_Islam at 250: Studies in Memory of G.H.A. Juynboll_, Leiden Studies in Islam and Society, eds. Petra M. Sijpesteijn and Camilla Adang, Brill. Pp. 207–234 , 2020
This paper is about two things: a fairly well-known hadith, and the historical function of hadith... more This paper is about two things: a fairly well-known hadith, and the historical function of hadiths as what I call translations of the prophet Muhammad. The hadith examined recounts that the prophet Muhammad directed a woman, al-Shifa' bt. 'Abdallah, to teach his wife Hafsa how to perform ruqyat al-namla. Some versions add that he asked her to do so just "as you have taught her writing." Today, when this hadith is quoted or referred to in academic scholarship it is usually as evidence that Hafsa (and/or sometimes al-Shifa') was fully literate, able to write as well as read. But as this paper demonstrates, it is unclear if the phrase "as you have taught her writing" was "originally" part of this hadith, and in any case it is chiefly about a type of ruqya (incantation). Classical authors' multiple interpretations of the type of healing or other benefit that ruqyat al-namla was supposed to provide illustrate the shifting ways that a hadith could be framed and interpreted in order to enable the prophet Muhammad to speak to issues and controversies which arose well after his death.
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The chapter on paradise in the _Sahih Muslim_ takes the audience/reader on a veritable tour of the afterlife. Among the key purposes of this tour is to delineate communal boundaries, affirming that some belong within the "orthodox" community while others do not. Female bodies, whether human or houri, serve as important vehicles for such affirmations and exclusions. Medieval hadith commentaries on the _Sahih Muslim_ further extend and elaborate upon these concerns in various ways.
This tantalizingly brief statement appears to portray a woman from the formative period of Islam as a religious authority. Her ritual practice is presented as relevant to a ritual-legal question of concern to the community as a whole, and as seemingly proceeding from her legal knowledge as to how the salat is to be performed. But it raises more questions than it answers: What exactly is the ritual-legal issue under discussion? Who was Umm al-Darda', and why would her example be singled out by al-Bukhari as especially relevant to this matter?
This portrayal is noteworthy for several reasons: It provides insight into two topics that are only just beginning to receive the historical attention that they deserve: women’s ritual involvement during Islam’s formative period, as well as early depictions of female Muslim religious authority. Moreover, it promises to shed some light on a phenomenon that has barely been researched: pre-modern textual representations of female Qur'an reciters. Umm al-Darda' the Younger is one of the few female figures included in Ibn al-Jazari’s (d. 833 /1429) famed biographical dictionary of Qur'an reciters; she is said to have learned from Abu al-Darda' (d. 32/652) his manner of recitation (qira'a), and to have taught it to several male students.
In order to examine these questions, we will discuss what is (and more often, is not) known about Umm al-Darda'. Then, we will consider this tradition in detail, situating it historically in relation to the pre-Bukhari legal-ritual discourse on the salat, as it is reflected in several legally-oriented collections of traditions conventionally dated to the formative period. These sources will be read using standard methods of historical analysis, as well as gender theory.
The chapter on paradise in the _Sahih Muslim_ takes the audience/reader on a veritable tour of the afterlife. Among the key purposes of this tour is to delineate communal boundaries, affirming that some belong within the "orthodox" community while others do not. Female bodies, whether human or houri, serve as important vehicles for such affirmations and exclusions. Medieval hadith commentaries on the _Sahih Muslim_ further extend and elaborate upon these concerns in various ways.
This tantalizingly brief statement appears to portray a woman from the formative period of Islam as a religious authority. Her ritual practice is presented as relevant to a ritual-legal question of concern to the community as a whole, and as seemingly proceeding from her legal knowledge as to how the salat is to be performed. But it raises more questions than it answers: What exactly is the ritual-legal issue under discussion? Who was Umm al-Darda', and why would her example be singled out by al-Bukhari as especially relevant to this matter?
This portrayal is noteworthy for several reasons: It provides insight into two topics that are only just beginning to receive the historical attention that they deserve: women’s ritual involvement during Islam’s formative period, as well as early depictions of female Muslim religious authority. Moreover, it promises to shed some light on a phenomenon that has barely been researched: pre-modern textual representations of female Qur'an reciters. Umm al-Darda' the Younger is one of the few female figures included in Ibn al-Jazari’s (d. 833 /1429) famed biographical dictionary of Qur'an reciters; she is said to have learned from Abu al-Darda' (d. 32/652) his manner of recitation (qira'a), and to have taught it to several male students.
In order to examine these questions, we will discuss what is (and more often, is not) known about Umm al-Darda'. Then, we will consider this tradition in detail, situating it historically in relation to the pre-Bukhari legal-ritual discourse on the salat, as it is reflected in several legally-oriented collections of traditions conventionally dated to the formative period. These sources will be read using standard methods of historical analysis, as well as gender theory.