The Spiritual Background of Early Islam. Studies in Ancient Arab Concepts

356 Pages·2009·21.367 MB·English

by  M.M. Bravmann, Rew Rippin

The Spiritual Background of Early Islam
Brill Classics
in Islam
VOLUME 4
The Spiritual Background of
Early Islam
Studies in Ancient Arab Concepts
By
M.M. Bravmann
With an introduction by
Andrew Rippin
LEIDEN (cid:129) BOSTON
2009
Cover Illustration: Image from The Art of Calligraphy in the Islamic Heritage, Istanbul: IRCICA,
1998
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Bravmann, M. M.
The spiritual background of early Islam : studies in ancient Arab concepts / by M.M.
Bravmann ; with an introduction by Andrew Rippin.
p. cm. — (Brill classics in Islam, ISSN 1872-5481 ; v. 4)
Previously published in 1972.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-90-04-17200-5
1. Islam. 2. Islam—Terminology. 3. Arabian Peninsula—Social life and customs. I.
Rippin, Andrew, 1950- II. Title. III. Series.
BP163.B62 2008
297.09’021—dc22
2008062323
ISSN 1872-5481
ISBN 978 90 04 17200 5
Copyright 2009 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
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CONTENTS
Preface VII
Introduction. . . IX
Andrew Rippin
I. The Spiritual Background of Early Islam and the
History of its Principal Concepts
I
A) "Muruwah and Din"
I
B) 'Islam . 7
C) ,Iman. . . . . . . . . . . 26
D) Ad-Dun.yii wal-Bu'd>ad-Dunya waPA.!Jirah . 32
II. Heroic Motives in Early Arabic Literature . . . 39
A) The Concept of 'Amr and the Drive to Manly
Activities . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
B) Aims and Values of Man's Activity. 63
III. Sunnah and Related Concepts .... 123
A) Sunnah and Sirah . . . . . . . . 123
B) The Concrete ("Material") Character of Sunnah 139
C) The Verb sanna in the Meaning "to assign, to
determine" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
D) The Hereditary Character of Sunnah . . . 159
E) The Responsibility of the Originator of a
Sunnah for All Later Acts. . . . . . . 164
F) Testimonies for the Early Existence of "the
Sunnah of the Prophet". . . . . . . . . . 168
G) Pre-Islamic Sunnah re-created by the Prophet 175
H) 'Ilm and Ra'y 177
I) Ig,tihiid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
J) Igma' . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 194
IV. The Ancient Arab Background oftheQur'anicConcept
al-gizyatu 'an yadin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
V. Bay'ah "homage": a Proto-Arab (South-Semitic)
Concept 213
VI. The Original Meaning of Arabic Wazir 220
VII. Allah's Liberty to Punish or to Forgive. 2Z7
VI CONTENTS
VIII. "The Surplus of Property": an Early Arab Social
Concept 229
IX. The Return of the Hero: an Early Arab Motif. 254
X. Life after Death in Early Arab Conception 288
XI. The Hunger of the Bedouin . 296
XII. Equality of Birth of Husband and Wife (kafiPah), an
Early Arab Principle 301
XIII. The State Archives in the Early Islamic Era 3II
XIV. The Community's Participation in the Punishment of
Crime in Early Arab Society 315
Index of Arabic Terms. . . . . . 335
PREFACE
The present volume includes studies' previously published in
various periodicals, as well as several new ones appearing here
for the first time. As was indicated in an introductory note to the
original publication of the earliest of these studies, my intention
from the beginning was to investigate the relationship of some
of the dominant ideas of early Islam to their pre-Islamic back
ground. My aim was not only to emphasize the far-reaching con
ceptual continuity from the pre-Islamic era to the early-Islamic
era, but also to uncover, by means of careful philological analysis,
the underlying psychological and social motives of the terms
involved. My basic conviction is that thesegenuinelyArabconcepts
and terms surviving in early Islam should not be considered (as is
frequently done) as antiquarian relics, but as living and potent
elements, as creative forces which helped to generate the new
social values and historical achievements characteristic of the
early stages of Islamic society and history. The present studies
must necessarily limit themselves to some selected ideas and con
cepts, as well as to a restricted number of literary texts. A fuller
and more exact picture of the spiritual background of early Islam
would naturally require the examination of many other aspects
of early Arab life, secular as well as religious.
New York, January 1972.
M. M. BRAVMANN

introduction ix

INTRODUCTION
Andrew Rippin
The essence of scholarship is always to be located in the cumulative
discussion that takes place surrounding a research topic. Each step
along the way in that conversation is important. Scholarly agendas
for the future are set by each turn that the conversation takes,
directed by the constraining factors that are at play and the varying
skills that individuals bring to their research at that particular point
in history. To understand fully any scholarly discussion today it is
essential to know the history of the topic among scholars. For the
study of the formative period of Islam, M. M. Bravmann’s The Spir-
itual Background of Early Islam: Studies in Ancient Arab Concepts is one of
those fundamental works that pave the scholarly path, incorporating
within it significant contributions to an array of key scholarly top-
ics.
Meïr Moshe Bravmann was born on July 3, 1909, and died on
September 16, 1977.1 Growing up in a town in the south of Ger-
many, he attended the University of Breslau between 1927 and 1932,
studying Semitic languages under the leading figure of the time, Carl
Brockelmann. His PhD thesis was entitled Materialien und Unter-
suchungen zu den phonetischen Lehren der Araber; the work was published
in Göttingen by W. F. Kaestner in 1934 with the author’s name as
Max Bravmann. In the sketch of Bravmann’s life that opens the
memorial volume published in his honour, Edward Greenstein
describes the period that followed Bravmann’s PhD as a life “stooped
under the weight of misfortune.” Bravmann’s career started as an
academic assistant at the University of Giessen but that came to an
end with the rise of the Nazis. He moved to Jerusalem. The “Oxford
Archive of the Society for the Protection of Science and Learning”
1 Biographical information has been derived primarily from Edward L. Green-
stein, “M. M. Bravmann: A Sketch,” Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society 11 (1979),
1-2; the journal issue was a memorial volume to Bravmann. The articles from the
issue are available online at www.jtsa.edu/Audience_Pages/Scholars_and_Re-
search/JANES.xml.
x introduction
reports2 having some correspondence with Bravmann in its files,
likely from this period when so many scholars found themselves
needing to leave Germany. In Jerusalem, Bravmann worked as a
research assistant under S. D. Goitein on the edition of volume 5 of
Ans§b al-Ashr§f of al-Bal§dhurÊ.3 He subsequently became an instructor
in Semitic philology but this did not turn into a permanent position
for him and he emigrated to New York in 1951. Raphael Patai
appears to have played a significant role in his life during this per-
iod.4 Patai and Bravmann had been friends in Breslau when they
were both at the Rabbinical Seminary there and both worked under
Brockelmann. Patai moved from Jerusalem to New York in 1947
and reports that he was able to find Bravmann work teaching Arabic
at Dropsie College.5 Such work remained piece-meal, it appears,
and included periods of teaching at New York University and
Columbia University. Bravmann’s permanent position was as a
library cataloguer in the Columbia University Library, starting in
1952 and last ing until his death.
As the quantities of his academic work display, Bravmann was
devoted to his scholarly life. His colleagues in the library saw him as
“enigmatic,” according to Greenstein, an active “determined ball of
energy,” but apparently a man with few close friends. Bravmann
never married; Patai reports that “despite our long friendship [Brav-
mann] never opened up as far as his relations with women were
concerned, and somehow I always suspected that he never had any
experience with the opposite sex.”6 However, given the list of illustri-
ous names of those who contributed to his memorial volume—among
them A. F. L. Beeston, Z. Ben-Hayyim, J. Blau, P. Cachia, D. M.
Dunlop, J. C. Greenfield, M. J. Kister, S. Morag, and Y. Muffs—he
did not lack for scholarly acquaintances and admirers. His work was
2 See the online index at www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/online/
modern/spsl/spsl.html, under “I.14.4 Oriental Philology.”
3 S. D. F. Goitein, The Ans§b al-Ashr§f of al-Baladhuri, Published for the First Time by
the School of Oriental Studies, Hebrew University, Jerusalem. Vol. 5. Jerusalem: University
Press, I936.
4 More could probably be learned from the New York Public Library archive of
Patai’s papers and letters which includes correspondence with Bravmann in box 9,
file 188, indicated as dating from 1955 to 1974; see www.nypl.org/research/chss/
spe/rbk/faids/patai.pdf.
5 Raphael Patai, Journeyman in Jerusalem: Memories and Letters, 1933-1947 (Salt Lake
City: University of Utah Press, 1992), 31.
6 Ibid.