Powers's new monograph Zayd follows his much-debated Muhammad Is Not the Father of Any of Your Men (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009) and investigates the lives of two prominent companions of Muhammad: his freedman Zayd ibn Haritha and Zayd's son Usama. Powers's 2009 monograph argued that at the intersection of the sira narratives of Zayd and the Qurʾan lie the key to unlocking many enigmas in early Islam. To resolve these enigmas, Powers pursued controversial theses regarding the redaction of the Qurʾan and the composition of the earliest traditions on Muhammad. Powers's theses were bold, and he marshalled an even bolder array of evidence to support them. Since this first publication, however, his theses have been disputed far more than acclaimed.
Powers does not answer his critics in Zayd, which neither recapitulates nor summarizes the arguments in his 2009 monograph. Instead, this new book focuses squarely on the narrative traditions of Zayd's life and Q. al-Ahzab 33:36–40, where Zayd's name (alone among Muhammad's companions) appears. This decision, in my view at least, makes Zayd a far superior volume in terms of cogency and readability.
Zayd is a learned and sympathetic biography of Zayd and his son Usama. Powers's enthusiasm and fondness for Zayd's story enlivens his prose, filling the book with compelling analysis and lucid storytelling. Powers’ treatment of the biblical and post-biblical narratives woven into the stories of Zayd and Usama in the sira literature is convincing. He offers modern scholarship one of the most masterful readings of the interrelation of these two traditions ever written.
However, Powers also grasps for grand conclusions that fail to convince and, at times, mischaracterize the evidence. In his introduction, Powers emphasizes that Ibn Hisham (d. ca. 833) features Zayd's numerous exploits in his sira while neglecting the most famous incident (recounted in Q. al-Aḥzab 33:36–40): Following divine command, Muhammad disowns Zayd as an adopted son, whereupon God commands Zayd to divorce his wife Zaynab bint Jahsh so that Muhammad may marry her. Powers's observation that Ibn Hisham includes no narrative of the Zaynab affair as extensive as those found among the exegetes is astute, yet he also overstates the case. Albeit in a rather laconic notice, Ibn Hisham does indeed narrate Zaynab's marriage to Muhammad, as does his source, Ibn Ishaq (d. ca. 767–8).
Furthermore, Ibn Hisham is one author among many. Al-Waqidi (d. 822) transmits an extensive account of the affair, and the Kitāb al-irjaʾ of Hasan bin Muhammad al-Hanafiyya, written around the turn of the eighth century, provides a very early mention of the story, as does Christian theologian John Damascene (written before 750).
Powers is least convincing when he reaches for conspiracies to explain the data. He states, for example, “Zayd and Usama posed” not only “a political threat to the earliest leaders of the Muslim community” but also “a theological threat” (109), but he produces scant evidence for either assertion. No political or theological movement ever arose in Zayd's favor. There was no shiʿat Zayd as there was a shiʿat Ali.
Sometimes, too, Powers's premises are dubious. He assumes that the existence of any surviving son of Muhammad would have compelled early followers to believe that prophecy continued with his progeny. Powers argues that this necessitated not only the stories of Zayd's repudiation as his adopted son but also wholesale passages in the Qurʾan such as Q. al-Aḥzab 33:36–40. For Powers, Zayd's death and repudiation were necessary for the viability of the dogma that Muhammad was the last prophet. Powers's analysis suffers from tunnel vision here, and he never addresses some rather obvious objections. For instance, even if Muhammad had no sons, he certainly had biological grandsons. Other spoilers here are the fadaʾil traditions concerning Umar ibn al-Khattab, which assert that of all the companions, Umar alone was a muhaddath (i.e., able to hear angels’ voices) and list Umar's many muwāfaqāt (i.e., incidents wherein he intuited God's revelation before it was revealed). For such reasons, the Prophet allegedly declared that were there to be a prophet after him, it would have been Umar.
In summary, although Zayd offers some of the most adroit and penetrating readings of the interrelation between the sira literature and the literary heritage of late antiquity, I hazard to say that few in the scholarly community will follow Powers's theses in the concluding chapter.
