#umayyads

[apenitentialprayer]

Alternate Shahadas

One of the most recognizable Islamic phrases in the world is the testimony of faith, or Shahada: lā ’ilāha ’illā-llāhu muḥammadun rasūlu-llāhi, “There is no god but God, Muhammad is the Messenger of God.” This phrase is often the first one spoken into the ears of newborn babies by pious parents, and the recitation of this phrase is considered to be the first of the five pillars of Islam; conversion to Islam requires the recitation of this phrase with the genuine intention of converting to the faith. Those who are aware of the finer details of the Sunni-Shi‘a divide may be unsurprised to hear that Shi‘is also make use of a slightly modified shahada, which adds the phrase ‘alīyun walīyu-llāhi, “Ali is the friend of God”. The first two phrases can be found in the Qur’an itself, while the third clause of the Shi‘i shahada is inspired by a speech given by Muhammad shortly before his death. In each community, their respective shahadas represent the most essential teachings of Islam, the bare minimum required to begin one’s journey into Islam. It might be surprising to some to learn that these weren’t the only shahadas floating around in the first century of Islamicate history; while both are composed of clauses whose pedigrees can be traced to the lifetime of the Prophet (d. 632), the forms of the Testimony seem to have been in flux up until the ‘Abbasid period, which started in 750. Some other early variants, which have survived primarily through inscriptions, include: bism Allāh lā ilāha illā Allāh waḥdahu Muḥammad rasūl Allāh In the name of God, there is no god but God alone, Muhammad is the Messenger of God. (Arab-Sasanian coin, approximately 690) bism Allāh al-rahmān al-rahīm lā ilāha illā Allāh wahdahu lā sharīka lahu Muḥammad rasūl Allāh In the name of God, the Gracious, the Merciful; there is no god but God alone, He has no partner, Muhammad is the Messenger of God. (Jerusalem inscriptions, 691-705) allā ilāha illā llāhu waḥdahū lā sharīka lahū wa-anna muḥammadan ‘abduhū wa-rasūluhū ṣallā llāhu ‘alayhī wa-sallama There is no god but God alone, He has no partner, and Muhammad is His servant and His Messenger (Egyptian grave inscription, 651-652) All of the shahadas emphasize the uniqueness of God (there is no god but God) and the special mission of Muhammad (Muhammad is the Messenger of God). These early alternate shahadas also all share a certain adamancy about God’s Oneness (He alone); the reasoning for why this clause was dropped is not clear. It is interesting that “He has no partner” appears in the shahada found in Jerusalem; at the time of its conquest, Jerusalem was a Christian city (Jews were not allowed to reside within it), and it housed one of the five most important Apostolic Sees of Christian antiquity. The fact that ‘Abd Malik’s inscriptions would have that clause in a predominantly Christian city may hint at his desire to both distinguish his religious community from the Christian majority and polemically attack the concept of Trinity at the same time. The Jerusalem inscription also includes the basmala, the invocation of God’s name and two of His attributes that, which is also found at the beginning of all but one of the Qur’anic chapters; an implicit statement of the importance of the Testimony, perhaps?

Sources: (1) “Signs of Sovereignty: The Shahāda, Qur’anic Verses, and the Coinage of ‘Abd al-Malik,” by Jere L. Bacharach, (2) “The Early Versions of the Shahāda: The Tombstone from Aswan of 71 A.H., the Dome of the Rock, and Contemporary Coinage,” by Jere L. Bacharach and Sherif Anwar (If you liked this, you may also like Alternate Hail Marys)

[medievalistsnet]

The Berber Queen who defied the Caliphate: Al-Kahina and the Islamic Conquest of North Africa

Seventh-century North Africa would see the rise of a warrior queen named al-Kahina. Who was she and how was she able to wage a war against the Umayyad Caliphate?

[apenitentialprayer]

Furthermore, various Umayyad caliphs are known to have lived in the monastery of St. Theodore where Rawḥ lived before his conversion. [...] According to another source, Hārūn al-Rashīd, who ordered Rawḥ's execution, is said to have visited Dayr Murrān and conversed with the abbot of the monastery. [...]  Medieval Arabic texts are filled with descriptions of encounters between Muslim[ aristocrats], monks, and priests inside the confines of Christian monasteries. The most vivid accounts of these come from the "books of monasteries" (kutub al-diyārāt), a genre that flourished in the third Muslim century. They described amusing and occasionally racy gatherings in which wealthy Muslims enjoyed song, drink, and the company of Christian boys in monastic surroundings. These encounters could occasionally be very intense. One poem discussed by Elizabeth Key Fowden, for example, speaks of a Muslim who was so overcome by the beauty of a Christian he spied in a monastery that he wished to be transformed into the bread and wine of the Eucharist in order to enter him and become one with his beloved. Of course, this imagery is poetic -not to mention profane- but it does highlight the fluid boundaries between Muslims and Christians in this world.

Christian Sahner (Swimming Against the Current: Muslim Conversion to Christianity in the Early Islamic Period)

[apenitentialprayer]

Early Suppressions of Karbala Commemorations

Since the antagonistic and politically dominant Umayyads were eager to sweep the [Karbala] affair from public memory, their sentiments against the commemoration of Husayn's death seem to have prevented any possibility of public commemorations without inciting a government purge. Moreover, there appear to have been efforts on the part of the Umayyad dynasty to actually neutralize the commemoration of Ashura by the Muslim populace. Historical sources even indicate that during the reign of the Umayyad caliph ‘Abd al-Malik b. Marwan (r. 65-86/685-705), the general al-Hajjaj b. Yusuf al-Thaqafi went so far as to institute a special festive holiday on the day of ashura.* It is quite likely that al-Hajjaj's deliberate institution of a festive holiday on the exact anniversary of Husayn's gruesome killing and decapitation only a year years earlier was a deliberate attempt to counteract what had by then become an increasingly disturbing trend: annual gatherings mourning the killing of Husayn and his family at the hands of the Umayyads. The annual gatherings during Ashura appear to have kept the memory of Husayn alive not only in terms of commemorating the anniversary of his battle and subsequent death but also by perpetuating the oral transmission of accounts of the battle, the events leading up to it, and its aftermath. Considering the Umayyad's antipathy toward any remembrance of Husayn and the Umayyads' repression of ‘Alid movements, the lack of documented written accounts of the battle in this period is completely understandable. Moreover, that the few Umayyad historical sources that do exist involve only the history of the Prophet seems to indicate Umayyad attempts at self-legitimation, whereby Umayyads reinforced their on piety by stressing the life of the Prophet and simultaneously averted focus from the internecine confrontations that occurred after his death. [...] The historical sources indicate that Husayn's grave site was by the third/ninth century so popular and, apparently, the commemoration of his battle and death so moving to the masses of visitors that the Abbasid caliph al-Mutawakkil (r. 232-47/847-61) destroyed the shrine of Husayn, razed Karbala, and banned visitation of the site on pain of death. Though we have only a few textual references to this in historical sources, the lack of elaboration in Abbasid-era texts actually speaks volumes. This is particularly startling, since much of the corpus of early Islamic sources was authored or compiled in third/ninth century Baghdad. As such, the significance of this act on the part of the Abbasid caliph cannot be overlooked. On one level, it shows the extent to which ritual visitation of Husayn's shrine at Karbala had developed by that time, a possible indication that ziyarah [pilgrimage] was by then already fully developed. On another level, it seems to indicate the above-mentioned discrepancy that developed in the different points of view between the Abbasids and the ‘Alids with regard to Karbala. Although the Abbasids interpreted Husayn's battle at Karbala as an anti-Umayyad battle, the destruction of Husayn's shrine and subsequent ban on visitation indicate that the commemoration rituals had by then likely acquired rebellious antigovernment connotations that were just as threatening to the new Abbasid dynasty as they were formerly to the Umayyads. *Al-Maqrizi notes that the Ayyubids reinstituted this festive practice in a deliberate attempt to replace the Fatimid commemoration of Ashura as a day of mourning.

- Ali J. Hussain ("The Mourning of History and the History of Mourning: The Evolution of Ritual Commemoration of the Battle of Karbala")

[medievalistsnet]

Al-Hajjaj: Machiavellian or Villain? - Medievalists.net

Al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf al-Thaqafi was the Umayyad caliphate’s most famous and most able governor. He administered the eastern “super province” of the caliphate which included Iraq, Khurasan, and Sijistan from 694 to 714.

[medievalistsnet]

How the Hashimite Revolution became the Abbasid Revolution - Medievalists.net

In 750 the Umayyad caliphal dynasty was overthrown by a popular revolution that had its origins in the eastern regions of the Muslim world, primarily in Khurasan.

[allureauctioneersnyc]

Elephant Fals, Early Medieval Islamic Bronze Coin, Umayyad Caliphate Local Regional Mints, Middle East Collectibles And Numismatics

Issuer: Caliphate Of Umayyads, Anonymous Mintage. Standard Circulating Coinage. UNKNOWN. Value Of 1 Fals Of Dinar. Composition, Bronze Alloy. Average Diameter 17mm. Weight Around 1.7 to 2.2 grams. Shaped Round But Irregular. Hammered Minting Technique. Reference: Walker 795; Album 177. Elephant Fals, Early Medieval Islamic Coin, Umayyad Caliphate Local Regional Mints, Middle East Collectibles And Numismatics. Obverse: Elephant standing, stylized provincial rendering typical of early Syrian bronze issues. Reverse: Arabic legend in lines within border, early Islamic epigraph style. Description: Scarce Umayyad bronze fals from the mint of Hims featuring the distinctive elephant motif. The elephant design is one of the most visually recognizable figural types of early Islamic provincial bronze coinage and reflects the transitional artistic environment of Bilad al-Sham, where late antique imagery persisted alongside Islamic inscriptions. Hims was an important military and administrative center during the Umayyad period. Elephant types are far less common than standard purely epigraphic fulus and are actively collected due to their strong iconography and historical appeal.

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[apenitentialprayer]

The Diversification of the Caliphate's Elite

Recent research has demonstrated that, while Arabized Persians from Kufa in Iraq and Persianized Arabs in Khurasan were involved in the revolution that toppled Islam's first caliphal dynasty, the Umayyad Dynasty, in 750 CE, the preponderant element was in fact the Iranian masses. Though it can no longer be said that the Revolution put an end to the distinctly ethnically Arab empire —that will come a little later— the success of the revolution did catalyze a redistribution of ethnic weights within the empire. The group that benefited the most from this sea change were the Persians, who would come to wield significant political, intellectual, cultural, and religious influence. In the process the ethnic Arabs became less and less observable in administration and in the various intellectual fields, including the religious sciences, and under the new caliphs these Arabs would even become persona non grata. Though they adopted the faith and language of their conquerors, some Persians were openly contemptuous of the customs and traditions of the Arabs, and this anti-Arab sentiment greatly impacted the Abbasid caliphs who, being the sons of non-Arab mothers, were notorious for the infatuation with Persian sedentary, urban culture and their disdain, if you will, for ethnically Arab, nomadic culture. This new philo-Persian and anti-Arab sentiment, I argue, coupled with the eventual conversion to Islam of the masses of non-Arabs within the empire and the gradually declining visibility of ethnic Arabs, contributed to the general de-arabization of Islamic culture and tradition[.]

- Wesley Muhammad ("Whosoever Says That the Prophet is Black is a Disbeliever": The Diversification of the Islamic Empire and the Developing Portrayal of Muhammad)