which I believe
ought to precede the writing of a comprehensive narrative life of
the Prophet Muhammad. Because of the present state of our
knowledge of the Prophet’s history and the immense difficulty
of interpreting the Arabic sources in their correct context, the
extant biographies of Muhammad are quite inadequate and often
include uncritical and arbitrary statements.
The book is dedicated with deep gratitude to Prof. M.J. Kister
on the occasion of his 80th birthday.
I am also indebted to Prof. Michael Cook for his encouragement
and careful reading of the full draft, and to Prof. Uri Rubin for
commenting on the first chapter. Prof. Frank Stewart read the
first three chapters and made many suggestions, much improving
the final product.
In addition, my thanks are due to the Mutual Fund of the Hebrew
University for providing me with a research grant; also to Mr.
Shmuel Shemesh of the Hebrew University and to Mr. Abe Alper
of the Friends of the Hebrew University (New York) for their help.
I wish to thank the Turkish Government and the Siileymaniye
Library, and in particular its director, Mr. Muammer Ulker, for
permission to work there. I am also grateful to Prof. William
Brinner and Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Rollig for their help in Berkeley
and Tubingen, respectively. The librarians at the Oriental Read­
ing Room of the National and University Library at Givat Ram,
Jerusalem, made my work there both pleasant and efficient. I am
indebted to Ms. Roza I.M. El-Eini for polishing my English style
and to Mr. D. Lensky for producing the camera-ready copy. The
preparation of this book for publication was supported by a grant
from Yad Avi Ha-Yishuv. I thank them all warmly.
VIII PREFACE
A note on conventions: I have used the name Medina even when
referring to the pre-Islamic period (during which it was called
Yathrib). The word “Banu” (“the sons of’) preceding the name
of a tribe is either contracted to “B.” or omitted.
INTRODUCTION
Scholars of Islam have in recent years grown accustomed to a
constant flow of Arabic texts which were hitherto only available
in manuscript form.1 For example, Ibn al-Kalbl’s Jamharat al-
nasab, which until lately had been available solely in manuscript
form, appeared almost simultaneously in three different editions
(one being incomplete).2 Of great importance is the recent pub­
lication of a facsimile of Ibn ‘Asakir’s TaWikh madinat Dimashq
and of the extant parts of Ibn al-'Adlm’s Bughyat al-talab ft
ta'rikh Halab. These books preserve many records copied from
earlier compilations, now lost, which can no doubt change the
form of scholarship in a number of key areas, above all in those of
Umayyad history and the history of Palestine under the Muslims.3
Mention should be made of the recent publication in Cairo of
Muqatil b. Sulayman’s Tafsir.4 Some of Muqatil’s unique texts
1 Alas, some editions of Arabic texts are “printed manuscripts” rather than
scientific editions; G. MakdisI, “Hanbalite Islam”, in M.L. Swartz (trans. and
ed.), Studies on Islam, New York-Oxford 1981, 216-74, at 218. It is of course
immeasurably better to have a bad edition than no edition at all.
2 Ed. NajI Hasan, Beirut 1407/1986; ed Mahmud al-‘Azm, Damascus 1406/
1986. The third (Jamharat al-nasab wa-mukhtasar al-jamhara u>a-hawashihi,
ed. ‘Abd al-Sattar Ahmad Farraj, I, Kuwayt 1403/1983), was not completed
due to the premature death of the editor. In R. Firestone, Journeys in Holy
Lands: The Evolution of the Abraham-1shmael Legends in Islamic Exegesis,
New York 1990, 179, n. 1 and 247, the book’s title is wrongly quoted as
Ghamarat an-Nasab and translated as “The Abundance of Kinship”.
3 For two recent studies which make extensive use of the former source
(though from rather different points of departure), see S. Leder, “Materialien
zum Ta’rTh des Haitam ibn ‘Adi bei Abu Sulaiman Ibn Zabr ar-Raba‘i”,
in ZDMG 144 (1994), 14-27; M. Lecker, “The Futuh al-Sham of ‘Abdallah
b. Muhammad b. Rabfa al-Qudaml”, in BSOAS 57 (1994), 356-60. Cf. the
convincing case for Ibn ‘Asakir presented by G. Conrad, “Zur Bedeutung des
Tarlh Madinat Dimasq als historische Quelle”, in W. Diem and A. Falaturi
(eds.), XXIV. Deutscher Orientalistentag, Koln 1988, Stuttgart 1990 (ZDMG
Supplement VIII), 271-82.
4 Ed. ‘Abdallah Mahmud Shihata, al-Hay’a al-Misriyya al-‘Amma li-1-
Kitab, 1980-87. The edition was quickly withdrawn from the shelves of Cairo