HADITHS AS HISTORICAL SOURCES FOR A BIOGRAPHY OF THE PROPHET Akira GOTO* I The term hadith is used today in both a narrow and broad sense. In the narrow sense of the term, hadiths are traditions that have been incorpo- rated into Islamic law. It is well known that al-Shafi'i (d. 820) ranked such hadiths in the highest position of legal authority next to the Qur'an to guide his followers. As far as they have been admitted as the basis of law, hadith should be considered as valid and true (sahih) traditions, but by the middle of the ninth century, hadith had multiplied into the hundreds of thousands of items. Most of them were considered quite spurious, "weak" or "infirm" so it is said, forcing legal scholars to develop a methodology for selecting just which ones were valid for Islamic law. As a result, several collections of "valid" hadiths were compiled, giving rise to the narrow, legal meaning of the term referring to the traditions that were selected for these authorized collections. adith H in the broader sense therefore indicates the whole body of nar- ratives and commentary on Muhammad that have been handed down through Islamic history. These traditions provide information about the Prophet, the people who lived during his generation, and the society of the time. The present paper will deal with hadiths in this latter sense as sources for study- ing the life of Muhammad and his times. Originally oral in nature, these hadiths have been collected without regard to validity in such work as al- sira al-nabawiya by Ibn Ishaq. Since the eleventh century in which the science of Islamic law became a key part of Islamic learning, the value of valid hadith has been greatly enhanced. Even Ibn Taymiya (d. 1328), a thinker who tried to understand Islam by strictly going back to its starting point, undoubtedly recognized *professor, the University of Tokyo 82 ORIENT HADITHS AS HISTORICAL SOURCES FOR A BIOGRAPHY OF THE PROPHET hadiths recorded in al-sahihayn by al-Bukhari (d. 870) and Muslim (d. 875) as true valid. On the other hand, western scholars of Islam have expressed doubts from the standpoint of the modern science of history about valid hadiths judged to be traditionally correct and some of them have criticized these hadiths as inaccurate ones concerning the words and deeds of the Prophet. Predating such doubts, however, were muslim intellectuals who themselves did not agree with how valid hadiths were selected. According to al-fihrist (The Bibliography) by Ibn al-Nadim (d. 990), the works of Ibn Ishaq (d. 767), the biographer of Muhammad (sahib al-sira), were not rated very highly. Ibn al-Nadim asserted that it was impossible for Ibn Ishaq to get information directly from Fatima bint al-Mundhir, one of his important "informants." Moreover, Ibn al-Nadim indicates that the poems cited in Ibn Ishaq's works were written only for his works, that they include many genealogical errors, and that there are many mistakes due to over-reliance on information from Christians and Jews. Ibn al-Nadim's criticism of Ibn Ishaq was in common with people like al-Bukhari, who sought for valid traditions. Al-Bukhari would not admit a hadith to be valid merely because the name of Ibn Ishaq was written in its isnad. Most of the hadiths that passed through the hands of Ibn Ishaq were estimated to be "weak" (da'if), or at most good (hasan). Therefore, the authorized six collections of valid hadith contain few hadiths gathered by Ibn Ishaq and recorded in his al-sira al-nabawiya. In this way Ibn Ishaq was ignored by the editors of the authorized collections of the ninth century and criticized severely by Ibn al-Nadim, a bibliographer of the tenth century. Was Ibn Ishaq therefore forgotten by Islamic society in the tenth century? The answer is no. Five collections of valid traditions were compiled in the latter part of the ninth century, and al-Nasa'i compiled the sixth at the beginning of the tenth century. It was at this time that a great scholar, al-Tabari (d. 923) became known to the world. In his al-fihrist, Ibn al-Nadim introduced al- Tabari in the sixth chapter concerning legal scholars and called him, with admiration, "a wise man," "a leader of the age," and "a legal scholar of the age." He was appreciated highly as an authority on hadith even during his lifetime (cf. Ibn Hajar) and also during the second half of the tenth century. Today, however, al-Tabari is not generally known as a legal scholar, but rather as the author of voluminous works, called tafsir (cf. al- Vol. XXX-XXXI 1995 83 Tabari: Tafsir) and ta'rikh, which covered history from the time of Adam to the beginning of the tenth century (cf. al-Tabari: Ta'rikh). It is also true that he cited many hadiths recorded in Ibn Ishaq's al-sira al-nabawiya, showing that this renowned legal scholar of the tenth century did not reject Ibn Ishaq. There were other people besides al-Tabari who held Ibn Ishaq's works in high estimation. Both Ibn Qutayba (d. 889) and al-Baladhuri (d. 892), intellectuals in the days when the six collections were compiled, are often found quoting Ibn Ishaq. In a period of one or two generations prior to them, Ibn Ishaq was an important source of information for al-Waqidi (d. 822) and his follower Ibn Sa'd (d. 845), while Ibn Hisham (d. 833) revised Ibn Ishaq's al-sira al-nabawiya, omitting unnecessary information and criti- cizing the quoted poetry. In sum, there were two different currents among muslim scholars in the ninth century concerning the works of Ibn Ishaq, who was active in the middle of the previous century. One was the group of people who sought for valid hadiths and did not hold Ibn Ishaq in very high estimation. The other group consisted of those who used Ibn Ishaq's works as sources for the books they wrote. Therefore, is it accurate to say that intellectuals like al-Tabari, who quoted "weak" hadiths from Ibn Ishaq, totally believed in him? The answer may be no. At present, we can not find a complete version of Ibn Ishaq's al-sira al-nabawiya. Many copies of the book must have existed for some time, but now, all of them have become scattered or lost. We only have about two-thirds of his works, through the al-sira al-nabawiya fortunately revised by Ibn Hisham and quoted passages by al-Tabari and others. However, Ibn Hisham himself seemed not to intend to hand down Ibn Ishaq's al-sira al-nabawiya to posterity, but was intent on diminishing the bad effects caused by the spread of the original versions. He eliminated doubtful, un- believable and useless parts from the original and made notes on the quoted poetry. Ibn Hisham seems not to have much appreciated the scholarship of Ibn Ishaq. It is clear that al-Tabari did not stress accuracy when writing his tafsir and ta'rikh. In his tafsir, when explaining verses from the qur'an, he would include various contradictory hadiths. In other words, it is impossible 84 ORIENT HADITHS AS HISTORICAL SOURCES FOR A BIOGRAPHY OF THE PROPHET to pursue what may be the correct explanation of each verse of the qur'an using al-Tabari's tafsir. On the contrary, one may find various interpreta- tions of the qur'an through his work. His ta'rikh also contains various hadiths describing various historical events, that are contradictory in regard to such basic data as dates and the names of places and people. Hadiths cited from Ibn Ishaq, in most cases, were recorded as possible contradictory examples. In fact, al-Tabari quoted hadiths from Ibn Ishaq's works, not because he judged them to be correct, but because he wanted his readers to estimate the value of each hadith for themselves. Both tafsir and ta'rikh by al-Tabari were voluminous works, but they did not contain all of the hundreds of thousands hadiths which seemed to be current at that time. Al-Tabari selected hadith carefully, though he does not indicate his criteria for his selection. He probably chose them relying upon his own experiential intuition. Al-Tabari's view about hadiths seemed to be the same as Ibn Ishaq's. Ibn Ishaq often introduced a few contradic- tory hadiths about a certain historical event, concluding that only God knew which one was correct. He also did not apparently consider all of the hadiths in his al-sira al-nabawiya to be correct. However, he did not discuss how to select hadiths from among his extensive collection either. He must have used what could be called his "synthetic judgement." The present writer is in no position to evaluate the results of efforts made by various people to put restrictions on the number and the contents of hadiths in their eagerness to find legally valid hadith, but it may well be that we will come across very few valid hadiths interesting enough to include in a body of historical materials for the biographical study of Muhammad and an investigation of the society in which he lived. On the other hand, it is useful for us to know about the existence of such people as Ibn Ishaq and al-Tabari, who gathered hadiths extensively without regard to their ac- curacy when compiling books, even though they were selective according to their own discretion. Many of those various and interesting hadiths will be the subject of this paper. II Both western scholars of Islamic studies and present day muslim scho- lars have relied on various hadiths recorded in Ibn Ishaq's al-sira al-nabawiya Vol. XXX-XXXI 1995 85 and books of others including al-Tabari when studying the life of Muhammad and Arab society of his time. It took Patricia Crone, however, to suggest that such a pursuit may be all for naught in her Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam (cf. Crone: Meccan Trade, pp. 203ff., Part III: Conclusion, 9: The Sources). Crone examines the hadiths related to Chapter 106 of the qur'an called sura quraysh as follows: For the ilaf of Quraysh their ilaf of the journey in winter and summer, so worship the lord of this house, who fed them against a hunger, and gave them security from a fear. In the first place, Crone decries, what is "their ilaf of the journey in winter and summer?" A certain hadith says it means "the hajj in dhu al- hijja and the 'umra in rajab". Another says it is "the migrations of Quray- sh to Ta'if in the summer and their return to Mecca if in the winter." However, many hadiths say they are "trading journeys." Then, where did they go? Various hadiths say various things. For example, "Quraysh would travel by the hot coastal route to Ayla in the winter and by the cool inland route to Busra and Adhri'at in the summer." "Quraysh would go to Syria in the summer and to the Yemen in the winter, when Syria was too cold." Quraysh would go to "Syria in the winter and the Yemen in the summer, when the route to Syria was too hot." "They went to Syria and Ethiopia." "They went to Syria, the Yemen and Ethiopia; or to Syria and Rum, on the one hand, and the Yemen and Ethiopia, on the other; or to Syria, the Yemen, Ethiopia, and Iraq." The third verse of the chapter, "so worship the lord of this house", relates to "journeys" and various reasons are mentioned why they worship. They say "Quraysh are being told to worship God because He enabled them to go on their journeys, thereby securing provisions for Mecca." "They are being told to worship Him instead of travelling, the journeys leaving them no time to do so." "They are being told to worship Him because He put an end to these journeys, Ethiopians and/or others having taken over the provisioning of Mecca." What does it mean by "fed them against a hunger" in the fourth verse? 86 ORIENT HADITHS AS HISTORICAL SOURCES FOR A BIOGRAPHY OF THE PROPHET It means "He enabled Quraysh to provision Mecca." And "this He did by letting Hashim institute the two journeys, or by defeating the Ethiopans so that they could continue to go on these journeys, at any rate by means of these journeys." Others are "the verse refers to a specific famine in Mecca" and "it was the pre-Islamic famine to which Hashim reacted by importing bread from Syria". Or else it was the later famine with which Quraysh were afflicted by God in response to Muhammad's prayer." "In Pre-Islamic times when impoverished families would withdraw to the desert until they died: Hashim put an end to this practice by instituting the two trading journeys." What Crone wants to say here is that there is much variety in hadiths even how to explain this short chapter of the qur'an. Therefore, she argues that it is impossible to understand the phrases of the qur'an correctly and to gather historical facts from hadiths We should admit Crone's gallant efforts to collect various hadiths on the theme, but we can easily find out that there are many contradictory hadiths in explaining these verses of the qur'an, if we just open the related pages of al-Tabari's tafsir. Al-Tabari of the tenth century, took it for granted that he could not get the right meaning of each verse of the qur'- n athrough the, hadiths. It was the premise of his learning. It was also a matter of course among other muslim intellectuals at that time. They understood that they could explain the verses of the qur'an diversely by making most use of various hadiths. They noticed, on the other hand, that it was difficult to define meanings of some terms appearing in the qur'an (cf. Goto: Note II). In this context what Crone says is cor- rect, but it does not mean that those hadiths or any other are of no value as historical sources. Let us follow Crone's argument a little further. It is needless to say that the motif of this chapter titled sura quraysh is ilaf. Several hadiths concerning ilaf are recorded in the works of Ibn Habib (d. 860) and al-Kala'i (d. 1237). According to these hadiths, Hashim, a great-grandfather of Muhammad, went to Syria and received permission to trade from the ruler there and then made ilaf agreements with people on his way back home. Watt (cf. Watt: Mecca) and Hamidullah studied ilaf on the basis of these hadiths. Watt considered the ilaf institution as the basis of Meccan trade. And Hamidullah concluded that just before the rise of Islam, Arabian society was unified under this institution and Mecca was Vol. XXX-XXXI 1995 87 the center of financial operations. The present writer does not agree with these assertions. Crone has also criticized them. She calls the above hadith an "ilaf tradition" and doubts its value. Crone says that most of the hadiths were created to interpret the qur'an, and that the ilaf tradition was created by Ibn al-Kalbi (d. 820) in order to explain the term ilaf which is contained only in Chapter 106. If there were not the word ilaf in the qur'an, the "ilaf tradition" would not have existed and later Islamicists would not have created the "ilaf institu- tion". As Crone insists, among a great number of the hadiths explaining Meccan trader movements in the time of Muhammad, we find no hadith concerning trade carried out under the "ilaf institution." Hadiths concerning ilaf are only the "ilaf tradition" which Crone points out, though its story varies slightly from book to book (cf. Kister: Tamim). There is no eviden- ce that Ibn al-Kalbi created the "ilaf tradition", but it may well be that someone collected various hadiths and made a story from them. In the hadiths the word ilaf is used in the context of the activities of Hashim and people of his generation. Therefore, in the time of Muhammad ilaf was probably not an established institution for Meccan people. Intellec- tuals such as Ibn Ishaq and al-Tabari do not cite the ilaf tradition in their works, because they might not have judged it to be a trustworthy criterion in selecting their hadiths. Crone assumes that storytellers (qass) were behind Ibn al-Kalbi's crea- tions. She says that the qur'an exegesis in the early period was not a product of learning, like al-Tabari's tafsir in the later days, but merely a collection of narratives told by storytellers. And she takes tafsir by Muqatil b. Sulayman (d. 767) or al-Kalbi (d. 763), Ibn al-Kalbi's father, as a typical qur'an exegesis in the early period. She thinks that the words of storytell- ers have no value as historical materials, the "ilaf tradition" being a typical example. J. Wansbrough has already pointed in his book Quranic Studies that most of the hadiths interpreting the qur'an were completed in a certain form by storytellers. Jones also demonstrates that the hadiths of Ibn Ishaq and al-Waqidi were mostly based on storytellers (of Jones). Some hundreds of thousands of hadiths with a certain length and nar- rative style in the ninth century might have been arranged by storytellers 88 ORIENT HADITHS AS HISTORICAL SOURCES FOR A BIOGRAPHY OF THE PROPHET in the seventh and eighth centuries. Crone's argument is valid so far, but it would be rash to conclude that qass created stories without foundation, and that their stories have no value as historical sources. III After the ninth century, biographies of people who handed down hadiths began to be complied in a form arranged by generation. According to at least one such collection written by Ibn Sa'd, the first and second genera- tions of tabi'un had not yet edited any tafsir or any maghazi, but they started gathering traditions composed mainly of genealogies. Ibn al-Nadim introduced books on "history" in Chapter 3 of his al-fihri st. He named Ziyad b. Abihi as the first person who wrote a book on "his- tory." Ziyad b. Abihi was a famous bureaucrat in the time of Mu'awiya and was borne by a prostitute. It was known later that Mu'awiya confessed that his father, Abu Sufyan, was Ziyad b. Abihi's real father. Ibn al-Nadim said that Ziyad b. Abihi wrote a book about his birth for his offspring. Ibn al-Nadim continued to introduce many persons, such as Daghfal, a genealogist (al-nassab) who was already active at the time of Muhammad and visited Mu'awiya as a delegate, al-Bakri, a Christian genealogist, Wiqa' b. al-'Ash'ar, the most proud genealogist, 'Ubayd b. Sharya who was from the Jurhum tribe of Yemen and invited by Mu'awiya, Suhar al-'Abdi who belonged to the 'Uthman party then to the Khariji sect, al-Shargi b. al- Qatami, and Ibn al-Kawwa' of the 'Ali party. Under such titles as al-nassabun and ashab al-akhbar, Ibn Qutayba named almost the same people as Ibn al-Nadim chose. In the latter part of the seventh century, nobody was active among people grouped under the names of ashab al-hadith, ashab al-qira'at and ruwat al-shi'r by Ibn Qutayba. They took an active part later. In the time of political chaos and transition during and after the first and second civil wars, each muslim must have wanted to establish his own social identity. For an Arab a genealogy was most important to prove his identity. Since the names of his father and ancestors were a part of his name, he thought he would become one with his father and ancestors. He tried to survive in a changing society by showing who he was. If his father was a muslim from an earlier time and participated in battles with Vol. XXX-XXXI 1995 89 Muhammad, he could make the most use of his background to strengthen his political and social status. Then, he could ask for protection of rights which could be easily taken away in a disordered society. A nomadic Arab whose father had participated actively in a battle of conquest could attempt to secure various rights including receiving a pension according to his family record. As for a tabi'un, who had nothing to do with Muhammad, no other information was more important than a genealogy traced back to ance- stors who had some connection with Muhammad, his companions, or the leaders in the time of conquest. In the same way, it was necessary for political leaders like Mu'awiya, who tried to manage an disordered Arab society, to have information on each Arab's genealogy. Abu Bakr, the first caliph, was famous for his large personal body of information on Arab genealogies. He was the one who had to organize Arabs for the battle of ridda. After the wars of conquest, when muslim society was split, leaders-to-be wanted experts on genealogy around them. Authorities on nasab mentioned in al-fihrist were at the same time also experts on both akhbar and poetry. Nasab not only means genealogy, but also a collection of records concerning ancestors' achievements (akhbar) and poetry, the form in which genealogies and akhbar were explained and confirmed. We can not find any books written by the early authorities on the nasab recorded in al-fihrist. However, it is known that a part of Ibn Ishaq's al-sira al-nabawiya, written in the middle of the eighth century, consisted of hadiths that included genealogies, akhbar and poetry. On the other hand, in the works of Ibn Sa'd and Ibn Qutayba in the ninth century, most gene- alogies were separated from akhbar and poetry. So it may well be said that the form of early nasab remains in Ibn Ishaq's work. Nasab was necessary for all muslims of that era. They desired nasab to trace their ancestors back as early as possible and to find akhbar on the battle of conquest after Muhammad's death. It is a matter of course that the most important thing among akhbar were items about the battles led by Muhammad and those of ridda and conquest, which have given muslims proof of their various rights. Since every muslim wanted his own nasab, there were many nasabs full 90 ORIENT HADITHS AS HISTORICAL SOURCES FOR A BIOGRAPHY OF THE PROPHET of contradictions. One can always see a certain event from a different angle owing to one's situation. Early oral tradition therefore, was not intended to relate Muhammad's words and deeds, or the meaning of verses in the qur'an. Rather, they were nasabs consisting of poems and historical infor- mation, of which each muslim intended to make good use for confirming his identity in a time of political turmoil. Therefore, as a whole, oral tradition was inconsistent, but by no means incoherent. IV In the middle of the Umayya period, people still had an interest in nasab due to social concerns apart form each muslim's personal and actual interest. It was fashionable to choose information on some certain special topics from the nasabs and compiled the information into one hadith. For example one would choose the names from each akhbar which had something to say about who had participated in battles led by Muhammad. A complete list of names could be compiled, because every descendant of the participants proudly recorded the fact in his nasabs. Thus, lists of participants, that seem to have been compiled by some storeytellers through nasab of each muslim as above mentioned, in various battles under the command of Muham- mad have been handed down to the present. It is known that in the first half of the eighth century several collections of traditions called maghazi were compiled. Maghazi is a record of a battle (ghazwa), but it does not mean that only. The original title of the main part of Ibn Ishaq's al-sira al-nabawiya was probably maghazi. Likewise, akhbar on Muhammad's life or his ancestors was called maghazi. Some maghazis seemed to have embraced events from the time of Muhammad at least to the era of conquest (cf. E. I. n. e. qv. al-maghazi). Maghazi is, as it were, "historiography" of muslim society. Before Ibn Ishaq, the following persons are known as the writers of maghazis: 'Urwa b. al-Zubayr (d. 712); Wahb b. Munabbih (d. 728); Shurahbil b. Sa'd (d. 741); al-Zuhri (d. 742); and Musa b. 'Uqba (d. 758). Their works have been lost. However, Ibn Ishaq obtained information from their maghazis (except Musa b. 'Uqba, his rival), when he compiled his al-sira al-nabawiya. Muslim intellectuals of the first half of eighth century wrote "histories" of various groups of tribes based on the nasab of each muslim. They were Vol. XXX-XXXI 1995 91