Fadā'il

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Fadā'il ( Arabic فضائل, DMG faḍāʾil from singular فضيلة / faḍīla  / 'excellence, excellence') are Islamic traditions that emphasize the special religious significance of certain people, groups of people, places, times or works and are intended to show their special distinction by God. Many of these traditions are traced back to the prophet Mohammed in the form of hadiths , while others claim the authority of a companion of the prophet or a Muslim of the following generation. Fadā'il traditions on specific topics were compiled early on in monographic works. In addition, they have found their way into numerous works of Arabic biographical, historical and theological literature. For people and places instead of the Arabic term appears Faḍā'il the term sometimes Manaqib in the same meaning.

Old Arabic and Koranic basics

The word faḍīla , to which faḍāʾil forms the plural, is derived from the Arabic root f-ḍ-l , which as a verb faḍala has the basic meaning "exceed, overflow, exceed, be superfluous, remain". The associated noun faḍl denotes on the one hand a protruding tip, but on the other hand also abstractly "excellence, superiority, priority, abundance". In ancient Arab society it was customary to brag about one's own falsehood in competitions of rank called mufāḫara or mufāḍala . The things with which one could prove one's case were tribal nobility, bravery, wealth, generosity and generosity. The person who owned the larger faḍl was referred to as afḍal using the elative form.

The transition from ancient Arab society to Islam is marked by the fact that God was now regarded as the one who bestows the faḍl . In Sura 3:73 it is clearly stated: “The faḍl is in the hand of God. He gives it to whomever he wants. ”From God's fall there grows forgiveness and otherworldly reward, but also the acquisition of worldly goods. The order of precedence in the case is also determined by God. Thus it says in sura 17:21: “Look how we have preferred one of them to the other” ( unẓur kaifa faḍḍalnā baʿḍa-hum ʿalā baʿḍ ). The preference given by God is shown above all in the livelihood ( rizq ): "And God has distinguished one of you in the livelihood above the other" ( wa-Llāhu faḍḍala baʿḍakum ʿalā baʿḍ fī r-rizq ; Sura 16 : 71). The tafḍīl , the preference of one over the other by God, is the subject of various other Quranic statements. So God distinguished the Israelites (Sura 2:47, 122; 7: 140; 45:46) and in the same way the prophets (Sura 6: 83-86) above all other people. Among the prophets he again distinguished one from the other (Sura 2: 253; 17:55), and he distinguished the men above the women (Sura 4:34). The fact that God distributes his falls at will creates inequality among people and the world maintains its hierarchical order. The Fadā'il traditions tie in with this idea of ​​a fixed order in which everyone - high and low - have their God-assigned place and rank. They aim to show the special qualities ( faḍāʾil ) by which the divinely bestowed faḍl can be recognized.

Fadā'il of persons and groups of persons

The first Fadā'il traditions arose in connection with the early Islamic succession dispute after the death of the Prophet. While those who believed that Alī ibn Abī Tālib had a right to the caliphate from the beginning gathered accounts of his fadā'il, conversely those who held the rule of the previous caliphs, Abū Bakr , Umar ibn al-Chattab and ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān considered legitimate, whose Fadā'il before. Followers of the Umayyads spread their Fadā'il in particular into the late 9th century. To this extent, many of the Fadā'il traditions were propagandistic in nature. They served to legitimize the political power claims of various families who were close to the Prophet Mohammed. The scholar Ibn-Saʿīd al-Muhsin Ibn-Karāma al-Baihaqī (st. 1101) wrote a Fadā'il work on the descendants of Abū Tālib in the 11th century in order to affirm their political prerogatives.

In the 9th century, various hadith scholars began to compile the fadā'il of all the companions of the Prophets . They were not concerned with taking political sides, but with proving that this group of people deserves religious veneration because of their merits and developmental achievements. The earliest surviving independent work on the Fadā'il of the Prophet's Companions comes from Ahmad ibn Hanbal . Later on, al-Buchari included a separate chapter on this in his saheeh . The main theme of these Fadā'il traditions are the merits of each of the Prophet's companions in the struggle and social life of the early Muslims, as well as the special experiences they shared with the Prophet. One of the Fadā'il Abū Bakrs , for example, is the account of his flight with the Prophet from Mecca in connection with the Hijra . Fantastic-looking prophecies about their future are also passed on for individual prophet companions.

Fadā'il were also later gathered about certain ethnic groups such as Persians , Turks and Arabs, as well as certain Arab tribal associations.

Fadā'il of cities and countries

The earliest Fadā'il work on a place is the collection attributed to al-Hasan al-Basrī (st. 728) on "The Advantages of Mecca and Living in This City" ( Faḍāʾil Makka wa-s-sakan fī-hā ). In the 9th century Faḍā'il works were also compiled on Basra , Kufa and Baghdad , but they have not survived. At the end of the 10th century ʿUmar ibn Muhammad al-Kindī and Ibn Zūlāq (d. 997) wrote the first Fadā'il works on Egypt ( Misr ).

The first Fadā'il work on Jerusalem was written around 1020 by Abū Bakr Muhammad Ibn Aḥmad al-Wāsitī, who worked as a Chatīb at the al-Aqsā Mosque . It is preserved in a manuscript that was made shortly before Saladin retook the city . A short time after al-Wāsitī's work in Jerusalem, ar-Rabaʿī (st. 1052) wrote his work Faḍāʾil aš-Šām wa-Dimašq , in which he compiled Fadā'il traditions on Syria and Damascus. A work that connects the Fadā'il of Jerusalem, Hebron and Syria is the book Faḍāʾil Bait al-Maqdis wa-l-Ḫalīl wa-faḍāʾil aš-Šām by al-Musharraf Ibn-al-Muraddschā (st. 1037- 1047). The Syrian historian Ibn ʿAsākir later integrated the Syria- related Fadā'il into the topographical introduction to his monumental work "History of the City of Damascus".

Fadā'il collections on specific locations are manifestations of a flourishing local patriotism. Overall, site-specific Fadā'il traditions evoke the image of a “sacred space”. They deal with the role of the places concerned during the creation of the world, their relationship with various prophets and the appearance of companions of the prophets in them. Many Fadā'il traditions also deal with the appearance of Quranic figures such as Adam , al-Chidr and Dhū l-Qarnain in the respective places. An important topic within the Fadā'il about Syria is the dispatch of the general Chālid ibn al-Walīds to this country by the first caliph Abū Bakr . Abū Bakr is said to have explained to the general who was in Iraq at the time that he believed the conquest of the “Holy Land” of Syria to be more important than Iraq.

The main themes of the Fadā'il literature on Jerusalem are:

  • the special importance of Jerusalem in the history of the three monotheistic religions: as the place of the temple built by Solomon (Judaism), as the place of Jesus' activity (Christianity), as the place of the first qibla and the starting point of the ascension of Muhammad ,
  • its future role as the place of the end-time battle between Jesus and the Antichrist ,
  • the sanctity of the various sites in and around Jerusalem (the Dome of the Rock , the Aqsā Mosque, the twelve gates of the city, the Dome of the Chain , the Siloah source , Bethlehem and Hebron ),
  • the merit of the pilgrims' visit to Jerusalem and the distribution of alms there as well as the special value of prayers spoken there . Al-Wāsitī, for example, stated that a prayer performed in the al-Aqsā mosque is worth 5,000 times as much as an ordinary prayer, a prayer in the Prophet's Mosque of Medina is worth 50,000 ordinary prayers and one prayer at the Kaaba in Mecca make up for 100,000 prayers.

Overall, Jerusalem is presented in Fadā'il literature as the “center of the countries” and the navel of the world . According to Amikam Elad, these traditions reflect the efforts of the Umayyads to emphasize the political and religious importance of Syria and Palestine, which formed the center of their caliphate, compared to the Hejaz , which was the former center of the Islamic empire.

Most of the traditions included in the Fadā'il collections go back to a much earlier period. The traditions on Syria and Damascus in the ar-Rabaʿīs collection, for example, name 8th century Syrian authorities such as Makhūl ibn Abī Muslim in their chain of narrators . The traditions in Jerusalem also go back to this time. The Fadā'il work on the city of Balch by Abū Bakr ʿAbdallāh ibn ʿUmar Wāʿiz Balchī, written in 1214, is based on a total of 31 earlier works. Many of them are biographical collections of the Tabaqāt genre, in which the Islamic scholars are arranged according to chronologically consecutive classes.

A peculiarity of the Fadā'il work on Egypt by Ibn Zūlāq is that it contains a chapter on scholars from pre-Islamic times who were born in Egypt, worked there for a while or were students of an Egyptian scholar. Mythical and real personalities such as Hermes , Agathodaimon , Socrates , Plato , Aristotle , Apollonios von Perge etc. are dealt with here . Hans Daiber suspects that the esteem in this work of Egypt as the land of “sciences” expresses a new national consciousness in the newly established Fatimid Empire , whose capital, Cairo , began to compete with Baghdad as the center of science.

Fadā'il of pious works

Turkish translation of the Fazail-i A'maal , a work by Muhammad Zakarīyā al-Kāndahlawī on the Fadā'il pious works.

In addition, there are Fadā'il traditions, which deal with the merit of certain pious acts. For example, the hadith scholar ʿAbdallāh ibn al-Mubārak (st. 792) put together a separate work on the Fadā'il of Jihad . And around the middle of the 9th century, the Iraqi scholar Ibn Abī Dunyā (d. 894) wrote a work on the Fadā'il of Ramadan , in which he emphasized the merit of fasting and other pious works.

The most important genre within this group of Fadā'il traditions are the Faḍāʾil al-Qurʾān , which contain statements about the merit of the various Koran-related actions (memorization and melodic recitation of the Koran, observance of its commandments) as well as the salvific effects of certain suras and verses of the Koran . Independent works on such fadā'il of the Koran were compiled early on. The oldest surviving work of this kind is that of Abū ʿUbaid al-Qāsim (d. 837). Other well-known Faʾāʾil-al-Qurʾān works come from an-Nasāʾī (st. 915) and Ibn Kathīr (st. 1373). Fadāʾil-al-Qurʾān traditions were also included in almost all major hadith collections. Thematically arranged collections of hadiths such as the Musannaf by Ibn Abī Schaiba and the two Sahīh works by al-Buchari and Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj contain their own chapters on the Fadāʾil al-Qurʾān .

All in all, the Fadāʾil-al-Qurʾān traditions are important sources for Islamic social and intellectual history, since, in addition to the actual Fadā'il traditions, they also contain information on the position of the Koran scholars ( ahl al-qurʾān ) in early Islamic society, their self -image and their own Relationship to other scholar groups (grammarians, lawyers and traditionists ) included. Some of these traditions are known to have been deliberately disseminated by certain Koran scholars in order to arouse interest in studying the Koran and to emphasize the priority of their class over other groups of scholars. Because of the dubious nature of this material, some Muslim scholars of the Middle Ages were very critical of it.

From the 10th century onwards, various works were created in which the Fadā'il of various groups of pious works (e.g. Salat (prayer) , Hajj , fasting, etc.) are systematically presented. The earliest surviving of these Fadāʾil-al-Aʿmāl works comes from the scholar Ibn as-Sunnī (d. 974). The original Urdu book Fazail-e Amaal by Muhammad Zakarīyā al-Kāndahlawī (d. 1982) belongs to the same genre . It is the most important textbook of the Tablighi Jamaat and deals with the Fadā'il of the Koran, ritual prayer, Dhikr , Islamic mission ( tablīġ ) and Ramadan.

literature

  • Asma Afsaruddin (a): Excellence and Precedence: Medieval Islamic Discourse on Legitimate Leadership . Suffering u. a., Brill, 2002. pp. 26-36.
  • Asma Afsaruddin (b): “In Praise of the Word of God: Reflections of Early Religious and Social Concerns in the Faḍā'il al-Qur'ān Genre” in Journal of Qur'anic Studies 4/1 (2002) 27-48 .
  • Asma Afsaruddin (c): “The Excellences of the Qurʾān: Textual Sacrality and the Organization of Early Islamic Society” in Journal of the American Oriental Society 122/1 (2002) 1-24.
  • Arezou Azad: Sacred landscape in medieval Afghanistan: revisiting the Faḍāʾil-i Balkh. Oxford Univ. Press, Oxford, 2013.
  • Hans Daiber : "Faḍāʾil literature as a source of the history of science: the example of the Egyptian historian Ihn Zūlāq (10th century)" in R. Arnzen (ed.): Words, texts and concepts cruising the Mediterranean Sea: studies on the sources , contents and influences of Islamic civilization and Arabic philosophy and science; dedicated to Gerhard Endress on his sixty-fifth birthday. Peeters [and a.], Leuven [ua] 2004, ISBN 90-429-1489-0 , pp. 355-385.
  • Ernst August Gruber: Merit and rank: the Faḍā'il as a literary and social problem in Islam. Schwarz, Freiburg im Breisgau, 1975. Available online here.
  • Nancy Khalek: Damascus after the Muslim Conquest. Text and Image in Early Islam. Oxford University Press, New York, 2011. pp. 136-150.
  • Rudolf Sellheim : Art. "Faḍīla" in The Encyclopaedia of Islam. New Edition Vol. II, pp. 728b-729b.
  • Fuat Sezgin: History of Arabic Literature . Vol. 1. Leiden: Brill 1967.
  • Emmanuel Sivan: “The Beginnings of the 'Faḍāʾil al Quds' literature” in Der Islam 48 (1972) 100-110.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cf. Afsaruddin 2002a, 26f.
  2. ↑ See Gruber 9.
  3. ↑ Cf. Gruber 15f.
  4. ↑ Cf. Gruber 18f.
  5. ↑ See Gruber 19.
  6. ↑ See Gruber 20.
  7. ↑ Cf. Afsaruddin 2002a, 30.
  8. ↑ It is titled Tanbīh al-ġāfilīn ʿan faḍāʾil aṭ-ṭālibīyīn .
  9. ↑ See Sezgin 508.
  10. ↑ See Sellheim 728b.
  11. ↑ See Sellheim 728b.
  12. ↑ See Sellheim 729.
  13. ↑ Cf. Sezgin 340f.
  14. ↑ See Sellheim 729a.
  15. ↑ See the article by Daiber.
  16. ↑ Cf. Sivan 100f.
  17. ↑ See Khalek: Damascus after the Muslim Conquest. 2011, p. 142.
  18. ↑ See Sivan 100.
  19. ↑ See Khalek: Damascus after the Muslim Conquest. 2011, p. 140.
  20. ↑ See Sivan 106.
  21. ↑ See Khalek: Damascus after the Muslim Conquest. 2011, p. 141.
  22. ↑ See Sivan 103-105.
  23. ↑ See Khalek: Damascus after the Muslim Conquest. 2011, p. 145.
  24. ↑ See Amikam Elad: Medieval Jerusalem and Islamic Worship. Holy Places, Ceremonies, Pilgrimage. Brill, Leiden, 1995. p. 150.
  25. ↑ See Khalek: Damascus after the Muslim Conquest. 2011, p. 147.
  26. ^ See Azad: Sacred landscape in medieval Afghanistan . 2013, pp. 40–61.
  27. ↑ Cf. Daiber 370-379.
  28. ↑ See Daiber 361.
  29. ↑ Cf. Reinhard Weipert, Stefan Weninger: "The preserved works of Ibn Abi d-Dunya: A preliminary inventory" in the magazine of the Morgenländische Gesellschaft 146 (1996) pp. 415–455. Here p. 425.
  30. ↑ Cf. Carl Brockelmann : History of Arabic Literature. Vol. I. 2nd ed. Leiden 1943, Vol. I, p. 106.
  31. ↑ Cf. Afsaruddin 2002a, 31.
  32. ↑ See Afsaruddin 2002b, 30-34.
  33. ↑ Cf. Afsaruddin 2002b, 27-44.
  34. ↑ See Sezgin 198.