Muhammad, The Jews and the Constitution of Medina: Retrieving the historical Kernel
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Paul Lawrence Rose
Abstract
The Constitution of Medina (Kitāb) is perhaps the earliest surviving text of Islam that is accepted as authentic even by most revisionist historians. It embodies crucial material for the history of Muḥammad's relations with the Jews of Medina as well as for the historical emergence of Islam, but its meaning and significance are difficult to ascertain, and it has proven difficult to extract the substantial kernel of historical truth which is contained within it. This article proposes a new method of doing so based on the triangulation of the Sīra narratives, the Qur'ān, and the Kitāb, in which the last may be used as a control on the other sources. The Kitāb itself is analyzed on the basis of R. B. Serjeant's critical dissection of the text into a series of component treaties concluded at various times with the Muslim, Jewish and Munāfiqūn residents of Medina. The particular episode of the Jewish Qaynuqā' tribe and its Munāfiqūn allies is investigated to demonstrate the potential of the method.
© Walter de Gruyter 2011
Articles in the same Issue
- Muhammad, The Jews and the Constitution of Medina: Retrieving the historical Kernel
- Hisham Djait über die „Geschichtlichkeit der Verkündigung Muḥammads“
- Ἁbd al-Raḥmān ibn Rustum al-Fārisī. Une tentative de biographie du premier imam de Tāhart
- Shifting Legal Authority from the Ruler to the ῾Ulamā᾿: Rationalizing the Punishment for Drinking Wine During the Saljūq Period
- Ibn Taymiyya's Criticism of the Syllogism
- Aḥmad Sirhindī: A 21st-century update
- Modernity from Within: Islamic Fundamentalism and Sufism
- Buchbesprechungen
Articles in the same Issue
- Muhammad, The Jews and the Constitution of Medina: Retrieving the historical Kernel
- Hisham Djait über die „Geschichtlichkeit der Verkündigung Muḥammads“
- Ἁbd al-Raḥmān ibn Rustum al-Fārisī. Une tentative de biographie du premier imam de Tāhart
- Shifting Legal Authority from the Ruler to the ῾Ulamā᾿: Rationalizing the Punishment for Drinking Wine During the Saljūq Period
- Ibn Taymiyya's Criticism of the Syllogism
- Aḥmad Sirhindī: A 21st-century update
- Modernity from Within: Islamic Fundamentalism and Sufism
- Buchbesprechungen
