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From Acolyte to Ṣaḥābī?: Christian Monks as Symbols of Early Confessional Fluidity in the Conversion Story of Salmān al-Fārisī

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 February 2019

Bradley Bowman
Bradley Bowman*
Affiliation:
University of Louisville
*
email: bbbowm01@louisville.edu
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Abstract

This paper will examine the narrative of Salmān al-Fārisī/”the Persian” and his conversion to Islam, as recounted in the eighth-century Sīra of Ibn Isḥāq, as a lens into the laudatory interpretation of Christian monasticism by early Muslims. This account of Salmān al-Fārisī (d. 656 CE), an original Companion (ṣaḥābī) of the Prophet Muḥammad, vividly describes his rejection of his Zoroastrian heritage, his initial embrace of Christianity, and his departure from his homeland of Isfahan in search of a deeper understanding of the Christian faith. This quest leads the young Persian on a great arc across the Near East into Iraq, Asia Minor, and Syria, during which he studies under various Christian monks and serves as their acolyte. Upon each master’s death, Salmān is directed toward another mystical authority, on a passage that parallels the “monastic sojourns” of late antique Christian literature. At the conclusion of the narrative a monk sends Salmān to seek out a “new Prophet who has arisen among the Arabs.” The monks, therefore, appear to be interpreted as “proto-Muslims,” as links in a chain leading to enlightenment, regardless of their confessional distinction. This narrative could then suggest that pietistic concerns, shared between these communities, superseded specific doctrinal boundaries in the highly fluid and malleable religious culture of the late antique and early Islamic Near East.

Keywords

SalmānSīramonasticismconversionacolyte
Type
Articles
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 112 , Issue 1 , January 2019 , pp. 55 - 75
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 2019 

Introduction

The impact of Christian monasticism and asceticism in the late antique Near East was not limited by sectarian constraints. To the contrary this particular facet of Christian devotion, long honored within the Roman/Byzantine sphere for piety and austerity, seems to have held significant interest for Muslim chroniclers, hagiographers, Qur’ānic exegetes, and theologians as well. This paper examines the narrative of Salmān al-Fārisī “the Persian” and his conversion to Islam, as recounted in the eighth-century Sīra of Ibn Isḥāq (the earliest extant biography of the Prophet Muḥammad), as a lens into the laudatory interpretation of Christian monasticism offered by early Muslims. In this account, Salmān is a seeker of religious knowledge, studying under various Christian teachers and monks while traveling a great arc across the Near East, ultimately acknowledging the perfection of Islam. In many ways, this quest mirrors the spiritual sojourns of eastern monasticism in late antiquity.Footnote 1

Fred Donner has argued that an inter-confessional flexibility existed within the earliest stages of Islam,Footnote 2 a situation in which distinct religious boundaries may have been blurred in deference to shared notions of monotheistic piety and devotion. This article will examine the conversion story of Salmān al-Fārisī and the role of Christian monks along his journey as further evidence for the transcending of doctrinal barriers during this period.

The figure of Salmān the Persian is most generally recognized, in terms of his contribution to Islamic history, as one of the earliest non-Arab converts to Islam, being an important source of ḥadīth transmission, as a member of the ṣaḥāba, or Companions of the Prophet, and for his strategic planning during the Battle of the Trench (al-khandaq) in the year 627 CE.Footnote 3 Over time, his legacy came to enjoy great prominence amongst Shīcī traditionalists as well as the mystical orders. The Iṣfahānī background of Salmān, in particular, was increasingly emphasized as the Muslim population of Persia began to flourish in subsequent centuries, with his tomb in Ctesiphon maintaining its important status as a place of visitation until the modern period.Footnote 4

This article examines Salmān’s initial embrace of Islam and the monks who bore considerable responsibility as his devotional guides along the path. This conversion narrative, found within the Sīra of Ibn Isḥāq, casts Christian holy men as intercessors between confessional distinctions. In doing so, the narrative not only seems to express an appreciation for Christian asceticism but can perhaps also be interpreted within the larger framework of a piety-driven, nebulous spirituality that characterized the early Islamic movement. Although the narrative’s decisive point is Salmān’s acceptance of Islam in Medina, at the feet of the Prophet himself, Christian ascetics provide the critical direction within the narrative. The crux of the account, therefore, supports Donner’s proposal for a synthesis between certain facets of late antique Christianity and an emergent Islam; one more specifically in which monasticism appeared as an “intermediary stage.”Footnote 5 The over-lapping of religious identities in such a case hinges upon shared tenets of righteousness, but without a rigidly defined dogmatic structure.

This analysis contends that the ultimate source of early Muslim interest in Christian monastic life was articulated through an inclusive, piety-centered religious orientation that extended from the late antique period. Within this zeitgeist of late antiquity,Footnote 6 laden with themes of veneration for “holy men” and ascetic figures,Footnote 7 the flexible parameters for confessional identity came to be a defining characteristic of devotion. This inclination, at least in its nascence, may perhaps be considered a component to an early “believers” movement.Footnote 8 In turn, membership within such a group of mu’minūn, or “believers,” would have been based upon a shared core of spiritual principles without regard to exclusive sectarian identities. The most essential concepts of this shared core would include a rigid monotheism, faith in a final judgment, and the acceptance of messengers from God.Footnote 9 The movement likewise seems to have emphasized the inherent immorality of the current age, hence the focus on a certain and looming apocalyptic reckoning.Footnote 10

The simple acknowledgment of the aforementioned concepts was not sufficient for full inclusion into the category of mu’minūn. As stated by Fred Donner, “the Qur’an makes it clear that to be a true Believer mere intellectual acceptance of these ideas was not sufficient; one also had to live piously. According to the Qur’an, our status as creatures of God demands pious obedience to His word; we should constantly remember God and humble ourselves before Him in prayer.”Footnote 11 Seeing themselves as existing in a world where iniquity was endemic, early Muslims strove to differentiate their group by expressing a loftier moral standard based not only on belief, but on righteous conduct as well.Footnote 12 Just as submission and humility before God were interpreted as key elements within this morality, the proposed piety-centered community would therefore have maintained a profound sense of humility as a fundamental criterion for genuine belonging. In terms of practicing such a precept, which accords with “living piously,” the traditional tenets of late antique monasticism would seemingly translate with relative ease into this kind of religious matrix. One of the crucial implications here is the prospect for pliability and fluidity of exchange across confessional divides, in part relating to Christian and Muslim theological interaction in a somewhat amorphous, pietistic milieu.Footnote 13

There have been several contemporary studies on the references to Christian monks and the interpretation of Christian monasticism in early Islamic literature.Footnote 14 The terms ruhbān, or “monks,” and rahbānīya, “monasticism,” appear throughout various Muslim literary genres of this period, including geographical texts, historical chronicles, poetry, theological treatises, hagiographies, discourses on Muslim asceticism, and ḥadīth scholarship. While one cannot argue that the medieval Muslim commentators held one definitive position on the merits of this Christian institution, it should be stated that the practice of monasticism clearly held genuine fascination for Muslims throughout this period. Moreover, monks appear to have been generally regarded in a positive light, particularly in discussions concerning the wisdom, rigor, and virtue associated with rahbānīya.Footnote 15

When the term ruhbān appears in verse 82 of Sūrat al-Mā’idah, for example, the Qur’ānic exegete al-Ṭabarī (d. 923) insists that the implicit approbation of monastic life is owed to the fact that monastic beliefs are so comparable to those of the Muslim faithful (fa-hum lā yabcudūna min al-mu’minīn).Footnote 16 According to his logic, Christians, as a whole, are more likely to be counted in fellowship with Muslims (bi-qurb mawaddatihim li-ahl al-īmān bi-llāhi wa rasūlihi)Footnote 17 because of the presence of these monastic devotees. Though these figures may not speak for the entirety of practitioners, their personal sense of holiness represents a broader sense of kinship between religious groups.

The passage from the Qur’ān states: “You will find the people most intensely hostile to the believers are the Jews and pagans, and that the nearest in affection to them are those that say: ‘we are Christians’ (alladhīna qālū innā Naṣāra). That is because there are priests (qissīsīn) and monks (ruhbān) among them who are free from arrogance (lā yastakbirūna).”Footnote 18

The ninth-century Muslim essayist al-Jāḥiẓ, when writing of this passage from Sūrat al-Mā’idah, establishes an even more specific point of reference to these monks that resonates between their Qur’ānic interpretation and certain vignettes within the Sīrat Rasūl Allāh of Ibn Isḥāq (d. 767).Footnote 19 The monks who guide Salmān al-Fārisī to Islam in the Sīra, mentioned by al-Jāḥiẓ below, are of primary interest to this paper’s proposal for flexible confessional identities in the early Islamic period. Jāḥiẓ writes:

In this verse itself there is the best proof that God did not mean these particular Christians and their like, those being the Melkites and Jacobites. Rather, He meant only the kind like Baḥīrā and the likes of those monks whom Salmān served (wa innamā cana ḍarb Baḥīrā wa ḍarb al-ruhbān alladhīna kāna yakhdimuhum Salmān).Footnote 20

These figures who are associated with Salmān, according to al-Jāḥiẓ, are distinct from the more reprehensible Christians who identify themselves as either Chalcedonians/Melkites (al-milkānīya) or Jacobites (al-yacqūbīya).Footnote 21 It would then appear that individual monks, perhaps those adhering to a particularly strict asceticism and disavowing a distinct confessional allegiance, formed a kind of “middle ground” in the early and classical Muslim understanding. In this way the monastic version of religious devotion seems to be interpreted as a more faithful rendering of the original dīn cĪsā (the religion of Jesus) and its precursor, the dīn ‘Ibrāhīm (the religion of Abraham), as opposed to the more popular forms of Christianity. The intrinsic purity offered by the monastic life had also previously been judged, by Christian figures such as St. Ephrem, as the only measure of sincere Christianity.Footnote 22 For certain Muslim commentators as well, these monks represented the last vestiges of a “true Christianity,” which was not only untainted by the corrupted teachings of the church but also receptive to the prophethood of Muḥammad.Footnote 23 The justification offered by al-Ṭabarī for this spiritual connection is the “presence of those among them that are steadfast in their duties to God; those that have entered monastic life in monasteries and hermitages, and are wise in their knowledge of scripture and practice the recitation of their texts.”Footnote 24 The exegesis here is quite lucid, placing the monastic tenets of solemnity and learning in close parallel to those of the Muslim community. It is, furthermore, the consummate humility of the institution which serves as a key determinant for religious virtue. Such themes are revisited in the account of Salmān’s journey to Islam. Inasmuch as the guides of Salmān are openly demonstrated to be Christians, their degree of wisdom and piety sets them apart from the larger Christian community, transferring them into a more fluid confessional environment.

The Narrative

The report of Salmān is included among other conversion stories and testimonials that might best be termed “annunciation narratives.”Footnote 25 Mecca, the contextual backdrop, is depicted here in the Sīra as a place with some degree of religious discontent on the eve of Islam, a depiction that draws attention to certain religiously conscious individuals and their quest for a higher truth than that offered by the traditional Arabian paganism.Footnote 26 Though several of these seekers embrace Christianity, this portion of the Ibn Isḥāq text does also recognize the existence of the ḥanīfīya Footnote 27 as a primordial, abstract monotheism that is distinct from either Judaism or Christianity.Footnote 28 Julius Wellhausen interpreted this pre-Islamic ḥanīfīya as a “religion of seekers” that emerged from “a mood which was widespread throughout Arabia in the period before Muḥammad and dominated many of the most noble spirits … the ground was then prepared for the emergence of Islam.”Footnote 29 By way of example, the story of Zayd ibn cAmr’s pursuit of the ḥanīfīya, the religion of Abraham, takes him from pagan Mecca and across the whole of Iraq before his meeting with a Christian monk at Balqā’, in Syria. The monk then reveals to Zayd that he is “seeking a religion that no one today can guide you toward, but the time has drawn near when a Prophet will arise in your own homeland. He will be dispatched with the ḥanīfīya, the dīn ‘Ibrāhīm, so you should follow it, for he is about to be sent and his time is at hand.”Footnote 30

As demonstrated by the example of Zayd ibn cAmr, these vignettes are highlighted by acknowledgements of the predestined arrival of Muḥammad by pagan, Jewish and Christian observers. Uri Rubin has suggested a highly biblical framework that consciously situates Muḥammad in an ancient pattern of prophetic annunciation.Footnote 31 Among the various groups that recognize the advent of this new Arabian prophet, Christians appear to be the most receptive to the message. The episodes are not solely cast in the Sīra as a foretelling of Muḥammad’s future emergence, but rather at times they entail a recognition of the Prophet in his own lifetime. Both the well-known story of BaḥīrāFootnote 32 and the account of Salmān’s conversion fall into this latter category. It is of some note that both the Ṭabaqāt al-Kabīr of Ibn Sacd (d. 845) and the Ḥilyat al-Awliyā’ of Abū Nucaym al-Iṣfahānī (d. 1038) provide similar versions of this story in biographical entries for Salmān al-Fārisī.Footnote 33

The exposition begins with Salmān recounting, in first-person narrative style, his youth in the village of Jayy, near Iṣfahān. His early years unfold under the watchful eye of his father, a local dihqān and ardent practitioner of Zoroastrianism (al-majūsīya). Over time Salmān is drawn toward the Christian faith that he sees practiced in the neighboring communities, a move that he himself claims was initially brought about by the beauty of their liturgical chanting (fa-samicatu aṣwātahum fīhā wa hum yuṣallūna).Footnote 34 When Salmān asks the Christians about the foundations of their tradition, they reply that its origins lie “in Syria” (thuma qult lahum: aina aṣl hādhā al-dīn? Qālū: bi-Shām). Salmān then reports staying with the Christians in their church until sunset that evening. Learning that his son spent time in a church, Salmān’s father is outraged. After being scolded by his father for this perceived betrayal of his Magian birthright, he is placed in fetters and forbidden to leave the house, lest these unwelcomed influences continue their advance. Salmān is eventually able to free himself from the shackles and conspire with a group of travelling Christian merchants, who help him escape into the wider world and flee to Syria. Upon his arrival to the Bilād al-Shām, he begins inquiring about men of knowledgeFootnote 35 and suitable places to learn more about Christianity. He is directed to a local bishop (usquf), a man recognized for his erudition in the faith, and he becomes an attendant in the bishop’s church.

In due course however, Salmān discovers that the bishop is “an evil man” (wa kāna rajul sū’), who uses alms money (ṣadaqa) granted to the church for his own personal treasury and withholds funds for the poor. Even as Salmān’s hatred for such an affront is swelling, the corrupt bishop dies and is subsequently replaced by a virtuous appointee. This new master continues the religious education of the young Persian. So profound is the affection between the disciple and teacher that Salmān declares, “I have never seen a man, who was not praying the five prayers that was more righteous (āfḍal), more ascetic (āzhad) in religion, more committed to the Hereafter (ārghib fī al-ākhira), or more constant through night and day, than this man. I loved him more than I had ever before loved another.”Footnote 36

The above passages in the Sīra also reflect the limitations of any uniform interpretation of the monasticism we find in the Qur’ān. Accordingly, in this stage of the narrative Salmān witnesses both the righteous and iniquitous monks. The charge against this first figure, whose refusal to grant alms money to the local Christians prompts Salmān’s castigation of him as an “evil man,” resonates with a negative assessment of monasticism in the Qur’ān. A similar condemnation of such greed is delivered in Sūrat al-Tawbah: “O Believers, many are the rabbis and monks who devour the wealth of the people in falsehood and hinder them from the path of God. To those that gather up gold and silver and do not spend it in the cause of God, announce for them a woeful punishment.”Footnote 37

The concurrence here between the Sīra and the Qur’ān is an excellent example of the dual function of the Ibn Isḥāq text: it is simultaneously an attempt to demonstrate a linear chronology of the Prophet’s Life in biographical fashion as well as to provide exegesis on the holy scripture of the Qur’ān.Footnote 38 Wansbrough has commented on this hermeneutical technique, stating: “In my study of the Muslim haggadah I drew attention to two characteristic narrative techniques employed in the Sīra: exegetical, in which extracts (serial and isolated) from scripture provided the framework for extended narratio; and parabolic, in which the narratio was itself the framework for frequent if not continuous allusion to scripture.”Footnote 39 These juxtapositions of monastic virtues and vices in the Sīra represent a microcosmic view of monasticism in the Qur’ān, providing commentary on the more general verses on the basis of specific episodes from the Life of the Prophet. In effect, the narrative serves as an explanation for both assessments of monasticism in the sacred text. It should also be stressed that the honorable qualities of the monks within the account outweigh the negative sentiments. The disparity here is shown directly through the individual qualities of several righteous monks contrasted with a single immoral example.

Upon the deathbed of his beloved teacher, Salmān is directed to seek out his next virtuous master. At this point in the narrative the dying man explains that most others have abandoned or distorted the true religion (baddalū wa tarakū akthar mā kānū calayhi), so it is necessary to embark on another journey to find the remaining, genuinely righteous men of the faith.Footnote 40 This instruction sets Salmān upon a great circuit of travel, studying with various holy men throughout the region: first to al-Mawṣil, then to Naṣībīn, then on to cAmmurīya in Byzantine territory. The cycle of an aged master pointing the way to distant, further guides is replicated in this portion of the narrative. Upon the death of his teacher in cAmmurīya, Salmān is confronted with the possibility that there are none left who still abide by this spiritual manner of life. Just before expiring, however, the master refers Salman to an unnamed prophet who will arise among the Arabs and whose advent is at hand. It is therefore in this land, the land of the Arabs, that the Persian will finally be able to end his long search for spiritual enlightenment. This prophet, according to the venerable old man, will be dispatched carrying the religion of Abraham (wa huwa mabcūth bi-dīn Ibrāhīm)Footnote 41 and will migrate between two lava fields set among palm groves.Footnote 42

This account detailing the conversion of Salmān al-Fārisī to Islam may, of course, be interpreted in a variety of ways. The proposition that the narrative represents a polemical attitude,Footnote 43 in which Islam is demonstrated to be superior to Christianity—in other words, the final phase in the journey toward true religious fulfillment—is reasonable at first glance. Such would be a powerful admonition of Christianity indeed, coming from the mouths of learned Christian monks themselves. With the details of the text in mind, however, to simply view the story as a polemic leaves much unanswered. The merits of Christianity, after all, are not dealt with explicitly, and there is a notable absence of any kind of theological or christological debate within the narrative.Footnote 44 There is, likewise, no judgment on the institution of monasticism here, the only criticism being that one of these teachers is not conducting his office in a righteous manner. By contrast, the other masters that educate Salmān are overwhelmingly seen in a favorable light. One might expect a straightforward polemic to take a stance on these concerns. In a more nuanced interpretation, Jaakko Hämeen-Anttila has suggested the story is a device detailing the gradual corruption of Christianity in its historical context: while perhaps the great majority of Christians have fallen away from the original teachings of Christ, there endure a select few who adhere to the authentic message. The Christians that guide Salmān are therefore seen as the last remaining “real followers of Christ—growing old and dying out,”Footnote 45 just in time for the next and final revelation to appear. In this respect the proposal by Hämeen-Anttila can be integrated into a model for an early mu’minūn movement, one in which certain groups are included among the “believers,” not on the basis of their theology, but by their pious standard of living. Whereas the argument for a polemical reading of the story insists on a tangible delineation between the two faiths, with one necessarily superseding the other, the contention here leans more toward a synthesis of traditions with a focal point on the ascetics themselves and their manner of living.

It is worth emphasizing that the “guides” along this spiritual sojourn of Salmān are explicitly identified as Christian ascetics. The years spent serving and studying under these various religious masters is ultimately the way in which the path to Islam is slowly revealed. The relationship between Salmān and his teachers is analogous to that of an initiate, or acolyte, and his monastic mentor. The narrative feature of travel between spiritual advisers, with each in turn pointing the way to another source of further illumination, clearly parallels themes found in late antique monastic literature and hagiographies.Footnote 46 The topos of the itinerant ascetic, it has been suggested, may actually represent a certain type of monastic pilgrimage. The wanderer here is not necessarily a peregrinus to a particular shrine or sacred place,Footnote 47 but rather a seeker of knowledge via the peripatetic life. The deliberate quest to make contact with holy people, or at least the prospect of meeting other pious figures along the road, the sharing of their life stories, and the acquisition of wisdom from collective experience are themes that resonate throughout the literature of this period.Footnote 48 Moreover, these figures are acknowledged within the narrative as supreme founts of religious virtue and knowledge. Such a motif occurs throughout sources from late antiquityFootnote 49 and even into the Islamic period in the form of Muslim hagiographical texts.Footnote 50 The defining characteristics of the holy men in this account do indeed correspond to a severity in ascetic practice and wisdom in spiritual affairs. It is likely not a coincidence that a location such as Naṣībīn, or Nisibis, for instance, has been recognized as a premier center of monastic scholarship since antiquity.Footnote 51

As this portion of the narrative comes to a close, an alternate ending is supplied in the form of an isnād traced to cUmar ibn cAbd al-Azīz. The variant account claims that Salmān’s teacher in cAmmurīya does not send him directly to the prophet among the Arabs, but instead to a particular place in Syria where he will find a man of exceeding virtue and miraculous powers. Salmān follows his instructions and finds this man living between two thickets,Footnote 52 periodically healing the masses of the sick and infirm that appear before him. In phrasing that is reminiscent of the travels by the unnamed Arabian prophet,Footnote 53 this holy man “passes between each thicket (yakhruj fī kul sana min hādhihī al-ghayḍa ilā hādhihī al-ghayḍa mustajayzā), where people gather for his curative attention.” When Salmān eventually makes his way through the throngs of witnesses, he inquires of this mystic concerning the dīn Ibrāhīm, the ḥanīfīya, and the narrative takes an unexpected turn. The last lines of the passage state:

The man replied, “you have questioned me about something that people today do not ask about! The time has arrived that a prophet will be sent forth with this religion [the dīn Ibrāhīm] from among the people of the ḥaram. Go to him, and he will deliver it to you.” Then he again entered [into the thicket]. The Messenger of God then said, “if what you have told me is true, O Salmān, then you met Jesus the son of Mary.”Footnote 54

”The Monks Whom Salmān Served” and Fluid Confessional Identities

In the latter, alternate account, at the narrative’s conclusion the figure of JesusFootnote 55 is invoked to provide the seeker, Salmān, with a final set of instructions for his religious quest. The end of the passage then depicts the Persian sitting before the Prophet Muḥammad and relating this story of his encounter with the mystic “between the thickets.” What is in effect being described here is a continuum of revelation on the basis of this ḥanīfīya, from the Prophet Abraham, through Jesus, and culminating in the message of Muḥammad. Quite literally, in the case of this last passage, Jesus is depicted as pointing the way to Islam. The wise teachers of Salmān are, likewise, represented as junctures along this spiritual path, apparently without regard to denominational constraints. It is only by virtue of Salmān’s long spiritual journey as a monastic acolyte amongst these pious Christians that his position as a ṣaḥābī, or Companion, comes to be realized. The quest for the ḥanīfīya, or the purest expression of ancient monotheism, is at the heart of this sojourn. In its Qur’ānic context the ḥanīfīya is itself entirely devoid of confessional affiliations, as demonstrated by the following lines of Sūrat Āl cImrān:

O People of the Book, why do you argue about Abraham when both the Torah and the Gospel were not revealed until after him? Have you no sense? Indeed you have argued about things of which you have some knowledge. Must you now argue about that which you know nothing? God knows, but you know not. Abraham was neither Jew nor Christian. He was a ḥanīfān muslimān and not an idolater.Footnote 56

In post-Qur’ānic Arabic terminology the ḥanīfīya tends to be synonymous with true belief, or with being a Muslim, while the community itself is sometimes referred to as al-ḥanīfa.Footnote 57 The concept of a continuum of revelation applies here in that all of the prophets from antiquity to Muḥammad revealed this same message, though it was distorted over the ages by both the Jews and Christians.Footnote 58 If Christian monks, or at least factions within the monastic fold, were understood by the early Muslim community to represent some of the few remaining repositories of this ancient tradition, it stands to reason that they were also seen as occupying an “intermediate phase” along the continuum. The statement offered by al-Ṭabarī, namely that monks are spiritually akin to “true believers” because of their rigorous and solemn devotion,Footnote 59 further explains the early Muslim interest in these men. Such would indicate a fluid religious environment in which confessional distinction was of less concern than the level of personal piety demonstrated by a particular individual or institution. This in-between stage regarding the perception of monasticism appropriately parallels the presentation of ascetic teachers in the narrative of Salmān. They appear for the acolyte as a middle ground or transitional level of spiritual awareness, serving as necessary points of guidance along the path to Islam.

Aside from the traditional reverence for the “holy man” that permeated late antique confessional divides, the principal motif of piety that is so fervently stressed within the Qur’ān,Footnote 60 by virtue of terms like birr and taqwā,Footnote 61 may provide an additional basis for a laudatory appraisal of Christian monasticism amongst early Muslims. This is surely the case with the exposition of al-Ṭabarī concerning monasticism. Though the terms ruhbān Footnote 62 and rahbānīya Footnote 63 occur in only a few passages within the Qur’ān itself, there is again the caveat of determining a harmonized scriptural assessment of the monastic institution.Footnote 64 Thus, we find in these Qur’ānic allusions what appear to be both positive and negative evaluations of the monastic station. As Christian Sahner has expressed in sharp terms: “We see the Qur’ānic monk as both hero and villain: a loyal follower of Jesus and Muḥammad, but also a perverter of the true Christianity.”Footnote 65 The Sīra, in its capacity as scriptural exegesis, provides a model for these conflicting views. Still, there does seem to exist a particular connection between the Muslim umma and their monastic counterparts from the earliest stages of the Prophet’s movement. These communities subscribed to remarkably similar ideas of religious devotion; chief among them an uncompromising and demanding sense of personal piety.

Adding to the complexity of the early Muslim perception of monasticism are cases in which the institution appears to be condemned, or at least specifically prohibited within Islam.Footnote 66 A certain ḥadīth Footnote 67 is commonly cited as a proof for the denunciation of monasticism by the Prophet Muḥammad, which states, “There is no monasticism in Islam (lā rahbānīya fī’l-Islām), the monasticism of this community is jihād.”Footnote 68 This reproach, as Massignon has argued,Footnote 69 is not necessarily directed against the religious merits of monasticism itself, but may rather represent a criticism of the social values attached to the monastic lifestyle. The primary affront in this case is the institution of celibacy within ascetic circles. It is on this basis that Ibn Sacd rejected monasticism as an innovation within Islam (al-rahbānīya al-mubtadaca), likewise expressly due to the connection to an “un-married life” as it existed in its Christian parameters.Footnote 70

Massignon has, moreover, argued against the authenticity of this ḥadīth, claiming that it appears to have come into use no earlier than the middle to late second century of the Islamic era.Footnote 71 The reasoning behind Massignon’s rejection of the ḥadīth, in its varied incarnations, is that the statement apparently comes into common acceptance at a time when Muslim polemics concerning Christianity were on the rise. Given the historical context suggested by Massignon, the statement could be understood as forming part of a larger theological reproof against rival confessions. He suggests, furthermore, that the “lā rahbānīya” statement may have a connection to criticisms against the emerging Sufi traditions, stemming from the more conservative elements, on the basis of potential influences from foreign imports. Given the similarities between Christian and early Muslim ascetic practices, a statement such as this against monasticism could have concurrently served as a denunciation of Sufism and other mystical/ascetic developments within Islam.Footnote 72

In contrast to the more controversial and potentially negative ḥadīth elements mentioned, the twelfth-century exegete al-Zamakhsharī discusses the impetus behind the development of monasticism in a most affirmative manner. This section within the Kitāb al-Kashshāf provides commentary on verse 27 of Sūrat al-Ḥadīd, which includes the statement: “As for monasticism, they instituted themselves (ibtadcūhā).”Footnote 73 The verse has been alternatively interpreted as evidence for the incompatibility between monasticism and Islam, in that it is an artificial and unnecessary “innovation” to religious life. The dissenting explanation of monasticism, provided by al-Zamakhsharī, is two-fold: first, it represents a withdrawal into the spiritual in an attempt to distance oneself from external temptations (fitan); and second, it is a necessary device to avoid persecution in the early years of the church.Footnote 74 Within this historical context some members of the community had to seek refuge in the mountains and outlying areas. It was in this tradition of flight or retreat that the concept of monasticism first originated, according to al-Zamakhsharī’s understanding. While not mandated directly by God, those who initiated this lifestyle were simply trying to please him.Footnote 75

Of particular interest is that al-Zamakhsharī uses the term “believers” (mu’minūn) when referring to the pious followers of the teachings of Jesus, those that were forced into virtual self-exile as a means of escaping oppression.Footnote 76 In other words, the exegete acknowledges that many of these “true believers” resorted to the monastic lifestyle in an effort to preserve their religion. This religion, the dīn cIsā in its purest form, is consonant with the teachings of both Abraham and Muḥammad in the framework of the ḥanīfīya. The “disobedient” referred to in the verse, the fāsiqūn, are those who failed to uphold their contract with God. The idea of monasticism therefore holds considerable merit and is seen as a binding agreement between man and the divine, worthy of reward when faithfully practiced, yet reprimanded when the terms of the monastic station are not carefully observed.Footnote 77

Muqātil ibn Sulaymān (d. 767), in an elucidation of a seemingly unrelated passage in the Qur’ān (v. 87 within Sūrat al-Mā’idah), provides an example from the life of Muḥammad that appears specifically to prohibit severe versions of asceticism as a part of his community.Footnote 78 The Qur’ānic verse in question states: “O you who have believed, do not prohibit the good things which God has made lawful for you (mā ‘āḥalla Allāh lakum), and do not transgress. Verily, God does not like transgressors.”Footnote 79 Muqātil then cites a ḥadīth in which several of the Prophet’s leading Companions, among them cAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib and cUmar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb, attempt to express rigorous piety by refusing food, maintaining an abstinence from women (their wives), and wearing course garments. Going even further, the group intends to set up monastic cells (yabnū ṣawāmica) and take up the monastic life (fa-yatarahhabū fīhā). The Prophet discovers their plans and promptly issues the following injunction: “He who does not follow my example (sunna) is not one of mine…. Our sunna concerns clothing, eating, and [taking] wives. Whoever averts this sunna, he does not belong to me.”Footnote 80

The citation above clearly serves as another example from the ḥadīth corpus that seeks to restrict the influence of extreme asceticism within the Muslim community. Sara Sviri has examined this type of material and concluded that there was indeed a trend within early Islam to denounce monasticism.Footnote 81 For Sviri the strong stance against monasticism reflects the highly aggressive mentality of the early umma, as the traditionally monastic preference for being non-combatants and engaging in spiritual withdrawal from the material world would have been seen as anathema to a militaristic society.Footnote 82 As Massignon suggests, however, there are reasons to believe that this negative view of monasticism appears rather late in the Islamic tradition and may have held ulterior purposes beyond just admonishing Christian asceticism. Additionally, it may be suggested that a key component within the ḥadīth provided by Muqātil has been undervalued. While the centerpiece of the tradition is, of course, the Prophet’s mandate concerning the sunna, one can also find a subtle indication of the early view of monasticism as demonstrated by some of the Companions. Within their understanding, the truly pious existence could perhaps be achieved by emulating the example of monastic life (fa-yatarahhabū fīhā).Footnote 83 Though spurned by the Prophet in this instance, the episode may reveal an early Muslim inclination toward a connection between the monastic station and radical piety.

Going back to the explicit admiration for the ruhbān in verse 82 in Sūrat al-Mā’idah, al-Ṭabarī insists that the positive appraisal is founded upon three main monastic characteristics: their absolute dedication to religious observance, in this case by withdrawing to monasteries and hermitages apart from the secular world, the presence of a learned class among them who focus on holy scripture, and their resolute humility.Footnote 84 Muqātil ibn Sulaymān likewise provides an exposition of verse 82 from Sūrat al-Mā’idah. In the explanation he suggests that when the word ruhbān appears in scripture it is to be understood as “those pious men of the cells” (mutacabbid aṣḥāb al-ṣawāmica),Footnote 85 “those who do not act pridefully in matters of faith” (lā yatakābirūna can al-īmān).Footnote 86 The foremost characteristics of the monk, therefore, appear to transcend the boundaries of confessional distinction by virtue of his righteousness, with his piety consistently emphasized. The monk was understood as a standard of devoutness par excellence in the late antique world, and the image remained virtually unchanged in the Islamic period, with an appreciation for the wisdom and piety of the monk being transferred into a new religious matrix. Some of these men would have remained exemplars for an extreme version of righteous behavior, though perhaps not for all Christians, or even for all Christian monks. Since the development of the early umma would have been predicated on precisely this tenet, it stands to reason that these monastic figures would have held significant influence in its pietistic orientation, which would suggest the idea of a “believers’ movement.” The aforementioned ḥadīth, in which the Companions attempted to model their own devotional behaviors within a monastic framework, would substantiate this idea.

As has been shown, in al-Zamakhsharī’s use of the term mu’minūn, for example, the connection between groups of “believers,” Muslims, and Christian monks would surely hold the capacity to transcend confessional boundaries in the early stages of Islam. The monks that the exegete references in his commentary of Sūrat al-Ḥadīd are marked by their devotion and “true belief” with precisely the same term often utilized in the Qur’ān to depict the fledgling Muslim umma. This bond amongst such communities would have been forged from their most general and mutual understanding of the importance of rigorous devotion in worship and way of life. These types of figures, it can be argued, are represented in the narrative of Salmān as paragons of righteousness, regardless of the fact that they are acknowledged to be Christians.

This brings us full-circle back to the construct of the “believers” movement and the shared notions of piety between religious groups. What precisely this piety meant for the early Islamic community is explained by Donner in Narratives of Islamic Origins: The Beginnings of Islamic Historical Writing, where it is defined within its Qur’ānic context. According to Donner, the overriding concern in Muslim holy scripture is that humankind has a duty to be pious “as a religious obedience—which, in the Qur’ānic terms, means submission (islām) to God’s revealed law for men: belief in one God and the Last Judgment, performance of basic ritual duties—prayer, fasting, righteous and modest manner.”Footnote 87 The theme of piety and morality is such a constant one, in terms of its absolute injunction within the Qur’ān, that it may be concluded that this was indeed “the essence of Muḥammad’s message.”Footnote 88

As put by al-Jāḥiẓ in his Thalāth Risā’il, when Sūrat al-Mā’idah speaks of monks in laudable terms it is referring to precisely “the likes of those monks whom Salmān had served.”Footnote 89 These figures, according to the commentary of al-Jāḥiẓ, are distinct from the reprehensible Christians who have taken a distinctly confessional stance. In this sense the Christians of Salmān defy categorization along confessional lines, even within the confines of Christian sectarianism itself. It would, therefore, be reasonable to think that these kinds of pious monks were also capable of traversing larger confessional barriers, those of a more inter-religious nature, and that they continued to be interpreted as idealized beacons of righteousness into the early Islamic period. If we take Donner’s suggestion that “the community of Believers was originally conceptualized independent of confessional identities…. Believers could be members of any one of several religious confessions—Christians or Jews, for example—if the doctrines of their religious confession were consonant with strict monotheism and not too inimical to the Believers’ other basic ideas,”Footnote 90 then the monks of Salmān would surely figure into such a movement and perhaps provide an additional lens into the appreciation of monasticism by early Muslims. In the narrative of Salmān’s conversion, these men serve as paradigms for an intermediary phase between the twilight of authentic Christianity and emerging Islam. Their uncompromising manner of asceticism, austerity, wisdom, and piety parallel the concerns of an early “believers” movement, unhindered by confessional allegiances. Bearing this contextual framework in mind, it should be quite reasonable from the standpoint of an early Muslim audience to accept that Christian monks, long seen as individual exemplars of righteousness, would ultimately reveal the spiritual path to Islam.

References

1 In part, these types of travels between late antique monastic communities were undertaken with the intention of collecting the wisdom of various sages and composing biographies of regional religious authorities. Such was the case with the fifth-century Lausiac History of Palladius and the Historia Religiosa of Theodoret, among others. See the discussion of “Desert Ascetics and Distant Marvels” in Georgia Frank, The Memory of the Eyes: Pilgrims to Living Saints in Christian Late Antiquity (Berkeley and Los Angeles, California: University of California Press, 2000) 35–78. For Christian ascetics of the period this “wandering” was perhaps also a method of imitatio Christi, taking scenes of travel in the life of Christ and the apostles as the highest form of religious devotion. See Caner, Daniel, Wandering, Begging Monks: Spiritual Authority and the Promotion of Monasticism in Late Antiquity (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 2002) 14Google Scholar. For the connection between knowledge and travel in the pre-Christian era, see Scott, Ian W., “The Divine Wanderer: Travel and Divination in Late Antiquity,” in Travel and Religion in Late Antiquity (ed. Harland, Philip; Waterloo, ON: Wilford Laurier University Press, 2011) 101–22.Google Scholar

2 Fred Donner articulated this idea in the article “From Believers to Muslims: Confessional Self-Identity in the Early Islamic Community,” al-Abhath 50–51 (2002–2003) 9–53, and later expanded the concept into a full monograph entitled, Muhammad and the Believers: At the Origins of Islam (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2010).

3 See Horovitz, Josef, “Salmān al-Fārisī,” Der Islam 12. 3–4 (1922) 178–83CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Massignon, Louis, Salmân Pâk et les prémices spirituelles de l’Islam iranien (Tours: Arrault, 1934)Google Scholar.

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7 A significant amount of scholarship has been composed on this subject. See Brown, Peter, “The Rise and Function of the Holy Man in Late Antiquity,” Society and the Holy in Late Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982) 103–52Google Scholar; Kirschner, Robert, “The Vocation of Holiness in Late Antiquity,” Vigiliae Christianiae 38 (1984) 105–24CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Vööbus, Arthur, A History of Asceticism in the Syrian Orient: A Contribution to the History of Culture in the Near East, Vols. I & II, (Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium; Louvain: Secrétariat du Corpus, 1958–60Google Scholar); Brock, Sebastian, “Early Syrian Asceticism” in Numen 20 (April, 1973) 1–19CrossRefGoogle Scholar, in addition to several works relating to the Syrian Church.

8 See Fred Donner, “From Believers to Muslims,” at 19–21. The core beliefs are mentioned as well in Donner’s Muhammad and the Believers: At the Origins of Islam, which is an expansion of the original article. It should, however, be conceded here that the “believers” model is not without its critics. See Hoyland, Robert, “Reflections on the Identity of the Arabian Conquerors of the Seventh-Century Middle East,” Al-cUṣūr al-Wusṭā 25 (2017) 113–40Google Scholar, in which the author challenges the notion of a non-confessional, monotheistic society within the foundational period of Islam.

9 Fred Donner, Muhammad and the Believers, 60–61.

10 Ibid., 66–67.

11 Ibid., 61.

12 Ibid., 66.

13 The central argument in the “believers” thesis suggests that fluidity in inter-religious discourse from this era corresponds to, or perhaps yields, the systematic development over time of a more clearly defined perception of confessional distinction within the early Islamic community. This formula is in relative accord with the conventional assessment of the hardening sectarian lines which, though undergoing a process of formulation and delineation in the Umayyad period, appear to have been fundamentally realized in the transition from Umayyad to Abbasid authority in the middle of the eighth century. The “believers” proposition can therefore ultimately be viewed as an important contribution to the analysis of the rise and establishment of Islam within a dynamic late antique religious context. Such a claim would correspond with assessments by historians such as Averil Cameron and Peter Brown, which tended to interpret and historically situate the rise of Islam in its perceived indigenous context within late antiquity—that of an intellectually vibrant, religiously diverse and complex, ascetic and eschatologically-minded culture of the Near East.

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15 Ofer Livne-Kafri, “Early Muslim Asceticism and the World of Christian Monasticism,” 105–107.

16 al-Ṭabarī, Jāmi’ah al-bayān can ta’wīl al-Qur’ān (15 vols.; Egypt: Dār al-Macārif) 10:505.

17 Ibid.

18 Qur’ān, Sūrat al-Mā’idah, v. 82 (5:82).

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21 The Melkites and Jacobites are also specifically targeted by the ninth-century theologian Abū cĪsā al-Warrāq. See Early Muslim Polemic against Christianity: Abū cĪsā al-Warrāq’s “Against the Incarnation,” (ed. David Thomas; Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002).

22 Meyendorff, John, Imperial Unity and Christian Divisions, The Church 450–680 A.D. (Crestwood, New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1989) 83Google Scholar.

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28 See Rubin, Uri, “Hanifiyya and Kacb—An Inquiry into the Arabian Pre-Islamic Background of the dīn ‘Ibrāhīm,” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 13 (1990) 85–112Google Scholar. Montgomery Watt has suggested that the original name for the movement founded by Muḥammad was not Islam, but rather tazakkī, or “righteousness.” It is after the Hijra that the most numerous references to a community of mu’minūn begin to occur. It appears that in the early terminology of “believers,” Jews would have been included under this general rubric. During the period of the Prophet’s break with the Jews of Medina, he claimed to have been following the religion of Abraham, the ḥanīfīya; and the Prophet’s religion may have been called exactly that for some time afterward. See Watt, , Muhammad at Medina (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977) 301–302Google Scholar.

29 Wellhausen, Julius, Reste arabischen Heidentums (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1961) 234CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cf. Hawting, The Idea of Idolatry, 27.

30 Ibn Hisham, al-Sīra al-Nabawiyya (ed. Mustafa al-Saqqa et al.; 4 vols.; Beirut: Dar al-Khayr, 1997) 1:186.

31 Rubin, The Eye of the Beholder, 21–22.

32 See Barbara Roggema, The Legend of Sergius/Baḥīrā.

33 Sacd, Ibn, Kitāb al-Ṭabaqāt al-Kabīr, al-Ṭabaqat al-‘Ūla, (11 vols; Cairo: Maktabat al-Khānjī, 2001) 4:69–79Google Scholar. The similarity in narrative is not altogether surprising given that both al-Ṭabarī and Ibn Sacd owed much of their maghāzī material, or “exploits of the Prophet,” as well as the mubtada’, or “beginnings,” to Ibn Isḥāq via his student Salamah. See Gregor Schoeler, The Biography of Muḥammad: Nature and Authenticity, 32. Abū Nucaym al-Iṣfahānī, Ḥilyat al-Awlīyā, (11 vols.; Beirut: Dār al-Fikr, 1967–68) 1:190–95.

34 Ibn Hisham, Sīra, 1:173.

35 Ibid., 1:174. The precise question uttered by Salmān is: “man afḍal ahl hādhā al-dīn cilmān?”

36 Ibid.

37 Qur’ān, Sūrat al-Tawbah, v. 34 (9:34).

38 Gordon D. Newby, The Making of the Last Prophet: A Reconstruction of the Earliest Biography of Muhammad, 2–4. Newby suggests that the exegetical nature of the Sīra is particularly concerned with the middle portion of the text. This section known as the Kitāb al-Mubtada’, or the “Book of Sending Forth,” is “a commentary on the Bible as well as a commentary on the Quran.”

39 Wansbrough, John, The Sectarian Milieu: Content and Composition of Islamic Salvation History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978) 2Google Scholar.

40 Ibn Hisham, Sīra, 1:175.

41 Ibid.

42 Ibid. While the details here clearly serve as an allusion to the eventual Hijra of Muḥammad, it could also be a foreshadowing of the description of the “holy man moving between two thickets” that is to come at the end of the narrative.

43 For the rise of Christianity in Muslim polemics, see Mann, Jacob, “An Early Theologico-Polemical Work,” Hebrew Union College Annual 12–13 (1937–1938) 417–43Google Scholar. Additionally, there is a systematic assessment of medieval Muslim arguments to counter Christianity in Lazarus-Yafeh, Hava, “Some Neglected Aspects of Medieval Muslim Polemics against Christianity,” The Harvard Theological Review 89.1 (1996) 61–84CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

44 Hämeen-Anttila, 118.

45 Ibid., 124.

46 See discussion of “Desert Ascetics and Distant Marvels” in Frank, Georgia, The Memory of the Eyes (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000) 35–78CrossRefGoogle Scholar. This journey also recalls the conversion story of Kacb al-Aḥbār, which involves travelling and studying under various Jewish scholars to finally reach Islam. See Ibn Sacd, Ṭabaqāt, 8:2, 156 on biographical form. For an analysis of Kacb’s conversion, see both Perlmann’s, Moshe “The Legendary Story of Kcab al-Aḥbār’s Conversion to Islam,” in The Joshua Starr Memorial Volume (New York: The Conference on Jewish Relations, 1953) 85-99Google Scholar, and “Another Kcab al-Aḥbār Story” in The Jewish Quarterly Review 45.1 (1954) 48-58.

47 Dietz, Maribel, “Itinerant Spirituality and the Late Antique Origins of Christian Pilgrimage,” Travel, Communication and Geography in Late Antiquity: Sacred and Profane, ed. Ellis, Linda and Kidner, Frank (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2004) 125-134Google Scholar, at 126. Dietz suggests that the instabilitas aspect of pilgrimage was the ritual in and of itself, without regard to an explicit destination. This is “monastic” in the sense of a retreat from the familiar and dedication to the hardships of a wandering life.

48 Ibid., 127–29. Mun’im Sirry has discussed a rather analogous phenomenon in medieval Muslim hagiography, where the pious seeker reaches a pinnacle of asceticism through direct contact with an imminent teacher. See Sirry, Mun’im, “Pious Muslims in the Making: A Closer Look at the Narratives of Ascetic Conversion,” Arabica, T. 57, Fasc. 4 (2010) 437–54CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The “conversion” here is not, however, between confessional traditions, but rather a movement within traditional Islam toward a more ascetic or “Sufi” lifestyle.

49 See Sizgorich, Thomas, “Narrative and Community in Islamic Late Antiquity,” Past and Present, 185 (2004) 9–42CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at 11. The quote from Sizgorich specifically refers to Muḥammad’s encounter with the monk Baḥīrā, but it applies here as well: “…these narratives employ a figure—the monk—which had been recognized and acknowledged for more than four centuries in communities of variant confessional alignments as a discerner of truth and godliness to support truth claims crucial to early Muslim programmes of communal self-fashioning.”

50 See Suleiman Mourad, “Christian Monks in Islamic Literature,” 81–98.

51 See Vööbus, Arthur, History of the School of Nisibis, Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium, Subsidia 26 (Louvain: Secrétariat du CorpusSCO, 1965)Google Scholar as well as Becker, Adam, Fear of God and the Beginning of Wisdom: The School of Nisibis and Christian Scholastic Culture in Late Antique Mesopotamia (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The story of the temporary conversion to Christianity of the Jewish philosopher David b. Merwān al-Mukkammaṣ (d. 937) takes place in Nisibis under a prominent Christian teacher. See Jacob Mann, “An Early Theologico-Polemical Work,” 417–18.

52 The word in the Sīra here is ghaiḍatayn, with the dual ending. Identical terminology is preserved in the Ibn Sacd, Ṭabaqāt, 4:74.

53 The dual is utilized in both cases, with the terms ḥarratayn (“two lava fields”) and ghaiḍatayn (“two thickets”) respectively, accompanied by terms indicating motion between these areas. Ibn Hisham, Sīra, 1:178.

54 Ibn Hisham, Sīra, 1:179.

55 For the differing views on the life, and death, of Jesus in the Islamic tradition, see Reynolds, Gabriel Said, “The Muslim Jesus: Alive or Dead,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 72.2 (2009) 237–58CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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57 De Blois, François, “Naṣrānī (Ναζωραῖnos) and ḥanīf (ἐθνικόσ): Studies on the Religious Vocabulary of Christianity and Islam,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 65.1 (2002) 1–30Google Scholar, at 18. Waardenburg provides a similar assessment in the use of the term ḥanīfīyya, as one of the original names for the movement, which was not only a reaction against the paganism of Mecca, but also a “reform movement’ with regard to the local Christian and Jewish communities. See Waardenburg, Jacques, “Towards a Periodization of Earliest Islam According to Its Relations with Other Religions,” The Qur’an: Style and Contents (ed. Rippin, Andrew; The Formation of the Classical Islamic World 24; Aldershot: Ashgate Variorum, 2001) 93–116Google Scholar, at 102.

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61 For a discussion on the nuance of these terms, see Rahman, Fazlur, Major Themes of the Qur’an (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009) 29Google Scholar, 61, 110, and 137.

62 Qur’ān, Sūrat al-Mā’idah, v. 82 (5:82); Sūrat al-Tawbah, v. 31 and 34 (9:31, 9:34).

63 Qur’ān, Sūrat al-Ḥadīd, v. 27 (57:27).

64 Beck, Edmund, “Das Christliche Mönchtum Im Koran,” Studia Orientalia 13.3 (1946) 3–29Google Scholar; Sahas, Daniel, “Monastic Ethos and Spirituality and the Origins of Islam,” in Acts of the XVIIIth International Congress of Byzantine Studies (ed. Ševçenko, Iho et al.; Sheperdstown, WV: Byzantine Studies Press, 1996) 27–39Google Scholar; Sviri, Sara, “Wa-Rahbāniyatan Ibtadcūhā: An Analysis of the Traditions Concerning the Origins and Evaluation of Christian Monasticism,” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 13 (1990) 195–208Google Scholar; See also section on the “Vocation of Monasticism,” in Massignon, Louis, Essay on the Origins of the Technical Language of Islamic Mysticism (trans. Clark, Benjamin; Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1997) 98–104Google Scholar.

65 Sahner, “Islamic Legends about the Birth of Monasticism,” 294–395.

66 See Sarah Sviri, “Wa-Rahbāniyatan Ibtadcūhā,” 195–201 as well as El-Badawi, Emran, “From ‘Clergy’ to ‘Celibacy’: The Development of Rahbānīyyah Between the Qur’ān, Ḥadīth and Church Canon,” Al-Bayān 11.1 (2013) 1–14Google Scholar.

67 One of the earliest incarnations of this statement comes from the Kitāb al-ṭabaqāt al-kabīr of Ibn Sacd.

68 Ibn Sacd, Ṭabaqāt, 5:70. For a comprehensive explanation of this nuanced term jihād, see Firestone, Reuven, “Jihād,” The Blackwell Companion to the Qur’ān (ed. Rippin, Andrew and Mojaddedi, Jawid; Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2006) 376–388Google Scholar. In essence, Firestone argues that Jihād can take on a range of meanings and can be applied to different kinds of action. It easily becomes a religiously laden term because it represents the most basic ethical message of religion, that one must strive to do the good by overcoming the bad. The term jihād is frequently used as part of this idiomatic expression “in the path of God” to convey a sense of deep religious commitment to certain defined acts of devotion. Though in particular usage this term can be applied to the concept of war in defense of Islam and the community, it can also be employed in a more general sense, referring to “religious piety.” Early variations of this ḥadīth are reported by cAbdallāh ibn al-Mubarāk (d. 797) in the Kitāb al-Jihād in the following two formats: “Every community has its monasticism (li-kull umma rahbānīya), and the monasticism of this community is jihād in the path of God (fī sabīl Allāh)” and “A person mentioned itinerant asceticism (al-sīyāḥa) in front of the Prophet, to which the Prophet replied: “God has given to us instead jihād in the path of God, and the extolment of God (takbīr) throughout every lofty place.” See cAbdallāh ibn al-Mubarāk, Kitāb al-Jihād (ed. Nazīh Ḥammād; Mecca, 1978) 37–38.

69 See section on the “Vocation of Monasticism” in Massignon, Essay on the Origins of the Technical Language of Islamic Mysticism, 98–104.

70 Ibid. cf. Goldziher, Ignaz, Introduction to Islamic Theology and Law (trans. Andras, and Hamori, Ruth; Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1981) 134–36Google Scholar.

71 Massignon, Essay on the Origins of the Technical Language of Islamic Mysticism, 99.

72 Ibid., 99–100.

73 The traditional rendering of the full v. 27 of Sūrat al-Ḥadīd follows: “As for monasticism, they instituted themselves (ibtadacūha), We did not prescribe it for them except that they were seeking to please God; but they did not observe it faithfully (fa-mā racawhā ḥaqq ricāyatihā). So We rewarded those among them who are true believers; but many of them are disobedient (wa kathīr minhum fāsiqūn).”

74 al-Zamakhsharī, , Kitāb al-Kashshāf can ḥaqā’iq ghawāmiḍ al-tanzīl wa cuyūn al-aqāwīl fī wujūh al-ta’wīl (6 vols.; Riyadh: Maktabat al-cUbaykān 1998) 6:52–53Google Scholar.

75 al-Zamakhsharī, Kitāb al-Kashshāf, 53. The commentary then goes on to explain that on a grammatical level, the phrase in question should be read as “We placed in their hearts compassion and mercy and monasticism…. We did not prescribe it for them except that they should seek, through it, the approval of God.” Edmund Beck further interprets the passage to reflect that Muḥammad, particularly during the early Medinan period, revered the ascetic ideal and monasticism due to the extreme versions of piety exhibited by their devotees. The meaning of the passage is, however, that such radical devotion was ultimately incompatible with human frailty and was therefore not explicitly enjoined to the pious by divine decree. Beck is essentially arguing that while the merits of monasticism were lauded, practical concerns compelled the Prophet to advocate for a more moderate set of parameters for worship. See “Das Christliche Mönchtum Im Koran,” 17–18.

76 Ibid.

77 Ibid.

78 Muqātil ibn Sulaymān, Tafsīr Muqātil ibn Sulīmān (ed. Shiḥātah; 5 vols.; Cairo: al-Hay’ah al-Miṣrīyah al-cAmmah lil-Kitāb 1979) 1:498–99.

79 Qur’ān, Sūrat al-Mā’idah, v. 87 (5:87).

80 Muqātil ibn Sulaymān, Tafsīr, 499. El-Badawi provides an additional report on “proper conduct” from the Majmūcāt al-fatāwā of Ibn Taymīyyah (d. 1328) that utilizes the core lesson from this same ḥadīth to emphasize the stance against celibacy. See El-Badawi, “From ‘Clergy’ to ‘Celibacy,’ ” 9–10.

81 Sviri, “Wa-Rahbāniyatan Ibtadcūhā,” 195–201.

82 Ibid., 201.

83 Muqātil ibn Sulaymān, Tafsīr, 499.

84 al-Ṭabarī, Jāmi’ah al-bayān, 10:505–506. So important was this theme of humility in the practice of asceticism in late antiquity that it became a sort of game between competing hagiographers as to which of their subjects displayed the highest degree of spiritual perfection. See Wortley, John, “The Spirit of Rivalry in Early Christian Monasticism,” Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 33 (1992) 385–404Google Scholar. This characteristic of submission or obedience to the divine is clearly reflected in the Arabic term traditionally employed for “monk,” rāhib, which carries an intrinsic root meaning of “veneration,” “reverence,” “awe,” and perhaps most significantly, “fear.” See Lisªn al-cArab of Ibn Manẓūr’s entry for the root rahiba (vol. V), in which the words khawf (fear) and fajca (fright) are provided as related meanings. al-Ṭabarī likewise provides the definition of rāhib in this section of his commentary as equating to khawf, or “fear of God.” See al-Ṭabarī, Jāmi’ah al-bayān, 10:502. It may even be suggested that this connotation of “fear of the divine” is more heavily pronounced in the Arabic terminology than in other languages from the region, in which the monk can literally be understood as “God-fearer.” Whereas in the typical designations of both µοναχός and the practice of ἀναχωρɛῑν from the Byzantine tradition, and iḥidayē most commonly utilized in Syriac, the emphasis falls on the solitary nature of the monastic existence. In both of these cases the central element, from which the designations arise, concerns a retreat from the material world into spiritual seclusion. Such terminology is discussed in Claire Fauchon, “Les forms de vie ascétique et monastique en milieu syriaque, Ve-VIIe siècles,” Le Monachisme Syriaque, (ed. F. Jullien; Études Syriaques 7; Paris: Geuthner, 2010) 37–63. The Syriac term also carries the sense of celibacy, as the iḥidayē is isolated from both worldly affairs and from the bonds of married life. A virtually analogous term for these consecrated celibates is qaddīshē, or “saints/holy ones.” See Griffith, Sidney, “Asceticism in the Church of Syria: The Hermeneutics of Early Syrian Monasticism,” Asceticism (ed. Wimbush, Vincent J. and Valantasis, Richard; New York: Oxford University Press, 1995) 220–45, at 223Google Scholar.

85 Muqātil ibn Suleimān, Tafsīr, 497.

86 Ibid. The sentiment coincides with certain features within the cycles of Syriac rules for monastic conduct and provides a virtually analogous assessment of the bond between fear, humility, and the pious existence. The regulations imposed on monastic communities by the fourth-century Mār Ephrēm of Edessa, for example, contain the following passage: “It is good for you that you are being educated in the fear (deḥltē) of your masters; and becoming humble (makīk), and chaste (nekhef), and disciplined (maṭkus). Do not become undisciplined.” The sixth-century Rules of Jōḥannan Bar Qūrsos likewise provide guidelines for the initiates that highlight a particular concern over the “fear of God”: “They shall be sent into monasteries to read books and to learn the conduct of the fear of God (deḥlṭ ‘Elohē). For if many send their children to far off countries because of the instruction of this world, how much more fitting it is for those who have set apart and offered their children to God, that they must send them into the holy mountains for spiritual wisdom.” See Vööbus, Arthur, Syriac and Arabic Documents Regarding Legislation Relative to Syrian Asceticism (Papers of the Estonian Theological Society in Exile; Stockholm: ETSE, 1960) 24–50Google Scholar.

87 Fred Donner, Narratives of Islamic Origins, 67.

88 Ibid., 75.

89 al- Jāḥiẓ, Thalāth Risā’il, 14.

90 Donner, “From Believers to Muslims,” 11.