Download PDF | Wilferd Madelung - The Succession to Muhammad_ A Study of the Early Caliphate -Cambridge University Press (1998).
434 Pages
In a comprehensive and original study of the early history of Islam, Wilferd Madelung describes the conflict that developed after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, between his family, Hashim, and his tribe, Quraysh, for the leadership of the Muslim community. He pursues the history of this conflict through the reign of the four 'Rightly Guided' caliphs to its climax in the first Inter-Muslim War. The outcome of the war, which marked the demise of the reign of the Early Companions, led to the establishment of dynastic despotism under the Umayyad caliphate and to the lasting schism between Sunnite and Shi'ite Islam. In contrast to recent scholarly trends, Professor Madelung brings out cAll's early claim to legitimate succession, which gained support from the Shi'a, and offers a radical and convincing reinterpretation of early Islamic history after the death of Muhammad. This important and original study will make a major contribution to the scholarship of the period and rekindle the debate over the succession to Muhammad.
Preface
This book was at first planned as a monograph on the nature of the caliphate at its foundation and during its earliest phase, before the establishment of Umayyad dynastic rule, with only a minimal discussion of the events and persons determining its evolution. The extreme distrust of most western historians with regard to the Muslim literary sources for the early age of Islam seemed to suggest a restriction of the inquiry to a few salient events whose reality, if not their interpretation, is not seriously disputed. As the research progressed, it became evident that such an approach would not do justice to the subject.
The question of the caliphate is too intricately tied to much of the internal history of the early Muslim community to be discussed without a solid understanding of that history based on more than abstract speculation. Work with the narrative sources, both those that have been available to historians for a long time and others which have been published recently, made it plain that their wholesale rejection as late fiction is unjustified and that with a judicious use of them a much more reliable and accurate portrait of the period can be drawn than has so far been realized. The introduction of large narrative sections into the presentation has, apart from substantially expanding the volume, inevitably changed the character of the book and produced a certain dichotomy which may at times obscure its basic purpose. Especially the detailed description of the fitna> the Inter-Muslim War opening with the revolt against the third caliph and outlasting the reign of the fourth, may appear to have marginalized the discussion of the caliphate itself. Narrative history carries its own momentum and dictates its appropriate ways of presentation. Persons, their motivation, action and reaction move to the foreground and confine the interpretation of ideas and documentary texts.
The book, especially its latter parts, can now be read as a partial history of the period. The reader should, however, be aware of its selective perspective. The Inter-Muslim War was the climax of the conflict about the caliphate and as such a proper understanding of its nature was vital. Selective narration from the large pool of narrative source material imposed compromises for the sake of readablity. I have tried to strike a proper balance between abridgement and faithful rendering of reports and texts. Colourful detail which the early reporters thought worth recording, and their personal comments, may convey to the late observer living in a very different environment a sense of the times which the abstract factual data largely fail to convey. In general those reports that seemed most reliable were chosen for presentation. Significant divergent reports are often briefly summarized in the notes without full argumentation for my preference.
In narrative reporting there is obviously a wide range of shades of reliability between outright fraudulent fiction and accurate factual testimony. It would have served no good purpose to weigh and assess every statement and expression of the narrators as might be appropriate in more narrowly focused studies. The book stands in a scholarly tradition on which it builds and to which it reacts. Much of the basic western research on the history of the early succession to Muhammad was carried out and published by a few scholars in the early decades of this century. Later research has generally accepted the substance of their conclusions while modifying some detail. The revision proposed here is more radical. The discussion naturally puts the differences into sharp relief and brings out aspects passed over or distorted in the earlier studies more prominently than if the book had been written in a vacuum of scholarship. Severe criticism, however, should not obscure its indebtedness to the tradition. My special thanks are due to my wife who patiently read and reread through an unfamiliar subject and made valuable suggestions to improve the presentation.
Introduction
No event in history has divided Islam more profoundly and durably than the succession to Muhammad. The right to occupy the Prophet's place at the head of the Muslim community after his death became a question of great religious weight which has separated Sunnites and Shi'ites until the present. The issue of right and wrong in the matter has long since been settled in their minds. For Sunnites, the first caliph, Abu Bakr, was the only rightful successor since he was the most excellent of men after the Prophet. Although Muhammad had not explicitly appointed him as his successor, his preference for him was indicated by his order for Abu Bakr to lead the Muslims in the prayers during his final illness.
The consensus reached by the Muslims in favour of Abu Bakr merely confirmed what was ultimately God's choice. For Shi'ites it was Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law 'All who, on account of his early merits in Islam as well as his close kinship, had been appointed by the Prophet as his successor. His rightful position was then usurped by Abu Bakr with the backing of the majority of Muhammad's Companions. In spite of the fundamental importance of this conflict for the history of Islam, modern historians have devoted relatively little effort to the study of the background and circumstances surrounding the succession.
This general lack of interest is evidently grounded in the view that the conflict between Sunna and ShTa, although revolving around the question of the succession, in reality arose only in a later age. Such a view is well supported by early Sunnite tendentious historiography, represented most blatantly by Sayf b. cUmar (d. 180/796). According to his account, ( Ali, on being informed of Abu Bakr's election, was in such a hurry to offer his pledge of allegiance that he arrived dressed merely in his shirt and had to send for his clothes.1 Perfect concord then prevailed among the Muslims until (Abd Allah b. Saba% a converted Jew from San( a', began to agitate against the third caliph, 'Uthman, and, after the murder of the latter, spread extremist views about 'AIT having been the wast, the legatee or the executor of the will, of Muhammad.2
Ibn Saba' thus became the founder of the SfrTa who retrospectively turned f AIT into the legitimate successor of Muhammad. While few if any modern historians would accept Sayf's legend of Ibn Saba', the underlying view that the succession of Abu Bakr to Muhammad was in itself - aside from the abortive attempt of the Medinan Ansar to seize the caliphate - unproblematic and that the conflict about it was artificially created by the ShT'a after the death of (A1T and against his own lifelong attitude is widely taken for granted. It is fully reflected in the most recent discussions of the origins of the 'Alid and the 'Abbasid, or Hashimite, ShT'a by M. Sharon. According to Sharon, the very concept of the 'Family of the Prophet', later expressed in the terms of ahl al-bayt > Al Muhammad, al al-nabi and Banu Hashim, did not exist in the time of Muhammad and under the early caliphs. Although the term bayt had sometimes been used in pre-Islamic Arabia for the noble families of famous chiefs and prominent men, this was not the case with respect to Muhammad. In Islam the term ahl al-bayt first came to be applied to the families of the caliphs.
The Shi'ite supporters of 'AIT, according to Sharon, then developed the idea of the ahl al-bayt of the Prophet and of Al Muhammad in order to establish hereditary rights of their man and his descendants to the caliphate. In the later Umayyad age the 'Abbasids appropriated the idea and still later, from the caliphate of al-MahdT, propagated the concept of the Banu Hashim as the Family of the Prophet to bolster their own claim to legitimate succession.3 Yet (A1T himself had still accepted the caliphate on the terms laid down by Abu Bakr and ( Umar without pretence to any special title based on his personal blood relationship with Muhammad.4 If concord prevailed among the Muslims until the caliphate of 'Uthman and the controversy between Sunna and Shfa arose only after the caliphate of 'AIT, there is obviously not much incentive to study in depth the circumstances of the succession and the establishment of the caliphate. Abu Bakr's and 'Umar's success during their reigns was decisive and spectacular, and recent historical research has tended to concentrate mostly on their activity in suppressing the dangerous movement of the Apostasy (ridda) of the Arab tribes and initiating the great Muslim conquests outside Arabia.
The few earlier studies dealing specifically with the succession as such, however, suggest that it was certainly not as unproblematic as implied in the prevalent view of the origins of the schism between Sunna and ShT'a. In 1910 H. Lammens published his article on the 'Triumvirate of Abu Bakr, (Umar, and Abu (Ubayda' in which he argued that it was the common purpose and close co-operation of these three men, initiated in the lifetime of Muhammad, that enabled them to found the successive caliphates of Abu Bakr and (Umar.
The latter would have appointed Abu ( Ubayda as his successor if Abu (Ubayda had not died during his caliphate.5 Although Lammens did not speak of a conspiracy to seize the succession, his presentation of the activity of the triumvirate suggests this term. In particular through Abu Bakr's and (Umar's daughters 'A'isha and Hafsa, who kept their fathers informed about every move and secret thought of their husband Muhammad, these two men came to exert great influence on the Prophet's actions and thus prepared the stage for their seizure of power. This conspirational aspect of Lammens' theory has probably provoked the common warnings of more recent western scholars that his study is unreliable.6 Lammens noted that the purpose of the triumvirate was to exclude the Hashimites, in particular 'All, as the kin of Muhammad from the succession, although CA1T, in Lammens' view, was hardly a serious rival for them. Dull-witted, incapable, and married to the pitiful figure of the Prophet's daughter Fatima, who was easily outmanoeuvred by the clever and headstrong daughter of Abu Bakr in their competition for Muhammad's favour, 'All could not have been an attractive choice for Muhammad as his successor.
Having experienced mostly disappointment in respect of his blood relations, the Prophet naturally turned away from them. His ahl al-bayt, Lammens affirmed with reference to Qur'an XXXIII 33, consisted exclusively of his wives.7 The only comprehensive and thorough investigation of the establishment, nature and development of the caliphate until 'All's reign has been offered by L. Caetani in his monumental Annali delV Islam. In his initial discussion, Caetani noted the gravity of the conflict between Abu Bakr and the Banu Hashim following his surprise claim to the succession during the assembly of the Ansar in the Hall (jsaqifa) of the Banu Sa'ida just hours after the death of Muhammad. The Banu Hashim refused to recognize Abu Bakr and buried their illustrious kinsman privately, depriving the new caliph and 'A'isha of the honour of attendance. Caetani indirectly acknowledged the potential seriousness of 'All's claim to the succession by rejecting the common accounts that Abu Bakr based his claim before the assembly of Ansar on the prior rights of Quraysh as Muhammad's tribe, since this argument would have strengthened the case of 'AIT as the closest relative of the Prophet.8 Rather, Caetani suggested, Abu Bakr argued the need to elect a successor to Muhammad who would most closely follow in his footsteps, propagate his teachings and maintain the unity of the Muslim Community. He was chosen solely for his superior qualities as a statesman and his personal merits.9 In view of these merits, Caetani judged the opposition of the Hashimites and other Companions to Abu Bakr to be motivated merely by personal ambition and rancour.10 If Muhammad had been able to choose his successor, he would presumably have preferred Abu Bakr to anyone else.11 In a later volume of the Annali, however, Caetani opted for Lammens' theory of the triumvirate of Abu Bakr, (Umar and Abu (Ubayda12 as the most likely explanation for the origins of the caliphate.
The inspirer of their joint action had been lUmar, 'the greatest statesman after the Prophet and in some respects even greater than the master himself'.13 f Umar had the practical and political intelligence to foresee the demise of Muhammad and to prepare the agreements for resolving the problem of the succession with energy and in the best way possible, thus saving the Muslim Community from disaster.14 The true founder of the caliphate thus was (Umar who merely put forward Abu Bakr as the first caliph in recognition of his righteousness and his high standing with the Prophet. As a result of the reaction of later scholars against the conspiracy theory, Caetani's earlier view that Muhammad, had he made a choice, would most likely have preferred Abu Bakr as his successor and that, in any case, Abu Bakr was the natural choice for the Muslims on account of his merits in Islam has become the prevalent opinion among non-Muslim historians of Islam. It is expressed, for instance, by W. M. Watt in his standard biography of Muhammad in the words: 'Certainly before Muhammad left Mecca for Medina Abu Bakr had established himself as his chief lieutenant and adviser; and this position he maintained to Muhammad's death, so that he was the obvious choice for successor.'15 Yet the critical observer may well question here whether the choice was really so obvious. It is true that in modern life the choice of a chief lieutenant and adviser to succeed, for instance, the head of a corporation or the leader of a political party must seem reasonable enough. But the succession to a ruler or king in traditional society was normally based on dynastic kinship and inheritance, and the succession of a lieutenant and adviser, however close to the ruler, would have been considered highly irregular. It has, of course, often been argued that the succession to tribal leadership among the Arabs was not based on heredity, and Lammens went so far as to assert that hereditary power and the dynastic principle were among the concepts most repugnant to the Arab mind.16
This assertion has, however, rightly been challenged by E. Tyan, who pointed out that hereditary succession was not unknown among the Arab tribes, as was consistent with the importance of noble lineage, nasab, among them and that among the Quraysh in particular hereditary succession was the rule.17 It may be countered that the succession to Muhammad cannot be compared to that of a ruler or king and that the classical Sunnite theory of the caliphate indeed sharply distinguishes between it and kingship, mulk, which it condemns in part for its principle of hereditary succession. But the classical theory is obviously posterior to the succession and its opposition to mulk and the principle of heredity presumably reflects in part its essential purpose of justifying the early historical caliphate. There is thus prima facie good reason to suspect that the common view of western scholars of Islam about the succession to Muhammad may not be entirely sound and to propose a fresh look at the sources for a proper reassessment.
The starting point for establishing what Muhammad may have thought in general about his succession and what his contemporary followers could have seen as basic guidelines after his death must certainly be a study of the Qur'an. The Qur'an, as is well known, does not make any provisions for, or even allude to, the succession of Muhammad, and for this reason non-Muslim historians have virtually ignored it in this regard. It contains, however, specific instructions about the maintenance of kinship ties and inheritance as well as stories and statements about the succession of the past prophets and their families, matters which could not be irrelevant to the succession to Muhammad.
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