Ibn al-Hashshab

Abu'l-Fadl ibn al-Hashshab ( Arabic أبو الفضل بن الخشاب, DMG Abūʾl-Faḍl ibn al-Ḫaššāb ; † 1125 in Aleppo ) was a chief judge ( qādī l-qudāt ) of Aleppo in the early 12th century.

Ibn al-Chashschab belonged to an influential Aleppine family who had become prosperous through the trade in wood. As a radical spokesman of the Sunni orthodoxy he came to prominence through his sharp sermons against Islamic religious dissenters, particularly against the powerfully present in Aleppo Shiite community of the so-called "Batiniten" ( Ismailis , nizari , aka " Assassins "), by the Emir Radwan was patronized. With the advance of the Christian Franks of the First Crusade into the Orient since 1098 , his agitation became more radical; He is the first known preacher to call for jihad (jihād) against the "infidels" from the West. Because Emir Radwan pursued an opaque policy towards the Franks, Ibn al-Chashschab traveled to Baghdad on his own initiative in 1111 to persuade the resident caliph al-Mustazhir to become more involved in the holy struggle. After the caliph initially met this request with indifference, Ibn al-Chashschab provoked a popular uproar in the city for several days with his sermons, which forced the caliph and the ruling sultan Muhammad I to send an army under the general Maudud to fight the crusaders .

The murder of Maudud by “Batinites” in October 1113 and the subsequent death of Emir Radwan in December of the same year escalated the situation in Aleppo. Together with the police chief Said ibn Budai, Ibn al-Chashschab became the ringleader of a pogrom against the local Ismaili community, to which hundreds of their relatives fell victim; the survivors were stripped of their property and driven from the city. After the following years of anarchy, Ibn al-Chashschab supported the takeover of the Emir Ilghazi in 1118 . At his side he led the Aleppine militia on June 28, 1119 in the victorious battle on the blood field (Ager Sanguinis) against the Franks. He then distanced himself increasingly from Emir Ilghazi, after he showed a more moderate demeanor towards the Ismailis. The death of Ilghazi in 1122 led to renewed anarchy in Aleppo, which was used by the Franks under King Baldwin II of Jerusalem to attack the city in late 1124. Ibn al-Chashschab largely organized the defense and directed his jihad against the local ancient oriental Christian community that had existed in Aleppo for almost a thousand years. He had several of their church buildings converted into mosques, and the Orthodox bishop was forced into exile. The fall of Aleppo was finally prevented by the relief of Aq Sunqur al-Bursuqi , which Ibn al-Chashschab was able to solemnly welcome to the city on January 29, 1125, whereupon the Franks broke off the siege.

That same year, Ibn al-Chashschab was found near his house at night, killed by several knife stabs. Although a perpetrator could never be determined, the deed was attributed to the "Batinites" in history, who would have retaliated against the pogrom committed in their community in 1113, for which Ibn al-Chashschab was jointly responsible.

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The Aleppine historians Ibn al-Adim († 1262) and Ibn al-Shihna († 1485), who themselves came from the milieu of the local judicial families, report on the work of Ibn al- Chashschab .

• Kamāl ad-Dīn Abūʾl-Qāsim ʿUmar ibn Aḥamd ibn al-ʿAdīm , Zubdat al-ṭalab min taʾrīḫ Ḥalab, in: RHC, Historiens Orientaux , Vol. 3 (1884), pp. 615–617, 638, 647, 650.
• Muḥibb ad-Dīn Abūʾl-Faḍl Muḥammad ibn aš-Šiḥna , Kitāb ad-Durr al-muntaḫab fī tārīḫ mamlakat Ḥalab, ed. by Jean Sauvaget, Les perles choisies d'Ibn ach-Chihna (1933), pp. 27, 65.

literature

• Claude Cahen , La Syrie du nord à l'époque des croisades et la principauté franque d'Antioche. Paris 1940, pp. 261 f, 268, 278, 286, 296-298, 300, 304, 347 f.
• Farhad Daftary , The Ismāʿīlīs: Their History and Doctrines. 2nd edition, Cambridge University Press 2007, pp. 332-333.