Volume 9, Issue 1

The Qurʾān, as a sacred text, poses distinctive challenges for the historian. The talk will begin by addressing briefly some of these challenges, in particular the limits of what the historian can say about sacred texts like the Qurʾān. The bulk of the talk will then discuss the challenges historians face in understanding the text’s transmission, as revealed both by Muslim tradition and from the evidence of the material record, and what implications the historian might draw from the Qurʾān’s content.

Although Sūrat al-Ikhlāṣ (Q 112) is one of the shortest sūrah s of the Qurʾān, it has led to an extensive commentary on its structure and content in Muslim exegetical literature and in Western scholarship. This article takes the recent attempt to contextualize the sūrah in Western scholarship as a starting point and proposes new evidence for the nature of the religious milieu that shaped its form and content. It posits several “intertexts” of creedal expressions, which shed light on the discursive nature of the sūrah .

The redirection of the qiblah to the Kaʿbah (Q 2:142-5) is redated from 622, very soon after the hijrah where it is placed in the sīrah , to 628 on the eve of the Prophet’s negotiations with the leaders of Mecca at al-Ḥudaybiyah. It is interpreted as a compromise forced on the Prophet, if he was to reach a settlement with the Quraysh. A corollary was God’s authorisation of pilgrimage in pagan fashion and of animal sacrifice at the Kaʿbah (Q 22: 23-38, Q 5: 2-4). The Kaʿbah was redesignated a monotheist sanctuary, on the grounds of its foundation by Abraham (Q 2:125-7, Q 3:96-8, Q 22:28-9). These sūrahs (and an anomalous late passage in Q 14:35-7) are all late. No earlier sūrah associates Abraham with the Kaʿbah.

A great number of qurʾānic passages exhibit demonstrable intersections with Christian traditions, and sometimes the Qurʾān even addresses Christians directly. Guillaume Dye, Tommaso Tesei, and Stephen Shoemaker have recently argued that this is difficult to reconcile with our current lack of evidence for organized Christian communities in the pre-Islamic Ḥijāz. Accordingly, all three scholars maintain that much of the Qurʾān ought to be decoupled from the preaching of Muḥammad (whose historical existence they do not deny). While recognizing the pertinence of the explanatory challenge identified by Dye, Tesei, and Shoemaker, this article suggests that the problem may be somewhat less acute than it is made out to be. The article then proceeds to a critical examination of the alternative scenario for the genesis of the Qurʾān that is offered, in different variations, by Dye, Tesei, and Shoemaker. This scenario is found to give rise to a number of explanatory difficulties of its own that have not so far been satisfactorily addressed. By way of an appendix, the article includes an extended critique of Shoemaker and Dye’s claim that the Jesus-and-Mary pericope in Sūrah 19 most likely reflects a post-conquest Palestinian milieu.

In the opening lines of the sūrah named after the “Romans,” Q Rūm 30, the qurʾānic preacher expresses his solidarity with the “Romans” who had then been defeated by the Persian army. In seeking to better understand these verses, one may start with the question: Who exactly are the “Romans” here? “Roman” was a broad, multifaceted term, as Yannis Stouraitis has lately pointed out, based mainly on sources written after the seventh century and stemming from the Greek-speaking “West” of the Byzantine Empire. In this study, using mainly Syriac sources but also some hitherto unnoticed Greek testimonies coming from the Near East, this semantic variability of the word “Roman” is shown to further expand when going East. Like in most Syriac sources, “Romans” in Q Rūm primarily means members of the Byzantine army (and state apparatus), be they ethnic Greeks, Syrians, or Arabs. At the same time, the “Romans” of this sūrah are all inhabitants, all “citizens” of the Byzantine Empire – not just its armies and magistrates. This latter sense corresponds to the broader sense in which “Romans” is used not only in Syriac, but also in Greek sources (and in other languages of the Late Antique Near East). That broader sense is one that we find in a definition by the Damascene Sophronios of Jerusalem, according to whom “Roman” is anyone “stemming from a city subject to the Romans.” Another qurʾānic passage that refers to the Byzantines (though without naming them), which has very much to do with the same geopolitical context of the Byzantine-Persian wars, Q Māʾidah 5:17, seems to criticize a “Byzantine” confidence in the invincibility of Christ and Mary. Why does the Qurʾān chose to name the Romans when expressing solidarity with them, yet leave them unnamed when criticizing them? Could it be the case that this difference between naming the “Romans” and leaving them unnamed is somehow meant to show that the solidarity with the “Romans,” as declared expressis verbis in the Sūrat al-Rūm, concerns the entire Byzantine world whereas the sharp criticism in al-Māʾidah is not general in the same sense?

The question of paradox and its relation to the Qurʾān is largely unexplored. Indeed, modern studies on the Qurʾān have often been shaped by a goal, stated or otherwise, to demonstrate that the Qurʾān has no real logical, or theological, contradictions or inconsistencies. In this article I propose that the Qurʾān thoughtfully uses the category of paradox to instill wonder in the reader regarding the transcendence of God’s nature and God’s will. I do this through an examination of a recent study on paradox in the Gospel of Mark, and then through an examination of five qurʾānic case studies: God’s guidance and misguidance; God’s nature; God’s will and judgment; ethics in the story of al-Khiḍr; and the personification of false gods.

Upon discovering the arrival of guests at Lot’s home, the men of the city rushed to his door and demanded that he bring them out, prompting Lot to respond by offering his daughters to the mob instead (Q 11:78–79, 15:67–71). The depiction of Lot’s offer of his daughters in Q 11:78–79 and 15:67–71 has troubled many scholars, some of whom question both the nature of this offer and Lot’s moral character. While early Muslim sources depict Lot as a righteous host and focus on the legal implications of his offer, later scholars grapple with how Lot sought to protect his guests. Such concerns arise from the later Muslim belief that Lot, being a prophet, is protected from sin. In this article, I propose adopting a historical reading of Lot’s offer of his daughters that takes into account early Muslims’ perceptions of the Lot narrative as fundamentally about hospitality. Moreover, I contend that Lot’s offer of his daughters can be read in light of other ancient narratives of “sacrificial children” for the purpose of upholding the sacred virtues of hospitality, generosity, and loyalty.