Volume 85, Issue 2

This article raises important critical questions about efforts to reconstruct the “sīra” of ʽUrwa ibn al-Zubayr using the methods of isnād criticism, particularly as recently proposed by Gregor Schoeler and Andreas Görke. While al-Zuhrī and occasionally other authorities of his generation can often be persuasively linked with the traditions in question, the reach back to ʽUrwa is generally not convincing (and even less so, the occasional invocation of ʽĀ'isha and claims of “authenticity”). The primary difficulty is that the data of the biographical traditions generally cannot meet the demanding requirements of common-link analysis: their networks of transmission usually are not dense enough to establish sufficiently meaningful patterns beyond the early second century. Moreover, the arguments for ʽUrwa's authorship often require a great deal of optimism regarding the accuracy of certain isnāds and an occasional willingness to accept hypothetically reconstructed lines of transmission or to overlook difficulties in the recorded patterns of transmission. Equally significant is the failure so far of this arduous method to reveal anything particularly “new” about the “historical Muḥammad” that could not otherwise be determined using simpler approaches.

Ahmad ibn Ḥanbal's book al-Zuhd (‘renunciation’) is one of the largest extant collections of renunciant sayings from the first two Islamic centuries. It was assembled by his son ʽAbd Allāh, who contributed about half the sayings in it independently of his father. The extant text is only half or a third of the version available to Ibn Ḥajar in the Mamluk period. Some of what is missing can be recovered from quotations in Abū Nuʽaym, Ḥilyat al-awliyā ʼ. It is notably dominated by data from Basra. Its contents are highly miscellaneous, but rejection of worldly goods appears to be the theme that comes up most often.

One of the most striking characteristics of the quranic text is the prevalence of a permanently led dialogue. Conversations and discussions serve to lay down the teachings of Islam on the one hand and its religious principles on the other. An exemplary case of this procedure is the dialogue between God and the angels. In the course of this article the author analyses this quranic narrative. Furtheron its reception within the islamic discourse is critically reviewed by example of selected classical and modern commentaries on the quran. This analysis finally tries to determine the meaning of the dialogue between God and the angels in all its plurality and to interpret it by comprehending it as a symbol. One issue coming to the fore on the search for additional important layers of meaning is the question, if the angels can be understood as parrhesiastes during their open and honest dialogue with God. This issue is discussed in detail using the hermeneutic method which Michel Foucault (1926–1984) employed in his analysis of discourses and truth.

This paper examines the trade relations between the Islamic world and Korea in the 11th century, specifically looking into the multiple arrivals of Muslim merchants in the Kingdom of Goryeo. Muslim ships and traders conducted vigorous commercial activities on the maritime Silk Road. But their economic and diplomatic extension to the Far East should be analyzed in more detail. The historical documents from the years 1024, 1025 and 1040 could allow new investigations in this field. From these documents it can be concluded that it was not only the changes in the political climate in the Far East, but the growing mutual economic interests that bound medieval Korea to the Muslim world. 100 merchants traveling to Korea in 1024 and 1025, and the merchandise from the different regions listed in 1040, show the clout of Islam before the coming of the western powers in the Far East.