Chinese Heirs to Muhammad: Writing Islamic History in Early Modern China 9781463239251, 1463239254

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Chinese Heirs to Muhammad

The Modern Muslim World

7 Series Editorial Board

Marcia Hermansen Hina Azam Ussama Makdisi

Martin Nguyen Joas Wagemakers

Advisory Editorial Board

Talal Asad Khaled Abou El Fadl Amira Bennison Islam Dayeh Marwa Elshakry Rana Hisham Issa

Tijana Krstic Ebrahim Moosa Adam Sabra Armando Salvatore Adam Talib

This series will provide a platform for scholarly research on Islamic and Muslim thought, emerging from any geographical area and dated to any period from the 17th century until the present day. 

Chinese Heirs to Muhammad

Writing Islamic History in Early Modern China

J. Lilu Chen

gp 2020

Gorgias Press LLC, 954 River Road, Piscataway, NJ, 08854, USA www.gorgiaspress.com Copyright © 2020 by Gorgias Press LLC

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise without the prior written permission of Gorgias Press LLC. ‫ܘ‬

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2020

ISBN 978-1-4632-3925-1

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A Cataloging-in-Publication Record is available from the Library of Congress. Printed in the United States of America

For my grandmothers, Su Binlan and Zhang Yuzhu. For all my ancestors.

TABLE OF CONTENTS Table of Contents............................................................................... vii Acknowledgments ............................................................................... ix Illustrations .......................................................................................... xi Note on Dates and Transliterations ................................................. xiii Introduction .......................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1. Muhammad ........................................................................ 11 Chapter 2. Perfected Beings ................................................................ 37 Chapter 3. Tombs ............................................................................... 67 Chapter 4. Empire ............................................................................... 91 Chapter 5. Continuity ........................................................................ 119 Conclusion ......................................................................................... 145 Bibliography ...................................................................................... 149 Index ...................................................................................................159

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Like most projects, this one took a long time in the making. The seeds of this book began while I was an undergraduate religion major at Carleton College. Thanks to a small grant from the Chang-Lan fellowship, I spent over a month in China visiting Islamic landmarks and speaking with Hui and Uyghur people. The conversations I had sparked a long-lasting interest in Chinese Muslims that continued into my graduate studies at Stanford University. Shahzad Bashir has accompanied me throughout most of this journey as my indispensable sheikh. Perhaps the most valuable thing he has offered is the encouragement to follow my intuition and pursue the themes that fascinated me, regardless of what I thought I ought to be studying. This freedom was complemented by timely steering, helpful suggestions, and a scrutinizing eye. The standards he inspires his students to reach have spurred all of us to greater scholarship. This story could not be told without him. Support and funding for this project came from the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation, the Stanford Ric Weiland Fellowship, and a residential year at the Stanford Humanities Center. Many of the chapters benefitted from feedback after presentations: chapter two from a workshop at Vanderbilt University with Tony K. Stewart, chapter four from a conference at Singapore National University with R. Michael Feener, and chapter five from my colleagues at the Stanford Humanities Center who were always eager to lend an ear. Will Sherman, Ariela Marcus-Sells, Ahoo Najafian, Wesley Chaney, and Zahra Ayubi cheered this project on and allowed me to share early drafts. Kathryn Gin Lum’s insightful comments helped refine the overall vision. Matthew Sommer offered critical corrections and contextualization within Chinese history. John Kieschnick ix

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mercifully read through the sources with me and encouraged me to think about parallels with Chinese Buddhism. Thanks to Adam Walker at Gorgias Press for working with me during the publication process. Two anonymous peer reviewers provided helpful suggestions. All mistakes, however, are entirely my own. My family has been an incredible support throughout this journey. I am grateful to my parents and extended family for their patience and love. To Amy, whose early years coincided with the completion of this book. You taught me how to tell a good story. My last thanks goes to Kevin, who read through everything at all hours, gave countless encouragement, and much-needed humor.

ILLUSTRATIONS Tables 1.1 2.1 2.2

Dynasties of Arabia in Liu Zhi, Utmost Sage Time of Death in Lan Xu, “Epitaphs” Burial Locations in Lan Xu, “Epitaphs”

19 48 52

Diagrams 1.1 4.1

Movement of the Haqq in Lan Xu, Upright Learning Human History in Li Huanyi, Words and Deeds

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29 97

NOTE ON DATES AND TRANSLITERATIONS All dates are Common Era unless otherwise noted. In a few places, it is indicated that dates are given as A.H., which stands for “after the hijra,” the beginning of the Islamic calendar. Transliteration of Chinese follows the Hanyu Pinyin system. Persian and Arabic follow the International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies standard, without the diacritics.

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INTRODUCTION Everyone has stories to tell. History is perhaps no more than the stories we have deemed significant about the past—the ones that carry meaning and authority for our present. For Muslims in China, the question of the past was particularly complicated. While all followers of Muhammad are to some extent at a temporal and spatial distance from foundational events of Islam, those living in China had to work a little harder to situate themselves back in time and back into Islamic history. Simultaneously as longtime residents of China, the Muslims in question here—the Hui—also saw themselves as part of Chinese history, with its glorious imperial lineage and ancient sages. This is the story of Hui attempts in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century to generate narratives about the community’s past. This past was fragmented across a vast spatial and temporal expanse: from Arabia to Central Asia to China, from genesis to antiquity to the modern era. The texts analyzed here string together places and times into a coherent, continuous narrative for the community. The history they tell makes sense for Hui recounters but it also calls into question our own contemporary understandings of Chinese history and Islamic history. If texts such as these can play so creatively with familiar places and personages to generate authority for their present, how much more so are long-accepted narratives of China and Islam entrenched in the prevailing power structures of their recounters. Though Muslims in China have been writing about themselves and their religion since the Yuan and Ming dynasties, we do not have large-scale historical narratives of the community until the late Qing dynasty. Before then, surviving texts dealt primarily with theological, ritual, and doctrinal issues. The earliest works of Islamic literature in Chinese date to the mid-seventeenth century by authors such as 1

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Wang Daiyu and Ma Zhu, who completed “guides” to Islam. These were penned in the question-and-answer tradition or as summaries of ritual and doctrinal points. In this early period are also Chinese renditions of Persian and Arabic texts from Sufi Central Asia. 1 Liu Zhi, whose works appear in the early eighteenth century, is often celebrated as the penultimate Chinese Muslim thinker. The most prolific and oft cited of the premodern authors, his writing set a standard for Islamic literature in Chinese. This explains why academic studies often stop at Liu Zhi. However, a rich corpus of material exists after the eighteenth century, which is the focus of this book. Access has been made easier since the 1980’s and 1990’s when a new flood of research on the Hui emerged from scholars within the People’s Republic of China. This was accompanied by the publication of encyclopedias, dictionaries, and primary sources that had hitherto been unavailable to Western scholars conducting research in the 1970’s and 1980’s such as Joseph Fletcher, Jonathan Lipman, and Françoise Aubin. In an effort to “control this upsurge of information,” Donald Daniel Leslie collaborated with others to publish Islam in Traditional China: a bibliographical guide in 2006. However, this valuable reference to primary and secondary sources in the field was written too early to account for yet another explosion in available material following the Chinese publication of two gigantic source collections. This was the twenty-five-volume Qingzhen dadian, part of a longer series on Chinese religion, and the two hundred thirty-five-volume Huizu diancang quanshu. 2 The publication of these two collections has allowed easier access to a wide selection of materials, enabling studies such as mine to target specific genres and themes across Hui literature. For a list, see Donald Leslie, Islam in Traditional China : A Bibliographical Guide (Sankt Augustin : Monumenta Serica Institute, 2006), 73–74; Zvi Ben-Dor, “The ‘Dao of Muhammad’: Scholarship, Education, and Chinese Muslim Literati Identity in Late Imperial China” (PhD dissertation, UC Los Angeles, 2000), 184. 2 My thanks to Zhaohui Xue at the Stanford University East Asia Library for acquiring this collection on my request. 1

INTRODUCTION

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My interest in perusing these collections was to identify historical narratives. In determining what constituted “history,” I was drawn to biographical compendiums, works that situated the community in time, and genealogical texts. The texts I have chosen for analysis in the following chapters engage with an overlapping group of key events, figures, and landmarks in the Sino-Muslim past. Many of them cite and incorporate each other, attesting to the strength of print distribution and other networks that joined Chinese Muslims across provincial lines. 3 This study engages with the works of four Hui historians: Liu Zhi writing in 1724, Lan Xu writing in the 1850’s, Li Huanyi writing in 1874, and Ma Yunhua writing in the early twentieth century. What these authors hold in common is their ability to cover a vast stretch of the time—some even claim to summarize all of the universe from beginning to end. The authors were also self-consciously aware of their position in China, striving to make sense of this space and other spaces in their accounts of the past. Indeed these Hui were cosmopolitan visionaries. Some like Liu Zhi and Lan Xu spent their entire lives in peregrination across the country –their travels propelled by intellectual pursuits or the changing posts of a government career. Others like Li Huanyi and Ma Yunhua never strayed far from their home province, yet spent years compiling texts about people from other places and times. For all of these authors, their investment was in “China” as a whole. They wrote seeing themselves as part of a great civilization. They wrote attuned to the imperial center. They also wrote with attention to Islamic origins and the past in See Cynthia Joanne Brokaw and Kai-wing Chow, eds., Printing and Book Culture in Late Imperial China, Studies on China 27 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005). Tristan G. Brown, “Muslim Networks, Religious Economy, and Community Survivial: The Financial Upkeep of Mosques in Late Imperial China,” Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 33, no. 2 (August 2, 2013): 241–66. The case of Hai Furun provides an excellent example in Zvi Ben-Dor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad: A Cultural History of Muslims in Late Imperial China (Cambridge, MA; London: Published by the Harvard University Asia Center: Distributed by Harvard University Press, 2005), 215–35. 3

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Arabia. “China” in these texts is studded with Islamic landmarks. The vision of the historiography is that of the country and of the world. The content and language of these works suggests that they were intended for Hui readers. The use of Arabic words and allusions to Islamic figures, landmarks, and cosmological concepts would have dumbfounded non-Muslims. Likewise, those unfamiliar with Chinese classics, mythological figures, and imperial history would have likewise found them impenetrable. The histories examined here assume a background and investment in the traditions they invoke— they were written for the Hui community. The authors of these texts were in conversation with each other. Liu Zhi was read by the other three. They all refer directly to him and to his works. Lan Xu’s text was also seen as some kind of standard. It was circulating widely enough that even the lesser-educated Ma Yunhua had access to Lan Xu’s diagrams and could replicate them in his work. Li Huanyi’s text was comparably lesser known. Still, the fact that it was distributed in other provinces and survives in woodblock prints points to financial and organizational backing. This book attempts to link historical discourse with the intellectual and religious world of Chinese Muslims. Previous scholarship in the field, however, has generally treated only one or the other. On the one hand are surveys by Chinese historians of insurgent Muslim groups to the west and their tumultuous relationship with imperial rule. On the other hand are studies by sinologists celebrating how famous Hui scholars have harmonized Islamic doctrine with the reigning “neo-Confucianism” of Chinese society. The earliest scholarship on Chinese Muslims was done by Joseph Fletcher. Fletcher attempted to situate Sufi groups in northwest China within the wider contours of world history. However, due to his early death in 1984, most of Fletcher’s work survives in posthumously edited articles and notes. 4 After Fletcher, Jonathan Lipman’s Familiar Strangers: A History of Muslims in Northwest China set See Joseph Fletcher and Beatrice Forbes Manz, eds., Studies on Chinese and Islamic Inner Asia (Aldershot, Great Britain: Variorum, 1995).

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the tone for future scholarship on Chinese Islam. 5 Lipman was highly influential in introducing the notion that Islam in northwestern China was characterized by tariqa (Sufi brotherhood) organizations whereas Islam in China’s eastern urban centers was manifest in the Han Kitab, a term referring to Chinese-language Islamic texts that employ “Confucian” terminology. Since then, scholarship in the field has taken off in both directions with few questioning the limitations to such a binary conceptualization of Islamic phenomenon in China. Studies of Muslims in western China have explored the tumultuous relationship between ethnic groups and the Chinese empire. On the northwest side, James Millward addressed the strategic importance of Xinjiang as a crossroads of trade and a site to study Qing imperialism. 6 Hodong Kim’s Holy War in China examined the Ya’qub Beg rebellion from 1864–1877. 7 More recently, Kwangmin Kim focused on Muslim leaders in Xinjiang who collaborated with the Qing. 8 Further inland, Ma Haiyun’s dissertation explores how the Qing government managed the Gansu Salars after their adoption of a new Islamic teaching. 9 In all of these works, the question of Is-

Jonathan Lipman, Familiar Strangers: A History of Muslims in Northwest China (Seattle: Unversity of Washington Press, 1997). 6 James Millward, Beyond the Pass: Economy, Ethnicity, and Empire in Qing Central Asia, 1759–1864 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998). 7 Hodong Kim, Holy War in China: The Muslim Rebellion and State in Chinese Central Asia, 1864–1877 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004). 8 Kwangmin Kim, Borderland Capitalism: Turkestan Produce, Qing Silver, and the Birth of an Eastern Market (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2016). See also Kwangmin Kim, “Saintly Brokers: Uyghur Muslims, Trade, and the Making of Qing Central Asia” (PhD dissertation, UC Berkeley, 2008). 9 Haiyun Ma, “New Teachings and New Territories: Religion, Regulations, and Regions in Qing Gansu, 1700–1800” (PhD dissertation, Georgetown University, 2007). Another study on northwest China is Anthony Garnaut, “The Shaykh of the Great Northwest: The Religious and Political Life of 5

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lam has only come up as it relates to interaction with the state. Studies of Muslims in southwest China have followed in a similar vein. 10 Throughout the scholarship, scant attention has been paid to the literary production and intellectual world of Muslims in western China. One exception is Rian Thum’s The Sacred Routes of Uyghur History. Thum utilizes manuscripts written in the vernacular language of eastern Turki to construct Altishahri (Xinjiang) identity in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. He shows how during this time there emerged a new genre of historical writing, the tazkirah, that recounted stories of local heroes and their deaths. The tazkirah provided a form of historical writing that avoided the problems of dynastic writing under infidel Zungar and Qing rule. 11 Like Thum, this project utilizes community literature to engage with and correct tendencies to view Muslims exclusively through state interests. Chapter four of this book reframes our discussion of Muslims and empire through one Hui rendition of Chinese history. While the study of Muslims in western regions of China has been dominated by historians concerned with imperial policy, the study of Muslims to the east has been largely undertaken by sinologists interested in intellectual history. In 2000, Sachiko Murata was the first western scholar to publish a close textual study of Chinese Muslim literature. Both Murata’s Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light and The Sage Learning of Liu Zhi present the harmonious synthesis of

Ma Yuanzhang (1853–1920)” (PhD dissertation, Australian National Unversity, 2011). 10 See Jacqueline Armijo-Hussein, “Sayyid ‘Ajall Shams Al-Din: A Muslim from Central Asia, Serving the Mongols in China, and Bringing ‘Civilization’ to Yunnan” (PhD dissertation, Harvard University, 1996). David G. Atwill, The Chinese Sultanate : Islam, Ethnicity, and the Panthay Rebellion in Southwest China, 1856–1873 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005). Kevin Caffrey, “China’s Muslim Frontier: Empire, Nation, and Transformation in Yunnan” (PhD dissertation, University of Chicago, 2007). 11 Rian Thum, The Sacred Routes of Uyghur History (Harvard University Press, 2014).

INTRODUCTION

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Islamic metaphysics with neo-Confucian concepts. 12 James Frankel’s Rectifying God’s Name: Liu Zhi’s Confucian Translation of Monotheism and Islamic Law follows in this same tradition. 13 Zvi Ben-Dor Benite’s The Dao of Muhammad: A Cultural History of Muslims in Late Imperial China is similar to the work of Murata and Frankel. 14 Like them, he focuses on the eastern urban literati and their production of the “Han Kitab” corpus. Ben-Dor Benite also emphasizes the harmony between Islam and its Chinese environment, stressing the “simultaneity” of Muslim and literati identities. Ben-Dor Benite’s study is valuable for its attempt to move beyond a strict intellectual analysis of Han Kitab books. He utilizes a lineage text, the Jingxue xichuan pu to reconstruct an educational network for participants in the Han Kitab. 15 Yet Ben-Dor Benite’s uncritical reading of this text to reflect actual Chinese lineage lines overlooks the sophisticated way genealogies and hagiographical traditions work. 16 He does not take Sachiko Murata, Chinese Gleams of Sufi Light: Wang Tai-Yu’s Great Learning of the Pure and Real and Liu Chih’s Displaying the Concealment of the Real Realm. With a New Translation of Jami’s Lawa’ih from the Persian by William C. Chittick (SUNY Press, 2000); Sachiko Murata et al., The Sage Learning of Liu Zhi: Islamic Thought in Confucian Terms (Cambridge, Mass.: Published by the Harvard University Asia Center for the Harvard-Yenching Institute : Distributed by Harvard University Press, 2009). 13 James D. Frankel, Rectifying God’s Name: Liu Zhi’s Confucian Translation of Monotheism and Islamic Law (Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2011). See also Kristian Petersen, Interpreting Islam in China: pilgrimage, scripture, and language in the Han Kitab (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018). 14 Ben-Dor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad. 15 This text can be found in Can Zhao, “Jingxue Xi Chuan Pu,” in Zhongguo Zongjiao Lishi Wenxian Jicheng, vol. 95, Qingzhen Dadian 20 (Hefei shi: Huangshan shushe, 2005), 1–105. 16 Many studies of Chinese Buddhism and Sufi Islam have already taken this into account. For critical readings of Chan lineage texts, see Elizabeth Morrison, The Power of Patriarchs: Qisong and Lineage in Chinese Buddhism (Leiden: Brill, 2010). For the Islamic context see Devin DeWeese, “The Legitimation of Baha’ Ad-Din Naqshband,” Asiatische Studien/Études Asi12

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into account, for example, the text’s bias in elevating Hu Dengzhou as lineage founder and promoting an image of continuous transmission. Chapter five of this book proposes an alternative way to read lineage texts through the Ma Family Genealogy. This book attempts to bridge the artificial divide between the intellectual worldview of Chinese Muslims and their historical situation. The early chapters begin in the intellectual realm of Hui religious thought. I stress the extent to which ideas about the placement of Muhammad and other elevated beings in the universe reflect the sociohistorical conditions of these thinkers. The later chapters address Hui responses to recent events and societal concerns in early modern China. I call for a careful reading of historical narratives, pointing to the political power and intellectual architecture behind these creations. Chapter one, “Muhammad,” begins with this essential figure and the Islamic past in Arabia. I show that there was never a static understanding of Muhammad in history. Rather, Muhammad must be continuously positioned and repositioned within time as Muslims enter new époques. I compare Muhammad’s placement in the texts of two authors, Liu Zhi [劉智] writing The Utmost Sage of Arabia [Tianfang zhisheng shilu 天方至聖實錄] in the eighteenth century and Lan Xu [藍煦] writing The Upright Learning of Arabia [Tianfang zhengxue 天方正學] in the nineteenth century. While Muhammad remains a crucial figure for both authors, their differing emphasis on him reflects the development of Islam in China. Chapter two, “Perfected Beings,” moves from Muhammad to other important entities in the cosmos. I show how Lan Xu’s category of superior individuals—the “Perfected Being” [zhen ren]— builds upon preceding Sufi Islamic and Chinese Daoist traditions. Through his systemization, Lan Xu unifies figures across space and time, from Arabia to China, from Adam to the nineteenth century. The assembly of lives is mirrored in the assembly of knowledge. This atiques 60, no. 2 (2006): 261–305. See also Engseng Ho, The Graves of Tarim: Genealogy and Mobility across the Indian Ocean (Berkeley, Calif.: Univ of California Press, 2006).

INTRODUCTION

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can be seen in Lan Xu’s flood account, which intersperses places and personages to render a coherent past for Chinese Muslims. Chapter three, “Tombs,” links the intellectual realm of Perfected Beings and their cosmos with the tangible conventional space of imperial China. I argue that it is through burial and accounts of the tomb that China becomes inscribed by Islamic lives. The past permeates into the present through animated graves and reappearing dead. Miracle stories point to how Perfected Beings continue to operate in the land. The passage of time is witnessed in the changing landscape of the tomb. Death becomes the ultimate equalizer for Lan Xu, unifying figures across geographic origin and time period. Chapters four and five address more standard histories of the Hui. I show how texts produced within the community respond to social and political concerns of the day. Chapter four, “Empire,” explores Hui relations with the state through a nineteenth century collection Words and Deeds of Islamic Exemplars [Qingzhen xianzheng yanxing lüe 清真先正言行略]. The author, Li Huanyi [李煥乙], builds upon traditions identifying Muhammad’s companion Sa’d b. Abi Waqqas as the first Muslim dispatched to China. Li positions Waqqas as the initiator of a long lineage of service to the emperor. His compendium strives to uncover this forgotten history of Hui who served the empire. I argue that this text is much more than a collection of exemplary lives from the Sui to Qing dynasties. It is written in response to pressing concerns regarding the status of Hui in late nineteenth century China. The attention to the state throughout sheds light on the deeply political nature of this creation. Chapter five, “Continuity,” begins with the Yunnan massacres in the mid-nineteenth century and ends with China’s new Republican era in the early twentieth. I follow the story of one man, Ma Yunhua [馬雲華], as he uncovers his family lineage tracing descent from the Yuan dynasty Bukharan Sayyid Ajall and from the Prophet Muhammad. In the process of editing the text, Ma Yunhua transforms the lineage into a genealogy covering all of time, from the beginning of the universe to the upcoming apocalypse. I posit three ways to read the final genealogy. One is for its temporal-spatial trajectory as the genealogy begins in Arabia with Muhammad’s heritage, follows the family’s migrations to imperial China, and ends addressing concerns of Republican era China. Another is to read for

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the relationship between this text and the socio-political events of its day. I argue that it is precisely in times of great community trauma and political uncertainty that lineage texts resurface for their crucial ability to generate a sense of continuity. Finally, far from a simple lineage concerning one Muslim family in Yunnan, I propose that this genealogy holds universal implications about the nature of time. The entire text is an exercise in chronicling time and situating oneself in quantifiable relationship to important events of the past. Ma Yunhua shows us how sense of time is itself subject to each community’s particular wounds and deepest aspirations. Taken as a whole, the chapters of this book offer multiple examples of history-telling. Each chapter can be read as a different mode of organizing the past. The past can be constructed around Muhammad, Perfected Beings, accounts of tombs, imperial heroes, and genealogy. The intention in presenting chapters thematically this way is to offer an alternative to the overly simplistic and long-used approach of asking “how Islam is made Chinese.” The problem with this framework is the static understanding of both Islam and Chinese-ness that is assumed. The chapters in this book invite a more nuanced understanding of the dynamics at play. The authors I introduce are constantly striving to renew Islamic tradition for the present. Simultaneously, they are situating contemporary personages and developments within this tradition. The bi-directionality of rewriting the past for the present and connecting the present to the past is what keeps Islam alive in China and elsewhere.

CHAPTER 1. MUHAMMAD The earliest biographies of the Prophet Muhammad (sira) were written down more than one hundred years after his death. By then, issues faced by the developing Muslim community shaped how Muhammad’s life was remembered and what details were emphasized. Previous studies have shown how concerns about gender norms, sectarian politics, and theological issues informed sira accounts from the very beginning. 1 Writing about Muhammad’s life continues today throughout various parts of the Muslim world. Yet how the Prophet’s life is contextualized evolves with the present-day concerns of chroniclers. This was certainly the case in eighteenth and nineteenth century China, when Muslims began composing accounts of Muhammad’s life in Chinese. This chapter compares how Muhammad’s life is positioned by two Chinese thinkers, Liu Zhi and Lan Xu. I examine The Veritable Records of the Utmost Sage of Arabia [Tianfang zhisheng shilu 天方 至聖實錄] authored by Liu Zhi [劉智, c. 1660 – c. 1739]. 2 This text See Denise Spellberg, Politics, Gender, and the Islamic Past: the legacy of ʿA’isha bint Abi Bakr, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996) and Leor Halevi, Muhammad's Grave: death rites and the making of Islamic society (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007). See also Tarif Khalidi, Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002). 2 Zhi Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” in Qingzhen Dadian, ed. Xiefan Zhou, vol. 14, Zhongguo Zong Jiao Li Shi Wen Xian Ji Cheng 89 (Hefei Shi: Huang Shan shu she, 2005), 1–365. 1

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is written in the Islamic sira tradition and entirely about Muhammad. In The Utmost Sage, Muhammad is the centerpiece around which other lives and everything else in the universe is organized. I contrast this Muhammad-centric approach with a later text titled “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings” [Zhenren muzhi 真人墓誌]. The “Epitaphs” is a biographical collection containing the lives of the Islamic prophets, Muhammad, and Sino-Muslim figures. The “Epitaphs” is found within a larger compendium, The Upright Learning of Arabia [Tianfang zhengxue 天方正學] by Lan Xu [藍煦, 1813 – c.1880]. In the “Epitaphs,” Muhammad holds an elevated position, but his life is presented alongside other biographies that culminate with Lan Xu’s parents. My approach in reading these texts side-by-side is not so much to focus on the content of Muhammad’s life. Rather, I am interested in how Muhammad is situated in relationship to time. I show how for Liu Zhi, time is organized around Muhammad. Muhammad drives time and represents the absolute culmination of things. This is in contrast to the later thinker Lan Xu. In Lan Xu’s account, time proceeds on its own. Muhammad appears at certain important junctures and influences key turning points due to his special status. However, the vision of the past is populated by other significant individuals who appear alongside Muhammad. I suggest that the difference in Muhammad’s placement within these two texts is not simply an issue of genre, with Liu Zhi writing in the sira tradition and Lan Xu undertaking a larger compendium and biographical collection. Rather, it reflects the development of the Islamic tradition in China. The key concern addressed in Liu Zhi’s text— consolidating the sira literature into a version that is standard and accessible to a Chinese audience—is no longer an issue for Sino-Muslim intellectuals writing over one hundred years later. By the time that Lan Xu composed the “Epitaphs” and opening metaphysical treatises that make up The Upright Learning, Liu Zhi’s life of Muhammad had already become canonical and well established within Sino-Muslim discourse. It was not so pressing anymore to rewrite Muhammad’s biography. Rather, the concern turns to situating other, more local lives in relation to that of Muhammad and his tradition. Lan Xu’s text still takes up the now standard endeavor of summarizing Islamic knowledge. The author even goes as

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far as to state in the preface that he believes his text to be “no different from the works of Liu Zhi and Wang Daiyu.” 3 However, the teleological drive of Lan Xu’s collection is towards China. Muhammad and the narrative of Islamic origins are told with a Chinese endpoint in mind.

I. MUHAMMAD: PHYSICAL, METAPHYSICAL, AND PRESENT Liu Zhi 劉智, also known as Jielian 介廉, is remembered today as the most famous and prolific Muslim author of late imperial China. Liu came from a scholarly family in present-day Nanjing and was educated in the Confucian classics like other literati of the time. His biography of Muhammad, Veritable Records of the Utmost Sage of Arabia [Tianfang zhisheng shilu 天方至聖實錄], was widely read among Muslims in Qing dynasty China and remains one of his most well known works today. The first woodblock prints of this sira were published in 1776 by editor Yuan Guozuo, with subsequent prints made in 1778 and 1785. 4 The text continued to be in wide circulation throughout China. 5 Towards the end of the Qing dynasty, it attracted the interest of Western missionaries. A Russian translation was made in the late nineteenth century by Archimandrite Palladii Kafarov and an English translation in the early twentieth century by British missionary Isaac Mason. 6 Xu Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” in Huizu Diancang Quanshu, ed. Haiying Wu, vol. 35 (Lanzhou: Gansu wenhua chubanshe, 2008), 167. 4 The 1785 prints are available online at http://www.archive.org/ details/02099340.cn (accessed May 25, 2011). For a punctuated edition in simplified script, see Jie Zhang, Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu (Beijing: Zhongguo yisilanjiao xuehui, 1984). For a modern Chinese translation and interpretation, see Zhiyi Zhou, trans., Yisilanjiao Chuangshi Ren Tianfang Zhisheng Mohamode Zhuan (Heilongjiang: Heilongjiang Renmin Chubanshe, 1996). 5 For an account of how the Qing emperor came to hear about this text, see Ben-Dor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad, 215–35. Ben-Dor Benite also provides a partial translation of one of the prefaces to this work, Ibid., 146. 6 In addition, a Japanese translation of the body with appendices in Japanese and Chinese was made in 1930. See Tanaka Ippei, Tempō shisei jitsu-roku 3

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What is interesting is not so much that a Chinese biography of Muhammad exists. For such a large Muslim community that has inhabited China for so long, it would be surprising if there weren’t one. Instead, the richness of Liu Zhi’s sira lies in the encasings around Muhammad. What is noteworthy is the way Muhammad’s life is packaged in eighteenth century China, and then repackaged in nineteenth century China by Lan Xu. The process of retelling Muhammad’s story belies an urgency. In writing the Utmost Sage, Liu Zhi is reordering the past. His text contains a wealth of information not just about Muhammad—the obvious subject—but also the concerns, world-system, and values of the recounter. I propose that we approach Liu Zhi’s account of Muhammad in terms of three nesting concentric circles. In the middle is the smallest circle, which is the actual life narrative of Muhammad. This is the discourse around the “physical Muhammad.” This refers to the human being who was born at a certain time and died at a certain time. The discourse around the physical Muhammad concerns the minute details of his life meticulously chronicled in sira literature and documented in the oral hadith tradition. It narrates when Muhammad was born, his childhood, marriage, adulthood, battles, wives, children, and death—all the details you would expect in the life story of a human being. (Tokyo, 1930). Archimandrite Palladii Kafarov [1817–1878] served as head of the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission in Beijing. See Ludmilla Panskaya and Donald Leslie, Introduction to Palladii’s Chinese Literature of the Muslims (Faculty of Asian Studies, Australian National University, 1977). Isaac Mason belonged to the Friends' Foreign Mission and Christian Literature Society for China and was inspired by Cairo-based Reverend Samuel M. Zwemer to focus on Chinese Muslims. See Jielian Liu, The Arabian Prophet; a Life of Mohammed from Chinese and Arabic Sources., trans. Isaac Mason (Shanghai: Printed by the Commercial Press, 1921). For a useful review, see Paul Pelliot, “Review of The Arabian Prophet: A Life of Mohammed from Chinese and Arabic Sources by Isaac Mason,” T’oung Pao 21, no. 5 (December 1922): 413–25. See also Isaac Mason, “A Chinese Life of Mohammed,” Journal of the North-China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 51 (1920): 159–60.

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The next larger circle is the “metaphysical Muhammad,” the atemporal and absolute aspects of Muhammad. This refers to an abstract notion of Muhammad, which exists before time and outside of time. The metaphysical Muhammad is not a person confined to a body and the limitations of lifespan. Rather, it is the essence of Muhammad, often termed the Light of Muhammad or the Muhammadean Reality. Finally, we can approach Liu Zhi’s text in terms of the the outer-most circle, which I call the “present Muhammad.” This refers to the connections in the text made between Muhammad and someone sitting in eighteenth century China. The links to the present can come in many forms, including the embedding of China into Muhammad’s life story or a silsila documenting transmission. In the case of Liu Zhi’s sira, connections to present eighteenth-century China are segmented to the end of his text. When we read Liu Zhi’s text for all three Muhammads—the physical, the metaphysical, and the present—we are able to see that it contains much more than a simple life account. Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage contains his ordering of the world. The Physical Muhammad Liu describes the Utmost Sage as “a record of the true events of the sixty-one or sixty-two years of the Arabian sage Muhammad’s life from birth to death.” 7 He describes how long and laborious the process was of producing this text, noting that it took him four years just to write it, in addition to research time spent traveling across the country scouring foreign texts held in the private collections of other Chinese Muslims. 8 The author also relates his awareness of other sira works from Arabia, which he could not obtain, as well as a vast and bewildering volume of hadith literature purposely left out for the sake of simplicity. 9 Liu presents his text as the ultimate and most up7 Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 38.

8 Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 40–42. 9

Ibid., 38–39. Liu writes, “In Arabia there is the entire account of the utmost sage, but I could not obtain this to use as my own model. The writing of those of Western learning who recorded what they saw and heard is vast

16

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

to-date summary of the essentials about Muhammad. He notes that his greatest goal in this composition is clarity so that the text can be easily understood by readers. He describes a conscious choice to organize Muhammad’s biography by year according to the “standard model,” and “weeding out that which was complicated.” 10 Indeed, apart from a few noteworthy episodes, which bring Muhammad’s marital and mourning practices in line with Chinese social norms, the actual account of the “physical” Muhammad found in the Utmost Sage, is standard and comparable alongside other sira texts circulating in the post-Mongol Islamic world. 11 While Liu refers to an exhaustive search consulting multiple sources in the composition of the sira, his work is based closely upon the Al-Muntaqa min Siyar al-Nabi al-Mustafa by the Persian Sufi Saʿid al-Din Muhammad b. Masʿud al-Kazaruni [d. 1386 C.E./788 A.H.]. 12 The bulk of Liu’s sira, fascicles three to fifteen, is devoted to narrating the physical Muhammad. It is organized in the same way as Kazaruni’s text. 13 and deep like the Milky Way. Their sayings are different and similar. It is difficult for the reader to arrive at the shore of wisdom.” 10 Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 38–39. 11 Liu Zhi’s version presents Muhammad’s first wife Khadija as an imperial princess, and presents his subsequent wives as virgins. To my knowledge, this is unique to imperial China as it is accepted among other Muslims that Khadija was a widow, as were most of Muhammad’s subsequent wives. The special filial piety Muhammad paid after the death of his parents and at their burial sites is also emphasized by Liu Zhi. 12 For biographical information about al-Kazaruni and and an overview of his text, see Lutfi Mansur, ed., Al-Muntaqa min Siyar al-Nabi al-Mustafa by Sa’id al-Din Muhammad b. Mas’ud al-Kazaruni (Kafr Qar’, Israel: Markaz Dirasat al-Adab al-ʻArabi wa-Dar al-Huda lil-Tibaʻah wa-al-Nashr, 2001), xvii. Zvi Ben-Dor Benite and Donald Leslie both believe that the Liu Zhi utilized a Persian translation made by the author’s son ʿAfif in 1383 titled Tarjuma i Mawlud i Mustafa. See Ben-Dor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad, 151. See Donald Leslie, Islamic Literature in Chinese, Late Ming and Early Chʻing: Books, Authors, and Associates (Belconnen: Canberra College of Advanced Education, 1981), 49. 13 I have consulted two surviving Persian manuscripts. Sa’id al-Din Muhammad b. Mas’ud al-Kazaruni, “Siyar al-Nabi,” [833 A.H.], Nuruosmani-

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Muhammad’s human existence is presented chronologically by year from birth to age sixty-four [11 A.H.]. Yet, this physical Muhammad does not appear alone in Liu Zhi’s text. He is introduced via a very abstract discussion of what Muhammad represents. The minutia of the year-by-year progression of Muhammad’s life is framed in terms of something bigger. Liu Zhi does not automatically assume that his audience will find the detailed contents of the sira significant. He devotes the first three fascicles towards reminding readers of Muhammad’s special status and establishing Muhammad’s importance. In this way, the highly theoretical opening to the sira and the actual narrative of Muhammad’s physical life complement each other. The Metaphysical Muhammad The discourse around Muhammad in the opening three fascicles of the Utmost Sage is organized differently than the body of the text devoted to Muhammad’s physical life. In describing the physical Muhammad, the author presumes that time exists and operates on its own. Time is divided into even yearly increments, into which major events of Muhammad’s life—his birth, marriages, and revelations—are subsumed. However, in discussing the metaphysical Muhammad, time and progression forward is subsumed under Muhammad. Muhammad is what drives time. Time is divided into the transmission of things—governance, prophecy, and light—which ultimately culminate in Muhammad. In his description of the metaphysical Muhammad that prefaces the biography, Liu Zhi introduces four models in which Muhammad is both the starting-point and end-point. These temporal systems, presented before the life account, showcase the complementary interaction between the physical Muhammad and the metaphysical Muhammad. According to Liu Zhi, the four systems dictated by ye 3342, Süleymaniye Library. Sa’id al-Din Muhammad b. Mas’ud alKazaruni, “Tarjamah Siyar al-Nabi,” transl. Uways b. Fakhr al-Din b. Hasan b. Isma‘il al-Mu’min‘abadi [896 A.H.], E.G. Browne J. 5 (10), Cambridge University Library.

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Muhammad, regulated by him, and inherited by him are the generational system [shi tong 世統], state system [guo tong 國統], religious system [dao tong 道統], and metaphysical system [hua tong 化統]. In the generational system, Muhammad inherits the light transmitted corporeally from father-to-son across fifty-generations beginning with Adam to Muhammad’s father ʿAbdullah. Here time is broken up by generational count beginning with Adam as the first and ending with Muhammad’s father and finally Muhammad. The issue of Muhammad having no living son fits well within this scheme. Liu Zhi writes, “With utmost virtue and utmost value, the utmost sage did not transmit to a son. This is upright, for with his utmost virtue and utmost value, he does not need a son. For sons find it pleasing to be greater than their fathers. Yet there is nothing greater than the utmost sage.” 14 Liu Zhi also points to how Muhammad is the light itself. Therefore, because “the light has no shadow, so the sage has no son, for the son is the shadow of the father.” 15 Muhammad cannot transmit again to another human being in this generational system because he is the system itself. This model establishes a circular progression around Muhammad who, as the Light of Muhammad, is the very essence being transmitted across fifty generations. As the human being Muhammad, the son of ʿAbdullah, he also bookends the generational transmission of his light. In the state system, Muhammad inherits governance from the rulers of antiquity beginning with Adam as the first ruler and going through the Persian and Byzantine kings. In this scheme, time is divided into six eras beginning with the first human being and ruler Adam. The rise and fall of each era is marked by a calculated number of years and rulers.

14 Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 79. 15 Ibid., 83.

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Table 1.1 Dynasties of Arabia in Liu Zhi, The Utmost Sage 16 Dynasty

Founding Ruler

Last Ruler

Number of Rulers

Years

Kai Bi

Adam

Noah

10 generations [2 rulers] 17

2257

Kai Yang 18 Shi Kang Han Dan Sa Man Arabian

Kai Yumo 19 Kai Gu 20 Er Shi Ke 22 E’erdeshi 23 Muhammad

Sha Xi Xi Kang De 21 E’erte Nushi’er Muhammad

20 rulers 14 rulers 17 rulers 19 rulers = 72 rulers from Adam

2446 751 360 380 = 6194 years from Adam

16

This table is based off the information given in Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 79–80. More research is needed to identify Liu Zhi’s source and the exact individuals and dynasties listed here. For the purposes of this project, I have reproduced them as they appear in Liu Zhi’s text to illustrate the positioning of Muhammad within this lineage system. Likely an eighteenth century Hui reader would also be lost as to the exact references here. 17 Liu does not give an explicit count for the number of rulers in this first dynasty, only specifying “ten generations.” I have assumed here that only Adam and Noah count as rulers in the first dynasty, thus reaching exactly seventy-two rulers before Muhammad. Both Noah and Adam are believed to have lifespans totaling over one thousand years. See the discussion of lifespans in my analysis of Lan Xu’s work later in this chapter. 18 Likely a reference to the Kayanian dynasty in the Persian Shahnameh. 19 This is the ruling name [hao 號] of Noah’s son Shem. 20 Decended from someone named Na Ze [納則]. 21 Responsible for the unification of Rum. 22 He executed a “false” leader of Shi Kang to establish the new Han Dan dynasty. Author notes he is the son of Da la [達喇], the twelfth ruler of the previous dynasty. 23 He attacked Han Dan to establish a new era. Liu Zhi notes he is the twentieth generation descendant of Bai Han [白罕], who was an ancestor of Da la [達喇].

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Liu Zhi notes that the state system leading up to Muhammad contains a total of seventy-two rulers. Seventy-two is a significant number in the Islamic tradition representing “many,” typically used in the context of seventy-two nations. Liu Zhi points out the completeness of this governing system of transmission with its seventytwo rulers noting that “if one were to transmit the system again, there would be no system.” 24 In other words, within this system it does not make sense to have additional rulers since that would put the total count past seventy-two. Muhammad represents the completion and fruition of the state transmission system. He is situated both within the state system and outside of it. While Muhammad inherits the transmission of governance from these seventy-two rulers of antiquity, he is unique in not calling himself a king or emperor. After Muhammad’s death, the state system of transmission is not transmitted further. Instead, the Arabian era is continued indefinitely under the stewardship of “worthies” [xian 賢]. These people carry on Muhammad’s Arabian era, but “do not call themselves emperor for they say this would usurp the position of the sage.” 25 For Liu Zhi, Muhammad represents the apogee of wise governance. The author notes how during Muhammad’s reign, all the kings and rulers of various nations came to submit themselves to him and pledge their allegiance. The sira itself contains anecdotes illustrating this, with Muhammad providing advice and assistance to rulers from India and China. After his death, Muhammad and the stewards of Arabia continue to be respected by other nations as exemplars of governance. 26 Muhammad receives the chain for transmission for the seventy-two rulers of antiquity, yet he does not transmit to a designated heir. His rule is the culmination of the state system. In this way, he is both the end of the system and its timeless exemplar. In the religious system, Muhammad is the tenth and final prophet in the biblical line of major prophets, identified here as Ad24 Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 81. 25 Ibid., 80. 26 Ibid.

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am, Seth, Noah, Abraham, Isaac and Ishmael (who share a single slot), Jacob, Moses, David, and Jesus. Liu Zhi writes: The birth of the utmost sage is the apex, like the sun at high noon. As for the path of all the sages from Adam to Jesus, he [Muhammad] is like the sprout to the roots, the branch to the trunk, and the flower to the leaves. The path of the utmost sage is the fruit. Of all that is bright under heaven and earth, none is brighter than the sun. Of all that is fortifying in the trees, none is more fortifying than the bearing of fruit. Of all that is complete on the path of religion [jiao 教], nothing is more complete than the utmost sage. For the religious system [dao tong 道統] reaches its end with Muhammad. 27

Muhammad is the climactic end of the biblical tradition of prophecy initiated by Adam and passed through Jesus. In this way, the religious system of transmission illustrates Muhammad’s reputation in Islam as the “Seal of the Prophets.” Yet Liu Zhi is careful to stress that this finality is not limiting. He writes, “The transmission of the path of the 124,000 sages ends at the utmost sage. Yet there is really no end, for the sage is the path itself.” 28 Muhammad and the path are one. He is both the recipient of this long legacy of religious teaching and the religion itself. Finally, the metaphysical system documents the creation of all phenomena as it emanates from Muhammad and assumes differentiating characteristics such as yin-yang, the five elements, and various divisions between plants, animals, and humans before ultimately culminating in Muhammad. The spirit of Muhammad marks the beginning of all creation. Liu explains: “even though the utmost sage resided in the human realm, in reality his spirit is the origin of creation and his form is the model of heaven and earth.” 29 In a circle punctuated by smaller circles arranged clockwise, Liu Zhi illustrates how it is the components of the utmost sage that initiate the system 27 Ibid., 81.

28 Ibid., 83.

29 Ibid., 38–39.

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of changes in prior heaven leading to the formation of all manifest phenomenon that we know of here in later heaven. All of creation emanates from the utmost sage. Furthermore, the appearance of the human sage Muhammad on earth also marks the culmination of creation. This system begins with the utmost sage and ends with the utmost sage. The author writes, “Muhammad encompasses and links all things from the beginning and end of creation. That is why the myriad of things all take Muhammad as their guide.” 30 It is Muhammad, his essence, that regulates these systems, and thus dictates the progression of time in these systems. Liu Zhi writes that not only do the four systems all end with the sage Muhammad, but “they are all regulated within his universe and they all fall within his scope.” 31 As such, Muhammad is not only the final recipient of these four systems of transmission but he encompasses the entirety of the systems themselves. The two narratives of Muhammad—that of his physical life and that of his metaphysical significance—are constantly intersecting with each other. The narrative of the physical Muhammad is only significant in and so much as he is no ordinary human being. He is the last Prophet and the establisher of Islam. Muhammad is accepted and celebrated as the wielder of all of these traditions. The details about his life matter precisely because of the authority that comes from his atemporal quality. He is still deemed to be powerful and relevant today. Conversely, the metaphysical Muhammad must relate to our current world. He must enter this worldly system at some point even if he is “outside the system” or encompasses the system itself. Without entry into the mundane world, Muhammad is just an abstract idea. His great metaphysical significance relies on the fact that these powers are vested in a single human being, and come to fruition in a single human being. Ibid., 83. Liu Zhi’s other major work, the Tianfang xingli provides a lengthier exploration of metaphysics. For a detailed study of the metaphysical dimensions to Liu Zhi’s thought, see Sachiko Murata et al., The Sage Learning of Liu Zhi. 31 Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 2005, 83. 30

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The Present Muhammad The last circle is Muhammad’s linkage to the present. The physical Muhammad is situated in seventh century Arabia and the metaphysical Muhammad is everywhere and nowhere all at once. So what is Muhammad’s connection to the author Liu Zhi and his readers in eighteenth century China? This outer-most circle addresses the physicality of the recounters sitting in a specific place and time. In Liu Zhi’s sira, concerns about Muhammad’s connection to immediate surroundings are relegated to the end of the text. The last five fascicles of the Utmost Sage include a mish-mash of things, likely compiled by the editor and publisher Yuan Guozuo [袁國祚]. The texts here include ritual and liturgical praise of Muhammad, a geographic exploration of Arabia and other countries, as well as Chinese inscriptions attesting to the arrival of Islam in China. 32 The placement of these items at the end of the sira, resembling an appendix in their hodge-podge manner, suggests that they are presumed to be the least important—something extra to be read after one has worked through the metaphysical and physical Muhammad. Yet their very presence in the Utmost Sage attests to the fact that they are connected to the life story of Muhammad. I argue that these items address a need to link Muhammad with the reader. The story of Muhammad is not complete without its relationship to the present. A temporal link to Muhammad’s lifetime is established through inscriptions attesting to Islam’s arrival during the Kaihuang era of the Sui dynasty. A geographic link to Muhammad’s location in Arabia is established through the survey of Arabian climate and geography. Praises of Muhammad and ritual guidelines also point readers 32 Yuan was active in the 1770’s. More on editor Yuan Guozuo

can be found in Ben-dor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad, 155–62, 175–79. Leslie offers a detailed listing of what can be found in fascicles nineteen and twenty of the Utmost Sage, including where he believes they are excerpted from. See Leslie, Islamic Literature in Chinese, Late Ming and Early Chʻing, 127–37. Ben-Dor Benite has also reviewed these, especially those relating to the arrival of Islam in China. See Ben-Dor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad, 189– 90.

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to tangible ways they can venerate Muahammad in the present. The last fascicles of Utmost Sage make the crucial link to present-day China. Their insertion point to the persistent need to keep these discussions relevant. They serve as the connecting piece to the present audience. If there is a core to Islam, this would be the “life” of Muhammad, the physical person who is generally agreed upon and standard across narratives. Yet this core or nucleus to the Islamic tradition is never found alone, stripped of all its outer layers—the metaphysical Muhammad and the present Muhammad. To only examine this fruit pit would be to forgo the juiciest and tastiest parts of the fruit— its flesh and outer skin. As I have shown in this section, the physical Muhammad must be made understandable and relevant in all settings where he is remembered. The process of relating to Muhammad is what drives the production of this literature. The life story may be similar, but each retelling is different.

II. MUHAMMAD AS THE TIPPING POINT For Liu Zhi, Muhammad is the focus of the past. Time is narrated up until Muhammad, with developments in China relegated to the appendix. Writing roughly a century after Liu Zhi, the thinker Lan Xu positions Muhammad in a very different way with respect to the past. The world created in Lan Xu’s text encompasses time from before the birth of the universe through the author’s present day until the end of the universe. Lan Xu’s Muhammad appears at key junctures in the evolution of the universe, but the Prophet himself does not drive time. Instead, Lan Xu introduces the concept of the haqq (Truth, Ultimate Oneness) from which everything emanates. The relationship between Lan Xu’s narrative of the past and his present time—nineteenth century China—is made much more apparent in the text. China is interwoven into his narrative from the very beginning, and the author consciously positions himself and his contemporaries within this system. I suggest that the richness of Lan Xu’s thought lies in the complex interplay between the haqq and human beings. The haqq operates in an automatic fashion, but select

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individuals—known as “Perfected Beings”—occupy powerful positions in relation to the haqq and can manipulate its powers. 33 In Lan Xu’s account of the past, Muhammad appears alongside other Perfected Beings selected from Sino-Islamic history. The story of Muhammad is told alongside the story of Islam in China. Lan Xu [藍煦, 1813–c.1880] was a successful bureaucrat who authored two collections of Islamic knowledge in addition to a commentary on the Chinese Yijing (Book of Changes) and some gazetteer pieces. Very little English language scholarship exists about him. 34 We know that he was born into a well-established Muslim family during the waning years of China’s last imperial dynasty. His father was originally from Changsha in Hunan Province, but moved the family around while serving as a low-ranking official in the Qing bureaucracy. After the death of Lan Xu’s father, his mother relocated the family to Beijing. Following a practice that was common during the time of Emperor Daoguang, Lan Xu bought his way into the examination system. He then assumed various low-level posts in the government. In 1868, Lan Xu was promoted to district magistrate of Xingzi District in Jiangxi Province. He served as district magistrate for eight years, during which time he compiled the Xingzi Gazetteer, authoring a preface and two literary pieces within it. In 1876, he was demoted from this position. We know nothing about his later years. 35

33

See chapter two of this project for a more detailed examination of the Perfected Beings. 34 See Leslie, Donald Daniel and Daye Yang, “Jesus the Prophet in Chinese Islam” in The Chinese Face of Jesus Christ, ed. Roman Malek, Monumenta Serica Monograph Series 50:3a (Sankt Augustin, Germany: Institut Monumenta Serica and China-Zentrum, 2005), 852–54. Leslie provides a brief overview of Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs” section in The Upright Learning of Arabia [Tianfang Zhengxue] and translations of the biographies of Jesus and Mary. 35 More biographical information on Lan Xu can be found in Yanhui Luo, “Xingzhou Zai Shuangchong Zi Jian: Lan Xu Shengping Shiji Kaoshu,” Huizu Kaojiu 3, no. 83 (2011): 84–87.

26

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Among his Islamic works, Lan Xu wrote an encyclopedia of Persian terms for cosmology, landscape, flora and fauna titled Tianfang Erya [天方尔雅]. 36 His most widely read Islamic text, however, is a compendium titled The Upright Learning of Arabia [Tianfang Zhengxue 天方正學]. The Upright Learning was completed during the reign of emperor Xianfeng (r. 1851–1861), while Lan Xu was serving as an official in Wuhan. Based on surviving prints, we know that it continued to be distributed up until the late Republican Era (1920’s). Several diagrams from The Upright Learning were incorporated into other Sino-Islamic works, including the Ma family genealogy examined in chapter five of this book. The Upright Learning summarizes what Lan Xu considers to be the most essential Islamic knowledge. The work is divided into seven sections. The first section consists of diagrams outlining the cosmos, the cycles of time, and the lineage of Islamic prophets. The 36 “Erya” refers

to the ancient Chinese dictionary dating to the third century BC. It was made one of the classics during the Tang dynasty in 837 and influenced the development of the Chinese language. Endymion Wilkinson, Chinese History: A Manual, Revised and Enlarged, Revised and Enlarged Edition edition (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Asia Center, 2000), 62. Unlike other ancient Chinese classics, the Erya has not been translated into English, perhaps owing to its difficult linguistic nature and reference quality. Scholarship on the ancient Chinese Erya is also limited. See for example, W South Coblin, “An Introductory Study of Textual and Linguistic Problems in Erh-Ya” (PhD dissertation, University of Washington, 1972). Lan Xu’s Tianfang Erya was published in 1861 with new prints issued in 1884. Xu Lan, “Tianfang Erya,” in Huizu Diancang Quanshu, ed. Haiying Wu, vol. 222–223 (Lanzhou: Gansu wenhua chubanshe, 2008). To my knowledge, this text has not been examined by Chinese or Western scholars. It is not included, for example, in Leslie’s bibliographical guide. Donald Leslie, Islam in Traditional China. Chinese scholar Luo erroneously calls it an Arabic-Chinese dictionary. Luo, “Xingzhou Zai Shuangchong Zi Jian: Lan Xu Shengping Shiji Kaoshu.” In fact, the foreign terms in Lan Xu’s entries are Persian. Similar to the ancient Chinese classic, Lan Xu’s “Arabian” [tianfang] Erya covers language, astronomy, geography, topography, flora, and fauna. The preface provides a narrative of creation on Mt. Kunlun, the Kaʿba, Adam, Noah, and Noah’s three sons.

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second section is devoted to the Arabic letters—both the mundane aspects of pronunciation, ordering, and vocabulary as well as their deeper mystical meaning. The third section contains exegesis of the Qur’an, including reference to specific surahs. The next three sections are short treatises outlining various doctrinal and metaphysical concepts, of which section six is a commentary on Wang Daiyu [王岱輿]. The seventh and final section, titled “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings” [Zhenren muzhi 真人墓誌], contains fifty-one biographies beginning with the first human being Adam and ending with the author’s parents. The Movement of the Haqq While Muhammad serves as the beginning, end, and essence of everything in Liu Zhi’s system, Lan Xu organizes time and cosmology in The Upright Learning around the haqq. Within the Islamic tradition, al-haqq is one of the names of God and refers to truth and ultimate reality. Lan Xu uses the Chinese words “han ge” [罕格] as a transliteration of the Arabo-Persian term haqq. He also employs the Chinese term zhen yi, “true Oneness,” interchangeably with the haqq. 37 In Lan Xu’s system, the haqq is what encompasses everything. The haqq will always be there, through the rise and fall of all phenomena in the universe. It was there before creation. It will be there after the dissolution of the universe. The haqq has no beginning and it will never end. 38 For Lan Xu, the haqq is the one thing that is constant. It does not depend upon or rest within time. It is independent of time. Lan Xu specifies that all known systems and cycles that dictate our lives are generated by the haqq. It is the movement of the haqq 37

The two are equated in the opening to his treatise, “Movement of the Haqq from its Origin,” [hange yunyuan shuo 罕格運元說] in which he writes: “When you examine antiquity, before the existence of Heaven and Earth, there was only the Real One [zhen yi], the haqq [han ge].” See Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 188. 38 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 190.

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that creates heaven and earth, Yin and Yang, the elements, and the seasons. Before the manifestation of all phenomena, the haqq is still. When it begins to move, the first thing that appears is the light of Muhammad. The light of Muhammad is produced at the first division of Yin and Yang. Lan Xu details how the light of Muhammad has five phoenixes, which in turn generate further divisions such as the ten heavenly stems and twelve earthly branches. 39 The light of Muhammad precedes all creation and is the link between created beings and the haqq. The entire lifespan of the universe can be encapsulated within one clockwise rotation around the twelve earthly stems. During the first two earthly stems “zi” and “chou,” the universe lies in gestation. At this time of Primeval Chaos, the light of Muhammad is dormant in the sea [Ar. bahr, Ch. bai ha ling 白哈領]. The next nine earthly stems relate to manifest phenomenon, during which time human beings appear starting with Adam. This is human history as we know it. Finally, in the last earthly stem “hai,” the universe is in termination and ceases to exist. 40 Human history is situated within nine-twelfths of the total duration of the universe’s lifespan. During the nine earthly stems which account for human history, time begins to be measurable. Each of these nine segments lasts for 1500 years, for a total of 13,500 years in human history. Lan Xu details these nine eras of human history via spiral diagrams. In the center of each diagram is the word haqq [han ge 罕格]. This is followed by a prose description of the era with characters arranged clockwise in a spiral circling out from the haqq. 41

39 Ibid., 188–89.

40 Ibid., 190–91.

41 Ibid., 192–200.

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Diagram 1.1 Movement of the Haqq in Lan Xu,

The Upright Learning42

The totality of human history in these nine circles is organized as follows: 1. Adam and Eve. 2. Noah and the flood. Fuxi arrives in China. 43

This spiral diagram is the second of nine in The Upright Learning. Image taken from Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 193. 43 A further exploration of Fuxi and how Lan Xu combines Islamic and Chinese flood stories can be found in chapter two of this book. 42

30

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3. Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac and Jacob. The Yellow Emperor, Yao and Shun. 4. Moses, David, and Jesus. Confucius, Laozi, and Mencius. 5. Muhammad is born. Tang Taizong requests the scripture. Waqqas arrives in China. 44 Sino-Muslim authors Liu Zhi, Wang Daiyu, and the author himself. 6–9. Increasing natural disasters, decreasing human lifespans. 45 The act of dividing up time into a certain number of eras is common practice among Islamic historians. Usually the eras up to Muhammad are segmented according to the prophets. For example in his well-known Tarikh, Tabari puts forth eight eras from Adam to Muhammad. 46 Liu Zhi’s governance transmission system has six eras and his prophetic transmission system puts forth ten. Lan Xu’s division of time differs from Liu Zhi, however, in the expanse of time he covers. Liu Zhi stops at Muhammad, but Lan Xu’s eras go on until the end of time. Furthermore, Lan Xu is remarkable in that his eras cover key Chinese individuals—the mythical hero Fuxi and other famed sages and rulers from Chinese antiquity. Lan Xu accounts for his present time as well. He places himself in the same era as Muhammad. Prominent figures in the transmission of Islam to China story, Tang Taizong and Waqqas, also appear in Muhammad’s era. In addition, Lan Xu includes his intellectual predecessors Liu Zhi and Wang Daiyu. Dividing up human eras in this way, Lan Xu is able to

44

A further exploration of Tang Taizong and the arrival of Islam in China via Waqqas is taken up in chapter three of this book. 45 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 192–200. 46 Tabari and Franz Rosenthal, The History of al-Ṭabarī: Ta’rikh al-Rusul Wa’l-Muluk. Vol 1, General Introduction and from the Creation to the Flood (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989), 370–71. Tabari’s Eras are: 1) Adam’s fall to sending of Noah, 2) Noah’s mission to drowning of all people, 3) Flood to fire of Abraham, 4) Fire to mission of Joseph, 5) Joseph to mission of Moses, 6) Moses to reign of Solomon, 7) Solomon to mission of Jesus, 8) Jesus to sending of Messenger.

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present a parallel history of the Chinese and Islamic past, which becomes a joint history during Muhammad’s era. 47 Lan Xu’s system belies many things about the author’s understanding of time. First, there is the general notion of a pristine antiquity which becomes increasingly degenerate. As time passes since Adam’s first appearance, the number of human beings increases, lifespans decrease, and natural disasters become more plentiful. In this sense, the earlier one appears in human history, the better one’s life. Lan Xu notes how the first cycle reflects the time “when the Primordial Chaos split, the water becomes clear and fire visible. The mountains slowly appear. The grass and trees grow back.” 48 This is the time from Adam to the flood when human beings are extremely tall and live more than one thousand years. After this, however, natural disasters increase in frequency. Humans appear in greater number with shorter statures and lifespans. Lan Xu measures Adam at two zhang tall (approximately 6.6 meters). Adam lives for one thousand five hundred years—the entire span of the first cycle—while Noah lives for one thousand three hundred years. 49 During the fifth cycle when Muhammad appears, human beings are eight chi tall (approximately 2.3 meters) and live for one hundred years. 50 At the end of the ninth cycle, human beings are only one chi tall (approximately 0.3 meters) and live for thirty years. As for natural disasters, Lan Xu writes: “The population of upper antiquity is sparse, and there is a disaster every thousand plus years. The population of middle antiquity is dense, and there are disasters every five hundred years. It has been many years since later antiquity, so a disaster is approaching.” He also notes that “Among those from

47

Chapter three of this project contains a further exploration of this parallel history-telling as well as more elaborate exploration of the figures Fuxi and Waqqas. 48 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 191. 49 Ibid., 192. 50 Ibid., 196.

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antiquity, there are more noble people. Among those after antiquity, most are evil.” 51 While there is an overall narrative of decline, there also exists within this system a sense of human development that peaks with Muhammad. The precise placement of Muhammad as the initiator of the fifth cycle of human history, exactly in the middle of the nine cycles, is deliberate. Here Lan Xu follows Liu Zhi and the Islamic notion of Muhammad being the Seal of the Prophets. Muhammad represents the completion of something that began among human beings with Adam. Humanity before Muhammad is simply a build up to him, and humanity after Muhammad can only bask in his fading glow. In this sense, Muhammad serves as the tipping point between progress and degeneration in human history. Human Beings and the Haqq Lan Xu’s model of the haqq’s movements can be likened to cogs turning within a clock. The largest cog is that of the rotations around the twelve earthly stems accounting for one lifecycle of the universe as it goes from gestation to birth to decline. The middle cog relates to the spiral rotation around one era of human history. As Lan Xu states, each era lasts for one thousand five hundred years. The smallest cog accounts for the calendar year from the first day of spring to the last day of winter. Each cog operates in an endless cycle as the tick-tock of the universe’s history progresses year by year, era by era, lifecycle by lifecycle. The interlocked movements of these rotations proceed endlessly. Even as Lan Xu places himself in a fading golden era with apocalypse looming on the horizon, he also foresees a new rebirth of the world after its demise. The haqq goes back and forth between stillness (resting in nothingness) and movement (the chain of events that produces time and the world). Lan Xu writes: “Stillness therefore is the hidden and is without mark. Movement therefore is the manifest and has a form. Because it has form, its movements can be seen. Because it moves therefore it manifests the myriad of things.” In the 51 Ibid., 191.

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beginning is the haqq’s stillness. “When stillness reaches its extreme, there is movement. When movement reaches its extreme, there is stillness.” 52 There is never an end point to this continuation of the haqq. “The sun sets and the moon wanes only to return to their original splendor.” 53 A very mechanical understanding of time and history exists in Lan Xu’s system, with the notion that all phenomenon progresses automatically in an endless cycle. How do human beings fit in here? For Lan Xu, humans possess a special status in relation to the haqq. Unlike other beings created from the haqq’s movements (such as animals, angels, and ghosts), humans have the potential to perfect themselves and return to the haqq. 54 Humans throughout history are intimately connected with the haqq. Certain important individuals appear at the beginning of the haqq’s cycles. For the largest cycle and cog, this is the light of Muhammad. In Lan Xu’s account of creation, the light of Muhammad makes an appearance at the first movement of the haqq and division of yin and yang. It then “lies dormant in the sea” before human history commences. With the appearance of the first human Adam, the light is placed in his body and transmitted until the appearance of a physical Muhammad in the fifth era of human history. The middle cogs which account for the nine eras of human history are closely correlated with the lifespans of well-known individuals. Adam’s life lasts the entire duration of the first era while the second era is initiated by Noah and the flood. Muhammad’s birth sets in motion the fifth era. While the description of the haqq’s machinations implies an impersonal, automated system, the situation of these names in the nine eras links it to narrative traditions familiar to the reader. Placed within this system are the miraculous accounts of Muhammad’s birth, the stories of Tang emperor Taizong requesting the scripture and Waqqas’ arrival in China, as well as the more recent lives and works of Sino-Muslim individuals like Liu Zhi. In this way 52 Ibid., 190. 53 Ibid., 191.

54 This topic is explored further in chapter two “Perfected Beings.”

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popular heroes and stories familiar to Lan Xu’s readers are interwoven into this mega-history of all creation. For the smallest cog, one individual is assigned to preside over each of the twenty-four solar-agricultural periods that break up the haqq’s movements around the calendrical year. Lan Xu refers to these figures, chosen from the Sino-Islamic past, as “Perfected Beings.” Chapter two of this book explores this concept further. Adam’s placement as the heavenly immortal presiding over the first day of spring and Muhammad’s placement presiding over the winter solstice signals that something is completed and set in place during Muhammad’s era. The richness of Lan Xu’s thought lies in his ability to pair a mechanical-cyclical understanding of history with an intimate human component. The highly theoretical and macro understanding of the universe that opens the first fascicle of The Upright Learning is complemented by the personal details found in biographies at the end of the text.

CONCLUSION When we consider how time operates in Lan Xu’s system, the framing of time in terms of movements of the haqq highlights the extent to which human beings are influenced by the era in which they are born. We are a product of our times, Lan Xu suggests. Timing in terms of the era determines our height, lifespan, likelihood of good moral character, and possibility of encountering disasters. The haqq keeps on progressing along its cycle, and all along the way are simply manifestations of its movements. On the other hand, the biographies at the end of The Upright Learning display a completely different understanding of time. This is a more human-centric view which emphasizes the extent to which certain individuals can influence time. Here it is the Perfected Beings who play with time and who manipulate the usual workings of the universe. This system of organizing time and history reflects Lan Xu’s unique intellectual worldview. Unlike Liu Zhi who is only interested in writing up to the lifetime of Muhammad, Lan Xu is much more invested in emphasizing the Chinese past and present in relation to Muhammad. As one of the first Muslims to be writing about the Islamic past in Chinese, Liu Zhi dedicated himself to explaining who

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Muhammad is. The life of Muhammad needed to be outlined first in Chinese, and Muhammad’s metaphysical significance explained to an audience that favored tradition. Muhammad, in Liu Zhi’s narrative, is presented as the bearer and recipient of a long line of tradition from his rich family legacy to his imperial and prophetic inheritance. The organization of The Utmost Sage, with Chinese connections relegated to the appendix, reflects the unique time period and position in which Liu Zhi is recounting Muhammad. Nearly a century later for Lan Xu, the life story and significance of Muhammad had already been established through Liu Zhi’s account, which was widely circulating and familiar to Lan Xu’s audience. The task that Lan Xu takes up in The Upright Learning is to reposition Muhammad’s story, which takes up the lengthiest biographical entry in the “Epitaphs.” However, Muhammad’s life is eclipsed by Lan Xu’s overall project of universal history covering the creation of the universe, the beginning of time, and the end of this universe via the mechanical movements of the haqq. Muhammad appears alongside a cohort of Perfected Beings who are given just as much if not more emphasis. Chapter two continues this exploration of how the mystical powers of Perfected Beings allows China to become a natural end point in the progression of Islam.

CHAPTER 2. PERFECTED BEINGS “Of everything between heaven and earth, human beings are the most precious. Among human beings, there are the sages, the virtuous, the learned, and the foolish.” Liu Zhi, The Utmost Sage of Arabia 1

Most religions have a system for ranking human beings, from the most noble to the most base. This chapter examines one such grouping of superior people, titled “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings” [Zhenren muzhi 真人墓誌]. In writing the “Epitaphs,” nineteenth century author Lan Xu [藍煦] enters the conversation already begun by Confucians, Daoists, and Islamic Sufis on what constitutes the highest degree of human potential. Lan Xu mobilizes concepts from the Chinese context like sage [sheng] and immortal [xian]. He also appeals to the Islamic notion of the prophets and the Sufi pole saint [qutb]. All of these terms are used, but the vision of the “Perfected Being” [zhen ren] that Lan Xu creates is uniquely his own. I argue that far from simply a collection of superstars, the “Epitaphs” unifies individuals across space and time. Seemingly disparate figures from Arabia to China, from the first person Adam to Lan Xu’s nineteenth century parents, are all subsumed under the concept of “Perfected Being.” This assembly of lives is mirrored in the assembly of knowledge, which can be seen in Lan Xu’s flood account. It is through the narrative of these biographies that Lan Xu arranges the

1 Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 52.

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relative importance of different elements in the Sino-Islamic tradition. Section one of this chapter examines the “Epitaphs” as a collection and the unique category of Perfected Beings created by Lan Xu. I argue that the concept of Perfected Beings creates a basket in which Lan Xu groups different assortments of figures from the past. These figures are chosen from Islamic history, ancient Chinese narratives, and the imperial Chinese present. Through their shared status as Perfected Beings, their lives are strung together chronologically to generate a narrative of the past. Sections two and three address the relationship between time of death and place of death in Lan Xu’s collection. I begin by examining the time of death for Perfected Beings up to Muhammad’s lifetime. Lan Xu coordinates the death dates of these most ancient figures with the Chinese solar-agricultural calendar. By doing so, he reiterates a core theme in Islamic history: the notion that Muhammad’s lifetime represents a certain completion of the biblical transmission begun by Adam, after which nothing more can be added. I continue in section three with an exploration of the formulaic description of death place. I argue that read together, the “Epitaphs” generate a progression of tombs moving from the mythical Mt. Kunlun to Arabia to China. Lan Xu puts forth a geographical imagination that pairs time with place. The earliest past is associated with Mt. Kunlun, the middle past with Arabia, and the recent past with China. The burial place of the Perfected Being generates sacred landmarks in the topography of time, a theme taken up further in chapter three of this book. Finally, the last section looks closely at the flood story told in Lan Xu’s biographies of Noah and Fuxi. The flood story is an excellent example of how Lan Xu weaves together different pieces of Chinese and Islamic history. The placement of Noah’s ark on top of Mt. Kunlun and the geographical distribution of Noah’s three sons points to the way this Islamic narrative is made sense of in a Chinese context. Lan Xu joins the Chinese figure Fuxi with the Islamic figure Noah to tease out the relationship between the Chinese and Islamic knowledge systems. By assembling the past around this cohort of Perfected Beings, Lan Xu generates a narrative from the porous traditions that Sino-Muslims are steeped in.

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I. ORGANIZING THE “EPITAPHS” The “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings” is the last fascicle of Lan Xu’s compendium, The Upright Learning of Arabia [Tianfang zhengxue]. Yet while the rest of the compendium consists of lengthy treatises on doctrinal and theoretical topics, the “Epitaphs” is a short collection of life stories. The people included in these narratives fall roughly into three chronological groups. First are the “PreMuhammad” individuals. This includes the standard list of prophets from Adam to Jesus who lived before Muhammad, along with Lan Xu’s addition of the Chinese sages Fuxi and Shennong. Read as a whole, the biographies in this section trace the linear development of human civilization, emphasizing the transmission of the “religious lineage” [dao tong] that began with Adam as well as the origins of different technologies and nations of the world. These biographies of Pre-Muhammad individuals set the stage for the arrival of Muhammad and also, in the case of Fuxi and Shennong, for the Chinese individuals who come at the end of the collection. Next are biographies of what I call the “Muhammad-Era” individuals, those who lived around the lifetime of the Prophet. This includes Muhammad, his parents and immediate descendants, the four caliphs, and the founders of the Islamic law schools. 2 Biographies in this section of Lan Xu’s collection are concerned with chronicling the establishment of Islam. The individuals chosen are standard for the Sunni Muslim tradition, and so are the details Lan Xu provides about them. Finally, there are the “Post-Muhammad” individuals. This includes the biographies of Chinese Muslims that Lan Xu selected for his collection. These individuals date from the Yuan dynasty Sayyid Imam 3 to the author’s present Qing dynasty with entries on his parents Father and Mother Lan. The Post-Muhammad biographies are 2 The founders of the

Islamic law schools actually lived one to two centuries after Muhammad, yet in Lan Xu’s mind all of this history is collapsed into Muhammad’s era. 3 See chapter five of this project for the genealogical legacy of Sayyid Ajall in China.

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noteworthy for accounts of tombs and sightings of the deceased, a topic I pursue further in chapter three of this project. Taken as a whole, life narratives in the “Epitaphs” reflect the knowledge base of late imperial Muslims. The attention paid to physical descriptions of the prophets and episodes from their life come from the Islamic Qisas al-anbiya’ (Tales of the Prophets) tradition. 4 The author also draws from classical Chinese accounts of the sages Fuxi and Shennong. Finally, the inclusion of late imperial Muslims reflects local oral traditions and textual records as well as Lan Xu’s own personal acquaintances. Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs” is influenced by the genre of writing known as the Chinese epitaph tradition [mu zhi 墓誌]. Traditionally, Chinese epitaphs are funerary essays carved in stone to be buried in or displayed at the tomb. A typical epitaph presents the ancestry of the individual, their progeny, major achievements in life, virtues, burial arrangements, and eulogy. Since the Tang dynasty, it was common for people to compose epitaphs for their own family, including deceased daughters or wives. Some scholars have noted the intimate, emotional nature of this genre, which differs from more official biographical forms in Chinese literature. 5 However, while the biographies in Lan Xu’s collection follow the general structure of Chinese epitaph writing and avowedly use the epitaph [mu zhi] title, it is difficult to define the genre of the text as a whole. Lan Xu’s choice of Islamic individuals and emphasis on their heightened levels of internal cultivation greatly resembles biographical collections composed in the Persian Islamic tazkirah See for example Muhammad ibn ʻAbd Allah Kisaʼi, The Tales of the Prophets of Al-Kisaʹi, trans. W. M. Thackston, Jr. (Boston : Twayne Publishers, 1978.). See also Ahmad ibn Muhammad Thaʻlabi, ʻAraʻis al-Majalis fi Qisas al-Anbiya, trans. William M Brinner (Leiden: Brill, 2002). 5 See Appendix A, “Traditional Genres of Biographical Material” in Joan Judge and Ying Hu, eds., Beyond Exemplar Tales: Women’s Biography in Chinese History (Berkeley, Calif.: Global, Area, and International Archive, University of California Press, 2011), 287–89. For a look at the emotive and intimate dimensions of mu zhi writing, see Ping Yao, “Women’s Epitaphs in Tang China (618–907),” in Beyond Exemplar Tales, 140. 4

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genre. 6 Furthermore, his preoccupation with the transmission of Islamic teachings from Adam through fifty generations of prophets until Muhammad shares concerns with Sufi silsila (lineage chain) texts from Central Asia. 7 It is not a particular genre that holds the “Epitaphs” together uniformly as a collection, for it fits loosely into Chinese mu zhi writing as well as Islamic tazkirah and silsila traditions. Furthermore, the “Epitaphs” is not a simple reproduction of lives from Chinese, Islamic, and Sino-Muslim history. Rather, in the very act of stringing these lives together, the author is creating something new. By appealing to and drawing from multiple traditions, Lan Xu fashions a past for his readers that makes sense for them. This past begins with the first human being Adam, goes through the Islamic prophets and Chinese sages, and eventually culminates in the present Muslim community of late imperial China. What holds this past together seamlessly across the episodic installments of each figure’s life? I argue that it is the category of the Perfected Being [zhen ren 真人] created by Lan Xu and reflected in the title “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings” [zhenren muzhi]. Through writing the “Epitaphs,” Lan Xu is able to connect himself intimately with all the elements of the past. The collection links him (through the final two biographical entries on his parents) to the Islamic prophets and the very first human ancestor Adam. This imagined community of transhistorical figures from China to

6

In particular, his choice of Hasan al-Basri and Uways Qarni. See Farid alDin ʻAttar and Paul E Losensky, Farid Ad-Din ʿAttār’s Memorial of God’s Friends: Lives and Sayings of Sufis (New York: Paulist Press, 2009). 7 See for example ʻAli ibn Husayn Kashifi Safi and Muhtar Holland, Beads of Dew: From the Source of Life. Luo Yanhui has identified Lan Xu as coming from a family of Qadiriyya Sufis, yet I am unable to verify this claim. To my knowledge, this is not explicit in Lan Xu’s own writings. Yanhui Luo, “Xingzhou Zai Shuangchong Zi Jian: Lan Xu Shengping Shiji Kaoshu,” Huizu Kaojiu 3, no. 83 (2011): 84–87.

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Arabia share in having attained a superior level of internal selfcultivation. 8 All of them are Perfected Beings. Perfected Beings Like countless thinkers before him, Lan Xu is interested in the hierarchical ranking of human beings, the best of whom are included in his collection. In the “Epitaphs” and Upright Learning as a whole, he refers to these special individuals in a multitude of ways, using a fascinating variety of terms drawn from indigenous Chinese and Islamic vocabularies. For the purposes of our discussion, I have chosen the English term “Perfected Being” as a stand-in for the conglomeration of concepts he employs. In the “Epitaphs,” Lan Xu explains the Perfected Beings as follows: The great sages that appear after Adam, whom we call the zhen ren (realized human beings), are more than 100,000. They all practice the path and when they die they achieve a subtle body. They are tian xian (heavenly immortals) who are assigned the governance of the hot and cold climes of thousands of nations, the twenty-four solar periods, and the wind, frost, rain and snow. The qutb (saintly poles) correspond to the seasons. This is the magnificent way of the great worthies and cultivators of the path. 9

In this section I explore the terms Lan Xu uses to describe the figures in his collection. The author interpolates Chinese notions of the zhen ren [真人] and tian xian [天仙] with Islamic conceptions of the haqq and qutb. While drawing from all these prior traditions within

8 My use of Benedict Anderson’s term “imagined community” follows Rian

Thum’s interpretation that Anderson intended it not only to describe modern nations but also pre-modern religious communities. See Rian Thum, “The Sacred Routes of Uyghur History," 177–78. 9 Xu Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” in Huizu Diancang Quanshu, ed. Haiying Wu, vol. 35 (Lanzhou: Gansu wenhua chubanshe, 2008), 355.

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Chinese and Islamic thought, the system of the Perfected Being that Lan Xu generates is uniquely his own. The most common term that Lan Xu uses to refer to the Perfected Beings is “zhen ren” (realized human being). The concept of the Real [zhen, Ar. haqq] is central to the Upright Learning and fundamental to Lan Xu’s imagination of the universe. Lan Xu uses zhen as a Chinese approximation of the Sufi Islamic term haqq, which has similar connotations. He equates the two terms in a treatise titled “Movement of the Haqq from its Origin,” writing: “When you examine antiquity, before the existence of Heaven and Earth, there was only the Real One [zhen yi], the haqq [han ge].” 10 The Real One is the origin from which everything in the universe—seen and unseen—is derived. Lan Xu notes that “When the Real One split, then Yin and Yang were complete. And then this produced the myriad of things.” 11 As described in chapter one, everything in the universe is derived from the Real. In Lan Xu’s thought system, human beings possess a special status in relation to the Real because they alone encapsulate all the divisions of the universe—Yin and Yang, heaven and earth. Therefore, as Lan Xu puts it “human beings are the most numinous. They understand the subtlest aspects of heaven and earth. They can obtain the inner mystery of the sage. They are at the root of creation. They know everything, yet there is much they do not realize.” 12 Due to their makeup, human beings have inherent capabilities that far exceed everything else in creation. Therefore, they alone are the only beings in the universe who can achieve the return to the Real, which constitutes the path. “The responsibility of the path falls upon human beings. Because human beings are the most complete and precious of all beings under heaven and earth.” 13 10 Ibid., 188. 11

Ibid., 289. For further discussion of the intellectual and philosophical background behind Sino-Islamic systems, see Murata et al., The Sage Learning of Liu Zhi. 12Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 289. 13 Ibid., 315

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However, only a few people succeed in realizing the Real within themselves. This is where the concept of the Perfected Being as zhen ren fits in. For Lan Xu, the Perfected Being is a figure from the Islamic past or local Muslim exemplar who has fully realized their human potential and achieved mystical return to the Real. 14 In addition, the term zhen ren has strong connotations in the Chinese indigenous context. John Major defines them as “adepts at inner-cultivation practice” 15 and “mysterious, self-sufficient beings beyond the reach of ordinary concerns.” 16 The superior attainments of the zhen ren come from meditative practices which enable them to preserve the Quintessential Spirit (jing shen) that is at the origin of the genesis of the universe. As such, the zhen ren can attain “complete union with the Way.” 17 This allows them to “see deeply into matters hidden from the perception of ordinary humans.” 18 In the Chinese philosophical classic the Huainanzi, they are described as being able to manipulate time and space: This is the Way of the Genuine [zhen ren]. Those who are like this shape and forge the myriad things and in their myriad being human are conjoined with what creates and transforms. Amid Heaven and Earth, in space and time, nothing can destroy or impede them. What generates life is not life; what transforms things is not transformation. While he does not employ this exact term, Lan Xu’s zhen ren have strong associations with the Sufi concept of the “Perfect Man” (al-insan al-kamil). For a preliminary overview of this paradigm, see R. Arnaldez, “al-Insan alKamil,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, accessed January 31, 2014, http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia-of-islam-2. 15 An Liu and John S. Major, The Essential Huainanzi (New York: Columbia University Press, 2012), 74. I am grateful to Jon Felts for pointing me to this usage of zhen ren in the Chinese context. 16 Ibid., 8. 17 Ibid., 74. 18 Ibid., 8. 14

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Their spirits: cross Mount Li or the Taihang [Mountains] and have no difficulty; enter the Four Seas or the Nine Rivers and cannot be trapped; lodge in narrow defiles and cannot be obstructed; spread across the realm of Heaven and Earth and are not stretched. 19

The Perfected Beings as zhen ren focuses on the superior attainments of these special individuals with respect to the macrocosm and microcosm. On a macrocosmic scale, the zhen ren have obtained a return to the zhen, (the Real, the haqq) from which all creation originates. On a microcosmic scale, the zhen ren have purified themselves through internal cultivation to the point where they can manipulate the workings of the universe. Either way the zhen ren are “realized human beings” because they have attained the highest potential of their humanity. The Perfected Being as zhen ren appeals to the human-ness of these figures and the special position of humans with respect to the universe. Tian xian Lan Xu also refers to the Perfected Beings as xian 仙 (immortals) or tian xian 天仙 (heavenly immortals). In the Upright Learning he differentiates between the xian and other beings within the Chinese cosmos. Within the yin-yang system, the xian are said to be made of pure yang and consist of a luminous light. Ghosts [gui 鬼], on the other hand, are pure yin. Humans possess both yin and yang. Lan Xu describes the xian as being analogous to humans in their superiority above other beings. “The heavenly immortals are the most numinous of the myriad of things that do not have form. Human beings, on the other hand, are the most numinous of the myriad of things that have a form.” 20 Huainanzi 2.12. English translation from Liu and Major, The Essential Huainanzi, 35. 20 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 315–16. 19

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Yet the xian are ultimately valued below humans. Consisting of pure yang, they do not have access to the physical realm with its sense desires. Lan Xu states that because they have no desires, there are no rewards for their behavior and they ultimately have no autonomy. The xian, like the ghosts in Lan Xu’s system, are simply peripheral assistants to the relationship between God and humans. He writes, “All heavenly immortals, ghosts, and spirits depend upon human beings for their existence.” 21 The heavenly immortals are incomplete compared to humans. “Human beings possess both the physical and the subtle, and that is why they can propagate the path. The responsibility for the path falls upon human beings. Because human beings are the most complete and most precious of all beings under heaven and earth.” 22 The xian are “always present, never disappearing” but humans can become xian when they die. Lan Xu writes: “All exceptional humans who obtain the Upright Path, become sages and worthies. When they leave this earth, they ascend to heaven and become tian xian.” 23 The sages [sheng 聖] reborn here then take on duties for God. They “follow the glorious commands of the True Lord…The True Lord regulates heaven and earth through the tian xian.” 24 The “Epitaphs” appeals to multiple concepts of superior human attainments. The individuals in this collection are described as zhen ren “realized human beings” and also as tian xian “heavenly immortals.” The zhen ren label appeals to the superior internal cultivation achieved during their lifetime. The tian xian label appeals to their continued activity after death in the heavenly realm. Both point to the macrocosmic significance of these figures stemming from their internal cultivation. In section two, I explore further the function of death in this biographical collection. Just as the concept of Perfected Being holds together this collection of individuals, so too do the death accounts. 21 Ibid.

22 Ibid. 23 Ibid.

24 Ibid.

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II. TIME OF DEATH Death forces us to assess a life, judge it, and value it. An individual is compared alongside other human beings and situated within something bigger. Lan Xu goes through great efforts to craft the death accounts in his biographies. As a collection, the “Epitaphs” is noteworthy for its marked absence of death year. 25 Instead, for the majority of the figures in the collection, time of death is specified in terms of a seasonal marker (ex. winter equinox) or the month and day (ex. “the seventh day of the seventh month”). As it is unusual in Chinese historical and biographical writing to leave out the year of death, Lan Xu’s omission suggests that he is accomplishing something purposeful with recording time in this way. One possibility is that the emphasis on seasonal or day-and-month markers lends itself well to commemorative remembrance of the figures as their death anniversaries rotate throughout the calendric year. Another possibility is that this reflects the oral nature of his sources, which are more likely to note time of death in this way. These possibilities make sense for the later figures in the collection who are buried locally within China. Chapter three explores in greater depth the descriptions of the tomb and miraculous post-mortem sightings of these individuals. However, why record the timing of death for the more ancient figures in this way? I argue that the timing of death for these figures is crafted by Lan Xu to narrate a certain understanding of history. The author pairs the death dates of the Perfected Beings up to Muhammad’s lifetime with a two-week period in the Chinese solaragricultural calendar. For example he concludes Adam’s biography by writing: “Finally, in the Spring Opening period he died. His body emitted a fragrance of the Real [zhen]….He became a guiding saint [qu tu bu ao shi, Ar. qutb irshad] and the heavenly immortal [tian

25

The exception is Muhammad and three individuals at the end of the collection: Father Lan, Mother Lan, and Mr. Li, who is discussed in chapter three of this book. The year (11 A.H.), month, day, and time are given for Muhammad’s death. This information is consistent with other Muslim accounts of Muhammad’s life.

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xian] who presides over ceremonies for Spring Opening.” 26 Similarly, Noah is stated to have died on the Spring Equinox period and become the tian xian who presides over ceremonies for the Spring Equinox. A list of heavenly immortals and their solar-agricultural period is provided in Table 2.1. The time of death in these biographies is consciously formulated in such a way that Adam represents the opening of the year with his death occurring during the first day of spring and Muhammad is connected to the closing of the year with his death occurring during the Winter Solstice. 27 In this way, a sense of uniformity and completeness is generated for this ancient cohort of figures. Building off his assertion that the great sages and worthies among humankind become tian xian after death, Lan Xu then goes on to describe the world and all its functioning mechanisms—the weather and seasonal patterns— according to the Perfected Beings. The correlation between Perfected Beings and seasonal markers is not a record of actual Muslim calendric festivities in China nor is it a prescription urging people to celebrate the heavenly immortals during certain times of the year. Rather, Lan Xu attempts to generate a coherent system within which to situate the figures in the “Epitaphs.” By correlating the death of Perfected Beings up until Muhammad’s time with solar-agricultural periods, the author creates a sense of completeness to these figures. Together, they constitute a full calendar year. 28

26 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 355. 27

This is shared with his immediate descendents (Fatima, Hasan, and Husayn) and successors (Abu Bakr, ‘Umar, ‘Uthman, and ‘Ali). Only Muhammad is listed as the heavenly immortal [tian xian] in charge of the winter solstice period in Lan Xu’s own diagram of the “Movement of the Haqq.” See Lan Xu, "Tianfang Zhengxue," 204. However, in the individual biographies of Fatima, Hasan, Husayn, Abu Bakr, ‘Umar, ‘Uthman, and ‘Ali, these figures are also listed as heavenly immortals in charge of the winter solstice period. 28 To my knowledge, Lan Xu’s correlation of the death dates of figures with the solar-agricultural calendar is unusual. I can find no precedence of this in

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Table 2.1 Time of Death in Lan Xu, “Epitaphs” Chinese Lunar Month

Solar-Agricultural Period

Perfected Being (tian xian)

1

Spring Opening

Adam

1

Rain Water

Eve

2

Waking of Insects

Seth

2

Spring Equinox

Noah

3

Pure Brightness

Fuxi

3

Grain Rain

Shennong

4

Beginning of Summer

Abraham

4

Lesser Fullness of Grain

Ishmael

5

Grain in Beard

Isaac

5

Summer Solstice

Jacob

6

Lesser Heat

Moses

6

Greater Heat

Lot

7

Beginning of Autumn

David

7

End of Heat

Joseph

8

White Dew

Solomon

8

Autumn Equinox

Idris

9

Cold Dew

Jonah

9

Frost’s Descent

Mary

10

Beginning of Winter

Jesus

10

Lesser Snow

‘Abdullah

11

Greater Snow

Amina

11

Winter Solstice

Muhammad

12

Lesser Cold

Waqqas

12

Greater Cold

Uways Qarni

either the Chinese or Islamic context, nor have I found any other SinoMuslims presenting a similar calendric system.

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Lan Xu’s zeal for systemization is not without its difficulties. One problem Lan Xu faces is that of Muhammad’s uniqueness among the prophets. In his model of heavenly immortals and their specific solar-agricultural periods, Muhammad is assigned the winter solstice. While the winter solstice arguably signals the ending of the Chinese year, making it suitable as the period to assign this “seal of the prophets,” Lan Xu realizes that his model runs the danger of demoting Muhammad from his elevated status. At the end of his section on heavenly immortals, he tries to clarify this point by saying: “The preciousness of the Utmost Sage [Muhammad] exceeds all things. How could he merely be ranked among the immortals and spirits?” 29 Even though he has ranked Muhammad among the heavenly immortals, Lan Xu insists here Muhammad is not merely among the immortals and continues to “exceed all things.” As examined in chapter one, the richness of Muhammad lies in the multiple ways he is constructed. There is the valence of Muhammad as a human being living a human life. Here Lan Xu places Muhammad alongside other human sages who ascend to the rank of heavenly immortal upon death. Yet Lan Xu reminds readers of the ultimate capacity of Muhammad as well. The metaphysical Muhammad must not be forgotten alongside the physical Muhammad. Muhammad is both within these systems and outside of them. He is uncontainable. Another boundary Lan Xu avoids crossing with his conceptualization of the heavenly immortals is that of God’s omnipotence. He writes: “The True Lord regulates heaven and earth through the heavenly immortals. He does not do this in order to delegate duties. Instead he is manifesting his eminence. He does not do this because he needs assistance to his power. Instead these beings manifest his completeness. This is a principle you absolutely must understand.” 30 Despite his arrangement of the Perfected Beings as heavenly immortals presiding over solar periods, Lan Xu safeguards basic tenants of Islamic theology –that of Muhammad as the most precious, elevated, and last prophet, and that of God’s omnipotence. 29 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 316. 30 Ibid., 315.

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The Perfected Beings may be dead, but they are still very much present in Lan Xu’s worldview. Lan Xu pairs these ancient individuals with seasonal markers in the calendar year. The Perfected Beings as tian xian continue to be active after death carrying out God’s jurisdiction of the universe.

III. BURIAL PLACE Multiple degrees of time are invoked in the “Epitaphs” and the Upright Learning as a whole. There is the cyclical time that is being created through the solar-agricultural calendar and its corresponding tian xian. As explained in chapter one, this cyclical time can be likened to the smallest cog turning in a clock. The middle cog is turning around the nine eras of human history, and the largest cog is the rise and fall of the universe as the haqq rotates around the earthly branches. Apart from this cyclical time, there is also a linear time that is being narrated. This linear time is closely connected to place in Lan Xu’s thought system. While cyclical time appeals to the universal and endless without much specification, linear time appeals to standard “history” as we know it—that is, accounts of the past that have a set beginning, end, characters, and location. Each of the Perfected Beings in the “Epitaphs” has a linear life story. Read as a collection of biographies, the “Epitaphs” also tells a longer linear progression of time. This progression begins with Adam on Mt. Kunlun, traverses Arabia, and ends with the Lan family in China. Lan Xu is careful to note the burial location of all the Perfected Beings in his biographies. Even for the biblical prophets and Chinese sages for whom there are no assigned burial locations, the author takes pains to specify a geographic resting place in his text. The burial sites of all the individuals in this collection can be organized into three major categories: Mt. Kunlun, Arabia, and China. Nine individuals are purported to be buried on the mythical Mt. Kunlun, twenty-four in Arabia, and eighteen in China.

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD Table 2.2 Burial Locations in Lan Xu, “Epitaphs”

Kunlun Adam Noah

Ishmael Isaac Jacob David Joseph

Mary

Uways

Arabia

China

Eve Seth

Abraham

Fuxi Shennong

Moses Lot Solomon Idris Jonah Jesus ‘Abdullah Amina Muhammad Abu Bakr ʿUmar ʿUthman ‘Ali Fatima Hasan Husayn Shafi’i Malik Ahmad ibn Hanbal Abu Hanifa Hasan Basri

Waqqas

Sayyid Imam Western Person Teacher Sayan Wang Daiyu Ma Minglong Mr. Huang

CHAPTER 2. PERFECTED BEINGS Kunlun

Arabia

53 China

Zhengzhou Person Woman Cai Mr. Gu Luo Cunli Mr. Li Ma Ji’an Zheng Ao Father and Mother Lan

Death place is closely correlated with the time period during which the figure lived. Only the most ancient individuals and those up to Muhammad’s lifetime are said to be buried on Mt. Kunlun. After Uways Qarni, Kunlun is notably absent as a burial place, suggesting that the mountain itself only exists within specific temporal limits in Lan Xu’s mind. Kunlun is the resting place of some of the most important ancestral figures: the first human being Adam and the prophet Noah, who survived the catastrophic flood to renew human civilization. Lan Xu further specifies that the prophets Ishmael, Isaac, Jacob, and David are all buried on the southern “yang” side of Kunlun. 31 Kunlun is also associated with meditative and reclusive activities. It is a place of retreat for the early figures, as Noah is said to seclude himself there after dispatching his sons to rule the world. Joseph retreats to Mt. Kunlun and dies there after traveling around the nations of the world. Mary and Uways, the final two figures buried on Mt. Kunlun, are characterized in their biographies as meditative-reclusive types. Mary is said to “perform quiet sitting in a dark chamber,” 32 while Uways does this in the caves of Mt. Kunlun. 33 The second categorical location of burial is Arabia, which covers figures from both the early and middle parts of the collection. Lan Xu refers to some individuals as being buried in the general loca31

Yang as one of the complements in Yin-Yang refers geographically to the south side of a mountain. If Lan Xu is imagining Kunlun somewhere to the west of China as it is traditionally said to be, then the southern side of Mt. Kunlun would be the one closest to Arabia. 32 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 372. 33 Ibid., 384.

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tion of “Arabia” [tian fang 天方], such as Eve, Abraham, Moses, Lot, Idris, and Jonah. 34 Or he may be more specific stating that soand-so was buried “near the Kaʿba” [Ke’er bai jin di], as in the case of Seth, Jesus, Hasan, Husayn, the founders of the four Islamic law schools Shafiʿi, Malik, Ahmad Ibn Hanbal, and Abu Hanifa as well as the early Sufi Hasan al-Basri. Finally, for those who lived during Muhammad’s lifetime Lan Xu provides more precise information as to their burial locations. Most of this information draws from general Islamic knowledge about the life of Muhammad, such as his father ‘Abdullah dying en route to Medina, 35 and his mother Amina dying in al-‘Abwa. 36 Muhammad himself is said to be buried between Mecca and Medina, with the four caliphs Abu Bakr, ‘Umar, ‘Uthman, and ‘Ali buried in front of him and his daughter Fatima buried behind him. This location for Muhammad’s tomb goes against the widely accepted notion that Muhammad is buried in Medina. It is unlikely Lan Xu was misinformed, as we have other Sino-Islamic sources

34

Note that even though the prophet Solomon is listed in my table under Arabia, Liu Zhi specifies that he is actually buried in Egypt [Ar. misr, Ch. mi su’er guo]. Solomon is the only figure in this collection with an Egyptian burial site. In addition, his biography is the longest of all the other preMuhammad prophets and includes a lengthy question and answer section demonstrating Solomon’s great wisdom. Lan Xu’s Chinese version contains twenty questions. This is most likely taken from the Qisas al-anbiya’ tradition of the questions asked between David and Solomon resulting in Solomon being chosen as David’s successor. See the thirteen questions asked in Brinner transl., ‘Ara’is al-majalis fi qisas al-anbiya’ or “Lives of the Prophets,” 486–7. 35 Lan Xu relates how ‘Abdullah was sent by own his father to find the famed “ten-thousand-year-old dates” of Medina. This date is a specialty of Medina and “as big as a chicken.” One can eat it and not be hungry for several days, and it is said to cure illness. ‘Abdullah’s father tells him that since he has already “transmitted the light” to the baby in Amina’s womb, he should go acquire this date for them. Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 374. 36 Lan Xu notes that later Amina’s grave is moved to Mecca. Ibid., 375.

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from his time testifying to the Medinan location. 37 Rather, Lan Xu purposely positions Muhammad’s tomb between Mecca and Medina to buttress his story about feuding between the cities over who hosts the tomb. 38 This complements a later story in the collection about people from different Chinese counties competing over who will host Mr. Li’s tomb. 39 Thus, burial sites in the “Epitaphs” are highly stylized to create an overall coherence to this collection. Finally, there are individuals buried in China, which serves as the resting place for subjects in the last part of the collection. China is the teleological endpoint of Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs.” Yet contrary to what might be expected, Lan Xu does not envision a straight linear progression from the mythical Mt. Kunlun to Arabia, and finally to China. Rather, the biographer weaves China into early history, through the sages Fuxi and Shennong, as well as Waqqas in the Islamic golden age. As Lan Xu’s narrative approaches the time of Muhammad, Mt. Kunlun becomes noticeably absent. And as he approaches the present, Arabia becomes noticeably absent. The biographies of figures closest to the present are all focused on China. Individuals buried in China have the most specific information about their burial location—often not just the city is given, but also near which gate of the city, how far from this gate, and familiar landmarks along the way. This is not surprising given that the author is writing from China and to an audience of readers who were most familiar with the landscape and cosmopolitan layout of China. It is worth noting that within China, the burial sites of the individuals included are not limited to a single province or region. Rather they are scattered throughout China, suggesting that this text is not interested in promoting the history of a local city or region like other Islamic biographical collections. 40 Rather, Lan Xu proposes a certain See for example Haiying Wu, ed., “Wang Pu Shi Zhang Gao,” in Huizu Diancang Quanshu, vol. 20 (Lanzhou: Gansu wenhua chubanshe, 2008), 244. 38 See Muhammad’s biography in Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 380. 39 Ibid., 405–6. 40 See scholarship on the tazkirah in other parts of the Islamic world. For a general introduction to the tazkirah and its role in South Asia see Marcia K. 37

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imagination of the earth in general, particularly its anthropomorphic characteristics and interactions with the body of the Perfected Being, which I take up in Chapter Three. The “Epitaphs” is heavily invested in uniformity. This preoccupation with uniformity can be seen in how Lan Xu narrates death—the status individuals achieve upon death, their death date, and burial location. This systematic presentation of lives allows for continuity within a massive collection of people from different locations and time periods.

IV. THE FLOOD STORY One example of how places and personages are assembled to generate a coherent past for Chinese Muslims is Lan Xu’s flood narrative. Lan Xu’s version validates Chinese civilization within a biblical narrative and posits ancient ties between the Islamic prophets and Chinese sages. Lan Xu’s biography of Noah begins as follows: The religious name of the great sage was Noah. He is the tenth generation descendent of Adam. He accepted the mandate to be ruler of all people. He had a holy visage, big head, and red eyes. His hair hung disheveled as if he were crying. He was saddened that all living beings did not honor the heavenly mandate…Knowing that a flood was coming, he built a boat to save the people. But as for those who did not believe, they all perished in the flood. The great sage saved his three sons as well as numerous officials totaling over seventy people. They emerged from the flood on the Kunlun Mountains. And not long after that, the chaotic waters gradually subsided. Noah commanded his son Shem [san mu 三穆] to lead twenty-four officials and Hermansen and Bruce B. Lawrence, “Indo-Persian Tazkiras as Memorative Communications,” Beyond Turk and Hindu: Rethinking Religious Identities in Islamicate South Asia, 2000, 149–75. Rian Thum’s dissertation discusses how these biographical histories created sacred locales in northwest China (Altishahr). See Thum, “The Sacred Routes of Uyghur History.”

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govern the middle lands—that is, present-day Arabia. It is south of the Kunlun Mountains. He commanded his son Ham [ha mu 哈穆] to lead twenty-four officials to govern the western lands, referring to Europe. This is downriver from Kunlun 120,000 li. He commanded his son Fuxi [伏羲] to lead twentyfour officials to govern the eastern lands. East refers to China [Chi ni, Per. Chin]. This is following the waters 120,000 li east of Kunlun. 41

Lan Xu begins the narrative of Noah in a very typical fashion, using descriptions and characteristics of Noah common to many Islamic accounts. Where the story becomes particular to the author’s orientation in China is when Noah’s boat lands on top of the Kunlun Mountains. This choice of geographic location dramatically defines the lens of the story as one focused not in Arabia but on the high mountain peaks populating the western Chinese borderlands. Mount Kunlun or the Kunlun Mountains is an important mythical place in the Chinese imagination. Today the name has been assigned to designate the mountain ranges bordering Tibet and Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Province. However, Kunlun in premodern Chinese sources does not have a set location. Rather, it refers to a point in the epicenter of the universe that vertically connects heaven and earth. In ancient texts, it is pictured as a pillar or “sky ladder” with nine stories representing the nine levels of heaven. 42 Kunlun is also imagined as a paradisiacal mountain to the west where various deities and immortals dwell. The Shan hai jing, for example, identifies it as the earthly abode of the Supreme Divinity [Tai di] and

41 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 357–58.

Lihui Yang and Deming An, Handbook of Chinese Mythology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), 161. Anne Birrell calls Kunlun “an axis mundi, where Heaven and earth meet in a perfect equipoise” and compares it to the Greek Mount Olympus. Anne Birrell, Chinese Mythology: An Introduction (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993), 183. 42

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describes many of the fearsome beings and wondrous creatures found there. 43 Lan Xu’s placement of Noah’s boat on top of Mount Kunlun brings the biblical-Islamic flood story into a Chinese configuration of the world and cosmos. The Qurʾanic account of Noah’s flood refers to the ark landing on the mountain al-Judi but does not specify this mountain’s geographic location. 44 While other Sino-Islamic sources contain general accounts of the flood, Lan Xu is unique in specifying that the ark lands on Kunlun. Previous Sino-Islamic authors do not use Kunlun. Liu Zhi, whom Lan Xu admires and cites as his predecessor, only writes: "Noah had among him more than seventy people who believed and boarded the boat. After three months the waters receded. Noah commanded his sons to govern the waters in the four directions. Because of this, there are people residing in the four directions." 45 In the “Epitaphs,” Lan Xu differentiates between the significance of Kunlun and Arabia [tian fang]. Kunlun, he explains, is “the ancestral mountain of all the nations” while Arabia is “in the middle of all the nations.” 46 Lan Xu juxtaposes Kunlun’s temporal significance with Arabia’s spatial importance. Kunlun as ancestor to nations precedes as the originator. Arabia, on the other hand, is central because of its geographic position in the middle of the world. Lan Xu’s conceptualization of Kunlun as origin place is developed in Adam’s biography. Lan Xu notes that Adam “was buried in the great land of the Kunlun Mountains.” 47 While Eve and her son Seth are buried in Arabia, the next individual buried again on Kunlun is

43

Additionally, the mountain serves as a setting for multiple tales associated with immortality such as the Queen Mother of the West (Xiwangmu) and the legend of the White Snake (Bailiangzi). 44 Qurʾan 11:44 45 Zhi Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” in Qingzhen Dadian, ed. Xiefan Zhou, vol. 14, Zhongguo Zong Jiao Li Shi Wen Xian Ji Cheng 89 (Hefei Shi: Huang Shan shu she, 2005), 69. 46 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 358. 47 Ibid., 355.

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Noah. 48 Lan Xu writes, “The great sage [Noah] divided his sons and sent them to govern the waters to govern the world. Noah resided alone in the Kunlun caves. … He was buried in Kunlun.” 49 In Lan Xu’s history of the world, it is on the Kunlun peaks that a new age is founded after the flood. Kunlun is where the seventyodd individuals who survive the catastrophic flood disembark. It is from the Kunlun Mountains that Noah’s three sons disperse to rule the world, with the old man staying behind to die in Kunlun. Noah represents the old world order, the old age initiated with Adam that came to pass with the mass destruction of the flood. His sons establish a new age, one that is fragmented into three kingdoms, to which the world has become divided. For Lan Xu, Kunlun is the juncture that divides the old world as it was organized before the flood and the new world as it becomes organized after the flood. The detail to which Lan Xu refers to the Kunlun Mountains in Adam and Noah’s biographies is evidence of the meaningful position this mountain holds in the author’s imagination of the past. Fuxi In addition to Mount Kunlun, the Chinese sage-king Fuxi holds a prominent place in Lan Xu’s flood account. Following Noah’s biography, Lan Xu proceeds to describe Fuxi and his establishment of Chinese civilization. This foray into China is deliberate but brief. After detailing the life of Fuxi, followed by that of his successor, Shennong 神農, the author returns to the middle kingdom in Arabia and continues with the biography of Abraham. Why then does Lan Xu make this digression into China? I argue that Lan Xu has a deep personal investment in what Fuxi represents. The author uses Fuxi to strategically insert crucial elements of Chinese mythology into the Islamic flood narrative. By positioning Fuxi as Noah’s son, Lan Xu is able to validate certain Chinese institutions and explain that their earliest origins are Islamic.

48 Ibid., 356–57. Seth is specified to be buried near the Kaʿba. 49 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 358.

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Within the Islamic tradition, the Qurʾan does not specify exactly where Noah’s sons venture after the flood, nor which nations they establish. Medieval Muslim authors often assign Shem the middle portion of the earth, including Jerusalem, the Nile, the Tigris, and the Euphrates. He becomes the ancestor of the Arabs, Persians, and Byzantines. Ham goes to the west (or southwest) and fathers the “blacks”—sometimes identified as the Copts, Sudanese, and Berbers. Japheth goes to the east (or northeast) and becomes the ancestor of the Turks. 50 Yet there has always been debate within these sources as to the relative status of Noah’s three sons, and which races they engender. For example, one account in Tabari’s history praises Japheth, citing how his line produces kings, Shem’s line produces prophets, and Ham’s line is destined to be slaves. 51 Other accounts disparage Japheth. His line is cursed to live in a cold, empty land afflicted by the plague, or begets “the Turks, Slavs, Gog, and Magog, in none of whom there is good.” 52 Lan Xu’s mapping of the post-flood world follows the scheme established in Liu Zhi’s eighteenth century sira, which assigns Shem

See Kisaʼi, The Tales of the Prophets of Al-Kisaʼi, 105; Thaʻlabi, ʻAraʻis alMajalis fī Qisas al-Anbiya, 105; Tabari, The History of al-Tabari, trans. Franz Rosenthal, vol. 1 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989), 370–71; Tabari and William M. Brinner, The History of Al-Tabari, vol. 2 (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1987), 19–21. 51 Tabari and Brinner, The History of al-Tabari, vol. 2, 14. 52 Ibid., 19, 21. The scholar of Central Asia Ron Sela cites one Turkic account from the mid-seventeenth century which attributes “Ham to Hindustan, Sam to Iran (iranzamin) and Japheth to the North (qutb-i shimal).” Sela suggests that following earlier accounts disparaging Japheth, his reputation began to change, “perhaps because of the Turks’ stronger position in the world of Islam in later centuries.” Sela points to one author from the late fifteenth century, Mir ʿAli Shir Nava’i, who was bold enough to claim that Japheth was superior to his brothers. Ron Sela, “Revisiting the Origin Myths of the Turks,” Central Asia in a Historical Context, last modified April 24, 2013, https://rsela.wordpress.com/2013/04/24/revisiting-theorigin-myths-of-the-turks/. 50

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to Arabia, Ham to Europe, and Japheth to China. 53 Lan Xu is not the only author during this time to claim that Japheth is the same as the Chinese sage-king Fuxi. Fuxi’s involvement in the biblical flood is mentioned by Li Huanyi, who I discuss in chapter four of this book, and by Qurban-‘Ali-Khalidi in his universal history. 54 Lan Xu’s description of Fuxi in the “Epitaphs,” however, offers one of the most prolonged and elaborate developments of this theme. Lan Xu’s biography builds upon Fuxi’s rich history in the Chinese historical imagination. In the Chinese narrative tradition, Fuxi is associated with Mount Kunlun and the establishment of the human race— oftentimes this is said to come about after a great flood. The earliest written record of this story dates to the Tang dynasty. In this account, Fuxi and his sister Nüwa live in a time when the world has just emerged. There are no other people except for themselves. Reluctant to marry, the siblings perform a sacrifice on Mount Kunlun. Fuxi vows, “If Heaven desires that my sister and I become man and wife, let this smoke intertwine. If not, let the smoke disperse.” The smoke intertwines, so Fuxi and Nüwa marry each other to produce the human race. 55 Later versions of this story, commonly told among minority groups in southern China and shared across Southeast Asia, describe Fuxi and Nüwa as a brother and sister who marry each other after surviving the flood in a floating gourd. 56

53 Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” 69. 54

See Nathan Light, “Muslim Histories of China: Historiography across Boundaries in Central Eurasia,” in Frontiers and Boundaries: Encounters on China’s Margins, ed. Zsombor Rajkai and Ildikó Bellér-Hann (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2012), 164. Light discusses Central Asian histories that involve Noah and his sons, most notably Japheth, in explaining how neighboring civilizations fit together. 55 Translation of the Tang dynasty Du yi zhi [a collection of fantastical stories] by Li Yin taken from Mark Edward Lewis, The Flood Myths of Early China (Albany: SUNY Press, 2006), 123. 56 For full citations pointing to other sources on this version of the story, see Ibid., 157, n. 36.

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Fuxi’s status as human ancestor is still celebrated in China today. During her fieldwork in 1993, Yang Lihui recorded this song sung at the annual springtime festivities for Fuxi at Renzu Temple in Huaiyang County of Henan Province. Remember the beginning of the world is chaos, Without sky, without earth, without Human beings. Then, the deity of sky created the sun, the moon, and the stars, Then, the deity of earth created the grain and grass. Having the sky and earth, the chaos separated, Thus appeared Renzu [the human ancestors], the brother and sister. They climbed to the high mountain Kunlun, To throw the millstone 57 and get married. They gave birth to hundreds of children, That’s the origin of Baijiaxing (human beings). Therefore, though people in this world look different, Yet in fact they belong to the same family. 58

By the late Qing dynasty when Lan Xu is writing, Fuxi himself was already the composite of many different figures and mythical traditions from the Chinese past. In the most ancient texts from the Zhou period, he is identified as one of three cosmogonic gods and the earliest deity in the archaic pantheon. 59 During the Han dynasty, he became a major figure in the “Appended Texts” to the Book of Changes (Yi jing or Zhou yi), where he is credited with discovering the eight trigrams that form the basis of divination. In the later Han, Fuxi is given the courtesy name Tai Hao, and conflated with this previously independent deity. Following this additional layer to his character,

57

In this version, the sign witnessed on Mount Kunlun sanctifying their marriage is not intertwining smoke, but a millstone. 58 Yang and An, Handbook of Chinese Mythology, 123. 59 The others are sometimes listed as Nüwa and Shennong, or Shennong and Huangdi. See Birrell, Chinese Mythology, 45; Yang and An, Handbook of Chinese Mythology, 121.

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the Han systematizers began designating him as “the god who reigns over the east and controls the season of spring.” 60 Lan Xu’s account utilizes many of these elements to Fuxi’s persona while simultaneously positioning him as Noah’s son. Fuxi’s biography in the “Epitaphs” begins: The religious name of the great sage is Fuxi. He is a man from the west. He is Noah’s son. His height is 1 zhang 4 chi. His holy visage is refined. His hair was worn in five locks. He received the orders from his father and left Kunlun on a boat, following the current. He harnessed and calmed the water and land. He made his capital in Chen. 61

Next Fuxi is glorified by Lan Xu for his ability to organize and systematize. Fuxi establishes all the basic institutions that make civilization possible—he creates the six categories of Chinese characters to invent writing, and the heavenly stems and earthly roots to designate time. He also created marriage “in order to give weight to human relations, and the practice of going through a matchmaker in order to make matrimony proper…” 62 Fuxi is an administrative genius who is the first to assign all the different offices of the imperial government. He wields power over the universe, setting up the seasons in the four directions. He coordinates the imperial offices so that they are in line with the five phases of universal phenomena. Furthermore, Fuxi records the divinatory signs (eight trigrams) so that people can comprehend the universe and have foreknowledge of the future. Lan Xu states that “Through his governance Fuxi established a wonderful order, regulating the universe.” 63 60 Birrell 45 61

“Chen” refers to modern Henan-Anhui province in China. Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 358. 62 Ibid., 359. While his sister Nüwa and sibling marriage is notably absent from Lan Xu’s account of Fuxi, Lan Xu credits Fuxi as the first to introduce the institution of marriage. It is possible that Fuxi as progenitor of the entire human race is already fulfilled by the previous mention of Noah and Adam. 63 Ibid.

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All of Fuxi’s accomplishments are things that Lan Xu himself was deeply interested in. The Upright Learning contains multiple treatises dealing with the heavenly roots and earthly stems attributed to Fuxi’s calendric system. As described in chapter one, Lan Xu creates an elaborate system charting how these categories relate to all universal phenomena and to the haqq. We also know that Lan Xu authored a separate commentary devoted exclusively to the Book of Changes (Yi jing) divinatory text—traditionally thought to have been authored by Fuxi. Lan Xu and Fuxi share a similar interest in the macrocosm. Finally, I suggest that it is no mere coincidence that Lan Xu’s courtesy name is Zixi [子羲], the second character of which is borrowed from Fuxi’s name. Lan Xu may have seen himself as a sort of Fuxi of his day. Like the Fuxi presented in the “Epitaphs,” Lan Xu had ties to the west through his Muslim roots. Like Fuxi, Lan Xu was well versed in the esoteric and mystical aspects of Chinese cosmology. And like Fuxi, Lan Xu was a systematizer. What Lan Xu systematized was the universe of the Chinese Muslim—a universe that contained multiple systems of knowledge drawn from the Confucian and Islamic traditions in which he was educated. 64 Furthermore, Lan Xu uses Fuxi to generate historical ties between the Islamic and Confucian traditions. By claiming that Fuxi is Noah’s son Japheth, Lan Xu inserts this figure into an overarching narrative of Islamic history. And once Fuxi is established there, then the institutions Fuxi created in China—many of which become the bedrocks of later Confucian learning—suddenly hold legitimate standing within an Islamic worldview. In the Upright Learning, Lan Xu writes: Japheth [Ya fu si 雅伏思] is the son of the Arabian Noah. It is the name of Lord Fuxi [Fu xi shi 伏羲氏]…Because his name includes the character Ya, Confucianism was considered Ya (re64

For more on the Islamic education system in late imperial China, see BenDor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad; Kristian Petersen, “Reconstructing Islam: Muslim Education and Literature in Ming-Qing China,” The American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 23, no. 3 (2006): 24–53.

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fined) and we say that a Confucian is someone who is refined. … Therefore, Japheth used Confucianism as his teaching. He used the eight trigrams to compose the Yi jing text. And Japheth is called Lord Fuxi. He used one quarter of the Arabian alphabet to produce the six types of Chinese characters. He commanded people to cultivate their bodies and principle their natures in order to return to the zhen [Real] of heaven. For the path is found there. 65

In this passage, Lan Xu plays with the characters used to transliterate the name Japheth both to praise Confucianism as “refined” and to suggest that the Confucian teachings can be inherently traced back to an Arabo-Islamic lineage. The crucial link here is Fuxi. Lan Xu mobilizes the Japheth-Fuxi connection to claim that Japheth “used Confucianism as his teaching” and that Chinese characters were created using one quarter of the Arabian alphabet. The implication here is that while the Chinese characters are honorable and date back to Fuxi, they are incomplete. They constitute only one quarter of the Arabian alphabet, which is the true and complete writing system. Lan Xu himself is very attentive to the precision of how Arabic terms are transliterated into Chinese. He notes in his preface that he makes an effort to revise the characters used in Chinese transliteration so that they conform to the proper pronunciation of the Arabian classics. 66 He also devotes an entire section of the Upright Learning to the Arabic alphabet. Finally, the quotation above hints at the ultimate point of Lan Xu’s enterprise, which avowedly goes beyond merely subsuming Confucian knowledge under Islamic tradition or subordinating the Chinese writing system to the Arabic alphabet. Lan Xu’s ultimate investment is in the notion of origin and return. At heart, Lan Xu is a systematizer who wants to trace everything back to the beginning—a beginning defined by the Real [Ar. haqq, Ch. zhen], which is the destination of mystical return. The last line of Lan Xu’s commentary on Fuxi and ultimate praise of this individual points to how 65 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 289. 66 Ibid., 165–66.

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Fuxi “commanded people to cultivate their bodies and principle their natures in order to return to the zhen [Real] of heaven. For the path is found there.” 67 The most significant aspect of Fuxi as a historical figure, and the one he shares with all the Perfected Beings in the “Epitaphs” is that he urged people on the path of return.

CONCLUSION The “Epitaphs” point to the complex richness of Islamic traditions as they are articulated in nineteenth century China. This is not a simple act of translating old stories into a new language nor can it be modeled by a Venn-diagram in which “Chinese” and “Islamic” placed on opposing sides are joined together in the overlapping center. Rather, Lan Xu’s vision of the past is three-dimensional. The narrated lives of Perfected Beings move across time and also across space. Categorical hierarchies of human beings, temporal systems, and geographical imagination are all manipulated in the creation of this text. The “Epitaphs” cannot be read without an appreciation of the macrocosm it points to. Contained in this account of past lives is the author’s vision of the universe. Lan Xu honors basic tenants of Islam regarding God’s omnipotence and Muhammad’s special status and heritage. Yet even while regulating himself within these confines, he finds creative room to mold the past in a way that speaks to the needs of his audience. Like a sculptor Lan Xu works with multiple pieces of material, material that has already been shaped by a long line of Chinese and Islamic thinkers before him. He engages with all of these previous conversations about Noah and the flood, Fuxi, Mt. Kunlun, the Islamic prophets, and Muhammad’s life. He also adds new pieces he has selected from the recent lives of Sino-Muslims—a topic I treat in greater detail in the following chapter. Choosing what is relevant and filtering out the unnecessary, Lan Xu creates a fulfilling past, a past that holds together the elements of the present.

67 Ibid., 359.

CHAPTER 3. TOMBS The Perfected Beings may be dead, but in the case of Muhammad and the later Chinese figures in Lan Xu’s Upright Learning, they continue to be active in the community. This chapter centers on narratives of the tomb and accounts of the dead found in the last section of the Upright Learning, titled “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings” [Zhenren muzhi 真人墓誌]. Descriptions of tombs in the “Epitaphs” offer entertaining stories of fantastic landscapes and miraculous sightings. Beyond that, they provide insight into the relationship between the deceased and the present community. I begin by exploring descriptions of Muhammad’s tomb and the tombs of Chinese Perfected Beings. Section one illustrates how Lan Xu relies upon the same tropes in describing these tombs. This is not an accident, I suggest, but evidence of the links made between the more recent past in China and Muhammad’s era. The Chinese tombs are not so different from Muhammad’s tomb in Arabia. Likewise, Muhammad’s tomb is similar to the local tombs in China. All are Perfected Beings, whose bodies affect the earth in the same way. By following changes in the landscape around the tomb, Lan Xu generates a sense of continuity between the Perfected Being’s death and his present topographic world. The Perfected Beings are not just significant because of their tombs. They also perform miracles for the community. Section two analyzes these post-death accounts in the “Epitaphs.” Some are miracle narratives centered on the tomb, as in the case of Muhammad’s magic teakettle and the Perfected Being from Zhengzhou. Others are super-human feats performed by Perfected Beings outside the tomb. These stories center around the Perfected Being’s ability to foresee death and transcend human limitations. 67

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Section three looks at the conceptual underpinnings behind Lan Xu’s miraculous figures. I explore how the author appropriates concepts from Islamic discourse on the qutb (pole saint) and Chinese traditions of the xian (immortal) to describe his Perfected Beings. While qutb and xian are old terms with a rich history in their respective traditions, Lan Xu employs them in new ways indicative of a Sino-Muslim agenda. Through death, Perfected Beings wield even greater powers over the community.

I. LIVING LANDSCAPES OF THE TOMB The rich connection between Islamic saints and their sites of burial is common throughout the Islamic world. In her study of South Asia, Marcia Hermansen points to the trope of the Islamic saint as originator of a site by choosing it, blessing it, protecting it, or being buried there. 1 In Bengal, Richard Eaton has emphasized the connection between Islamization and the veneration of tombs of newly arrived Muslim holy men who cleared the forest. 2 In Xinjiang province of China, Rian Thum’s study of Uyghur tazkirahs points to how writing about and visiting shrines created a sacred interconnected landscape for local Muslims. 3 Lan Xu differs from these previous examples in the scope of the tombs described in the “Epitaphs.” His work is not a literary homage to saints of a particular area like we see in other parts of the Islamic world, where attention is focused on a city like Delhi or a region like Altishahr. As stated in chapter two, the tombs of the Perfected Beings span a large geographic expanse from Mt. Kunlun to Arabia to China. Within China, Lan Xu does not emphasize a specific area either. The tombs of the Chinese individuals are scattered throughout the empire.

1

Hermansen and Lawrence, “Indo-Persian Tazkiras as Memorative Communications,” 149–75. 2 Richard Maxwell Eaton, The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204– 1760 (Berkeley : University of California Press, 1993). 3 Thum, The Sacred Routes of Uyghur History.

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Lan Xu’s example also does not fit so neatly into Engseng Ho’s notion of diaspora where the origin of venerated figures does not matter so much as death place. 4 For Lan Xu, origins are consistent, though in a vague sense. The Perfected Beings buried in China have an association with the West (xi yu) and with Arabia (tian fang)— either as their personal origin place or the origin of the teachings they study. Death place matters, as I show in this section on living landscapes of the tomb. Yet here too it is in a vague almost generic sense. The “Epitaphs” is better understood in terms of time. Chronology is the major driving force behind the organization of Lan Xu’s project. In getting from the first human being Adam to the most recently deceased Sino-Muslims, the author suggests that some of these people are still active. In particular, their tombs are animated. A consistent imagination emerges in the “Epitaphs” of the relationship between the Perfected Being and his tomb. This is most dominant in the biographies of Muhammad and the later Chinese individuals. Muhammad’s tomb In Muhammad’s biography, Lan Xu concludes his life account by noting that Muhammad died at noontime on the twelfth day of the third month of the eleventh year of the Islamic hijri calendar [632 C.E.]. He was buried in the ground bordering Mecca and Medina. Then Lan Xu writes: The four great Sahaba led the people in reverently inviting the body of the sage to be peacefully interred at that place [the boundary of Mecca and Medina]. They constructed a wall surrounding it. After the grave was settled, the tomb slowly rose higher and higher. The moat outside the enclosing wall turned into a river. It connected with the Zamzam heavenly spring 5 and 4

Ho writes, “Graves provide a ready point of return in a world where origins keep moving." Ho, The Graves of Tarim, 3. 5 In the Islamic tradition, Zamzam is the holy well next to the Kaʿba that God revealed to Hagar so that she could feed her thirsty son Ishmael. See Chabbi, Jacqueline, “Zamzam,” Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition (Brill

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD flowed into the ocean. The tomb itself manifested into a dense forest. Its soil was a pure white color. Over six thousand coral trees sprung up. They gradually grew bigger and bigger. Today they measure more than 3 chi tall. Underneath the trees pure white pearls sprung like foxtail millet. These also gradually grew bigger until they were the size of peas. 6

Even though he has never left China, Lan Xu envisions Muhammad’s grave as a lofty sanctuary ornamented by fertile, lush vegetation. This pristine place is surrounded by a wall first erected by the “four great Sahaba” [the four caliphs Abu Bakr, ʿUmar, ʿUthman, and ʿAli] 7 and enclosed by a moat, whose waters connect with the Zamzam spring and pour into the ocean. The theme of natural beauty and fortressed protection is further emphasized in another passage of the biography where Lan Xu describes the forest around Muhammad’s tomb as being composed of pines, cypresses, and willows. “The crisscrossing tree trunks are lush and flourishing. They wind and twist around one another without end. When the whirlwind reaches there it stops. The flying birds go around to cross it and the land animals dare not to tread there.” 8 As for those human beings foolish enough to trespass with evil intentions, Muhammad’s tomb reacts in miraculous ways to ward them off. Grave robbers quickly give up their intentions after Online, 2014), http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia -of-islam-2. 6 Xu Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 380. This description comes in the annotation that follows Muhammad’s death in the main text of the biography. 7 While Lan Xu does not explicitly define who the “four great Sahaba” [Si da shuai ha bu] are, I believe it refers to the four caliphs. In Muhammad’s biography, the four great Sahaba act in unison as leaders of the community. Muhammad relates his burial wishes to them, and they uphold it after his death. They also lead the community in Muhammad’s burial. In his biographies of Abu Bakr, ‘Umar, ‘Uthman, and ‘Ali that appear later in the collection, Lan Xu calls them the “four great worthies” (Si pei da xian). 8 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 382. This description comes at the end of Muhammad’s biography. It is introduced by the words “the scripture says” [dian yun] which suggests that it was found in another text.

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encountering the “sage’s moat,” which can suddenly fill up with water from the Zamzam spring, splashing the banks and making it too deep and broad to cross. Those who try to steal the pearls growing beneath the coral forest are reprimanded by the loud clamor of a divine being. “Thereupon they become remorseful and reverently fearful. They retreat from that place on their knees.” 9 By the late nineteenth century when Lan Xu is writing, many Sino-Muslims such as Ma Dexin had left China and physically embarked on the hajj, bringing back written chronicles of their journey. 10 If Lan Xu had been interested in these accounts of Muhammad’s tomb he could have accessed them, or spoken with a hajji. Yet what grasps Lan Xu’s imagination is a certain romantic vision of the place in his mind. It doesn’t matter if someone else has already been there. In fact, he even ends Muhammad’s biography stating, “All who complete the hajj to Arabia must pay their respects at the sage’s grave to view it and pray piously before it. Those who have seen it with their own eyes can append their additions to this epitaph here.” 11 Lan Xu is well aware of the details of the hajj and its customary conclusion at Muhammad’s tomb. Despite never having completed the hajj himself and never having visited Muhammad’s tomb, he confidently believes that his description is in line with what previous visitors have seen. Later hajjis can simply add on to what is already written. It is not from “lack of information” that Lan Xu’s account of Muhammad’s tomb is written in this way. The author is not misinformed. On the contrary, as shown in the meticulous details on the Arabic letters, hadith literature, Persian vocabulary, and other 9 Ibid., 381–2.

10 See for example, Ma Dexin’s description of his hajj in Chao

jin tu ji [朝覲 途紀] , written in Arabic and translated into Chinese by his disciple Ma Anli. This text can be found alongside other Chinese Muslim travelogues and geographical texts from the Ming era to the Republican era organized in the same volume. Dexin Ma, “Chaojin Tuji,” in Zhongguo Zongjiao Lishi Wenxian Jicheng, ed. Xiefan Zhou, trans. Anli Ma, vol. 95, Qingzhen Dadian 20 (Hefei shi: Huangshan shushe, 2005). 11 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 382.

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information incorporated in the beginning of the Upright Learning and in his other work, the Tianfang Erya (Encyclopedia of Arabia), Lan Xu is deeply immersed in Islamic knowledge. It is also not the case that this knowledge somehow became twisted and convoluted in the process of its transmission to China, like a game of “telephone” in which the message changes the farther from the source it travels. Neither of these explanations is appropriate here. Rather, I argue that Lan Xu is purposefully building something in describing Muhammad’s grave this way. 12 This “reality” of Muhammad’s tomb fits the reality of other sacred Muslim tombs he is describing in China. In other words, Muhammad’s tomb functions and has to function in the same way as the tombs of the Chinese individuals he is describing. There is a consistency to the “Epitaphs,” and a heavy investment in continuity. Lan Xu is making sense of the past, of the various pasts stretching across China and Arabia. Chinese tombs A similar description of the landscape around the tomb appears in another biography, this time of a much later figure from Arabia who died in Zhengzhou city of Henan province. Lan Xu notes that Momuduzhi taught at the local mosque and died on the seventh day of the seventh month. This “Perfected Being from Zhengzhou” was interred outside the west gate of the city, north of the major thoroughfare. A mausoleum was built and a stele erected. After the tomb had settled into the dirt, the ground gradually rose until it became a mountain. The muddy little gully next to the path thereupon transformed into a clear spring and large ravine. Today the mountain is tall and rising gradually; the water is a river and in12

There has historically been an abundance of folklore around Muhammad’s tomb, despite recent Saudi Wahhabi efforts to erradicate this. What Lan Xu is doing is not unique, but exists in other Islamic places. Likely he is building off narratives of Muhammad’s tomb already circulating. See Leor Halevi, Muhammad’s Grave for early accounts of Muhammad’s death and burial.

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creasing in flow. Where there used to be flat land, today there is a raised tomb. Where there used to be a gully of only 3 chi, today there is a wide, gushing river. You must cross a bridge and approach from the east to mount the mountain face. Upon arrival at the mausoleum, you will see that the stele is still there. 13

Just as in Muhammad’s biography, the tomb of this person from Zhengzhou creates an outpouring of water. In Muhammad’s case, the water comes from the Zamzam spring, fills up the moat surrounding the walled grave, and flows into the ocean. For this tomb in Zhengzhou, the water replenishes a muddy little gully, transforming it into a wide, gushing river. In both biographies, Lan Xu notes the upward swell of the land. The tomb of the Perfected Being from Zhengzhou sprouts a mountain where there had once been flat land. This miraculous theme of the tomb growing in height appears in yet another biography. This time the subject is also a teacher from Arabia who died in China. Lan Xu writes that Kelemenlaxi 14 lived to be over one hundred years old and was buried in Beijing outside the Xi Bian gate, west of the stone path. He was interred there for over three hundred years. During the beginning when our current dynasty was being established, officials were flattening out the land all over the perimeter of this city. Yet only this grave would rise up again after it was flattened. They would flatten it out again but it would rise up again. It happened like this three times and they could not flatten it out. The officials decided to keep watch over it. They wanted to see what was going on. 13 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 401–2. 14

The Chinese characters given by Lan Xu are clearly a transliteration of a foreign name. In the surviving Republican-era wood-block prints found in the Huizu diancang quanshu edition, someone wrote out the names of the individuals in Arabic script above the biographies. In this case, the calligraphy is upside-down, but reads Koneh Lassi. This does not resemble any well-known Arabic or Persian names. Lan Xu himself is tentative about the name, indicating only that “he heard” [gai wen] that his name was Kelemenlaxi, whereas in other biographies he simply states the name.

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD One evening during the third watch of the night, an old man with ash-white hair appeared from the tomb carrying a red gauze lantern. He rode a white camel on top of the grave. He would go forward, he would go backward. He looked in all directions to the left and right. Thus the officials reported to the princely establishment that this tomb had a spirit in it, and this was why the grave rose up. It was a Hui-hui tomb. The princely establishment instructed the Hui to pay their respects to this grave and allowed them to refurbish the tomb marker. Another two hundred years passed, and a divine tree emerged in front of the tomb. Its branches covered the four directions. 15

Two miracles are recorded for Kelemenxi’s grave. One occurs three hundred years after his death, in the mid-seventeenth century, when officials reportedly witness the apparition of a camel-riding man carrying a red gauze lantern. The second miracle occurs two hundred years later during Lan Xu’s time, with the sprouting of a divine tree. Time is even more vague in the case of Muhammad’s tomb and the tomb of the Zhengzhou individual. Transformations to the surrounding landscape occur “after the grave has settled into the dirt,” and continue up until the present day where they can be witnessed by the reader. Lan Xu attests that the coral trees around Muhammad’s grave are more than 3 chi tall today. For the Zhengzhou individual, he writes that the mountain is tall and continues to rise; the 15

Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 394–95. This biography is unusual in having been addended to after Lan Xu’s initial completion of the collection in 1852. An annotation added in 1861 records: “The writing on the stele: ‘The Xianfeng reign of the great Qing dynasty [r. 1850–1861]. In this year the tomb was refurbished. As of today the tomb is over five hundred years old. There is a divine tree in front of the tomb. As of today it is over two hundred years old. If future people come to refurbish this tomb, they can use this count for calcuations in addending the tomb marker. This addendum to the tomb marker added the Qinqiu year of Emperor Xianfeng [1861].’ ” It is possible, given the similarity in the language and description, that this stele was erected by Lan Xu himself [still serving in the government until 1876] or someone who had read Lan Xu’s text. Alternatively, it may point to a shared source or similar dating used by Hui to describe this tomb.

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water has become a river and is still increasing in strength. He provides instructions for his readers who wish to visit the Zhengzhou tomb, noting that “you must cross a bridge and approach from the east to mount the mountain face. Upon arrival at the mausoleum, you will see that the stele is still there.” The passage of time since death can be witnessed in the trees, rivers, and mountains that continue to grow to this day, just like the memory of the Perfected Being in the minds of raconteurs. Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs” is heavily invested in landscape. 16 The biographies pay a great deal of attention to burial sites. Descriptions of the tombs of the Perfected Beings, often elaborate and miraculous, assume a resonance between the body of the Perfected Being and the land around him. Lan Xu paints a vivid landscape, emphasizing the interaction of the terrain, waterways, and vegetation with the tomb. This landscape is not static but continues to change, sometimes reacting quickly to protect the tomb from external threats posed by grave robbers and demolition forces. Detailing the landscape of the tomb and the changes it undergoes over time provides a way for Lan Xu to chronicle time after the death of his subjects. This enables narration of the deceased to continue up until the present day. In this way, the tomb becomes a nexus between the interred body and the land, as well as between the deceased and the living.

II. MIRACLES In the “Epitaphs” it is precisely death that enables a person to achieve special status and governing powers that he otherwise did not possess during his lifetime. Death functions as an equalizer. Regardless of geographic origin, time period, and other distinguishing characteristics, all figures in the “Epitaphs” end up in the same state. In particular for the later Chinese individuals in this collection and for Muhammad’s biography, death marks the beginning of the figure’s main role as remembered in the community. In these biographies, the life account is often short and generic in contrast to a lengthy and highly 16

See also Lan Xu’s description of mountains, plants, and other elements of the natural world in his Tianfang Erya [Encyclopedia of Arabia].

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animated post-death section. Miracle stories abound. My use of the word “miracles” here refers to events that defy the normal limitations of time, space, or matter. Lan Xu employs the Chinese term ganying [感應]. 17 For many of the later Chinese figures, Lan Xu is not interested so much in the details of their life accomplishments as he is in the way they function within the community after death. This is not the case for earlier individuals in the collection such as the Islamic prophets and the Chinese sages Fuxi and Shennong. For these individuals, the recording of death is the last sentence of the biography. The only exception is Muhammad. Like the biographies of many Chinese individuals, Muhammad’s death does not mark the end of his life account. A remaining lengthy portion is devoted to describing the burial, landscape around the tomb and miracles at the tomb. In Muhammad’s biography, Lan Xu relates a story concerning a precious stone kettle that sprouted atop the burial mound. This kettle performed five miracles a day. When the time for prayer approached, the kettle would fill up with warm water for ablutions. When the time of prayer had passed, the water in the kettle would dry up. Lan Xu gives the following account: The previous emperor of Rum 18 followed the teachings of Muhammad. After he died, his son inherited the throne and did not The term gan ying 感應 is often translated as “sympathetic resonance” or “stimulus-response.” In his study of one Tang dynasty Buddhist text, Robert Sharf calls it a cosmological concept which is far more Chinese than Buddhist or Indian. For a detailed exploration, see Robert H. Sharf, Coming to Terms with Chinese Buddhism : A Reading of the Treasure Store Treatise (Honolulu : University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2002), 77–133. 18 The Chinese lu mi 魯蜜 refers to the Arabo-Persian term rum or rumi. Based on the historical usage of this term and the fact that most of the Islamic sources that are integrated into late imperial Sino-Muslim writing come from post-Mongol Central Asia, I believe this story refers to a Central Asian ruler from around the eleventh to fourteenth century. However, I have not been able to identify the name “Jiexi’erge” or find mention of this story in other sources. Yet this story resembles other conversion to Islam narratives of medieval Central Asian rulers. See Devin A. DeWeese, Islami17

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follow Muhammad’s teachings. Not long after that, he heard that upon Muhammad’s grave a precious emerald sprouted forth and a kettle was manifest… When the king of Rum heard this, he personally paid a visit to the sage’s tomb. With his own eyes he saw this. Sure enough, he saw the miracles that would occur five times a day. Then he kneeled in front of the grave and repented for his doubtful heart. Thereupon he immediately performed the ablutions and entered into the religion, daring not to delay…. The King of Rum, the son of Jiexi’erge, practiced the sage’s teaching because he had seen the miracles at the sage’s grave. 19

Not only does Muhammad’s tomb inspire faith, but miracles at his tomb are closely tied with the fundamental tenants of Islam —the kettle fills up with warm water at precisely the time for prayer. In the biography of the Perfected Being from Zhengzhou, Lan Xu describes how guidance of the interred saint grants protection to the surrounding area. Through the miracles it produces, this tomb prevents ethnic violence and maintains harmony in Zhengzhou: In former days, ignorant folk among the Hui and Han in Zhengzhou city began to feud, and their mutual enmity was already deep. They set up a date for the fight. On dusk of the day before the scheduled fight, white-capped Hui entered the city from the west gate. They rolled in like clouds, entering the city zation and Native Religion in the Golden Horde : Baba Tükles and Conversion to Islam in Historical and Epic Tradition (University Park : Pennsylvania State University Press, 1994). On historical usages of the term “Rum” to refer to the Seljuks and later Turkish lands see Cemal Kafadar, “A Rome of One’s Own: Reflections on Cultural Geography and Identity in the Lands of Rum,” Muqarnas 24 (2007): 7–25. My thanks to Patricia Blessing for referring me to this article. 19 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 381. At the end of Muhammad’s biography, the anecdote is repeated again, this time introduced by “the scripture says” (dian yun). It is likely this was a circulating oral and written tale that Lan Xu is recounting here. I have found no mention of it in any other Islamic sources.

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD in large number. By the third watch of the night, these Hui numbered in the tens of hundreds of thousands. Thereupon they beat a gong and cried: “The Hui and Han should be in harmony. They should not be enemies. Do not fight tomorrow! Do not fight tomorrow!” When dawn came, the city was quiet and without a stir. The Hui and Han resided peacefully as if this were always the case. The next day, the department magistrate came to check on the city. Yet the number of Hui in the city had not increased. A local report outside the west gate said: “From the tomb of the Perfected Being, there came white-capped Hui. There were tens of hundreds of thousands…” That day, the department magistrate visited the mosque. Urging the ignorant and common folk towards good, he said: “The Hui and Han should no longer be envious of each other. In the past they have lived together very peacefully. Now that the tomb of the Perfect Being has responded in this way, it is fitting that this great harmony should be maintained. For this we can thank the Perfected Being. He has brought blessings to the people. It is a great fortune for this county. Be fearful of him and cautious. All Hui and Han commoners should respect and obey this without exception.” 20

20 Ibid., 401–2. The issue of state

concern about violence involving Muslims would have been especially pertinent to the author and his readers in nineteenth century China. In 1852 when Lan Xu first completes this text, the Taiping rebellion is just beginning. In ten years, at the same time when the biographies of Lan Xu’s father and mother are addended to the text as well as the annotation about the new stele in front of the Western Person Kelemenlaxi’s grave, another massive rebellion would occur. This uprising involves Muslims from northwest China, including Xi’an city and Shaanxi and Sichuan provinces. For an overview of Muslim revolts in eighteenth and nineteenth century China, see Lipman, Familiar Strangers, 103–66. Chapter four of this project addresses the issue of violence further through Li Huanyi’s text.

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When we examine the entire biography of the Perfected Being from Zhengzhou, the details of his life are vague. What Lan Xu really animates, and spends more than half of the biography on, is the tomb. He describes the tomb and recounts this miracle story about the manifestations witnessed around the tomb. The details of the living person’s life are overshadowed by elaborate accounts of what happen after death. In this respect, the “western person” Kelemenlaxi and this saint from Zhengzhou are remembered precisely due to their post-mortem miracles and not because of anything from their lifetime. The details of their lives —their names, the fact that they were teachers from afar—are generic. The author devotes very little time to this, treating their life accounts as merely an introduction to the miracle tales, which he is more interested in relating. In this case, miracles are the centerpiece of the biography. Lan Xu also recounts miracles that take place further away from the tomb. These stories point again to the continued activity of Perfected Beings in the community. Later biographies in the “Epitaphs” draw upon Chinese motifs relating to the xian (immortal). The life accounts of Sino-Muslim scholars Ma Minglong and Mr. Li illustrate how bodily cultivation leads to transcending human limitations. Ma Minglong and Mr. Li’s post-mortem appearances center around their burials, but Lan Xu suggests that those who are truly worthy may be rewarded with seeing these Perfected Beings at any time or place. Ma Minglong [馬明龍], often affectionately called “Ma si baba” [馬四爸爸] 21 or referred to by his hometown Wuchang, is one of the most well-known and respected teachers in the Sino-Muslim tradition. His name appears in several late imperial sources, and stories about him proliferate to this day. 22 His biography is included in 21

Literally “Baba Ma the Fourth.” Baba is an affectionate title for senior males in the Hui community. This title is also used in Central Asia. See for example “Baba Tukles” in DeWeese, Islamization and Native Religion in the Golden Horde. Ma Minglong is reputedly known as “the fourth” because of he is the fourth-born in his family. 22 For Ma Minglong’s life and works see Xiaochun Yang, “Ming Mo Qing Chu Yisilan Jiao Xue Zhe Ma Minglong de Sheng Ping Yu Zhu Shu,” Hui-

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the seventeenth-century genealogical text Jingxue xi chuan pu by Zhao Can where he is elevated as one of the “four great scholars of the east.” 23 Lan Xu’s account of Ma Minglong’s life in the “Epitaphs,” however, leaves out many details about Ma’s pedagogical lineage and scholarly attainments. Rather, the biography focuses on miracle stories attesting to Ma’s supernatural powers and continued presence in the world today. Lan Xu opens Ma Minglong’s biography with a very brief biographical sketch of his life. “The family name of the Perfected Being was Ma. He was a Ming dynasty person from Jiangxia district. 24 He was a person of high learning, an imam of Wuchang, who obtained the true transmission of the western scriptures. He was a leader of the Hui teaching.” Next, Lan Xu emphasizes the advanced degree of bodily cultivation that Ma Minglong obtained. “He was cultivated in body and virtue. His nature attained a luminous light. He often would do quiet-sitting inside a cave.” 25 Lan Xu then goes on to relate several miracle tales illustrating the results of Ma’s advanced bodily cultivation. Only one takes place during Ma’s lifetime. In this story, Ma becomes so well known for zu Yanjiu 81, no. 1 (2011): 112–17. See also Zhenyi Da, Hubei Huizu (Beijing: Zhong yang xue yuan chubanshe, 1993), 53, 189–90. Ma’s tomb can still be found in Wuhan today, and his legacy is still being discussed by SinoMuslims. See mention of him in Ben Song, ed., “Zhennian huizu shi xuejia Da Zhenyi xiansheng,” Musilin tongxun, accessed March 11, 2014, http://dev.gansudaily.com.cn/system/2010/05/12/011551663.shtml 23 See Zhao, “Jingxue xichuan pu.” For analysis of Ma’s figure in this text, see Ben-Dor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad, 48–49, 100–6. 24 Jingxia district is in the modern city of Wuhan (formerly Wuchang). 25 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 398. This characterization of Ma Minglong resembles that of the much earlier figure Uways Qarni, who Lan Xu notes was also fond of meditating in caves. Lan Xu buries Uways on the mythical Mt. Kunlun. This option is not available for Ma Minglong, since he is a contemporary individual with a known grave site in Wuhan. However, the portrayal Lan Xu gives of Ma in his miracle stories brings to mind the “heavenly immortals” (tian xian) who are also associated with mountains, particularly Mt. Kunlun.

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his virtue that the investigating censor of Hunan and Hubei province asks him to take up office. When Ma appears at the yamen, however, he is seen “walking on 3 chi high of mist.” This impresses the censor so much that he releases Ma from office, claiming that he is too good for imperial service. The official apologizes to Ma for interrupting his spiritual pursuits and requests that Ma “return to the cloud and quiet-sitting.” He predicts that the brilliance of Ma’s spirit will be great. 26 This story provides external validation of Ma Minglong’s virtue by a high-ranking official, both in his initial invitation for Ma to take up office and in his decision to relinquish Ma from office. It also introduces the idea that during his lifetime, Ma was already beginning to exhibit supernatural abilities. Lan Xu follows this story with another account illustrating Ma’s powers—this time his ability to foresee the events of his funeral and appear after death. Shortly after this [episode with the imperial censor], the Perfected Being returned to the Real on the twelfth day of the winter month. His body emitted a fragrance of the Real. His last words were to place the thirtieth juzʾ 27 of the Heavenly Scripture [Qur’an] on his chest and bury it with him. They carried out his wish, constructing a tomb in the province of Wuchang, twenty li east of the city, in Majia village. He became a guiding saint [Ar. qutb irshad, Ch. Gu tu bu ao shi]. With utmost reverence, our people adorned his grave with an octangular pavilion. At this time, the Perfected Being was on a road in Henan… His son saw him standing in the middle of the path. Ma Minglong took out a scripture from against his chest and instructed his son saying, “The family is waiting for this thirtieth juzʾ of the scripture. You need to hurry up and go home.” His son obeyed, took the scripture reverently with both hands, and returned home.

26 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 398.

27 The Qur’an is divided into thirty juzʾ/ajzaʾ

(Ch. juan), to make it easier to break up reciting it, especially during the month of Ramadan or on special occasions.

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD This was the seventh day 28 after his father’s death. They were just about to recite the entire Qur’an and people were looking for this thirtieth juzʾ. His son brought the scripture home. Only then did he realize that his father had died. The group of teachers obtained the thirtieth juzʾ from him and were able to complete their recitation. 29

While this story may seem unbelievable to most readers, its value lies in how Lan Xu mobilizes the account to illustrate Ma Minglong’s legacy as a powerful figure. Ma’s ability to foresee the events of his funeral attests to his internal cultivation and superhuman abilities. Furthermore, the story details how he is unimpeded by death. Even after burial, he is able to manifest himself—in this case in another province carrying the book he was buried with—to aid the community in carrying out his funeral rites to their completion. Another Sino-Muslim scholar who appears after death to oversee his burial is Mr. Li, a contemporary of Lan Xu. Lan Xu is able to record the exact year of birth and death for Mr. Li. In the entire “Epitaphs,” this information is only given for Muhammad, the Lan parents, and Mr. Li. 30 It is likely that the author had a close association with Mr. Li, perhaps as a teacher or family friend. Lan Xu notes how Li Benxian [b. 1755] “spent decades principling his nature. He traveled to visit those who were accomplished in scriptural learning… He knew how to carry out the Path on his own The seventh day following death (tou qi). According to Da Zhenyi, the important days after a person’s death are day 7, day 40, day 100, and the yearly anniversary. During these days, Hui families invite the ahong (imam) to recite scripture at the grave. Da, Hubei Huizu, 186. 29 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 398. 30 The biographies of Father Lan and Mother Lan were addended to Lan Xu’s collection after it was completed in 1852. Someone by the name of Sun Ru completed the biography for Father Lan [1782–1859]. Someone by the name of Ma Lian completed the biography of Mother Lan [1779–1860]. My best guess given the titles [men sheng, men xia] used for these authors is that they were students in an educational system connected with Lan Xu and his family. Mr. Li was likely a teacher of Lan Xu. This suggests that the Upright Learning may have been used in a pedagogical setting. 28

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body, and that virtue came from cultivation of the body.” Mr. Li knew ahead of time when he would die. “In the gengzi year of Emperor Daoguang’s reign [1840], on the twenty-eighth day of the tenth month, he performed ablutions on his perfected body and put on his own burial shroud. Thereupon he died.” 31 This is followed by an elaborate account of the competition over where to place his tomb in which the deceased Mr. Li appears in person to aid the winning team. Lan Xu relates how people in Zitong county of Sichuan where Mr. Li died constructed a tomb for him. When those from other counties heard about this, they arrived in hordes demanding that the tomb be moved to their locale. Even those who hadn’t heard Mr. Li’s teachings stilled revered his virtue. In the ensuing battle over the placement of Mr. Li’s tomb, only the people from Tuqiao county reverently prayed for the wind to help them. Lan Xu writes: The Perfected Being was glad to fulfill the will of these people [from Tuqiao]. He was pleased at this good thing that they were doing. A little while later, there arose a fierce wind. The gusts scared the others and drove them to take shelter in the doorways of homes. They could not see the people from Tuqiao moving the tomb. When the people of Tuqiao had moved the tomb and left, the fierce wind stopped.

This first miracle attests to Mr. Li’s power to influence the natural world after death, manipulating the wind to help those who prayed. This is followed by another miracle in which Mr. Li manifests himself in various forms to continue assisting the Tuqiao people. The people from Tong hurried in large crowds pursuing the people of Tuqiao. The Perfected Being manifest himself in mountain gorges hindering their path. Each of the pursuers lost their way and found that they had arrived at the gate to their home. Then they began to realize that even though the manifestation they saw on the path in the mountain gorge was that of

31 Ibid., 406–7.

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD Guandi, 32 he was really a Perfected Being. He was there to hinder their pursuit. Thereupon the perfected body was moved and re-entered in Chengbu at Tuqiao fifteen li away. People shared in their enthusiasm to scrupulously and reverently construct a tomb for him. They erected a stele to engrave his epitaph. He became a guiding saint [Ar. qutb irshad, Ch. Gu tu bu ao shi]. 33

In this story, the people of Tuqiao emerge victorious. They pray for assistance, and Mr. Li offers it to them. Competitors are driven away by fierce winds and blocked in their path by manifestations of Guandi. They find themselves transported right back to their own homes. In another miracle story featuring Ma Minglong, Lan Xu suggests that this Perfected Being may still be visible today. The author relates how Ma appeared to a group of people seeking to find him. After this [episode in which Ma appears to his son], someone said that the Perfected Being Ma is still on this earth. We wanted to find him to see him and learn from him. Ten people divided into five groups, with each group of two taking a different route. One group arrived a Zhoukou. They heard that they should go to Zheng Yang pass. They hurried to that pass. They searched and heard that they should go to Yangzhou. They hurried to Yangzhou. Before they reached this prefectural city, they encountered a mountain in the middle of the road. In the middle of this mountain was a mosque. They entered the mosque and saw that everyone was carrying out the Friday prayer. There were two bottles of water for ablutions. Thereupon, the two people did their 32

Guandi is a figure in Chinese religion known for his power over demons and association with military combat. Also called Guan Yu, Guan Gong, and Wudi, he was originally a historical figure from 3rd century C.E.. Guandi later became popular in the Ming dynasty drama Sanguo yanyi “Romance of the Three Kingdoms,” in which he is one of the heroes. 33 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 406–7.

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minor ablutions and hurried to participate in the two main rakʿah of the Friday prayer. There they saw the Perfected Being leading the prayer and standing above everyone else. They said to themselves, “Now we have really seen the Perfected One!” They could not help but koutou to the ground. When they finished, the entire area became a wild mountain with overgrown grass. There was neither mosque nor anyone else in sight. The glasses of water they had used earlier for ablutions had also disappeared. Then they began to realize that this was the holy realm 34 of the Perfected Being. They could only experience it for a short instant, but would not be able to find it again. If the foolish reflect on their faults and the bright cultivate themselves, they too can see him like this. 35

Lan Xu suggests that Ma reappears in multiple locations after his death and can still be seen by readers. Ma Minglong continues to be seen on this earth, but not in a fixed location. At best those who reflect on their faults and cultivate themselves might be able to see him for a brief instant. This, according to Lan Xu, is good enough to hope for. Perfected Beings like Ma Minglong are not confined to the tomb, manifesting in mountain gorges and mosques. These superior individuals have power over space and time, manipulating elements of the natural world to influence events to their liking.

III. THE CHINESE XIAN AND ISLAMIC QUTB Lan Xu’s imagination of death and the individuals who can transcend death draws from a mélange of Sufi Islamic and indigenous Chinese religious concepts. In the case of Mr. Li and Ma Minglong, the author’s description of their post-mortem activity evokes Chinese notions of the “heavenly immortal” [xian, tian xian]. The characteristics of Mr. Li and Ma Minglong fit squarely into what Robert “Holy realm” here refers to the Chinese xian jing 仙境, or abode of the heavenly immortal. 35 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 398–9. 34

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Campany calls the “repertoire” of the xian: the emphasis on bodily cultivation, association with mountains or caves, and reported sightings after death. 36 In Lan Xu’s setting, it is no surprise that revered individuals come to be known as xian. Other scholars have noted the use of this term among Chinese Muslims during this time. 37 The concept has also been incorporated into Chinese Buddhism. 38 Lan Xu is comfortable depicting someone like Ma Minglong as both a xian—propensity for quiet meditation, walking on a cloud, appearing after death on a mountain—and as someone who leads a congregation in Friday prayers. This reveals that while he is applying an indigenous concept, the concept itself is being changed and expanded to fit an Islamic agenda. Lan Xu also draws on Islamic terminology pertaining to the qutb, a certain kind of saint thought to be the pole or axis of the world. Carl Ernst summarizes the qutb as follows: Traditions going back to hadith reports from Muhammad affirm that there is a special class of servants of God, often numbered as 356, upon whom the maintenance of the world rests…this invisible hierarchy includes various categories… the supreme figure of the hierarchy, known as the savior (ghawth) or the pole or axis of the world (qutb). 39

Robert Ford Campany, Making Transcendents: Ascetics and Social Memory in Early Medieval China (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2009), 47–57. 37 David Atwill notes that a Yunnan gazzetter records how in 1852 near Dali, “Hui bandits named Ma Alue, and his daughter, called A-feng, were practicing heretical Islamic teacings. [She] was venerated and referred to by the term immortal [xian gu].” Atwill, The Chinese Sultanate, 133. 38 See for example A. Charles Muller, “Xian,” CJKV/English Dictionary, entry created July 15, 1995, http://buddhism-dic.net. See also the use of xian to refer to the ten ṛṣis [Sanskrit], who preceded Śākyamuni. A. Charles Muller, “Xian,” Digital Dictionary of Buddhism, last updated October 20, 2015, http://buddhism-dic.net. 39 Carl W. Ernst, The Shambhala Guide to Sufism (Shambhala, 1997), 60. For another exploration of the qutb and sainthood in Islam, see Michel 36

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For Lan Xu, the Perfected Beings are a particular kind of qutb, the qutb al-irshad [gu tu bu ao shi 固土補奧師]. In the biography of the Perfected Being from Zhengzhou for example, the miracle of the tens of thousands of Hui appearing from the tomb is described as “a manifestation of the irshad” and “a miracle of the qutb.” The guidance of this saint’s tomb protects the community from ethnic feuding. The term qutb al-irshad or “pole of guidance” is a muchdebated category among the Kubravi and Naqshbandi Sufis. 40 Positioned differently by various sects within the saintly hierarchy, the qutb al-irshad is understood as one of the highest levels of qutb, often associated with the ghawth or “savior.” 41 Yet while Lan Xu latches onto one specialized term within the categorization of Islamic Chodkiewicz, The Seal of the Saints: Prophethood and Sainthood in the Doctrine of Ibn ʿArabi, transl. Liadain Sherrard (Cambridge: The Islamic Texts Society, 1993). A discussion of the qutb in Persianate societies can be found in Bashir, Shahzad. Sufi Bodies: Religion and Society in Medieval Islam (New York: Columbia University Press, 2011), 85–87. 40 Hamid Algar mentions transmission of the Kubravi into China, in particular in Gansu province. ʻAbd Allāh ibn Muḥammad Najm al-Dīn Rāzī, The Path of God’s Bondsmen from Origin to Return (Mersad al-ʻebad men al-Mabdaʼ elaʼl-Maʻad), trans. Hamid Algar (North Haledon, N.J. : Islamic Publication International, 2003), 7. Algar refers to the late eighteenth century Kubravi saint Mīān Faqīrollāh of Afghanistan who wrote an Arabic work titled Qutb al-irshad. This text is available online. Shikarpuri, Haji Faqir-Allah al-Alavi al-Hanafi Naqshbandi, “Qutb al-irshad,” digitized December 2011 by Maktabah.org, https://archive.org/details/QutbAlirshadarabic. This edition was published in 1316 AH (1898 CE). 41 The contemporary leader of the Naqshbandi-Haqqani order Shaykh Muhammad Hisham Kabbani defines it as one of the five highest levels of qutub. The Qutub al-irshad “advises the 124,000 awliya.” Kabbani, Shaykh Muhammad Hisham, “Qutbanniyya,” The Muhammadan Way, accessed November 16, 2016, http://nurmuhammad.com/NaqshbandiSecrets/ qutbanniyya.htm. The Turkish Sufi Ahmed Hulusi who lives in North Carolina calls the Qutub al-Irshad one of two assistants to the Ghaws. Hulusi, Ahmed. “Assembly of the saints,” accessed Sept. 2, 2016, http://www.ahmedhulusi.org/en/articles/assembly-of-the-saints.html.

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saints, the “Epitaphs” also ignores other traditional divisions. There is absolutely no distinction made between the prophets [rusul, nabi] and the saints [wali]. Qutb is a category previously used only for saints in the Islamic tradition, those powerful beings who come after Muhammad. Lan Xu, however, applies it to Adam, Noah, Muhammad, and everyone else in the “Epitaphs.” Furthermore, he eschews other categories of qutb. There is only one type of qutb in the collection, the qutb al-irshad. For previous thinkers like Ibn ‘Arabi, qutb is a prize position, a competitive title one earns—or gives oneself as in the case of some Sufi leaders— that identifies an individual as greater than others. A qutb outranks other more “commonplace” saints. Yet for Lan Xu, qutb is the ultimate equalizer. All individuals in the “Epitaphs” are qutub, from the utmost sage Muhammad to Miss Cai from Shaanxi province. The subject of unsavory gossip due to her distended belly, Miss Cai was spotted floating on a white cloud, her virtue proven after death. 42 For all these Perfected Beings from the greatest prophet to an unmarried woman in northern China, qutb al-irshad is their common title after death. Qutb al-irshad also serves as part of the formulaic ending to all of the biographies. For example, Adam’s biography concludes: Finally, in the Spring Opening period he died. His body emitted a fragrance of the Real [zhen]. He enjoyed a lifespan of one thousand five hundred years. He was buried in the great land of the Kunlun mountains. He became a qutb al-irshad and the tian xian who presides over ceremonies for Spring Opening. 43

Noah’s biography ends: Noah resided alone in the Kunlun caves. He cultivated the Real and principled his nature. He emitted a great light. He died in the Spring Equinox period. His body emitted a fragrance of the Real. He enjoyed a lifespan of eight hundred and ten years. He 42 See her biography in Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 403. This motif of float-

ing on a white cloud is typical behavior of the xian.

43 Ibid., 355.

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was buried in Kunlun. He became a qutb al-irshad and the tian xian that presides over ceremonies for Spring Equinox. 44

Muhammad’s death is told in the same language: The utmost sage of Arabia, Muhammad Mustafa, stayed true to his original nature and cultivated the Real. At noon on the twelfth day of the third month of the eleventh year after the hijra, he returned to the “Palace of Destiny.” 45 His sagely body was interred in the ground between Mecca and Medina. He became a great qutb and a great irshad and the leader of the tian xian. 46

CONCLUSION Multiple pasts are joined together in the “Epitaphs” collection. Each of these pasts is self-contained to a certain extent. The individual lives have beginnings and ends. The chain of prophets reaches Muhammad. One can divide the collection into the individuals found in other Islamic narratives and those particular to this Chinese context. Yet in spite of all these possible concrete divisions, the “Epitaphs” is incredibly messy. The lives flow into each other, as do the landscapes of the tombs. Read as a collection, these accounts begin to sound increasingly similar. Mr. Li and Ma Minglong’s appearances after death. The descriptions of Muhammad’s tomb alongside other tombs in China. Even the categories of xian and qutb are nearly interchangeable in the way Lan Xu uses them at the end of the biography. The special beings chosen for this collection are elevated for their unusual powers—powers described in rich language drawn from the Chinese and Islamic traditions. What is striking is the consistency of the imagination here. The past continues to permeate into the present through animated graves and reappearing dead. This is dominant for the later Chinese individuals as well as for Muhammad, since they are the people freshest in the memory. They matter 44 Ibid., 358.

Destiny” [Ming gong 命宮] is calculated based on heavenly stems and earthly branches after one’s birth date. 46 Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 380. 45 The “Palace of

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the most for how Hui like Lan Xu see the past flowing into the present. As such, these individuals continue to be active in the landscape and through miracles.

CHAPTER 4. EMPIRE In writing about their past and defining themselves as a people, Chinese Muslims were attentive to their status with respect to empire. Holding associations with two of the greatest empires in the world— the Chinese empire and the Islamic empire—they navigated this political terrain carefully. Origin narratives, central to any historical endeavor, clarified this relationship. Through stories about how their ancestors came to China and persistent endeavors to keep these stories alive, Chinese Muslims defined what it meant to be Hui. Hui identity was especially dangerous in the late Qing dynasty due to the turbulent nature of the empire. State officials were vigilant and hostile, owing to Hui rebellions in Shaanxi, Gansu, and Yunnan provinces. It was precisely during this time that Li Huanyi [李煥乙] composed his work, Words and Deeds of Islamic Exemplars [Qingzhen xianzheng yanxing lüe 清真先正言行略]. This biographical compendium, completed in 1874, smooths over the mottled past and emphasizes the special place Hui hold in Chinese history. It points to a sacred tie formed between Muslims and the Chinese empire. I begin by introducing Words and Deeds in part one of this chapter. I examine how Li defines the Hui as a people and situates them within the history of China and Arabia, dating back to the first human being Adam. For Li, the Hui are not an ethnic or religious minority on the fringes of two empires. Rather, they are central to both histories and the history of humankind as a whole. The second part of this chapter focuses on Saʿd b. Abi Waqqas, a Companion of the Prophet Muhammad who is claimed as progenitor of the Hui. Waqqas is crucial to the narrative of how Muslims first arrived in China on the authority of both Muhammad and the 91

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Chinese emperor. Words and Deeds features a distinctive interpretation of Waqqas’ place in history. As the first biography in Li’s collection, Waqqas serves as the founder of Hui history and loyalty to the state. The last section of this chapter follows the tradition of service initiated by Waqqas. I examine three biographies from Li’s collection—an opium war hero from the Qing dynasty, a military general from the Ming dynasty, and an elusive immortal from the Tang dynasty. Each of these lives epitomizes Li’s central message that Hui throughout history have proved invaluable to the Chinese empire.

I. DEFINING HUI HISTORY Li Huanyi [李煥乙], also known by his sobriquet Lianfang [蓮舫], was a native of Tang prefecture in Henan Province. Lacking the successful government career of Lan Xu or the prolific output of Liu Zhi, Li was a comparably obscure figure. He progressed as far as the county level of the imperial exam system as xiucai. Words and Deeds appears to be his only surviving text. 1 It enjoyed limited distribution among Hui intellectuals in Li’s home prefecture, with some mention of prints made in Jiangnan and Guangdong provinces. 2 Compared to works by Liu Zhi and Lan Xu, Words and Deeds is a lesser-known text. Yet it hardly displays a provincial worldview. This is an expansive work that attempts to address all of Chinese history and human history in its narrative scope. The biographies of Hui individuals are organized chronologically by dynasty. Li's coverage begins in the Sui dynasty with MuAccording to Chinese scholar Fenglin Lu, the woodblocks for Words and Deeds were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. The current prints survived the Cultural Revolution thanks to a doctor named Gong Kebing. These prints were entrusted to Gong by Li Huanyi’s descendant Li Guanglu, the original owner and a relative of Gong by marriage. See Fenglin Lu, Nanyang Shigu (Beijing: Zhongguo wenhua chubanshe, 2005). 2 For evidence of other publication sites, see end of the liyan in Huanyi Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” in Huizu Diancang Quanshu, ed. Haiying Wu, vol. 105 (Lanzhou: Gansu wenhua chubanshe, 2008), 237. For more on the distribution and history of this text, see Lu, Nanyang Shigu. 1

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hammad’s companion Saʿd b. Abi Waqqas and his journey to China. The collection culminates with the Qing dynasty, covering a total of ninety-five exemplars. Li’s son Zumian claims that his father spent more than ten years working on this project, consulting hundreds of imperial histories in order to consolidate these records of learned and high-ranking Hui. 3 Unsurprisingly, the majority of these exemplars are state officials—bureaucrats and more often military heroes, like the famous Turkic Tang general Han Geshu. In recounting their lives, Li relies on Chinese dynastic accounts, often reproducing extracts from official state biographies. Li also includes Hui religious scholars in the collection. This is initiated by Wang Daiyu's biography in the Ming dynasty, and followed by notable figures such as Ma Zhu, Liu Zhi, She Qiyun, and Jin Tianzhu. Li’s collection also mentions a few holymen, who are presented in the style of the Chinese xian—idiosyncratic recluses who escape or elude death as evidence of their great powers. Words and Deeds opens with an outline of the origins of human civilization, focusing on Arabia and China. Li allocates attention to each respective site according to time period. Arabia holds a monopoly over antiquity, with Li claiming that human origins are better understood through Islamic narratives. Following the flood and the dispersal of Noah’s sons, however, a parallel history is presented of both the Arabian and Chinese empires. These empires meet in the Sui and Tang dynasty with the arrival of Islamic emissaries to China. After this, Li’s history focuses exclusively on China, with Arabia disappearing from the narrative. Li’s treatment of antiquity employs many of the same themes used by other Sino-Muslim authors. Like Liu Zhi and Lan Xu, he combines the Islamic figure Japheth with the Chinese sage Fuxi. He also identifies Adam with the Chinese mythical figure Pangu. Li writes: When the universe opened up, Adam was born in Arabia. Just as the Hui scriptures call him Adam, the Ru [Confucian] scrip3

See Li Zumian's preface to the 1917 woodblock edition in Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 233–34.

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD tures call him Pangu. He was also known as “Ya Dan.” They were probably the same person with different names. When the tenth generation descendent [of Adam] Noah quieted the floodwaters and set right the path, he enlightened people as to the correct way to conduct themselves. Noah had three sons. The oldest was called San Mu [Shem]. He spent his life watching over the middle lands, which is present-day Arabia. The second was called Han Mu [Ham]. He was given governance of the western lands, which are the present-day countries of Europe. The third was called Ya Fuxi [Japheth]. He was given governance of the eastern lands, which is present-day Chi ni [赤 泥]. Chi ni refers to the “middle country,” China. 4 The Tianfang shiji [天方世紀] 5 says that Fuxi [son of Noah] is the same as Fuxi [Chinese mythological sage]. He is the eleventh generation descendent of the ancestor of human beings, Adam. From Arabia he crossed the desert and cultivated the fertile farmlands. He was the first to go east and set up his capital there. 6

Li equates the Islamic Adam with Pangu, who appears in Chinese mythology as the first human being. Li cites that this figure goes by different names in Chinese and Islamic texts, but is essentially the same person. Later, following the Islamic tradition of ten generations separating Adam and Noah, Li presents a division of the post-flood world between Noah’s three sons as consisting of Europe to the west, Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 229–30. Chi ni 赤泥 is a transliteration of the Persian word for China chīn. 5 This is a highly generic title. Li is likely referring here to a section of Liu Zhi’s Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu, which contains a section chronicling the generations after Adam. In Noah’s biography, Liu Zhi makes the connection between his youngest son Japheth and rulership over China. Zhi Liu, “Tianfang Zhisheng Shilu Nianpu,” in Qingzhen Dadian, ed. Xiefan Zhou, vol. 14, Zhongguo Zong Jiao Li Shi Wen Xian Ji Cheng 89 (Hefei Shi: Huang Shan shu she, 2005), 69. 6 Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 229–30. 4

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Arabia in the middle, and China to the east. Noah’s sons become the progenitors of each of these civilizations. Like Hui authors Liu Zhi and Lan Xu before him, Li makes the connection between Noah’s youngest son Japheth, who is purported to have traveled west in the Islamic traditions and the Chinese flood figure Fuxi, who has a strikingly similar sounding name. The effect of equating Fuxi with the Islamic Japheth is that the birth of Chinese civilization becomes linked to an even earlier origin of human beings in Arabia. Li emphasizes that these connections make sense given that Chinese historical accounts of what happened between Pangu and Fuxi are vague if not missing altogether. When you examine the history after Pangu and before Fuxi, they all remained in Arabia. And that is why the records of Shuyi and Xunfei are muddled and without solid evidence. 7 The episodes of Nüwa patching up the sky and Yi shooting down the ten suns are preposterous, fabricated tales. Because of this, the Grand Historian says: “The historian should begin with Fuxi.” 8 ...Moreover, Confucius left out the Shang Shu, only starting with the dynasties of Yao and Shun. For how could he speak of these things without a foundation? 9

If Fuxi were indeed Noah’s son, then the details of human history predating him would have been virtually unknown in China since human beings between Pangu and Fuxi actually “remained in Arabia.” Thus Li argues that the true history of this early time lies in Islamic sources. Other Chinese tales of this period involving Nüwa 7

Shuyi and Xunfei are segment number ten and number seven respectively of the Shiji text [十記]. The Shiji divides into ten segments the 2,760,000 years spanning the opening of heaven and earth and coming of the human emperor [ren huang人皇] to the Spring and Autumn period of ancient Chinese history. 8 Grand historian [tai shi gong 太史公] refers to the Han dynasty holder of this position, Sima Qian, who wrote the famous Shiji [史記], a monumental history of China up to the Han dynasty, on which all subsequent imperial histories are based. 9 Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 229–30.

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patching up the sky and Yi shooting down the suns are “preposterous and fabricated.” Only the histories rooted in Arabia—the Islamic ones—have authority over what really happened before Fuxi came to China. Li points out that other Chinese historians have agreed with him on the weakness of Chinese sources for this period. The Grand Historian Sima Qian and Confucius all began their histories after Fuxi. Thus Arabia becomes the cradle of human civilization. Chinese history only begins after the dispersal of Noah’s sons. For Li, Noah marks the transition from one unified world history to multiple histories. From Fuxi onwards, Li paints two parallel timelines between the Chinese civilization descended from Fuxi, and the “Hui religion” [hui jiao 回教] upheld by San Mu’s descendants in Arabia. On the Chinese side, the original religious lineage [dao tong 道統] traced back to Fuxi and even further to Adam diverges after the Qin and Han dynasties. China witnesses the arising of Buddhism, Daoism, and other teachings deviant from the true root in Arabia. Concurrently, the Hui religion is in turmoil in Arabia and almost vanishes. However, it ascends again during China’s Liang [502–557 CE] and Chen [557–589 CE] dynasties of the North-South era. This would have been concurrent with the lifetime of the Prophet Muhammad, according to Li’s calculations. Li arrives finally at the Sui and Tang dynasties, during which China encounters the Hui religion via the first Sui emperor’s “invitation to the west for a scholar to fix the calendar” and Tang emperor Taizong’s edict sanctioning mosque construction in the capital. Following this, each successive Chinese dynasty is summarized with a defining characteristic in relation to the Hui. “The Song age held the Hui customs in esteem. The Yuan hired Hui talent. The Ming ancestors praised Hui knowledge. This sagely dynasty [the Qing] emphasizes Hui works.” 10

10 Ibid.

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Diagram 4.1 Human History in Li Huanyi,

Words and Deeds

It is noteworthy here the scope and limits of the term Hui as employed by Li. The historical development of Islam as a religion, even during its nascence in Arabia, is understood as hui jiao, “the teachings of the Hui.” Hui jiao develops first in Arabia, but then moves to China in the Sui and Tang dynasties, where it continues to flourish until the present day. Notable is the absence of any mention of hui jiao in Arabia after the Sui and Tang dynasties. Li is simply not

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interested in Arabia after the transmission of Islam to China. Arabia no longer holds any authority. Hui jiao is alive in China. While the tradition of learning that the Hui uphold is dated to antiquity (even before the Prophet Muhammad), the Hui people only emerge during Muhammad’s lifetime. Li applies the term hui to all those in China, Muslims and non-Muslims alike, who originate from western lands—specifically the region encompassing Arabia, Persia, and Central Asia. In the Tang dynasty, most of these people were of Turkic descent and followers of Mani. 11 This is why the majority of Li’s Tang dynasty biographies and many of his Song and Yuan dynasty figures are described as being Uyghur [huihe 回紇, huihu 回鶻, or belonging to the huibu 回部]. Li includes the construction of a Manichean temple in 807 CE alongside a lineage of famous Islamic buildings in China. The inclusion of these details about Uyghurs and Manichean sites allows Li to date Words and Deeds back to Muhammad’s lifetime. This is crucial in order to include the Prophet’s companion Saʿd b. Abi Waqqas in the collection. Waqqas is elevated as the progenitor of the Hui people, even as it is emphasized that the Hui teachings date back to antiquity. Li’s choice to organize his account of early human history around the term hui belies the author’s state-centric focus. In the study of premodern Chinese Islamic literature, scholars have generally agreed upon the following distinctions between the terms Chinese Muslims employ in reference to themselves and their religion: tianfang 天方 “Arabia,” qingzhen 清真 “Islam,” and hui 回 “Muslim.” 12 By and large, tianfang and qingzhen are used exclusively within the Muslim community in discourse about itself. 13 On the other hand, 11

The prophet Mani lived during the Persian Sasanian Empire. He founded Manichaeism, which spread into Central Asia and China. 12 See Leslie, Islam in Traditional China, 28. Leslie provides a glossary of Chinese-Islamic terms. 13 For example, Liu Zhi’s famous tripartite series: Tianfang zhisheng shilu, Tianfang Dianli, and Tianfang Xingli. Lan Xu, also favored tianfang in his titles: The Upright Learning of Arabia [Tianfang zhengxue] and Encyclopedia of Arabia [Tianfang erya]. For these authors, tianfang holds a geo-

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imperial discussion directed at China’s Muslim population favors the term hui or huihui in reference to the people, and hui jiao in reference to their religion. When hui does appear in works from this era by Muslim authors, it is in discussion about their origins as a people within the state. 14 As part of this discourse, Words and Deeds is a carefully constructed, self-conscious reflection on the status of Hui in China. Li presents a history of the world that defines Chinese history as a subset of a larger history rooted in Arabia. He presents a parallel timeline chronicling the development of Chinese civilization and the Hui religion, which meet during the Sui and Tang era. From this time forward, the author makes the case that the state enjoyed a long history of contributions from the Hui. Yet despite this long history, Li believes there has not been significant inquiry into the Hui as a whole or celebration of their achievements within Chinese historical texts. Li writes, "The honor of the emperors and wise gentlemen and the wisdom of the great ministers of the court have already been praised and rewarded. But the following individuals, whose luminosity is like a consuming fire and cries are like an earthenware kettle, how can one not inquire about them!" 15 The biographies that follow in his collection, then, are presented as a new grouping of famed Hui from the state's history, a grouping that had previously been overlooked in the acknowledgement of notable Chinese emperors and ministers. Through outlining a lineage of human history from his Qing dynasty back to Noah and Adam in Arabia, Li positions the Hui in a graphic imagination as an area from which the religion originated. Religious knowledge too is rooted in tianfang. Tianfang is also associated with the Arabic letters and language, as evidenced in Liu Zhi’s Tianfang zimu jieyi. The term qingzhen, literally “pure and true” in reference to Islam, also appears in works and titles such as Wang Daiyu’s Qingzhen Daxue and Ma Zhu’s Qingzhen Zhina. 14 An example of this would be the Huihui Yuanlai. See “Huihui Yuanlai,” in Zhongguo Zongjiao Lishi Wenxian Jicheng, vol. 99, Qingzhen Dadian 24 (Hefei shi: Huangshan shushe, 2005). 15 Ibid.

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particularly meaningful place. The Hui join together the two lineages of China and Arabia, which date back to the first human being Adam. Yet as Li notes, the achievements of the Hui as a group have not been given sufficient attention in Chinese history. The rest of the collection is devoted to “uncovering” these virtuous life stories as they have been scattered throughout Chinese imperial sources and integrating them into a lineage. This lineage connects eminent Hui back to Arabia and the time of Muhammad through the origin figure Waqqas.

II. SAʿD B. ABI WAQQAS The Companion of the Prophet Muhammad, Saʿd b. Abi Waqqas [Wo ge shi 斡歌士, Wan ga sa 宛嘎斯], lies at the center of Hui origin narratives circulating in nineteenth century China. 16 Stories about Waqqas belie a certain fascination with documenting imperial involvement behind the transfer of Hui to China. On the one hand, they highlight the Chinese emperor’s need for Islamic aid and his affirmation of Hui teachings. On the other hand, the dating of these origin narratives to the lifetime of the Prophet and the details given about Waqqas’ connection to Muhammad, belie an investment as well in Islamic imperial authority. This Islamic imperial authority, however, is limited to the Muslim state under Muhammad, and does 16

For the figure of Saʿd b. Abi Waqqas in Islamic traditions outside of China, see G.R. Hawting, “Saʿd B. Abi Wakkas,” Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition, accessed December 15, 2014, referenceworks.brillonline.com. Different transliterations of his name in Chinese exist, and the ones given here are from Li Huanyi. For an investigation into the historical veracity of Waqqas visiting China and theories as to how he became associated with Chinese Muslim origin stories, see Donald Daniel Leslie, “The Sahaba Saʿd Ibn Abi Waqqas in China,” in The Legacy of Islam in China: An International Symposium in Memory of Joseph Fletcher, Harvard University, 14–16 April 1989 (Cambridge, Mass.: John King Fairbank Center for East Asian Research, 1989), 1–32. See also Donald Leslie, The Integration of Religious Minorities in China: The Case of Chinese Muslims, George Ernest Morrison Lecture in Ethnology 59 (Canberra: Australian National University, 1998).

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not concern the future caliphates (‘Uwayyad, Abbasid, etc.). Muhammad appears as the Islamic head of state, with emphasis on his superior command ruling Arabia. Waqqas is presented as the link between Muhammad’s kingdom in Medina and the Chinese court in Chang’an. Waqqas’ multiple journeys back and forth provide the crucial temporal and spatial link joining the two poles of authority in Medina and Chang’an. Origin narratives such as these lend insight into the subtle ways multiple affiliations were negotiated by nineteenth century Hui. Many Hui sources survive from Li’s time and earlier concerning the origin of Muslims in China. While these traditions share a great deal in common, they are not all consistent with each other. Some date the earliest arrival of Muslims to the Sui dynasty and others to the Tang dynasty. Yet all agree that the first entry was during the lifetime of the Prophet. In the Utmost Sage of Arabia [Tianfang zhisheng shilu], Liu Zhi weighs the multiple datings and settles in favor of the Sui dynasty. He writes: The account of the entry of the religion of the Prophet into China in the seventh year of Wendi of the Sui dynasty [587 CE], following the sending of an envoy to the West, is given in detail in several Chinese histories, so it can be proved.... The old statement that it was in the reign of Xuanzong of the Tang dynasty [713 CE] that the entry occurred is an error. That period was over one hundred and fifty years from the advent of the Prophet, so the time does not tally nor do the circumstances agree. 17

While Liu Zhi rules in favor of the Sui dynasty dating, the most elaborate versions of the origin tale feature Tang emperor Taizong. Taizong is prompted by a dream in which his palace is under assault from a hideous monster. Just in time, a turbaned man emerges to vanquish the monster and save the palace from disaster. When the This translation is taken from Isaac Mason’s translation. Jielian Liu, The Arabian Prophet; a Life of Mohammed from Chinese and Arabic Sources., trans. Isaac Mason (Shanghai: Printed by the Commercial Press, 1921), 94. For uniformity here and elsewhere, Mason’s use of Wade-Giles transliteration has been changed into the pinyin system. 17

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emperor recounts his dream to the Imperial Astronomer, the astronomer confirms that last night when he was observing the sky, he noticed a strange appearance among the stars and a felicitous light appearing in the west. The astronomer concludes that there is impending danger, but a sage from the west can save the kingdom. The emperor decides to send a messenger to the west to inquire about this man. This marks the first invitation for Muslims to appear in the Chinese court. 18 In almost all versions, the man from the west dispatched back to China is identified by the name Waqqas. Waqqas is said to have made multiple journeys to China. Liu Zhi recounts how Muhammad was urged to send Waqqas one last time when he encountered an envoy from Sui emperor Yangdi scouting out the western lands. Muhammad guesses correctly that Emperor Yangdi is being remiss in his governing duties at home and obsessing over western expansion. He decides to send Waqqas to help guide Emperor Yangdi and also to look after the increasing numbers of Muslims in China. Muhammad is reported instructing Waqqas: If the Emperor of China asks you what I am doing, tell him that I am engaged in the work of transformation at the command of 18

This tradition of the emperor’s dream and the stars appears in Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage as well as the Huihui yuanlai and the Xilai zongpu. The Huihui yuanlai dates as early as 1712. Partial translations of this text can be found in Marshall Broomhall, Islam in China, a Neglected Problem; (London,: Morgan & Scott, ltd.;, 1910), 62–68. Donald Leslie states that multiple editions of the Huihui yuanlai survive which date to 1754, 1844, 1862, 1872, 1919, 1924, 1927, and 1930. See Donald Leslie, Islamic Literature in Chinese, Late Ming and Early Chʻing: Books, Authors, and Associates (Belconnen: Canberra College of Advanced Education, 1981), 55. The Xilai zongpu was completed by Ma Qirong in 1876. A translation of this text is available in the appendix of Isaac Mason’s translation of Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage. See Liu, The Arabian Prophet; a Life of Mohammed from Chinese and Arabic Sources., 265–76. For analysis of the Huihui yuanlai and Xilai zongpu, see Zvi Ben-Dor Benite, “Even Unto China’: Displacement and Chinese Muslim Myths of Origin.”,” Bulletin of the Royal Institute for Interfaith Studies 4, no. 2 (2002): 93–114.

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Heaven, promoting the correct and destroying the false, abolishing idols and images and leading to the worship of the True God; I am daily busy with the affairs of the people, denying myself in every way for the general good. If he should ask you about the duties of an emperor tell him to act in accordance with the will of Heaven and to follow the examples of the prophets and pay due respect to worthies; be as a parent to the people, exercise wide benevolence, and let laws be correct and forbearing; but let the wicked be sought out and admonished; there should be daily self-examination, and also investigation into the misfortunes of the people; there should be no covetousness or oppression, power and position should be lightly regarded in comparison to the importance of the welfare of the empire; let all selfishness be set aside, and follow that which is virtuous and good. 19

This lengthy oration on the proper duties of a ruler casts the Prophet in an ideal light epitomizing how rulers should behave. Muhammad shares this wisdom with Emperor Yangdi through Waqqas, who acts as an intermediary conveying the lesson on how to rule. In this episode, the transmission between Chang'an and Medina is prompted by Muhammad, who sees that the Chinese ruler is in need of support to better govern his kingdom, and that Muslims in China are in need of additional guidance. In the previous episode involving Tang emperor Taizong’s dream, it is the Chinese emperor who initiates the contact with Muhammad, forewarned by various signs that his kingdom is in need of help from the west. Underlying both these narratives, however, is the interest in presenting Muslim origins as something sanctioned by two imperial heads, who legitimate the exchange as something much needed for the welfare of the Chinese state. Liu, The Arabian Prophet; a Life of Mohammed from Chinese and Arabic Sources., 246–47. This episode involving Muhammad sending an envoy to China after encountering a scout from a land-lusting Emperor Yangdi is also mentioned in Xu Lan, “Tianfang Zhengxue,” 376–82. See also mention of this in Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 243–52. 19

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Building upon these narrative traditions, Li’s presentation of Waqqas emphasizes the many assets he brings to the emperor. Waqqas’ biography initiates a long line of Hui service to the Chinese state. As the first and longest entry in Words and Deeds, his life story is easily the focal point. Unlike the other biographies that follow, which are limited to the lifetimes of the individuals in question, Waqqas' biography extends from his life all the way to Li's Qing dynasty. This emphasizes Waqqas’ special position as founder of the lineage and representative of all the Hui. For Li, Waqqas’ life is an occasion to encapsulate all of Hui history, beginning with its Chinese origins in the Sui dynasty. Li begins by describing Waqqas as an official serving as messenger from Arabia, highly skilled in both civil and military affairs with a special finesse for calendric calculations. Waqqas hails from a country, Arabia, which is presented in the most ideal light. Li notes: One name for Arabia is the "western lands," 20 another name for it is the country of Persia, 21 and yet another name for it is the "heavenly house." 22 There is pleasant scenery and a mild, temperate climate. The people there have upright customs. From the officials to the lowly masses, all worship God and they take it as the religion of the realm. If you examine those books that are profound and authentic, you will find that the laws of the country prohibit alcohol, dogs and pigs. Their customs place great emphasis on the method of slaughter, and they do not eat things that have been slaughtered by others. The people and their customs are genial, and there are no impoverished households. The officials impose neither taxes nor corvée labor, and they also do not deal out punishments. All honor the religious regulations and naturally manage them-

20 Xi

yu 西域 Da shi 大食 Originally meant to designate the Sasanian Persian-speaking empire. Since the Tang dynasty it is used in reference to the Islamic lands. 22 Tian fang 天房 21

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selves. They do not steal or engage in other inappropriate conduct. 23

Li idealizes Arabia, emphasizing just how upright the people are. He refers to Islamic law forbidding intoxication and labeling dogs and pigs as unclean. He also touches upon Muslim halal practices and the importance of ritually slaughtered meat. For Li, the inhabitants of Arabia all follow these practices. In fact, the people there are so pious and law-abiding, the government doesn't need to impose taxes or corvée labor since "all honor the religious regulations and naturally manage themselves." There is neither law enforcement nor poverty since the place is so harmonious and prosperous. Arabia emerges as a land China could only aspire to emulate in terms of how upright its people and officials are. Furthermore, Arabia possesses crucial knowledge of calendric calculations that China lacks. The first appearance of Muslims at the Chinese court is presented in Waqqas' biography as arising from a need to correct the Chinese calendar, which had become muddled in the chaos of the North-South era [420–589 CE]. The founding emperor of the Sui dynasty, Wendi [r. 581–600 CE], decides to dispatch a messenger to the west upon hearing that Arabia possess an extraordinary person who "writes scriptures containing everything” and is furthermore “skilled in calendric calculations.” This extraordinary person refers to Muhammad. In the following paragraph of Waqqas' biography, Li writes: In the Dingwei year, that is the seventh year of the Kaihuang era [of Emperor Wendi, 587 CE], the sage of the nation Muhammad commanded his official Sayyid Waqqas and others to follow the emissary and pay tribute to the Chinese emperor. They brought with them thirty volumes of heavenly scripture for presentation to the emperor. They reached Guangzhou via the southern seas. The first thing they did was to build the

23 Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 244.

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD Huaisheng Si [“Prophet Remembrance Mosque”] in Guangdong. 24 They reached Chang'an where they reported to the emperor. The emperor read the scriptures and liked them immensely. He allowed them to build mosques in China and transmit the teaching. He also allowed them to stay and reside in the eastern lands [dong tu 東土］and to revise the calendar. It was completed in the Yiwei year of the Kaihuang era [599 CE]. And that is how China came to have the Huihui calendar system. 25

The association of the Hui with the imperial calendar is taken up again later in Wang Daiyu's biography, whose ancestors are described as coming from Arabia to the court in Nanjing during the founding of the Ming dynasty in the fourteenth century. With the emperor, they established the intricacies of the astronomical calendar. They corrected the errors in the calendric system, surpassing the knowledge of the ancients with extreme subtlety and not a single error. The great emperor was delighted. He concluded that they must have legitimate transmission of orthodox teachings in order to arrive at such accurate calculations. Therefore he endowed them with the position of Directorate of Astronomy. They were granted residency in the capital and were exempt from corvée labor. 26

This is a theme throughout Words and Deeds in which Waqqas’ imperial service repeats again and again in subsequent generations of Hui, a topic I explore further in section three of this chapter. Waqqas’ biography is an occasion for Li to project the themes of Hui history he wishes to highlight back onto an individual who lived during the Prophet’s lifetime. Waqqas legitimates Hui history in China precisely through his proximity to Muhammad. As Li puts it, it is Muhammad who first commanded that Waqqas pay tribute to the Li notes that this episode is recorded in Shu yu zhi [殊域志] treatise of the Sui Shu. 25 Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 244–45. 26 Ibid., 400–401. 24

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Chinese emperor, sending him off with Islamic knowledge in the scriptures and calendar. Furthermore, Waqqas receives affirmation from Muhammad’s contemporary in China—the founding Sui emperor Wendi—who “read the scriptures and liked them immensely,” leading to the bestowal of Muslim residences and mosques in China. In this way, Waqqas’ story enables Hui to trace their origin back to two sovereigns in Medina and Chang’an. The Chinese emperor’s good impression of the Hui beginning with Waqqas and corresponding bestowal of imperial favor is a theme that repeats throughout the collection. Li ends Waqqas’ biography with an overview of ancient mosques in China and the dynasty that bestowed them. His chronicling forefronts a long tradition of imperial legitimation of Islam from the Sui dynasty to his present Qing. Li begins with the Huaisheng Si [Prophet Remembrance Mosque], which he calls “the origin of Hui mosque construction in the east.” This mosque was supposedly built by Waqqas upon his first arrival in China via the southern seas. 27 The next oldest Islamic structures in China, the Tang mosques in Chang’an, are also linked to Waqqas—this time through the men who accompanied him to China. Li writes that during Waqqas’ last journey to China, Muhammad selected teachers to spread Islamic doctrine in China and dispatched them with Waqqas. In the following Tang dynasty, these Muslim teachers were summoned by Emperor Taizong to respond to hundreds of questions about Islam. The emperor was impressed by their responses and exclaims, “This only has minor differences with the Confucian (ru) path and is largely similar. The two paths of the Hui and Han can be undertaken simultaneously without any risk.” 28 Thereupon he issues an edict for the construction of mosques in Chang’an. Here the emperor's approval of teachings transmitted by Waqqas’ companions corresponds with mosques appearing in Chang’an. 27 Ibid., 250–51. Here he cites the Ming dynasty text Shu

周咨录] as his source. 28 Ibid.

yu zhou zi lu [殊域

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Li continues with the Tangming Si, which he dates to the first year of the Tianbao reign of Emperor Xuanzong [742 CE]. This emperor is purported to have “taken the dao of the sage from the western regions to be the same as that of China.” 29 Therefore, he commanded his supervisor of the Ministry of Works to oversee the construction of this mosque in Chang’an. In the following section, I analyze another biography in Li’s collection of the Tang dynasty holyman Tao Baba, who assumes Waqqas’ role in expounding the virtues of Islam to the emperor, leading to the imperial construction of this mosque. Li continues Waqqas’ biography with further mosques constructed and renovated in the Song, Yuan, and Ming dynasties along with their corresponding imperial patrons. He interweaves quotes from various Chinese rulers praising the Hui religion. The last emperor to be mentioned is the Ming dynasty Wanli Emperor, Shen Zong [r. 1572–1620 CE]. Linking all these developments with the current Qing dynasty, Li writes in conclusion to this section and Waqqas’ biography as a whole, “Now we reach this current dynasty, whose benevolence is deep and profound, whose grace tumbles forward like a wagon wheel, mosques proliferating all over.” 30 Through Waqqas’ biography, Li outlines the history of imperial favor towards the Hui. This imperial favor is made tangible by permission to construct mosques throughout the empire. Waqqas initiates this relationship with the court by being the first westerner with Arabian affiliation to cement ties with the emperor. The tradition is then continued by others of western origin who come to China in later dynasties and whose descendants also serve the empire.

III. SERVANTS OF THE STATE After Waqqas, Li goes on to narrate the long line of contributions made by Hui throughout subsequent dynasties. Waqqas is the only figure from the Sui dynasty, followed by twenty-two from the Tang dynasty, eleven from the Song, eleven from the Yuan, twenty-eight 29 Ibid. 30 Ibid.

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from the Ming, and twenty-two from the Qing. 31 Promotion of the Hui and their Islamic teachings is accomplished through documenting individuals who provided exceptional state service and received imperial affirmation. Ironically, in the 1860’s and 1870’s when Li was composing Words and Deeds, the Hui were not enjoying any imperial favor or affirmation. Instead, they occupied a very precarious position within the empire. The Tongzhi era witnessed widescale violence involving Hui in Shaanxi and Gansu provinces, many of whom were taking up arms against each other, neighboring Han Chinese, and the state. Displaced Hui refugees were fleeing to Xinjiang and neighboring Central Asia. Just a year before the completion of Li’s text in 1874, Qing forces put an end to the Islamic sultanate in Yunnan and executed its leader Du Wenxiu. Hui throughout Yunnan province were being systematically massacred—a topic I take up in chapter five. There is a remarkable silence in Li’s text about these events. Certainly none of the Hui involved with the rebellions are mentioned in Words and Deeds. Rather Li’s focus is backwards, as if the present is too volatile to speak of. Against this backdrop of Hui violence and upheaval, the lives of the following three individuals appear in sharp contrast. The Qing dynasty war hero Sha Chunyuan, the Ming dynasty martyr Tie Xuan, and the Tang dynasty holyman Tao Baba bear no resemblance to the dangerous upstarts brewing rebellion in contemporary Yunnan, Shaanxi, and Gansu. Rather, like other Hui chosen for Words and Deeds, they are subjects loyal to the state whose virtues are endlessly affirmed by the imperial center.

31

It is remarkable that the Hui eunuch Zheng He, who served Emperor Yongle, is absent from Li’s collection. Based on my examination of the twenty-eight Ming dynasty figures, Zheng He is not among them. It is possible Li chose to omit him or more likely was unaware of Zheng He. Either way, Zheng He’s absence suggests that his contemporary fame as an iconic Hui figure in Chinese history did not come about until the twentieth century, long after Li’s death.

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Among the most dramatic life stories in Li Huanyi's collection are that of the two martyrs Sha Chunyuan and Tie Xuan. Both heroes were natives of Henan, the same province that Li hailed from. 32 Li himself had met Chunyuan in the years before his epic death in the second opium war. Li describes Chunyuan as having a “dignified and grave appearance” as well as a “lively manner of conversation.” The author notes, “I recognized that he was an extraordinary person, and I felt reverence towards him.” 33 Li introduces Chunyuan as someone who succeeded in the imperial exam system, eventually earning a military jinshi. After moving through various posts as junior guardsman and brigade officer, Chunyuan commanded Emperor Xianfeng’s army against the 1852 Taiping rebellion in Anhui province. Li credits him with effectively blocking the Taiping expansion northwards into Henan province. Li notes of Chunyuan’s performance on the battlefield, “he always placed himself in front of the foot soldiers. Because of this, he won all his battles. The number of traitors he wiped out completely was beyond count.” 34 Eventually Chunyuan is promoted to Brigade Commander and in 1858 acted as the regional Vice Commander for the Tianjin brigade. He was responsible for protecting the port against the AngloFrench invasion of the second opium war. Li chronicles the valiant end to Chunyuan’s life in the midst of canon fire between the British and Chinese. After mounting the canon deck and shattering two foreign ships with his “calm and collected” aim, Chunyuan was close to weakening the enemy. Yet his fellow Chinese soldiers were fleeing their positions, urging him to leave as well. Chunyuan rebukes them saying, “If you give up land, the army is lost. I can only repay my 32

The collection, however, is not limited to Henan. The Ming and Qing sections also include figures from the northwestern provinces of Shaanxi, Gansu, and Ningxia, as well as the southern provinces of Jiangnan and Yunnan. 33 Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 451–52. 34 Ibid.

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country with death. This is the spot where I will die.” 35 Chunyuan refuses to desert his position, remaining on the canon deck. Eventually, he is hit by canon-fire and thus dies on the battlefield, fulfilling his wish to repay his country. Li notes that martyrdom for the state was a life-long ambition of Chunyuan’s. Even though Chunyuan didn’t usually engage in reading, he enjoyed the company of learned and cultivated officials. He often requested others to expound on and discuss the official histories. He would listen quietly to them. Whenever he heard of an especially loyal or outstanding official, he would wish earnestly in his heart to be like them. When the port fell, the old men of his town said to each other: “Alas, Chunyuan must have died with the port.” And in fact, that is what happened. Likely they understood his longstanding ambition to die in battle. 36

As in the biographies of other Hui from Li’s collection, Chunyuan's virtuous conduct is recognized by others upon death. When the emperor hears of Chunyuan's death, he is granted imperial burial rites. His corpse is returned to his ancestral home and re-interred in the cemetery for war heroes. 37 He also earns a place in the temple for those who exhibit the utmost loyalty. Chunyuan’s descendants are awarded the hereditary title “Commandant of Fleet-as-clouds Calvary.” In concluding the biography, Li shares a eulogy he composed in praise of Chunyuan’s martyrdom. When I heard that Chunyuan had died in Tianjin sacrificing himself for the country, I was simultaneously pleased and full of grief. I grieved that he lost his life before the enemy was entirely extinguished. I was pleased that while his physical body had been killed, he was able to sacrifice himself for a just cause… Alas! In order for a great man to repay the great benevolence of 35 Ibid.

36 Ibid. 37

No mention is made in Li’s biography of any tension between this method of burial and Islamic rites.

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD his ruler, he must die on the battlefield. This is a worthy death. Let this poem serve as a eulogy for Master Sha: Even today when passing the Tianjin shore I mount the platform of combat And gaze outwards, recalling the brave warrior. Who could not refrain from admiring Those who step forward in moments of great crisis While dead, he is as if alive. 38

Sha Chunyuan and the following Ming dynasty figure Tie Xuan epitomize for Li the apex of loyalty to the Chinese sovereign. Both men are lauded for their successful careers in the imperial military, culminating in epic deaths displaying their valiant devotion. Rather than Hui rebels or challengers to the empire, these men expended their lives aiding Chinese rule. Chunyuan gave up his life battling the British and French, while Tie Xuan defends Emperor Jianwen against Zhu Di. Tie Xuan Tie Xuan’s biography is one of the most grotesque in the collection. His cannibalism of his own body parts attests to this hero’s undying loyalty. Xuan died in the aftermath of the Ming civil war [1402 CE], during which he sided with the reigning Emperor Jianwen against Zhu Di, the Prince of Yan and future Yongle Emperor. Li's biography of Tie Xuan presents an upright and steadfast government servant whose devotion to his emperor extended into the last moments of his life. After graduating from the Imperial Academy, Xuan served as Administration Vice Commissioner of Shandong. Li notes that “he inspected the water transportation of grain and not once did anything go missing.” 39 Xuan's integrity as a government servant is further complemented by his loyalty to Emperor Jianwen, sustained even in the face of crisis. After Jianwen's imperial troops lost to the 38 Ibid.

39 Ibid., 372–74.

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Prince of Yan and fled south, Xuan continued to recruit soldiers for the emperor’s cause, urging them to swear vows and pledge their lives. Li describes one incident during the second year of the civil war when Xuan worked with the Commissioner in Chief of Jinan, Sheng Yong, to successfully protect the city from Zhu Di's invading forces. After an initial plan to feign surrender and ambush Zhu Di failed due to the fumbling of his men, Xuan came up with an even better scheme. He engraved the name of Ming dynasty founding emperor Taizong on a stele and suspended it from atop the city. Upon seeing this, the commanding generals of Zhu Di’s army dared not attack. Xuan then ordered the Commissioner in Chief to send his troops undercover in the darkness of night and attack Zhu Di. The Prince of Yan lost in a “great defeat” and Emperor Jianwen took back Dezhou. Xuan was credited with the success of this campaign and promoted to various posts within Shandong. Despite Xuan’s clever efforts on the battlefield, Emperor Jianwen eventually lost the civil war. Xuan, however, remained loyal to him. Even when the emperor was deposed and Zhu Di became established as the new Yongle emperor, Xuan kept his remaining troops stationed in Huainan with plans to march to Jianwen’s rescue. Xuan was eventually captured and brought before the Yongle emperor in a climactic end to his life. Li recounts how even Xuan’s dying process testified to this man’s unwavering loyalty. Xuan sat with his back turned to the throne. The emperor commanded that they cut off his nose and ears. Yet he did not turn around. They cut off his flesh and made him eat it. When asked if it was sweet or not, he replied in a stern voice, “How could the flesh of a loyal official and righteous man be anything but sweet.” It was commanded that they ladle oil into a big cauldron and throw his corpse inside to cook. They adjusted his corpse to face north [towards the Yongle emperor]. Yet it tossed around and faced outwards. Then it was commanded that the eunuchs use iron rods to rotate the corpse to face north. Chengzu [temple name of the Yongle emperor] laughed and said, “Now you have to pay homage to me.” Before his words were finished, the oil in

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CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD the cauldron boiled over. This scorched the hands of the eunuchs, who had to drop their rods and flee. The bones still faced outwards. The emperor was greatly astonished. He ordered that the corpse be buried. At that time, Xuan was thirty-seven years old. 40

In this last episode of Xuan's life, his loyalty to Jianwen extends even to the bodily mutilation and self-cannibalism to which he is subjugated. Xuan bravely endures these ordeals, valiantly proclaiming, “How could the flesh of a loyal official and righteous man be anything but sweet.” This remark expresses that Xuan is unfazed by the torture. It also suggests certain qualities about his body. Not only is the flesh of Xuan’s body “sweet” to the taste due to his lifelong loyalty and righteousness, the bones of his body also proclaim his character. After death his corpse staunchly refuses to pay respect to the Yongle emperor by facing him. The eunuchs adjust it to face north, but it refuses, even after the use of iron rods. The Yongle emperor’s boastful comment that “Now you have to pay homage to me” is interrupted by the miraculous boiling over of the cauldron’s water, which scalds the hands of the eunuchs. The operation to reorient the corpse towards the new emperor is abandoned and the bones are left to face outwards. Xuan’s biography ends with an astonished Yongle who at last recognizes the power of Xuan’s character. Yongle gives up on his operation to force Xuan to pay homage to him. In an action indicating his newfound fear and respect, he orders that Xuan’s corpse be buried. The fact that even Emperor Jianwen’s usurper to the throne comes to begrudgingly recognize Xuan’s virtue is the crowning achievement in Li’s biography of this remarkable Ming official. Li celebrates Tie Xuan’s loyalty to the emperor. Words and Deeds is not a history critical of the Chinese state or the decisions and weaknesses of its leaders. Emperor Jianwen is not passed over in favor of the victorious Zhu Di. No mention is made in Sha Chunyuan’s biography of the various blunders on the part of the Qing court that 40 Ibid.

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led to the second opium war. The heroes in Li’s collection pledge themselves to a single ruler and state, never wavering in their devotion—down to their bones. Tao Baba Apart from the biographies of civil and military officials, Li’s biographies of holymen also exhibit a focus on the Chinese state. Li notes at the beginning of Tao Baba’s biography that “baba” is what those of the Hui religion call elderly people. Tao Baba was “originally a person of the west” who journeyed to Chang’an during the Tang dynasty. He was learned, having “mastered the classics and calendar systems of all the various nations of Arabia.” Li writes that Emperor Xuanzong heard of Tao Baba and summoned him to court. After hearing him discuss the Hui scriptures, the emperor decides that even though people here in the east have generally not heard of them before, they contain valuable teachings about “ethics, diet, and customs of daily life.” He thereupon issues an edict for the construction of Tangming Si [唐明寺] in Chang’an, and allows the Hui to spread their western teachings widely. 41 While it is almost certain that Li is basing this anecdote on apocryphal traditions circulating among Qing dynasty Hui, it cannot be denied that Tao Baba fits very much in the mold of Waqqas. Like Waqqas he comes from the west and arrives at the Chinese court in Chang’an. He imparts Islamic knowledge on the emperor and earns imperial recognition for Islam, enabling the construction of Islamic buildings and the proliferation of the teachings, just as Waqqas had done in Li’s account one dynasty earlier during the Sui. Yet quite differently from Waqqas, Tao Baba is characterized in the tradition of the Chinese immortal (xian). His white hair, ruddy complexion, and child-like face match the standard appearance of 41

Ibid., 266–67. Tangming Si is another name for Da Xuexi Xiang Qingzhen Si [大學習巷清真寺] in Xi’an. This name comes from the lane on which the mosque is located, Da Xuexi Xiang, the very lane that Tao Baba is noted in Li’s biography for having dwelled in. The mosque currently contains a plaque claiming it dates to the eighth century.

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Daoist masters of the internal arts, who sit in mountains cultivating immortality. Li notes that Tao Baba’s life was full of strange occurrences. “Once when he was crossing the water, his boat overturned. Tao was the only one to stand on top of the water and his clothes were still dry. Whenever he walked in the mountains, tigers and wolves would all become tame and obedient to him.” 42 While other characters in Li’s collection like Sha Chunyuan and Tie Xuan are known for their martyrdom, Tao Baba eludes death. Li notes that the details of his death are unknown. 43 The famous Tang calligrapher and imperial officer Yan Zhenqing [709–784 CE] makes an appearance in the biography as Tao Baba's friend, praising his skills. Yan reveals how he learned the arts of immortality from Tao Baba. He is quoted saying, “In the past, I encountered an ascetic of the path [daoshi 道士] in Jiangnan named Tao Baba. He gave me the jade cloud medicine spoon pellet, which can prevent death. Up until today, my health has not waned.” 44 Li then describes various miracles Tao Baba performed in front of Yan Zhenqing, such as predicting correctly where they would meet each other again. Upon seeing Yan in the afore-mentioned location, Tao Baba pointed his finger towards a nearby mountain and vanished. In an anecdote at the end of Tao Baba’s biography, Li illustrates just how effectively Tao Baba’s lessons in immortality served Yan. Tao Baba predicts that after the age of seventy, Yan would encounter “a great calamity” in Luofu. This comes to pass, and Yan is buried on the northern mountain of Yanshi. Afterwards, a curious incident occurred: There was a merchant who journeyed to the Southern Sea [nan hai 南海]. He saw an ascetic of the path playing chess. This ascetic of the path asked him to bring a letter to the Yan family home in Yanshi. When the merchant arrived there he realized it was a grave. The tomb-keeper was an old man with ashen-gray hair. He jumped in fright when he recognized the lord’s [Yan 42 Ibid. 43 Ibid.

44 Ibid.

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Zhenqing’s] handwriting in the letter. The family members decided to open up the grave at once that very day. They found that the coffin had already been emptied. 45

Yan’s empty coffin substitutes for Tao Baba’s empty coffin, as the abandoned grave is a standard way to end biographies of Chinese immortals. 46 Yet the value of this last anecdote in Tao Baba's biography is to show that he had effectively taught Yan how to elude death. In other words, Tao Baba’s legitimacy is heightened and built upon his transmission of knowledge to Yan. Li cites that this last anecdote about Yan Zhenqing’s abandoned tomb comes from the Qing dynasty text Guangyu Ji. 47 Li utilizes a circulating story about Yan to endorse Tao Baba. Throughout Words and Deeds, Li co-opts well-known figures in Chinese history—Emperor Xuanzong and Yan Zhenqing in this case—and places them in the biographies of lesser-known Hui. While Tao Baba differs from Sha Chunyuan and Tie Xuan in that he lacks direct employment by the state, his biography is built upon interactions with and legitimation by Emperor Xuanzong and Yan Zhenqing.

CONCLUSION The prevailing theme throughout Words and Deeds is that Hui have consistently been valuable to the state and to the Chinese ruling elite. I suggest that this message was particularly pertinent during the late Qing dynasty, which witnessed revolts in the southwest and northwest frontiers, and a proliferation of imperial writing about treacherous Hui. It is precisely during this volatile time that Li unearthed and narrated this tradition of Hui loyalty. Written amidst ethnic and religious upheaval in the empire, Words and Deeds presents an idealized and meticulously crafted past 45 Ibid.

For more on tropes involving the xian see Campany, Making Transcendents 47 The Kangxi era text, Zengding guangyu ji [增订广舆记] by Cai Fangbing [蔡方炳], also known as Jiuxia [九霞], who lived from 1626–1709. This appears to be a geographic text of Chinese areas. 46

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for the Hui. Here it is not religious devotion that defines the Hui as a people. Nor does author Li Huanyi focus on local or sectarian identity. To be Hui for Li is to be a loyal subject of the Chinese state. His attention to the lives of Hui heroes throughout the dynasties and the planting of Saʿd b. Abi Waqqas at the head of the collection claims a certain past for his people, and the hope for a more stable future. Texts such as Words and Deeds are absolutely essential to a more comprehensive understanding of not only Islamic history in China, but also Chinese history as a whole. Scholarly discourse on the late Qing dynasty has been dominated by excessive focus on violence and aggression among the Hui. This is reflected in the writing of imperial authorities for whom the Hui do not appear unless they are becoming problematic for the state. Yet Hui themselves were engaged in the act of writing. Those who suffered as a result of state violence and those who were not involved at all were attentive to their status with regard to empire. In many ways, Li’s history can be seen as a mirror image of state accounts written during this period. Hui appear in Li’s text only when they are benefitting the state. The absence of violence in his account reflects back to us the predominance of violence in other accounts. Reading all of these histories together is essential for a richer understanding of China. Words and Deeds consolidates the past and defines a history for the Hui to safeguard their future. Stories about the entry of Saʿd b. Abi Waqqas matter because they point to a special relationship with the state. For Li, the Hui are not haphazard subjects of the empire, trickling into China driven by the tides of commerce and personal pursuits. Rather, they are the result of a deliberate partnership between Muhammad’s empire in Arabia and the Chinese empire. They are vital for the governance of China and invaluable contributors to its past and to its future.

CHAPTER 5. CONTINUITY Genealogy is one of the most universal modes of chronicling the past. Lineage texts abound in both Chinese and Islamic societies. The genre of tracing descent is highly malleable, adapting to new settings and brought forth under different circumstances. As elsewhere in human society, lineage was of particular import to Chinese Muslims. Multiple texts survive today from the Ming era onwards, showing that Muslims throughout the empire were engaged with documenting descent. 1 One such text was produced by the Ma family in Yunnan province. The Ma’s claim descent from the Yuan dynasty Bukharan, Sayyid Ajall Shams al-Din [Sai dian chi shan si ding 赛典赤赡思丁], who himself claimed descent from the Prophet Muhammad. 2 This lineage covers an immense expanse of time and space, from the Prophet Muhammad in Arabia, to Sayyid Ajall in Bukhara, to the current family in China. Perhaps the most fascinating and frustrating thing about a lineage like The Ma Family Genealogy is that it is an open text. Open in the sense that it is never complete—always acquiring new clan mem1

At least ten such genealogies can be found here. See Jianwei Wu and Jinhai Zhang, eds., Huizu diancang quanshu zongmu tiyao (Yinchuan Shi: Ningxia renmin chubanshe, 2010). Summaries are provided of each family lineage and reference to which volume in the collection they can be found. 2 For more on the figure of Sayyid Ajall, see George Lane, “Sayyed Ajall,” Encyclopaedia Iranica, June 29, 2011, http://www.iranicaonline.org/ articles/sayyed-ajall.

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bers and necessitating updates as the family grows. And open in the sense that it bears the imprint of many hands as the genealogy has been rewritten by multiple authors through the centuries. Genealogies are slippery in this way. This chapter approaches The Ma Family Genealogy from the perspective of its early twentieth century editor Ma Yunhua. Yunhua lived an extraordinary life, having survived the Yunnan massacres as a child. His adult life witnessed the demise of China’s last dynasty and the establishment of a new Republican era. Revising the family genealogy as an old man, Yunhua reflects upon his life. The genealogy serves as a map from which he orients the past and future. Section one explores the socio-historical context of the late nineteenth century during which Yunhua comes to possess his family lineage. I argue that interest in genealogical writing, as seen in the case of the Ma family, is never consistent. Genealogies tend to surface after major disruptions to social order. For Muslims in Yunnan, the late nineteenth and early twentieth century was one such time. The Ma Family Genealogy tells the reassuring story of the family’s past greatness and continuity of descent at precisely a time when that great heritage was most questionable. Section two examines in detail the careful construction Yunhua did around the family lineage. I argue that the massive amount of excerpted material addended to the beginning and end of the family lineage are crucial to understanding the family lineage itself. All are part of the Genealogy’s exercise in orienting time. Genealogies are not self-contained systems but powerful building blocks from which to craft history. As such they need to be read with care for their polemical worldview.

I. IN NEED OF GENEALOGY Certain moments in history prompt a greater need for genealogical writing, particularly experiences of rupture, loss, and diaspora. In their study of genealogical discourse across Muslim societies, Sarah Bowen and Helena de Felipe have noted that “genealogies are often used to create a picture of continuity precisely in times of change,

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when a group’s heritage is scattered across geography and its need to feel rooted in place and time is, as a result, most acute.” 3 Lian Ruizhi shows how in Yunnan province during the Yuan-Ming transition, the Bai utilized lineage writing to differentiate themselves from other groups and secure a higher status under the new regime. It is precisely in these times of instability alternatively brought on by state building and state collapse that textual articulation of genealogies in line with the new social order are most crucial. 4 The late nineteenth century in Yunnan was one such time for Muslims. Located on the southwestern periphery of the Chinese empire bordering modern-day Burma, Laos, and Vietnam, Yunnan province was considered one of the least desirable places to be posted as an official. This “malarial region” was a common destination for convicted criminals, exiles, and other unfortunate individuals sentenced to forced labor by the Qing court. It was also home to a rich diversity of ethnic groups long perceived as barbarian by Han and Manchu ruling elites to the north. From 1856 to 1873, the Muslim leader Du Wenxiu established an independent Islamic state in Yunnan known as the “Panthay Sultanate” [Ping nan guo]. Historian of China David Atwill notes that very little is known about the actual operations of Du Wenxiu’s state for the eighteen years during which he was in power. Yet based on a few European traveler accounts, Atwill surmises that those living under Du’s military regime enjoyed relatively stable and fair rule. 5 If that was the case, than the Panthay Sultanate was an oasis surrounded by gruesome violence for Muslims in the years leading up to its formation and immediately after its dissolution. Sarah Bowen Savant and Helena de Felipe, eds., Genealogy and Knowledge in Muslim Societies: Understanding the Past, Exploring Muslim Contexts (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press in association with the Aga Khan University Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilisations, 2014), 2. 4 Ruizhi Lian, “Surviving Conquest in Dali,” in Chieftains into Ancestors: Imperial Expansion and Indigenous Society in Southwest China, ed. David Faure and Ts ’ui-p’ing Ho, Contemporary Chinese Studies (Vancouver ; Toronto: UBC Press, 2013), 87. 5 Atwill, The Chinese Sultanate, 139–48. 3

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The early nineteenth century witnessed increasing anti-Hui violence in Yunnan perpetuated by certain Han groups in the years leading up to the Panthay Sultanate. Government officials failed to respond to the situation or compensate survivors, and things escalated until the Kunming massacre of 1856, in which a prerogative to “kill them one and all” resulted in bloodshed that lasted an estimated three days and three nights. The estimated death toll was at least four thousand Muslims, though several witnesses would contend that the numbers were two or three times greater. 6 Atwill argues that it was not so much the religion of “Islam” that was a rallying cry for Du Wenxiu’s anti-Qing rebellion but the mutually felt grievances experienced by the Hui and other ethnic groups that brought people together across regional and ethnic differences. He writes, “The source of the Panthay Rebellion lies less with the rebellious actions of the Hui, and more with the fact that killing all Hui had come to be perceived as acceptable behavior and thus beyond questioning.” 7 Wide-scale violence and population loss also followed the final dissolution of Du Wenxiu’s state in 1873 when Qing forces penetrated Dali, the last stronghold and former headquarters of the sultanate. Du swallowed poison and surrendered himself to the Qing, stating hopes that some of his population would be spared by his actions. This was not the case. Imperial forces lured seventeen of Du’s top generals into a seemingly conciliatory banquet and promptly beheaded them. Then the massacre of Dali began, lasting three days. The newly appointed governor Cen Yuying estimated that ten thousand were slaughtered, four thousand of which were women, children, and the elderly. Hundreds who survived the initial massacre of the city drowned while trying to escape across Erhai. Jackie Armijo provides an alternate account of the deaths at Erhai, noting that they died not from the water but at the hands of Qing officials. “After the city had finally fallen, the Qing officials announced they would spare the lives of those who had survived the first wave of massacres (mostly women and children) if they agreed 6 Ibid., 3.

7 Ibid., 115.

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to come out of hiding and vacate the city. Believing the officials, the Hui women and children left their hiding places and surrendered. They were then ordered to march north of the city, and by the side of a river they were murdered and their dead or dying bodies thrown in.” 8 Later the site of these killings [along Erhai] came to be known as “The Pile of Ten-thousands” and Armijo points to ceremonies still held there today to commemorate the dead. 9 News of the Dali massacre reached neighboring Menghua, where French traveler Émile Rocher recorded that all the Hui swallowed poison and committed mass suicide rather than grant their enemies the satisfaction of killing them. “They assembled all the precious objects [of the city] into one group of houses and lit them on fire. When the flames were almost out, poison was distributed to the women, children and elderly, and when the men who had been manning the defenses against the imperial forces were all but alone, they lit the city on fire and only then opened the city gates to their assailants.” 10 Atwill estimates that before the rebellion began, one million Hui lived in Yunnan province but by 1874, only a small fraction remained. He notes that even today, “Yunnan’s Hui population still has not recovered to its pre-rebellion level.” 11 It was against this backdrop of wide-scale community loss and trauma following the Yunnan massacres that the Ma Family Genealogy re-emerged in the late nineteenth century. This is a text that connects the Ma family in Yunnan with the Yuan dynasty Bukharan and descendant of Muhammad, Sayyid Ajall. The lineage of Sayyid Ajall has long been in circulation among Chinese Muslims. The oldest known text, containing Chinese, Persian, and Arabic, dates to the Yuan dynasty. 12 Multiple versions of the genealogy exist among Hui 8

Jacqueline Armijo, “Narratives Engendering Survival: How the Muslims of Southwest China Remember the Massacres of 1873,” Traces-Multilingual Journal of Cutlural Theory and Translation 2 (2001): 302. 9 Ibid., 312. 10 Atwill, The Chinese Sultanate, 187. 11 Ibid. 12 This version is held in the Shandong Provincial Museum, and I have not been able to consult the manuscript myself. See Jufeng Na, “Sai Dianchi

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across China, who claim to be a branch of this family. 13 This study focuses on one particular edition produced in Yunnan province by Ma Yunhua [馬雲華, b. 1859–c. 1940]. Manuscript reproductions of the text call it the “Genealogy of Sayyid Ajall” [Sai dianchi jiapu 赛 典赤家谱] while a print version refers to the same text as the “Ma Family Genealogy” [Ma shi jiasheng 馬氏家乘]. 14 Because my interest is in editor Ma Yunhua’s worldview and not so much the figure of Sayyid Ajall, I refer to this text as the Ma Family Genealogy. Ma Yunhua was fourteen years old at the time of the massacres and a native of Menghua. In an autobiographical postscript appended to the genealogy, Yunhua describes how the Dali massacre— referred to here as “Rocking of the Waves of Lake Er”—led to his eventual relocation to Yongsheng county, where he built a mosque and discovered this genealogy.

Jiazu Yuandai Jiapu Chukao,” Mingzu Yan Jiu 1 (2012): 71–80. See also Baoquan Ma, “Shandong Bowuguan Zhang Sai Dianchi Shan Siding Houyi Zupu Waiwen Bufen Chengshu Niandai Kao,” Shijie Zongjiao Wenhua 2 (2014): 98–103. 13 For a listing and comparison of some of these different versions, see Qingsheng Li, “Suo Fei’er Ru Song Yu Sai Dianchi Gui Yuan Kaolüe,” in Shoujie Saidianchi Yanjiu Guoji Huiyi Lunwen Ji, ed. Fayang Gao (Kunming: Yunnan daxue chubanshe, 2004), 202–15. See also Na, “Sai Dianchi Jiazu Yuandai Jiapu Chukao,” 76. Na compares three different versions of the family genealogy in Yunnan, including Ma Yunhua’s version. Na quotes the famous scholar Bai Shouyi saying that he himself has seen twelve to thirteen different versions of the genealogy and adds that even more have been discovered in the last thirty years. 14 For the print version, see Yunhua Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” in Dali Congshu Yi Zupu Pian, ed. Shiyu Yang (Kunming: Yunnan minzu chuban she, 2009), 66–142. For the manuscript reproductions, see Yunhua Ma, “Sai Dianchi Jiapu,” in Huizu Diancang Quanshu, ed. Haiying Wu, vol. 94 (Lanzhou: Gansu wenhua chubanshe, 2008), 11–344. I have consulted both the manuscript and print versions. Whenever possible, citations are given from the print version. Manuscript references are given when something is not found in the print version.

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The exact date of my birth is unknown, but it took place in the autumn amidst a busy time of military affairs. After the “Rocking of the Waves of Lake Er,” my family’s assets were dried up. I was still a child then when I headed to a distant land and foreign city to make a living doing manual labor. For being in those times and having not yet studied any books or scriptures, how could I possibly emerge into the world? When I grew a little older, I learned how to do commerce at the shop of my maternal uncle. I was put in charge of bookkeeping, despite having little schooling. I probably muddled sixty percent of the records. I thanked my uncle and took leave of him, deciding to make it on my own… I saw that the southern region of Yongsheng [county] was picturesque and had generations of successful people. As I approached the village, I noticed that the elderly were pure and simple of heart. So I chose to settle in the town of Na. Thereupon I gathered together my comrades [in religion] to take stock of their financial affairs for the next years and months, and if there was even the least amount of wealth amassed, to use it for the construction of a mosque since all the gentry and officials of the region permitted it. When the day came to erect the pillars of the mosque, they bestowed colorful cloths and other gift items. Our hearts overflowed with gratitude. Afterwards because the financial resources were meager, I went outside the region to ask for funds for renovation of the mosque. Unexpectedly I obtained a volume of the family annals from my clan member, the county magistrate Ma Shisheng [Ma Yulin]. Due to the ravages of time the paper was slightly damaged. Therefore I recopied it and made selected addendums. 15

Yunhua’s postscript provides insight into the socio-historical situation behind the revitalization of this genealogy. His description of life after the Yunnan massacres matches other accounts of Hui dur15

Postscript dating from 1939, a reflection of his life written when the author was eighty years old. Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” 141.

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ing this period. The allusion to the family’s impoverishment after the Rocking of the Waves of Lake Er and his own journey to a “distant land and foreign city” reflects the fact that Hui lost their homes, land, and other property after the Dali massacre, with many fleeing to Thailand and Burma. 16 The editor’s story also attests to how some were able to rebuild their communities after the brutality. Atwill notes that following the massacre of 1873, Qing officials forbade Hui from building mosques. He speculates that this lasted for at least twenty years. 17 The mosque that Yunhua helped construct in Na town, otherwise known as the Qina mosque of Yongsheng county, is recorded by one Chinese study as being erected in the first year of China’s Republican Era [1912] with support from four named individuals, the second of which is listed as Ma Yunhua. 18 Indeed by the time Yunhua built this mosque, the prohibition must have been lifted since he describes how “all the gentry and officials of the region” supported the endeavor and bestowed gifts on its opening day. The Genealogy also reflects social changes in the Ma family after the massacres. Beginning with generation fifty-one, daughters are recorded for the first time, likely due to the loss of so many sons. Another indication of a shortage of males is the increasing presence of named son-in-laws, adopted sons, and uxorilocal marriages. One daughter of a fifty-second generation lineage member is recorded to have first married someone surnamed Mi. However, following the 16 Armijo, “Narratives Engendering Survival,” 301. 17 Atwill, The

Chinese Sultanate, 187–88. Yongsheng wenli ziliao xuanji-Di liu ji, Yongsheng xian weiyuanhui wenli ziliao weiyuanhui bian (Yongsheng Xian: Zhongguo renming zhengzhi xieshang huiyi wenli zijiao weiyuan hui, 1998), 140. This source describes the current mosque as being two hundred seventy meters squared, with enough room for four hundred Muslims to congregate. Another source, a gazetteer from the twentieth century citing a census of the Yongsheng region from the 1950’s, identifies the Qina mosque as one of the Hui mosques in Yongsheng, located on Qina Jie. Here it is listed as rebuilt in 1905. “Yongsheng xian zhi,” in Yongsheng xian zhi bianzuan weiyuanhui bianzhuan (Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe, 1989), 630. My thanks to Tom Mullaney for helping me identify this mosque.

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“Rocking of the Waves of Lake Er,” she remarried someone surnamed Chen. Presumably her first husband was Hui but had died during the massacres and her second husband was Han. A fifty-third generation member is listed as living with his wife’s family and taking on her surname, while a fifty-fourth generation member’s son did the same. The son of another fifty-fourth generation member is said to have changed his surname to “Zhang” after the massacre and relocated to Nanjian county in Dali. 19 Yunhua wrote his autobiographical postscript in 1939, noting that he is eighty years old at the time of writing. In his old age, the events of the massacre during his childhood continue to factor in his mind. In the text, Yunhua’s postscript is immediately followed by a record from 1904 reflecting on the village population around Menghua following the massacre. It is recorded that prior to the reign periods of Qing emperors Daoguang and Xianfeng [1820–61], Little Weigeng Village had over two thousand households, of which those surnamed Ma were many. Greater Weigeng Village had four hundred households in which those surnamed Ma occupied threequarters of the households. However, the census points to how “nearly everyone lost sons after the Rocking of the Waves of Lake Er. The number of people today is hardly one-twentieth of that before.” 20 Read differently, Yunhua’s autobiographical account points to something universal about the relationship between people and genealogy. Genealogy is an integral part of the re-anchoring process for this man. His family lost everything and he left home, only to return years later to rebuild a community. The Qina mosque is a physical anchor, constructed from the financial support of fellow Muslims and the political approval of government officials. It serves as a physical symbol of the ability for Muslims to be visible again and to gather in public. In the process of keeping this mosque alive in strained financial times, Yunhua discovers the genealogy. Here perhaps is another kind of anchor—a document that attests to the longstanding 19 Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” 97–98. 20 Ibid., 141.

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presence of his family in the region. The genealogy tells the story of how Yunhua’s family came to be: the origins in Arabia with the Prophet Muhammad; the illustrious era of court service in the Song and Yuan dynasties; the family’s first arrival in Yunnan under the patronage of the Ming emperor; and subsequent branching throughout the province in the early Qing dynasty. Against the backdrop of early twentieth century Yunnan, a genealogy like this is precious and much needed. It legitimates, through generational narrative, the place of Muslims in Yunnan. Yunhua’s Ma Family Genealogy is about belonging and wanting to belong in a place that has so recently been hostile. Picking up this lineage text in the rubble of post-massacre Yunnan, Yunhua would have been struck by the great family past it points to. The lineage chronicles the trajectory of this family from Arabia to China and their special connection to Yunnan, where two of the great ancestors Sayyid Ajall and Hajji were personally sent by the emperor. The lineage begins in Arabia with the Prophet Muhammad as lineage founder. Initially the ancestors live in the “Lands of the Great West” [Da xi yu] and rule over Egypt [Mi si le 蜜思勒, Ar. Misr]. Later they journey east and settle in other countries, moving progressively closer to Bukhara [A si bu hua la 阿思補花喇]. 21 The narrative coalesces around an ancestor in the twenty-fifth generation who ascends the Bukharan throne. The lineage records that: “It just so happened that the king of Bukhara died at that time, and there was 21

More research is needed for the place names here. A fifteenth generation ancestor Mu Ba’ersha is said to have moved from Miṣr to San Ban’er where he was a merchant. Later because of turmoil in San Ban’er, the nineteenth generation ancestor Mu Xie moved the family to She Liu. By the time of twenty-third generation ancestor Chafa’er the genealogy records that the family had fallen out of favor with the king of She Liu and were exiled. They went to the country of Long where they served as military protector. Chafa’er’s son Zhemanai’din helped carry out the attack on neighboring Bukhara and the family was stationed at the military garrison there. Later, Chafa’er’s grandson Andu’eryi waged attacks on the neighboring countries before ascending the Bukharan throne.

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no monarch on the throne. The people urged him to ascend the throne as king, and he began to lead the affairs of the country.” The son of this Bukharan king is the first to enter China as the famous Song dynasty figure Najm al-Din Suofei’er [Suo fei’er 所非爾]. 22 Suo fei’er is mentioned in Chinese imperial records and also appears in Li Huanyi’s Words and Deeds of Islamic Exemplars. 23 The lineage describes this ancestor as “king of the country of the western regions, Bukhara.” In 1070, he leads a delegation to the Chinese capital consisting of his three sons, brother, seventy thousand troops, two hundred officials, and seven thousand camels and horses. Emperor Shenzong is reportedly delighted at his arrival and bestows upon him the position of commander-in-chief of the capital. Ten years later, another delegation from Bukhara arrives at the Chinese capital seeking Suofei’er’s return. The emperor convinces Suofei’er to stay, granting him another title, money, and lands. 24 When Suo Fei’er dies in 1093, he and his wife are granted additional titles by the court. The next four generations of his descendants continue in military service to the Song, with his grandson and great-grandson leading campaigns against the Jin. The text notes with pride, “The preceding five generations all served as officials in the Song court. In the span of one hundred sixty years, the amount of merit they accumulated is beyond expression.” 25 After the Song, Yunhua’s family continues to enjoy high status under the Yuan dynasty. The Mongols are portrayed in a favorable light. “Founding Emperor Taizu of the Yuan dynasty [Genghis Khan] came from the northern lands. He united his people and the tribes spread all over the wild spaces without a system of urban centers. His national customs were simple and honest…With only ten 22 Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” 84. 23

See Li, “Suo Fei’er Ru Song Yu Sai Dianchi Gui Yuan Kaolüe.” Suo fei’er’s biography appears in Li, “Qingzhen Xianzheng Yanxing Lüe,” 316– 17. 24 200 liang of gold, 5000 liang of silver, 1000 rolls of silk, and an increase of 500 dan in his yearly salary. Furthermore, 5300 of his guardsmen are given fertile land to cultivate in the Shandong and Shanxi region. 25 Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” 84–85.

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thousand unified troops he was able to resolve the issues of governance and punishment, and he appointed only one or two ministers from among those intimate with him.” 26 The thirty-first generation ancestor Sayyid Ajall was trusted under the Yuan to rule over its newly conquered Chinese territories. This ancestor is dispatched to Yunnan to administer Mongol rule in the region. The lineage preserves an edict from Temur Khan, conferring upon Sayyid Ajall the title “Lord of Xianyang” following his death in 1297. 27 His sons and grandsons continue to hold prominent positions under the Yuan. Under the Ming, the family continues to be sent by the court to Yunnan. The thirty-seventh generation ancestor Hajji [Ha Zhi 哈智] was dispatched to Yunnan in 1392 by the first Ming Emperor Hongwu on a military and civilizing mission. 28 In an edict included within Yunhua’s genealogy, the emperor identifies Hajji as the sixth generation descendant of the Lord of Xianyang [Sayyid Ajall], as well as a descendant of the “great sage of the Western regions” [Muhammad]. The emperor notes how Yunnan is far from the imperial center with uncultivated land and disorderly people. He entrusts Hajji with the mission of introducing the Confucian scriptures and establishing ethical human relations in the area, noting that Hajji is carrying on the duty of his ancestral patriarch, the Lord of Xianyang, who had accomplished similar feats under the Yuan. The edict confers upon Hajji several titles including “General of Military Virtue” Ibid., 86. Here the lineage quotes the Yuan shi, bai guan zhi (shang), zhi san shi wu. 27 Xian yang zhong hui wang 咸陽忠惠王.⁠. The immediate members of his family are also granted titles, including his wife Bibi Ha [必比哈], oldest son Nasr al-Din [賽典赤納速喇丁], and Nasr al-Din’s wife Namu Tali Kan [納母塔裡看]. See Ma, "Ma Shi Jiasheng," 90–91. 28 Hajji’s full name is Bu Luo Tian Sai Ha Zhi [卜羅添賽哈智]. For more on Chinese Muslims under the first Ming emperor, see Zvi Ben-Dor Benite, “The Marrano Emperor: The Mysterious Bond between Zhu Yuanzhang and the Chinese Muslims,” in Long Live the Emperor!: Uses of the Ming Founder across Six Centuries of East Asian History, ed. Sarah Schneewind, Ming Studies Research Series 4 (Minneapolis, Minn.: Society for Ming Studies, 2008), 275–308. 26

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and “Marquis of Xianning.” It is understood that Hajji’s sons and grandsons would also find ample opportunities for advancement in Yunnan. The genealogy includes a gazetteer excerpt indicating that Hajji was well respected in the region as a government official. After his death, his grave was honored, and his life conduct praised. His status as a descendant of a sage continued to be recognized. Hajji’s sons and grandsons scattered across the various prefectures of Yunnan. 29 The family line itself contains a record of the text’s history and the generations of editors before Yunhua who have added to the lineage. Here the lineage is identified by the name “Record of Heirs to the Prince of Xianyang [Xianyang wang tiaoji 咸陽王祧記],” (henceforth “Record”). The Prince of Xianyang is one of Sayyid Ajall’s titles conferred upon him after death by Temur Khan. The “Record” claims that Sayyid Ajall was the first to compose the lineage, basing it off an original lineage from Muhammad preserved by his ancestor Suo Fei’er. 30 Sayyid Ajall’s son Husayn put the text in order and his grandson Bayan made additional corrections. The second major revision occurs in the Ming dynasty when Hajji’s son Ma Wenming adds his own updates. In both of these cases, revisions to the “Record” coincide with the deaths of major figures in the clan’s history: Sayyid Ajall in the Yuan and Hajji in the Ming. The “Record” bears most prominently the hands of their sons and grandsons. After Hajji’s son Ma Wenming, the “Record” is left aside again until the Ming-Qing transition, when a third flurry of revisions oc-

29

Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” 91–92. Note that the 1392 Ming edict and gazetteer are only found in the print version of the genealogy and do not appear in the manuscript versions. The gazetteer excerpt is identified as the Dali fu zhi gao, huan ji [大理府志稿 宦迹]. 30 It is likely that Suo Fei’er is a retroactively claimed ancestor of Sayyid Ajall. Not all of the sources on Suo Fei’er mention his relation to the famous Yuan Muslim Sayyid Ajall, nor do some biographies of Sayyid Ajall himself.⁠ Suo Fei’er is not mentioned in the Yuan shi biography of Sayyid Ajall.

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cur. 31 Then the lineage is untouched again until Ma Yunhua’s discovery in the Qing-Republican transition. Additions to the “Record” are not consistent nor continuous through the generations. Rather, interest in the lineage waxes and wanes. The greatest impetus to update seems to coincide with volatile times—following the death of powerful clan members when affiliations need to be claimed, or in the face of major socio-political change such as the Ming-Qing transition and the events of Yunhua’s lifetime. Johanna Meskill has suggested that rather than approaching genealogies as reflecting previously existing and well-organized kinship groups, it is often the very act of making a formal genealogy or revitalizing a previously languishing one that marks the beginning of formal kinship incorporation. 32 Similarly, Robert Hymes believes that kinship labels in genealogy hardly represent the reality of interpersonal relationships. Rather they are retrospective constructions, usually underscoring connections with more powerful brethren. As such, genealogies “forge networks that can be mobilized later should the practical need for kinship arise.” 33 This need for kinship was very much present during Ma Yunhua’s adult life. The recent massacres in Yunnan Province resulted in a massive loss in population. The 31 Listed as editors are two descendents from Hajji’s son Ma Wenming in the

forty-third and forty-fourth generation followed by two descedants from Hajji’s son Ma Wenheng in the forty-sixth and forty-seventh generation. The forty-third and forty-fourth generation members are the last in the Ming dynasty. The forty-third generation Ma Yeru, a “ministry of war official,” made revisions. He is followed by a forty-fourth generation imperial college member Ma Zhiyun who proofread the text. In the early Qing, a forty-sixth generation member Ma Hongcai authored a preface and a fortyseventh generation member Ma Yingfang made records. 32 Johanna M. Meskill, “The Chinese Genealogy as a Research Source,” in Family and Kinship in Chinese Society, ed. Maurice Freedman (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1970), 141. 33 Summary of Robert Hymes’ study of Song and Yuan dynasty descent groups found in Jun Jing, The Temple of Memories: History, Power, and Morality in a Chinese Village (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), 118.

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country’s regime change in the Republican Era created further uncertainty. It was ripe time for the rekindling of kinship.

II. READING GENEALOGY The practice of kinship, however, is a strategic one. In his study of the Fuzhou region, historian of China Michael Szonyi has shown how kinship is not static or monolithic. Rather, “contests over meaning within it can never be completely resolved.” 34 Genealogies, therefore, can provide windows into how kinship relationships are being created and emphasized by interested parties. Anthropologist Engseng Ho has stated that nowhere is genealogy simply a series of linked names and a straightforward reckoning of lineal descent. 35 Rather, genealogies are mobilized by Muslim diaspora communities towards “narrative ends,” combining with poetry, biography, history, law, and prayers. 36 This is true in China too, where lineage texts [jiapu, zupu, zongpu] have long been repositories for poetry, calligraphy, contracts, and ritual or religious texts. One scholar of Chinese genealogies has dubbed them “a family archive,” holding documents that give “an impression of the social image that people of the lineage sought to project.” 37 This is certainly the case for Yunhua’s Genealogy. The lineage record—already containing excerpts from imperial edicts pertaining to the family—is further ensconced in a dizzying array of other texts, so much so that the family lineage is dwarfed in comparison. Editor Yunhua is aware of the extent to which he has transformed the text. In the postscript, he outlines the construction he did around the family record. Preceding the lineage, he admits inserting nine diagrams copied from Lan Xu’s Upright Learning of Arabia. This is followed by the fifty-generation transmission of the light to Muhammad, members of Muhammad’s family, and notes Michael Szonyi, Practicing Kinship: Lineage & Descent in Late Imperial China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002), 207. 35 Ho, The Graves of Tarim, 152. 36 Ho, The Graves of Tarim, xviii. 37 Lian, “Surviving Conquest in Dali,” 103. 34

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on the branching of Islam as it entered China. At the end of the family record, he reports adding various pieces from local society including couplets from mosque pillars, remarks on Dali history, and a speech on Sino-Islamic education. Why does Yunhua include these texts and what is the connection between all these “extra” pieces and the family lineage itself? I suggest that we approach the Genealogy as a whole in three ways: 1. One way to understand Yunhua’s Ma Family Genealogy is to read it linearly for its temporal-spatial trajectory. From front to back, we can divide the text into three sections: Arabia, family line, and China. In the first section, “Arabia” [tianfang] is both a temporal and geographic marker. These are the pieces added before the family record that deal with a macrocosmic view of the universe’s creation and the material on Muhammad. The last section of the genealogy, “China,” is also a temporal and geographic marker. Here the texts chosen by Yunhua to follow his family record address the tangible, quotidian reality of Republican China—local landmarks, the contemporary education system, and a recent drought. The middle section, the family line, is what joins “Arabia” to “China.” The family line traces individual links as descendants of Muhammad leave Arabia, rule in Bukhara, enter China in service of the empire, and settle in Yunnan. When read in this way, similarities emerge between the historical narrative in Yunhua’s genealogy and the historical narratives of other Chinese Muslim authors. In Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” the burial sites of Perfected Beings move from Kunlun to Arabia to China. This trajectory from Arabia to China is also found in the three sections of the Ma Family Genealogy as well as the family line itself. The way in which the Ma Family Genealogy is organized also points to how foundational knowledge about the past is always encapsulated within the universal and the present. Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage of Arabia contains the physical life of Muhammad in the core, surrounded by the metaphysical Muhammad, and finally the links between Muhammad and present-day China. These three nesting concentric circles are not so different from Yunhua’s genealogy when read in terms of Arabia, family line, and China. The Ma family line, like the life of Muhammad, resides in the middle of the text. Yunhua’s project is to situate a meticulously chronicled family descent line within the larger concerns of universal time, local time, and

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Islamic history. The family genealogy, like the life of Muhammad, serves as a precious and essential building block. 2. A second approach is to examine the socio-historical context behind the Genealogy’s creation. In the postscript, Yunhua reveals his own motives behind editing the text in this way. He shares his concern that certain kinds of knowledge have been lost in Republican China. The family lineage and the excerpted texts before it are presented as a solution. They are part of Yunhua’s endeavor to help Hui remember their origins. Nearly forty years after the social upheaval of the Dali massacres, Yunnan Muslims experienced newfound hope and enthusiasm for the future at the establishment of China’s Republican era. In the postscript to his updated version, editor Yunhua shares his vision of the genealogy’s continued relevance in these new times. He positions the Genealogy as a crucial piece in the revival of Islamic knowledge, the transmission of which he believes has been increasingly narrow and overly circumscribed by myopic scholars of Arabic scripture. In the postscript to the Genealogy, Yunhua laments how ignorant Hui are about their own past. He describes how when Islam first entered China, all the early Muslims could eloquently answer difficult questions about Islam. Yet this kind of knowledge about Islam’s origins in China is no longer available today. On the one hand, scholars of scripture are incompetent at this task because they enter the madrasa at a young age, where “all they learn are the Arabic letters and then later the Arabic scriptures. Thus the entire basis of their education from the very beginning is not useful for this purpose.” On the other hand are Hui commoners, preoccupied since childhood with securing a livelihood and with little time for study. “If they were to encounter someone of a different religion who asked about the origin of the Hui, it would be difficult for them to provide an answer. This causes the questioner to suspect and guess at all kinds of unsavory origins for the Hui.” 38 For Yunhua, the Hui in his day had a self-image problem and a public relations problem. From the lowly commoners to the ‘ulama, all of these individuals are igno38 Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” 141.

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rant of the broader swath of Islamic knowledge. He writes, “if you consult the Arabic scriptures that came from the West during the beginning of the Tang dynasty, the contents cover everything as expansive as the universe and as minute as quotidian diet. There is nothing left out. However, any discussion of this has been obstructed by the scholars of scripture.” 39 The Genealogy as a text is part and parcel of a wider movement taking place in Republican China, supported by Yunhua and other Muslims, to recover this wider breadth of knowledge belonging to the Hui. Yunhua notes in his postscript the recent establishment of a Hui Advancement Association in Beijing. He highlights the major endeavor of this organization to translate a wide swath of Arabic texts into Chinese [ru zi 儒字], noting: The types of volumes we are working with are no fewer than one hundred in variety. First there are the works on astronomy, topography, governance, religious regulation, domains of the world, anecdotal tales, classical stories and parables. Then there are the works on agriculture, history of nations, origin of different religions, footprints of the prior worthies, and the more than three-thousand-year-old system that existed before Fuxi. All of these have been written down in books to be transmitted through the generations. Even the livestock of other nations is there. Everything is there! 40

Yunhua describes how translators can rely upon the many dictionaries available for Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Tibetan, Manchu, Burmese, and Japanese. In addition they have the ready guidance of professors at the colleges. Yunhua presents the significance of this translation project in terms of the “freedom of religion” and harmony between ethnic groups that has become available since the establishment of the Republican era. He states his intention for the trans-

39 Ibid.

40 Ibid.

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lation project as a whole is “in hopes that we will evolve in the future down the path towards a harmonious society.” 41 While this greater purpose for the betterment of Chinese society is duly noted, Yunhua also has specific intentions for the Hui community with regard to this genealogy. He writes, “Today I have obtained the annals of my forebears and transcribed and reviewed them. I have saved it in hopes that sincere guidance from the wise teachers of today will address the problems I have just raised and the issue of forgetting… So that the sons and grandsons of my descendants may read and learn from it, and know that their generation has a true transmission. They can review the prior generations one by one. None in our clan deserves greater favor than those who preserved the family annals from the very beginning.” 42 Yunhua hopes that this Genealogy will educate the Hui about who they are. He wishes to keep the Muslim community connected to its roots and aware of its lineage. 3. A third way to understand the breadth of material included in the Ma Family Genealogy is to look at themes that run throughout the text. The Genealogy shows a central preoccupation with time—how to conceptualize, calculate, and think about time. Yunhua has chosen excerpts from other Chinese Muslim texts that deal exclusively with breaking up and segmenting time. The different models of time presented in the family lineage and texts preceding it enfold one other, offering layers of a rich worldview. In this way, Yunhua’s Genealogy points to how we cannot simply approach lineage texts as selfcontained systems. The family lineage is not so different from other texts chosen for inclusion in its opening. The temporal narrative of the lineage connecting Yunhua’s fifty-third generation to the Prophet Muhammad is encapsulated within other temporal narratives. Muhammad too must be situated in time. First there are excerpts of Muhammad’s genealogy tracing descent from Adam—both through bloodline and prophetic transmission. Then there are texts that situate the events of Muhammad’s 41 Ibid.

42 Ibid.

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lifetime relative to other imperial calendars. Throughout these excerpts, Yunhua adds his own mathematical computations, bringing the temporal references “up to date” for those in Republican era China. Preceding all other excerpts are diagrams from Lan Xu showing the birth and death of the universe. Attuned to time, Yunhua’s genealogy is not just about a provincial family in Yunnan. The text orients the past and the future, claiming a universal significance for this lineage. It is not enough simply to trace descent from Muhammad. Muhammad’s descent too is traced, placing his pedigree in relation to the first human being Adam. Scouring available Han Kitab texts, Yunhua zones in on the fifty-generation transmission of light [wushi shi chuan guang 五十世傳光] popular among Chinese Muslims in explaining Muhammad’s lineage. 43 Yunhua chooses a Chinese translation of the Qasida al-burda [Tianfang Shijing 天方詩經] by Ma Anli. 44 The excerpt comes from the conclusion to this text, “Praise of the Tianfang Shijing,” authored by the Hui publisher Zhou Mingde. Zhou supplies the exact fifty-generation transmission of the light from Adam to Muhammad. Highlights include Adam as the “initiating ancestor,” Noah in the tenth generation, Abraham in the twentysecond generation as “minor ancestor,” Hashim the progenitor of Banu Hashim in the forty-eighth generation, and Muhammad’s fa-

43

As scholars of Islam in other contexts have shown, the expanding Muslim empire needed to demonstrate that its religious head was not simply an orphaned, illiterate Arab tribesman but an illustrious world leader with a noble lineage of his own. Muhammad increasingly required a pedigree that could compete with and triumph over those of other religious and political figures. Eighteenth century Chinese accounts of Muhammad are laden with images of the prophet as a wealthy monarch akin to or even better than the Chinese emperor and replete with his own harem of virgins and royal genealogy to boot. See Liu Zhi, “Tianfang zhisheng shilu nianpu.” 44 Originally published in 1890 and based on the famous thirteenth century text. See Anli Ma, “Tianfang Shijing,” in Zhongguo Zongjiao Lishi Wenxian Jicheng, vol. 89, Qingzhen Dadian 14 (Hefei shi: Huangshan shushe, 2005), 442–540.

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ther ʿAbdullah in the fiftieth generation. 45 Not satisfied at that, Yunhua includes another account of Muhammad’s ancestry by generation, this time from Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage. This is a prophetic genealogy referring to the biblical prophets and not Muhammad’s blood line through his father ʿAbdullah, yet Yunhua still refers to it as the “fifty generation transmission of the light.” 46 What started as one lineage for a single family in Yunnan turns into a proliferation of genealogies. The Ma’s are situated in relation to their heroic Yuan dynasty ancestor Sayyid Ajall, who is situated in relation to the Prophet Muhammad, who is situated in relation to the first human being Adam. Everyone requires a genealogy. In the volatile world of early twentieth century China, all previous continuities of time, claims to place, and status stability have been shattered. The excerpts placed at the beginning of the Ma family lineage can be understood as a reorientation to time. The temporal markers of Muhammad’s life, already situated in previous Chinese Muslim literature, must be re-situated for Yunhua’s community. As discussed in chapter one of this project, Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage marks Muhammad as the final recipient of four transmission systems: generational [shi tong], state [guo tong], religious [dao tong], and metaphysical [hua tong]. Liu Zhi is concerned with calculating time up to Muhammad. Yunhua is concerned with calculating time after Muhammad. Yunhua reproduces Liu Zhi’s outline of prophets in the generations before Muhammad. Yunhua reframes the Prophet David, making him recognizable to a Chinese audience and dating him within the Chinese calendar. Yunhua remarks that David is the same as the Buddha Sakyamuni. “The people of Tibet and Burma still worship him up until today.” 47 Reproducing Liu Zhi’s calculations, Yunhua 45

Ma, “Sai Dianchi Jiapu,” 32–33. For the original passage in the Tianfang Shijing, see Ma, “Tianfang Shijing,” 538–39. From the 1890’s to the 1910’s, Zhou Mingde was active in Chengdu publishing and distributing Chinese Muslim texts. 46 Ma, “Sai Dianchi Jiapu,” 34–37. Note that this does not appear in the print version of the genealogy. 47 Ibid., 28.

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writes that David was born in the Shikang era of the Arabian calendar, which is the forty-fourth year of King Mu of the Zhou dynasty in China [c. 932 BC]. 48 The editor addends to these calculations the distance between David and Republican era China, noting “it is a total of three thousand and eight years to today, the Guiqiu year of the Republican era [1933].” 49 Remarks in the genealogy show that Yunhua was engaged in these kinds of computations more than once over a five-year span of editing the text. He reproduces Liu Zhi’s calculations from the Utmost Sage, situating the major events of Muhammad’s lifetime—his birth and initiation of prophethood—in relation to calendars from different empires, including the Chinese one. Liu Zhi’s state transmission system [guo tong], which lists the number of rulers before Muhammad and the respective years between each ruler is also copied into the genealogy. 50 Arriving at Muhammad as the last ruler, Yunhua remarks that the hijra marks the moving of Muhammad’s capital from Mecca to Medina. “From the hijra to the Wuchen year, that is the seventeenth year of the Republican era [1928], it has been one thousand three hundred and forty-six years.” 51 Another calculation done five years later is added to an excerpt from Liu Zhi’s chain of prophets before Muhammad. Yunhua writes that between the last prophet Jesus and Muhammad is six hundred years. “The birth of Muhammad is the first year of the elephant. The hijra is the fiftythird year of the elephant. Beginning with the origin year of the hijra until the Guiyou year, that is the twenty-second year of the Republican Era [1933], it is one thousand three hundred fifty-one years since the hijra.” 52 48

See chapter one of this project for a lengthier discussion of Liu Zhi’s calculations with respect to the “dynasties of Arabia.” 49 Ma, “Sai Dianchi Jiapu,” 28. Note that 1933 + 932 do not add up to 3008, so either Yunhua’s math is faulty or he has a different year for King Mu’s reign. 50 Ibid., 49. See chapter one of this project for a lengthier discussion of Liu Zhi’s state system. 51 Ibid., 47–48. 52 Ibid., 49–50.

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The building blocks established by Liu Zhi’s sira mark the metaphysical significance of Muhammad beyond his human life. Muhammad is positioned within a chain of ancestors, a chain of prophets, and a chain of rulers. Here the numerical links between Muhammad and the transmitters in his lineage are brought forward to Republican China. Yunhua adds the final link to the present. The preoccupation with dating here is not simply a mathematical exercise, but an endeavor to situate oneself in relation to the foundational events of the past. It is through the constant effort to calculate the number of years that have passed between oneself and Muhammad that the opening pages of the genealogy construct a universal significance to the Islamic past. In fact, it is not just dating and calculating links to the past that Yunhua is concerned with. The editor wants to encapsulate all time from origin to apocalypse. The genealogy opens with excerpts from Lan Xu’s Upright Learning. Yunhua copies the nine spiral diagrams discussed in chapter one of this book, which model the rise and fall of the universe. 53 Yunhua justifies his inclusion of Lan Xu, writing: “So that those of the religion can find its origin again and return to what is upright, return to the beginning and end of everything from antiquity until today.” 54 Muhammad’s era is important and so is the antiquity of the sages before him. However, the scope of Yunhua’s vision is much bigger, wishing to link everything from the earliest point, to his present, to the future. For Yunhua, this modeling of time brings the Republican era into context. The recent turbulent times in China are seen as a natural progression of the unfolding of the haqq. Yunhua follows Lan Xu’s assessment that we are living in declining times following the universe’s peak. In prose commentary after the Upright Learning diagrams, he uses the analogy of natural daylight to describe the progression of great human beings. The Chinese sages Yao and Shun appear when the heavens were in their noon-time position. They lived for over one hundred years. By the 53 Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” 72–76. 54 Ibid., 141.

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time Confucius and Mencius are born, “it is already the fading light of the afternoon.” Confucius and Mencius lived to be seventy-three and eighty-four respectively. Muhammad is called “the sage who is the seal of the final age,” and lives for sixty-three years. After Muhammad’s death, “there are very few worthies appearing among his descendants whether in China or abroad.” 55 The declining lifespans here follow the decreasing frequency of sages who appear less and less as the universe nears its sunset. Yunhua points to signs of a coming apocalypse, noting: “The Arabian scriptures report that the world is coming to an end. First there will be omens. One is that the males will be without integrity and sincerity. And the females will be without shame. One is that the words in the scripture will slowly disappear. Today you can observe that people of this age are heading towards this evil direction.” 56 The declining times within which he places Republican era China are contextualized within Lan Xu’s earthly branches system. Within the cyclical rotation of the universe, Yunhua notes that Adam was born under the Yin earthly branch, representing the first manifest cycle in Lan Xu’s model. By Muhammad’s time, the heavens have reached the position of the Wei earthly branch, the sixth manifest cycle in Lan Xu’s universe. Yunhua calculates that as of his day, we have been living under the Wei earthly branch for over one thousand years and have not yet reached the next earthly branch of Shen. He concludes by stating: The calendars of Arabia record that we begin from the birth of Adam in Yin and we go up until the death of Muhammad and later. This is more than seven thousand years. In the past, Mr. Shao annotated beneath the Yin character “the unity underlying the principle of all things.” Beneath the Wu character, he indi-

55 Ibid., 77. 56

Ma, “Sai Dianchi Jiapu,” 28–31. Note that the print version’s reproduction of Yunhua’s comments on the Upright Learning are cut off part way and incomplete. See Ma, “Ma Shi Jiasheng,” 77.

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cated the disappearance of humankind. 57 Consult all aspects of the Upright Learning diagrams on the movement of the haqq from the origin to understand scarce and plenty, heaven and earth, ancient and modern, having and not having, and beginning and end. With one glance you will understand immediately. 58

Yunhua refers back to Lan Xu’s Upright Learning, reflecting on the large expanse of time—over seven thousand years—that have elapsed since Adam. With attention to beginnings also comes attention to endings in this genealogy’s orientation to time.

CONCLUSION The three ways of understanding the Ma Family Genealogy outlined above do not conflict with each other. Instead they are complimentary and offer multiple vantage points from which to approach this text. They all consider the genealogy in relation to time. In the first approach, we follow the temporal-spatial trajectory of the Genealogy’s segments as it links Muhammad’s time in Arabia, with the family’s migrations to imperial China, and finally with the concerns of Republican China. Yunhua’s overall trajectory and organizational framework here is shared with other Chinese Muslim authors Lan Xu and Liu Zhi. In the second approach, I consider the genealogy in relation to the context of its composition—that is, the socio-historical circumstances of late Qing and Republican China. Here the postscript offers insight into the editor’s self-professed motives. As I explored in section one of this chapter, the genealogy arrives at a particularly 57

Mr. Shao is the eleventh century Neo-Confucian thinker Shao Yong, who authored the⁠ Treatise on the Supreme World-Ordering Principles [Huangji Jingshi]. For more on his life and work, see Anne D. Birdwhistell, Transition to Neo-Confucianism: Shao Yung on Knowledge and Symbols of Reality (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1989). See also Don J. Wyatt, The Recluse of Loyang: Shao Yung and the Moral Evolution of Early Sung Thought (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1996). 58 Ma, “Sai Dianchi Jiapu,” 2008, 28.

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pivotal time in Yunhua’s life. He discovers the family lineage during efforts to rebuild a mosque after the Yunnan massacres. I argued in section one that “Record to Heirs of the Prince of Xianyang” shows interest in the lineage text was never consistent. Rather, revisions tended to occur during volatile times following regime changes or the death of a powerful member. Yunhua’s own efforts to make major revisions during his lifetime show that the family history had suddenly become important again. His postscript situates his newly addended excerpts relative to efforts in Republican China to revive Islamic knowledge. With the dismantling of the old Qing order and growing ethnic consciousness among Hui in the new republic, origins were important again. Yunhua refashions his family record, transforming it into a crucial piece educating Hui about their heritage in China. In the third approach, I read this text for its universal implications. In the Genealogy, Yunhua is not just making claims about his family history or about Hui history. He is making truth claims about time in general. The whole text is an exercise in chronicling time— from Lan Xu’s rise and fall of the universe, to Muhammad’s lineage from Adam, to this family’s lineage from Muhammad. Everyone and everything in Yunhua’s world is being situated in time. The most recent times of Republican China are linked to this progression of the past and positioned within a progression towards the future. While Yunhua’s postscript bears an optimistic tone about advancements of a new age, the opening comments on Lan Xu’s diagrams warn of a looming apocalypse in these “evil times.” Perhaps on a microcosmic level, the editor is excited about the new opportunities offered Muslims in recent years. Yet on a macrocosmic level, he is cognizant of a broader vision that this era in Chinese history is but one tiny point in the unfolding of the universe. The universe as a whole from its first inception at the haqq’s movement has already undergone countless transformations—just as Yunhua’s own lifetime witnessed enormous changes to Yunnanese society. The massive temporal expanse covered by Yunhua’s Ma Family Genealogy allows us to see more clearly how genealogy is a powerful way to construct time.

CONCLUSION The past is a dynamic process, brought forth anew in each retelling of the story. Like Yunhua’s family lineage, it is often laid aside and then discovered again at opportune moments. Rewritten, it finds new life and meaning as the community moves forward into uncertain circumstances. This project approaches “history” as ways of thinking about the past. Historical narratives single out particular events, people, and themes from the past that are deemed significant today. As such, all histories contain elements of the present. Changing one’s account of the past has the effect of changing one’s perspective on the present. In this sense, history is a very powerful endeavor. The choice over what to remember and what to forget reflects our deepest values, hopes, and fears. 1 The authors examined here produced histories about themselves, placing Muslims in China within an overarching storyline. I have endeavored to show how the process of conceptualizing the past unfolded for four authors, whose respective concerns generated different visions. Liu Zhi organized his work around Muhammad, within whom all lineages and transmission systems could be subsumed. Lan Xu employed the category of the Perfected Being, who had access to the haqq in its microcosmic and macrocosmic manifestations. The past for Lan Xu could be told through the lives of these superior individuals. Li Huanyi, on the other hand, assembled his See Sarah Maza, Thinking about History (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017) for a good overview of theoretical discussions about history. 1

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collection around Waqqas, who epitomized the joining of two kingdoms and a long-standing tradition of Hui service. The last author, Ma Yunhua, relied upon his family lineage to chronicle the past. Yet Yunhua ultimately expanded his account to include the human family and the universe from birth to death. This is the history that mattered to Hui in the late nineteenth century. These narratives feature their own people as active, resourceful agents. The heroes celebrated include Muhammad, Waqqas, and Sayyid Ajall, as well as numerous lesser-known individuals. History in these texts covers time from the origins of human beings and the universe, to the foundation of Islam, arrival of the community in China, and present times. It also encompasses a wide geographic expanse from Arabia to China and the in-between terrains of Mt. Kunlun and Central Asia. The narratives reveal a common trajectory. They begin in Arabia and end in China. Each of these locations, however, is limited in time. Arabia holds authority over antiquity while China becomes a greater concern as history approaches the modern era. The imagination of each location is informed by the other. Like the striking similarities between Lan Xu’s description of Muhammad’s tomb and the tombs in China, Arabia is being generated by authors sitting in China, and China is being created against a backdrop of Arabia. This book puts together a collage of Hui historical narratives, analyzing and contextualizing them. I am aware that in the process, I am telling my own story made up of these individual accounts. The meta-story told in Chinese Heirs to Muhammad traces the evolution of an Islamic tradition in China. This tradition begins with “Muhammad,” the first chapter. I open in Arabia with Chinese attempts to situate the foundational events of Islam. The second chapter, “Perfected Beings,” expands vertically and horizontally from Arabia by including the cosmos and important figures before and after Muhammad. “Tombs” begins the process of putting down roots in China through death accounts. “Empire” treats the thorny issues of being subjects of the Chinese state. The last chapter, “Continuity,” addresses attempts to keep one’s connection to the past alive, despite catastrophe and transition. This final chapter brings us back to the first one through the encapsulation of Ma Yunhua’s genealogy with-

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in the universal cycles of Lan Xu. It also ends this project in Republican China. This is fitting because the stories told here could only be told during certain moments in Chinese history. The construction of time by these authors was itself highly contingent upon the times in which they lived. The era I examine here is bookended by the establishment of a robust Sino-Islamic knowledge base after Liu Zhi on one end and the beginning of Communist China on the other end, which created new ruptures and concerns for the community that drastically altered the kind of historical writing that was possible. While these histories are reflective of a certain time period, they also contribute to larger discussions about Islam and about China. I argue that the type of political, intellectual, and social efforts exerted by these authors is indicative of all history writing. While all Muslims are at some temporal and geographic remove from Muhammad, nineteenth century Hui had perhaps one of the longest distances to traverse in linking themselves back. Hui may offer one of the starkest cases, but whether the past is told from twelfth-century Morocco, contemporary Indonesia, or sixteenth-century Iran, Islamic history is always constructed relative to the current position of its recounters. This calls for us to treat all accounts of history carefully. Who is being favored as heir? Who is being excluded? The authority generated from delineating a past for oneself, or someone else, must not be overlooked. With respect to China, I have endeavored to show here the extent to which these authors were deeply invested in the tenets of Chinese civilization. The histories examined subsume Chinese civilization under Islamic history. Fuxi, the founder of the government offices, calendar, and writing system is no more or less than Noah’s son. Chinese imperial histories are not enough for these writers who saw themselves and their beloved figures missing from the story. Previous accounts in Chinese do not go back far enough in time. The histories written here remake China into an Islamic space, and into a safe place for Muslims. In these accounts, that Islam moved to China where Muslims flourished for centuries is but a natural progression.

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INDEX Page locators in italic refer to diagrams and tables. ‘Abdullah: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54, 54n35 in Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 139 Abraham: and Lan Xu’s Epitaphs, 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54, 59 and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30 in Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 138 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 21 and Tabari’s eight eras of time, 30, 30n46 Abu Bakr: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 as one of the four great Sahaba, 70, 70n7 Abu Hanifa, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 Adam: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 27, 37, 39, 51, 52t2.2, 53, 56, 58–59, 88 association with tian xian presiding over ceremonies for Spring Equinox, 34, 42, 47–48, 49t2.1, 88 and the term qutb, 42, 88 and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 8, 28–31, 33, 63n62, 69, 142–143, 144 and Adam’s height, 31 and Lan Xu’s preface to “Erya,” 26n36 and Li Huanyi’s lineage of human history, 91, 96, 99–100 159

160

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

identification with Pangu, 93–95 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 18, 19n17, 19t1.1, 20–21 Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 137–139, 142–143, 144 and Tabari’s eight eras of time, 30, 30n46 Ahmad Ibn Hanbal, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 Algar, Hamid, 87n40 ʿAli: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 as one of the four great Sahaba, 70, 70n7 Amina, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54, 54n36 Anderson, Benedict, term “imagined community,” 42n8 apocalypse: and timeline of Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 9, 141–142 and Lan Xu’s diagrams, 144 Arabia (tianfang 天方), 98, 98-99n13 and burial locations in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 51, 52–53t2.2, 53–55, 58 Li Huanyi’s Words and Deeds on, 93-98, 104-105, 108 Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage on, 15, 15-16n9, 19t1.1, 20, 23 and Ma Yunhua’s Ma Family Genealogy, 134, 140-142 See also Shem Arabic language: Arabic script written on names found in wood-block prints of, Huizu diancang quanshu, 73n14 Lan Xu’s Upright Learning on, 26–27, 65, 71–72 texts translated into Chinese (ru zi 儒字) by the Hui Advancement Association of Beijing, 136–137 Armijo, Jacqueline, on the Dali massacres of 1873, 122–123 astronomy: and Lan Xu’s Erya, 26 and Ma Yunhua’s postscript to his Genealogy, 136 See also calendar systems; heavenly branches and earthly stems Atwill, David G., 86n37 on Du Wenxiu, 121–122

INDEX

161

on the Hui population in Dali, 123, 126 Ben-Dor Benite, Zvi, 7–8 on Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage, 16n12, 23n32 Birrell, Anne, 57n41 Book of Changes (Yijing 易經): the eight trigrams of, 62, 63, 65 Lan Xu’s commentary on, 64 Buddhism: and Chan lineage texts, 7n16 David identified as Śākyamuni by Ma Yunhua, 139 emergence in China, 96 and the term ganying 感應 “sympathetic resonance,” 76n17 and xian (immortals), 85–86 and Śākyamuni, 86n38 calendar systems: David’s birth according to the Arabian calendar, 140 fixing of the Chinese calendar for the Sui emperor, 96, 105–106 Fuxi’s founding of the Chinese calendar, 147 Islamic hijri calendar, 69 and Liu Zhi’s calculation of events in Muhammad’s life, 140 the solar-agricultural calendar in Lan Xu’s calculation of death dates of Perfected Beings, 38, 47, 48n28, 49t2.1, 51 Tao Baba’s knowledge of, 115 See also heavenly branches and earthly stems Campany, Robert Ford, 85–86 Chang’an (Xi’an): and Tao Baba, 115 Waqqas as a link between Medina and Chang’an, 101, 107–108 Chen dynasty, and Li Huanyi’s biographies of Hui individuals, 96 Chinese history: and burial locations in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 51, 52–53t2.2, 53–55 and Hui recounters, 1 See also dynastic histories; Fuxi Confucian learning, and Lan Xu’s association of Fuxi with Japheth, 64–65

162

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

Confucius, and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30, 142 Dali massacre of 1873 (or Rocking of the Waves of Lake Er): Hui population decimated by, 122–123, 126–127 and lineage writing in times of change, 120–121, 127–129 and Ma Yunhua’s relocation to Yongsheng county, 124–126, 127 rebuilding of mosques following it, 126 David: identified as Śākyamuni by Ma Yunhua, 139–140 and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2 and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 21 Solomon chosen as his successor, 54n34 death places: and burial locations in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 51, 52–53t2.2, 53–56 burial on Mount Kunlun identified in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 51– 54, 52–53t2.2, 54n31, 68, 88–89, 134 burial of individuals near the Kaʿba, 54, 59n48 and Engseng Ho’s notion of diaspora, 69 Ma, Minglong’s tomb in Wuchang 武昌(present-day Wuhan 武 汉), 52t2.2, 80n25, 81 topography of time generated by burial place of the Perfect Being, 38, 51, 52–53t2.2, 53–56, 66, 68 Waqqas, Sahaba Saʿd Ibn Abi’s burial location, 52t2.2 See also tomb veneration diaspora communities: and death place in Engseng Ho’s notion of diaspora, 69 genealogies mobilized by, 120–121, 133 Du Wenxiu 杜文秀, “Panthay Sultanante” (Ping nan Guo 平南国) in Yunnan: and the Dali massacre of 1873, 122 ending of, 109, 122 operation of, 121 dynastic histories:

INDEX

163

and Li Huanyi’s biographies of Hui individuals, 97, 97diagram 4.1, 92-100 and the Ma Family Genealogy, 128–132 and the Shiji 史記 of Sima Qian 司馬遷, 95n8, 96 tazkirah as an alternative for Muslims in Altishahri (Xinjiang), 6, 68 See also Chen dynasty; Han dynasty; Ming dynasty; Qing dynasty; Song dynasty Eaton, Richard Maxwell, 68 emperors: Emperor Wendi and Waqqas, 9, 91–92, 105–107 the human emperor (ren huang 人皇) arrives in China, 95n7 Qing emperor’s interest in Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage of Arabia, 13n5 of Rum, 76–77, 76–77n17 and Muhammad’s state system of transmission in Liu Zhi, 20 Yellow Emperor, 30 Yongle emperor’s interaction with Tie Xuan, 112–114 See also dynastic histories; Tang dynasty—Emperor Taizong epitaph tradition (mu zhi 墓誌): as a genre of Chinese literature, 40 Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs” distinguished from, 40–41 Ernst, Carl W., 86 Europe—missionaries. See Kafarov, Archimandrite Palladii; Mason, Isaac Eve, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54 Fatima, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 Fletcher, Joseph, 2, 4 flood or flood myth: and Mount Kunlun, 38, 56–59, 63, 66 and the post-flood world in Islamic tradition, 60, 60n52 and the post-flood world in Lan Xu’s history, 56–59, 60–61 See also Noah four great Sahaba (Si da shuai ha bu), 69–70, 70n7 See also Abu Bakr; ʿAli; ʿUmar; ʿUthman

164

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

Frankel, James D., 7 Fuxi 伏羲: and the Chinese narrative tradition, 61–63 and the eight trigrams of the Book of Changes, 62, 63, 65 and Hui historical narratives, 147 Japheth associated with. See Japheth (Ya fu si) and Lan Xu’s courtesy name Zixi 子羲, 64 and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 39–40, 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 55, 63–64, 63n62, 76 marriage of Fuxi and Nüwa, 61–62, 63n62 status as a human ancestor, 62, 63n62 Garnaut, Anthony, 5–6n9 genealogies. See lineage writing; Ma Yunhua—Ma Family Genealogy (Ma shi jiasheng) ghosts (gui 鬼): human potential to perfect themselves distinguished from, 33 tian xian 天仙 (heavenly immortals) distinguished from, 45–46 Guandi, 84, 84n32 hajj. See Kaʿba; Muhammad Mustafa—tomb of Ham (Ha mu 哈穆): Europe associated with, 57, 61, 94 and the post-flood world in the Islamic tradition, 60, 60n52 and the post-flood world in Lan Xu’s history, 56–59, 60–61 Han dynasty: and Fuxi, 62–63, 95 and Li Huanyi’s biographies of Hui individuals, 96 Han Kitab 汉克塔布: and binary conceptualization of Islamic phenomenon in China, 5 and the fifty-generation transmission of light (wushi shi chuan guang 五十世傳光), 138 haqq (the Real, zhen 真): and humans as distinguished from other beings, 33, 43–44 and Lan Xu’s “han ge” 罕格 and zhen yi “true oneness,” 27, 27n37, 28, 43

INDEX

165

and Lan Xu’s understanding of time and history, 27–28, 29diagram 1.1, 31–34, 51, 65–66 and the transformations of the universe, 144 and Perfected Beings (zhen ren), 44–45 Hasan al-Basri, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 Hashim, in Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 138 heavenly branches and earthly stems: and Lan Xu’s diagrams of human history, 28, 32, 64, 142 and the “Palace of Destiny” (Ming gong 命宮), 89n45 heavenly immortals. See tian xian 天仙 (heavenly immortals) Hermansen, Marcia K., 68 history: dynasties of Arabia in Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage, 19t1.1 and modes of organizing the past, 10, 145–146 and power structures of its recounters, 1, 147 See also Chinese history; dynastic histories; Hui historical narratives; Islamic history; Lan Xu, The Upright Learning of Arabia; Li Huanyi, Words and Deeds of Islamic Exemplars (Qingzhen xianzheng yanxing lü); lineage writing; Liu Zhi,—The Utmost Sage of Arabia (Tianfang zhisheng shilu); Ma Yunhua—Ma Family Genealogy (Ma shi jiasheng); Muhammad Mustafa-biographies (sira); tazkirah Ho, Engseng, 69, 133 Huainanzi 淮南子, on zhen ren, 44–45 Hui 回: as defined in Li Huanyi’s Words and Deeds of Islamic Exemplars, 96–100, 117–118 and revision of the Chinese calendar, 105–106 religion and the spreading of, 96, 115 –historical narratives: and concern with tenets of Chinese civilization, 92, 98–99, 103– 109, 118, 147 and distance from foundational events of Islam, 1, 9–10, 146–147 and evolution of an Islamic tradition in China, 146–147 and Islamic texts prior to the Qing dynasty, 1–2 and the publication of Huizu diancang quanshu 回族典藏全书,

166

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

2 and publication of Qingzhen dadian 清真大典, 2 See also Li Huanyi, Words and Deeds of Islamic Exemplars; Liu Zhi; Ma Yunhua; Ma Zhu; Wang Daiyu; Waqqas, Sahaba Saʿd Ibn Abi Hui Advancement Association of Beijing, 136–137 Huizu diancang quanshu 回族典藏全书: Arabic script written on names found in wood-block prints of, 73n14 and research on the Hui, 2 Hulusi, Ahmed, on the Qutub al-Irshad, 87n41 Husayn, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 Hymes, Robert, 132 Ibn ‘Arabi, 88 Idris, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54 Isaac: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2 and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30 Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 21 Ishmael: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2 Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 21 Islamic history: and the Hui. See Hui historical narratives Muhammad’s continuous repositioning in, 8, 34–35 and Tabari’s eight eras of time from Adam to Muhammad, 30, 30n46 Islamic law: founders of Islamic law schoools, 39n2, 54 and Muslim halal practices, 105 See also Qurʾan

INDEX

167

Jacob: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2 and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 21 Japheth (Ya fu si 雅伏思): and Central Asian histories of Noah and his sons, 61n54 Fuxi associated with, 59, 61, 64–65, 93–95, 94n5 in Li Huanyi’s Words and Deeds, 93–94, 94n5 and the post-flood world in the Islamic tradition, 60, 60n52 and the post-flood world in Lan Xu’s history, 56–59, 60–61 Jesus: and the birth of Muhammad in Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 139 and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 39–40, 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54 and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 21 Jonah, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54 Joseph: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2 and Tabari’s eight eras of time, 30n46 Kaʿba: burial of individuals near, 54, 59n48 and the holy well Zamzam, 69n5 and Lan Xu’s preface to “Erya,” 26n36 Kafarov, Archimandrite Palladii: and the Russian Eccleasiastic Mission in Beijing, 14n6 translation of Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage, 13 Kim, Hodong, 5 Kim, Kwangmin, 5 Kubravi Sufis, 87, 87n40 Kunlun. See Mount Kunlun or the Kunlun Mountains Lan Xu 藍煦:

168

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

courtesy name Zixi 子羲, 64 haqq (the Real): and “han ge” 罕格 and zhen yi “true oneness,” 27 used by, 27n37, 28, 43 in Lan Xu’s understanding of time and history, 27–28, 29diagram 1.1, 31–34, 51, 65–66 Tianfang Erya 天方尔雅 (Encyclopedia of Arabia), 26n36 and Lan Xu’s interest in Islamic knowledge, 25–26, 72 Lan Xu 藍煦, The Upright Learning of Arabia (Tianfang zhengxue): on Arabic letters, 26–27, 71–72 commentary on Wang Daiyu 王岱輿, 27 diagrams, 26, 28, 29diagram 1.1, 30 and Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 4, 133, 138, 141–142, 144 “Movement of the Haqq,” 48n27 exegesis of the Qur’an, 27 Muhammad’s placement in, 8, 12–13, 14, 48n27, 133–134 Lan Xu, The Upright Learning of Arabia (Tianfang zhengxue)— “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings” (Zhenren muzhi 真人墓誌): and the concept of qutb (Sufi pole saint), 37 Kelemenlaxi (the Western Person), 52t2.2, 73n14, 78n20, 79 Li, Mr.: burial location of, 52t2.2, 55 post-mortem appearance of, 79 perfected being (zhen ren) as a category, 8–9, 38, 42–45 See also Perfected Beings topography of time generated by the burial place of the Perfect Being, 38, 51, 52–53t2.2, 53–56, 66, 68 Zhengzhou Person, 53t2.2, 67, 72–75, 73n14, 77–79, 78n20, 87 See also Fuxi; Noah; tomb veneration—tombs described in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs” Laozi, and human history by Lan Xu, 29 Leslie, Donald Daniel, 26n16 on editions of the Huihui yuanlai, 102n18 Islam in Traditional China: a bibliographical guide, 2 on Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 25n14

INDEX

169

on Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage, 16n12, 23n32 Li Huanyi 李煥乙, background of, 92 —Words and Deeds of Islamic Exemplars (Qingzhen xianzheng yanxing lü 清真先正言行略): biography of Sha Chunyuan, 109–112, 114, 116, 117 biography of Tie Xuan, 109–110, 112–114, 116, 117 chronological organization of, 92–93, 96–98, 97diagram 4.1, 107– 108 Japheth combined with Fuxi in, 93 and late Qing dynasty turbulence, 91, 117–118 and the status of Hui in late nineteenth century China, 9 the term hui 回 used for organizing it, 96–100, 117–118 Lian, Ruizhi, 121 Liang dynasty, and Li Huanyi’s biographies of Hui individuals, 96 Light, Nathan, 61n54 lineage writing: and “narrative ends,” 133 and the need for continuity in times of change, 120–121, 127–129, 144 utilization by the Bai during the Yuan-Ming transition, 121 See also Ma Yunhua 馬雲華—Ma Family Genealogy (Ma shi jiasheng); tazkirah; Muhammad Mustafa—lineage of Lipman, Jonathan, 2, 4–5 Liu Zhi 劉智 (aka Jielian 介廉): influence on the field of Islam in China, 2 scholarly bacground of, 13 —The Utmost Sage of Arabia (Tianfang zhisheng shilu 天方至聖實 錄): Lan Xu’s biography of Muhammad compared with, 12–13, 14, 133–134 Muhammad’s life presented in, 14–15, 133–134 popularity in China of, 13 translation by Western missionaries, 13, 101n17 translation into Japanese, 13–14n6 Lot, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54 Luo, Yanhui, 26n16, 42n7

170

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

Ma, Anlin, Qasida al-burda (Tianfang Shijing 天方詩經), 138–139, 138n44 Ma, Dexin 馬德新, 71, 71n10 Ma, Haiyun, 5 Ma, Minglong 馬明龍: as a guiding saint (qu tu bu ao shi, Ar. qutb irshad), 81, 86–87 cave meditation practiced by, 80, 80n25 as “heavenly immortal” (tian xian 天仙), 85–86 Lan Xu’s biography of, 79–82 location of his tomb in Wuchang 武昌(present-day Wuhan 武汉), 52t2.2, 80n25, 81 post-mortem appearance of, 79, 84–85, 89 title Ma si baba 馬四爸爸 (“Baba Ma the Fourth”), 79n21, 81 Ma, Wenming, 131, 132n31 Ma Yunhua 馬雲華: and the Dali massacre of 1873, 124–126, 127 and the Qina mosque in Yongsheng, 124, 125, 126, 126n18 Ma Yunhua 馬雲華—Ma Family Genealogy (Ma shi jiasheng 馬氏 家乘): and the “Genealogy of Sayyid Ajall” (Sai dianchi jiapu 赛典赤家 谱), 124 Hajji (Ha Zhi 哈智) and his service to the Ming court, 130–131, 131n28 and Lan Xu’s nine eras of human history, 141–143 Ma Wenming and his service to the Ming court, 131, 131n31 Muhammad in Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage compared with, 134–135 and Sayyid Ajall, 9, 39, 119, 123–124, 128, 130–131, 131n30, 139, 146 Ma Zhu 馬注: guide to Islam by, 2 Wang Daiyu’s biography of, 93, 99n13 Major, John S., 44 Malik, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 Manichaeism, 98, 98n11 Mary: burial location on Mt. Kunlun, 52t2.2, 53

INDEX

171

and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings,” 49t2.1 Mason, Isaac: as a British missionary, 14n6 translation of Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage, 13, 101n17 Mencius, and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30, 142 Meskill, Johanna M., 132 Millward, James, 5 Ming dynasty: Emperor Jianwen, 112–114 and Lan Xu’s account of Ma Minglong, 80–82 and Li Huanyi’s biographies of Hui individuals, 96, 108, 108– 109n31, 109–110, 110n32 and Li Huanyi’s biography of Tie Xuan, 109, 112–114 and the Ma Family Genealogy, 128, 130–132, 132n31 and texts documenting the descent of Chinese Muslims, 119 Yongle emperor, 112–114 Moses: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54 and Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 21 and Tabari’s eight eras of time, 30, 30n46 Mount Kunlun or the Kunlun Mountains: and burial locations in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 51–54, 52–53t2.2, 54n31, 68, 88–89, 134 and Lan Xu’s flood narrative, 38, 56–59, 63, 66 and Lan Xu’s narrative of creation, 26n36, 38, 51 and the marriage of Fuxi and Nüwa, 61–62, 63n62 mythical place in the Chinese imagination, 57, 57n41 Mr. Shao. See Shao Yong 邵雍 (Mr. Shao) Muhammad Mustafa: as leader of the tian xian, 89 as qutb in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 88 ranking by Lan Xu as both within and outside his systemization, 50 and Tabari’s eight eras of time, 30, 30n46

172

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

Winter Solstice associated with, 48, 48n27, 49t2.1, 50, 89 —biographies (sira): concerns informing various sira accounts, 11 the development of the Islamic tradition in China reflected in, 8, 12–13, 14 Lan Xu’s presentation. See Lan Xu, The Upright Learning of Arabia (Tianfang zhengxue) Liu Zhi’s presentation. See Liu Zhi,—The Utmost Sage of Arabia (Tianfang zhisheng shilu) and Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 140 —lineage of: and the fifty-generation transmission of light (wushi shi chuan guang 五十世傳光), 138–139 in Lan Xu’s organization of human history into nine eras, 30 as the tenth and final prophet in the biblical line of prophets, 20– 21 and silsila (lineage chain) texts, 15, 41 —tomb of: and the four great Sahaba, 69–70, 70n6 Lan Xu’s detailed description of, 71–72 Murata, Sachiko, 6–7 Na, Jufeng, 124n13 Naqshbandi Sufis, 87, 87n40 Noah: burial location on Mt. Kunlun, 52t2.2, 53 and Hui historical narratives, 147 in Lan Xu’s texts: and the flood narrative, 33, 38, 56–59 and his organization of human history, 29 identification as qutb in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 88 and Noah’s lifespan, 31 preface to Tianfang Erya, 26n36 as tian xian associated with Spring Equinox, 49t2.1 and Li Huanyi’s Words and Deeds, 93–96, 94n5, 99 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 19n17, 19, 21

INDEX

173

in Ma Yunhua’s Genealogy, 138 and Tabari’s eight eras of time, 30, 30n46 three sons of. See Ham; Japheth; Shem and transition from one world history to multiple histories, 96 Nüwa, 62n57 marriage of Fuxi and Nüwa, 61–62, 63n62 tales of her patching up the sky, 95–96 opium wars, 110, 114 Pangu, Adam identified with, 93–95 Perfected Beings (zhen ren 真人): as heavenly immortals. See tian xian 天仙 (heavenly immortals) Lan Xu’s systemization of, 8–9, 38, 42–45 and spatial conception of imperial China, 9, 146 See also Lan Xu, The Upright Learning of Arabia (Tianfang zhengxue)—“Epitaphs of Perfected Beings” (Zhen-ren muzhi); Ma, Minglong; tomb veneration Persia: Da shi 大食 as term for the Sasanian Persian-speaking empire, 105n21 and the hui, 98 and Muhammad’s lineage, 18 as a name for Arabia, 104 and the prophet Mani, 98n11 and Shem’s line, 60 See also tazkirah Persian: Chinese, Persian, and Arabic found in the “Genealogy of Sayyid Ajall,” 123 and Lan Xu’s Tianfang Erya, 25–26, 26n36, 72 term rum or rumi, 76–77n18 See also haqq (the Real, Ch. zhen 真) prophets: Mani, 98n11 See also Abraham; Adam; David; Isaac; Ishmael; Jacob; Jesus; Mo-

174

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD ses; Muhammad Mustafa; Noah; Perfected Beings; Seth; Shem

Qasida al-burda (Tianfang Shijing 天方詩經) of Ma Anlin, 138–139, 138n44 Qing dynasty: Emperor Daoguang’s reign, 25, 83, 127 Emperor Xianfeng’s reign, 26, 74n15, 110, 127 Hui rebellions during, 91, 117–118, 122–123, 126 and Lan Xu and his parents, 25, 39, 82n30 and Lan Xu’s biography of Kelemenlaxi, 74, 74n15 and large-scale historical narrative of Muslims in China, 1–2 late Qing dynasty turbulence, 91, 117–118, 144 and Li Huanyi’s biographies: of Hui individuals, 96, 108, 110n32 of Sha Chunyuan, 109–112, 114 opium wars, 110, 114 popularity of Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage of Arabia, 13, 13n5 studies on Muslims in western China, 5 Taiping rebellion, 78n20, 110 and Ma Yunhua’s family settlement in Yunnan, 128 Zengding guangyu ji by Cai Fangbing, 117, 117n47 See also Dali massacre of 1873 (or Rocking of the Waves of Lake Er) qingzhen (“Islam”), 98–99, 98n13 Qisas al-anbiya’ (Tales of the Prophets), 40, 54n34 Qurʾan: exegesis in Lan Xu’s Upright Learning, 27 Ma Minglong’s burial with the thirtieth juz on his chest, 81–82 and Noah’s sons after the flood, 60 qutb (saintly pole): and Lan Xu’s concept of “Perfected Being” (zhen ren), 37, 68, 87–90 and sainthood in Islam, 86–87n39 qutb al-irshad or “pole of guidance” (gu tu bu ao shi 固土補奧 師): and the Kubravi and Naqshbandi Sufis, 87, 87n40

INDEX

175

and Lan Xu’s categorization of Perfected Beings, 68, 87–88 and Lan Xu’s formulaic ending to his biographies, 88–89 Republican Era: and Lan Xu’s diagrams, 26, 144 and Yunhua’s optimistic efforts to revive Islamic knowledge, 9, 135–137, 142, 144 Rocking of the Waves of Lake Er. See Dali massacre of 1873 Rum: and the dynasties of Arabia, 19n21 emperors of, 76–77, 76–77n17 sages of China: and burial locations in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 51, 52t2.2, 55 and Lan Xu’s flood narrative, 56–57 Śākyamuni, 86n38 See also Confucius; Fuxi; Mencius; Nüwa; Pangu; Shennong; tian xian 天仙 (heavenly immortals); xian 仙 (immortals); xian 賢 (worthies); Yao and Shun Savant, Sarah Bowen, and Helena de Felipe, 120–121 Sayyid Ajall (Sai dianchi 赛典赤): “Genealogy of Sayyid Ajall” (Sai dianchi jiapu 赛典赤家谱), 124 and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 52t2.2 and the Ma Family Genealogy, 9, 39, 119, 123–124, 128, 130–131, 131n30, 139, 146 Sela, Ron, 60n52 Seth: burial near the Kaʿba, 59n48 and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad in the biblical line of prophets, 21 Shafi’i, and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 Shan hai jing 山海經, identification of Kunlun as the abode of the Supreme Divinity (Tai di 太帝), 57–58 Shao Yong 邵雍 (Mr. Shao), 142–143, 143n57 Sharf, Robert H., 76n17

176

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

Shem (San mu 三穆): Arabia associated with, 60–61, 94 and Liu Zhi’s description of Muhammad’s place in the biblical line of major prophets, 19n19, 19t1.1 and the post-flood world in Lan Xu’s history, 56–59, 60–61 and the post-flood world in the Islamic tradition, 60, 60n52 Shennong and the post-flood world in the Islamic tradition, 60, 60n52 Shennong 神農: burial location in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 52t2.2, 55, 76 and Fuxi as a composite of many different figures, 62n59 and Lan Xu’s organization of his “Epitaphs of Perfected Beings,” 39–40 as tian xian associated with the Grain Rain, 49t2.1 Shiji 十記, 95n7 silsila (lineage chain) texts, 15, 41 of Muhammad. See Muhammad Mustafa—lineage of Sima Qian 司馬遷, Shiji 史記 of, 95n8, 96 sira. See Liu Zhi 劉智—The Utmost Sage of Arabia (Tian-fang zhisheng shilu); Muhammad Mustafa-biographies (sira) solar-agricultural calendar, and the Lan Xu’s calculation of the death dates of Perfected beings, 38, 47, 48n28, 49t2.1, 51 Solomon: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 49t2.1, 52t2.2, 54n34 and Tabari’s eight eras of time, 30, 30n46 Song dynasty: and Li Huanyi’s biographies of Hui individuals, 96, 98, 108 and the Ma family’s court service, 128, 129 Najm al-Din Suofei’er (Suo fei’er 所非爾), 129, 131, 131n30 Sufism: Ibn ‘Arabi on qutb, 88 Kubravi Sufis, 87, 87n40 Naqshbandi Sufis, 87, 87n40 “Perfect Man” (al-insan al-kamil), 44n14 pole saint. See qutb (saintly poles) See also haqq (the Real, zhen 真), tazkirah; Uways Qarni

INDEX

177

Sui dynasty: and Li Huanyi’s biographies of Hui individuals, 9, 91–92, 96–97, 108, 115 and Liu Zhi’s dating in the Utmost Sage, 101–102 Waqqas’ service to Sui Emperor Wendi, 9, 91–92, 105–107 Suofei’er (Suo fei’er 所非爾), 129, 131, 131n30 Szonyi, Michael, 133 Tabari: eight eras of time from Adam to Muhammad, 30, 30n46 on Noah’s three sons, 60 Taiping rebellion, 78n20, 110 Tang dynasty: Emperor Taizong: edict sanctioning mosque construction in the capital, 96 request of the scriptures in Lan Xu’s system, 30, 33 request of the scriptures in Li Huanyi’s Words and Deeds, 107 request of the scriptures in Liu Zhi’s Utmost Sage, 101–103 Emperor Xuanzong, 101, 107–108, 115, 117 general Han Geshu, 93 and Li Huanyi’s history, 96, 97diagram 4.1, 98, 107–108 biography of Tao Baba, 115–117 Yan Zhenqing, 116 tazkirah: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 40–41, 68 and Muslim identity in nineteenth-and-early-twentieth-century Xinjiang, 6, 68 scholarship on, 55–56n40 and Uways Qarni, 41n6 Thum, Rian, 6, 42n8 study of Uyghur tazirahs, 56n40, 68 tianfang. See Arabia Tianfang shiji 天方世紀, 94 tian xian 天仙 (heavenly immortals): and activity of Perfected Beings after death, 51 and God’s omnipotence, 50

178

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD

and Lan Xu’s discussion of Perfected Beings (zhen ren), 42–46 Ma, Minglong as, 80n25, 85–86 and Mr. Li, 85 and Mt. Kunlun, 80n25, 88 Noah identified as, 48, 49t2.1, 88–89 solar-agricultural periods associated with, 48, 49t2.1, 50–51, 88–89 and zhen ren 真人 (realized human beings), 42–43 See also xian 賢 (worthies) tomb veneration: and animated graves and reappearing dead, 9, 69, 75, 79, 89–90 and connection with Muslim holy men in Bengal, 68 and Engseng Ho’s notion of diaspora, 69 and the trope of the Islamic saint, 68 See also death places —tombs described in Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 67, 68 burial locations, 51, 52t2.2, 53–56 and the trajectory from Arabia to China in Yunhua’s Ma Family Genealogy, 134 Uyghur figures in Li Huanyi’s biographies, 98 and tazkirah writing about shrines in Xinjiang, 68 See also Thum, Rian ʿUmar: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 as one of the four great Sahaba, 70, 70n7 ʿUthman: and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs of Perfect Beings,” 52t2.2, 54 as one of the four great Sahaba, 70, 70n7 Uways Qarni: Mt. Kunlun and caves associated with, 52t2.2, 53, 80n25 and Persian Sufi tazkirah genre, 41n6 as tian xian of the Greater Cold, 49t2.1 Wang Daiyu 王岱輿: guide to Islam by, 2

INDEX

179

and Lan Xu’s “Epitaphs,” 13, 27, 52t2.2 Li Huanyi’s biography of, 93, 106 Waqqas, Sahaba Saʿd Ibn Abi: biography by Li Huanyi, 103–108, 118 burial location, 52t2.2 calendrical period associated with by Lan Xu, 49t2.1 and Hui historical narratives: Lan Xu’s organization of, 30, 33 Li Huanyi’s organization of, 91–93, 98, 145–146 and Liu Zhi’s dating in the Utmost Sage, 101–102 Sui Emperor Wendi, 9, 91–92, 105–107 Wilkinson, Endymion, 26n36 worthies. See xian 賢 (worthies) xian 仙 (immortals): ghosts (gui 鬼) distinguished from, 45–46 and Lan Xu’s discussion of Perfected Beings (zhen ren), 37, 45– 46 pure yang 陽 of, 45–46 and the qutb (pole saint) in Lan Xu, 68, 86–90 and the ten ṛṣis in Buddhism, 86, 86n38 tropes associated with, 85–86, 86n37, 88n42, 93, 115–116, 117 See also tian xian 天仙 (heavenly immortals) xian 賢 (worthies): duty of the emperor to pay respect to, 103 as exceptional humans on the path alongside sages and heavenly immortals, 42, 46 and the “four great Sahaba,” 70n6 and Muhammad’s era in history, 20, 142 See also Muhammad Mustafa—tomb of; Waqqas, Sahaba Saʿd Ibn Abi Xinjiang: and displaced refugees during the Tongzhi era, 109 and the Kunlun Mountains, 57 strategic importance during the Qing of, 5 and tazkirah used to construct Muslim identity in the nineteenth

180

CHINESE HEIRS TO MUHAMMAD and early twentieth century, 6, 68

Yan Zhenqing, 116 Yang, Lihui and Deming An, 57n41, 62 Yao and Shun, and human history organized into nine eras by Lan Xu, 30 Yellow Emperor, and human history organized into nine eras by Lan Xu, 30 Yijing 易經. See Book of Changes Yuan dynasty: and Li Huanyi’s biographies of Hui individuals, 96, 98, 100–108 and the Ma family’s court service, 128, 129 and Sayyid Ajall, 130–131 Yunhua. See Ma Yunhua zhen ren 真人 (realized human beings): and inner cultivation of the Way, 44 and Lan Xu’s discussion of Perfected Beings, 42–45, 44n14 and qutb (saintly poles), 37, 42–44 and tian xian 天仙 (heavenly immortals), 42–43 Zheng He, 109n31 Zhou Mingde: and distribution of Chinese Muslim texts, 139n45 “Praise of the Tianfang Shijing” 天方詩經, and Ma Anli’s Qasida al-burda (Tianfang Shijing), 138–139