After the Prophet: The Epic Story of the Shia-Sunni Split in Islam (28 page)

eleventh-century treatise:
See al-Mufid,
The Book of Guidance
, and discussion of signs of the Mahdi’s return in Sachedina,
Islamic Messianism.

“the Shia revival”:
Most notably in Nasr,
The Shia Revival.

Sources

EARLY ISLAMIC SOURCES

The source I have relied on most heavily is al-Tabari (839–923), generally acknowledged throughout the Muslim world as the most prestigious and authoritative early Islamic historian. His monumental work
Tarikh al-rusul wa-al-muluk
(History of the Prophets and Kings) starts with biblical peoples and prophets, continues with the legendary and factual history of ancient Persia, then moves on to cover in immense and intimate detail the rise of Islam and the history of the Islamic world through to the early tenth century. It has been translated into English in a magnificent project overseen by general editor Ehsan Yar-Shater and published in thirty-nine annotated volumes between the years 1985 and 1999 as
The History of al-Tabari.
Specific volumes are cited below. Al-Tabari is the source of all direct quotes and dialogue in this book unless otherwise stated in the text itself or in the Notes before this section.

The
Tarikh
is outstanding for both its breadth and its depth, as well as its style. Al-Tabari—his full name was Abu Jafar Muhammad ibn Jarir al-Tabari, but he was known simply as al-Tabari after his birthplace in Tabaristan, on the southern shore of the Caspian Sea—was a
Sunni scholar living and writing in the Abbasid capital of Baghdad. His work is so inclusive as to make extremist Sunnis suspicious that he may have had “Shia sympathies.” He made extensive use of oral history, traveling throughout the empire to record interviews and documenting them in detail so that the chain of communication was clear, always leading back to an eyewitness to the events in question. The
Tarikh
thus has an immediacy that Westerners tend not to associate with classic histories. Voices from the seventh century—not only those of the people being interviewed but also those of the people they are talking about, whom they often quote verbatim—seem to speak directly to the reader. The result is so vivid that you can almost hear the inflections in their voices and see their gestures as they speak. All other early Islamic histories seem somewhat dry by comparison.

Al-Tabari combined these oral accounts with earlier written histories, fully acknowledging his debt at every step. He did this so faithfully and skillfully that his own work soon superseded some of his written sources, which were no longer copied or saved. His detailed account of what happened at Karbala in the year 680, for instance, is based in large part on
Kitab Maqtal al-Hussein
(The Book of the Murder of Hussein), written by the Kufan Abu Mikhnaf just fifty years after Karbala from firsthand eyewitness accounts, including that of Hussein’s one surviving son.

For anyone who delights in the Middle Eastern style of narrative, al-Tabari is a joy to read, though Western readers accustomed to tight structure and a clear authorial point of view may be disconcerted at first. Sometimes the same event or conversation is told from more than a dozen points of view, and the narrative thread weaves back and forth in time, with each separate account adding to the ones that came before, but from a slightly different angle. This use of multiple voices creates an almost postmodern effect; what seems at first to be lack of structure slowly reveals itself as a vast edifice of brilliant structural integrity.

Given his method, it should come as no surprise that some of the dialogue quoted in the present book is given several times in al-Tabari, as recounted by different witnesses and sources. While the general drift of these accounts is usually the same, the wording obviously differs according to who is speaking, as do the details: one person remembers this detail; another, that. My sole criterion in deciding which of multiple versions of a quote to use was the desire for clarity, eschewing more ornate and worked-over versions for clearer, more direct ones and opting for detail over generality.

Where al-Tabari offers conflicting versions of an event from different sources, I have noted the difference and followed his example in reserving judgment. “In everything which I mention herein,” he writes in the introduction to the
Tarikh
, “I rely only on established [written] reports, which I identify, and on [oral] accounts, which I ascribe by name to their transmitters … Knowledge is only obtained by the statements of reporters and transmitters, not by rational deduction or by intuitive inference. And if we have mentioned in this book any report about certain men of the past which the reader finds objectionable or the hearer offensive … he should know that this has not come about on our account, but on account of one of those who has transmitted it to us, and that we have presented it only in the way in which it was presented to us.”

I have made especially heavy use of the following volumes:

The Foundation of the Community
, tr. and annotated W. Montgomery Watt and M. V. McDonald, Vol. VIII. Albany: State University of New York Press,1987.

The Victory of Islam
, tr. and annotated Michael Fishbein, Vol. VIII. Albany: State University of New York Press,1997.

The Last Years of the Prophet
, tr. and annotated Ismail K. Poonawala, Vol. IX. Albany: State University of New York Press,1990.

The Crisis of the Early Caliphate
, tr. and annotated R. Stephen Humphreys, Vol. XV. Albany: State University of New York Press,1990.

The Community Divided: The Caliphate of Ali
, tr. and annotated Adrian Brockett, Vol. XVI. Albany: State University of New York Press,1997.

The First Civil War: From the Battle of Siffin to the Death of Ali
, tr. and annotated G. R. Hawting, Vol. XVII. Albany: State University of New York Press,1996.

Between Civil Wars: The Caliphate of Muawiyah
, tr. and annotated Michael G. Morony, Vol. XVIII. Albany: State University of New York Press,1987.

The Caliphate of Yazid b. Muawiyah
, tr. and annotated I. K. A. Howard, Vol. XIX. Albany: State University of New York Press,1990.

The earliest biography of Muhammad is that of Ibn Ishaq, whose
Sirat Rasul Allah
(Life of the Messenger of God) is the basis of all subsequent biographies of the Prophet. Like al-Tabari’s work, it is regarded as authoritative throughout the Muslim world, and al-Tabari drew on it heavily for his own account of Muhammad’s life.

Muhammad ibn Ishaq was born in Medina around the year 704 and died in Baghdad in 767. His original manuscript no longer exists, since it was superseded by an expanded and annotated version by the Basra-born historian Ibn Hisham, who lived and worked in Egypt. Ibn Hisham’s version of Ibn Ishaq’s biography has been translated into English as
The Life of Muhammad: A Translation of Ibn Ishaq’s Sirat Rasul Allah
, tr. Alfred Guillaume (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1955).

Two other early Islamic historians demand special note. The work of al-Baladhuri complements that of al-Tabari. Born in Persia, Ahmad ibn Yahya al-Baladhuri lived and worked in Baghdad, where he died in 892. His
Kitab Futuh al-Buldan
(Book of the Conquests of Lands) has been translated by Philip Hitti and Francis C. Murgotten as
The Origins of the Islamic State
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1916–24). His
Ansab al-Ashraf
(Lineage of the Nobles), which covers the reigns of the early caliphs and includes thousands of capsule biographies, is not yet available in English translation.

Muhammad ibn Sa’d (spelled “Saad” in this book) was one of the earliest compilers of biographies of major figures in early Islam, and his work proved a major source for later historians, including al-Tabari. Born in Basra in 764, he lived in Baghdad, where he died in 845. Abridged selections from two Volumes of his nine-Volume collection
Kitab al-Tabaqat al-Kabir
(Great Book of Generations) can be found in
The Women of Madina
, tr. Aisha Bewley (London: Ta-Ha Publishers, 1995) and
The Men of Madina
, tr. Aisha Bewley (London: Ta-Ha Publishers, 1997).

I have worked with three English versions of the Quran (I use the word “version” rather than “translation” since a basic tenet of Islam is that the Quran as the word of God cannot be translated, only “interpreted” in other languages):

The Koran
, tr. Edward H. Palmer. Oxford: Clarendon Press,1900.

The Koran Interpreted
, tr. A. J. Arberry. New York: Macmillan,1955.

The Koran
, tr. N. J. Dawood. London: Penguin,1956.

CONTEMPORARY SOURCES

This book is especially indebted to the work of the following scholars, listed here by area of expertise.

The Early Caliphate

Wilferd Madelung’s
The Succession to Muhammad: A Study of the Early Caliphate
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997) is a magisterial study of the caliphates of Abu Bakr, Omar, Othman, and Ali, based on close reading of original sources. Extensively and fascinatingly footnoted, it emphasizes Ali’s claim to the succession.

Marshall G. S. Hodgson’s
The Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilization
is a three-Volume study of the historical development of Islamic civilization, with numerous tables of time lines.
The Classical Age or Islam
, Vol. 1 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961) covers the rise of Muhammad to the year 945.

W. Montgomery Watt’s
The Formative Period of Islamic Thought
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1973) examines developments within Islam from the
khariji
Rejectionists to the establishment of Sunnism.

Shia Islam

S. H. M. Jafri’s
The Origins and Early Development of Shi’a Islam
(London: Longman, 1979) provides a detailed and deeply sympathetic examination of Shia history and theology from the time of Muhammad through to the twelve Imams.

Vali Nasr’s
The Shia Revival: How Conflicts Within Islam Will Shape the Future
(New York: Norton, 2006) is an excellent and highly readable overview of the Shia-Sunni conflict in the twentieth century and into the twenty-first.

Moojan Momen’s
An Introduction to Shi’i Islam: The History and Doctrines of Twelver Shi’ism
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985) is far more detailed than one might expect an “introduction” to be, and is especially good on Shia theology.

The Iranian Revolution

Anthropologist Michael M. Fischer’s work, in particular
Iran: From Religious Dispute to Re Volution
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980), is outstanding. Also his essay “The Iranian Re Volution: Five Frames for Understanding,” in
Critical Moments in Religious History
, ed. Kenneth Keulman (Macon, Ga.: Mercer University Press, 1993) and, in collaboration with Mehdi Abedi,
Debating Muslims: Cultural Dialogues in Postmodernity and Tradition
(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1990).

Nikki Keddie ’s
Modern Iran: Roots and Results of Re Volution
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003) is rightfully regarded as essential reading, as should be almost all the essays in an anthology edited by Keddie:
Religion and Politics in Iran: Shi’ism from Quietism to Re Volution
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1983).

Ali Shariati’s lectures can be found in translation at
www.shariati.com.
His most influential lectures have been published in English as
What Is to Be Done: The Enlightened Thinkers and an Islamic Renaissance
(Houston: Institute for Research and Islamic Studies, 1986) and as
Red Shi’ism
(Teheran: Hamdani Foundation, 1979). His lectures on Hussein and martyrdom can be found in
Jihad and Shahadat: Struggle and Martyrdom in Islam
, ed. Mehdi Abedi and Gary Legenhausen (North Haledon, N.J.: Islamic Publications International, 1986).

Ashura Rituals and Karbala Imagery

Peter J. Chelkowski, editor of
Ta’ziyeh: Ritual and Drama in Iran
(New York: New York University Press, 1979), provides invaluable insight into both the content and import of Karbala Passion plays, while
Staging a Re Volution: The Art of Persuasion in the Islamic Republic of Iran
, by Chelkowski and Hamid Dabashi (New York: New York University Press, 1999), is a superb visual survey and analysis of the collective symbols used in the Iranian Re Volution and the subsequent war with Iraq.

David Pinault provides on-the-ground understanding of the emotive and theological power of the Karbala story in
The Shiites: Ritual and Popular Piety in a Muslim Community
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1992) and in
Horse of Karbala: Muslim Devotional Life in India
(New York: Palgrave, 2001).

Kamran Scot Aghaie’s detailed work on Shia symbolism and ritual can be found in
The Martyrs of Karbala: Shi’i Symbols and Rituals in Modern Iran
(Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2004) and
The Women of Karbala: Ritual Performance and Symbolic Discourses in Modern Shi’i Islam
(Austin: University of Texas Press, 2005).

Aisha

Nabia Abbott’s
Aishah: The Beloved of Muhammad
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1942) is the classic biography in English, drawing on the earliest Islamic histories and in particular on al-Tabari, Ibn Saad, and al-Baladhuri.