Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East 9780192871251, 0192871250

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OX F O R D S T U D I E S I N T H E A B R A HA M IC  R E L IG IO N S General Editors

A DA M  J.  SI LV E R ST E I N and G U Y  G .  S T R OUM S A

OX F O R D S T U D I E S I N T H E A B R A HA M IC R E L IG IO N S This series consists of scholarly monographs and other volumes at the cutting edge of the study of Abrahamic Religions. The increase in intellectual interest in the comparative approach to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam reflects the striking surge in the importance of religious traditions and patterns of thought and behaviour in the twenty-­first century, at the global level. While this importance is easy to detect, it remains to be identified clearly and analysed from a comparative perspective. Our existing scholarly apparatus is not always adequate in attempting to understand precisely the nature of similarities and differences between the monotheistic religions, and the transformations of their “family resemblances” in different cultural and historical contexts. The works in the series are devoted to the study of how “Abrahamic” traditions mix, blend, disintegrate, rebuild, clash, and impact upon one another, usually in polemical contexts, but also, often, in odd, yet persistent ways of interaction, reflecting the symbiosis between them. Titles in the series include The Making of the Abrahamic Religions in Late Antiquity Guy G. Stroumsa Judaism, Sufism, and the Pietists of Medieval Egypt A Study of Abraham Maimonides and His Times Elisha Russ-­Fishbane Purity, Community, and Ritual in Early Christian Literature Moshe Blidstein Islam and its Past Jahiliyya, Late Antiquity, and the Qur’an Edited by Carol Bakhos and Michael Cook Goy Israel’s Others and the Birth of the Gentile Adi Ophir and Ishay Rosen-­Zvi Veiling Esther, Unveiling Her Story The Reception of a Biblical Book in Islamic Lands Adam J. Silverstein The Golden Calf between Bible and Qur’an Scripture, Polemic, and Exegesis from Late Antiquity to Islam Michael E. Pregill

Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East U R I E L SI M O N S O H N

Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Uriel Simonsohn 2023 The moral rights of the author have been asserted First Edition published in 2023 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2022947356 ISBN 978–0–19–287125–1 DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.001.0001 Printed and bound in the UK by TJ Books Limited Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials contained in any third party website referenced in this work.

To Noa

Acknowledgments The seeds of this project were sown in 2013, when I had the good fortune to join a team of excellent scholars at Ben-­Gurion University’s Center for the Study of Conversion and Inter-­Religious Encounters. It was thanks to countless formal and informal discussions that were held there that I began to develop my ideas about religious conversion and the significance of kinship ties for mobilizing, or obstructing, religious change. Later, over the years, various institutions afforded me the invaluable peace and comfort necessary for immersing in research and writing. In 2015, I had the privilege to be part of a research group led by Dorothea Weltecke at the University of Konstanz Kulturwissenschaftliche Kolleg. At Konstanz I benefited from the wisdom and insights of close colleagues, including Ana Echeverria, Alexandra Cuffel, and Clara Almagro-­Vidal. In 2017, I spent two months at the Helen Gartner Hammer Scholars-­ in-­ Residence Program at Brandeis University. Here discussions with local scholars, in particular Bernadette Brooten, contributed immensely to my thoughts about how to look at gender issues in a historical setting for which the extant records offer meager direct evidence. It was also during this time that I initiated with Oded Zinger the research group “Kinship and Community in the Early and Medieval Islamic Mediterranean,” generously supported by the Haifa Center for Mediterranean History. The meetings the group has held in Haifa and Oxford over the past years have been incredibly instrumental for my work. Finally, I was able to bring this project to conclusion thanks to the year I spent at the Israel Institute for Advanced Studies in Jerusalem in 2020–21. The setting of the campus of the Hebrew University as well as the peaceful routine offered by the institute were ideal for the laborious task of putting my ideas into writing. Although clearly of a solitary nature, the historian’s work is highly reliant upon the feedback, ideas, and suggestions of their peers. In my own case, I am grateful to have had the good fortune to share my work with a great many wonderful colleagues. Avner Giladi has been not only a close friend, but also a mentor and a role model. To Ido Shahar I owe thanks for his challenging comments and camaraderie. Luke Yarbrough has been a close friend and a partner to more than one project. And Christian Sahner has been a generous colleague, with whom I have had many fruitful conversations. In addition to the two anonymous reviewers, drafts of various chapters of this book have been read and commented on by Avner Giladi, Simcha Gross, Youval Rotman, Christian Sahner, Ido Shahar, Dina Stein, and Luke Yarbrough. I have also profited from the wisdom and critique of the following colleagues: Keren

viii Acknowledgments Abbou-­Hershkovits, Arezou Azad, Karen Bauer, Massimiliano Borroni, Janet Carsten, Yaniv Fox, Eugenio Garosi, Yitzhak Hen, Nimrod Hurvitz, Moshe Lavee, Regev Nathansohn, John Nawas, David Nirenberg, Arietta Papconstantinou, Micha Perry, Gregor Schwarb, Shai Secunda, Zur Shalev, Ephraim Shoham-­ Steiner, Adam Silverstein, Jack Tannous, David Wasserstein, Moshe Yagur, Avraham Yoskovich, and Oded Zinger. I would like to extend my appreciation to Leigh Chipman for editing the manuscript and to Alia Hijazi for assisting in the early stages of my research. I wish also to thank the editors of the Oxford Studies in the Abrahamic Religions—­ Adam Silverstein and Guy Stroumsa—­for their vote of trust and to the editorial team at Oxford University Press for their hard work along the way. Finally, I wish to thank my wife Noa and our two children, David and Ella. Had it not been for their love, good counsel, comfort, and, at times also perseverance, I would not have been able to carry out this and many other projects over the years.

Contents Note on transliteration systems, translations, dates, and references List of abbreviations

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East

xi xiii

1

1. Contours of Family Dynamics

29

2. “Even though it be against yourselves, or your parents and kinsmen” (Q 4: 135): The Prioritization of God over Family

59

3. Religiously Mixed Families as Sites of Competing Religious Traditions

95

4. “No bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another” (Q 53: 38): The Liminal Position of Women in Religiously Mixed Families

127

5. Female Conversion to Islam: Religious Defiance and Feminine Resistance153 6. Precarious Gatekeepers: Female Power and Religious Conflict The Paradox of Female Religious Power Bibliography Index

177 209 215 253

Note on transliteration systems, translations, dates, and references Post Hijra years are given in accordance to both the Hijri/lunar and Gregorian calendars (e.g. 1/620). Centuries are given in accordance to the Gregorian calendar only. Names of well-­known figures (e.g. Muhammad), places (e.g. Baghdad), and foreign nouns listed in the OED (e.g. qadi, hadith) are given without transliteration. The following transliteration systems have been adopted: IJMES for Arabic, JQR for Hebrew, and GEDSH for Syriac. Biblical citations are of the New Revised Standard Version and Qurʾanic ones are of A.  J.  Arberry, The Koran interpreted. References to both primary sources and secondary studies have been abbreviated and are listed in the following order: author’s name, abbreviated title, volume: page (e.g., Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 3: 287). Full references are found in the Bibliography.

List of abbreviations Ar. Arabic b. Ar. ibn (“son” or “son of ”) Bodl. MS Heb Bodleian Library, Oxford, Hebrew manuscripts collection bt. Ar. bint (“daughter” or “daughter of ”) b‘AZ Babylonian Talmud, ‘Avoda zara bBekh Babylonian Talmud, Bekhorot bGit Babylonian Talmud, Gittin bKetub Babylonian Talmud, Ketubbot bNid Babylonian Talmud, Niddah bQid Babylonian Talmud, Qiddushin bYeb Babylonian Talmud, Yebamot CUL. Or. Cambridge University Library Oriental Collection d. died ENA E. N. Adler Collection, Jewish Theological Seminary Eng. English EI2 Encyclopaedia of Islam, ed. P.  Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C. E. Bosworth, E. Van Donzel, and W. P. Heinrichs. 2nd edition. Leiden: Brill, 1960–2005. EI3 Encyclopaedia of Islam, ed. K.  Fleet, G.  Krämer, D.  Matringe, J.  Nawas, and E. Rowson. 3rd edition. Leiden: Brill, 2007–. EQ Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾan, ed. J. D. McAuliffe. Leiden: Brill, 2001–6. fl. flourished Fr. French Ger. German Heb. Hebrew mKet Mishna, Ketubbot mQid Mishna, Qiddushin mYoma Mishna, Yoma mShab Mishna, Shabbat PO Patrologia Orientalis Q Qurʾan r. reigned Syr. Syriac tHor Tosefta, Horayot tNid Tosefta, Niddah tr. translated T-­S AR Taylor-­Schechter Collection, Cambridge University Library, Arabic Boxes T-­S NS Taylor-­Schechter, Cambridge University Library, New Series yḤ ag Palestinian Talmud, Ḥ agigah

  In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East This book engages with two levels of scholarly discussion that are all too often treated separately, namely the Islamization of the Near East and the place of women in pre-­modern Near Eastern societies. In what follows, I shall argue that these two lines of inquiry can, and should, be read in an integrative manner. Put differently, an adequate assessment of historical themes, such as conversion to Islam, Islamization, religious violence, and the regulation of Muslim–­non-­Muslim ties must attend to the relatively hidden, yet highly meaningful, female side of things. This book is not about the history of women in Muslim-­dominated lands, but about the history of Islam from the perspective of female social agents. Women, I argue, irrespective of their religious affiliation, possessed crucial means for affecting or hindering religious changes, not only in the form of religious conversion but also in the adoption of practices and the delineation of communal boundaries. A focus on the role and significance of female power in moments of religious change within family households offers a historical angle that is relatively absent from modern scholarship. Rather than locating signs of female autonomy or authority in the political, intellectual, religious, or economic spheres, the present endeavor is concerned with women’s little recorded, yet highly significant, role due to their kinship ties. The literary materials chosen for this project originated in the lands between Iran in the east and Egypt in the west over centuries that span from pre-­Islamic times to the later middle period of Islamic history (twelfth–­thirteenth centuries ce). The women discussed in this book were often active in domains of a rather private nature, or at least that fell outside the interests of historiographic recordings. This state of affairs has dictated both the thematic focus of the book and its methodology: By considering a rich and diverse collection of literary evidence, the study uncovers expressions of female power in the context of religiously mixed family settings. It explores women’s significance as mothers, wives, daughters, and sisters in moments of religious change within their households. These women, it  shall be argued, possessed crucial practical and symbolic means to serve as ­brokers of religious practices, as agents of religious conversion, and as communal gatekeepers. It shall be further argued that patriarchal conventions did not hinder non-­ Muslim women from introducing non-­Islamic rituals and objects into Muslim Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East. Uriel Simonsohn, Oxford University Press. © Uriel Simonsohn 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.003.0001

2  Female Power and Religious Change households, or Muslim women from drawing other family members to their religion. Although the discussion in the ensuing chapters moves back and forth across dichotomies such as authority vs. submission or choice vs. expectation, these concepts were in fact mutually constituted and dialectically inseparable. This book seeks to show that what might appear to the modern observer as a state of social inferiority was in fact a source of agency; that operating within the limitations of male authority offered a variety of opportunities to advance personal ends; and, that male stereotypes of female behavior were in fact a reflection of female power. Thus, while dichotomies might seem like oversimplifications of a complex social world, their employment is unavoidable in order to highlight subtleties and nuances of social situations.

Religion, religious communities, and religiously mixed families Historians and anthropologists have wrestled with the adequacy of the term “­religion” for defining the set of principles that constitute the markers of a communal identity that is based on cultic affiliation.1 A similar critique seems to hold valid with regard to the translation of the Arabic dīn, Hebrew dat, Syriac haymānutā and dḥ eltā, Pahlavi dēn, and so forth, as “religion.” Although these terms are code for different perceptions, experiences, and normative orders that emanate from an identification with a divine entity, the modern concept of religion does not do them justice. This leaves us, however, with the options of either specifying an exact term for each so-­called religious tradition, or of resorting to a non-­Western terminology. Alternatively, however, we may choose to retain the use of “religion,” while acknowledging its pitfalls and therefore treating it as a concept that requires contextual definitions. At the base of this latter approach stands a concern with such things as beliefs and myths, on the one hand, and their resulting organizing principles, norms, and practices, on the other. These are meaningful categories not only for the contents of communal life but also for perceptions of inclusion and seclusion, hierarchy, and morality. The term “religion,” despite its limitations, is employed in this book with reference to the communal affiliations of the people with whom it is concerned. While clearly charged with theological meaning, religion is considered here in its social ordering capacity, its practical requirements, and as an element in the identity of those who adopt it. It is in this context that we should think about the claims which religions, specifically monotheistic ones, make upon their adherents. As Chapter 2 of this book shows, Jews, Christians, and Muslims were placed under 1  Asad, “The construction of religion as an anthropological category”; Lincoln, Holy Terrors, 5–8; Becker, “Martyrdom, religious difference, and ‘fear’, ” 301–4; Barton and Boyarin, Imagine No Religion; Boyarin, Judaism, 24; Meylan, Qu’est-­ce que la religion?; Abbasi, “Islam and the invention of religion.”

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  3 the vigorous scrutiny of their respective communal institutions regarding the most mundane of their activities.2 The expectation was that they would show uncompromising fidelity to God, expressed in loyalty to their religious community and submission to its leaders, even at the expense of their sentiments towards their loved ones.3 To that end, biblical archetypes provided literary models for the images of female heroines that featured in late antique, early, and medieval Islamic narratives.4 Both biblical stories and later narratives fascinated the imaginations of popular audiences and thus worked to instill in their minds religious ideals that cut across communal boundaries. A shared scriptural background of monotheistic traditions was likely to generate a resemblance in beliefs and practices among religious communities.5 Thus, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim women displayed a striking similarity in terms of their legal status, their participation in communal and family events, as well as the manner in which they attended to their domestic chores, and their dress, tastes, and leisure activities.6 For present purposes, it was their relative place within their respective communities and within the household that holds special importance. Scriptural ideals, narrative images, and legal prescriptions of diverse religious provenances speak of common patriarchal ideals. Accordingly, girls were to be placed under the authority of their fathers prior to marriage and that of their husbands thereafter. The private domain was perceived as their natural arena of activity, and their roles were seen first and foremost as domestic and reproductive. At the same time, however, as powerful and influential these ideals may have been, we are justly advised to entertain variations and gradations in terms of their implementation across time, space, and cultural settings.7 In an article published in 2013 in The Washington Post, Naomi Schaefer Riley referred to the high rates of Muslim intermarriages in the US. Schaefer Riley proposed that, unlike their Jewish counterparts in the early twentieth century, present-­day American Muslims are far more prone to intermarry since “there are no religious or racial limits in universities and workplaces, and people’s social circles are far more diverse.”8 Similar conditions have been referred to as explanatory for religiously mixed kinship ties in other parts of the globe that are “characterized by  socio-­religious fluidity.”9 Although roughly a millennium earlier, and under

2 Brown, World of Late Antiquity, 186. 3  See Fowden, Empire to Commonwealth; Payne, A State of Mixture, 14. 4 Renard, Crossing Confessional Boundaries, 4–5. 5 Krakowski, Coming of Age, 4, 19–20. 6  See Stillman, Arab Dress; Giladi, Infants, Parents and Wetnurses; Rapoport, Marriage, Money and Divorce, 5; Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 244; Verskin, Barren Women, 15. The question of cross-­ cultural female practices has been rather extensively dealt in its medieval Western contexts; see Baumgarten, “ ‘A separate people’?”; Caballero-­Navas, “The care of women’s health and beauty”; Green, “Conversing with the minority.” 7  Halevi, “Wailing for the dead,” 34; El Saadi, “Rulings and gendering the public space,” 271. 8  Riley, “When Muslims intermarry, do they keep the faith?.” 9  Bangstad, “When Muslims marry non-­Muslims,” 351.

4  Female Power and Religious Change radically different circumstances, the evidence gathered in this book speaks of societies that experienced similar dynamics. These too consisted of communities that were culturally permeable, despite the endeavors of their leaders to curtail exchanges across religious lines.10 The constant tension between formal prescriptions, celebrated ideals, customary practices, and mundane considerations that emerges from narrative and documentary sources is seen here as a reflection of social movements across the boundaries of different religious communities. This holds particularly valid in the case of kinship ties among members of d ­ ifferent religious affiliations that rendered the family a space of intersecting convictions and sentiments. Such ties facilitated a cultural hybridity that bore noteworthy consequences for matters pertaining to identity formation, faith, social hierarchies, and normative arrangements.11 In consequence, the participation of family members of different religious backgrounds in the intimate circle of the household was, as it still is today, a cause of considerable concern on the part of  religious elites. The implications were considerable as well, as mixed families served to facilitate numerous occasions for inter-­communal exchanges through the expansion of social networks and the loosening of religious barriers.12 Under such circumstances, individuals of one religious affiliation may have developed a sense of identification with that of another and a greater readiness to acquire foreign practices, values, and norms.13 This is not to argue for the acquisition of one religious affiliation at the expense of another, but merely to highlight a constant negotiation between them, their reinstatement and diversification.14 In sum, religiously mixed families feature in this book as loci of social and cultural negotiations, in-­between zones, where communal notions are represented, contested, and compromised.15 Their implications are broad, as they challenged ideals of religious unity within the household, thereby affecting not only the tone and contents of the prescriptive texts but also the very notion of communal membership. The phenomenon of religiously mixed families is attested throughout history in different parts of the globe. Despite obvious differences between one case and another, parallel scenarios are helpful for historical analysis, often revealing similarities in the motives and roles of different family members. Case studies from present-­day Western societies suggest that the religious conversion of young males often goes hand in hand with the absence of a paternal figure and a reliance on a strong maternal one.16 In other instances, parents of different religious affiliations are seen showing particular interest in instructing their children in 10 On the tension between elite regulation and lay conduct in the early and medieval Islamic ­ eriods, see Fowden, “Sharing holy places”; Cuffel, “From practice to polemic”; Albera, “ ‘Why are you p mixing what cannot be mixed?’ ”; Weltecke, “Multireligiöse Loca Sancta”; Tannous, The Making of the Medieval Middle East.” 11  See Arweck and Nesbitt, “Close encounters?.” 12  Rodríguez-­García, “Advances in the study of mixedness.” 13 Carsten, The Heat of the Hearth, 12. 14  McCarthy, “Pluralist family values,” 189. 15  See Bhabha, Location of Culture, 1–4. 16 Ullman, The Transformed Self, 40–1, 56.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  5 ac­cord­ance with their respective religious heritages and traditions.17 Similar dynamics, resulting in religious conversion, have also been noted between spouses. The fact that these dynamics were not necessarily temporally, spatially, or culturally bound is suggested by cases of children whose fathers converted to Christianity in medieval Iberia. These children were placed under the care of their fathers, despite their very young age, lest their Jewish mothers had a negative impact on their Christian identity.18 Parallel examples from the early modern Mediterranean serve to justify such apprehensions, given the success of formerly Christian mothers in secretly baptizing their Muslim children and imparting Christian teachings to them.19 The enduring Christian beliefs of women who converted to Islam and the presence of competing religious traditions within the household resulting from intermarriage should be understood in light of the liminal qualities of those partaking in religiously mixed family settings. Either as converts or as affiliates of one religious community who chose to bind their fate together with those of another, members of mixed families could be expected to retain ties with their original coreligionists. This is often suggested by the choice of converts to continue practicing rituals associated with their former religions,20 and the enduring ties of converts and those who married outside the fold with their native religious communities.21 At the same time, liminal qualities can be traced to the descendants of converts and mixed couples. For example, the children of a Muslim father who were baptized on account of their Christian mother could have been considered as both Muslim and Christian at the same time by respective religious authorities.22 Shared family routines among members of different religions were equally informed by competition and conflict. These came in the form of the estrangement of parents from recalcitrant daughters in the event of mixed marriages, and divorce in the event of the conversion of one of the spouses. In other instances, religious competition presented itself in the conflicting didactic agendas of parents, as they might argue over how to instruct their children. Most of all, interreligious conflicts should be seen through the representation of communal agendas within the family. One of the primary arguments of this book concerns the highly intertwined nature of family and communal circles in matters pertaining to religious instruction and discipline. Social repercussions and sanctions, such as the loss of child custody, economic insecurity, and the absence of social solidarities, were often the consequence of religious discord.23 17 Kaplan, Interfaith Families, 101. 18 Tartakoff, Between Christian and Jew, 114. 19  Dursteler, “Fleeing ‘the vomit of infidelity’, ” 183; Semerdjian, “Armenian women, legal bargaining, and gendered politics,” 19. 20  Bernard, “Se convertir à l’Islam chez Chrétiens de Syrie, XVIIe–­XVIIIe siècles.” 21 Kaplan, Interfaith Families, 173; Van Nieuwkerk, Women Embracing Islam, 48. 22  Dursteler, “Fleeing ‘the vomit of infidelity’, ” 183; Gallala-­Arndt, “The impact of religion in interreligious custody disputes”; Shahar, “When ‘mixed’ marriages fall apart.” 23  Tartakoff, “Jewish women and apostasy,” 9–12; Dursteler, “Fleeing ‘the vomit of infidelity’, ” 182; Semerdjian, “Armenian women, legal bargaining, and gendered politics,” 3.

6  Female Power and Religious Change

Writing about female power in religiously mixed family settings This book attempts to locate expressions and forms of female power in the ­framework of the family in a period that was crucial to the formation of Islamic civilization. Schaefer Riley observes with regard to mixed married couples in American homes that women often take charge over the religious aspects of family life, by assuming various related responsibilities, including attendance at religious services and supervision of their children’s religious education. This may explain the results of a survey that Schaefer Riley commissioned in 2010, that covered roughly 2,500 participants and showed that “children in interfaith families are more than twice as likely to adopt the faith of their mother as the faith of their father.”24 Another gender-­characteristic feature that was noted with regard to present-­day Western societies is that women are particularly attractive targets for the missionizing efforts of religions.25 This has been partially explained as being due to women being the markers of religious boundaries, with women’s religious choices at the center of inter-­ethnic and interreligious rivalries.26 Despite obvious differences, the following chapters will seek to show that religiously mixed family dynamics in pre-­ modern Muslim-­ dominated societies were crucially affected by the presence of their female members for similar reasons. Women’s history, it is premised here, speaks of social spheres that were beyond the immediate concerns of male informants and therefore offer a counter perspective to the one that dominates pre-­modern literary testimonies and, consequently, modern scholarship. That said, the choice to focus on women as a historical theme has already met with considerable critique. In her seminal essay from 1986, Joan Scott responds to Natalie Zemon Davis’s position that there is no justification for women’s history any more than there is for a class-­focused history.27 According to Scott, the number of case studies pertaining to women justifies an assessment of continuities and discontinuities in the history of women and an amendment to their misrepresentation in modern scholarship. These, in turn, she argues, will contribute to the development of gender theories that will counter traditional, outdated, and overly generalizing “social scientific frameworks.”28 Scott proposes to think about gender as a system of relations, rather than as a means for balancing a seeming overemphasis on men’s affairs. As such, a gender-­sensitive approach towards female case studies should consist of observations of social relations between the 24  Schaefer Riley, “When Muslims intermarry.” 25  Van Nieuwkerk, Women Embracing Islam, p. xi. 26  Ibid., 1. 27  Scott, “Gender: a useful category of historical analysis,” 1054; Davis, “ ‘Women’s history’ in transition,” 90. 28  Scott, “Gender: a useful category of historical analysis,” 1055.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  7 sexes, and within society as a whole, including “institutions, ideologies, economic resources, identities, beliefs, practices, family life, death and burial, the writing of history, and more.”29 Writing women’s history in pre-­modern times, however, is bound to be riddled with difficulties. The immediate impression is that women’s affairs did not merit recording unless they pertained in one way or another to those of men.30 As a result, historians have shifted their inquiries from events to meanings.31 Such an approach calls for a clearer vision of power relations that hinge upon gender differences, generating a historical outlook that takes cognizance of the agendas underpinning dominant discourses. It is, therefore, a history of discourse, symbols, and imagined possibilities that we should be seeking in order to uncover the place of women in society, their relative power, and roles. A historical analysis of this kind is premised on the working principle that representations can be dismantled to discover the realities behind them. As we shall see throughout this book, these representations feature in pre-­modern Near Eastern societies in relation to patriarchal principles that dictate polarities between honor and shame and the public and the private.32 The challenge at hand, then, is to locate objects of meaning within a social setting that reflect a notable preoccupation with female concealment. To that end, Bernadette Brooten advises historians of women’s history to employ a “thorough and careful study of all available sources.”33 She calls for the net to be cast as wide as possible over a rich selection of sources: a synthesis of documentary, narrative, and material evidence. The meaning of a legal prescription, for example, can be significantly enhanced when read through its narrative illustrations and against its physical application.34 Moreover, an openness to evidence across religious and ethnic differences permits us to observe the actions, gestures, and articulations of various social players against a shared setting, thus compensating for the all too often fragmentary nature of the extant sources.

Female power within a patriarchal setting According to the patriarchal norms that informed the lives of the communities discussed in this book, a female’s subordination to male authority was manifested in relations between fathers and daughters, between brothers and sisters, and 29  Smith, “Introduction: gendering the early medieval world,” 1. See also Nashat and Beck, Women in Iran, 2; Baumgarten, Mothers and Children, 4. 30  See Hambly, “Becoming visible.” 31  Scott, “Gender: a useful category of historical analysis,” 1066. 32 Mathieson, Christian Women in the Greek Papyri of Egypt, 4. 33  Brooten, “Early Christian women and their cultural context,” 67. 34  Keddie, “Problems in the study of Middle Eastern women,” 227–8; Guity and Beck, Women in Iran, 2–3; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 4.

8  Female Power and Religious Change most decisively between husbands and wives. The expressions of patriarchal control will be discussed in detail in Chapter  1, as a point of departure for assessing ­gender relations in moments of religious change. It is necessary, however, to specify from the outset that, in locating women within patriarchal settings, I am not interested in identifying moments of female liberation, autonomy, or resistance. Rather, the ensuing discussion endorses Deniz Kandiyoti’s proposal that we fix our gaze on women’s strategies within the normative constraints of their society.35 These strategies can be seen in different forms of negotiation, bargaining, or maneuvering that allowed women to exercise agency within patriarchal constraints. According to Saba Mahmud, as social analysts, our task is to investigate the particular factors that enable female agency: “Agency is the capacity of action that specific relations of subordination create and enable.”36 It is attained, Kandiyoti notes, both actively and passively, in correspondence to local circumstances, “susceptible to historical transformations.”37 As such, gender negotiations of power allow us to observe both meaningful aspects of female power as well as the social order that is constructed through conflict and collaboration between the sexes. Women’s forms of religious power will be sought here in relation to the relative social capitals that they possessed and the means that were available to them for advancing their goals. In the context of a woman’s kinship ties, the extant evidence highlights the significance of her enduring relations with her natal family, especially for its material support. In other instances, a woman would attain social status through her descendants. And whereas for some women seclusion in the private domain would be a sign of high status, for others their presence in commercial and industrial spaces offered access to social resources. Yet both within the private sphere and outside it, the dependency of women on male patrons was a given, not only as subjects to their authority but also as proxies of their agendas. At the same time, the highly emotional, and therefore affective, ties between mothers and sons, among siblings, and between spouses, were greatly instrumental in the course of social negotiations. Accordingly, social norms, albeit governed by patriarchal values, were also the sources of female agency.38 The expectation that women should be able to achieve their objectives by means of feminist liberation is, therefore, essentialist by nature when it comes to pre-­ modern societies in general and Near Eastern ones in particular.39 It was within 35  Kandiyoti, “Bargaining with patriarchy.” Cf. Kandiyoti, “Rethinking bargaining with patriarchy,” where Kandiyoti did not retract her ideas about female bargaining within the constraints of male authority, but sought to separate the discussion about gender relations from the one about class struggles. Avoiding judgmental observations that are couched in a presupposed set of values, allows the focus to be on individual cases and to test them in their own context and power arrangements. 36 Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 19. See also Fraser, “Introduction,” 17; Charrad, “Women’s agency across cultures,” 518; Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 118; Rinaldo, “Pious and critical”; Zinger, “Goitein and strong women.” 37  Kandiyoti, “Islam and patriarchy,” 26. 38  Charrad, “Women’s agency across cultures,” 518. 39 Jones, “Citizenship in a woman-­friendly polity,” 786–7; Thompson, “Public and private in Middle Eastern women’s history,” 53; Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 5–6, 11, 14.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  9 the confines of the family and in attendence to the ideals of a patriarchal society that women possessed social power; not through their resistance to male authority, but by embracing it.40 Past scholarship has made note of a host of factors that dictated a woman’s social place, including life in urban versus rural settings, topography, climate, socio-­economic conditions, and local cultural traditions.41 For example, it has been argued that, in contrast to the Arabian tribal societies, “the urban centers of medieval Islam were crowded, with strangers interacting together and a very active merchant economy.”42 While veiling and seclusion in the former was the result of social intimacy and proximity, in the latter these were equally called for, yet more prevalent among the upper classes who possessed the economic means for their application.43 According to Leila Ahmed, the depiction of patriarchal arrangements and female behavior in pre-­Islamic Arabia derived from an Islamic endeavor to promote its own set of norms and practices.44 Ahmed’s judicious observation, however, did not stop her from rather naïvely relaying on early Islamic reports in order to argue for a greater measure of female participation in the public sphere prior to the rise of Islam, and shortly thereafter, in comparison to later trends.45 Similar conclusions have been reached by Fatima Mernissi, who has argued on the basis of hadith material that Islamic veiling was prescribed only after converts to Islam had advocated for it.46 The trend of female seclusion would intensify, so the theory goes, only to be relaxed following the increasing domination of military elites as of the eleventh century.47 It is against these readings, however, that other scholars have called for the acknowledgment of a complex social setting in which women possessed different forms of social power.48

Forms of female power In order to locate different forms of women’s social power in the Muslim-­ dominated societies of the pre-­modern Near East, it is essential to begin by identifying some of the main restrictions that were imposed on them. These should allow an understanding of the normative order in which women operated on the one hand, and an assessment of their ability to maneuver within that order on the 40  Rinaldo, “Pious and critical.” 41 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 322; Marín and Deguilhem, “Introduction,” p. xvi; Giladi, “Sex, marriage and the family in al-­Ghazālī’s thought,” 179–80. 42  Sonbol, “Rise of Islam: 6th to 9th century,” 7. 43  Keddie and Baron, Women in Middle Eastern History, 2; El Cheikh, “Revisiting the Abbasid harems,” 12; Lev, “Women in the urban space of medieval Muslim cities,” 157. 44  Ahmed, “Women and the advent of Islam,” 671. See also Teipen, “Jahilite and Muslim women,” 440. 45  Ahmed, “Women and the advent of Islam,” 691. 46 Mernissi, The Veil and the Male Elite. 47 Afsaruddin, “Islamic biographical dictionaries: 11th to 15th century,” 32–3; Abou-­ Taleb, “Constructing the image of the model Muslim woman,” 197–201. 48  Thompson, “Public and private in Middle Eastern women’s history”; Lev, “Women in the urban space of medieval Muslim cities,” 157; see Katz, Women in the Mosque, 118–19.

10  Female Power and Religious Change other. Perhaps the most principal expression of female restriction that derived from the patriarchal arrangements under consideration is the spatial one. A clear distinction between the private and public spheres of social activities and the ideal according to which women were to be restricted to the private sphere had substantial implications for the most mundane of practices. These came in the form of architectural planning, dress codes, sitting arrangements, occupational choices, the division of labor within the household, physical movement, social gestures, not to mention the contents of public sermons, legal injunctions, and folktales.49 As Islamic ideals, they feature already in the Qurʾan, numerous aḥ ādīth, and legal principles.50 And although the exact origins of principles of female seclusion are hard to pinpoint, their prevalence among Near Eastern cultures long before the rise of Islam is evident.51 Their implementation and enforcement were entrusted to male relatives, most notably fathers and husbands. It was as if women could not stand on their own; their decisions, occupations, and movements were to be ubiquitously sanctioned and supervised by men.52 As a result, a woman’s capacity to advance her interests through personal contacts other than her male patrons was highly circumscribed by her gender.53 Once again, however, female limitations resulting from patriarchal conventions did not necessarily mean the lack of female agency, for such actions as veiling and seclusion could have been a matter of a woman’s choice as much as fulfillment of a man’s expectation.54 Furthermore, there is more than a little to suggest that within the domicile itself women possessed ample opportunity to exert power and assert meaningful claims. Assessed in the context of male domination, indications of female power within the household align with the propositions noted above to identify moments of female agency in forms other than resistance or struggle. As we shall see in Chapter 1, medieval theoreticians of different religious backgrounds presented a set of ideals that entrusted the woman with the management of the household. Accordingly, the woman was seen as the mistress of the private domain, taking charge of its order and maintenance through the supervision and instruction of its members. Another source of a woman’s relative power stemmed from her intimate relations with her husband. The effectiveness of sexual abstinence 49  Keddie and Baron, Women in Middle Eastern History, 2–4; Bahloul, The Architecture of Memory, 30; Stowasser, “Women and citizenship in the Qur’an,” 28; Stillman, Arab Dress, 56, 139–45; Halevi, “Wailing for the dead,” 28; El Cheikh, “Revisiting the Abbasid harems,” 6–7, 12; Coope, “An etiquette for women,” 77; Giladi, “Sex, marriage and the family in al-­Ghazālī’s thought,” 182; Lev, “Women in the urban space of medieval Muslim cities,” 151–3. 50 Spectorsky, Women in Classical Islamic Law, 45. 51 MacDonald, “Early Christian women married to unbelievers,” 224–8; Ahmed, Women and Gender in Islam, 26–7, 67, 79, 86; Halevi, “Wailing for the dead,” 33–4. 52 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 313; Puente, “Juridical sources for the study of women,” 101–3; Katz, “Gender and law.” 53 Goitein, Med. Soc. 5, 228; Kraemer, “Women speak for themselves”; Zinger, “The use of social isolation.” 54 Wilkinson, Women and Modesty in Late Antiquity, 2.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  11 in preventing war has already been suggested by Aristophanes (d. 386 bce) in his famous Lysistrata. Centuries later, admittedly for different reasons, Christian women were advised to employ a similar measure with regard to their unbelieving husbands.55 And there is good reason to accept the assertion that, among Near Eastern societies, “[a]lthough men might control the quantity of sex, women had much control over its quality and the amount of pleasure the man had.”56 Finally, we should not undermine the social rewards that came with the fulfillment of reproduction expectations. Whereas in antiquity giving birth could have gained a woman her “independence from her husband,”57 there is enough to suggest that in the Islamic Near East a woman was “partially ‘redeemed’ from her innate social inferiority” by producing sons, who later, as adults, would look after their mother’s interests.58 We are thus reminded that the flip side of male patronage was protection and intercession, as fathers, husbands, brothers, and sons provided their womenfolk with personal safety and economic security and facilitated access to male-­dominated institutions and venues.59 The centrality of kinship networks in this context has been well noted and recently characterized as “patronage networks,” through which women were able to advance their interests and on which they might fall back in cases of need.60 It should be remarked, however, that an image of female confinement to the private sphere of the domicile is a highly distorted one. A host of activities—­ occupational, economic, religious, and others—­suggest that women were present in a variety of public spaces. Private letters from early Islamic Egypt speak of women traveling to visit relatives and performing pilgrimage.61 There is also indication of women traveling to oversee estates and business, an activity which further indicates that ownership of property and possession of wealth were not limited to men.62 While in most cases we may assume that the accumulation of wealth was achieved through inheritance and matrimonial gifts, there is also some evidence, although relatively thin, of business women as well.63 Further

55  MacDonald, “Early Christian women married to unbelievers,” 228. 56  Keddie and Baron, Women in Middle Eastern History, 10. 57  Horn and Martens, “Let the little children come to me,” 23. 58 Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 163. 59  Puente, “Juridical sources for the study of women,” 100–3; Azad, “Female mystics in mediaeval Islam,” 60; Coope, “An etiquette for women,” 77; Zinger, “Women, gender and law,” 41–6. 60 Krakowski, Coming of Age, 15. See also Zinger, “The use of social isolation,” 834. 61 Dietz, Wandering Monks, Virgins, and Pilgrims, 108; Bagnall, Cribiore, and Ahtaridis, Women’s Letters from Ancient Egypt, 81; Schenke, “Christian women in Muslim Egypt,” 69. 62  Bagnall, Cribiore, and Ahtaridis, Women’s Letters from Ancient Egypt, 80; Whitcomb, “Ladies of Quseir,” 64. 63 On women’s inheritance, see Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 326; Keddie and Baron, Women in Middle Eastern History, 7; Shatzmiller, “Women and property rights in Al-­Andalus and the Maghrib”; Rapoport, Marriage, Money and Divorce, 14–16, 30; Rapoport, “Women and gender in Mamluk society,” 17–18. On women’s management of property and financial affairs and transactions, see Berkey, Transmission of Knowledge in Medieval Cairo, 165; Katz, “Gender and law”; a particularly telling and rare example is that of the eleventh-­century Jewish businesswoman known as al-­Wuḥsha (“the desired one”)—a wealthy,

12  Female Power and Religious Change indication of women’s participation in the urban economy can be extracted from  both narrative and documentary sources. They speak of women being highly visible in economic life, including the marketplace, and in a variety of occupations in the fields of industry, medicine, finances, education, and more.64 Here we should recall once again that variations in socio-­economic backgrounds were of considerable weight, as women of the higher classes were more homebound than others since their presence outside the home was not warranted.65 Such variations reflect a tension between ideals of female seclusion and the daily exigencies of urban families that relied on the economic participation of women no less than on that of men. A similar tension can be detected in matters pertaining to education and religious knowledge. The extant evidence confirms the continuation of late antique practices, whereby parents, particularly mothers, provided their daughters with basic reading skills and a limited acquaintance with sacred texts.66 And although there is no indication of female enrollment in formal institutions of learning, there is considerable indication of Muslim women who received religious training, assumed teaching positions, transmitted hadith, and excelled in memorizing the Qurʾan and Arabic grammar.67 The presence of women in public religious events was limited to a female audience, whereby Muslim women assumed religious leadership positions, rendering legal opinions, and even serving as judges.68 Nonetheless, we may assume male audiences as well. According to Delia Cortese and Simonetta Calderini, women who sat in the markets fulfilled an important role as Ismaʿīlī propagandists (dāʿī) during the tenth and eleventh centuries in Syria and North Africa, propagating doctrine among the merchants with whom they came into contact.69 Admittedly, the assertion relies principally on narrative sources that served to valorize the achievements of Ismaʿīlī leaders and present their households as models of utmost piety. Similar expectations may have been at the background of a report about the eschatological preaching of a Jewish woman unmarried business woman, about whom we have highly detailed information in the Geniza; see Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 346–52. 64  Shatzmiller, “Aspects of women’s participation in the economic life of later Medieval Islam”; Rapoport, Marriage, Money and Divorce, 32; Rapoport, “Women and gender in Mamluk society,” 22–4; El Cheikh, “Women’s history,” 140; Sonbol, “Rise of Islam: 6th to 9th century”; El Saadi, “Fiqh rulings and gendering the public space,” 269. 65 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 324; Lev, “Women in the urban space of medieval Muslim cities,” 156. On the emergence of the term mukhaddara in the thirteenth century in reference to women of a high social status who secluded themselves from the public sphere, see Katz, Women in the Mosque, 107. 66 Hezser, Jewish Literacy in Roman Palestine, 44; Tannous, The Making of the Medieval Middle East, 17–18 n. 27. 67 Goitein, Med. Soc. 2, 183–5; Bulliet, “Women and the urban religious elite in the pre-­Mongol period”; Rapoport, “Women and gender in Mamluk society,” 38; El Cheikh, “Observations on women’s education”; Berkey, Transmission of Knowledge in Medieval Cairo, 162–75. 68 Chamberlain, Knowledge and Social Practice in Medieval Damascus, 52–3; Sonbol, “Rise of Islam: 6th to 9th century”; Coope, “An etiquette for women,” 78; Katz, “Gender and law.” Cf. Sayeed, “Gender and legal authority.” 69  Cortese and Calderini, Women and the Fatimids, 23.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  13 in Baghdad in 514/1120 amidst a wave of anti-­Jewish persecutions.70 The report that was preserved in the Geniza further notes that the caliph ridiculed the Jews for paying heed to the woman and gave orders that she be burned. On the very same night Elijah appeared in the caliph’s dream, an event which apparently resulted in the termination of Muslim violence. The historicity of the event aside, the account aligns with the sentiments of societies in which women were perceived as legitimate bearers of spiritual authority, particularly among mystical circles.71 Education and literacy were not merely forms of cultural capital, but also means of acquiring direct access to formal institutions, most notably legal ones. The ability to write letters and initiate formal documents was bound to release women from their dependence on their male patrons for purposes of safeguarding their property, making legal claims, bequeathing, and appealing to communal authorities.72 While there is little reason to assume high literacy rates among women, there is quite a bit to suggest that women had recourse to public institutions, specifically courts of law, whether as litigants or witnesses.73 In the latter case, women’s testimony was of special value with regard to matters of restricted female nature, such as childbirth.74 Women’s appearances in legal venues, it should be noted, were often a cause of notable communal discomfort and resulted in both social and legal attempts to dissuade women from them.75

Male conceptions of female power At the base of male apprehensions lay a set of ideals and conceptions regarding women in society, namely their relative place with respect to men, their disordering nature, and, consequently, the manner in which they were expected to conduct themselves. These were expressed through a rich variety of sources, narrative as well as documentary, that reveal not only the patriarchal expectations of their authors but also the symbolic meanings that were ascribed to women and their activities.76 While ideals are mainly expressions of an aspired reality, their significance for recovering experiences cannot be overstated. They are the basis of legal principles and social expectations that were imagined and presented by religious 70  Goitein, “A report on messianic troubles in Baghdad in 1120–21.” 71 Cornell, Early Sufi Women, 48, 57; El Cheikh, “Revisiting the Abbasid harems,” 54; Azad, “Female mystics in mediaeval Islam,” 81. 72  Friedman, “Termination of the marriage upon the wife’s request”; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 332, Med. Soc. 5, 227; Zinger, “The use of social isolation,” 821–2. 73  Tillier, “Women before the Qāḍī”; Zinger, “Women, gender and law.” 74 Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 131–2. 75  Early rabbinic positions already reflect a discomfort with the appearance of women in legal courts; see Ilan, “Gender issues and daily life,” 51; Puente, “Juridical sources for the study of women,” 102–3; Tillier, “Women before the Qāḍī,” 281. 76  For an example of a methodological approach that seeks to extract perceptions of gender, identity, and community through female symbols, see Hasan-­Rokem, Tales of the Neighborhood.

14  Female Power and Religious Change elites: a reflection of prevalent attitudes that held meaning for the application of social practices. Veiling, seclusion, distinctions between the public and the private, social hierarchies, patronage, forms of education, and access to social power should all be understood in the context of the normative expectations found in scripture, tradition, folklore, and jurisprudence.77 For example, depictions of women in medieval Jewish folktales are often founded on the biblical architypes of the matriarchs, female judges, prophetesses, and queens. Their stories were used to offer moral guidance for potential readers, or auditors, by highlighting a variety of positive and negative female attributes.78 A similar method is adopted in late antique Christian compositions that portray the miraculous and heroic deeds of female martyrs and saints.79 A particularly telling example is the Syriac Ktābā d-­neshē (“book of women”), dated to the sixth century and featured in subsequent variant copies in the eighth through the twelfth centuries.80 The text includes the biblical accounts of Ruth, Esther, Susannah, and Judith (as well as Thobit in at least one version), to which that of St. Thecla was added. It is considered a unique Christian composition that was written with the didactic intention of underscoring female “self-­sacrifice, fidelity, and chastity” by positing Thecla’s character in relation to biblical archetypes.81 And while a similar focus on female ideal behavior and social place is found throughout the Qurʾan, above all in sūrat al-­nisāʾ (“the chapter of the women”), a particularly rich repository of such ideals is to be found in Islamic biographical literature and hadith.82 Like earlier Jewish and Christian materials, the Qurʾan often posits its ideals of proper female behavior in correspondence to images of b ­ iblical figures.83 Its attitude towards women is ambivalent, whereby they are seen as equal to men in the eyes of God (Q 33:35), while at the same time secondary to them (Q 2:223), ­mentally weak, physically impure (Q 2:222), and as a source of social disorder. Accordingly, they are to be placed under the authority of their male patrons (Q 4:34).84 The incorporation of biblical motifs in later Islamic lore can be discerned in a story about the strong nature of Egyptian women found in Ibn ʿAbd al-­Ḥakam’s (d. 257/871) Kitāb futūḥ Miṣr wa-­akhbāruhā (“The conquests of Egypt and the reports about it”), later further recounted in Islamic historiography.85 It explains 77  See Ahmed, Women and Gender in Islam, 27; Noorani, “Normative notions of public and private,” 49; Katz, Women in the Mosque, 3; Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 16, 19–20. 78  Dishon, “Images of women in medieval literature.” 79  See, e.g., Brock and Harvey, Holy Women of the Syrian Orient. 80  Burrus and Van Rompay, “Some further notes on Thecla,” 226–7. 81  Burrus, “The Syriac Book of Women,” 94. 82  Roded, “Women and the Quran.” 83 Stowasser, Women in the Qur’an, chs 2, 3; Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 115. 84  Here it should be noted that Qurʾanic ideas reflect a notable change in the economic status of women, whereby they were entitled to possess property, to bequeath and inherit, and to receive a dowry; see Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 25–6. 85 Ibn ʿAbd al-­Ḥ akam, Futūḥ Miṣr, 28; al-­ Maqrīzī, al-­Khiṭaṭ, 102, 129; al-­ Suyūṭī, Ḥ usn al-­ muḥ āḍara, 45.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  15 that, following the elimination of Pharaoh and his army in the Red Sea, the only men that were left in Egypt were slaves and servants, resulting in the rule of an Egyptian queen (Dalūka bt. Zabbāʾ) and the general dominance of Egyptian women. While the report has been considered as a rare instance of reversed gender hierarchies, its retelling should be seen as indicating the extraordinary sequence it reports. Had it not been for the assumed inferiority of women, the story would have been less likely to draw the attention of later Muslim historians.86 Nonetheless, the significance of the story is not only in its subtext. The intersection of a biblical event, early religious historiography, and perceptions of female power and place was a common feature in diverse religious textual traditions. It is through the reasoning that assumes male authority in different religious traditions that we may capture some of the governing perceptions of legal and normative principles. A central aspect of this reasoning, attested in late antique Jewish and Christian traditions, was that women are weak and are thus more prone than men towards sinful behavior.87 The fifth- or sixth-­century Life of Abraham, depicting a male holy man endeavoring to save a girl who has gone astray due to temptation, is a case in point. The story relates how a fourth-­century recluse from Qidun (near Edessa) had set out to rescue his niece Mary from prostitution.88 Her eventual healing and reversion to proper Christian conduct was attributed to the ascetic. And while ascetic females were presented by late antique Christian authors as equal to their male counterparts in their devotion, their nature was nonetheless considered weaker.89 It has been suggested that the very same notion lay behind seventh-­century Coptic sermons that enjoined men to control the behavior of their womenfolk.90 In a similar way, the Qurʾanic appointment of men over the affairs of women in Q 4:34 has been understood in the context of male mental superiority.91 According to some Muslim scholars, however, a woman’s inferiority, at least intellectually, was not necessarily due to her nature, but rather on account of her seclusion; her removal from society and lack of access to sacred knowledge.92 And in other instances, it was the female body, specifically its reproductive organs, that were depicted as the source of women’s weakness, both physically and morally.93 Further justification for female submission to male authority was centered on  the strong notion of women as the source of social disorder, moral ­decadence,  and sin, on account of their sexuality and their seductive nature. 86  The anecdote has received notable attention in modern scholarship; see Goitein, “The position of women,” 177; Goitein, Med. Soc. 5, 310; Goitein, “The Jewish family in the days of Moses Maimonides,” 26; Abu-­Lughod, Veiled Sentiments, 45; Sijpesteijn, “Building an Egyptian identity.” 87  Barkai, “Greek medical traditions,” 117. 88  Brock and Ashbrook Harvey, Holy Women of the Syrian Orient, 27–36. 89  Muehlberger, “Simeon and other women in Theodoret’s Religious History,” 592. 90 Wilfong, Women of Jeme, 31. 91  Sonbol, “Rise of Islam: 6th to 9th century,” 7; Katz, “Gender and law.” 92 Katz, Women in the Mosque, 5. 93 Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 115.

16  Female Power and Religious Change The notion is yet again an old one that goes back to biblical figures such as Eve, Potiphar’s wife, and Delilah, resonating, for example, with early rabbinic references to women as sexually desirous towards their husbands.94 In other instances, the ground for denying women the study of the Torah was their potentially disturbing voices.95 The “myth of temptation,” and the subsequent Fall continued to haunt the male imagination, branding all women as Eve’s descendants and therefore bound to lead their men astray and provoke social havoc.96 These early notions made their way into Islamic literature, specifically hadith, in which women are often associated with fitna (“test,” “temptations”). The term was understood in certain contexts to denote sexual temptation, posing a moral test that was followed by an Islamic prohibition of mixing (ikhtilāṭ ) between men and women who were not related to one another.97

Literary testimonies of female power The Muslims would not look at Abū Sufyān and would not sit with him, whereupon he said to the Prophet: “O Prophet of Allah, grant me three things.” He (the Prophet) said, “Yes.” He (Abū Sufyān) said, “I have the best daughter among the Arabs and the most beautiful one—­Umm Ḥ abība bt. Abī Sufyān; I wish to marry her to you.” He (the Prophet) said, “Yes.” He (Abū Sufyān) said, “And Muʿāwiya, appoint him as secretary in your service.” He (the Prophet) said, “Yes.” He (Abū Sufyān) said, “And appoint me as commander so I may fight the infidels, as I fought the Muslims.” He (the Prophet) said, “Yes.” Abū Zumayl said, “Had he not requested this from the Prophet he would have not granted it to him, since he (i.e., the Prophet) was not asked for a thing without saying ‘Yes.’ ”98 The renown Abū Sufyān b. Ḥ arb b. Umayya is reported to have embraced Islam around 8/630.99 According to the hadith, however, Abū Sufyān’s conversion to Islam did not result in his immediate social immersion among his new coreligionists. In order to attain a respected position within the Muslim community, 94 Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 133. 95 Brown, The Body and Society, 118, 145; Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 169. See also Talmudic discussions describing powerless women whose principal weapon was their tears. Accordingly, they are subject to male patronage and are hindered from studying the Torah. Any exception to this rule is presented as a sign of female licentiousness: Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 108, 133, 167–9, 178, 182. 96  Barkai, “Greek medical traditions,” 117; Teipen, “Jahilite and Muslim women.” 97  Katz, “Gender and law.” See also Malti-­Douglas, Woman’s Body, Woman’s Word, 106; El Cheikh, Women, Islam, and Abbasid Identity, 83; El Saadi, “Fiqh rulings and gendering the public space,” 265; Lutfi, “Manners and customs of fourteenth-­century Cairene women.” 98  Muslim b. al-­Ḥ ajjāj, Ṣaḥ īḥ Muslim, 2: 1168 (no. 2501). 99  Watt, “Abū Sufyān.”

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  17 he  made three requests of the Prophet, one of which was that the latter would marry his daughter Umm Ḥ abība. The figure of Umm Ḥ abība bt. Abī Sufyān features in Islamic tradition as a powerful woman who endured the hardships of migration, sustained her Muslim identity while married to an apostate (prior to her marriage to the Prophet), and chose to prioritize her spiritual kinship over her biological one. Yet contrary to other reports about Umm Ḥ abība, her figure in the above hadith is a passive one. She is voiceless, yet not insignificant. Her fate is negotiated between two men, irrespective of her wishes or interests. Yet she is anything but ignored, a fact indicated by her barter value, as her father offers her in marriage so he may improve his social position. The historicity of the reported figures and the events are of little consequence for present purposes. We need not concerns ourselves with the authenticity of the tradition, its chain of transmission, or whether the events it reports actually took place. Rather, it is the centrality of figures such as Abū Sufyān and Umm Ḥ abība in Islamic historical memory, the anticipated codes of social conduct that underpin their stories, and their literary recording, that are worthy of our attention. Broadly speaking, they highlight the themes that were part of the conceptual world of early and medieval Muslim writers and their audiences, allowing us to reconstruct some of the notions and ideals that informed contemporary social arrangements. The social setting in which the exchange between Abū Sufyān and the Prophet took place was a patriarchal one, privileging men over women in matters pertaining to social agency beyond the private sphere of the domicile. At the same time, it was a setting in which a person’s social allegiances and achievements were highly dependent on his lineage, kinship, and household affiliations. It was in these contexts that women possessed power, affecting not only the social interests of their kinsfolk but also their mundane and spiritual routines. As a woman, Umm Ḥ abība endowed her father with the means to negotiate his social position. Her value increased owing to her pious reputation, specifically her early conversion to Islam, which may have also constituted a crucial factor in that of her father. Islamic narratives contain numerous tales that refer to relations among family members of different religions, at the center of which women feature as either passive or active, powerful or allegedly weak. Their depictions as feeble-­minded and prone to sin are dominant, yet not exclusive. In some instances they show up as resourceful, yet also cunning, or untrustworthy and even unclean, yet also pious and noble.100 These representations are indicative not only of a complex imagery but also of the symbolic significance of female figures for purposes of delineating

100  For examples and analysis of such representations, see Cuffel, Gendering Disgust; Schippers, “Some remarks on the women’s stories,” 278–80; Kueny, Conceiving Identities.

18  Female Power and Religious Change social boundaries and ascribing moral values to different acts and beliefs.101 “Women are good to think with,” as has been famously coined; accordingly, we should consider their narrative representations as symbolic constructs of a male imagination.102 Thus, for example, female figures were instrumental in early Christian narratives that were couched in a dichotomy between “desire and self-­ restraint, passion and renunciation.”103 The association of women with sexual promiscuity lent their images a literary efficiency for signaling the porous state of religious boundaries. We may therefore think of female imageries as literary devices in texts that were composed for purposes of normative edification. This is particularly evident in hagiographic narratives that contained a variety of symbolic features, such as names, places, scriptural allusions, and actions that served as literary devices for advancing meanings and ideals of religious significance.104 With regard to religious boundaries, scholars of late antiquity and early Islamic history note the great utility of stories about saints, martyrs, and exceptional figures in advancing notions of communal affiliation and boundaries.105 Thus, rather than treat female narrative depictions, whether misogynistic or laudatory, as informants of historical facts, it is their tone, context, setting (religious, social, political, economic, etc.), and potential impact on the reader to which we should be attentive.106 These reflect both the aspired normative order of their authors as well as the social reality which they targeted. Read in tandem with other forms of documentary evidence, including legal treatises, regulations, depositions, private letters, and communal records, and different forms of historiography, legendary tales can be utilized for reconstructing the relative place and power of women in society.

Narratives about the first female followers of Muhammad It is with the above considerations in mind that I approach early and medieval Islamic stories about the Prophet’s Companions, specifically female Companions—­ the saḥ ābiyyāt. Put differently, the biographies of first-generation Muslims were  very similar to Christian hagiographies and other narratives of ­legendary nature.107 Their recording served, among other things, to advance a worldview, a set of values, norms, and practices in the context of the realities of 101  Cuffel, “From practice to polemic”; Cuffel, Gendering Disgust; El Cheikh, Women, Islam, and Abbasid Identity, 8. For similar assessments regarding the symbolic meaning of women in late antiquity, see Lieu, “The attraction of women’ in/to early Judaism and Christianity”; Cooper and Fales Cooper, The Virgin and the Bride. 102  Strauss, Jacobson, and Schoep, Structural Anthropology, 61–2. 103 Lipsett, Desiring Conversion, 4. 104 Payne, A State of Mixture, 19. 105  Sizgorich, “Narrative and community in Islamic late antiquity”; Butts and Gross, The History of the “Slave of Christ,” 2–3. 106 Stowasser, Women in the Qur’an, 104. 107 Renard, Crossing Confessional Boundaries, 11.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  19 their time.108 It is here that female protagonists are depicted as both active and passive, strong and weak, assertive and compassionate, and as a threats to, or custodians of, the aspired social order. Their changing appearances in the Sīra, hadith, biography, and Qurʾanic exegesis were well imbedded in events that were perceived as factual in Islamic historical memory.109 Yet their sayings and conduct should be seen with an eye to the didactic objectives of the narratives in which they feature.110 We are dealing with a historiography that says more about its authors than its subject matter. This is not to say that reports about saḥ ābiyyāt were the product of sheer imagination or invention. Yet the choice to dwell on their sayings, attributes, and actions offers us a window into the conceptual world of their transmitters, who lived centuries after the purported events took place.111 Such an approach holds particularly valid for the first century of Islam, a period that has been treated by Muslims, and still is today, as an exemplary era, due to the formidable images of its heroes and the decisive nature of its events for the shaping of Islamic identities, institutions, and norms.112 Stories about seventh-­century Muslims should therefore be seen as containing ideas regarding doctrine, ritual, government, and society, all of which pertained to realities in which women played important parts. The legendary images of some of the saḥ ābiyyāt are often presented in a manner that defies patriarchal expectations, as they move about without a male escort, participate in military campaigns, take an assertive stand vis-­à-­vis their male interlocutors, and pursue an independent religious path. Such stories present us with the ideologically laden perspectives of their authors, not despite the characters and acts of their female protagonists, but because of them. It is through such dramas that the authors of saḥ ābiyyāt biographies were able to praise qualities such as uncompromising piety, communal loyalty, and a firm belief. My interest in these narratives stems from both a recognition of their normative utility and the assumptions at their base. These narratives were generated by normative orders and at the same time contributed to their formation and maintenance.113 In acknowledging the subtexts of biographic narratives, we can uncover the objectives of their authors and the social reality in which they were active.114 It is in this respect that saḥ ābiyyāt 108 Baumgarten, Mothers and Children, 4. 109 Spectorsky, Women in Classical Islamic Law, 9; Savant, The New Muslims of Post-­Conquest Iran, 15. 110  El Cheikh, Women, Islam, and Abbasid Identity, 97–8; Abou-­Taleb, “Constructing the image of the model Muslim woman,” 180. 111 Coon, Sacred Fictions, p. xv. 112 Donner, Narratives of Islamic Origins, 112; Afsaruddin, The First Muslims: History and Memory; Robinson, “The ideological uses of early Islam.” 113 Raʿanan, Kosansky, and Rustow, Jewish Studies at the Crossroads, 5–6. 114  Kilpatrick, “Some late ʿAbbāsid and Mamlūk books about women,” 76–7; El Cheikh, Women, Islam, and Abbasid Identity, 9; Myrne, “Narrative, gender and authority,” 48–52; Opwis, “The role of the biographer in constructing identity and doctrine,” 3; Winet, “Female presence in biographical dictionaries”; Abou-­Taleb, “Constructing the image of the model Muslim woman.”

20  Female Power and Religious Change biographies displayed a resemblance to narratives that circulated in the late antique, early, and medieval Islamic Near East. They presented women enduring the hardships of life within social environments that posed a threat to their morality as they opted for chaste behavior and uncompromising devotion.115 At the same time, their heroic achievements were not attributed merely to their perseverance, but also to their model conduct as mothers who invested themselves in their children’s religious upbringing, as wives who facilitated their husbands’ worship and pious deeds, and as communal members who attended to the sick and the needy.116 The exemplary significance of the saḥ ābiyyāt for future generations of Muslim women cannot be overestimated.117 Their awe-­inspiring stories served to imbue their characters with a mimetic quality and thus impart Islamic ideals and expectations regarding the place of women in their families and communities.118 As such, saḥ ābiyyāt biographies constitute one of the literary corpora that deal directly with female matters in the context of pre-­modern Muslim societies.119 At the same time, we are well advised to pay attention to the male authors of these biographies, who gathered, selected, and often modified biographical accounts in a manner that would meet their own concerns, whether these were anchored in a particular doctrinal position, understanding of scripture, or social norms.120 From a historical perspective, however, the very limitations of female biographies are also an aspect of their genuine value, reflecting the contours of a gender system that was idealized by their recorders.121 Saḥ ābiyyāt biographies, then, are stories composed, recorded, edited, and transformed by men who lived centuries after the purported events took place, in accordance with ideological agendas that were couched in local social circumstances.122 It is in this sense that biographies in general, and those of saḥ ābiyyāt in particular, have much in common with other genres of Islamic tradition. They were retold and adapted over the centuries as they were perceived to be relevant to communal life.123 115  Schippers, “Some remarks on the women’s stories,” 279, 282; Cobb, “Putting women in their place,” 122; Burrus, “The Syriac Book of Women.” 116 Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 106; Coon, Sacred Fictions, pp. xxi–­xxii; Grossman, “Violence against women in Mediterranean Jewish society,” 183; Saint-­Laurent, “Images de femmes dans l’hagiographie syriaque”; Kilpatrick, “Some late ʿAbbāsid and Mamlūk books about women,” 64; Cortese and Calderini, Women and the Fatimids, 23; Myrne, “Narrative, gender and authority,” 127. 117 Roded, Women in Islamic Biographical Collections, 11; Al-­Qadi, “Biographical dictionaries,” 26; Afsaruddin, “Early women exemplars and the construction of gendered space,” 23; for a helpful illustration in the context of the religious learning of female members of the Mamluk elite, see Berkey, Transmission of Knowledge in Medieval Cairo, 162. 118  El Cheikh, Women, Islam, and Abbasid Identity, 97. 119 Sayeed, Women and the Transmission of Religious Knowledge in Islam, 9. 120 Roded, “Islamic biographical dictionaries: 9th to 10th century,” 29, 31; Decker, Frauen als Trägerinnen religiösen Wissens; Winet, “Female presence in biographical dictionaries,” 94. 121  Halevi, “Wailing for the dead,” 12. 122  Afsaruddin, “Early women exemplars and the construction of gendered space,” 24. 123  Noth, “Der Charakter der ersten großen Sammlungen”; Noth and Conrad, The Early Arabic Historical Tradition; Nagel, “Ḥ adīth—­oder: Die Vernichtung der Geschichte”; Görke, “Authorship in the Sīra literature,” 76.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  21 Unlike the Sīra and hadith, however, which appear to have taken a fixed form by the third Islamic century (ninth century ce), Islamic biographies were continuously reworked.124 This in itself points to the enduring relevance of exemplary figures from the time of the Prophet for scholarly instruction, discussions, and debates regarding matters of theology, ritual, law, and practice.125 The significance of the editorial choices that were made by compilers of biographical collections has been duly noted in modern scholarship. These choices pertain not only to the figures whose biographies were deemed important enough to be recorded but also to their acts, sayings, and characteristics. Editorial decisions were prompted by a variety of considerations, including the reception of the biography, literary conventions, potential audiences, and most importantly, an outlook that encompassed both the holy and mundane aspects of communal life.126 Editorial decisions, once reconstructed, allow some access to the social and religious worlds of transmitters and compilers. At the same time, they serve to remind us of the potential pitfalls of reading too closely or selectively into biographical accounts. Indeed, the naïveté that characterized past readings of Islamic historiographical accounts of women has given way to a highly critical approach.127 Nonetheless, there is still a tendency to view shifts in women’s literary representations as indications of a rise or decline in their status, specifically of changing attitudes towards their presence in the public sphere. Conclusions along those lines have met considerable resistance on the grounds that viewing normative sources as mirrors of reality obstructs our ability to consider the measure by which ideals were implemented in practice.128 Instead, it is by uncovering the paternalistic features of these texts that we may be in a better position to uncover subtexts of female voices.129

Law and society The limitations of narratives in revealing historical realities are evident. It is for this reason that an integrative approach towards the extant literary sources is called for. The methodological premise of this book is that different literary genres 124  Afsaruddin, “Islamic biographical dictionaries: 11th to 15th century,” 32. 125 Rosenthal, A History of Muslim Historiography, 101. 126 Khalidi, “Islamic biographical dictionaries: a preliminary assessment,” 60–2; Malti-­Douglas, “Controversy and its effects,” 115, 130; Malti-­Douglas, “Islamic biography,” 238; Young, “Arabic biographical writing,” 178; Hurvitz, “Biographies and mild asceticism,” 43–4; Cooperson, Classical Arabic Biography, 22–3; Robinson, Islamic Historiography, 61–73; Al-­Qadi, “Biographical dictionaries,” 27–33. On the engaging quality of medieval Islamic narratives, see Lecker, “Were there female relatives of the Prophet Muḥammad among the besieged Qurayẓa?,” 397; Bauer, “The emotions of conversion and kinship,” 141. 127  A rather uncritical reading is suggested in Lichtenstadter, Women in the Aiyâm al-­ʻArab; Abbott, “Women and the state on the eve of Islam.” 128  Sonbol, “Introduction,” p. xix; Meisami, “Writing medieval women.” 129  Cooper and Fales Cooper, The Virgin and the Bride, 13; Hasan-­Rokem, Web of Life, 109–10.

22  Female Power and Religious Change are the products of an intellectual milieu that often sought to advance similar, if not exactly the same, ideas through exegesis, tradition, historiography, folktales, and legal discourse.130 A combined reading of diverse genres reduces the danger of falling into the trap of privileging impressions communicated by a single body of sources.131 To that end, legal sources constitute one of the principal literary sources of this book. This methodological choice has been guided by the shared objectives and thematic concerns of narrative and legal compositions, as well as their interdependence.132 In both cases we are dealing with texts that were designed and written in attendance to patriarchal principles, whereby a woman’s freedom of movement and choices was circumscribed by her male patrons.133 Yet whereas narratives highlight the reasoning at base of these principles, legal sources specify their practical application. In addition, there is much to be said about the utility of legal sources for writing social history, as laws not only reflect the conceptual world of their makers but also could have been issued in response to social realities.134 While legal sources have been utilized by historians of different periods and geographic domains, the methodological question whether law can tell history has been scarcely addressed by historians of Islam and of the societies under its sovereignty.135 The premise underlying the use of legal sources for writing social history is that laws and legal institutions are anything but autonomous, and should be seen as mirrors of social ideals, mores, dynamics, and structures.136 While laws aim to serve the theoretical outlook of their issuers, they also bear a functional quality, whereby they serve to sustain the orderly operation of social institutions and the implementation of ideologies of various sorts.137 Accordingly, they relate to numerous aspects of society, such as political power, economy, class, race, gender, family, and so forth. At the same time, however, legal principles and stipulations are not direct informants; they are first and foremost part of an elitist endeavor to sustain a social order that is governed by a moral code.138 Their articulation features within the parameters of a technical juristic discourse and rests 130  On the connectivity of diverse literary discourses, see Bray, “Men, women and slaves in Abbasid society,” 129–30. 131  On reading private letters and court records next to prescriptive legal sources, see Krakowski, Coming of Age, 4. 132  Sonbol, “Rise of Islam: 6th to 9th century,” 8; Zorgati, Pluralism in the Middle Ages, 17. 133  Abou El Fadl, “Legal and jurisprudential literature: 9th to 15th century,” 37. 134  El Saadi, “Fiqh rulings and gendering the public space,” 270. 135  On this question, see Friedman, “The state of American legal history”; Grossberg, “Social history update”; Ross, “The legal past of early New England”; Crook, “Legal history and general history”; Prest, “Law for historians”; and the collection of essays in Musson and Stebbings, Making Legal History; Simonsohn, “Conversion to Islam”; Simonsohn, “The introduction and formalization of civil law.” 136  Grossberg, “Social history update,” 192; Stebbings, “Benefits and barriers,” 86–7. 137  Scholars of the Wisconsin school of legal history were the first to approach law from a historical perspective in the 1950s as an “instrument that could be seized by members of the dominant class to achieve consensual economic goals”; see Grossberg, “Social history update,” 191. For a summary of the different historiographic methodologies, see Rabban, “Methodology in legal history.” 138  Spectorsky, “Women of the People of the Book,” 270; Ali, Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam, 5.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  23 on foundational legal traditions, such as the Bible, classical rabbinic literature, apostolic ideals, the Qurʾan, and hadith.139 Thus legal principles, stipulations, deliberations, and opinions should be handled with care when it comes to extracting historical information. As in the case of narratives, however, it is often the symbolic function of legal discourses, serving to legitimate or oppose institutions, practices, and even ideologies, that is worthy of the historian’s attention.140 As such, legal discourses were in “a constant state of negotiation with social, political, and economic factors.”141 As previous studies have shown, the legal traditions of the different Near Eastern communities that lived under Islamic rule had much in common, due to their common scriptural heritage, social arrangements, and a wide array of exchanges and encounters.142 Treatments of the patriarchal order of things was no exception. Jewish, Christian, and Islamic legal materials reflect a shared interest in placing women under men’s authority and advancing corresponding limitations regarding their place in society. Although similarities were not across the board, it would be safe to argue for a “broader culture of legal understandings” that cut across different legal traditions that simultaneously stemmed from and generated male-­dominated kinship systems.143

Where, when, and who This study is an attempt to write about women’s conflicts and achievements in the most mundane routines. Yet it relies on sources that on the face of it do not lend themselves too easily to the social historian, as they were written by a narrow intellectual elite of religious scholars who were often concerned with ideals rather than realities on the ground. Another aspect of this study that has been dictated by the nature of the extant sources is its time frame. Its focus on a long period ranging between the late seventh century to as late as the twelfth century is largely the result of the asymmetric balance between Islamic and non-­Islamic sources.

139  Yarbrough, “A Christian Shīʿī, and other curious confreres,” 301. 140  See Gordon, “Historicism in legal scholarship,” 1054, cited in Friedman, “The state of American legal history,” 108; see also Wickham, Framing the Early Middle Ages, 9; Musson and Stebbings, “Introduction,” 5. 141  El Saadi, “Fiqh rulings and gendering the public space,” 262. See also Ali, Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam, 21, 23; De la Puente, “Juridical sources for the study of women.” Cf. Sayeed, “Gender and legal authority.” 142  The literature on this topic is vast. See, e.g., Crone, Roman, Provincial and Islamic Law; Libson, Jewish and Islamic Law; Macuch, “Die sasanidische fromme Stiftung und der islamische waqf ”; Freidenreich, Foreigners and their Food; Jany, Judging in the Islamic, Jewish and Zoroastrian Legal Traditions; Zellentin, The Qurʾan’s Legal Culture; Salaymeh, The Beginnings of Islamic Law; Cohen, Maimonides and the Merchants; Macuch, “Descent and inheritance in Zoroastrian and Shiʿite law”; Tillier, L’invention du cadi. 143 Ali, Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam, 11.

24  Female Power and Religious Change Although we are fortunate to possess a rich and diverse body of Islamic literary sources for this period, parallel non-­Islamic textual materials are significantly fewer and far less consistent in terms of chronology. While the former includes hadith, historiographical accounts, biographical collections, and legal compendia that were composed over the centuries, the latter consist primarily of ninth- to eleventh-­century rabbinic responsa, eleventh- to thirteenth-­century documents from the Cairo Geniza, late seventh- to early tenth-­century Syrian canon laws and ecclesiastical regulations, and eighth- to tenth-­century Eastern Christian martyrologies. These were written, composed, and compiled in a variety of Near Eastern and Mediterranean urban centers, such as Isfahan, al-­Madāʾin (Seleucia and Ctesiphon), Baghdad, Edessa, Damascus, Cairo, Qayrawān, and Cordoba. At the same time, however, the reader will note extensive reference to sources of earlier and later dates as well, and of religious and geographic provenances outside the frame of the book’s inquiry. The broad selection of sources has been guided by consideration of the highly fragmentary nature of the historical picture that can be extracted from a single body of sources. In addition, it rests on the premise that Near Eastern Jewish, Christian, and Muslim communities operated within a shared social context. Many of these texts, whether narratives or documentary, not only were meant for a narrow intellectual elite but were composed and formed to meet the interests and concerns of a lay audience. Recent scholarship on the social and cultural contexts of literary and reading practices in the medieval Islamic world seems particularly relevant here. Its reference to social circles in which biblical stories, hadith, and tales about the first generations of Muslims were delivered by means of aurality speaks to the interest of medieval popular circles in the contents of texts that were composed by religious specialists.144 In addition to Friday sermons (khuṭba), ninth-­century Baghdadi literary salons and the Umayyad mosque in twelfth-­century Damascus have been identified as venues in which crowds of educated urban elites would assemble to attend reading sessions.145 At the same time, public readings were not limited to the elites or to men. In his study on the social significance of literary practices in the medieval Islamic world, Konrad Hirschler has shed valuable light on the presence of household members, including women, as well as segments of the wider society in such gatherings.146 Hirschler further notes that in some cases reading practices included materials of  a more performative character, such as epics (sīra), as well as Stories of the

144 Hirschler, Written Word in the Medieval Arabic Lands, 13–19. 145  See Berkey, Popular Preaching and Religious Authority, 16; Toorawa, Ibn Abi Tahir Tayfur and Arabic Writerly Culture, 33; Ali, Arabic Literary Salons in the Islamic Middle Ages; Jones, The Power of Oratory; Hirschler, Written Word in the Medieval Arabic Lands, 32. 146 Hirschler, Written Word in the Medieval Arabic Lands, 44–6. On the presence of women in public audiences, see also Rosenthal, “Fiction and reality,” 14.

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  25 Arabian Nights, that featured the acts of heroic figures, quite often within romantic or adventurous plots.147 The social utility of oratory and aural practices has been noted in modern scholarship as well, as further means for sustaining social order, solidarity, and unity, by way of integrating popular audiences within a social fabric that drew its guidance from historical models. These practices, particularly in their public contexts, can be seen as effective occasions for transmitting ideals and norms that were to instill a sense of communal affiliation in their audiences.148 Their social role could, therefore, be considered along that of legal regulations, sermons, public symbols, and architecture that were put to use by religious elites. To this end, diverse types of literary sources were designed to fulfill similar objectives. Read together, they speak of complex, religiously diverse societies, consisting of elaborated households and highly active economies, at the center of which a variety of socio-­religious institutions functioned as the foci of communal life. These societies constituted the backdrop against which the texts at the center of this book were composed. These were mostly urban societies, we may surmise, with strong religious communal affiliations on the one hand, and simultaneous social affiliations that were external to their religious communities, on the other.149 The limitations of the present study should be noted as well. Despite its wide-­ ranging chronological and geographical scopes, as well as its attempt to encompass a rich selection of sources, its conclusions do not allow for broader comparative assessments. It is not the objective of this study to argue for changes over time, across space, or communal settings. The reader may rightly ask to what extent were the societies and individuals discussed in this book different from those that lived under the Roman Empire, for example; whether women enjoyed a different status or held a different station in different parts of the Islamic Near East; or whether different religious communities approached religious diversity and religious conversion differently. Such questions, important as they may be, are beyond the scope of this study.

Arrangement The following discussion locates women in early and medieval Islamic social ­settings as both agents and targets of religious instruction and change. Starting by first observing their place in the context of kinship ties and family households, it gradually turns to assess the significance of these ties in moments of religious conflict and transformation. In Chapter 1 I attempt to enter the private household 147 Kruk, The Warrior Women of Islam, 3–4, 10. 148 Hirschler, Written Word in the Medieval Arabic Lands, 28. 149  Lev, “Aspects of Egyptian society in the Fatimid period”; cf. Herrin, Unrivalled Influence, 14.

26  Female Power and Religious Change and assess its composition, hierarchies, and the relationships among its members. These were guided by a patriarchal order which imposed considerable limitations upon the female members of the family. At the same time, in accordance with the theoretical principles outlined above, the chapter reveals moments which afforded women considerable agency thanks to their different family capacities. In addition, there is much to be said for the liminal nature of the place of women within the family. Their movement between the private and the public, between different households, and their changing images, as both motherly and seductive, lending support and posing a threat to their male counterparts, imbued women’s positions with a liminality that reinforced their agency. Women’s agency became the focus of a set of norms and practical considerations that resulted from an ongoing attempt to balance between the two primary poles of commitment that feature in this book, namely kinship and community. Whereas the former was governed by material considerations, sentimental attachments, and legal principles, the latter was motivated by a profound commitment to religious ideals that were upheld by communal agents and stipulated in sacred texts. It is this tension between kinship and community that Chapter 2 seeks to capture. Through a reading of a selection of literary sources, diverse in their religious origin and genre, the chapter focuses on the significance of kinship ties for promoting religious agendas. The ancient conflict, witnessed in the terrible scene of the binding of Isaac, persisted in the endeavors of rabbinic sages, ecclesiastical leaders, and Muslim religious scholars to prioritize God over family, or community over kinship. Yet kinship was seen not only as a rival to the divine but also as a path to it. Extensive attempts on the part of communal agents to enter and dominate the private household, by overseeing the proper administration of family affairs and assemblies, offer a useful indication of a perception of the family as a vehicle for transmitting religious ideals. Moreover, a sophisticated discourse, reflected in the writings of different religious leaderships, in which a vocabulary of kinship was employed to explicate the bond between God and believers, is a reminder of both the strength of kinship and its communal utility. It is here, at the center of competing and completing kinship and communal affiliations that women stood both vulnerable and powerful at the same time. The final part of the chapter thus turns to explore the manner in which the presence of women in religiously mixed families was perceived as both threat to and opportunity for communal agendas. The final part of Chapter  2 sets the scene for a discussion dedicated to ­religiously mixed families in early and medieval Islamic contexts in Chapter  3. The significance of this historical phenomenon for understanding related ­phenomena such as conversion to Islam, religious syncretism, as well as the survival of non-­Muslim religious communities, cannot be overstated. It is here that the tensions and interplays between kinship and community were most pronounced, rendering religiously mixed families a valuable framework for a historical inquiry

In Quest of Female Power in the Medieval Near East  27 into female religious agency. Accordingly, the chapter reads legal principles of separation between family members of different religious affiliations as reflections of instances of religious hybridity. As can be expected, religiously mixed families were the outcome of two primary trends—­conversion to Islam and marriage between Muslims and non-­Muslims. The defiance of communal identities, however, did not necessarily result in the severance of ties between converts and those who married outside the fold with their original religious communities. In fact, there is much to suggest the opposite, resulting in an extensive body of normative literature that came to terms with the phenomenon, yet at the same time attempted to contain it. Chapter 4 turns to examine the significance of women’s liminal position in the context of religiously mixed kinship settings. It shows that the intrinsic qualities that afforded women a mediating agency between different social, spatial, and normative arenas rendered their place particularly meaningful in relation to cross-­religious exchanges. As mothers and wives, women were in a unique position to introduce ideas and practices that originated from one religious tradition into a home that was dominated by another. The chapter reveals, however, different concerns, or emphases, on the part of different religious leaderships regarding the presence of women in religiously mixed families. While Syrian ecclesiastical authorities appear to have been concerned with its contribution to an ongoing state of communal fragmentation, rabbinic legal discourse reflect a preoccupation with its practical implications, and Islamic legal principles with its potential threats to the religious integrity of Muslim believers. The extent to which these differences allow for generalizations, however, remains an open question. While Chapter 4 considered the ability of women to affect religious change within their families thanks to their enduring ties with their former coreligionists, Chapter 5 turns to consider the agency of female converts to Islam in bringing about a subsequent conversion of other family members. Although difficult to recover in the periods under consideration, a woman’s religious conversion was clearly not limited to better documented historical moments, such as the early Christian movement or medieval Iberia. The vast treatments of women’s conversion to Islam (or from it) in legal corpora, specifically (although not exclusively) Islamic ones, read alongside the exemplary images of the female Companions of the Prophet in medieval biographical dictionaries, suggest anything but a marginal phenomenon. Their role, it is premised here, was to inspire, if not to guide, women who converted to Islam in social reorientations that followed their religious decisions. At the same time, it was once again thanks to their unique familial capacities that women were in a position to motivate other family members to embrace Islam as well. Thus, in converting to Islam, women were not only untying former religious commitments but also defying the very essence of patriarchal authority. In Chapter 6, the question of women’s religious agency comes full circle, as it turns to explore the different means by which women were in a position to

28  Female Power and Religious Change circumvent religious change. Rather than introducing external religious traditions into the family, or drawing others to convert, the women that feature in this chapter are seen as gatekeepers, or guardians, of communal boundaries. Their heroic perseverance in the face of actual or potential pressures to convert was bound to inspire other women under similar circumstances as well as their own family members. We are therefore dealing not only with human agency but also with texts that introduce images of ideal conduct in moments of religious conflict. Once again, however, the normative thread that runs through narratives of diverse religious provenance is of a prioritization of God over family, even at the cost of reversing gender hierarchies. A particularly telling illustration can be found in the Maccabaean story of the mother and her seven sons. The heroic image of the mother, who was willing to sacrifice her sons and herself in order to evade idolatry, was achieved in defiance of a powerful male monarch, yet at the same time through her adoption of male qualities. Different versions of the story were adapted by Jewish, Christian, and Muslim writers, not only in the Near East but also in Europe, thus betraying a common investment in the empowerment of women under circumstances of competing religious sentiments.

1 Contours of Family Dynamics The texts that feature the female protagonists at the center of this study evoke different notions of family commitments. For example, the biographies of prominent figures among the Companions of the Prophet speak of the significance of shared ancestry, maternal bonds, and their resulting emotional attachments. At the same time, legal texts from different religious backgrounds reflect a strong preoccupation with matters of property, specifically its division among family members. They speak of both the anticipation of these members for a share in family property and the endurance of family ties owing to shared economic interests. They suggest that shared property was bound to charge family ties with a meaning that was no less significant than the one generated by sentimental and biological affinities.1 Thus, a principal task, prior to the assessment of texts referring to female agency in family contexts, is to consider the family ideals, sentiments, and arrangements that were known to the writers of these texts. This chapter lays out the main contours of pre-­modern Near Eastern urban families. Its key argument is that women were in a unique position to advance their interests, introduce ideas and practices, and, consequently, play an important role in affecting religious identities, thanks to their relative place within the family and their kinship ties. Behind windowless walls, in rooms and courtyards that were accessed through narrow corridors, the families at the center of this book were often engaged in what would seem to be a world of their own. Their eventful routines, however, were concealed not only from the eyes of the random passerby but also from those of modern historians. To unearth their stories, we are required to resort to sporadic and relatively meager testimony, and, as a result, a great deal of interpretation. It is within this frame of limitations that the present chapter offers a rather crude image of Near Eastern urban families during the early and medieval Islamic periods. Being far from exhaustive, this image has to be taken with a pinch of salt, owing to the inconsistency and fragmentary nature of the extant evidence. The reader is therefore advised to anticipate divergent scenarios, if not alternative ones, in addition to those presented here. As already noted, the chapter has been designed with an eye towards the ­protagonists of this book, namely wives, mothers, daughters, and sisters. Beyond

1  Simonsohn, “Are gaonic responsa a reliable source.”

Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East. Uriel Simonsohn, Oxford University Press. © Uriel Simonsohn 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.003.0002

30  Female Power and Religious Change immediate questions pertaining to family structures and norms, it is essential to uncover the internal dynamics of these families, the nature of the relationships they entertained, the hierarchies among their members, and to trace the ideologies and traditions that informed them. The ensuing discussion gradually evolves from generic observations onto some rather minute details, until it addresses, in its final part, the nature of women’s agency, both despite kinship arrangements and thanks to them. To that end, we shall seek to touch upon such matters as commitments, attachments, and expectations. These, I argue, constituted not only the strings, or the glue, that kept family members together but also channels through which ideas, norms, and practices were transmitted and exchanged. The chapter builds upon the studies of others. It is a product of a cumulative scholarship that has focused on the history of the family in late antiquity and the Middle Ages, in the eastern Mediterranean and the Near East, among communities that drew from diverse cultural traditions and adhered to different systems of beliefs. It is premised, however, on the idea that, despite these differences, the urban societies of the early and medieval Islamic lands exhibited similar family structures and arrangements, not only among themselves but also with respect to their pre-­ Islamic predecessors.2

The problem of definition A growing concern with the family in modern scholarship since the 1950s has resulted in ongoing modifications of its definitions and characterizations.3 More recently, however, scholars have had some notable reservations regarding past generalizations. Consequently, “family” has received a more nuanced definition, following the acknowledgment that it takes on different features and fulfills different roles in changing political, social, and economic circumstances, not to mention religious ones, across time and space. Such qualifications have left us with a rather narrow definition of the family as a social institution that is bound by biological and emotional ties and, accordingly, assigns different roles to its members. Any additional feature, whether its size, structure, internal hierarchy, gender arrangements, utility and more, should be tested in a local context. Studies on the history of the family in general, and that of the pre-­modern Near East in particular, have been couched in different disciplinary approaches and have accordingly highlighted different institutional and conceptual aspects. The multiplicity of disciplinary perspectives is unsurprising, given the plurality 2  See Benkheira, La famille en islam, 38; Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 244; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 19–20; Verskin, Barren Women, 15. 3 Burke, History and Social Theory, 54.

Contours of Family Dynamics  31 of meanings we tend to ascribe to the family, as the meeting point of social norms, economic interests, cultural sentiments, and emotional ties. The family as the objective and the framework of analysis—“can be studied as a structure, a proc­ess, a cultural construct, and as a discourse.”4 For example, whereas sociological approaches tend to focus on the family as a site of socialization, its role within society at large, and as a microcosm of social norms, anthropological ones place much importance on kinship ties, their underlying assumptions, and their effect on family commitments.5 Historians, however, specifically social historians, display an interest in both disciplinary perspectives, as they attempt to capture the essence, role, and internal dynamics of families in specific periods and regions.6 Yet the family poses a serious challenge to historians who seek to use it as a framework for their inquiries. Medieval Near Eastern families have been depicted as extended households, governed by a patriarchal system, patrilineal values, and  patrilocal arrangements.7 These features are noted in the third volume of S.D. Goitein’s Mediterranean Society—­one of the few studies, and clearly the most comprehensive among them, that deals with medieval Near Eastern families.8 In addition, they go hand in hand with stereotypes of the so-­called “family in Islam,” often defined as polygamous and tribal by nature, in which women had minimal status and were subject to the domination, at times oppressive, of male family members.9 Recent scholarship, however, has taken issue with ­generalizations of this kind on two main grounds: family structures, arrangements, and roles are never uniform.10 Thus, for example, the notion of patriarchal extended family structures has been countered by the mere prospect of high mortality rates.11 Family, it is now asserted more than before, is a malleable term, institution, and entity which takes shape in relation to a variety of factors.12 Broader contexts, local circumstances, and individual choices have yet to be seriously considered when attempting to capture the essence of Near Eastern medieval families. Rather than assuming a singular type or pattern, we should do best to acknowledge a variety of families.13 These, we are also reminded, tend not only to feature differently but also to be seen differently, based on the perspective 4 Doumani, Family History in the Middle East, 1. 5  Goldberg, “Family relationships,” 22. 6 Schremer, Male and Female He Created Them, 20–2. 7  For a useful overview, Krakowski, Coming of Age, 8–9. 8 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 1–7, 16–54. 9 Benkheira, La famille en islam, 9; Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 240. 10 Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 51; Boyarin, Jewish Families, 21; Satlow, “What does love have to do with it?,” 104; Huebner and Nathan, Mediterranean Families in Antiquity, 6; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 12. 11  Sacchi and Viazzo. “Family and household,” 241. 12  Peskowitz, “ ‘Family/ies’ in antiquity,” 10. 13  Ibid. 14.

32  Female Power and Religious Change we are given or the one we choose to take. The family takes on different roles and functions along different principles, often simultaneously, as a residential unit, an economic unit, a legal unit, and as a community, whose members share sentiments and ideals.14 Failing to take topographic differences, settlement patterns, economic changes, legal cultures, and communal traditions into account compromises our ability to adequately perceive the families we seek to examine. The family is anything but an isolated entity. Rather, it is constantly affected by external conditions, both material and social.15 The Islamic takeover of the Near East, its gradual domination through Islamization, that is to say, making things Islamic, through government and ­settlement,16 have all left their marks on the Near Eastern social landscape, at times replacing older arrangements, in others in symbiosis with them.17 For example, the changing settlement patterns of Muslim populations, the gradual dissemination of Arabian tribes among local conquered populations,18 demographic changes resulting from waves of migration, in addition to permanent factors, such as life expectancy and child mortality, were all bound to affect family compositions and customs.19 Both demography and settlement are factors that influence and feed into economic matters, and it is of such factors that we should be mindful when considering the economic utility of families and their economic interests.20 Beyond functionalist aspects, the significance of the family as an economic unit served to enhance its social cohesiveness.21 Families, we can therefore predict, were also very much shaped by their members and their shared experiences.22 Yet significant as material, social, and even political factors may have been, the call to perceive families as diverse cultural constructs merits attention.23 The ­family was not only the product of cultural practices and sentiments but, perhaps more importantly, one of their major generating institutions. Norms such as patrilineal kinship, practices such as patrilocal living arrangements, and ideals such as codes of honor and shame, should be seen in the context of evolving

14 Burke, History and Social Theory, 55. 15 Hanna, Making Big Money in 1600, 139. 16  Carlson, “Contours of conversion”; Peacock, “Introduction”; Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 363. 17  Bray, “The family in the medieval Islamic world,” 731; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 28. 18 Donner, The Early Islamic Conquests, 245–50. On Muslim settlement patterns in Syria, see Whitcomb, “Amṣār in Syria?”; Walmsley, Early Islamic Syria, 71–112; Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 350. 19 Kertzer, “Household history and sociological theory,” 156; Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 242; Huebner, Mediterranean Families in Antiquity, 6. 20 Harper, “Marriage and family in late antiquity,” 368; Huebner, Mediterranean Families in Antiquity, 6. 21  Peskowitz, “ ‘Family/ies’ in antiquity,” 20–1; Moxnes, Constructing Early Christian Families, 21. 22 Hanna, Making Big Money in 1600, 140. 23  Goldberg, “Family relationships,” 22.

Contours of Family Dynamics  33 t­raditions. In addition, these traditions should be considered when thinking of families as loci, and hence markers, of group affiliations, whether those were ­ethnic, religious, or political.24 Our understanding of the family is often hampered by confusion in terminology. For example, David Kertzer points out that the term household can be taken as synonym for family. He notes, however, that whereas household refers to aspects of co-­residency, family signifies matters of kinship.25 The need for precision can be seen in the attempts of modern scholars in general, and historians in particular, to come up with an exact definition of the family.26 These efforts, however, are complicated by the textual evidence. Roman vocabulary, for example, speaks of a family that is hinged upon rather different principles than the one mentioned in early Islamic Arabic sources. While the Latin familia meant “the legal, proprietary group under the power of a pater familias,” and domus referred to matrimonial, biological, and proprietary bonds, the Greek oikos, literally meaning family and house, was standard for family.27 At the same time, in the hadith we find different aspects of family relations, such as nasab—“lineage,” ṣihr, muṣāhara—“affinity” or “marital relations,” qarāba—“relation,” ahl—“people,” “home,” “relatives connected to the home,” or raḥim—“womb,” and ṣilat al-­ raḥim—“kinship.”28 Different meanings suggest different sets of expectations and at times, also different arrangements. They serve as a reminder of the lack of a universal vocabulary that cuts across societies and cultures. A case in point can be found in the Babylonian Talmud’s discussion of a set of forbidden relationships, whereby a man’s father’s paternal brother, his father’s maternal brother, and his mother’s paternal brother receive the same designation: they “are all called uncle!” (kulhu de-­bei dodi kari lahu).29 According to Adiel Schremer, the Talmudic discussion serves as clear testimony to the use of identical appellations for individuals of different kinship positions. Later geonic sources, Schremer notes, explain these common appellations in co-­residency.30 It is therefore essential to be mindful not only of the meaning of the vocabulary applied in our sources but also to what extent that vocabulary was common to the various groups and individuals under consideration.31 As historians we are of course operating within the parameters, or rather limitations, of the extant sources. These not only are selective and fragmentary but 24  Kertzer, “Household history and sociological theory,” 156; Peskowitz, “ ‘Family/ies’ in antiquity,” 19; Moxnes, Constructing Early Christian Families, 20; Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 235, 242; Boyarin, Jewish Families, 3. 25  Kertzer, “Household history and sociological theory,” 156. 26 Burke, History and Social Theory, 56. 27  Harper, “Marriage and family in late antiquity,” 369. 28 Benkheira, La famille en islam, 16. 29  bYeb, 21b. 30  Schremer, “Kinship terminology and endogamous marriage,” 6. 31 Krakowski, Coming of Age, 31.

34  Female Power and Religious Change also display internal contradictions. The challenge intensifies given the lack of surviving archives from the early centuries of Islamic rule.32 As a result, scholars have had to resort to a highly diverse selection of sources, many of which are of notable disadvantage when compared to documentary records. As noted in the introduction to this book, legal literature and narratives should be approached with caution, as both were composed by particular circles of writers, with their own normative agendas. They therefore do not offer “the full range of social and historical experience,”33 and tend to reflect the concerns and, in most cases, the realities of urban society, perhaps even its upper strata.34 Moreover, these texts might favor certain practices and ideals, while silencing others, whether deliberately or simply by taking them for granted.

Structures, norms, and values A historical study that is concerned with regional phenomena that occurred in a particular period, yet had an effect on communities of diverse cultural, ideological, and—­therefore—­social traditions, must take this diversity into account. The Near Eastern societies of the middle Islamic period often exhibited similar patterns of social organization. While differences did exist, the next part of our discussion will concentrate on those features which appear to have been shared by a greater part of the societies under consideration. As noted in the introduction to this book, it seems safe to identify the individuals and groups under study as urban, property holders, and with significant attachments to their religious communities. In what follows I shall attempt to reconstruct some of the salient characteristics of their families, their family lives, and family ideals, based on what I believe can be safely extracted from theoretical analysis, historical studies focused on the pre-­modern Near East, and both the textual and material evidence on which this study rests.

Kinship Kinship ties constitute the foundations of family structures as well as its guiding principles.35 Although understood and defined differently in different social contexts, it seems safe to qualify kinship as a set of privileged relations among family members.36 They may be biologically, emotionally, as well as legally generated,

32  Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 234. 33  Bray, “The family in the medieval Islamic world,” 733. 34  Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 243; Nathan, The Family in Late Antiquity, 7. 35 Parkin, Kinship: An Introduction, 3. 36  Overing et al., “Kinship in anthropology.”

Contours of Family Dynamics  35 but in themselves they produce a set of shared commitments, sentiments, and sense of unity among family members.37 According to Goitein, the agnatic nature of the Jewish families that feature in the Cairo Geniza had a profound impact on a man’s notion of kinship: “A man’s family, foremost in his mind, was not the small one founded by himself but the larger one into which he was born. His family was ‘the house of his father’. ”38 Goitein’s remarks were recently qualified by Eve Krakowski, who has argued that kinship relations among Geniza Jews did not hinge on descent, but on a set of mutual obligations among relatives, “dyadic relationships” or “horizontal ties,” through which different social services were exchanged.39 These kinship ties were biological in their base, but were extended, amplified, and complicated thanks to their social utility. On the face of it, the ­kinship patterns outlined by Krakowski stand in stark contrast to the ideals of kinship that are founded on biological affinities in Islamic normative sources.40 These highlight the central significance of both male and female bodily fluids in forming kinship attachments and consequently notions of family unity, distinctiveness, separateness, space, and solidarity.41 The apparent contrast is reconciled by the realization that particular notions of kinship are not exclusive, but rather overlap and take on relative importance in changing contexts. Indeed, different societies exhibit different kinship systems, yet whether these are centered on biological, material, emotional, spatial, or functional affinities, their defining, solidifying, and unifying effect cannot be overstated.42

Parenthood Kinship is generally discussed in anthropological literature in relation to common descent, lineage, biological (and fictive) affinity, and consanguinity.43 Kinship relations are therefore strongly based on parental roles, the latter constituting both the nexus of kinship attachments and their source of meaning. A useful starting point when considering the central role of parents in forging kinship attachments might be the place of the father as a crucial link in a generational chain of descent.44 In Near Eastern social traditions, the father represented the 37  See, e.g., on descent vs. kindred groups, Parkin, Kinship: An Introduction, 32; Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, 35. 38 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 1. 39 Krakowski, Coming of Age, 13. 40 Giladi, Infants, Parents and Wet Nurses, 21; Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 17. 41  Abu-­Lughod, Veiled Sentiments, 53; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 38–44; Benkheira, “Le vocabulaire arabe de la parenté,” 45–66. 42 Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, 34–41; Goody, The Oriental, the Ancient and the Primitive, 9; Parkin, Kinship: An Introduction, 3–7. 43  Overing et al., “Kinship in anthropology.” 44  On the patrilineal structures of Eastern Christian, rabbinic Jewish, and Muslim families, see bBava Batra 109b, discussed in Cohen, “The origins of the matrilineal principle in rabbinic law,” 37. See also Giladi, “Sex, marriage and the family in al-­Ghazālī’s thought,” 172; Giladi, Muslim Midwives,

36  Female Power and Religious Change good name of the family, the source of its existence, and, hence, the one to whom family members were to offer primary affinity and honor.45 It is through the father’s image that memories, sentiments, and norms were traced back in a common descent and merged into a family’s perception of itself and the ties among its members.46 If the father is seen imbuing kinship ties with a meaning that stems from a common descent, it is the mother who is often portrayed as the source of life, thanks to her biological roles as bearer, birth-­giver, and primary nurturer of her children.47 And it was on account of these reproductive tasks that the mother has been presented in classical as well as medieval sources as so central to the formation of kinship ties and sentiments.48 It is perhaps one of the few occasions in which females are credited with superiority to their male counterparts in familial contexts.49 It is also in this context that the maternal womb is attributed with the power to maintain kinship ties, as a mediating link (hence in Arabic ṣilat al-­ raḥim, lit. the “link of the womb”), between the father and his descendants.50 Yet the significance of maternal reproductive organs goes far beyond functionality, as the child’s good nature is conditioned upon its mother’s moral conduct.51 It was in these early, formative, years of the child that mother–­child bonds were first forged and given precedence over others, particularly of father–­child ones.52 And it is perhaps with this understanding in mind that we find medieval Muslim scholars endeavoring to regulate maternal power through paternal intervention.53 The mother was therefore expected to provide first the fetus, and later the newborn, with the necessary care and nourishment, yet in subordination to God and under the supervision of her husband.54 Tasks such as breastfeeding were to be monitored, not to mention controlled, by the father.55 Both descent and reproduction are key for the establishment of kinship ties. They are crucial for fostering reciprocal attachments between members of the kin group, as well as a sense of affinity that is couched in both an ancestral past and a biological present. Kinship thus binds family members together and delineates their mutual loyalties towards one another, as well as against those beyond the 23; Benkheira, “Le vocabulaire arabe de la parenté,” 55, 61; Payne, “East Syrian bishops,” 18–21; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 72. 45 Blidstein, Honor Thy Father and Mother, 7; Baumgarten, Mothers and Children, 156; Benkheira, “Le vocabulaire arabe de la parenté,” 61. 46 Parkin, Kinship: An Introduction, 15–17. 47 Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 24. 48 Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 4. 49 Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 24. The claim of maternal right will show up again in the story of the mother and her seven sons, discussed in Chapter 6. 50 Giladi, Infants, Parents and Wet Nurses, 21; Benkheira, “Le vocabulaire arabe de la parenté,” 52. 51 Giladi, Infants, Parents and Wet Nurses, 2; Kueny, “The birth of Cain,” 121; Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 82. 52 Bouhdiba, Sexuality in Islam, 215. On the insistence of mothers in Roman Egypt to nurse their children, see Wilfong, Women of Jeme, 73. 53 Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 4. 54  Ibid. 48, 81–2, 118–20. 55 Giladi, Infants, Parents and Wet Nurses, 3, 19; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 21.

Contours of Family Dynamics  37 cord of their kinship.56 The achievement is collaborative: the link of descent ­represented by the father merges with the biological roles of the mother, establishing the foundation for all subsequent kinship relations. It is on account of this foundation that children are called upon to offer unwavering honor and commitment to their parents while the latter take charge of their upbringing. These ideals featured in early and medieval Islamic outlooks which considered fathers and mothers crucial for the formation of their children’s character and, accordingly, their sense of kinship. At the same time, however, the occasions which afforded parental didactic interventions were different for mothers and fathers. Parent–­child relations were to a large extent gender-­based.57 The division is nicely illustrated in the following hadith: Each of you is a guardian and is responsible for his ward. The ruler is a guardian and the man is a guardian of the members of his household; and the woman is a guardian and is responsible for her husband’s house and his offspring; and so each of you is a guardian and is responsible for his ward.58

It was in the framework of this guardianship that the Qurʾan ascribes the mother with a set of unique qualities, including tenderness, intelligence, and unique insight.59 Similar notions, however, show up already in the first-­century ce Greco-­Roman work by an anonymous author, bearing the pseudonym Bryson. It offers advice on the management of the household (Gr. oikonomia; Ar. tadbīr al-­ manzil), of which the family constituted an important part.60 Here, the mother is assigned the task of keeping her husband’s estate safe and managing its internal affairs. She may do so on account of a set of unique qualities and skills: Can there then be management without someone of intelligence and knowledge? Can there be rule without someone of kindness and consideration, together with severity when severity is in place? Can there be benefit without control and custody? Can there be proper execution without acumen and skill? . . . How can one preserve on the road if one has no patience? How can one have the patience to provide for the children’s upbringing and for supporting their needs and to serve the husband unless one has tolerance? Will one give them priority over oneself unless one has the strength and the courage in oneself 56  Benkheira, “Le vocabulaire arabe de la parenté,” 46. 57 Moxnes, Constructing Early Christian Families, 33. 58  Bukhārī, Ṣaḥ īḥ al-­Bukhārī, 1326 (no. 5200); cited also in Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā, Kitāb al-­ʿayāl, 491. 59  Thus, maternal love in the story of the infant Moses appearing Q 28:7–133 (al-­Qaṣaṣ/the Story) (Meccan) is a love of ongoing care and supervision. And in return, the Qurʾan instructs children to be kind to their parents and their mothers in particular (e.g., Q 46:15 [al-­Aḥqāf/Sand Dunes]). 60  An Arabic translation of the work has been recently edited and translated into English by Simon Swain: Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam. Bryson’s principles should be read in their Greco-­Roman context; see Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 2, 143–65.

38  Female Power and Religious Change to make this easy? . . . For nobody can say that the woman is concordant in her relationship with her husband and her children unless she prefers their wrongdoing of her to her wrongdoing of them and tolerates their anger and sullen looks and violence at times when they are vexed or afflicted by illness, and, further, shows them that the fault in all of this lies with her and not with them, and finally, bears them no grudge for it and shows no trace of this in her soul. . . . For when these qualities are united in the woman, then she is blest in herself, her husband and her children are blest on her account, her family is held in honor because of her, and she becomes an example to women.61

Although the ideas found in the Management of the Estate appear to have infiltrated Islamic thought in an explicit fashion only around the turn of the ninth century, and to a greater extent in the tenth and eleventh, the idea of wives assuming responsibilities over the internal domain of the household finds resonance in late antique rabbinic and Christian sources as well.62 It was in the domestic sphere, the internal part of the household, that mothers and children were presented in classical and medieval texts as conducting a reciprocal relationship, whereby a mother’s love was met with that of her child. Her care, supervision, tenderness, and other maternal roles were to be met with her child’s respect and obedience, as well as care when the child became an adult.63 At the same time, it is owing to this reciprocity that the mother played a crucial edifying role. Thus, a hadith calls upon mothers to “Pronounce as the first words to your children, ‘there is no God but Allah,’ and recite to them at death, ‘There is no God but Allah.’ ”64 Both the Qurʾan and the Islamic traditions endow mothers with priority over fathers in what pertains to the early years of their children’s upbringing.65 One of the most striking expressions of this attitude can be seen in the Islamic principle of a mother’s right of custody (hiḍāna/haḍāna) during the child’s early years in the event of marital dissolution.66 And it is thanks to the  mother’s emotional traits, which were already noted in the Management of

61 Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 100–1. 62 On the reception of the Management of the Estate in Islamic literature, see Plessner, Der OIKONOMIKOC des Neupythagoreers “Bryson”; Giladi, Children of Islam, 49–50; Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 352–63. On maternal childbearing and education in medieval Muslim societies, see Giladi, “Gender differences in child rearing and education,” 291; Giladi, “Concepts of childhood and attitudes towards children in medieval Islam”; Adang, “Women’s access to public space,” 75. In classical and medieval rabbinic contexts, mYoma 1:1; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 231–7, 341; Baumgarten, Mothers and Children, 157–9; Marks, “Bayit versus Beit Midrash,” 196; Baker, Rebuilding the House of Israel, 35; and in early and medieval Eastern Christian literature, Wilfong, Women of Jeme, 26; Horn and Martens, “Let the Little Children Come to Me,” 23–4. 63 Bouhdiba, Sexuality in Islam, 213–15. 64  Ibn Qayyim al-­Jawziyya, Tuḥ fat al-­mawdūd bi-­aḥkām al-­mawlūd, 329. 65 Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 44. 66 Spectorsky, Women in Classical Islamic Law, 188–9; Linant De Bellefonds, “Ḥ aḍāna,” EI2.

Contours of Family Dynamics  39 the Estate, that her contribution to her child’s mental development was deemed so central.67 At the same time, it would be wrong to view the father as absent from the early stages of the child’s upbringing and assuming responsibility only at a later stage, in spheres that were external to the domicile.68 Greco-­Roman ideals of parenthood underscore the example a father was expected to set to his children. The latter were not only to obey their fathers but to imitate them as well—­an ideal that would permeate early Christian thought, classical rabbinic discourse, and Islamic teaching.69 Obedience, however, appears to override the paternal–­ maternal divide, whereby the child’s obedience to its parents becomes a dominant theme in late antique and medieval discourses on parent–­child relations.70 Parent-­child relations affected sibling relations as well. These took on special importance as children turned into adults and gradually took over duties that were once performed by their parents. Sibling ties were manifested in the sentiments which they expressed towards one other,71 their mutual care, support, and responsibility;72 and in formal arrangements, specifically through the division of family property, the administration of shared economic enterprises, and commercial partnerships.73 While sibling attachments were often instrumental in advancing material ends, it was the merging of economic utility and emotional sentiments that fed into the bloodstream of family cohesiveness. Finally, with regard to women, it is worth recalling that, in the absence of a father, or the latter’s gradual withdrawal from the center stage of family life, it was up to the male siblings to assume a measure of responsibility over female ones, even when they were married and had formed their own households.74

67  Giladi, “Sex, marriage and the family in al-­Ghazālī’s thought,” 173; Chodorow, “Family structure and feminine personality,” 46; O’Roark, “Parenthood in late antiquity,” 78. 68  Chodorow, “Family structure and feminine personality,” 49; Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 129. 69  O’Roark, “Parenthood in late antiquity,” 68–9; Horn, “Let the Little Children Come to Me,” 56; Giladi, “Parents,” in relation to Q 17:24 and Q 25:74; Blidstein, Honor Thy Father and Mother, 137–57. 70  Giladi, “Parents,” 20; Horn, “Let the Little Children Come to Me,” 80–2; Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 139; Stearns, Childhood in World History, 35. 71  Goitein refers us to the strong expressions of feelings in Geniza letters containing correspondences between siblings, and of “brotherly love,” as “reflections of strong emptions.” See Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 16–18; see also Lamdan, A Separate People, 61; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 64. 72 Lamdan, A Separate People, 56; Satlow, “What does love have to do with it?,” 109; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 154. 73 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 33, 41; Hjerrild, Studies in Zoroastrian Family Law, 16; Satlow, “What does love have to do with it?,” 108–9. 74 Spectorsky, Women in Classical Islamic Law, 69–70; Hallaq, An Introduction to Islamic Law, 68: “Obviously, the ties of the wife/woman with her original family were not, upon marriage, severed, and her parents, brothers and sisters continued to watch closely as the marriage of their daughter/sister unfolded.” See also Goitein, Med. Soc. 5, 219, referring to a case in which a woman stayed in her brother’s house during her husband’s absence from home. See also Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 20–1; Satlow, “What does love have to do with it?,” 110–11.

40  Female Power and Religious Change

Marriage The legal bond that united man and woman was of central importance for the creation, elaboration, and ordering of kinship ties. It was a realization of ideals and an expression of social interests, operating simultaneously to delineate family boundaries and enhance its capacity.75 As in the case of the family, marriage too has been a target of generalizations.76 Yet as we shall see, marriage took on different meanings and played different roles in different contexts—­as a social alliance, a sacrament, a legal contract, and even as a form of ownership. Differences acknowledged, however, certain common features do appear to cut across diverse social traditions. Accordingly, there is room for some general observations regarding the role marriage played in the lives of the families at the center of our inquiry.77 A central feature in late antique and medieval matrimonial arrangements was their contractual nature, whereby the economic, as well as moral, responsibilities of the married couple would receive formal constitution.78 Accordingly, husbands were to pay a dowry and commit to supporting their wives in exchange for sexual access and reproduction. In fact, the set of mutual commitments entailed by marriage rendered it a form of partnership in certain traditions.79 At the same time, however, we are well advised to read such prescriptions in broader contexts, namely the gender inequalities imbedded in them and the social and economic interests to which they responded.80 It was perhaps with these considerations in mind that late antique Christian leaders sought to reform Greco-­Roman marriage ideals, rendering virtue as the strongpoint of a potential match, and valorizing the merits of harmony and friendship between the married couple.81 Concurrently, in Palestine, local rabbis advanced a conjugality that was agreed upon between the couple, signaling a contrast to the Babylonian form of agreement that was concluded between the husband and the bride’s father. Whereas in late antique Palestinian circles the  bride was a side to the contract, in Babylonia she was considered part

75 Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, p. xvii; Rosenthal, Man Versus Society, 845. 76 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 1; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 19. 77  See Karras, Unmarriages, 2. 78  In rabbinic Judaism, see Friedman, Jewish Marriage in Palestine, 19, 189; Gafni, “The institution of marriage in rabbinic times,” 15; Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, 224; Schremer, Male and Female He Created Them, 339; Ackerman-­Lieberman, “A partnership culture,” 148; Zinger, “Women, Gender and Law,” p. xvi; in Eastern Christianity, see Doumato, “Hearing other voices,” 190; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 117–18; in Islam, see Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 33; Sonbol, “History of marriage contracts,” 161; Spectorsky, Women in Classical Islamic Law, 25; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 24. 79  Friedman, “Marriage as an institution,” 35; Harper, “Marriage and family in late antiquity,” 680; Schremer, Male and Female He Created Them, 339. 80 Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, p. xvi. 81 Bagnall, Egypt in Late Antiquity, 189–93; Harper, “Marriage and family in late antiquity,” 667.

Contours of Family Dynamics  41 of it.82 A few centuries later, this time in an Islamic context, a hadith advised a father to choose carefully a husband for his daughter: “for marriage is slavery, therefore you should look carefully where your emancipated slave is enslaved.”83 Nonetheless, from the perspective of medieval Muslim jurists, matrimony was still a contract, a commercial transaction that granted the husband rights of possession over his wife and endowed her guardians, whether her father or other first degree male relatives, with considerable capital.84 The contractual nature of matrimony introduced more than a set of mutual commitments between husband and wife. Its functional characterization tends to conceal the emotional investment on either side of the conjugal arrangement.85 Cohabitation and parenting were bound to leave their marks on marital relations, infusing them with considerable mutual affection between the couple, attested in private correspondences between husbands and wives.86 Emotions, coupled with the formal tone of the matrimonial agreement, rendered conjugal life a source of social order. It was through expectations of spousal fidelity and the regulation of the sexual impetus that matrimony stood as a rock of social stability and reassurance.87 Centuries after matrimony was legalized by the rabbis, sanctified by the church, and regulated in the Qurʾan, al-­Ghazālī (d. 504/1111) listed procreation, sexual outlet, companionship, household order, and self-­discipline as five of its principal advantages in his monumental Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-­dīn (“The revival of the religious sciences”).88 Matrimony was perceived as a means for guarding against licentious behavior and sin, while at the same time as a source of life and social harmony. Al-­Ghazālī was merely reiterating earlier notions,89 yet viewed in the context of early and medieval Islamic ideas about ­kinship, his comments are a useful reminder of the social significance of matrimonial arrangements. Another ramification to matrimony was the creation of a social matrix between two families within a unified kinship system.90 And with the forging of new family loyalties and sentiments came a variety of benefits, including the expansion of economic means and assets, a broader net of social solidarity, and perhaps even

82 Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, 224; Schremer, Male and Female He Created Them, 325. The Babylonian practice was carried on into later periods, as can be seen in Babylonian marriage contracts: Friedman, Jewish Marriage in Palestine, 19, 189. 83  Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā, Kitāb al-­ʿayāl, 266 (originally al-­Bayhaqī, al-­Sunan al-­kubrā). 84 Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 31; Ali, Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam, 6, 8; Giladi, “Sex, marriage and the family in al-­Ghazālī’s thought,” 181. 85 Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 2, 149–50. 86 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 165–71. 87 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 53; Parkin, Kinship: An Introduction, 39; Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, p. xvi; Brown, The Body and Society, 56, 308; Karras, Unmarriages, 26. 88  Al-­Ghazālī, Iḥ yāʾ ʿulūm al-­dīn, 2 (Kitāb adab al-­nikāḥ ): 31–42; discussed in Giladi, “Sex, marriage and the family in al-­Ghazālī’s thought,” 175–6. 89 Rubenstein, The Culture of the Babylonian Talmud, 102; Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 283–301. 90 Moxnes, Constructing Early Christian Families, 30; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 210.

42  Female Power and Religious Change an upgrade in social status.91 This is particularly true when we think of the married couple as the organizing unit of the household, very much in the manner it was conceived in The Management of the Estate. Its author’s ideas, which at the time echoed those of his classical contemporaries, later permeated medieval Islamic etiquette treatises, such as Ibn Miskawayh’s (d. 421/1030) Tahdhīb ­al-­akhlāq (“The refinement of character”), and al-­Māwardī’s (d. 450/1058) Adab al-­dunyā wa-­l-­dīn (“Religious and worldly ethics”).92 According to these works, the matrimonial contract was not only a formal declaration of mutual commitments between spouses but an expression of the economic relationship that served to safeguard the couple’s common property, its proper administration, and, eventually, distribution.93 Family interests were carefully strategized. For families that owned property, ran businesses, and enjoyed a privileged social position on account of their material capital, the choice of a partner for one of their members was a crucial decision.94 It is with these considerations in mind that we should read into the common practice of endogamous marriages, yet also into less common circumstances in which exogamous marriages were chosen. While the ­former practice assisted in retaining wealth within the family, the latter facilitated its growth through new social alliances.95 And while matrimonial strategies in the form of endogamous and exogamous marriages were of great economic utility, their ramifications were bound to leave their marks on the relative place of individuals within their respective family structures and in relation to their kinship ties.

The extended family Marriage patterns, as well as living arrangements (discussed below), played an important role in the formation of the extended family. These were centered on a patriarchal figure, whose male descendants constituted extensions of his power and authority upon multiple nuclear family clusters. The extended family, or

91 Schremer, Male and Female He Created Them, 126–43; Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 33; Ali, Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam, 31; Younes, Joy and Sorrow in Early Muslim Egypt, 33; Benkheira, “Famille, parenté, droit,” 140–1. On the utility of matrimonial arrangements for the preservation of property, see Payne, “East Syrian bishops.” 92 Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 352. 93 Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, 199. 94 Hanna, Making Big Money in 1600, 145; Vuolanto, Children and Asceticism in Late Antiquity, 30. 95 Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, 30–2; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 33; Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 31–2; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 24; Hjerrild, Studies in Zoroastrian Family Law, 15–16; Payne, “East Syrian bishops,” 20; Rapp, Brother-­Making in Late Antiquity and Byzantium, 10; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 211. It is worth noting in this regard also polygamous marriages, though it is hard to measure the extent to which these were practiced, clearly a prerogative that was adopted by the higher echelons of society; see Friedman, “Polygyny in Jewish tradition and practice”; Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 41; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 173.

Contours of Family Dynamics  43 household, is often presented as a consequence of patriarchal norms and patrilocal practices, as well as multi-­generational habitation patterns within co-­residency structures.96 Yet more recently, such depictions have been met with a counter-­ argument according to which the formation of extended families was conditioned upon local circumstances. For example, low population density, such as in rural areas, would dictate nuclear family structures in separate residencies, whereas high population density and partible inheritance arrangements would dictate extended ones.97 In addition to considerations pertaining to land and surplus, the formation of extended families was of low feasibility in the event of common occurrences such as death, divorce, relocation, and separation. According to Krakowski, these were anything but rare occurrences among the families that feature in the Geniza.98 The “romantic” image of extended families has been qualified, if not rejected outright.99 At the same time, however, we should not underestimate the prevalence, and consequently, the significance, of extended family structures or of extended kinship ties that often went beyond immediate blood relations.100 Late antique and medieval documentary and narrative, as well as material, evidence speaks of a network of solidarities that transcended the family fold and spread among neighbors and friends. These were often the result of shared spaces of relative intimacy in which members of different families would interact on a daily basis. The ties they forged among each other entailed a regular exchange of services, generating affinities that echo those that prevailed among members of the same kin.101

Residency and objects Social proximities that translated into kinship ties were very much the result of the spatial features of urban domicile patterns. These conjectures seem to have been at the base of at least one of the Arabic terms for kinship, i.e., qarāba, which literally means “proximity.” Kinship, it has been argued, “can therefore be defined in reference to a spatial framework.” At the same time, it not only signifies

96 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 36–9; Bagnall, Egypt in Late Antiquity, 199; Bagnall and Cribiore, Women’s Letters from Ancient Egypt, 79; Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 374. 97 Huebner, Mediterranean Families in Antiquity, 12. 98 Krakowski, Coming of Age, 12. See also, in a 17th-­ century Ottoman context, Gerber, “Anthropology and family history,” 413–14. 99 Benkheira, La famille en islam, 36; Younes, Joy and Sorrow in Early Muslim Egypt, 44. 100  Cf. Kandiyoti, “Islam and patriarchy,” 31. Kandiyoti notes the significance of extended families as a powerful cultural ideal. Discussed also in Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 374. 101 Geertz, “The meaning of family ties”; Bahloul, The Architecture of Memory, 51–2; Hasan-­ Rokem, Tales of the Neighborhood, 8; Baker, Rebuilding the House of Israel, 116; Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 377; Huebner, Mediterranean Families in Antiquity, 156; Younes, Joy and Sorrow in Early Muslim Egypt, 44.

44  Female Power and Religious Change closeness and the attachments resulting from it but also contrasts between those who are near each other and those who are external—­unknown—­ajnabī.102 The families at the center of this book exhibited kinship attachments that drew their strength not only from shared lineage and biological ties but also from customary co-­residency, shared property, and a set of memory-­charged items of sacred and mundane nature.103 These were to instill kinship ties with further meaning, rendering them crucial for generating a sense of a familial unity.104 The significance of domestic experiences, whether those evolving around objects or in the context of shared space, are therefore worthy of particular attention when considering the creation, formation, and extension of kinship ties.105 Social scientists speak highly of the structuring role of the domicile in relation to kinship.106 It is through the mundane activities that take place in the house, their almost ritualistic character in a virtually congregational setting, that kinship ties are imbued with meaning and are given order.107 Or, as Janet Carsten puts it, “[t]he very quality of experiences in the houses we inhabit leads many people around the world to assert that kinship is made in houses.”108 The house is not merely a physical expression of social commitments; it is a space which affects various levels of commitment through the unique experiences it stimulates.109 The domicile was not only the locus of family experiences but also a space that consisted of objects of sentimental value. These are “the material stuff to which ideas about kinship are attached.”110 We can try to imagine how the elaborately decorated houses of urban middle-­class families in Fust ̣āt ̣, for example, were more than mere manifestations of personal taste. A set of objects, including furniture, bed and sofa covers, rugs and carpets, drapes and curtains, lamps, as well as dining and serving dishes, carried with them sentiments over time and space.111 They were often brought by brides into their new homes or to that of their husband’s family, for which we have detailed references in legal records that were made out in Islamic, Christian, and Jewish legal dispositions.112

102  Benkheira, “Le vocabulaire arabe de la parenté,” 51. 103  Carsten, “The stuff of kinship,” 143; see, e.g., on the memories of the descendants of the Jewish Algerian Bahloul family, Bahloul, Architecture of Memory; discussed in Carsten, After Kinship, 33. 104  Cf. Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, 35, on formal and practical kinship and representational and self-­representation kinship. 105 Rapoport, “Spatial organization and the built environment,” 461; Hendon, “Archaeological approaches to the organization of domestic labor,” 48. 106 Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, 89. 107 Bahloul, Architecture of Memory, 28. 108 Carsten, After Kinship, 35. 109  Carsten, “The stuff of kinship,” 136; citing Sahlins, What Kinship is—­and is Not, 29. See also Bachelard, Poetics of Space, 14; Bahloul, Architecture of Memory, 28; Baker, Rebuilding the House of Israel, 32–3; Luz, The Mamluk City in the Middle East, 70. 110  Carsten, “The stuff of kinship,” 134. 111  See, e.g., in Goitein, Med. Soc. 4, 105, 107–35; Vorderstrasse and Traptow, A Cosmopolitan City, 182. 112 Goitein, Med. Soc. 4, 105; Rapoport, “Matrimonial gifts in early Islamic Egypt,” 23–4, 27; Rapoport, Marriage, Money and Divorce, 20; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 29, 114, 118, 120.

Contours of Family Dynamics  45 Domestic items constituted both the substances of kinship and its markers. Upon entry, they offered occupants a notion of familiarity and intimacy, yet at the same time a reminder to visitors of their external status. The few high windows overlooking the street from within, the single entrance leading into the house, and the absence of external decorations, convey a strong sense of privacy, almost secrecy, as well as distinction.113 They serve to mark the boundaries of kinship and their sanctity, whereby the impermeability from the outside is strongly contrasted with an internal openness, signaled by shared halls, a dining area, and spacious courtyard.114 Concealment from the outside and spacious internal spaces are some of the more salient features of pre-­modern Near Eastern housing arrangements. They derive from a planning that was designed to serve a variety of purposes that go beyond the basic needs of accommodation, including socialization, dining, hospitality, storage, and livelihood.115 The most common structure was the dār, attested throughout the Near East and known for its multi-­structure composition, at the center of which there were one or more courtyards.116 The arrangement points to the centrality of family life and its communal nature, rend­ er­ing the domestic setting central in fostering attachments through dynamics of co-­residency. These dynamics were the result of functional and recreational activities, both of which took place in shared spaces, whether those were open, roofless courtyards or large halls, onto which the doors of dwelling units would open, and corridors would lead.117 The self-­contained quality of these houses is remarkable, as the domicile served to meet both the material and the emotional needs of its occupants.118 Courtyards further served to facilitate kinship attachments. It is through their diverse practical utilities, their role as centers of socialization, and the interconnectedness they created among household members, that they constantly infused meaning into kinship relations.119 All this had much to do with the fact that individual houses would rely on the services of facilities, such as a common well,

113  MacDonald, “Early Christian women married to unbelievers,” 223; Goitein, “Urban housing in Fatimid and Ayyubid times,” 15–16; Walmsley, Early Islamic Syria, 44; Luz, Mamluk City in the Middle East, 55. 114 Bahloul, Architecture of Memory, 31. 115  See Abu Lughod, “The Islamic city—­historic myth, Islamic essence and contemporary relevance,” 167–9; Abu Lughod’s remarks about the creation of semi-­private spaces in modern Middle Eastern cities is helpful for considering principles of gender segregation at the base of urban planning. 116  Marçais, “Dar,” EI2; Hoffman, “Ascalon on the Levantine coast,” 30; Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 64–6; Boas, Domestic Settings, 25; Oleson et al., Humayma Excavation Project, 159, 163; Luz, Mamluk City in the Middle East, 72. On references in the Geniza to the dār and its variants, see Goitein, Med. Soc. 4, 56–9. 117  Ibrahim, “Residential architecture in Mamluk Cairo,” 47. 118 Russell, Medieval Cairo and the Monasteries of the Wādi Natrūn, 53. 119  On the reoccurrence of courtyard housing systems in late antique and middle Islamic period societies, see Meyers, “The problems of gendered space in Syro-­Palestinian domestic architecture,” 59–60; Walmsley, Early Islamic Syria, 131; Baker, Rebuilding the House of Israel, 36; Huebner, The Family in Roman Egypt, 41; Avni, The Byzantine-­Islamic Transition, 167–8, 170–1, 220, 235.

46  Female Power and Religious Change laundry area, and at times also a shared cooking space that were all located in a ­common courtyard.120 Urban as well as rural houses, such as those found in the Fayyum and Galilee regions and the towns of Jarash, or Fust ̣āt ̣, would often cluster together, sharing public spaces for purposes of social, economic, and daily activities.121 Indeed, clustered houses were often meant to meet the needs of an expanding household, providing adjacent dwellings to members of the extended family.122 Yet the reliance on common facilities within the same compound also suggests high levels of social proximity among individuals of different household affiliations.123 The extension of kinship ties across public domains can also be seen in the context of gradual changes in Near Eastern urban planning. Material findings suggest that already in the sixth century ce, and to a greater extent in the seventh and eighth, private housing was increasingly taking over public urban spaces throughout the eastern Mediterranean.124 The trend went hand in hand with the gradual introduction of economic activities into living quarters and the appearance of “an all-­ encompassing house unit suited to the multifaceted socio-­ economic activities of the households.”125 While these developments say much about the centrality of family life and its social place, their implications for kinship boundaries should not be overlooked. The expansion of private households at the expense of public domains was to charge distinctions between the private and the public with uncertainties that necessitated regulation.126 Moreover, the density of housing arrangements was bound to undermine residential boundaries. This may have constituted the background for an Islamic legal requirement to build screens on the edges of roofs that overlooked neighboring houses.127

Economic arrangements Small-­scale industries and business activities were often incorporated within the private residencies of urban families.128 Such families would operate as 120 Baker, Rebuilding the House of Israel, 38; Hanna, Making Big Money in 1600, 152. 121 Huebner, Mediterranean Families in Antiquity, 178, 198–9; Goitein, Med. Soc. 4, 105. 122 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 36. 123  A question to Abraham Maimonides (d. 635/1237), noting a woman’s demand of her husband that he provide her with a house with a courtyard that would be inhabited strictly by Jews, suggests the level of intimacy among neighbors in shared compounds. See T-­S K27.45, discussed in Zinger, “Women, Gender and Law,” 255 n. 159; Goitein, Med. Soc. 4, 21 n. 100; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 254 n. 38, 271 n. 20. 124  Kennedy, “From polis to madina,” 5, 12; Tsafrir and Foerster, “From Scythopolis to Baysan,” 113. 125 Walmsley, Early Islamic Syria, 132. 126  Kennedy, “From polis to madina,” 21–2. 127  Alshech, “ ‘Do not enter houses other than your own’,” 313–14. 128  See Hendon, “Archaeological approaches to the organization of domestic labor.” Shops, businesses, and other forms of economic activities which constituted part of the domicile, or were adjacent to it, are attested in different surveys of medieval urban housing; see Goitein, “Urban housing in Fatimid and Ayyubid times,” 15; Ibrahim, “Residential architecture in Mamluk Cairo,” 56–7; Russell,

Contours of Family Dynamics  47 self-­contained, economic units, engaged in a set of economic activities that were to further enhance kinship ties through a notion of common purpose, collaborative effort, and material interests.129 Shared property and livelihood also formed the basis of a solidarity network among immediate and remote family members. In the absence of state institutions, the family constituted the basic support system for its members, whether these were orphans, sick, disabled, or elderly. Its  solidarity came in the form of material aid, shelter, and patronage.130 Correspondences found in the Geniza records include appeals to kinship solidarities by relatives in need or others who sought to advance various material ends.131 These appeals were grounded both in a normative tradition and a set of informal arrangements, one of which was that children would support their parents in old age.132 And it is perhaps here that we may identify the key to family solidarity—­ reciprocity: the care of children for aging parents was in fact a changing of the guard; the once-­dependent children, now grown up, assume the role previously taken by their parents. Similar expectations facilitated the solidarity networks of pre-­modern Near Eastern families, established between parents and children, ­siblings, spouses, and a long list of additional dependents.133

Women within the family The endeavor to recover female power and agency in early and medieval Islamic family settings is premised on the notion of the family as a social network that was pieced together by means of sentiments and a set of shared interests. In addition, considering the place of mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters calls attention to the customs, traditions, ideologies, and daily experiences of the societies at the center of this book. It is here that we must locate our female protagonists, probing into the nature of their relations with other family members, particularly their male counterparts, namely their husbands, sons, brothers, and fathers.

Medieval Cairo and the Monasteries of the Wādi Natrūn, 52–4; Walmsley, Early Islamic Syria, 86–7, 132; Luz, Mamluk City in the Middle East, 99–100. 129 Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 2, 157; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 33; Goody, The Oriental, the Ancient and the Primitive, 9; Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 55–6; Harper, “Marriage and family in late antiquity,” 685; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 30–1. 130  Mattson, “Law: family law,” 453; Huebner, The Family in Roman Egypt, 3. 131  T-­S 10J6.10, unpublished; CUL. Or. 1080 J35r.19, ed. Gil, In the Kingdom of Ishmael, doc. 156, discussed by Oded Zinger in a workshop held at the University of Haifa in Dec. 2018. See also Krakowski, Coming of Age, 15. 132 Singerman, Avenues of Participation, 83–4, discussed in Sacchi and Viazzo, “Family and household,” 377. See also Avner Giladi, “Parents,” EQ, 21; Huebner, The Family in Roman Egypt, 86; Vuolanto, Children and Asceticism in Late Antiquity, 33. 133  Goitein notes in this regard endogamous marriages as a means of protection for young couples; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 2. See also Krakowski, Coming of Age, 14.

48  Female Power and Religious Change Any assessment of female power within Near Eastern family settings must attend to their patriarchal framework. Our point of departure, then, is a family, whether nuclear or extended, at the center of which stood an authoritative male figure who further delegated power, privileges, and tasks to other family members. Patriarchy is well attested in a variety of late antique Near Eastern and Mediterranean patrilineal traditions.134 There is reason to believe that it took on special significance in Arabia following the Islamic revolution there in the seventh century.135 According to Moshe Gil, the purpose of the clause in the Constitution of Medina which declares that “a woman shall only be given protection with the consent of her family”136 was the product of an Islamic agenda to abolish whatever remained of an ancient Arabian matriarchate system.137 Whether Arabian society was indeed matriarchal is difficult to determine with certainty, yet the clause serves to remind us that the patriarchal framework was very much part of the Islamic social vision. At the same time, patriarchy was not uniform in its application, and recent scholarship has offered some helpful nuances that underscore the importance of assessing principles vis-­à-­vis practices, as well as local circumstances.138 In what follows, I shall tease out some of the patriarchal features of the societies under discussion, focusing on aspects of male/female asymmetries in what pertains to hierarchies within the family, power structures, and spatial restrictions. This is aimed to set the ground for the final part of this chapter, where I turn to consider aspects of female power within the family. Patriarchy, a system which places male figures in advantageous positions over females, is founded on the notion of male superiority. In the early centuries of Christianity, a still very much pagan Roman nobility consisted of young men who held a sense of strong superiority over “women, slaves, and barbarians.”139 It was a notion that received a biological justification in Greco-­Roman thought according to which men were held to be superior mentally and physically in comparison to women.140 Consequently, gender asymmetry would find its expression in a family hierarchy which endowed men with a set of privileges (as well as obligations) and imposed on women a set of limitations, whereby men were to exert authority and women were to offer submission. Thus, for example, while conjugal fidelity was expected from a man as an expression of self-­mastery, it was equally expected from a woman as an expression of her obedience to her husband.141 Greco-­ Roman notions of gender inequality would be somewhat refined by rabbinic sages and the Church Fathers, gradually introducing the woman as a meaningful, 134 Benkheira, La famille en islam, 15. 135  Giladi, “Family,” EQ, 75; Bamyeh, “Patriarchy,” EQ, 31–2; Spectorsky, Women in Classical Islamic Law, 24. 136 Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 233. 137  Gil, “The constitution of Medina,” 57. 138 Benkheira, La famille en islam, 35; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 12. 139 Brown, The Body and Society, 9. 140 Wilkinson, A Cultural History of Childhood, 9. 141 Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 2, 151.

Contours of Family Dynamics  49 yet still secondary, family member.142 Accordingly, a female’s place in the ­family stemmed from her relation to a male figure.143 And despite early ­monotheistic modifications, the notion of male superiority persisted, but now due to the conviction that woman was created from man, and was subordinate to him.144 Centuries later, these notions were to underpin principles of a gender hierarchy among early and medieval Islamic societies.145 For example, the newly-­wed Jewish women who feature in the Geniza were often seen in analogy to slaves from a legal perspective, and as minors from a social one.146 The slavery analogy is even more explicit in Islamic law.147 A saying attributed to the Kufan notable and tribal leader Asmāʾ b. Khārija (d. 66/686), suggests, however, that both men and women were slaves to one another upon marriage. When marrying off his daughter, Asmāʾ is recorded saying to her: “O daughter, may you be to your husband as a slave girl and he to you as a slave; do not go [too] near him, for you may bore him and do not distance yourself from him, lest you burden him (in your absence) and he shall burden you (in his absence).”148 Here we are reminded, however, that whereas the Muslim man possessed full independence vis-­à-­vis his wife, the latter’s movement was restricted.149 What might initially seem an equal standing is then qualified by the father’s exhortation of his daughter to conduct herself in a way which would please her husband. Whether Asmāʾ’s saying is indicative of the notions of his time, we cannot say. Yet it once again introduces the concept of slavery into matrimonial relations and the notion of gender hierarchy from which it stemmed. As Yossef Rapoport notes, “slavery, rather than being a contemptible institution, was the exemplary patriarchal ­model.”150 The analogy is seen also in the framework of the house as an economic unit, rendering a man its master and a woman his servant. The hierarchical ramifications of such notions are worthy of our attention, as they further highlight the scope of male supremacy.151 The ideal of male domination was articulated through a variety of symbols and practices, including an analogy to master–­ slave relations, gender-­ designated spaces, notions of honor, principles of purity, and of course, an imagery of ­masculinity.152 In practical terms, male domination resulted in a disempowering 142 Schremer, Male and Female He Created Them, 336; Nathan, The Family in Late Antiquity, 41; LaFosse, “Age hierarchy and social networks,” 216. 143 Huebner, The Family in Roman Egypt, 124. 144 Nathan, The Family in Late Antiquity, 41. 145  See Bauer, Gender Hierarchy in the Qurʾan. 146 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 164; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 6, 265. 147 Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 31; Ali, Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam, 6, 8; Giladi, “Sex, marriage and the family in al-­Ghazālī’s thought,” 181. 148  Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā, Kitāb al-­ʿayāl, 288 (no. 136). 149  Myrne, “Narrative, gender and authority in ʿAbbāsid literature on women,” 127. 150 Rapoport, Marriage, Money and Divorce, 52. 151 Bouhdiba, Sexuality in Islam, 11. 152  Abu-­Lughod, Veiled Sentiments, 119; Baumgarten, Mothers and Children, 77.

50  Female Power and Religious Change de­pend­ency of women and corresponding restrictions that found application first and foremost in the role of the head of the family. The arrangements and ideals that prevailed among early and medieval Islamic urban Near Eastern societies appear to echo an earlier Hellenic perspective: whereas a man possessed complete and unrestricted agency within the family, a woman’s agency was conditional.153 The vision in The Management of the Estate of a woman who shows her husband “subservience and obedience,” submitting “herself to his commands, for he has bestowed the estate upon her and made her the owner of it,”154 was to find resonance in the Qurʾan and early Islamic traditions that sought to promote similar female traits. Wives were called upon to obey their husbands who were entrusted with their wellbeing and overseeing their conduct: “Men are the managers of the affairs of women . . . Righteous women are therefore obedient, . . . And those you fear may be rebellious admonish; banish them to their couches, and beat them” (Q 4:34).155 These ideals were not very different from the ones promoted in late antique Palestinian rabbinic circles which placed unmarried girls under the authority of their fathers and married ones under the authority of their husbands.156 The early rabbis presented a list of domestic duties which the wife was expected to perform in exchange for her livelihood and husband’s benevolence.157 Around the same time, the second-­century narrative of the Shepherd of Hermas presents a hero whose duties included the disciplining of his wife.158 The didactic messages that emerged from rabbinic, early Christian, and Islamic texts spoke of women who were under the constant guardianship of male figures. This was both a moral and a material guardianship, endowing men with the authority to supervise women’s upbringing and behavior, monitor their movement, administer their property (although with qualification and to a limited extent), and at the same time charging them with the responsibility to provide for their female dependents and fulfill their needs.159

153  Foucault, Michel. The History of Sexuality, vol. 2, 156. 154 Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 15. 155  On the reception of this verse among later Muslim commentators, see Marín, “Disciplining wives.” See also in Ibn Mājah, Kitāb al-­nikāḥ , 1857: “Pious woman, who obeys her husband’s orders, makes him happy when he looks at her, . . . and in his absence is earnest with him in respect to her body and his property,” translated and discussed in Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 350. For further discussion, see Spectorsky, Women in Classical Islamic Law, 59, 184, 196. 156  mKet 4:5, discussed in Valler, “Business women in the Mishnaic and Talmudic period,” 1–2; Friedman, Jewish Marriage in Palestine, 182, 216–18. 157  Stav and Weiss, The Return of the Absent Father, 16. See also Ilan, Jewish Women in Greco-­ Roman Palestine, 59. 158 Horn, “Let the Little Children Come to Me,” 83. Halakhot ketsuvot, a rabbinic halakhic compendium attributed to Yehudai Gaon, although probably from around the mid-­9th century, lists the duties that the wife is expected to perform, stressing the importance of the respect she is to offer her husband; see Lewin, Otsar, Ketubbot, 169–70 (n. 428). 159  On the application of male guardianship, see Puente, “Juridical sources for the study of women,” 95–110; Mattson, “Law: family law,” 452; Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 22, 31; Rapoport,

Contours of Family Dynamics  51 The scope of male power vis-­à-­vis their female kin renders the image of the latter as silent, passive figures, usurped of agency, even over their own bodies.160 This image, however, is challenged to a large extent by the legal documents found in the Geniza. Krakowski argues that the females represented in these documents were afforded autonomous legal agency after puberty and prior to marriage, and although controlled by their husbands after marriage, they were not entirely without rights. According to Krakowski, their position was not very different from that of other women, Christian and Muslim.161 We shall come back to this point, as it bears great relevance to the overall argument of this book, but for now, let us remain within the limits of male authority. As already noted, its application was founded on the expectation that a woman should accommodate herself to her husband. This was hardly a novel idea, as can be gathered from the Brysonian instruction: “The affairs of the estate will not be straight until the character of the woman corresponds to the character and way of the man.”162 Indeed, good character was of central importance. Centuries later, medieval authorities such as ­al-­Ghazālī, and in direct correspondence to him, Bar Hebraeus (d. 685/1286), listed good character as one of the principal qualities desired in a good wife.163 Around the same time, the eleventh-­century Turkish Kutadgu Bilig advised the prince of Kashgar to find a wife “who has virtue,” rather than beauty, wealth, or nobility, for women who possess these seemingly good qualities end up turning their husbands into slaves. Instead, the prince should choose a wife for her piety and good nature, a wife who will “brighten” the prince’s life.164 Good character, however, could not suffice. The qualities listed in The Management of the Estate, read alongside Proverbs 31, speak of a woman who is reliable, competent, and takes proper charge of her household.165 Read in the framework of medieval Islamic normative literature, the managerial traits of the wife show up along a list of features pertaining to her character, behavior, and appearance.166 Thus, the Andalusi author and poet Ibn ʿAbd Rabbih (d. 328/940) incorporated in his famous adab work, al-­ʿIqd al-­farīd (“The unique necklace”), anecdotes which speak of the required characteristics (khiṣāl) of the wife to be.  These include a submissive and obedient disposition, a diligence towards Marriage, Money and Divorce, 72; Hjerrild, Studies in Zoroastrian Family Law, 16; Benkheira, “Famille, parenté, droit,” 140–1; Bauer, Gender Hierarchy in the Qurʾan, 165. 160 Friedman, Jewish Marriage in Palestine, 179; Giladi, Infants, Parents and Wet Nurses, 94. 161 Krakowski, Coming of Age, 4. 162 Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 26. 163  Weitz, “Al-­Ghazālī, Bar Hebraeus, and the ‘Good Wife’,” 206. 164  Dankoff, “Wisdom of royal glory (Kutadgu Bilig),” 186. 165 Berger, “Marriage, sex and family,” 3; Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 26. 166  A highly illustrative example of the dissemination of these traits across diverse literary and religious traditions can be seen in the story about Umāma bt. al-­Ḥ ārith’s advice to her daughter upon marriage to a king of Kinda in pre-­Islamic times. See Zinger and Torollo, “From an Arab queen to a Yiddische Mama.”

52  Female Power and Religious Change self-­appearance, good judgment, and fine management.167 Likewise, al-­Ghazālī’s Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-­dīn and Bar Hebraeus’s Ethicon list piety, good character, beauty, along with fertility, virginity, and good lineage, as the future wife’s commendable features.168 While it is hard to say whether grooms and their families sought the qualities listed above in practice, there can be little doubt that the authors who espoused them did so due to the conception that they were key for the implementation of patriarchal ideals. Such female ideals, asserts Nadia El Cheikh, were conceived for the sake of “serving the husband, making his life more comfortable, and insuring his honor, his money and place in society.”169 The wife who entered her husband’s domicile in accordance with patrilocal arrangements would no doubt feel pressure not only to please her husband but also to satisfy her new kinsfolk. Although it is hard to estimate the scale of patrilocal arrangements, the phenomenon is well attested.170 In addition, whether patrilocal or matrilocal, there is much to suggest the prevalence of co-­residential, complex, multi-­generational households. Under such circumstances, the young bride possessed the lowest status in the household, not only due to her age and gender but at times also due to the shift from her father’s custody to her husband’s.171 Perhaps one of the most notable expressions of female subordination were the limitations imposed on her movement. In the eleventh century, the prince of Kashgar was advised to “keep women indoors at all times,” lest “the roving eye that sees her on the street will want to possess her.”172 Indeed, concerns over conjugal fidelity may have been sincere, yet the motivation to restrict female freedom of movement and confine women to the inner space of the domicile should also be read in light of patriarchal norms. Women, whether wives, mothers, or daughters, were expected to roam within a rather limited space, preferably within the boundaries of the domicile.173 We should recall, however, that the extent to which such an expectation could be fulfilled had much to do 167 Ibn ʿAbd Rabbih, al-­ʿlqd al-­farīd, 6: 83–4, presented and discussed in El Cheikh, “In search for the ideal spouse,” 186. 168  Al-­Ghazālī, Iḥ yāʾ ʿulūm al-­dīn, 2: 48–53; Ethicon, 146–9. The relevant paragraphs are both ­presented and discussed in Lev. Weitz, “Al-­Ghazālī, Bar Hebraeus, and the ‘Good Wife’, ” 206. On the virtue of fertility, see Verskin, Barren Women, 30. 169  EL Cheikh, “In search for the ideal spouse,” 187. 170  Huebner, “Introduction,” in Mediterranean Families in Antiquity, 13–14. According to Sabine Huebner, in late antique Egypt patrilocal marriages were mostly common in the countryside. The point is further explained by Mona Tokarek LaFosse, as being on account of the tendency of urban couples “toward neolocal residence and simple family households,” due to economic considerations and limited space in the city; LaFosse, “Age hierarchy and social networks,” 209. According to Krakowski, patrilocal arrangements were implemented among a relatively small percentage of the Jewish families recorded in the Geniza; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 48. 171 Lamdan, A Separate People, 58; LaFosse, “Age hierarchy and social networks,” 208; Stav and Weiss, The Return of the Absent Father, 30. 172  Dankoff, “Wisdom of royal glory (Kutadgu Bilig),” 187. 173  Choksy, “Women during the transition from Sasanian to Early Islamic times,” 53; mYoma 1: 1, discussed in Stav and Weiss, The Return of the Absent Father, 17.

Contours of Family Dynamics  53 with social class. Whereas the prince of Kashgar and members of the elite classes throughout the Near East were able to implement the highest measures of female spatial restrictions, lower social classes were bound to manifest a great deal of compromise in this respect.174 On the face of it, it appears that restrictions of a woman’s freedom of movement were motivated by a variety of concerns, among them a high regard for certain behavioral norms. Careful monitoring of a woman’s movement served to prevent undesired socialization between men and women outside the family, as well as circumventing the moral threat that women were believed to pose by their presence in public.175 To that end, in circumstances that required their movement, women were obliged to seek the permission of a male relative. For example, a Christian widow in eighth-­century Egypt who wished to travel to another town was obliged to seek permission from her son—“the only male in the family.”176 Here, as in other instances, we might anticipate that a woman would have been accompanied by either her son or another male relative who would serve as her guardian for purposes of travel.177 We may assume a similar motivation behind Islamic legal principles which exempted husbands from supporting their wives, should the latter violate their spatial restriction.178 Likewise, clauses in marriage contracts, found in the Geniza, that gave explicit instructions as to where and when a man’s wife might go.179

Female agency within the family As already noted, the family constituted a common source of identification for its members. It is through the family that individuals were often able to advance economic and social goals; and it was the family that constituted a locus of their sentiments and a reminder of their generational standing. It was a framework that offered security and solidarity and at the same time demanded loyalty and social primacy. Within it, members knew their place and role, both dictated by the exigencies of daily experiences as well as by a profound commitment to patriarchal ideals. It is here that the female members of the house were expected to assume an inferior place with respect to their male relatives and attend to domestic duties, as mothers and wives. Their place was a restricted one, deprived of autonomy and 174  Lutfi, “Manners and customs of fourteenth-­century Cairene women”; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 23; Krakwoski, Coming of Age, 198–9. 175  Mattson, “Law: family law,” 454; Noorani, “Normative notions of public and private in early Islamic culture”; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 190. 176 Evetts, History of the Patriarchs, PO 5.1: 70, presented and discussed in Horn, “Reconstructing women’s history from Christian-­Arabic sources,” 427. 177  The arrangement takes the form of a legal stipulation in Islamic law: Mattson, “Law: family law,” 454; Sayeed, “Women and the hajj,” 67–9. 178 Ali, Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam, 71–2. 179 Krakowski, Coming of Age, 192.

54  Female Power and Religious Change freedom of movement. They were governed and supervised by the male figures of the family, upon whose will, and at times whim, they were dependent. Nonetheless, within what seems like a rigid system of male dominance, women possessed a set of social means that rendered their place in the lives of their families highly significant and consequently afforded them possibilities for advancing their interests and fulfilling a certain measure of personal ambition. The final part of this chapter is devoted to assessing these means and seeks to offer some basic observations regarding female agency within early and medieval Islamic family settings. One of the characteristics of the women that feature in the societies at the center of this book was their state of continuous transition, resulting from a set of social and moral conventions. A woman can be seen passing through different stations in life—­from adolescence to adulthood, childhood to motherhood, from paternal custody to spousal custody, and from being a young motherless bride to assuming the role of a mature mistress of the house. A woman’s movement, however, was not merely linear, over time. At least among the lower classes, women could be found moving back and forth, from the private domicile, through the shared courtyard, onto the public spheres of the street, market, a site of worship, bathhouse, and workplace. And not only physically but also in nature, women occupied an ambivalent place in male imagination, as both motherly and managerial on the one hand, and seductive and enticing on the other.180 Women have been, therefore, characterized as possessing a liminal position, or being in a state of in-­between.181 Accordingly, they assumed a variety of mediating roles between different spaces, between the house of their paternal kin and that of their conjugal kin, as well as between the private and the public.182 Their ambiguous state was expressed in different ways: symbolic, and practical, in phases of initiation, clienthood, and dependency.183 Yet while liminality could suggest various inconveniences, it was also a state which imbued women with power and opportunity. Their presence was therefore perceived as dangerous, but also gave them agency.184 Liminality afforded women with means to negotiate their power between the formal and informal spheres of the patriarchal order; to operate both within and outside the visible boundaries of male authority and restriction. They were able to do so by bargaining for a variety of male favors as well as by taking advantage of local circumstances which afforded them with opportunities for advancing their goals.185 Their actions were in no way meant to challenge patriarchal conventions, but rather took place within their parameters.186 Despite their highly defined 180 Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 4; Stav and Weiss, The Return of the Absent Father, 32, 46. 181  See Gennep, Rites of Passage. 182 Turner, The Ritual Process, 95. 183  Ibid. 96. 184 Horvath, Modernism and Charisma, 4–5; Jacobson et al., Liminality, Hybridity, and American Women’s Literature, 3. 185  Kandiyoti, “Islam and patriarchy,” 32–3; Hanna, Making Big Money in 1600, 140. 186 Kueny, Conceiving Identities, 118–19; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 24.

Contours of Family Dynamics  55 place in normative texts of diverse genres and provenances, women were able to make their way beyond formal categories in a manner which has been classified as “unofficial or even clandestine and occult.”187 Spatial restrictions, for example, were diffused on both formal and informal levels. In the case of the former, there is some indication that men were advised to grant their wives permission to leave the domicile in order to fulfill their duties towards other family members, whether in their father’s home or on different occasions of family gatherings.188 Such movements, within the limits of male consent, are well documented in the Geniza. Correspondences speak of women not only frequenting the houses of immediate relatives and attending communal prayer and local bathhouses but also embarking on trips to relatives in distant lands and on pilgrimages.189 As already noted, movement of this nature was often, if not always, accompanied by male relatives, whereby women were not only guarded but also monitored in a manner that correlated with prescribed principles of female restriction. On an informal level, however, this image deserves some complication. The urban houses discussed earlier in this chapter, as well as their shared compounds, and their intrusion into streets and markets, contributed to a fluidity of physical boundaries and to female mobility beyond them. While these may have further contributed to detailed specifications regarding bodily concealment, they also speak of the immersion of women in domains that were external to their homes.190 Yet even within the limits of formal ideals which prescribed the restriction of wives to the home in order to allow husbands to engage in external affairs, women were endowed with notable power. As we have seen, The Management of the Estate speaks of men who entrust their wives with safeguarding and managing their homes for them.191 Counter to the frail, almost powerless, image of the wife which dominates many of our sources, it seems highly reasonable to assume that a woman who was entrusted with managing household affairs in the absence of her husband possessed considerable agency. And also prior to married life, medieval marriage contracts suggest considerable bargaining on the part of future wives. According to certain Islamic legal manuals and the contracts found in the Geniza, women were able to look after their interests in the event of their husbands taking a second wife.192 Moreover, the efforts of late antique and medieval authors to curtail the negative effects wives could have on their husbands, should they resort to harmful behavioral manipulations, speak of the emotional influence 187 Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, 41. 188  Friedman, “The ethics of medieval Jewish marriage,” 91. 189 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 337–8, 343. 190 Baker, Rebuilding the House of Israel, 3–4; Noorani, “Normative notions of public and private in early Islamic culture.” 191 Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 14 (nos. 75–6); on the reception of these ideas within medieval Islamic tradition, see 352–9. 192 Rapoport, Marriage, Money and Divorce, 57–8; Zinger, “Women, gender and law,” 195–6; Ashur, “Protecting the wife’s rights in marriage.”

56  Female Power and Religious Change these authors ascribed to women.193 Finally, a woman was able to assume an active and highly central place within the family by means of emotional attachment was almost limitless thanks to her maternal roles.194 These could also work to her advantage at a later stage, as her male sons matured and served to secure her position within the household, not to mention in the event of divorce or her husband’s death.195 The dependency of a mother on her sons should be seen within a broader set of relations which Krakowski has characterized as a network of kinship that stretched far beyond a woman’s immediate family members.196 According to Krakowski, like social networks, extended families rested on a pattern of mutual benefits, allowing women to turn to their natal families at times of need.197 It was through these ties, with their fathers, siblings, and sons, that women were able to find succor in the event of their husband’s absence, secure their marital property, initiate divorce, and move about outside their domicile.198 In fact, it appears as if the lack of formal social power endowed women with a form of informal capital.199 In appealing for a relative’s aid, a women would often emphasize both her weak state and the bonds of her kinship with her addressee.200 At the same time, however, women were not entirely dependent on their relatives. As Oded Zinger has demonstrated in great detail, the Geniza contains numerous records of women appealing to the local congregation, the community’s judicial courts, to Jewish communal heads, and even to Muslim judicial authorities in order to advance their goals.201

Conclusions Families take on different forms and are founded on different norms. A variety of  factors, including traditions, settlement patterns, economic conditions, demographic features, and even climate are central with respect to family structures and the relationships among their members. Consequently, theoretical principles, such as the utility of kinship ties or the dynamics resulting from patriarchal ­ideals, 193 On the “problematic wife” in early rabbinic literature, see Rubenstein, The Culture of the Babylonian Talmud, 122; on the dangers of a woman’s advice to her husband in medieval Islamic anthologies, see Swain, Economy, Family, and Society from Rome to Islam, 351. 194 Bouhdiba, Sexuality in Islam, 214–15; Giladi, Infants, Parents and Wet Nurses, 95; Baumgarten, Mothers and Children, 158–9; Giladi, Muslim Midwives, 46, 51–2. 195  Cf. Abu-­Lughod, Veiled Sentiments, 54. 196 Krakowski, Coming of Age, 12–15. 197  Ibid. 65–6. 198 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 324, 326; Goitein, Med. Soc. 5, 228; Goody, The Oriental, the Ancient and the Primitive, 49–51; Harper, “Marriage and family in late antiquity,” 672; Rapoport, Marriage, Money and Divorce, 6. 199  The observation was first made by Oded Zinger in a conference on the social capital of Jewish women that was held at the Israel Institute of Advanced Studies in 2017. 200  Melammed, “Women in medieval Jewish societies,” 105–11. 201  Zinger, “Women, Gender and Law”; Zinger, “ ‘She aims to harass him’.” See also Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 332–6; Goitein, Med. Soc. 5, 227; Benkheira, La famille en islam, 25.

Contours of Family Dynamics  57 are of limited use for the external observer. The historian is faced with the task of uncovering local arrangements and accounting for the different forces that dominate the setting under scrutiny. This chapter has attempted to do just that. Yet rather than offering another model of the pre-­modern Near Eastern family, it highlighted some of its more salient features that are considered here particularly relevant for the study of female agency in family settings. These features draw attention to the fluidity of family boundaries, the complex matrix of family ties and their reciprocal nature, and the types of commitments among family members that are based on notions of shared ancestry, debt, respect, solidarity, and common interest. Seen in relation to the place, and subsequently power, of women in the family, these features speak also of the moments and means that enabled women to exercise agency in regard to their families. Kinship ties, it would be fair to argue, were instrumental in various ways. They offered the individual social security and a sense of being part of a group. As such, the family operated as a small-­scale community. It demanded the commitment and identification of its members and as such constituted a central aspect of their identity. Yet important and central as it was, the family was not the only focal point of social life and corresponding sentiments. As the next chapter will demonstrate, membership in a religious community could be either in harmony or in conflict with family life. Whereas the family served as a vehicle for advancing communal agendas, it could also work to undermine them, particularly when such agendas were aimed at religious conformity and unity. Accordingly, religious authorities called upon communal members to prioritize their religious commitments at the expense of those stemming from their kinship affinities. To that end, they endeavored to supervise family life and render the individual’s loyalty to the religious community primary. Their measures and resulting norms will take center stage in the ensuing discussion, as it considers the tension between kinship and community crucial for understanding the religious agency of women in religiously mixed families.

2 “Even though it be against yourselves, or your parents and kinsmen” (Q 4:135) The Prioritization of God over Family

A coincidental encounter, related in al-­Tanūkhī’s (d. 384/994) al-­Faraj baʿd al-­shidda (“Relief following hardship”), between a Christian captive and his Muslim grandson in the camp of Maslama b. ʿAbd al-­Malik (d. 120/738), stirred a dramatic series of events. Despite evident religious differences, a bond is forged between the two as the young Muslim is reminded of his Christian background. We were with Maslama b. ʿAbd al-­Malik in the land of the Byzantines. He captured many captives, occupied some of the dwellings, and exposed the captives to the sword, killing a group of them, till an old feeble man was presented to him, whereupon he ordered to kill him. He (the old man) then said to him (Maslama): “What need do you have in killing an old man like me? If you let me live, I will bring you two young prisoners from among the Muslims.” He said to him: “Who shall [guarantee] this to me?” He said: “I, for when I promise I fulfil.” He said: “I do not trust you.” He then said to him: “Let me walk among your soldiers, perhaps I will recognize someone who can vouch for me so I may go and return with the two prisoners.” He then appointed someone to walk around with him and ordered him to keep an eye on the old man, and the latter kept walking around, inspecting the faces, till he came across a youngster from among the Banī Kilāb, currying his horse. He then said to him: “Young man, vouch for me to the commander” and he told him his story. He said: “I shall do so.” The boy came before Maslama and vouched for him, whereupon Maslama released him (i.e., the old man). When he left, [Maslama] said to the youngster: “Do you know him?” He said: “No, by God.” He said: “Why then did you vouch for him?”

Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East. Uriel Simonsohn, Oxford University Press. © Uriel Simonsohn 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.003.0003

60  Female Power and Religious Change He said: “I saw him examining the faces, and he chose me from among them, and I hated [the idea] of disputing his opinion of me.” On the following day, the old man returned along with two young prisoner boys from among the Muslims, whom he surrendered to Maslama, and said: “If the commander sees fit to permit this youngster to go with me to my fortress, I shall repay him for his deed.” Maslama then said to the young Kilābī: “If you wish then go with him.” When he went to his fortress, he said to him: “O young man, do you know, by God, that you are my son (i.e., a descendant of his)?” He said to him: “How can I be your son, for I am a Muslim of the Arabs and you are a Christian of the Byzantines?” He said to him: “Tell me about your mother, what is she?” He said: “A Byzantine.” He said: “I shall describe her for you and by God, if I am right, will you not believe me?” He said: “I shall.” The Byzantine then turned to describe the boy’s mother, without leaving out a thing from her description. The youngster then said to him: “She is so; how did you know that I am her son?” He said: “On account of the resemblance, the mutual acquaintance of souls, and the veracity of discernment.” Then he brought to him a woman, and when the youngster saw her, he did not doubt that she was his mother, on account of the resemblance. And with her came out an old woman as if it was her. The two of them kissed the youngster’s head and hands and sucked in his saliva. He said to him: “This is your grandmother and this is your aunt (on the youngster’s mother’s side).” Then he looked out of his fortress and called out for youngsters in the desert. They came near and he spoke to them in Greek, whereupon they turned to kiss the boy’s head and his hands. Then he said: “These are your uncles (on your mother’s side) and the sons of your aunts (on your mother’s side), the cousins of your mother (on her father’s side).” Then he brought him much jewelry and splendid cloths and said: “This belongs to your mother. We have it since she was taken captive. Take it with you and give it to her. She will know it.” He then gave him for himself a great fortune, cloths, and jewelry, which he loaded on a number of mules. He returned him to Maslama’s soldiers, and he left. The youngster set off till he entered her dwelling. He then took out one thing after the other of what the old man had informed him that belongs to his mother.

The Prioritization of God over Family  61 His mother saw him and began to weep, whereupon he said to her: “I give this to you as a gift.” When he presented her with an abundance, she said to him: “My son, I ask you in the name of God, from which town did these cloths come to you, and will you describe to me the people of this fortress in which all this was found?” The youngster then described to her the town and the fortress, and he described her mother and sister and the men he saw, and she wept with excitement. He said to her: “Why do you cry?” She said: “The old man, by God, is my father, and the old woman is my mother, and that one is my sister.” He then told her everything and took out what remained from what her father had sent her and gave it to her.1

Read in the context of relief (faraj) literature, the anecdote may have been meant to offer hope to those who thought they had lost their families following circumstances beyond their control.2 Yet it is also in the course of the narrated events, in which the young Muslim comes to terms with his Christian origin, that we are reminded of the underpinnings of kinship ties. His initial portrayal betrays his heavy immersion within his Muslim tribe to the extent that he offers no sign that would suggest a Christian connection. His mother’s conversion has allegedly drawn a final curtain on her ties with her Christian kin. Shortly into the story, however, the family’s past begins to trickle in, as the grandfather offers increasing proof of his relation to the young Muslim. That proof is given on the grounds of shared physical features, a vivid memory of absent relatives, and the retention of material items associated with the young Muslim’s mother. Together, they work to revive what was thought to have been lost, charging anew old family ties, despite the harsh separation that was imposed on the family under circumstances of war, conquest, and eventually, religious reorientation. The highly emotional sequence, enhanced through the portrayal of the Muslim’s encounter with his Christian kinsfolk and his mother’s bursting into tears towards the end of the story, leave little doubt as to the strength of their shared past. The emotionally charged anecdote serves to remind us that kinship ties may have constituted a hurdle in the path of changing communal allegiances. Yet kinship and religion were not necessarily at odds. As we shall see, their overlapping features resulted in their interdependence. For example, religious authorities relied on family ties to advance religious ideals and considered the family as a site for instilling religious sentiments. At the same time, family arrangements were often couched in a religious discourse that informed their rationale and legitimacy. Authors of diverse literary genres and of diverse religious backgrounds appear 1  Al-­Tanūkhī, al-­Faraj, 2: 29–31.

2  See Moebius, “Narrative judgments.”

62  Female Power and Religious Change to have been well aware of this fact, as can be seen in their attempts to prioritize God and His community over individual kinship relations. The present discussion aims to show that there is an enduring history of this idea, long before the rise of Islam. At the same time, the emergence of the Arabian Community of Believers in the seventh century in a setting that was dominated by tribal social allegiances should be seen as an important milestone in this context. While the Qurʾanic text stresses an uncompromising loyalty to God over family, the Constitution of Medina reflects a recognition that blood relations are not easily disposed of and therefore should be solicited for the sake of spiritual unity.3 Having considered family structures and the contents of kinship ties in the previous chapter, the present chapter turns to examine kinship commitments vis-­à-­vis communal ones. An acknowledgment of the subtle balance between the two is crucial for assessing moments in which women were able to advance, or curtail, religious changes in family settings. Their agency was largely contingent upon this balance as they operated within the liminal space of competing sentiments.

Community vs. kinship Endeavors to prioritize God over family, or communal commitments over those emanating from kinship ties, can be detected in the normative literatures of the three monotheistic traditions. Unlike late antique Christian and Islamic ideas that underscored a clear distinction between the biological and the spiritual attachments of their respective adherents, we do not find a similar discourse in early rabbinic Jewish literature. This, however, was not always the case. Second Temple Jewish authorities articulated a dual approach, whereby Jewish identity was considered biologically hereditary and could also be established through the adoption of a set of convictions and practices. By the third century ce, however, we find a growing emphasis on the principle of genealogical purity, designed to overcome the challenge posed by permeable communal boundaries.4 Yet despite the inherent ambivalence, late antique and medieval Jewish narratives and legal opinions reflect not only an awareness of tensions between religious and kinship affinities but also an attempt to prioritize the former over the latter and to solicit the latter in favor of the former. Accordingly, whereas Jewish notions of communal membership were articulated through a discourse that was inspired by sentiments of kinship, Jews were often called upon to offer loyalty to communal ideals at the expense of kinship commitments.

3  Arjomand, “The constitution of Medina,” 565. 4 Hayes, Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities, 9–11; Oppenheimer, “Purity of lineage in Talmudic Babylonia,” 145–56; Levinson, “Changing minds—­changing bodies,” 124.

The Prioritization of God over Family  63 An indication of a rabbinic awareness of the dilemmas and personal conflicts caused by family ties in moments of shifting religious affiliations can be seen in classical rabbinic deliberations on conversion to Judaism.5 Here, the image of Abraham stands out as the archetypal convert, commanded by his new God, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you” (Gen. 12: 1). The act of conversion in Abraham’s case can only be fulfilled if accompanied by an act of divorce from his family. According to Moshe Lavee, the ideal of severing family ties following conversion is further developed with respect to Abraham in Ecclesiastes Rabba, following his willingness to sacrifice Isaac, his son, and the loss of Haran, his brother, in the course of events surrounding Abraham’s rejection of his father’s idols.6 While the context of conversion is evident, the symbolic significance of Abraham’s personal sacrifices, specifically his willingness to sacrifice his son as a demonstration of utmost piety, is pertinent to our discussion. The story of the Binding of Isaac appears to have generated considerable discussion already in antiquity. Thus, Philo (d. c.50 ce), for example, argued against the demeaning suggestion that Abraham was motivated similarly to other parents in his time to sacrifice their children: [T]his action of Abraham’s was in reality one deserving of praise and of all love, . . . he labored above all men to obey God, which is thought an excellent thing, and an especial object for all men’s desire, . . . for which reason he also bore, in a most noble manner, and with the most unshaken fortitude, the command given to him respecting his son.7

Philo makes it clear that Abraham’s decision to sacrifice his son was prompted by his uncompromising piety. A similar impetus was attributed to Abraham in later periods, particularly in moments of persecution, when parents are reported to have faced the terrible choice between the lives of their children or commitment to God.8 The Stoic ideals of antiquity later made their way into medieval Jewish traditions that sought to uphold religious loyalty up and above other types of commitment, among them the one most difficult to suppress—­loyalty to one’s kin. We shall come back to this question in Chapter 6 with the story of the mother and her seven sons. Such stories, I shall argue time and again in this book, should be read within a broader context of competing commitments to community and

5  Lavee-­Levkovitch, The Rabbinic Conversion of Judaism, ch. 8. I wish to thank Moshe Lavee for drawing my attention to his discussion on this topic. 6  Ecclesiastes Rabbah 4:8, discussed in Lavee-­Levkovitch, The Rabbinic Conversion of Judaism, 203. 7  Yonge, tr., On Abraham, p. xxxv, discussed in Spiegel, “Folktales on the binding of Isaac,” 475. I wish to thank Galit Hasan-­Rokem for suggesting this article to me. 8  See Spiegel, “Folktales on the binding of Isaac,” 480; Münz-­Manor, “Narrating salvation,” 161–6. I wish to thank Ophir Münz-­Manor for sharing his article with me.

64  Female Power and Religious Change kinship. This was a rivalry that appears to have been even more pronounced in the formative moments of Christianity and Islam and which informed normative texts that showed up well beyond that time. A discernable awareness of the complexity of Jewish identity in what pertains to its genealogical aspect can be found in rabbinic legal opinions of the medieval Islamic period dealing with the question of Jewish apostasy. Geonic responsa convey a notion of rupture between apostates and their former coreligionist relatives and of a social separation, or rejection, of spiritual dissenters. The geonic discourse and terminology, that at times diverted quite dramatically from what is found in classical rabbinic sources, included phrases such as “this one is not his brother and is not from Israel”; “since he apostatized he has gone out of the sanctity of Israel and the sanctity of his parents”;9 or “since she has apostatized she is no longer ‘his nearest kin’. ”10 We shall return to these geonic positions on apostasy in Chapter 3 as we discuss the attempts of religious authorities to regulate religiously mixed family ties. In contrast to the indirect, at times ambiguous, character of late antique and medieval rabbinic positions, the Gospels present a blunt demand that believers offer Jesus their primary allegiance. Thus, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me” (Matt. 10: 37). “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14: 26). Such exhortations, we should recall, were voiced during the early stages of the Christian movement, a time in which individual new believers were often in a state of conflict regarding their loyalty to their kin and their commitment to their new faith. Undermining kinship commitments was deemed vital for the consolidation and expansion of the Christian community.11 And the reward awaiting those who were willing to forsake their relatives for the sake of Jesus was substantial: “And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold, and will inherit eternal life” (Matt. 19: 29). Those who left behind their biological kinsfolk were now provided with spiritual ones: “Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother” (Matt. 12: 50). The parallel was of great utility, imbuing communal ties  with a biological meaning, while at the same time erecting a fence between Christians and their non-­Christian relatives.12 The rejection of non-­ Christian family members and the assumption of family roles by communal members can be seen in late antique Christian hagiography and documentary

9 Lewin, Otsar, Qiddushin, 30, no. 80. 10 Lewin, Otsar, Ketubbot, 356, no. 790. 11  Horn and Martens, “Let the Little Children Come to Me,” 88–9; Vuolanto, Children and Asceticism in Late Antiquity, 45. 12  Penn, “Ritual kissing,” 161.

The Prioritization of God over Family  65 records as well.13 The latter present instances of clergy and lay members assuming legal roles for the sake of persons who required various services that until then had been performed by their relatives.14 As we shall see, the notion of the ­community as family and efforts to separate Christians from their non-­Christian kin would figure in ecclesiastical vocabulary and legislation many centuries beyond early Christian missionary endeavors. It is in the course of the missionary endeavors of the young Muslim community in Arabia that we can detect a similar prioritization of God and His community over the biological family. Loyalty to God is made explicit in the Qurʾan, whereby Muslims are called upon to be “witnesses for God, even though it be against yourselves, or your parents and kinsmen” (Q 4: 135). The Qurʾanic text is clearly aware of the hazards family sentiments may cause to the Muslim community: “O believers, among your wives and children there is an enemy to you; so beware of them” (Q 64: 14).15 The Qurʾan exhorts Muslims to substitute their blood-­based kinship with a spiritual kinship: “And hold you fast to God’s bond, together, and do not  scatter; remember God’s blessing upon you when you were enemies, and He brought your hearts together, so that by His blessing you became brothers.” (Q 3: 103). The believers, who are brothers (Q 49: 10), are exhorted not to take infidel family members as allies (Q 9: 23) and to disassociate themselves from them: “Thou shalt not find any people who believe in God and the Last Day who are loving to anyone who opposes God and His Messenger, not though they were their fathers, or their sons, or their brothers, or their clan.” (Q 58: 22). Qurʾanic ideals were designed not only to render family ties secondary to those of community but also to prioritize piety-­based social hierarchies above genealogical ones. By insisting that the “noblest” among the believers “in the sight of God is the most god-­fearing” of them (Q 49: 13), the Qurʾan ascribes supreme importance to individual piety, rendering family, specifically lineage, also secondary as a source of social capital.16 Tribe, clan, and family solidarities were inferior to those of the community.17 According to Fred Donner, “it was exactly this emphasis on the broader, super-­tribal character of the umma that allowed it to expand.”18 Over time, however, these ideals, which were underpinned by the initial objective of recruiting new believers, constituted the guiding principles of communal membership. Muslim believers were expected to partake in the life of their communities with a profound commitment towards group solidarity and a sense of 13 Brock and Harvey, Holy Women of the Syrian Orient, 82–99; Harvey, “Sacred bonding,” 28; White, Lives of Roman Christian Women, 78. 14 Mathieson, Christian Women in the Greek Papyri of Egypt, 202. 15  See also Q 3:14: “Decked out fair to men is the love of lusts—­women, children, heaped-­up heaps of gold and silver, horses of mark, cattle and tillage. That is the enjoyment of the present life; but God—­with Him is the fairest resort,” discussed in Bauer, “The emotions of conversion and kinship,” 147. 16 Neuwirth, Scripture, Poetry, and the Making of a Community, 53. 17  Bauer, “Emotion in the Qurʾan,” 13. 18 Donner, The Early Islamic Conquests, 57.

66  Female Power and Religious Change communal boundaries.19 Nonetheless, the notion of spiritual kinship continued to carry importance by facilitating further conversion to Islam, particularly in its first centuries, during which converts to Islam were considered clients (mawālī) who were issued membership in the households of their Muslim patrons.20

Kinship ties and the formation of religious communities Another way of prioritizing communal agendas over familial ones can be seen in attempts to render the family a locus of social and religious sentiments. Scholars of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam speak of the emergence of socio-­religious communities as one of the main hallmarks of late antiquity.21 As such, membership in these communities was founded on the social application of religious ideals, whereby the most mundane decisions were governed by religious affiliation. The genesis of this type of community has been associated with various historical developments, including aspirations for communal leadership on the part of certain early rabbis, the Christianization of the Roman Empire, the fragmentation of ecclesiastical hierarchies in the seventh century, Jewish and Christian adaptations to minority life, and Islamic forms of government. Sidestepping questions of causation, context, and chronology, however, the endeavors of religious agents to control communal affairs under the pretext of divine planning cut across the messages of diverse religious discourses. These reflect an assertive demand that communal members offer exclusive fidelity towards religious ideals, as well as the soliciting of social institutions for securing that fidelity. By regulating the family structure, supervising its daily affairs, and formalizing central milestones in its formation and expansion, the rabbis, ecclesiastics, and ʿulamāʾ were able to permeate the private lives of their coreligionists on the most intimate level. Their efforts were premised on the anticipation that thoughts, beliefs, norms, and a sense of communal identity can be directed by making claims on the “body and souls” of the believers.22 Law, specifically family law, constituted a primary mechanism for instilling a sense of communal identity, preserving communal boundaries, and endowing leaders with the social power to exert authority over their communities. The endeavors of religious authorities to uphold and elaborate scriptural law in what pertains to family life served to realize visions of religious communities, on the 19  Benkheira, “Le vocabulaire arabe de la parenté dans les sources anciennes,” 46–7. 20 Savant, The New Muslims of Post-­Conquest Iran, 31. 21 Brown, World of Late Antiquity, 82, 187; Morony, “Religious communities in late Sasanian and early Muslim Iraq,” 1, 10; Sharot, “Religious syncretism and religious distinctiveness,” 30; Fowden, “Religious communities”; Kennedy, “Islam,” 219–21; Hoyland, “Introduction,” p. xiii; Morony, “Social elites in Iraq and Iran,” 284; Papaconstantinou, “Between umma and dhimma”; Schwartz, Imperialism and Jewish Society; Payne, “Persecuting heresy in early Islamic Iraq.” 22  Katznelson and Rubin, Religious Conversion, 2.

The Prioritization of God over Family  67 one hand, and counter a culturally and religiously integrative social climate, on the other.23 Family law gave communal lawmakers direct access to the most private affairs of their coreligionists, rendering the family a miniature of communal arrangements.24 The family was perceived as the basic fabric of social organization—­ an Aristotelian ideal according to which the regulation of society hinged on that of the family.25 Here, institutions and events that marked the establishment of new households were in a constant process of regulation. A notable example was the effort invested in the formalization of the marriage ceremony as an event that bore distinct religious markers. The presence of religious agents and witnesses in  matrimonial proceedings and the elaboration of contractual formulas that were to cement conjugal commitments in the sight of God are cases in point.26 Marriage, and with it the family, was a matter of public concern.27 This brought family affairs under the watchful eyes of the community and charged kinship commitments with a spiritual sanctity. The door was now open for further communal involvement in family life by means of measures and ideals that were manifested in regulations and narratives. In addition to offering guidance to conjugal life,28 texts of diverse religious provenance include extensive treatments of matters such as reproduction, child education, family events, and the division of family property.29 Their utility was not only in solidifying communal attachments and boundaries but also in submitting the family to communal authority and scrutiny.30 While notions of communal membership could permeate family households by means of legal regulation, notions of kinship made their way into various types of discourse in order to cement communal affiliations. A spiritual kinship that 23  Simonsohn, “The introduction and formalization of civil law,” 233. See also Becker, Fear of God and the Beginning of Wisdom; Minov, “Syriac Christian identity”; Secunda, The Iranian Talmud; Herman, Jews, Christians and Zoroastrians; Payne, A State of Mixture; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 61–2; Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East. 24  Brown, “Late antiquity,” 239, 248; Brown, The Body and Society, 16–17; see also MacDonald, “Kinship and family,” 31. 25  Shaw, “The family in late antiquity,” 10; Blidstein, Honor Thy Father and Mother, 22. 26 Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity, 68–9, 87–8; Berger, “Marriage, sex and family”; Novak, “Jewish marriage,” 62–3; Selb, “Zur Christianisierung des Eherechts”; Selb, Orientalisches Kirchenrecht, 1: 206–13; Korbinian, Le mariage dans les églises chrétiennes, 149–55; Edakalathur, Theology of Marriage in the East Syrian Tradition, 15, 77; Reynolds, Marriage in the Western Church, pp. xiii–­xix; Feghali, “Origin et formation du mariage,” 416; Friedman, “The ethics of medieval Jewish marriage”; de Vries, Sakramententheologie bei den Nestorianern, 253–4; Spectorsky, Chapters on Marriage and Divorce; Ali, “Marriage in classical Islamic jurisprudence”; Payne, A State of Mixture, ch. 3; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, ch. 2. 27 Moxnes, Constructing Early Christian Families, 69. 28  tNid 5:3, as an example of rabbinic attempts to control matters of intimacy between husband and wife, discussed in Fonrobert, “When women walk in the way of their fathers,” 404–9. See also Stein, “The untamable shrew,” 257. On rabbinic menstrual control, see Fonrobert, Menstrual Purity, 103–28. 29 Bagnall, Egypt in Late Antiquity, 198; Peskowitz, “ ‘Family/ies’ in antiquity,” 20; Berger, “Marriage, sex and family,” 7–8; Vuolanto, “Early Christian communities as family networks,” 117; Payne, “East Syrian bishops”; Benkheira, “Famille, parenté, droit.” 30  Simonsohn, “The introduction and formalization of civil law,” 235.

68  Female Power and Religious Change was to take precedence over, if not replace, biological kinship was advanced by infusing notions of fraternity into relations among Muslims (e.g., Q 3: 103; 49: 10). The designation of Muhammad’s wives as “Mothers of the Believers” (Q 33: 6), was further elaborated in Islamic traditions in order to buttress their exemplary images for future generations of Muslims as “paragons of virtue.”31 Such uses of kinship operated to instill in the minds of their audiences both a sense of communal belonging and a sense of social order.32 Their discursive utility was well acknowledged in the Hebrew Bible, whereby a place in Israel carried fraternal connotations.33 Yet whereas the Hebrew Bible and early rabbinic texts appear to have been primarily focused on the notion of communal siblinghood, Christian narratives refer to the believers also as the children of God, of the Church, of their bishop, and—­at times—­of local saints.34 Further illustration of fictive kinship can be found in early Islamic sources reporting that Muhammad applied a principle of “fraternizing” (muʾākhā) in order to secure social bonds among the members of the recently established Community of Believers.35 A similar procedure can be seen in the adelphopoiesis, a Byzantine form of commitments between close associates that was inspired by late antique monastic practices.36 Whereas fraternal imagery was solicited for the purpose of enhancing ties among communal members, paternal and maternal ones served to imbue the roles of leadership figures with an edifying significance. The paternal roles attributed to Muslim sheikhs and mentors vis-­à-­vis their disciples resonates nicely with those of holy men towards their followers and abbots towards members of their monastic community.37 The employment of a terminology of kinship in order to depict communal relations served to enhance communal ties, communal solidarity, and submission to communal ideals. Yet perhaps most importantly, the presentation of the community in kinship terms made its boundaries tangible and meaningful for its members, allowing them to differentiate between those within and those outside communal lines. These notions went hand in hand with efforts to imbue family activities with a sanctity that stemmed from divine planning, serving as constant reminders of the household’s religious affiliation. The family was thus perceived as a site of religious sentiments which presented numerous occasions for the implementation and promotion of religious ideals among its members, as well as among other related households. Central milestones in family life, such as birth, 31 Stowasser, Women in the Qurʾan, 116. 32  Cf. Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, 34. 33  Satlow, “What does love have to do with it?,” 103. 34 Horn and Martens, “Let the Little Children Come to Me,” 56–7, 68; Becker, “Christian ­society,” 576. 35  Yarbrough, “A Christian Shīʿī, and other curious confreres,” 11. See also Watt, “Muʾākhāt,” EI2; Lichtenstaedter, “Fraternization (muʾākhāt) in early Islamic society”; Simon, “Sur l’institution de la muʾāhāh.” 36  See Rapp, Brother-­Making in Late Antiquity and Byzantium. 37  Benkheira, “Introduction,” La famille en islam, 22; Horn, “From the Roman East into the Persian Empire,” 264–5; Vuolanto, Children and Asceticism in Late Antiquity, 73.

The Prioritization of God over Family  69 marriage, and death were accordingly invested with divine meaning. These highly emotional events, around which family members would congregate, presented unique opportunities for conveying notions of community by providing “idioms and registers for ritual enlargement and for incorporation of outsiders.”38 The Qurʾanic text, like its rabbinic and early Christian counterparts, sought to present God’s omnipotence in relation to such major events.39 For example in Q 30: 21: “And of His signs is that He created for you, of yourselves, spouses, that you might repose in them, and He has set between you love and mercy. Surely in that are signs for a people who consider.” These events served as reminders not only of a divine plan but also of a constant divine presence within the most intimate spheres of a person’s life: “The Originator of the heavens and the earth; He has appointed for you, of yourselves, pairs, and pairs also of the cattle, therein multiplying you. Like Him there is naught; He is the All-­hearing, the All-­seeing” (Q 42: 11). Somewhat contemporaneous to the Qurʾan, the Babylonian Talmud offers a vivid depiction of the same divine presence from the earliest stages of life to its very last: Our Rabbis taught: There are three partners in man, the Holy One, blessed be He, his father and his mother. His father supplies the semen of the white substance out of which are formed the child’s bones, sinews, nails, the brain in his head and the white in his eye; his mother supplies the semen of the red substance out of which is formed his skin, flesh, hair, blood and the black of his eye; and the Holy One, blessed be He, gives him the spirit and the breath, beauty of features, eyesight, the power of hearing and the ability to speak and to walk, understanding and discernment. When his time to depart from the world approaches the Holy One, blessed be He, takes away his share and leaves the shares of his father and his mother with them.40

The pervasion of God and His community into the private space of family life should seem trivial, given the ubiquitous nature of religious activities. Nonetheless, in most cases, the scope and nature of these activities is concealed not only from the view of modern historians but also from communal agents whose business was to enforce and supervise the fulfillment of religious ideals in the daily lives of their coreligionists. Exhortations to believers to pray in private and depictions of a Divine Father, “who sees into concealed places” (Matt. 6: 6), reflect a communal interest in the private domain. The efforts of religious agents to submit domestic activities to their authority by means of regulation and a symbolic discourse attest

38  Carsten, “The stuff of kinship.” 39  Giladi, “Family,” EQ, 175; Schremer, Male and Female He Created Them, 311. 40  bNid, 31a; The Babylonian Talmud, ed. Epstein 1: 214. See also Kiperwasser, “ ‘Three partners in a person’. ”

70  Female Power and Religious Change to the significance of “the family as a social and biological entity, as a community,” whose social assets were to be harnessed for the sake of the religious community.41 It may have been the ancient civic conception of the household as a microcosm of social order that formed the basis for late antique visions of families as loci of religious ideals and vehicles for their promotion.42 Early Christian authors, for example, portrayed spouses and parents as models of communal interaction and at the same time considered them to be agents of theological messages.43 In addition, the family was charged with communal sentiments through regular rituals and festivities.44 These special moments of family gatherings, fixed in coordination with annual calendars, constituted important reminders of the community in the lives of its members. At the same time, they served to revive memories of past generations, who would partake in the same communal events, serving to sustain an ancestral line and through it the notion of a communal past.45 A variety of experiences in the formative stages of the child were especially useful for the transmission of religious ideals: the youth of the Christians were not raised but to become Christians, and the youth of the Jews were not raised but to become Jews, and the youth of the Muslims were not raised but to become Muslims. And I heard the tradition transmitted from the Messenger of God when he said: “Every infant is born according to Allāh’s way of creating (kull mawlūd yūlad ʿalā al-­fiṭra), then his parents make him a Jew, or a Christian, or a Magian.”46

In citing the famous prophetic hadith, al-­Ghazālī presented in his autobiography an insight regarding the paramount role parents played in the religious upbringing of their children.47 As already noted in Chapter  1 regarding the classical sources of medieval Islamic parental pedagogy, the ideas of al-­Ghazālī and contemporary Muslim thinkers in this respect were not innovative but merely adaptive.48 Accordingly, the Hebrew Bible, classical rabbinic sources, the New Testament, the teachings of the Fathers of the Church, as well as the Qurʾan and

41  Smith, “Here, there, and anywhere,” 26. See also MacDonald, “Kinship and family,” 32. 42  Shaw, “The family in late antiquity,” 17; Brown, The Body and Society, 16; Hodge, “Married to an unbeliever,” 9. 43 Moxnes, Constructing Early Christian Families, 32; Nathan, The Family in Late Antiquity, 43. 44  Peskowitz, “ ‘Family/ies’ in antiquity,” 24; Hodge, “Married to an unbeliever,” 4. 45  Thus, e.g., Geniza documents record synagogue services in which past generations of a family were commemorated through prayers for the dead. The practice underscores a family continuity that found its expression in a communal setting and as such indicates the paramount role of a family’s past in an individual’s communal affiliation; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 7. 46  Al-­Ghazālī, al-­Munqidh min al-­ḍalāl, 51–2. See also Giladi, Children of Islam, 51. 47  On the fiṭra, see Wensinck, The Muslim Creed, 214–16; Macdonald, “Fit ̣ra,” EI2; Mohamed, “The interpretations of fiṭrah”; Adang, “Islam as the inborn religion of mankind”; Gobillot, La conception originelle; Holtzman, “Human choice, divine guidance and the fiṭra tradition.” 48  See also Giladi, Children of Islam, 30–1.

The Prioritization of God over Family  71 hadith, urge parents to raise their children to be good believers and meaningful communal members.49 Numerous traditions attribute to Muhammad and his Companions directives that highlight parental responsibilities over the spiritual convictions of their children. These include instruction to pronounce to children as the first words, “There is no God but Allah,”50 and accustoming them to regular hours of prayer and to fasting.51 Around the same time, in Egypt, Christian parents were rebuked for failing to give their children Christian names and instructing them in the Coptic language: They will give their names to their children, discarding the names of the angels, the prophets, the apostles and the martyrs . . . they will abandon the beautiful Coptic language, in which the Holy Spirit has often spoken through the mouths of our spiritual fathers; they will teach their children from an early age to speak the language of the Bedouin . . . But woe to every Christian who teaches his son the language of the hijra from an early age, causing him to forget the language of his fathers! He will be responsible for his transgression . . .52

Other instances reflect a more gender-­specific type of parental guidance. As already noted, the early years of a child’s development were characterized by considerable maternal rearing. These were the years in which classical thinkers and their Muslim successors located moments of mother–­child intimacy and therefore placed the mother in a unique position regarding the education of her child.53 It is in this context that the Babylonian Talmud assigns to mothers particular religious agency with regard to their daughters, passing on to them a set of religious norms and ideals, allowing the father to devote himself to affairs outside the house, whether engaging in study (in the case of the Talmud) or business.54 At the same time, early Christian sources stress similar maternal responsibilities, considered in the context of Christian missionizing. These sentiments were carried on to the History of the Patriarchs of the Coptic Church of Alexandria, where mothers of the Coptic patriarchs are depicted as those who were entrusted with “the spiritual well-­being” of their children, “securing their children’s access to Christianity.”55 And whereas medieval Muslim scholars ascribed primary importance to the impact of a mother’s piety and conduct, prior to and during her

49  Shaw, “The family in late antiquity,” 18; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 7; Yarbrough, “Parents and children in the Jewish family of antiquity,” 42; O’Roark, “Parenthood in late antiquity”; Blidstein, Honor Thy Father and Mother, 22–3; Nathan, The Family in Late Antiquity, 42. 50  Ibn Qayyim al-­Jawziyya, Tuḥ fat al-­mawdūd, 329. 51  Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā, Kitāb al-­ʿayāl, 463, 466, 470. 52  Papaconstantinou, “ ‘They shall speak the Arabic language and take pride in it’, ” 275. 53  Prescendi, “Children and the transmission of religious knowledge,” 76. 54  See Lavee, “Like mother, like daughter.” 55  Horn, “Reconstructing women’s history from Christian-­Arabic sources,” 433.

72  Female Power and Religious Change pregnancy, on her child’s morality,56 contemporary Islamic narratives offer p ­ owerful images of mothers who strove to inscribe religious devotion in the hearts of their children. Thus, the tenth-­century recording of an account about the Arabian poetess al-­Khansāʾ, stirring her sons to combat before the battle of Qādisiyya in 15/636: “My sons, you have embraced Islam, being obedient and migrating out of choice. . . . You may know what Allah has promised to the Muslims regarding the great reward [awaiting them] on account of combatting the infidels.”57 It was through such scenes of pious parents, instilling notions of religious identity in the minds of their children, that the authors of narratives were able to enlist kinship ties on behalf of communal commitments. We may anticipate that such stories were received by their audiences like biblical tales, often told in moments of family gatherings, particularly festive ones, thus conveying a sense of communal continuity and offering models of conduct.58 Here, in addition to regular family gatherings, ceremonies, celebrations, and rites of passage, specifically those in a child’s early years, presented further opportunities for enhancing links between kinship and community. Their effectiveness for retaining communal memories rendered them highly significant for marking communal boundaries through moments of family intimacy.59 Of particular value were occasions such as circumcision, baptism, puberty, and marriage, which simultaneously marked both highly emotional family events as well as important milestones in the individual’s participation in communal life.60

Ideals of family breakups The relative manageable structure of the family and the microcosmic social network it facilitated made it a highly efficient mechanism through which communal agents could control, supervise, and monitor the individual’s participation in communal life. Kinship and community, however, not only completed one 56  Kueny, “The birth of Cain,” 121. 57  Al-­Iṣfahānī, Akhbār al-­nisāʾ, 110–12. See also Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Kitāb al-­istīʿāb, 4: 1827–9 (no. 3317); Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 90 (no. 6876); al-Ṣafadī, al-­Wāfī, 10: 240 (no. 2544); al-Subkī, Ṭabaqāt al-­shāfiʿiyya, 1: 260; Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fi tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 8: 109 (no. 11112). 58  Yarbrough, “Parents and children in the Jewish family of antiquity,” 43; Prescendi, “Children and the transmission of religious knowledge”; Giladi, “La notion d’enfance,” 254; Aasgaard, “Growing up in Constantinople,” 166. 59  Smith, “Here, there, and anywhere,” 327; Horn and Martens, “Let the Little Children Come to Me,” 97; Horn, “The Pseudo-­Clementine homilies,” 17–18. 60 Giladi, Children of Islam, 35; Baumgarten, Mothers and Children, 55. Thus, e.g., an Islamic system of rites of passage was created for integrating the child into the Muslim community. These include reciting the Islamic call to prayer (adhān) in the ears of the newborn, naming the child (tasmiya), “rubbing the infant’s palate with a date” (taḥ nīk), the child’s first haircut (ḥ alqa), and circumcision (khiṭān); about these rites and their communal significance, see Giladi, Children of Islam, 36; Giladi, “La notion d’enfance,” 249.

The Prioritization of God over Family  73 another but also competed with one another. As the opening passage of this chapter serves to illustrate, kinship ties often operated as either incentives towards, or hurdles in the path of, religious change. The point is further explicated in a hadith that was transmitted by Abū Hurayra (d. 58–9/678) and Anas b. Mālik (d. 91–3/709–11): “None of you shall believe until I am more beloved to him than his child, parents, and all people.”61 In what follows we turn to explore moments in which individuals had to choose between the two, namely between communal affiliation and family ties, a dynamic that highlights the proselytizing and anti-­proselytizing effects of kinship ties. The idea that a convert should sever ties with former coreligionist kinsfolk was deeply rooted in late antique monotheistic traditions which sought, as we have seen above, to prioritize religious over kinship commitments. Early rabbinic narratives reflect a perception of religious conversion as an act that entailed a drastic renunciation of family ties and property.62 The theme of family breakups which dominated early Christian sources resonates with rabbinic ideas about conversion. Separations between husbands and wives, children from their parents, and family divisions in general, were often presented in Christian sources as consequences of moral differences.63 Accordingly, texts like those of Gregory Nazianzen’s (d. 390) Orations and Martyrdom of Andrew speak of bodily gestures, such as the greeting kiss, for affirming Christian communal membership. As Michael Penn shows, it was through the image of Gregory’s mother, Nonna, who refused to kiss a non-­Christian or be kissed by one, even her own relatives, that Gregory was able to advance an ideal of separation between Christians and pagans.64 Further to the east, Christian martyrologies, authored in Sasanian Iran, offer yet again numerous scenes of terrible family breakups, consequent to Zoroastrians’ conversion to Christianity.65 Still in the vicinity of late antique ideals, Qurʾanic verses exhorted believers to refrain from taking non-­believers and apostates as allies,66 within a broader Islamic scheme that called for new Muslim believers to leave behind family 61 Bukhārī, Ṣaḥ īḥ al-­Bukhārī, 14 (no. 14). 62 Lavee, “From emotions to legislation,” 260–2. Early rabbinic attitudes, it should be noted, focused on converts to Judaism and had very little to say about Jews who moved in the opposite direction. The theme of Jewish apostasy, as we shall see, was pronounced in concrete terms at a much later stage. Whereas medieval rabbinic sources reveal a clear concept of shemad as an act of apostasy, its exact meaning in early rabbinic discourse remains elusive. In contrast to a single and indirect reference in the Babylonian Talmud, indicating that a meshumad, specifically a defiant one (meshumad ­le-­hakh‘is), is not considered a brother to a Jew (b‘AZ, 26a–­b), we find two indirect references (bBekh. 30b; bYeb. 47b) validating the betrothals of meshumadim, and more than a handful which retain the meshumad within the scope of rabbinic purview. Thus, according to Gerald Blidstein, the Talmudic ethos did not recognize the possibility of a Jew becoming a non-­Jew; Blidstein, “Who is not a Jew,” 374. 63  Horn, “The Pseudo-­Clementine homilies,” 3–4. 64  Penn, “Performing family: ritual kissing,” 167–8. 65  Debié, “Devenir chrétien dans l’Iran sassanide,” 347–8. 66  Hallaq, “Contracts and alliances.”

74  Female Power and Religious Change members who insisted on holding fast to their pagan beliefs.67 In exchange, new believers were admitted into an alternative family—­the family of believers, a prospect which was realized in accounts such as the one about Salmān al-­Fārisī (d. c.35/656). The Persian Companion is depicted as making both a physical and a spiritual journey from his former non-­Muslim environment in the village of Jayy, nearby Isfahan, to Medina, and consequently being admitted into the Prophet’s family—­ahl al-­bayt.68 In addition to the spiritual journeys of new believers, the powerful image of Imruʾ al-­Qays the grandson of the famous Arabian poet Imruʾ al-­Qays al-­Ḥ ajr (d. c.550) putting to death his apostate uncle during the wars of apostasy (ḥ urūb al-­ridda) should have left little doubt in the hearts of future Muslim audiences as to what is expected of them.69 Perhaps it was dramatic scenes such as this that inspired converts to Islam who found themselves centuries later waging war against their fathers and brothers. The battlefield confrontation between the recently converted Sogdian general Haydar b. Kāwūs (d. 226/841) and his non-­Muslim (perhaps Buddhist) father and brother in 206–7/822–3 in nearby Transoxiana suggests the relevance of stories from the time of the Prophet to later generations.70 Similar motifs feature in Christian narratives as well. The story told in the History of the Patriarchs of the Coptic Church of Alexandria about the apostasy of Būlus b. al-­Rajā speaks of a previously Muslim Egyptian who was willing to sacrifice his son for the sake of his Christian faith.71 In an attempt to dissuade him from his act, Ibn Rajā’s father threatened him: “If thou do not obey me and renounce what thou hast done, then I shall drown thy son in thy presence,” to which Ibn Rajā responded: “Yea, I love him, and he is my son, yet I love the Lord more than him.” Shortly after, Ibn Rajā’s religious commitment was put to the test as his son was drowned before his eyes. The notion of sacrifice cannot be ignored when considering different norm-­prescribing texts that present moments in which converts and their family members faced heart-­breaking dilemmas regarding their personal loyalties and the sacrifices they were expected to make. These were often couched in a biblical narrative that centered upon the exemplary images of individuals who either sacrificed or were prepared to sacrifice their most loved ones as a manifestation of their uncompromising devotion. We have already noted the Binding of Isaac, specifically Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his only son at God’s behest, as an act that was perceived as expressing the utmost piety.72 A parent’s offering was perhaps the worst that could be imagined; the most incon-

67 Neuwirth, Scripture, Poetry, and the Making of a Community, 61. 68 Savant, The New Muslims of Post-­Conquest Iran, 66–7. 69  Ibn Ḥ azm, Jamharāt ansāb al-­ʿarab, 428–9. See also Bauer, “The emotions of conversion and kinship,” 139. 70 Spuler, Iran in the Early Islamic Period, 58. 71 Atiya, History of the Patriarchs, 2.2: 101–13 (Ar.)/151–70 (Eng.). 72  See also Gribetz, “Zekhut imahot.”

The Prioritization of God over Family  75 ceivable and therefore the most provocative. Its use as a literary motif was deemed highly effective, not only as a sign of parental devotion but also of that of children. The latter feature as late antique Christian martyrs following Zoroastrian attempts to resist an expanding Christian movement. Their choice to become Christians results in their banishment by their families and even their death at the hands of their fathers.73 Such sacrifices, terrible as they were, came with a notable sense of consolation, often featuring reward in the afterlife. For example, in the Life of Daniel by Jacob of Serugh (d. 521), the son who renounced his family in order to become a hermit, resists his mother’s highly emotional supplications by insisting, “My expectation of seeing Christ depends on my not seeing you.”74 The attempts of Daniel’s mother to retrieve something of her son’s old sentiments towards her are depicted as a form of temptation. The protagonist’s ability to overcome that temptation was a sign of his uncompromising fidelity to God and hence the reason for his grand reward. Similar literary strategies cut across other forms of monotheistic literary traditions, most notably Islamic depictions of Muhammad’s first followers. Their presentation in the Qurʾan, hadith, and later biographies is of individuals who were prepared to leave their dearest ones behind in favor of the newly founded community in Medina. They too are promised assurance: “And when the blast shall sound, upon the day when a man shall flee from his brother, his mother, his father, his consort, his sons, every man that day shall have business to suffice him” (Q 80: 33–7).75 The authors of such narratives were clearly aware of the almost unrealistic standards their audiences were expected to live by, hence the heavenly prizes that awaited them. Yet we are also rightly advised to read these literary tropes less as calls for physical separations, than for spiritual ones.76 A seventh-­century account about a Christian putting his wife and children to the sword in the face of forced conversion to Islam prompts the question as to whether parents were in fact called upon to commit such atrocities.77 Rather, what appears to be underpinning these emotionally stirring scenes was the objective of preparing family members for the worst of sacrifices in moments of dilemma between their loyalties to community and kin. References to non-­Muslim parents and Muslim children show up in early Islamic sources as illustrations of the desired boundaries within households of mixed religions. Their effectiveness as messages that were meant to prioritize God over family in moments of religious difference was likely to have derived from the 73  See e.g., the seventh-­century tale of The Martyrs of Mount Berʾain, depicting an incident that occurred in the fourth century in which a Zoroastrian father murdered his children following their conversion to Christianity; Brock and Dilley, The Martyrs of Mount Berʾain. See also the martyrology of ʿAbd al-­Masīḥ in Fiey and Conrad, Saints syriaques, 19–20. 74  Palmer, “Sisters, fiancées, wives and mothers of Syrian holy men,” 212. 75  Discussed in Neuwirth, “From tribal genealogy,” 57. 76  Bauer, “The emotions of conversion and kinship,” 145. 77 Caner, History and Hagiography from the Late Antique Sinai, 197–8.

76  Female Power and Religious Change emotional struggle that came with them. At the same time, it may also have been the equation, in principle, between obedience to parents and to God that served to mark the limits of parental authority and of family commitments at large. Gestures of filiality were notably inscribed in monotheistic traditions from early on. Honoring and obeying thy parents amounted to honoring and obeying thy God, as both parents and God were seen as a source of life. And while obedience to parents was deemed essential for securing family order, obedience to God was considered key to the realization of social order.78 Whereas parental authority constituted an important channel for infusing religious ideals into the household, the limitation of that authority in the event of religious difference was meant to serve the very same objective. The critique by  second-­century ce pagan philosopher Celsus of Christians encouraging ­children  to disobey their non-­Christian parents has been understood in this context.79 A few centuries later, Augustine presented an imaginary dialogue between a son and his father, in the course of which the boy explained that, although God has commanded him to honor his father, he places God before his father, for He “taught me to love you, but not more than Him.”80 Although distant in time and place, early Christian and early Islamic ideals display a striking resemblance in their contents. A review of Qurʾanic verses reveals a recurring call upon children to offer respect and obedience to their parents so  long as these do not come at the  expense of their Islamic belief.81 While ­parental authority was crucial for passing down Islamic ideals to their c­ hildren, its restriction in circumstances of non-­ Muslim parenthood derived from the same logic. According to Ibn Kathīr (d. 774/1373), in his commentary to Q 6: 151, the stipulations to obey God and obey one’s parents (birr al-­walidayn) go hand in hand, likewise in the case of non-­Muslim parents, to whom obedience is considered even more important than the duty of jihād.82 At the same time, there was also a counter opinion, according to which obedience to ­non-­Muslim parents was seen equally important to submission to God so long as the ­parents do not lead the child astray. An example of such a scenario is offered by ­al-­Ṭabarī (d. 310/923) in relation to Q 31: 15: “But if they strive with  thee to make thee associate with Me that whereof thou hast no  ­knowledge,  then do not obey  them.” Al-­Ṭabarī quotes in this regard a ­tradition attributed to Muṣʿab b. Saʿd, son of the Companion and general Saʿd b. 78 Blidstein, Honor Thy Father and Mother, 2, 21; Horn and Martens, “Let the Little Children Come to Me,” 79; Nathan, The Family in Late Antiquity, 42; Baumgarten, Mothers and Children, 156; Benkheira, “Famille, parenté, droit,” 166–7. 79  MacDonald, “Kinship and family,” 42. See also the martyrology of Cyriqus and Julitta, in Fiey and Conrad, Saints syriaques, 63–4. 80 Cooper, The Fall of the Roman Household, 28. For the Latin original, see Étaix, “Sermon inédit de saint Augustin.” 81  Giladi, “Family,” 175; Giladi, “Parents,” 20; Asad, “Kinship,” 99. 82  Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr al-­qurʾān al-­ʿaẓīm, 3: 359–61.

The Prioritization of God over Family  77 Abī Waqqāṣ (d. 54/674), according to which Saʿd’s mother swore that she would not eat a thing so long as Saʿd did not renounce Islam. Following her son’s persistence, the mother lost consciousness, and upon her awakening she cursed her son, at which point the verse was revealed.83 The question of Muslim children’s attitude towards non-­Muslim parents features also in Islamic traditions, suggesting not only a concrete concern with circumstances of mixed households but also a level of kinship commitments that posed a considerable challenge to religious loyalties and therefore required careful dismantling. In a hadith attributed to Asmāʾ bt. Abī Bakr (d. 73/693), the first caliph’s daughter notes that the Prophet instructed her to treat her polytheist mother with kindness, employing the imperative ṣilī ummaki, literally “be good to your mother.”84 A similar tone emerges from traditions which instruct Muslims to pay their last respects to their deceased non-­Muslim parents.85 The attitude shifts, however, with regard to the question of whether Muslims may ask for forgiveness for their non-­Muslim parents. The Muslim exegete Abū ʿAbdallāh al-­Qurt ̣ubī (d. 669/1271) argued it is forbidden, basing himself on a tradition in which Allah is said to have allowed the Prophet to visit his mother’s tomb, but not to ask for her forgiveness.86 Yet perhaps the most striking indication of a rift in kinship between believers and their non-­Muslim parents can be discerned from traditions portraying the Prophet directing infants to cling to their Muslim fathers, despite their immediate instincts which drew them towards their mothers. Thus, the report about the female Companion ʿUmayra bt. Abī al-­Ḥ akam Rafīʿ b. Sinān, related by ʿAbd al-­Hāmid b. Jaʿfar, “I was informed by my father, on behalf of my  grandfather, Rafīʿ b. Sinān, that he embraced Islam but his wife refused to embrace Islam. She then went to the Prophet (with her husband) and said, ‘[This is] my daughter, and she is weaned or almost so.’ And Rafīʿ said, ‘[She is] my daughter.’ The Prophet then said to him, ‘Sit on one side.’ And he said to her (to the mother), ‘Sit on one side.’ He then placed the girl between them and subsequently said, ‘Call upon her.’ She (the girl) turned in the direction of her mother, whereupon the Prophet said, ‘May Allah guide her,’ whereupon she turned in the direction of her father who then took her.”87

Upon realizing that the little girl is about to submit to her natural inclination and draw towards her mother, the Prophet called upon Allah’s guidance, whereby the

83  Al-­Ṭ abarī, Tafsīr al-­Ṭabarī, 18: 552. 84  Ṣaḥ īḥ Muslim, 1: 447 (no. 50). 85 Tannous, The Making of the Medieval Middle East, 446–7. 86  Al-­Qurt ̣ubī, al-­Jāmiʿ li-­aḥ kām al-­qurʾān, 13: 61. See also Benkheira, “Introduction,” La famille en islam, 22. 87 Ibn Ḥ anbal, Musnad, 39: 168 (no. 23757); Abū Dāwūd al-­Sijistānī, Kitāb sunan: sunan Abī Dāwūd, 3: 94 (no. 2237); Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7:206 (no. 7144); al-­Iṣbahānī, Maʿrifat al-­ṣaḥ āba, 2: 264 (no. 2677); Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 2: 365 (no. 2538).

78  Female Power and Religious Change anticipated chain of events took a turn, and the child moved in the direction of her father. This is a vivid illustration of the tension between competing affiliations, those of kinship and religion, sentiment and law, blood and spirit. It not only underscores the primacy of religious loyalties and idealizes family divisions in the event of religious difference but also legitimatizes communal interventions when believers find it difficult to resolve similar conflicts. Almost exactly the same accounts are given with regard to other figures from the time of the Prophet, among them Abū Salāma al-­Anṣārī.88 His figure has been further developed in al-­Shīrāzī’s (d. 476/1083) Shāfiʿī legal collection in relation to the principle of child custody (ḥ aḍāna): [Child custody] cannot be assigned to an unbeliever over a Muslim [child]. [However,] Abū Saʿīd al-­Iṣtạ khrī (d. 328/940) said: “[Child custody] can be assigned to the unbeliever over a Muslim, according to what has been transmitted by ʿAbd al-­Ḥ amīd al-­Salama on behalf of his father, who said: ‘My father embraced Islam and my mother refused to hand me over [to him] while I was still young. They therefore appealed to the Prophet, who said: “O boy, go over to either one of them who you wished; if you wish, [go] to your father, and if you wish, [go] to your mother.” I turned to my mother, but when the Prophet saw me I heard him say, “May God guide him,” whereupon I turned to my father and sat in his bosom.’ ” The first guiding principle is that child custody was made for the benefit of the child and there is no benefit for the Muslim child who is under the custody of an unbeliever, since he will entice him away from his religion and this is the greatest harm.89

Al-­Shīrāzī’s legal formulation attempts to decide between two principal objectives of parenthood, namely responding to the child’s needs in the early stages of its life and instilling an Islamic identity in its mind. The question is resolved by prioritizing the latter, indicating the normative utility of communal narratives and their application to family life in the event of religious difference.

Choosing between God and kin—­the proselytizing utility of kinship ties A useful presentation of the force of kinship ties in moments of religious difference can be found in accounts about early pious believers who were prepared to

88 Ibn Ḥ anbal, Musnad, 39: 166 (no. 23755), 167 (no. 23756); Ibn Abī Ḥ ātim, Kitāb al-­jarḥ ­ a-­l-­taʿdīl, 6:11–12 (no. 46/9296); Al-­Iṣbahānī, Maʿrifat al-­ṣaḥ āba, 2:473 (no. 3421). See also on Khawt w al-­Anṣārī in Ibn Manda, Maʿrifat al-­ṣaḥ āba, 540 (no. 334); Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 2: 437 (no. 2191). 89  Al-­Shīrāzī, al-­Muhadhdhab fī fiqh al-­imām al-­Shāfiʿī, 2: 216.

The Prioritization of God over Family  79 forsake their families on account of their commitment to their new community. Yet religious differences between family members did not necessarily result in family breakups. Accounts depicting the trials of pious Muslims also demonstrate the role of kinship ties in promoting religious conversion. The report about al-­ Ṭufayl b. ʿAmr al-­Dawsī (d. 11/633) is a case in point. The affair is first reported in the Sīra and later in a long list of Islamic biographical and historiographical compositions.90 It is one of many similar stories, of men and women who were profoundly impressed by Muhammad. ­Ṭufayl was the chief of the Banū Daws, located south of Mecca; he was an Arabian nobleman, a prolific poet, and known for his hospitable nature. Shortly after his arrival in Mecca to dispute with the Prophet, he was approached by local members of the tribe of Quraysh and was warned by them of the great harm caused by the Messenger of God; how he had divided their community. They claimed that “he talks like a sorcerer, separating a man from his father, his brother, or his wife. We are afraid that he will have the same effect on you and your people (i.e. his tribe, the Banū Daws), so do not speak to him or listen to a word from him.” Yet Ṭufayl did not heed the words of the Qurayshīs and wished to judge for himself as to the nature of Muhammad’s preaching, a decision that eventually led to Ṭufayl’s own conversion to Islam. Upon his subsequent encounter with his kinsfolk, the following account is provided: When I got down, my father came to me (he was a very old man) and I said, “Be off with you, father, for I have nothing to do with you or you with me!” “But why, my son?” said he. I said, “I have become a Muslim and follow the religion of Muḥammad.” He said, “All right, my son, then my religion is your religion.” So I said, “Then go and wash yourself and clean your clothes; then come and I will teach you what I have been taught.” He did so; I explained Islam to him and he became a Muslim. Then my wife came to me and I said: “Be off with you, for I have nothing to do with you or you with me”. “Why?” she said, “thou art as dear to me as my father and mother!” I said, “Islam had divided us and I follow the religion of Muḥammad.” She said, “Then my dīn is your dīn.” I said, “Then go to the ḥ imā (temenos?) of Dhū-­l Sharā and cleanse yourself from it (i.e. from the idolatrous practice there).” . . . she went . . . [and] she became a Muslim.

The tension between Ṭufayl’s newly acquired religious affiliation and his kinship ties is at the center of the recorded dialogues. Ṭufayl was prepared to leave behind 90  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 2: 33–7; tr. Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad, 175–7. See also in Ibn Saʿd, Ṭabaqāt, 4: 224–7 (no. 454); Al-­Iṣbahānī, Maʿrifat al-­ṣaḥ āba, 1: 1561–5 (no. 1541); Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Kitāb al-­istīʿāb, 2: 757–62 (no. 1274); Ibn ʿAsākir, Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq, 25: 7–20 (no. 2972); Ibn al-­Jawzī, Ṣifat al-­ṣafwa, 1: 245–6; Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 3: 78–81 (no. 2611); al-­ Dhahabī, Siyar aʿlām al-­nubalāʾ, 1: 344–7; Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 3: 322–4 (no. 4273).

80  Female Power and Religious Change his parents and wife for the sake of his new community, suggesting not only a high level of piety but also that conflicting religious affiliations within the family were considered problematic. At the same time, the decision of Ṭufayl’s parents and wife to embrace Islam serves to remind us of the efficacy of kinship ties as motivators of religious change. It was their expressed dependence on Ṭufayl that seems to have induced their religious choices. The allegation that the Prophet was causing separation between family members was not exceptional and should be read in light of the dramatic events surrounding his move to Medina.91 Islamic tradition contains numerous reports of the first Muslim believers who swore allegiance to Muhammad at the cost of severing ties with their relatives, while at the same time drawing others to Islam. For example, the Companion Wāthila b. al-­ʿAsqāʿ al-­Laythī (d. 85/704–5) from the Kināna tribe, known also among ahl al-­ṣuffa (“people of the bench”), a group of pious exemplars.92 Following his conversion to Islam his father disowned him, while his sister chose to follow his path and embrace Islam as well.93 The utility of kinship ties as principal motivators behind choices to convert are well indicated in early and medieval Islamic sources as well. In Baghdad, some 250 years after the Muslims began their campaign, the East Syrian scholar and physician Ḥ unayn b. Isḥāq (d. 259/873) formulated an apologetic response to Ibn al-­Munajjim’s (d. 274/888) Burhān (“Proof ”), in which he listed family relations among the six reasons for why people lean towards falseness, that is, false belief (asbāb qubūl al-­ bāṭil): “Between the one calling (towards false belief) and his other there is a ­natural relation (nasab ṭabīʿī), and (since) the dissolution of that tie, as to what is between them, is unwanted, one agrees to follow the religion of the other.”94 Ḥ unayn’s assertion resonates the sequence of events in a contemporary story about the famous Baghdadi mystic and ascetic Maʿrūf al-­Karkhī (d. 199/815) who was sent in his childhood by his Christian parents to a Christian tutor who sought to impose on him conviction in the trinitarian doctrine. The child refused and consequently fled the tutor, whereupon his parents exclaimed, “If only he returned to us, in any religion he wishes, we shall be in agreement with him in its regard.” Maʿrūf embraced Islam and returned home. Upon knocking on his parents’ door, they asked him about his religion. Following his answer that he had become a Muslim, his parents embraced Islam as well.95 Whereas stories such as the one about Maʿrūf al-­Karkhī highlight the emotional aspect of kinship ties, others underscore biological aspects. For example, the Christian cousin of the Abbasid governor Mālik b. Ṭawq (d. 260/874) is reported to have converted to Islam 91  Bauer, “The emotions of conversion and kinship,” 150. 92  Watt, “Ahl al-­Ṣuffa,” EI2; Gil, History of Palestine, sec. 185. 93  Al-­Zuhrī, Kitāb al-­tạ baqāt al-­kabīr, 1: 263–4. 94  Samir and Nwyia, Une correspondence islamo-­chrétienne, 692–3. See Swanson, “A curious and delicate correspondence.” 95  Al-­Qushayrī, al-­Risāla al-­qushayriyya, 285; al-­Khat ̣īb al-­Baghdādī, Taʾrīkh Baghdād, 13: 199–209.

The Prioritization of God over Family  81 following the governor’s affirmation, “you are my cousin, and our flesh and blood is one,” and his consequent demand, “you should abolish what comes from disbelief.”96 The cousin not only embraced Islam but caused the descendants of their common grandfather to become Muslims as well. The ability to draw family members towards religious conversion should be understood also in light of the emotions that charged kinship ties. Various scenes found in Islamic and non-­Islamic literature speak of the emotional dramas that followed such instances. The idea of losing a family member in the event of religious conversion must have been dreadful for many, as indicated in a ninth-­ century poem by the Egyptian al-­Qāsim b. Yaḥyā al-­Maryamī (d. 316/928/9) in which he attempts to comfort his Christian friend Isḥāq b. Nuṣayr al-­ʿIbādī whose nephew had recently converted to Islam.97 In the poem, al-­Maryamī confesses his ambivalence: “I rejoice at the conversion of ­al-­Walīd, but anguish at the knowledge of your anguish. My heart is cleft in twain at it; half exuberant, half saddened, scorched for your sake.” The choice of words is noteworthy, as the poet refers to the nephew’s conversion in tragic terms. Indeed, such a reaction may have been shared by others whose relatives chose to join or leave the religious fold. The pressures exerted by family members in order to prevent the conversion of their loved ones further speaks of the emotions invested in such circumstances. In a sequel to the conversion story of Maʿrūf al-­Karkhī, an account in the work of the Sicilian scholar Ibn Ẓafar (d. 565/1170), Kitāb anbāʾ nujabāʾ al-­abnāʾ (“Reports on the sons of noble breed”) adds further details to the events ensuing after Maʿrūf ’s conversion. In response to his transgressive act and at the behest of his wife, Maʿrūf ’s father locked him in a closet for days.98 At some point, however, the father pitied his son and wanted to let him out, hoping perhaps that he would be able to reason with him. Yet Maʿrūf chose to remain in the closet, stating: “I have found in it the thing which you claimed has alienated me from the two of you.” Later, Maʿrūf was forced to come out from the closet and was taken to a monk. The monk wished to know what it was that alienated Maʿrūf from his parents, to which he answered, “My heart.” The reactions of family members to the choice of a relative, particularly a close one, such as a son to his parents, varied between sorrow and anger. Our sources include some indication as to the kind of pressures relatives would attempt to exert over their loved ones in order to dissuade them from such an act. According to al-­Ḥ asan b. Ayyūb (d. before 376/987), who converted from Christianity to Islam, these pressures were substantial not only on the part of immediate family

96 Ibn ʿAsākir, Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq, 56: 463. 97 Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Bahjat al-­majālis, 2: 756; tr. in Yarbrough, “A Muslim poet consoles a Christian friend,” 136–8. 98  Ibn Ẓafar, Anbāʾ nujabāʾ al-­abnāʾ, 186–7.

82  Female Power and Religious Change members but also from neighbors and friends.99 An illustration of family efforts to prevent one of its members from crossing religious lines is provided in al-­ Ṭabarī’s account of the Muslim conquest of Alexandria in 20/641, in the course of which Christian prisoners were given the choice to either embrace Islam or pay the poll-­tax: Then we began to bring forward every single man from among them and we gave him the choice between Islam and Christianity. When he chose Islam, we all shouted, “God is great,” even louder than we had done when that village was conquered, and we gathered him within our ranks. When he opted for Christianity, the Christians would snort and pull him back into their midst, while we imposed the jizya on him. All the time we were subject to great uncertainty, as if one of us was about to cross over to the other camp. The eyewitness went on: this is how we went about it, until we had dealt with all of them. Among those who were thus brought forward was Abū Maryam ʿAbdallāh b. ʿAbd al-­ Raḥmān. . . . We positioned him (i.e., in front of the people) and offered him the choice between Islam and Christianity. Meanwhile, his father, mother and brothers had already opted for Christianity. But Abū Maryam chose Islam, so we  made him step into our ranks. However, his father, mother and brothers pounced on him, struggling for control of him, until they tore his clothes from his body.100

The presence of family members in this particular scene was of little consequence to Abū Maryam’s decision to convert. Contemporary narratives were nonetheless composed as reminders of the unpleasant social consequences that awaited apostates should they ever consider returning to their former communities and families. In the History of the Patriarchs of Alexandria, we come across a Coptic deacon who around the mid-­eighth century converted to Islam and was assigned a prominent office in the Islamic administration. After losing his post and returning to his village he was met by the resentful sentiments of his kinsfolk.101 We may assume that emotionally stirring scenes served to glorify the image of pious believers. At the same time, they also served to discourage those who contemplated a different religious path than that of their relatives. A similar agenda appears to have motivated depictions of firm believers attempting to keep their family members within the fold. Sibling ties, for example, are seen as particularly instrumental in this context. The ninth-­century biography of the Companion 99  Ibn Taymiyya, al-­Jawāb al-­ṣaḥ īḥ , 4:90; referred to and discussed in Hackenburg, “Voices of the Converted,” 12. 100  Al-­Ṭ abarī, The History of al-­Tabari, 13: 164–5; referred to and discussed in Abbou-­Hershkovits, “Kinship, expectations, and God,” 305–6. 101  Evetts, “History of the Patriarchs,” 10.5: 378–9; see also Swanson, The Coptic Papacy in Islamic Egypt, 38–9; referred to and discussed in Mikhail, From Byzantine to Islamic Egypt, 69.

The Prioritization of God over Family  83 Abū Ḥ udhayfa b. ʿUtba (d. 11/633) refers to his sister’s harsh reaction following his invitation to his pagan father to a duel (birāz) during the Battle of Badr in 2/624. The celebrated Companion Hind bt. ʿUtba (d. c. mid-­seventh century) resorted to her poetic skills in an attempt to hinder her brother from the terrible act: “The crossed-­eyed, the one tooth or more than usual, the one whose fortune is ominous—­Abū Ḥ udhayfa, the worst among the people in religion (dīn)—did you not thank a father who has raised you since infancy till you have become an unbent youth.”102 Similar dynamics are attested in a non-­Muslim context as well. The Life of Dioscorus, a Coptic martyr in Fatimid times, offers another example of a sister’s reaction to her brother’s religious conversion.103 Unlike Abū Ḥ udhayfa’s sister, however, the declaration of Dioscorus’s sister that she has disassociated herself from her apostate brother was sufficient to prevent his conversion to Islam:104 The sixth day of Paremhat (the seventh month of the Coptic calendar = March 10–April 8) On this day died the holy Dioscorus the martyr during the time of the Arabs. This holy one was from the people of the city of Alexandria. For various reasons he left his religion and the religion of his ancestors and entered the religion of the Arabs, remaining in it for some time. He had a sister in the city of Fayyūm who was married to a Christian man. When she heard about his matter and about what had happened to him she was struck by a great sorrow and then sent him a letter, saying: “I would have desired, my brother, to have received a message that you had died a Christian, whereupon I would have rejoiced in that, rather than to have received a message about you that you had abandoned Christ, your God.” She then said to him many words and finally said to him: “know that this letter is the last contact between me and you as of now. Do not show me your face and do not write me your letter.” Then, when he read her letter he began to weep a great weeping, struck/slapped his face and plucked his beard. He then stood for a while and fastened the zunnār on his waist. He then prayed a lengthy prayer and humbled himself with extra humility and made the sign of the cross. He went out walking in the city and when the people saw him they were amazed by him and seized him and brought him before the governor, inquiring about this, to which he answered: “I am a Christian man and shall die as a Christian.” They exhorted him intensely, but he did not go back on his word, to which they responded: “did you not leave the religion of the Christians and

102 Ibn Saʿd, Ṭabaqāt, 3: 81; discussed in Abbou-­ Hershkovits, “Kinship, expectations, and God,” 308. 103  Cf. Sahner, Christian Martyrs, 70 n. 170, noting the uncertainty of the martyrdom’s date. 104 The Life is included in the Coptic liturgical collection the Synaxarium Alexandrinum, which reached its final form around the mid-­14th century. See Swanson, “Kitāb al-­Sinaksār al-­jāmiʿ,” 937–45.

84  Female Power and Religious Change enter our religion?” He replied, saying: “I was born a Christian and shall die a Christian and do not know a thing other than that.” They struck him a terrible blow, then arrested him. (He was eventually put to death.)105

The story about Dioscorus of Alexandria is founded on the notion of kinship ties as a crucial factor behind conversion decisions. Dioscorus’s change of heart and choice to revert back to Christianity was clearly in response to his sister’s harsh reaction. The underlying premise is the same as in cases exhibiting religious conversion in the context of kinship ties, namely that it could be either advanced or prevented on account of the same ties, given the prospect of their severance. Endeavors to bring apostate family members back to the religious fold appear in narrative sources in which Muslim parents go to great lengths to return their runaway sons through a network of relatives and friends.106 Further indication of the role of parents in preserving their children’s religious identity is suggested in The Martyrs of Syracuse, offering an example of two Christian brothers, Anthony and Peter, who were captured and enslaved along with their father by the Muslims following one of the raids on Syracuse in the second half of the ninth century.107 Although forced to convert and installed as officials in the Aghlabid court, the two brothers remained Christian in heart, a fact which was eventually revealed and led to their execution. The legendary narrative suggests that the two were able to sustain their Christian faith thanks to the continued presence of their father by their side. The effectiveness, although limited, of parental pressure is also observed in the autobiographical introduction to the polemical treatise by al-­Samawʾal al-­Maghribī (d. 575/1180)—the renowned Jewish scholar who converted to Islam: Thus, trenchant proof convinced me of the prophethood of Jesus and of Muhammad, and I believed in them. For some time, out of consideration for my father, I held this belief without performing the Muslim rites. For he loved me intensely, could hardly live without me, and was very much attached to me.108

The fact that Samawʾal felt liberated enough to declare his Islamic faith only after his father’s death is another testimony to some converts’ fear of the reaction of their families, hence its anticipated effect in dissuading potential converts. 105  Synaxarium Alexandrinum, 10–13; discussed in Basset, “Synaxaire arabe jacobite,” 845–7/203–5; discussion in Bibliotheca sanctorum orientalium, 1: 701–2; Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 338, 364 n. 89, 368 n. 101; MacCoull, “Rite of the Jar,” 156; Mikhail, From Byzantine to Islamic Egypt, 69. 106  See, e.g., the life of the Coptic patriarch Isaac of Alexandria, written in the late seventh–­early eighth century, which reports the failed attempt of a father, from what appears to be Arabia, to bring back his son who fled to Egypt to the Christian faith: Mena of Nikiou, The Life of Isaac of Alexandria, 69–70. 107 Delehaye, Synaxarium ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae e Codice Sirmondiano, esp. pp. 72–4; referred to and discussed in Sahner, Christian Martyrs under Islam, 45. 108 Perlmann, Ifḥ ām al-yahūd, 81 (Eng.)/106 (Ar.)

The Prioritization of God over Family  85

Kinship manipulations of religious agendas Family breakups following shifting religious affiliations, or the latter resulting from family ties, are well attested with regard to the early Christian mission throughout the Mediterranean and Iranian lands.109 The efficacy of family ties for attracting new believers has been noted through paradigms of social networks, whereby intimate personal relations facilitated meaningful ties among family members, through which they were able to transmit ideas about god and cult.110 Under early Islam, however, an accelerated process of defining distinct religious social systems was well under way. And while communal agents took advantage of family ties for advancing their missionizing endeavors on the one hand, and circumventing apostasy on the other, communal members, who were well aware of these agendas, would seize such opportunities for their own interests.111 The potential of such manipulations is suggested in the Islamic exegesis on Q 60: 10, regarding the acceptance of female converts to Islam into the fold and the consequent annulment of their marital commitments to non-­Muslim men: “O believers, when believing women come to you as emigrants, test them. God knows very well their belief. Then, if you know them to be believers, return them not to the unbelievers. They are not permitted to the unbelievers, nor are the unbelievers permitted to them.” As we shall see, Muslim exegetes argued that the verse was uttered following the migration to Medina of Umm Kulthūm bt. ʿUqba during the time of Muhammad. The specification that migrating women be tested has received extensive attention as well. According to al-­Māwardī, testing was required since some of these women sought to pressure their husbands by threatening to migrate to the Muslim side. Al-­Māwardī cites Ibn ʿAbbās (d. 68/686–8), according to whom the test included a requirement of the migrating (convert) woman to swear that “she did not leave for the hate of her husband, and not due to exile from one land to another, and not for soliciting worldly affairs, and not due to passion for a man from among us, but rather for the love of God and His Messenger.”112

109  Lieu, “The ‘attraction of women’ in/to early Judaism and Christianity,” 11; Walker, The Legend of Mar Qardagh, 241, 245; Debié, “Devenir chrétien dans l’Iran sassanide,” 348; Elman, “The other in the mirror,” 25–4; Bodin, “La conversion au christianisme,” 4–8; Simonsohn, “Communal membership despite religious exogamy,” 251–8. 110  White, “Social networks in the early Christian environment”; Stark, The Rise of Christianity, 115; Stark and Sims Bainbridge, “Networks of faith,” 1378–9; but see Castelli, “Gender, theory, and the rise of Christianity,” in which the author offers a critique of Stark’s method and of his conclusion that intermarriage contributed to the spread of Christianity; and Salzman, The Making of a Christian Aristocracy, 15, in which the author qualifies the use of network theory with the need to investigate “particular contours of historical reality.” See more recently Vuolanto, “Early Christian communities as family networks,” 113; and Bodin, “La conversion au christianisme.” 111  Simonsohn, “Conversion, exemption, and manipulation.” 112  Al-­Māwardī, al-­Nukat wa-l-ʿuyūn, 5: 521–2. See also Mujāhid b. Jabr, Tafsīr al-­imām Mujāhid ibn Jabr, 655–6; al-­Qurt ̣ubī, al-­Jāmiʿ li-­aḥ kām al-­Qurʾan, 20: 411–12; al-­Suyūt ̣ī, al-­Durr al-­manthūr, 14: 416. Similar concerns seem to have constituted the background to an order attributed to the caliph

86  Female Power and Religious Change Further indications of communal concerns with women employing tactics that would enable their release from their husbands can be seen in the geonic enactment regarding a rebellious wife (isha moredet), allegedly in c.29–31/650–1.113 The enactment stipulated the immediate divorce of so-­called recalcitrant wives, following the latter’s tendency, according to a responsum from head of Pumbedita Rav Sherira Ga’on (fl. 357–97/968–1006), to “attach themselves to the Gentiles” (benot Yisra’el holkhot ve-­nitlot ba-­goyyim).114 In other words, Jewish women who were considered rebellious in Jewish legal terms, and who sought the immediate implementation of their bills of divorce, exerted pressure on Jewish legal authorities to issue such a divorce by attaching themselves to non-­Jews. The act was expounded by Rav Natronai bar Hilai (fl. 239–243/853–858) as “turning to evil ways” (yetsiʾa le-­tarbut raʿa), an expression which by Natronai’s time could have been understood as apostasy.115 Seen from the perspective of Natronai, the historical background to the enactment suggests a tactic employed by Jewish women converting, or merely threatening to convert, in order to receive an immediate divorce in Jewish courts. Another issue related to the question of matrimonial bonds and the possible threat of conversion can also be seen in a recorded attempt to compromise the principles of the legal arrangement known in Jewish rabbinic law as levirate marriage (yibbum).116 The case is recorded in a Geniza letter that was written by a Jewish judge in Alexandria to Nahray ben Nissim (d. 491/1098) in Fust ̣āt ̣ around 441/1050.117 It mentions a young Jewish widow who insisted that she be given in marriage to one of the single younger brothers of her deceased husband, rather than to his eldest, yet married, brother. In response to the court’s attempt to impose on her marriage to the married brother, the woman threatened that she would fall into “evil ways” (tarbut raʿa). The communal court, which apparently deemed the prospect of sinful behavior, of apostasy, graver than a compromise of

ʿUthmān b. ʿAffān, whereby Byzantine slave girls who were captured and sought to embrace Islam were to be circumcised and purified; see al-­Bukhārī, al-­Adab al-­mufrad, 426 (no. 596). 113  The term “rebellious wife” (isha moredet) refers to a woman who refuses to have intercourse with her husband or, alternatively, a woman who refuses to perform domestic labor. The refusal can legally be seen as a sign of a woman’s wish to obtain a bill of divorce. See bKetub 63b. 114 Lewin, Otsar, Ketubbot, 191–2 (no. 478). This was an innovation, since according to earlier rabbinic principles, under such circumstances, divorce would be postponed for twelve months so that the couple could reach reconciliation. The enactment is reported in the famous Epistle and a legal responsum that were written by Rav Sherira Gaon, and a legal responsum attributed to Rav Natronai bar Rav Hilai. See Mann, “The responsa of the Babylonian geonim,” 122; Libson, Jewish and Islamic Law, 111. 115  Cf. a responsum from Sherira Ga’on regarding the circumcision of the son of an apostate on a Sabbath. Sherira expressed his confidence that the son will follow his mother and not “turn to the evil ways” (yitse le-­tarbut raʿa) of his father; Lewin, Otsar, Shabbat, 130, no. 398. 116  Yibbum, i.e. Levirate marriage; a marriage prescribed by Jewish rabbinic law, according to which the wife of a man who died without offspring marries his brother. 117  Bodl. MS Heb c 13.20, ed. and Hebrew tr. in Gil, Kingdom of Ishmael, 4: 237–40 (doc. 673); English tr. and discussion in Zinger, Women, Gender and Law, 48.

The Prioritization of God over Family  87 levirate arrangements, decided to release the woman from her levirate bonds.118 Despite the questionable interpretation of “turning to evil ways” as indicative of apostasy,119 it seems safe to assert that, at least in the case of rebellious wives, their alliance with non-­Jews in some form or another was at stake. Other indications of conversion as a means of annulling matrimonial commitments, this time in a Christian context, are attested in a regulation included in the legal code of the East Syrian Catholicos Timothy I (r. 163–207/780–823) which he compiled in Baghdad. The regulation permits a man to divorce his wife with no legal grounds, but merely in response to his threat to apostatize.120 As we shall see in Chapter  3, leaders of the East and West Syrian Churches were continuously exhorting Christian women against marrying non-­Christians, often indicating that intermarriage would eventuate in conversion to Islam. We can infer that a Christian man’s threat to apostatize could have been deemed sufficient reason to issue a (legally unfounded) authorization to divorce.121 Legal adjustments, if not concessions, in response to threats of apostasy offer yet another indication of communal sensitivities towards conversion out of the fold. The few examples already noted suggest that these threats were occasionally made in relation to unresolved family disputes, particularly divorce settlements. The close interplay between kinship and community was exploited for advancing personal goals by means of religious conversion, or at least threats of it. Conversely, however, a similar communal motivation has also prompted attempts to circumvent conversion by means of kinship ties.

Women between kinship and community The place of women is especially relevant to tensions between kinship and community, given their frequent association with the internal spheres of household arrangements. The final part of this chapter focuses on women as both agents and targets of religious agendas. The women to whom early Islamic and non-­Islamic sources refer are seen manifesting both power and weaknesses that emanated from their positions within patriarchal settings. Yet a dichotomy between power and the lack of it tends to conceal the fact that quite often women derived their agency from what were, or seemed to be, their inherent disadvantaged positions. 118  Cf. a threat on the part of a Jewish woman in medieval Provence to convert to Christianity if she is not given a divorce has been read as one of many examples indicating that Jewish men and women would threaten to convert in an effort to improve their personal state. See Tartakoff, Between Christian and Jew, 71. 119  Yet see Gross, “When the Jews greeted Ali.” According to Gross, the expression tarbut ra‘a should be understood as licentious behavior, based on its earlier rabbinic attestations. 120 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2: 88–9, reg. 43. 121  Explicit permission to divorce in the context of apostasy finds no precedence prior to early ninth-­century East Syrian legislation. See Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 119, 131, 136–7.

88  Female Power and Religious Change The obscurity of female agency is further complicated by our sources. Literary presentations of women affecting religious change were often penned by men as part of a demeaning rhetoric that was designed to serve polemical ends.122 Rather than treating the available sources as factual accounts, it is the symbolic significance of the figures at their center that should receive most of our attention. The late antique depictions of heroic female figures which would inspire later literary occurrences were both heavily couched in a religious discourse and framed within family settings. Images of biblical matriarchs, such as Rachel who “became the paradigmatic meritorious mother,” owing to her devotion and sudden death while giving birth, were later incorporated in classical rabbinic and early Christian theology.123 A few centuries later, the images of female saints in Syriac hagiographies were ascribed central roles as disseminators of Christian ideals within the household. The appearance of sisters in the dreams of their brothers, offering consolation and encouragement in moments of satanic temptations, not only imbued their figures with power but stemmed from a perception of their influence. At the same time, these female heroines often appear as exemplars of women who were prepared to sever ties with their families in order to follow the path of Christ.124 Their images would continue to dominate Christian texts from the early Islamic period, as mothers who raised their children to be Christians, despite considerable risks to their lives and wellbeing.125 While at times portrayed as alluring and tempting, and thus able to draw male believers to their religion, women were mostly seen as weak-­minded and therefore an easy target of proselytizers.126 The inclination of women towards conversion, however, could also have meant that they made “good converts.”127 In consequence, their presence in the household could be considered as a foot in the door, so to speak, in terms of the missionary endeavors of proselytizing agents.128 And it is here that we should recall once more women’s liminal position, referred to in Chapter 1, which rendered their relative place a “site” through which the family, and ultimately the community, could accept or reject the religious other.129 The potential danger stemming from the place of women within the household, was anticipated in the Qurʾan on account of the natural trust ­ ­husbands were bound to have in their wives. It therefore cautions: “O believers,

122  In the context of early Christianity, see Salzman, The Making of a Christian Aristocracy, 138–40; MacDonald, “Was Celsus right?,” 157, 158–62; Cooper, “Insinuation of womanly influence”; Lieu, “The attraction of women,” 14; and from an Islamic perspective, see Cuffel, “From practice to polemic.” 123  Kattan, “Zekhut I-­imahot,” 291. 124  Saint-­Laurent, “Images de femmes dans l’hagiographie syriaque.” 125  Horn, “Reconstructing women’s history from Christian-­Arabic sources,” 435. 126  On women as targets of conversion and as proselytizers, see Chapter 5. 127  Cf. in a medieval Western context, Katznelson and Rubin, Religious Conversion, 25; Goldin, Apostasy and Jewish Identity, 77. 128  Stern, “The first women converts in early Islam”; Herrin, Unrivalled Influence, 139. 129  Nirenberg, “Religious and sexual boundaries in the medieval crown of Aragon,” 146.

The Prioritization of God over Family  89 among your wives and children there is an enemy to you; so beware of them” (Q  64: 14). According to Abū ʿAbdallāh al-­Qurt ̣ubī, the same threat applied to women believers as well, from the direction of their husbands and children.130 It allows us yet another glance at the manner in which kinship sentiments required monitoring lest they undermine religious loyalties. The closing literary example in this chapter presents a female protagonist whose choice to join the Community of Believers in Medina entailed severing her ties with her pagan kinsfolk yet was dependent on the willingness of her newly acquired spiritual kin to grant her asylum. It underscores both the ideal which encouraged women who joined a new religious community to distance themselves from their former coreligionist relatives and the inherent perceptions regarding the limitations of female power. Yet, as we shall see, it was precisely due to these limitations that we are able to ascribe this woman considerable agency. Umm Kulthūm bt. ʿUqba b. Abū Muʿayt ̣ migrated to the Messenger of God during this period. Her two brothers ʿUmāra and al-­Walīd sons of ʿUqba came and asked the Messenger of God to return her to them in accordance with the agreement between him and Quraysh at Ḥ udaybiyya, but he would not. God forbade it. Al-­Zuhrī from ʿUrwa b. al-­Zubayr told me: “I came in to him as he was writing a letter to Ibn Abū Hunayda, the friend of al-­Walīd b. ʿAbd al-­Malik, who had written to ask him about the word of God: ‘O you who believe, when believing women come to you as emigrants test them. God knows best about their faith. If you know that they are believers do not send them back to the unbelievers. They are not lawful to them nor vice versa.’ (Q 60:10)”131

As already noted above, the story of Umm Kulthūm is associated with the revelation of the Qurʾanic verse regarding the admission of women converts to Islam whose husbands were unbelievers (Q 60: 10).132 Accordingly, it is a story that has been treated extensively in Islamic exegesis and law.133 The Medinian historian al-­Wāqidī (d. 206/822) reports that Umm Kulthūm was the only Qurayshī woman who left her parents to become Muslim and also the first woman who migrated to Medina after the Hijra: “They said: ‘we do not know of a Qurayshī woman who

130 Al-Qurt ̣ubī, al-Jāmiʿ li-aḥ kām al-qurʾān, 21: 18. 131  Ibn Hishām, al-Sīra al-nabawiyya, 3: 271–3; tr. Guillaume, The Life of Muhammad, 509–10 (with slight modifications on my part). 132  The title of Sura 60—al-mumtaḥ ana (“she who is tested”)—has also been noted in relation to the event known as the Women’s Pledge of the first treaty of Aqaba in 621; see Abbott, “Wahb b. Munabbih,” 106–7. 133  See Afsaruddin, “Reconstituting women’s lives,” 478 n. 9; al-Wāḥidī, Asbāb nuzūl al-qurʾān, 444–5 (no. 424); al-Qurt ̣ūbī, al-Jāmiʿ li-aḥ kām al-qurʾān, 20: 410–20; al-Suyūt ̣ī, al-Durr al-manthūr, 14: 413–24.

90  Female Power and Religious Change left her parents being a Muslim, migrating to Allah, but Umm Kulthūm.’ ”134 ­al-­Wāqidī’s account includes the dialogue that took place between Umm Kulthūm and the Prophet: O Messenger of God, I have fled to you on account of my faith. Therefore, protect me and do not send me back to them, [for] they will torture (yaftinūnī) and torment (yuʿadhibūnī) me. I have no endurance in the face of torment, for I am a woman, and the feebleness of women is something you know of. I have already seen you send back two men to the polytheists even though one of them refused [to return], and [yet] I am a woman!135

It was during the period governed by the principles of the Ḥ udaybiyya treaty (signed in 6/628) that Umm Kulthūm expressed an intention to visit relatives living in the desert. After setting out to meet the Prophet, Umm Kulthūm parted with her escort and was met by a member of the Khuzāʿa tribe, who took her to Medina where she met the Prophet. Her brothers from Mecca hurried after her, seeking to return her on the grounds of the conditions signed in Ḥ udaybiyya, which specified the return of dissenters from both the Meccan and Medinian sides. It is here, however, that Umm Kulthūm offers the key statement in the entire affair, as she pleaded with Muḥammad not to send her back to Mecca, lest her former coreligionists and tribe members force her to renounce her Islamic faith: “for I am a woman, and the feebleness of women is something you know of.” Muhammad heeded Umm Kulthūm’s plea. He announced that God has cancelled the Ḥ udaybiyya treaty with regard to women (inna Allāh naqaḍa al-­ʿahd fī-­l-­ nisāʾ), having revealed this in the Qurʾanic chapter of al-­Mumtaḥ ana (lit. “she who is to be examined”). The events of Umm Kulthūm’s conversion, migration, and encounter with the Prophet, and the consequent modification of the Ḥ udaybiyya treaty appear in later biographical collections.136 These accounts collectively offer an image of a woman prepared to repudiate her allegiance with her family and community while still living among them. Her bold story notwithstanding, Umm Kulthūm also demonstrates her limitations as a woman. Her statement about women’s fragile position in family and society is highly striking and is presented as having a marked influence on the Prophet. In consequence, the Prophet granted Umm Kulthūm asylum. At the risk of jeopardizing his treaty with the people of Mecca, he resorted to the most powerful measure—­a Qurʾanic verse shielding newly 134  Al-­Wāqidī, Kitāb al-­maghāzī, 2: 629. See also Afsaruddin, “Early women exemplars,” 26–7; see also Ibn Saʿd, Ṭabaqāt, 10: 218–20 (no. 4995). 135 Al-Wāqidī, Kitāb al-maghāzī, 2:631. See also Abbot, “Women and the state,” 109–10. 136 See the treaty’s modification in al-Iṣbahānī, Maʿrifat al-ṣaḥ aba, 1: 3548–9 (no. 4163); Ibn al-Athīr, Usd al-ghāba, 7: 386–7 (no. 7577); al-Dhahabī, Siyar aʿlām al-nubalāʾ, 1: 1157 (no. 1110); Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-ṣaḥ āba, 8: 464–2 (no. 12231).

The Prioritization of God over Family  91 c­ onverted Muslim women from their kinfolk’s demands. Throughout the story we find continual reminders of the heroine’s disadvantages in a male-­dominated setting. While Umm Kulthūm left her family behind, she was required to exchange its patronage for that of a male companion in the desert, and finally for that of the Prophet. The narrative portrays a woman able to stand her ground, but only so long as she successfully negotiates within the constraints of male power. Echoes of Umm Kulthūm’s limitations are found in later Islamic legal sources.137 For example, al-­Māwardī, quoted al-­Shafiʿī (d. 204/820), according to whom, “women, when they are enticed they are weak and they do not discern in a manner that men discern. They can dissimulate and it could occur that their husbands would obtain their desired enjoyment of them while they are forbidden to them.”138 God’s injunction, it should be noted, allowed for the sheltering of women who left Mecca, but not men. Al-­Māwardī noted that: at that time the Prophet refrained from returning them (the women) and from returning all the women, but did not refrain from returning the men, on acount of the difference between men and women in two regards: The first—­men are firmer than women and more capable of repenting if they are compelled towards disbilief; the second—­married women are forbidden to their infidel husbands, yet cannot avoid them, unlike men.139

Al-­Māwardī made a similar point in his exegesis of Q 60: 10, noting that Allah has abrogated the requirement of returning Muslim women to their polytheist kinsfolk for two principal reasons: “The first, [since] they have intimate parts which [men] are forbidden [to touch]; the second, they are softer in hearts and are more prone to change of heart than they (men) are.”140 At the center of Umm Kulthūm’s story we find an evident tension between her kinship and religious ties. Her choice of the latter required the severance of the former. The narrative makes it very clear that the root of the problem goes back to Umm Kulthūm’s gender. Due to her natural weakness as a woman, she will not be able to endure as a Muslim among her non-­Muslim kinsfolk. She has no choice but to relocate and move to a Muslim environment. Yet if the early historiographical narratives seem vague as to the meaning of female fragility, later legal discourse offers clarity: women are weak since they do not discern as men do; they are  less bound to stand fast in the face of pressures to change their religion; and they will not be able to refuse their infidel husbands. That said, it was on  these  very accounts that Umm Kulthūm appears to possess significant 137  See, e.g., ʿAbd al-Razzāq al-Ṣanʿānī, al-Muṣannaf, 7: 13233 (no. 12697); al-Shāfiʿī, al-Umm, 5: 457–8; al-Māwardī, al-Ḥ āwī al-kabīr, 14: 271. 138  Ibid. 14: 355. 139  Ibid. 14: 357; see also al-­Shīrāzī, al-­Muhadhdhab, 2: 334. 140  Al-­Māwardī, al-­Nukat wa-l-ʿuyūn, 521; see also al-­Qurt ̣ubī, al-­Jāmiʿ li-­aḥ kām al-­qurʾān, 411.

92  Female Power and Religious Change agency. Her dialogue with the Prophet reveals how she resorts to her limitations in order to cajole Muhammad to take her in. Had it not been for her natural weaknesses, so we are told by later jurists, her fate would have been the same as of those men who were sent back to Mecca. With kinship and religious attachments at play, religious ideals offered opportunities of power to women whose state was otherwise precarious owing to patriarchal arrangements. The story about Umm Kulthūm exhibits a woman who was dependent on male figures on both sides of the religious divide. Yet it is also about a woman who is rewarded for her courage and resolution and who is able to exercise agency on account of her restricted state. It is here that the story about Umm Kulthūm and about the mother of the young Muslim soldier with which this chapter begins juxtapose. Whereas in Umm Kulthūm’s case kinship ties were successfully severed, those in al-­Tanūkhī’s story appeared to have transcended physical separation through the memories and objects that retained them over time and space. The radical separation between Umm Kulthūm and her Meccan family was bound to convey a powerful message to women who converted to Islam. The utility of her story was of particular significance in such moments when memories and objects, such as those featuring in al-­Tanūkhī’s story, served to retain kinship ties across religious boundaries, despite family breakup. The link between Umm Kulthūm’s story and that of the Byzantine woman becomes further evident when seen in the context of its incorporation in legal texts. The story of the female Companion is discussed in al-­Shāfiʿī’s al-­Umm with regard to “the details of the truce, that the Imām will return whoever came to his territory, whether Muslim or infidel.” Here, we should recall that the story of the Muslim soldier and his former Byzantine mother begins with the request of a Byzantine captive to return to the Byzantine side in exchange for Muslim captives that were held there. Al-­ Shāfiʿī rules, based on Umm Kulthūm’s example, that a Muslim leader (imām) will not prevent the men [from returning], excluding the women from among the people of the Abode of War. When someone from the men of the Abode of War comes to the place of the Imām alone, and someone comes seeking him from his allies, he should let him do whatever he wants and not prevent him from going.141

Conclusions A conspicuous feature in the normative discourse of monotheistic traditions is the prioritization of God over family, or of communal commitments over those emanating from kinship ties. This objective should be read in light of family life as 141  Al-­Shāfiʿī, al-­Umm, 5: 457–9 (no. 1970).

The Prioritization of God over Family  93 the immediate locus of a person’s emotional attachments and material wellbeing. Community and family could therefore be seen as rivals; as competitors over the primary loyalty of their members. Accordingly, when faced with the choice between a divine commandment and family interests and sentiments, believers were called upon to offer primacy to the former. The ideal was transmitted through diverse forms of a normative literature that glorified the acts of exemplary figures who were willing to sacrifice their dearest ones for the sake of God and His community. At the same time, the authors of this literature were evidently aware of the limits of their expectations, given the force of kinship ties. As a result, another way to prioritize communal agendas was by presenting the family as the fulfillment of communal ideals. The family was therefore at the center of communal concerns and its structure, routines, and emanating relationships were continuously regulated by religious law. It is also in this context that a vocabulary of kinship was used to articulate communal membership, the relationship among believers, and the bond between God and His agents on the one hand, and the simple believer, on the other. When considered against the meanings of kinship and the profound investment of religious systems in kinship attachments, the radical shift in a person’s commitments following so-­called religious conversion seems almost impossible to achieve. In consequence, stories about family breakups at the event of religious conversion offered models of pious figures who were prepared to go as far as severing ties with their relatives in the course of their conversion. At the same time, these stories reveal their authors’ acknowledgment of the lasting ties between converts and their former coreligionist family members. Accordingly, believers could also find stories that would illustrate the manner in which model figures were able to draw their relatives to their religion by resorting to the contents of kinship. All this is to say that the tension, interplay, and overlap between kinship and religious affiliations could generate both partnership and separation between family members of different religions. Such a duality is indicative not only of competing values but also of a pragmatism on the part of religious authorities in changing social circumstances. This duality will feature in the following chapters, as we locate women in moments of conflict between their religious and kinship commitments. Women will feature as initiators of religious change, as well as its obstructers, owing to their relative place and unique capital within the patriarchal framework. Yet in order to obtain a better grasp of their roles, it is pertinent to consider the different social situations that these women were bound to encounter. The following chapter takes us to those moments in which family structures and kinship relations are confronted with the ideal of prioritizing God over kin, namely the multifaceted phenomenon of religiously mixed families.

3 Religiously Mixed Families as Sites of Competing Religious Traditions On behalf of Zakariyyā b. Ibrāhīm who said: “I entered upon Abī ­ʿAbdallāh (Jaʿfar al-­Ṣādiq; d. 148/765), peace be upon him, and said: ‘I am a man of the People of the Book, and I have embraced Islam, while all of my family remained (adhering) to Christianity. I am with them in the same house; I have not parted from them yet. May I eat from their food?’ to which he said to me: ‘Do they eat pork?’ I said: ‘No, but they drink wine’, whereupon he said to me: ‘Eat with them and drink.’ ”1 Narratives from the early and middle Islamic periods were often premised on the  basic assumption of kinship separation resulting from religious difference. As a result, a common assertion in modern scholarship has been of ­drastic detachment between converts and their former kinsfolk, not to mention communities.2 According to Richard Bulliet, what drove converts out of their communities were the unfriendly reactions towards them from “people they had been friends with only days before.”3 In practice, however, we should keep in mind that notions of social ostracism and kinship detachment among former coreligionists were often the product of ideals designed to counter an opposite reality. The present discussion offers a more nuanced historical image, whereby religious dissent and inter-­religious marriage did not necessarily result in the ­severance of family ties. Having attended to family arrangements in Chapter 1, and to aspects of interplay between family and community in Chapter 2, we now turn to explore religiously mixed families as the social settings in which the female protagonists of this book feature. These families drew special attention on the part of religious authorities as liminal spaces that endangered the coherence of religious communities and undermined principles of normative behavior. The ensuing discussion is largely structured as a broad overview of the phenomenon 1  Al-­Ṭ ūsī, Tahdhīb al-­aḥ kām, 9: 87 (no. 369). I wish to thank Michael Cook for bringing this ­passage to my attention. 2 Goitein, Med. Soc. 2, 299; Med. Soc. 3, 81; cf. Cahen, “Histoire économico-­sociale et islamologie,” 203; Blidstein, “Who is not a Jew?,” 376; Bulliet, Islam: The View from the Edge, 76–9; Shatzmiller, “Marriage, family, and the faith,” 257; Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 338. 3  Bulliet, “Conversion stories in early Islam,” 130.

Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East. Uriel Simonsohn, Oxford University Press. © Uriel Simonsohn 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.003.0004

96  Female Power and Religious Change of religiously mixed families in the early and medieval Islamic periods and is ­primarily concerned with the preoccupation of communal authorities. An acknowledgment of the relevance of religiously mixed families to communal affairs will allow us to consider the religious agency of women in these settings as pertinent to matters that were beyond the parameters of the private domain. As we have seen in Chapter 2, and as we shall see in the following chapters, religiously mixed families are referred to everywhere: in scripture, legendary tales, popular epics, legal lore, private correspondence, tax receipts, court records, polemical treatises, biographies and autobiographies, and more. In what follows, religiously mixed family ties are considered through a specific subset of evidence, namely legal texts. The chapter explores legal sources from the foundational phases of the religious communities under discussion as well as from the early and medieval Islamic periods. Legal principles, regulations, and positions reflect communal agendas to supervise family life. Read against the grain, however, legal materials reflect not only the different communal responses to religiously mixed families but also their different manifestations in daily lives.

An overview of social circumstances Whereas religiously mixed families offered opportunities for daily interactions between kinsfolk of different religions, religious authorities sought to monitor these ties, curtail them, and even eradicate them. For example, the alleged rescript of the Umayyad caliph ʿUmar b. ʿAbd al-­ʿAzīz (r. 98–101/717–20) promises the full benefits of conversion to those among the Christians, Jews, or Zoroastrians, who following their acceptance of Islam leave their former abodes (dār) and join the “the body of the Muslims in their abode.”4 Yet settlement patterns from the first few centuries of Islam, particularly in regions that were distant from garrison towns, such as Palestine and parts of Egypt, include numerous examples of urban and rural towns, as well as neighborhoods, that comprised members of different religious communities.5 Such a proximity may have constituted the background to a question posed to Aḥmad b. Ḥ anbal (d. 240/855) regarding “a Muslim man 4 Ibn ʿAbd al-­Ḥ akam, Sīrat ʿUmar, 84; English tr. Gibb, “Fiscal rescript of ʿUmar,” 3; the rescript is recorded in ʿUmar’s biography (sīra), which was written about a century later by the Egyptian historian ʿAbdallāh b. ʿAbd al-­Ḥ akam (d. 213/829) and made available by his son Muḥammad (d. 268/882). Recent scholarship, specifically that of Luke Yarbrough, has expressed substantial reservations regarding the reliability of ʿUmar’s biography. Yarbrough argues that the policy attributed to ʿUmar II should be read in the context of an Abbasid endeavor to set the literary figure of the Umayyad caliph in a plot that was to serve Abbasid concerns. See Yarbrough, “Did ʿUmar b. ʿAbd al-­ʿAzīz issue an edict,” 198. See also Hawting, First Dynasty, 78. 5 See Avni, The Byzantine-­Islamic Transition in Palestine, ch. 4; see also Goitein, Med. Soc. 2, 289–93. Further indication of mixed cohabitation can be gleaned from the endurance of mixed cemeteries in the Fayyum region in the eleventh century; see Gaubert and Mouton, Hommes et villages du Fayyoum dans la documentation papyrologique arabe, 200.

Religiously Mixed Families  97 and a Christian (man) in the (same) dwelling (dār) and the two have children, yet it is not possible to distinguish the Christian’s child from that of the Muslim.”6 The prospect of Muslims, Christians, Jews, and Zoroastrians living in such proximities challenges the notion of inter-­religious segregation. At the same time, inter-­religious ties appear to have persisted far beyond the social intimacy that was afforded by mixed settlements and neighborhoods. Religiously mixed families were the product of two primary phenomena: ­religious conversion and intermarriage. In both cases, there is evidence for the endurance of family ties, despite religious dissent, whereby converts who chose to remain in place and partners of mixed unions retained contact not only with their families but also with their communities.7 It is hard to estimate how common was the phenomenon of mixed families in the early and medieval Islamic periods, although the scale of references to it seems staggering. And while the extent of the phenomenon is beyond our reach, much can be said about the circumstances that generated it. In addition, an acknowledgment of the phenomenon’s late antique precedents allows us to broaden the scope of our analysis, nuance the relevant cases, and, eventually, pose questions regarding features that may have been unique to the Islamic Near East.

Intermarriage Marriage between members of different religious communities, also known as religious exogamy, is widely attested in our sources from early on. It not only constituted a central factor in the formation of religiously mixed families but also facilitated the extension of religious hybridity through kinship ties that stretched beyond the household. Given the permeation of religious ideals and practices into the private domain and their relevance to the most mundane of experiences, spouses of distinct religious affiliations were bound to face the perplexing reality of cohabitation.8 A striking resemblance between late antique realities and those featuring under Islam can be seen in the fact that intermarriage often took place between a male member of the dominant religious community and a female member of minor religious background.9 Whereas during the first few centuries of the evolving Christian movement there was a greater prospect of Christian women marrying pagan husbands, under Islam a similar balance prevailed between Muslim men and non-­Muslim women, specifically Christian and Jewish

6  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 11 (no. 11). 7  Décobert, “Sur l’arabisation et l’islamisation de l’Egypte medieval,” 292; el-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion in medieval Cairo”; Zorgati, Pluralism in the Middle Ages, 11; Simonsohn, “Religious exogamy.” 8  MacDonald, “Early Christian women married to unbelievers,” 221. 9  Ibid., 222.

98  Female Power and Religious Change ones. The rise of Islam in Arabia, followed by the Muslim conquests during the seventh century, brought with it another wave of mixed marriages. While many of these unions were followed by the conversion to Islam of the non-­Muslim spouse, in other instances the religious affiliations of both spouses remained unchanged.10 As Muslims began settling in the newly acquired territories, intermarriage was often the consequence of a shortage in Muslim women.11 Yet the gradual migration of Muslim populations into the conquered lands may have been the cause also of an early policy, if not merely traditions reporting it, suggesting that intermarriage was frowned upon. It is in this context that we should think of ʿUmar I’s declaration about the captivating lure of non-­Arab women (i.e. non-­Muslim women from the Sawād): “the non-­Arab women are captivating, and if you draw near to them they will wrest you from your wives.”12 Be that as it may, within a relatively short time, Muslim jurists faced the challenge of providing legal solutions to questions that were triggered by intermarriage. Echoes of their endeavors are found in medieval legal compilations, such as Ibn Ḥ anbal’s responsa listing illicit kinds of intermarriage, or Ibn Abī Shayba’s (d. 234/849), Muṣannaf, referring to the religious identity of the fetus in the womb of a Christian woman married to a Muslim man.13 East Syrian and West Syrian legal regulations and canon laws that were issued from the very beginning of Islamic rule confirm these scenarios, indicating that the majority of cases of intermarriage resulted from unions between Christian women and non-­Christian men.14 A few centuries after the Muslim conquest, indications of mixed marriages are further attested in legal contracts from Egypt,15 and envisioned in rabbinic legal compendia from Iraq: “A Cuthean (i.e., a Samaritan; used halakhically to refer to non-­Jews) who betrothed, his betrothal should be suspected . . . And the rule (concerning) the son of an apostate, born to a Gentile woman, who betroths, his betrothal is not held (valid), whereas the betrothal of the apostate himself is held (valid).”16 While the rabbinic ruling in this case concerns marriage with a non-­ Jew, geonic responsa from the ninth to the eleventh centuries refer to mixed marriages between Jews and apostates, most likely converts to Islam. For example,

10  On mixed marriages and conversion to Islam in the context of the Islamic conquest, see Stern, “The first women converts,” 293, 297; Abbot, “Women and the state in early Islam,” 107; Spectorsky, “Women of the People of the Book,” 272; Lecker, “The Jewish reaction to the Islamic conquests,” 179–80. 11  Islamic legal principles allowing Muslim men to marry non-­Muslim women will be discussed later. On the shortage of Muslim women during the early conquests, see Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 181–2. 12  The History of al-­Ṭ abarī, 12: 159; discussed in Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 438. 13  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 159–69, chs. 82–84 (nos. 448–82); Ibn Abī Shayba, al-­Muṣannaf, 3: 37–8 (nos. 11895–6). 14  Simonsohn, “Communal membership despite religious exogamy.” 15  Gladys Frantz-­Murphy, “A comparison of the Arabic and earlier Egyptian contract formularies, I,” 206; Frantz-­Murphy, “Conversion in early Islamic Egypt,” 16; Mikhail, From Byzantine to Islamic Egypt, 66, 300 n. 82. 16  Halakhot gedolot, 40, “Hilkhot qiddushin.”

Religiously Mixed Families  99 there is a responsum from the head of Sura Rav Sa‘adya Ga’on (fl. 226–44/841–58) regarding a Jewish woman who married a Jewish apostate “according to the ­custom of the Gentiles,” while still married to a Jew.17 A parallel case, recorded in a mid-­eleventh century Geniza document, concerns Serur bar Ḥ ayyim, who on account of his apostasy had no choice but to marry a Jewish woman of low social class.18

Conversion of family members As noted above, religiously mixed family ties were often consequent to the conversion of a family member. The phenomenon is well attested in late antique sources of diverse religious provenance.19 Here, husbands occupy a prominent place, mostly as converts to Christianity, whose religious choices complicated the personal status of their dependents. The sixth or seventh-­century Palestinian rabbinic compendium Sefer ha-­ma‘asim refers to the betrothal of a Jewish couple, after which the future husband apostatized, yet the bride had to be released in order to remarry.20 Further to the east, the sixth-­century Zoroastrian Hērbedestān (lit. “school for priests, religious school”; an Avestan/Pahlavi text dealing with advanced Zoroastrian priestly studies)21 addresses the state of the children and wife of a man who becomes a Zoroastrian.22 As we enter the period following the Muslim conquest, we find many converts who were non-­Muslim prisoners of war and sought manumission through conversion to Islam.23 Shaybānī’s (d. 187/803 or 189/805) relatively early legal treatise of Ḥ anafī jurisprudence refers to the personal status of the wife and children of “a man from the People of War (ahl al-­ḥ arb; i.e. people who live outside Islamic territory), who embraces Islam possessing property and land, and being with children and family”: 17 Lewin, Otsar, Yebamot, 196, no. 474; Sha‘are tsedek, part 3, vol. 1, no. 54; see Simonsohn, “The legal and social bonds of Jewish apostates.” 18  T-­S NS J360; published in Gil, Palestine in the First Muslim Period (634–1099), doc. 449a; discussed in Yagur, “Religious identity and communal boundaries,” 151. See also T-­S Ar. 40.96, discussed in Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 301: an undated question to a Muslim jurist mentioning a Jewish woman whose husband converted to Islam and, after a year of cohabitation with his wife, set off to India where he spent ten years, following which the woman asked for a divorce. It is noteworthy that the request for divorce came up not after the conversion but after the apostate had distanced himself from his wife, suggesting that the woman’s primary concern was over her livelihood. 19  For the conversion of individual family members to Christianity around the fourth century, see Horn, ‘‘The Pseudo-­Clementine homilies.” 20 Newman, The Ma‘asim of the People of the Land of Israel, 152–6 (no. 25). On The Ma‘asim, see ibid., 1–85. 21  Kotwal, “Hērbedestān,” Encyclopedia Iranica, s.v. 22 Humbach and Elfenbein, Erbedestan: An Avesta-­ Pahlavi Text, 12.8–12.21; Macuch, “The Hērbedestān as a legal source,” 92–6. On the Hērbedestān, see ibid. 91. See also Elman, “The other in the mirror,” 15–26; Mokhtarian, “The boundaries of an infidel in Zoroastrianism,” 107. 23 Bulliet, Conversion to Islam, 52; Crone, Nativist Prophets, 8.

100  Female Power and Religious Change A man from the People of War, if he embraces Islam in the Abode of War, after which the Muslims show up in that Abode, what should they leave him from his property and children? . . . And what is your opinion with regard to his wife, who is an infidel, being pregnant? He said: She and that which is in her womb is considered booty (fayʾ) for the Muslims. I said: And that which is in her womb is of her status? He said: Yes. I said: And why, while his father is not an infidel? He said: Since his mother is an infidel and she and her child that is in her womb have her status.24

The legal question exhibits a case in which a non-­Muslim man converted to Islam, his non-­Muslim wife and older children are considered booty from conquered land (fayʾ), his younger children are considered Muslim, and the fetus in his wife’s womb, like its mother, is also booty.25 Yet despite differences in religious affiliation and legal status, the family could have remained intact. The conversion to Islam of non-­Muslim husbands is further reported with regard to the male members of the Syrian Christian tribe of the Banū Tanūkh, who were forced to convert to Islam at the behest of the Abbasid caliph al-­Mahdī (r. 158–68/775–85).26 According to the account in Michael the Syrian’s (d. 595/1199) chronicle, the Christian wives remained active members in their church.27 It seems, however, that most signs for the conversion of household heads are noted in relation to Christian and Jewish officials who served in the Islamic administration. These officials, many of whom were forced to convert (though estimates as to when and under which circumstances vary), remained married to non-­Muslim wives, and fathered children who might have been considered Muslim, but as we  shall see, were often raised as non-­Muslims.28 Whereas Muslim jurists may have considered their children to be Muslims (see later in this chapter), there is some indication of single-­generation conversions, in which the adult descendants of converts claimed to have remained non-­Muslims.29 The case of a Christian girl mentioned in a ninth-­century fatwa from Cordoba illustrates some of the legal complications that could arise under such circumstances. The fatwa mentions a Christian woman whose father was a Muslim, but lived with her Christian mother. In response to the qadi’s suggestion that she was a Muslim owing to her 24  Al-­Shaybānī, Kitāb al-­siyar, 139 (no. 121). 25  See also al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, ch. 88 (nos. 504–9): a man converts, but his wife refuses to convert. 26  Al-­Balādhurī, Futūḥ al-­buldān, 147; Abū al-­Fidāʾ, al-­Yawāqīt, 4. 27 Chabot, Chronique, 3: 1; the same report is also given in Bar Hebraeus, Chronography, 1: 117. See Jalabert, Hommes et lieux dans l’islamisation de l’espace syrien, 133. 28  On the conversion of non-­Muslim officials in the early Abbasid era, see Fiey, Chrétiens syriaques sous les Abbassides; Yarbrough, “Did ʿUmar b. ʿAbd al-­ʿAzīz issue an edict”; Levy-­Rubin, “ʿUmar II’s ghiyar edict,” 160. On the formation of religiously mixed families following the conversion of Coptic and Jewish officials to Islam in the twelfth through the fifteenth centuries, see el-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion in medieval Cairo,” 71–3. 29  El-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion in medieval Cairo,” ch. 2.

Religiously Mixed Families  101 father’s Islam, the woman stated that her father converted to Islam when she was already at the age of maturity.30 A similar debate regarding an event that took place in Mosul in 554/1159 is reported in Bar Hebraeus’s Ecclesiastical History. The daughter of a Christian man who converted to Islam was about to be wed to a Christian and it was asked of the West Syrian Maphrian31 whether she could receive a blessing in the church. The Maphrian ruled that if the girl had not converted to Islam, then she was considered Christian and may therefore receive a priestly benediction. The ruling was brought to the attention of Muslim authorities, after which the qadi ruled that if the girl confesses to being a Muslim, then the Maphrian is to be put to death by stoning. The girl, however, insisted she was a Christian: “I am a Christian and this is my mother, who raised me. My father, in contrast, I do not know at all.”32 Beyond the girl’s recorded statement, we can only speculate as to the exact circumstances under which she was able to sustain her Christianity. Testimonies from Egypt, around the same time, mention Islamic judicial decisions which confirmed the Christian identity of adult sons of former Copts who converted to Islam.33 There is reason to believe, however, that, contrary to legal principles, children of non-­Muslim fathers continued to grow up as non-­Muslims thanks to the continuing presence of a non-­Muslim mother. At the same time, some women converted to Islam while still married to non-­Muslim partners. In contrast to Umm Kulthūm, whom we encountered in the previous chapter, a tradition found in al-­Ṣanʿānī’s (d. 210/826) Muṣannaf mentions women who “during the time of the Prophet would convert to Islam in their land (most likely Mecca, although perhaps also women members of Arabian tribes), without migrating, and their husbands, at the time they converted to Islam, were infidels.”34 As we shall see, the question of Muslim women married to non-­Muslim husbands prompted considerable attention on the part of Muslim jurists. Matrimonial ties between converts to Islam and non-­Muslims were bound to cause religious differences also between parents and children. A famous case in point is the agreement between ʿUmar I and the Mesopotamian Arab tribe of the Banū Taghlib, whereby those who refused to convert to Islam would pay a poll-­ tax in an equivalent rate to the Islamic alms tax. The concession, however, came with a cost: “ʿUmar agreed (to make the rate of their jizya the same as the alms tax paid by Muslims) on the condition that they would not bring up in a Christian way children whose parents had embraced Islam.”35 The historicity of the report 30  Al-­Wansharīsī, al-­Miʿyār, 2: 347–8; discussed in Zorgati, Pluralism in the Middle Ages, 49. 31  The second-­highest rank in the ecclesiastical hierarchy of the Syrian Orthodox Church. 32  Bar Hebraeus, Gregorii Barhebræi Chronicon ecclesiasticum, 3: 347–51; Chabot, Chronique, 3: 316–17; English tr. Conterno, “The tribulations of a converted man’s daughter,” 186–8. 33  El-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion in medieval Cairo,” 68. 34  Al-­Ṣanʿānī, al-­Muṣannaf, 7: 169–71 (no. 12646). 35  The History of al-­Tabari, 13: 62. See also in Abū Yūsuf, Kitāb al-­kharāj, 121; al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 67–81 (nos. 181–91). On conversion via mixed marriages in nineth-­century Egypt in order to evade taxes, see also Frantz-­Murphy, “Conversion in early Islamic Egypt,” 16; Sijpesteijn, “Landholding patterns in early Islamic Egypt,” 128; Lev, “Coptic rebellions and the Islamization of medieval Egypt,” 325.

102  Female Power and Religious Change should be treated with a grain of salt, given the problematic suggestion of a specific tax that was imposed on non-­Muslims at this early stage in Islamic history.36 Yet the alleged arrangement brings to mind a scenario in which at least one of the parents adhered to a different religion than that of his or her children. A question referred to Ibn Ḥ anbal concerning the religious identity of children of mixed couples suggests that the arrangement with the Banū Taghlib was not a single incident. The question mentions an agreement between two clans, according to which the male newborns resulting from mixed unions will be Muslim like their fathers and the females will be polytheist, Jewish, Christian, or Zoroastrian (like their mothers).37 Such deliberations stand out in the vividness of the scenarios they depict yet were anything but unusual. In fact, Islamic legal literature envisions similar cases in extensive detail, referring to instances of Muslim fathers of Christian daughters,38 women converts to Islam and their non-­Muslim children,39 a son who converted to Islam who has a Christian mother,40 and non-­Muslim children whose parents converted to Islam.41 They receive confirmation in contemporary historiography, as in the case of the former Sabian Sinān b. Thābit (d. 331/943) who was forced to convert to Islam yet his children remained Sabian.42 Around the same time, geonic responsa address the ability of Jews to claim the property of their deceased Jewish apostate fathers. Although the nature of relations between adult children and parents of different religions is difficult to assess, the durability of ties for purposes of inheritance are indicative of a certain level of contact between them.43

The conversion of children Reports about Iraqi Christian officials who converted to Islam mention their enduring ties with their Christian parents despite their conversion to Islam. It has been suggested that it was thanks to these ties that their parents were able to improve their status and advance their personal interests.44 While the choice to

36 On the use of jizya in the early period, see Dennett, Conversion and the Poll Tax, 12–13; Løkkegaard, Islamic Taxation in the Classic Period, 131–2; Morimoto, Fiscal Administration of Egypt, 53–62; Sijpesteijn, Shaping a Muslim State, 177. Cf. the ambiguity of Greek and Arabic taxation terms in Papaconstantinou, “Administering the Early Islamic Empire.” 37  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 26, ch. 10 (no. 60); discussed in Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 112. 38  Al-­Ṣanʿānī, al-­Muṣannaf, 6: 26 (no. 9894). 39  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 40, ch. 17 (nos. 91–2). 40  ibid., 228–31, ch. 121 (nos. 649–58). 41  ibid., 17, ch. 6 (nos. 32, 33). 42  Roberts, “Being a Sabian at court in tenth-­century Baghdad,” 253. 43  See, e.g., Sa‘adya Ga’on’s responsum regarding the question of whether a Jewish woman may inherit her from apostate father; Lewin, Otsar, Qiddushin, 29, no. 76. Similar cases are further discussed below. 44 Fiey, Chrétiens syriaques, 113.

Religiously Mixed Families  103 follow a different religion was most likely taken at an advanced age, there is some indication of children converting to Islam prior to adulthood.45 In most cases, however, it seems reasonable to anticipate religious conversion at a later stage in a person’s life. One such scenario is depicted in al-­Ṣanʿānī’s Muṣannaf in relation to the division of inheritance among family members of different religious affiliations: (A question referred to the Companion Yazīd b. Qatāda): My mother died being a Christian, while I am a Muslim. She has left behind three slaves, a newborn girl, and two hundred palm trees. . . . ʿUmar b. al-­Khaṭt ạ̄ b ruled that her in­her­it­ ance should go to her husband and her brother’s son, who are both Christian, whereas I should not receive a thing. Yazīd b. Qatāda said: “My grandfather died being a Muslim . . . leaving behind his daughter . . . we went (lit. travelled) with this matter to ʿUthmān (b. ʿAffān)—me, his nephew, and his Christian daughter, whereupon ʿUthmān bequeathed the entire inheritance to me, and he did not bequeath his daughter a thing. I kept the inheritance for a year or two and later his daughter embraced Islam, whereupon we went (lit. travelled) to ʿUthmān . . . (and despite ʿUmar’s ruling that whoever embraced Islam before the division of the inheritance, may receive a share of it) . . . he bequeathed her all of it.46

Questions pertaining to the inheritance of children take up much of the legal ­discussions about the implications of religiously mixed family ties. Their importance is further reflected in their treatment by jurists of diverse religious affiliations. For example, circumstances in which parents and their children adhered to different religions are mentioned in Išōʿbokt’s (d. c. second half of the eighth century) Book of Laws: “If a man has children, whom he has from a woman of a different faith, without having another wife, and these children are Christian, they should inherit their father. If, however, they are pagans (i.e., Muslims), they do not inherit their father’s property.”47 Finally, ninth-­century geonic responsa, in particular those of  the head of the rabbinic academy of Sura, Natronai bar Hilai Ga’on, mark a turning point in rabbinic positions, whereby according to some rabbinic authorities apostate sons were to be disinherited from their fathers’ legacy.48 The question resurfaces in a few Geniza documents. One such

45  See, e.g., al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 25, ch. 9 (nos. 58, 59): A Muslim boy of Zoroastrian parents; 38, ch. 16 (nos. 87–8): youths who convert while still with their parents; 39, ch. 17 (nos. 89–90): a 10-­year-­old who converts; 40–1, ch. 18 (nos. 93–6): a 7-­year-­old who converts; 41–3, ch. 19 (nos. 97, 99–101): a youth who converts before his majority, then reneges on Islam. 46  Al-­Ṣanʿānī, al-­Muṣannaf, 6: 26 (no. 9894). The hadith was later incorporated in Ibn Qudāma, ­al-­Mughnī, 5: 503–4. 47 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 3: 118 (Ger.)/119 (Syr.), reg. 10. 48  Irshai, “The apostate as an inheritor.”

104  Female Power and Religious Change instance is an account dated to 544/1150 which settles the inheritance of a widow whose apostate sons made claims to their share in their father’s estate.49

Clienthood, enslavement, and concubinage The introduction of the Islamic legal institution of clienthood (walāʾ) and the role of slave concubinage (umm walad, lit. “mother of child”) presented further legal uncertainties regarding religiously mixed kinship ties. The identification of clients with their patron took on a form of kinship, integrating them within the family, clan, and tribe of the patron, to an extent that they were able to appropriate the patron’s genealogy.50 That said, however, there is evidence suggesting that membership in a Muslim patron’s kin group was not necessarily followed by the client embracing Islam.51 Similar to clienthood, slave concubinage of non-­Muslim women signaled yet another instance of potential tension. The trend finds resonance in both Islamic and non-­Islamic sources.52 For example, a question that was referred to the abbot of St Catherine’s monastery, Anastasius of Sinai (d. c. 81/700), speaks of “women who go astray while they are also slaves in cap­tiv­ity.”53 The question betrays a concern for the religious integrity, perhaps even conversion, of female slaves, owing to their subjugation to Muslim masters. Indeed, cases of manumission following conversion and marriage comprise some of the better known stories about the Prophet’s wives and concubines.54 At the same time, non-­Muslim women who fulfilled the role of slave concubines, namely female slaves who bore Muslim children and were known as umm walads, might have retained their non-­ Muslim religion.55 Beyond its theoretical principles, references to non-­Muslim slave concubinage are mostly attested in relation to the wives and mothers of Muslim leaders during the first few centuries following the Islamic conquest (further discussed in Chapter 4).56 49  T-­S K15.95, discussed in Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 290–1; Yagur, “Religious identity and communal boundaries,” 182. 50  Onimus, “Les mawali en Égypte,” 82. 51 Crone, Slaves on Horses, 237 n. 358; Onimus, “Les mawali en Égypte,” 84. 52  See Lecker, “The Jewish reaction to the Islamic conquests,” 179–80; Spectorsky, “Women of the People of the Book,” 272. 53 Munitiz, Anastasios of Sinai, 191 (question 76); on this collection, see Haldon, “Works of Anastasius of Sinai.” 54 The oft-­recounted stories about Rayḥāna bt. Shamʿūn and Ṣafīyya bt. Ḥ uyayy, both Jewish ­captives who converted to Islam and were subsequently manumitted and married to the Prophet, exemplify the opportunities afforded by conversion to Islam; Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 116–26; al-­Wāqidī, al-­Maghāzī, 2: 520; discussed in Stern, “First women converts,” 297; Spectorsky, “Women of the People of the Book,” 272; Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 183–4; Yitzhak, “Muhammad’s Jewish wives.” 55  See Schacht, “Umm al-­Walad,” EI2, s.v.; El Cheikh, “In search of the ideal spouse,” 190–1; Mirza, “Remembering the umm al-­walad”; Urban, Conquered Populations in Early Islam, ch. 5. 56  Lammens, “Études sur le règne du calife Omaiyade Mo’awiya Ier,” 157; Canard, “Les relations politiques et sociales entre Byzance et les Arabes,” 45; Kallfelz, Nichtmuslimische Untertanen im Islam, 91; Mansouri, “Les femmes d’origine byzantine/les roummiyyat sous les Abbassides”; Bray,

Religiously Mixed Families  105

Extended mixed families Cross-­religious family ties appear to have transcended the nuclear family. This is of course hardly surprising, given the extension of kinship ties among relatives who traced their lineage to common ancestors, participated in joint business enterprises, and interacted on a daily basis in shared courtyards, urban quarters, and houses of worship. Whereas, for some, religious differences did not seem to  pose obstacles in the continuation of peaceful family relations, for others it constituted a barrier, whereby religious otherness would fuel intra-­family strife.57 For the most part, however, there was a certain measure of perplexity regarding the meaning of certain social gestures among relatives of different religions. For example, the head of the rabbinic academy of Sura, Rav Yehudai Ga’on (fl. 139–43/757–61) was asked whether a Jew should prepare a meal of comfort (given to mourners after the funeral) for his apostate relatives.58 A few decades later, also in Iraq, Ibn Ḥ anbal was asked whether Muslims may visit their sick non-­Muslim relatives.59 Our sources also speak of instances in which relatives of one religious group wished to partake in various activities related to the death of a relative from another religious group, such as washing the corpse,60 attending the funeral,61 and praying for God’s forgiveness of the deceased’s sins.62 While religious differences could have kept kinsfolk apart during their lifetime, moments of hardship, loss and grief may have served to bridge those differences, if only for a short while.

Restriction and regulation This brief survey of circumstances that prompted religiously mixed family ties speaks of the variety of social situations that required regulation. The phenomenon was evidently sizeable enough to demand the attention of communal regulators. A host of rabbinic, ecclesiastical, and sharʿī legal opinions and principles were formulated prior to and following the rise of Islam in relation to ties between kin “Men, women and slaves in Abbasid society,” 133–5; Ruggles, “Mothers of a hybrid dynasty”; Barton, “Marriage across frontiers”; Krönung, “The employment of Christian mediators,” 73–7. 57  See CUL T-­S NS 312.50c, discussed in Yagur, “Religious identity and communal boundaries,” 239: a question referred to Hayya Ga’on where the apostasy of a family member was used to blacken the name of the entire family; T-­S 8J10.16v, discussed in Zinger, “Women, gender and law,” 355–7; Goitein-­Friedman, Maḍmūn, 438; Goitein-­Friedman, India Traders, 507; Friedman, “Maimonides, Zūt ̣ā, and the Muqaddams,” 488 and 511 (tr. into Hebrew of r. 1–9): a letter from Egypt, dated between 560/1165 and 591/1195, containing allegations of one Jewish family against another about some of its members being Muslim. 58  Sha‘are tsedeq, part 3: 4, 47, no. 13. 59  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 212–13, ch. 104 (nos. 597–605). 60  ibid., 215, ch. 108 (no. 609). 61  ibid., 218–220, ch. 112 (nos. 619–28). 62 Vööbus, Synodicon, 367: 239–40 (Syr.)/368: 220–2 (Eng.), no. 15.

106  Female Power and Religious Change of different religious affiliations. Their objectives ranged from prevention and dissolution to restriction and supervision. Their different religious provenances notwithstanding, legal regulations were prompted by the same motivation, namely, to safeguard communal boundaries. It is through these regulations that we are given a sense of communal strategies, as religious agents wrestled to balance between the mundane inclinations of their coreligionists and the ideals that constituted the cornerstones of their communities. Legal regulations were therefore often designed as guidelines for maintaining religious fidelity and integrity within families whose members owed allegiance to distinct religious codes.

Intermarriage Intermarriage constituted a principal target of legal regulation. The Jewish ­communities that fell under Islamic rule in the seventh century were bound to draw their attitude towards the practice from a legal reasoning that went back to biblical times and further evolved in the early rabbinic academies in Palestine and Babylonia. A notable emphasis in the early phases of matrimonial restrictions was on the polluting effect of extra-­religious unions. The boundaries between Jews and others were erected on account of the notion of the holy seed, which was to be vigorously protected, particularly given the indissolubility of Jewish ge­ne­al­ogy.63 Yet a clear prohibition on Jews uniting with Gentiles appeared only in post-­ biblical times.64 The rabbis devised mechanisms that would ensure the purity of Jewish lineage through “a meticulous care in matrimonial matters, involving the rejection of people with various genealogical defects,” namely tainted, or unfit, Jews of different sorts, and non-­Jews.65 A particular stress, it appears, was placed on the threat posed by marriage with Gentile women.66 The underlying concern was that marriage with non-­Jewish women, or women of blemished pedigrees, would draw men towards sin, not to mention apostasy.67 Rabbinic authorities of the early Islamic period were most likely aware of their predecessors’ positions, as can be inferred from the c. mid-­eighth-­century Babylonian Sefer ha-­she’iltot ­de-­rav Aḥ ay (“The book of Quæstiones of Rav Aḥay”):

63 Hayes, Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities, 10, 27–9. See also Gruen, “Kinship relations and Jewish identity.” 64  Cohen, “The prohibition of intermarriage.” 65 Oppenheimer, Babylonia in the Talmudic Period, 16. See also Secunda, The Iranian Talmud, 40. 66  Cohen, “The origins of the matrilineal principle in rabbinic law,” 32. 67 Hayes, Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities, 139; Cohen, The Beginnings of Jewishness, 260–2; Klawans, Impurity and Sin in Ancient Judaism, 45.

Religiously Mixed Families  107 Those among the house of Israel are forbidden from taking as wife a daughter of an idolater or a slave girl. If a daughter of an idolater or a slave girl is taken as wife, it is considered as prostitution (zenut) and the betrothal does not hold valid in this case. . . . And an idolater and a slave who betroth a daughter of Israel, their betrothal does not hold valid.68

Of special notice is the rabbinic prohibition of intermarriage on grounds of the potential cause for sin. Yet, intriguingly, rabbinic legal sources from the early and medieval Islamic periods hardly address, if at all, intermarriage between Jews and non-­Jews, focusing their attention on matrimony between Jews and apostates. Correspondingly, the problem at hand was rarely the durability of marital bonds, but rather their socio-­legal implications.69 An exception can be seen in a query to head of Pumbedita Rav Hayya Ga’on (fl. 397–430/1006–1038) regarding the validity of a marriage between a Jewish apostate who “joined the religion of the Gentiles, whereas his wife . . . was still adhering to the Israelite religion,” and whether a Jewish apostate could marry “a woman of the daughters of Israel who adheres to the Torah of Israel.”70 Unlike early rabbinic prescriptions, early Christian attitudes towards intermarriage are strikingly ambiguous. Couched in the Pauline license for Christians to remain in wedlock with non-­Christian spouses (1 Cor. 7: 12–16), subsequent late antique ecclesiastical positions were often premised on the possibility that Christians would be able to draw in new believers through marriage.71 These messages were augmented in narratives portraying the missionizing potential of mixed marriages. A case in point are the heroes of late antique Christian hag­i­o­graphic narratives of Iranian provenance featuring as exemplary believers who succeeded in drawing their Zoroastrian spouses to Christianity.72 Among those, a particularly telling case can be found in the seventh-­century History of Išōʿsabran in which the protagonist, a Zoroastrian, had initially permitted his Christian wife to practice her religion and later, following his acquaintance with the Christian doctrine, underwent baptism.73

68  She’iltot de-­Rav Aḥ ai Ga’on, 1: 159–63, no. 25. 69  Simonsohn, “The legal and social bonds.” 70 Friedman, “Mi-­shut Rav Hayya Ga’on,” 79: the answer part of the responsum is missing; Friedman, “Responsa of Hayya Ga’on,” 317 (Ar.)/320–1 (Heb.), q. 2. 71  Thus, e.g., Tertullian (d. 220), in Tertullian, Ad uxorem 2, 4: 44–5, book 2, ch. 2; see Raepsaet-­ Charlier, “Tertullien et la législation des mariages inégaux,” 253; MacDonald, Early Christian Women and Pagan Opinion, 190; cf. Cohen, “From permission to prohibition,” 277. See also Jerome, Litterae, 189–90, letter 197; in his letter to Laeta, Jerome speaks of the evangelizing potential of Laeta and her Christian daughter vis-­a-­vis Laeta’s father. 72 Walker, Legend of Mar Qardagh, 241, 245; Devos, “Sainte Šīrīn, martyre sous Khusrau 1er Anōšarvān,” 113–14, 119–21; Devos, “La jeune martyre perse sainte Širin,” 6–15, 22–3; discussed in Payne, A State of Mixture, 52. 73  Chabot, “Histoire de Jesus-­Sabran,” 510–11; discussed in Payne, A State of Mixture, 52. See also the early to mid-­5th-­century Acts of Mar Pusai and his Daughter Martha; Bedjan, Acta Martyrum et Sanctum, 2: 208–33, 233–41; Brock and Harvey, Holy Women of the Syrian Orient, 67–73; originally cited and discussed in Walker, Legend of Mar Qardagh, 222.

108  Female Power and Religious Change At the same time, the initial accommodation of mixed marriages should also be considered in the context of an emerging religion whose adherents were socially bound to their former coreligionists. Church leaders, it has been suggested, were well aware of the challenges of being a Christian in a non-­Christian household, or one that was partially occupied by non-­Christian members, and therefore sought to create a manageable setting for the new believers.74 Women who lived in such households were called upon to take special care to preserve their piety in the company of their non-­Christian husbands.75 Yet while in some cases ecclesiastical positions reflect a readiness to accommodate Christian–­non-­ Christian marital arrangements, in others we find outright objection. At the base of the latter was another Pauline principle, according to which Christian believers were to avoid being “mismatched with unbelievers” (2 Cor. 6: 14–18). The grounds for this stand have been seen in relation to biblical, pseudoepigraphic, and Second Temple Jewish texts that considered intermarriage as a cause of impurity (porneia).76 Yet whereas early Jewish opposition to intermarriage was in the interest of protecting the holy seed, the Christian position centered on the body of Christ. If husband and wife were to become one flesh and believers are members of the body of Christ, marital unions with unbelievers would defile the believers and, ultimately, Christ.77 In consequence, attempts were made to compromise between the Pauline license for Christians to remain in matrimony with non-­Christians and the Pauline objection to such marriages. According to some Christian thinkers, the objection to intermarriage constituted a basic principle, whereas permission to remain in matrimony with non-­Christians was given to those who converted to Christianity after their marriage. Early ecclesiastical lawmakers, however, showed little perplexity with regard to the apparent gaps in Pauline instructions. The surviving records of canon laws from across the Mediterranean and Iran between the third and the seventh century reflect a uniform objection to intermarriage.78 By the second half of 74  On the potential threat that marriages with non-­Christians posed to the religious integrity of Christian believers, see Justin Martyr, First Apology, Second Apology, 1: 188–9, ch. 2. Cf. Clement of Alexandria, Stromata, 2: 431–2, book 4, ch. 14, calling on Christian women to endure the hardships entailed by marriage to impious husbands. See also Moxnes, Constructing Early Christian Families, 73; MacDonald, Early Christian Women and Pagan Opinion, 189; MacDonald, “Early Christian women married to unbelievers,” 226–7. 75  Thus, e.g., Theodore of Mopsuestia (d. 428) took the phrase “only in the Lord” (1 Cor. 7: 39) as a call for women to preserve their piety if married to a non-­Christian; see Cohen, “From permission to prohibition,” 267. 76 Hayes, Gentile Impurities and Jewish Identities, 93; See also Gaca, Making of Fornication, 146–52; Cohen, “From permission to prohibition.” See also Hodge, “Married to an unbeliever,” 3, n. 6. 77  Tertullian, Cyprian (d. 258), and John Chrysostom (d. 407): Cyprian, Testimoniorum Libri III, 5: 550–1, ch. 62; see also Cyprian, De lapsis, 5: 438, treatise 3: 6; John Chrysostom, On marriage and family life, 30–1, homily 19, and Adversus Iudaeos, 43, discourse 2: 3. 78 The Didascalia Apostolorum calls upon bishops to give virgins in marriage “to one of the brethren”: Didascalia Apostolorum, 152, ch. 17: 4. 2; the council of Elvira (c.300–9) issued prohibitions on ­marriage between “Christian maidens” and “pagans,” between “Catholic girls” and “Jews or heretics,” and against parents who “perchance join their daughters in marriage to priests of the idols”: La Coleccion

Religiously Mixed Families  109 the  seventh century, with the arrival of the Muslims and subsequent trends of intermarriage between the conquerors and the conquered, Near Eastern church leaders were confronted anew by the ambivalent message that came through early teachings. While some argued that mixed unions did not apply to unmarried Christians, others appear to have held less resolute opinions.79 The lack of clarity is further reflected in the attempt of the eighth-­century East Syrian cleric Išōʿbokt to resolve the problem by arguing that the call to marry “only in the Lord” (1 Cor. 7: 39) was a call to marry only within the church.80 At the same time, ecclesiastical regulations of the early and medieval Islamic periods retained the early aspiration to expand Christian ranks through matrimony. Christian men were accordingly permitted to take non-­Christian wives, but only if this would eventually lead to their conversion to Christianity. The original Pauline intent that the unbelieving husband will be made holy through his wife, and the unbelieving woman will be made holy through her husband (1 Cor. 7: 14), was now applied to non-­Christian women only.81 Compared to late antique ecclesiastical legislation, the tone and recurrence of ecclesiastical regulations from the early and medieval Islamic periods suggest an intensification in efforts to stem the tide of intermarriage. The danger of apostasy and the threat of excommunication were some of the more powerful consequences with which ecclesiastical leaders attempted to amplify their admonitions.82 Increasing rates of intermarriage may have been in the background. The circumstances just outlined suggest this, particularly as the Muslims began to move out of the garrison towns and settle among local populations, gradually integrating into the local social fabric.83

Canonica Hispana: Tomo IV, 247, canons 15, 16, 17. In 339, a stipulation attributed to the emperor Constantine prohibited marriage between Christians and Jews, later reiterated in another regulation attributed to Theodosius in 388, Codex Theodosianus, 16.8.6 (Constantine), 3.7.2, 9.7.5 (Theodosius), in The Jews in Roman Imperial Legislation, 178–82; the seventy-­three canons introduced by the Roman emissary to the East Mārūtā bishop of Maipherqat ̣: Vööbus, Mārūtā of Maipherqat ̣. For the canons dealing with marital affairs, see Vööbus, Mārūtā of Maipherqat ̣, 1: 80–2; 2: 68–70, nos. 32–5; and in 544 and 554, respectively, catholicoi Mār Aḇā I (r. 540–52), and Mār Joseph (r. 552–67) issued additional warnings against mixed marriages; Chabot, Synodicon Orientale, 83–4 (Syr.)/336 (Fr.), 102 (Syr.)/359–60 (Fr.). 79 See Anastasios of Sinai, 190, question 74; Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 604–5, question 75; discussed in Simonsohn, “Communal membership despite religious exogamy,” 262–3. 80 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 3: 30 (Ger.)/31 (Syr.), book 2, ch. 1: 4. See also in the East Syrian exegesis of Ishoʿdad of Merv re 1 Cor. 7: 14; Gibson, The Commentaries of Ishoʿdad of Merv, 32. For a medieval version of this position in Bar Hebraeus’ Ethicon, see Weitz, “Al-­Ghazālī, Bar Hebraeus, and the ‘good wife’, ” 218–19. 81  The first ecclesiastical regulation to licence marriage between Christian men and non-­Christian women is dated to the East Syrian synod of 410; Vööbus, Mārūtā of Maipherqat ̣, 439: 71, 440: 62, canon 20; for its persistence in the early Islamic period, see Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2: 122 (Ger.)/23 (Syr.), reg. 11; ʿAbdišoʿ bar Baḥrīz, Ordnung der Ehe, 36 (Syr./Ger.), reg. 41. 82  See, e.g., East Syrian catholicos Timothy I (fl. 780–823), in Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2: 75 (Ger./Syr.), reg. 27; 84 (Ger.)/87 (Syr.), reg. 36; West Syrian patriarch Gīwargī (r. 758–90), in Vööbus, Synodicon, 375: 4 (Syr.)/376: 5 (Eng.), canon 13. 83  See Morony, Iraq, 251–3; Donner, Early Islamic Conquests, 245–50; Hoyland, “Jacob of Edessa on Islam,” 152–3.

110  Female Power and Religious Change An intensification of regulation is also attested on the Muslim side, envisioning a variety of social scenarios which resulted either in or from marriages between Muslims and non-­Muslims. These included a list of licit and illicit non-­Muslim partners; the status of marriages following the conversion of a spouse to Islam, or apostasy from it; and the limitations and required impositions pertaining to the upbringing of children, domestic life, and performance of religious rituals. The regulations are strikingly more numerous and detailed in comparison to those found in neighboring religious traditions. These will not be reviewed here, but rather their underpinning principles.84 While Muslim men were called upon to seek partners from within the Muslim community and to avoid at all cost marriage with polytheist women (Q 2: 220), they were given permission to marry women from among the “People of the Book” (ahl al-­kitāb) (Q 5: 5). At the same time, Muslim women were to be separated from their non-­Muslim husbands, whatever their faith (Q 60: 10), as matrimony between a Muslim wife and a non-­Muslim man would undermine the principle of the superiority of the former over the latter. The latter injunction was founded on two Islamic principles: a legal one, according to which the marital arrangement endows the husband with rights over his wife, analogous to masterhood vis-­à-­vis slavery;85 and a normative one that was couched in an Islamic notion of exaltedness (al-­Islām yaʿlu wa-­lā yuʿla ʿalayhi; “Islam should be above and nothing should be above it”).86 When juxtaposed, the two principles render matrimony between a Muslim woman and a non-­Muslim husband unsuitable, due to the lack of what has been termed kafaʾā, that is, suitability or adequacy between the spouses.87 Islamic law did not accommodate a situation in which a non-­Muslim man would be in a superior position to a Muslim woman, owing to their marital bond. Put differently, while a Muslim male could enslave a non-­ Muslim woman through marriage, a non-­Muslim man could not do the same to a Muslim woman.88 In consequence, Islamic law not only prohibited marriage between a Muslim woman and a non-­Muslim man but also stipulated the annulment of the marriage in the event of a woman’s conversion to Islam should her husband choose to cling to his non-­Muslim religion. There is some indication, however, of other views among the early jurists. While some applied the Qurʾanic 84  Islamic legal principles and regulations have received considerable attention in modern scholarship; see Fattal, Le statut légal des non-­musulmans en pays d’Islam, 129–36; Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, ch. 5; Tsafrir, “The attitude of Sunnī Islam toward Jews and Christians”; Spectorsky, Chapters on Marriage and Divorce, 14–15, 101–3, 183, 202–3, 213–14, 250; Bosanquet, “The kitābī wife’s conversion to Islam.” 85 Bianquis, La famille arabe medieval, 31; Ali, Marriage and Slavery in Early Islam, 6, 8; Giladi, “Sex, marriage and the family in al-­Ghazālī’s thought,” 181. 86  Al-­Bukhārī, Ṣaḥ īḥ al-­Bukhārī, kitāb al-­janāʾiz, 326, ch. 79; Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 162, esp. n. 8. 87  See Linant de Bellefonds, “Kafāʾa,” EI2. 88 Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 162; Spectorsky, Chapters on Marriage and Divorce, 14–15; Bosanquet, “The kitābī wife’s conversion to Islam,” 116.

Religiously Mixed Families  111 prohibition of marriages with polytheists to scriptural women as well,89 others went as far as allowing marriages between non-­Muslim men and Muslim w ­ omen.90 The latter rested their position on the examples of two prominent female figures from the time of the Prophet—­the Companions Umm Ḥ akīm and Zaynab bt. Muhammad (see more in ch. 5).91 In both cases, their marriages to husbands who did not convert with them at first are given as examples of marriages that remained intact since the husbands ended up converting within the three-­month menstrual waiting period (ʿidda).92 Another case in point is a tradition according to which ʿUmar I permitted the continuance of a marriage of a woman from al-­Ḥ īra whose husband did not convert to Islam.93 By the ninth century, however, Sunni jurists appear unanimous in their position, according to which the only licit form of mixed matrimonies is between a Muslim man and a non-­Muslim kitābī woman.94

Offspring from mixed unions Differences in the attitudes of different legal traditions towards intermarriage should be seen in the context of varying historical circumstances. The imbalance in scope is striking, however. Whereas intermarriage received a broad and detailed treatment in Islamic jurisprudence, it takes up a far more limited place in parallel ecclesiastical legal sources and is only marginal in rabbinic law. This could of course have to do with the majority status of Muslim communities. Muslim legal scholars were perhaps less concerned with the loss of members and more interested in adding new ones, an objective for which intermarriage fulfilled an effective role. At the same time, intermarriage prompted additional social circumstances that demanded regulation as well. Among those were the offspring resulting from mixed unions and the questions of their religious identity and upbringing. From a halakhic perspective, the question of children from mixed couples hinged on the principle of matrilineality and prompted discussion regarding their legal status. In rabbinic terms, the Jewishness of offspring resulting from a union between a Jew and a Gentile was to be established based on the religious identity of the mother. According to the second-­century Palestinian Rabbi Shim‘on bar Yoḥai, a boy that is born to a non-­Jewish woman and a Jewish man is considered her son and not his, since he follows his mother in her religion. Yet a child born to a

89 Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 192. 90  Ibid. 166–70. 91  Mālik b. Anas, Muwat ̣t ̣aʾ, 2: 545 (no. 46). 92  Al-­Ṣanʿānī, Muṣannaf, 7: 169–71 (no. 12646), 183 (nos. 12700, 12701); al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 186–8, ch. 92 (nos. 526–36), 188–95, ch. 93 (no. 537–49); on the ʿidda, see Linant de Bellefonds, “ʿIdda,” EI2, s.v. 93  Al-­Ṣanʿānī, Muṣannaf, 6: 68 (no. 10117). See also 7: 132–3 (no. 12697), commenting that the Messenger of God did not separate a woman who converted to Islam from her non-­believing husband. 94 Freidmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 190.

112  Female Power and Religious Change non-­Jewish man and a Jewish woman is considered a legitimate Jew.95 The ­problem further features in the Babylonian Talmud, suggesting much concern with the halakhic status of offspring resulting from mixed marriages among the rabbinic communities in Mesopotamia.96 Around the same time, in Palestine, Sefer ha-­ma‘asim refers to an instance in which a Jewish widow, who had a daughter, married a Gentile. The girl spent considerable time with the Gentile man and her mother, and then a Jew of priestly lineage (kohen) came along and married her. At this point a question arose whether such a marriage was legal, given the girl’s tainted status (ḥ alala) for the purpose of marriage with a kohen, due to the time spent in the Gentile’s house.97 Unlike their Palestinian counterparts, the Babylonian sages subscribed to the opinion that, while a marriage between a Jew and a Gentile was illegal, the child resulting from it was not considered a bastard in halakhic terms (mamzer).98 These considerations are echoed, centuries later, in two geonic responsa. The first, already mentioned, from Sa‘adya Ga’on, concerns the halakhic status of a child born to a Jewish apostate and a Jewish wife who was still legally married to another man. Whereas the Jewishness of the child was not in doubt, given the Jewishness of the mother, its legal status, whether it was to be considered a bastard or not, remained an open question: [Regarding] a man’s wife, whose husband went overseas, after which an apostate Israelite came and married her according to the custom of the gentiles. She gave birth to a boy and later her husband came and gave her a divorce. That apostate violates the Sabbath in public (tHor 1:5.). Now is that boy a legitimate Jew (kasher), for his father is considered a gentile, [according to the principle that] a gentile and a slave who have sex with an Israelite girl, [their] son is kasher, or, rather, since if [that apostate] repented, he is a complete Israelite, and the boy is [halakhically considered] a bastard (mamzer)?99

The question is premised on the assumption that, following his apostasy, the father was considered a Gentile, a status which would potentially delegitimize that of his offspring. The ga’on, however, ruled that the child is illegitimate not on account of the alleged Gentile status of the father, but rather because the father was considered a Jew for purposes of marriage and the mother was still legally bound to her former Jewish husband. Yet beyond the significance of the halakhic 95  bYeb 23a; bQid, 68b, discussed in Elman, “The other in the mirror, II,” 42. For a similar dilemma regarding the child’s religious identity following mixed marriage between a Zoroastrian man and a non-­Zoroastrian woman, see Sahner, “Zoroastrian law and the spread of Islam,” 24. 96 Schremer, Male and Female He Created Them, 157. 97 Newman, The Ma‘asim of the People of the Land of Israel, 209, no. 66. 98 Secunda, The Iranian Talmud, 40. The term mamzer (lit. bastard), refers to a child resulting from a halachically illicit relationship, such as between siblings or if either man or woman is legally bound to another partner at the time of sexual intercourse. 99 Lewin, Oszar, Yebamot, 196, no. 474.

Religiously Mixed Families  113 question, the problem at hand, pertaining to the legal status of children whose parents adhered to different religions, appears to have demanded the attention of  the community. If Sa‘adya’s responsum could have been prompted by the concerns of family members, a strikingly similar affair that was put to a rabbinic court around 617/1220 suggests a broader communal investment in such matters. The case is recorded on a Geniza fragment containing reference to an apostate Jewish woman who had given birth to a bastard (mamzera) girl. The girl was considered a bastard since her mother was married to a Jewish husband when she conceived the child with an apostate.100 The fact that the girl’s parents were both apostates, yet her matter was nonetheless brought before a Jewish tribunal, allows us to assume that a communal issue was at hand, such as the prospect of the girl marrying a Jew. While it may suggest that the apostate parents (or at least one of them) retained a certain level of contact with the Jewish community, the interest of the Jewish community in regulating the state of a child resulting from such circumstances is pertinent to the present discussion. The concern over the religious identity of the offspring of an apostate Jew further exhibits itself in a case involving the newborn child of an apostate man and his Jewish wife. A responsum attributed to Rav Sherira Ga’on mentions a Jewish man who apostatized “while married to an Israelite woman and [later] had a child born by her on a Sabbath.”101 It seems that there was uncertainty regarding the child’s religious identity, a state which would allow the delay of its circumcision till after the following Sabbath, in order to avoid its violation.102 The ga’on, however, argued that the child was to be circumcised on the Sabbath, not on account of its Jewish mother, but since the father’s apostasy did not affect the Jewish identity of his son.103 We shall come back to this responsum in Chapter 6 when we consider the significance of the child’s mother in this context. Both Sa‘adya and Sherira’s responsa can be seen as examples in which communal agents offered legal solutions to a problem resulting from intermarriage, namely the religious identity of the offspring of Jewish and non-­Jewish parents. At this point, it appears, intermarriage was a given and its consequences had to be 100  ENA 2560.6; discussed in Simonsohn, “The legal and social bonds,” 431; Krakowski, Coming of Age, 253; Yagur, Religious Identity and Communal Boundaries, 348; Zinger, “ ‘She aims to harass him’, ” 167. 101 Lewin, Otsar, Shabbat, 130, no. 398. 102  The circumcision of the newborn should normally take place eight days after birth, even if it is on a Sabbath, since circumcision precedes the law of the Sabbath (Lev. 12: 3; mShab 18.3). Yet, in the event of uncertainty regarding the infant’s Jewishness, the circumcision may be delayed to a regular weekday. 103  The uncertainty regarding the child’s Jewish identity may derive from a reading into mQid 3.12: “ ‘If the betrothal is valid and no transgression befell, the standing of the offspring follows that of the male [parent] . . . If the betrothal was valid but transgression befell, the standing of the offspring follows that of the blemished party’ ”; cf. the position of Abraham Maimonides (d. 637/1237) in Teshuvot Rabenu Avraham b. ha-­Rambam, 54–5, no. 53: the case brought before Abraham Maimonides dealt with the circumcision on a Sabbath of a newborn whose parents were both apostates. Maimonides ruled that the newborn should be circumcised by a Gentile.

114  Female Power and Religious Change contained. A similar approach can be noted in ecclesiastical positions from the early Islamic period. Shortly before the Muslim takeover, a synod headed by the East Syrian Catholicos Mār Joseph (r. 552–67) issued a canon that threatened to excommunicate clergy who married Zoroastrian women, even if they had converted to Christianity, since the women were taken back by the Zoroastrian authorities and in consequence their children left the Christian fold.104 Some two hundred years later, Catholicos Timothy I warned his coreligionists against marriage with non-­Christians, as this would lead to the apostasy of the Christian spouse and the couple’s children.105 According to most Muslim jurists, if either one of the parents of a child under the age of maturity converted to Islam, the child is considered Muslim.106 The underlying rationale was founded on the principle of fiṭra, articulated in the prophetic hadith: “Every newborn is born in the natural condition; his parents transform him into a Jew, a Christian or a Zoroastrian” (mā min mawlūdin illā yūladu ʿalā al-­fiṭra fa-­abāwahu yuhawwidānihi aw yunaṣṣirānihi aw yumajjisānihi).107 The basic disposition of the fetus was considered Muslim, yet once born, it follows the religion of its parents. Should one of them convert to Islam, it immediately follows the Islam of that parent. At the same time, however, certain jurists were in the opinion that it is the father’s religion that counts. According to Mālik (d. 179/796), in the case of a Christian whose Christian wife converted to Islam, their small children “are in accordance with the religion of their father but should be left with their mother so she may raise them as long as they are small” (yutrakūna maʿ al-­umm ma dāmū ṣighār taḥ ḍunuhum).108 The reasoning behind Mālik’s opinion is provided in Ibn Qudāma’s (d. 620/1223) Mughnī (“the sufficient”):109 This is since the child of the people of the Abode of War (walad al-­ḥarbiyyayn) follows his father, not his mother . . . [and since] the child is highborn thanks to its father’s nobility and is related to his (father’s) tribe, not to its mother’s tribe, it therefore follows its father in his religion, whatever it may be.

Ibn Qudāma notes that, in contrast to the Mālikī position, the Ḥ anbalī school subscribes to the opinion that a child’s Islamic religious identity is determined by 104 Chabot, Synodicon Orientale, 102 (Syr.)/359–60 (Fr.), canon 10. 105 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2: 75 (Ger./Syr.), reg. 27. 106  See Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 112–14, 174–5. 107  Al-­Bukhārī, Ṣaḥ īḥ al-­Bukhārī, kitāb al-­janāʾiz, 327 (no. 1358); discussed in Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 109. 108 Saḥnūn, al-­Mudawwana, 2: 306. See al-­Māwardī, al-­Ḥ āwī al-­kabīr, 14: 236; and the example of the Mālikī Ashhab b. ʿAbd al-­ʿAzīz (d. 203/819), discussed in Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 175. See also Fernández Félix, “Children on the frontiers of Islam,” 7; Zorgati, Pluralism in the Middle Ages, 72; Zorgati argues that this was the opinion of most Mālikī scholars. 109  Ibn Qudāma, al-­Mughnī, 12: 117 (no. 1547).

Religiously Mixed Families  115 either one of the Muslim parents. In fact, Ibn Qudāma asserts that there is even greater justification for the child to follow its mother’s Islamic identity: [f]or she (the mother) is more related to him (akhaṣṣ bihi), since he is created from her in reality, and she has a right over him by bearing him and nursing him. He follows her in captivity and in freedom, in a state of future manumission (tadbīr, i.e., upon the death of the master), or (following) manumission (mukātaba). And since [among] the rest of the animals the child follows its mother without its father, this stands in contradiction to what he (Mālik) noted.110

An anecdote found in Kitab al-­wulāt wa-­l-­quḍāt fī Miṣr (“the book on the ­governors and judges in Egypt”) by al-­Kindī (d. 350/961) offers some illustration as to how different legal approaches appeared in practice. It mentions a case that was brought before the Mālikī qadi Abū al-­Ṭ āhir al-­Dhuhlī (d. 367/978), who was asked to determine whether a son born to a woman who converted from Christianity to Islam and her Christian husband, should be considered Muslim. A previous ruling on a related case had declared: “He (the boy) shall not become a Muslim through the mother’s (adherence to) Islam.” The ruling was met with opposition: “Consequently, the people rejected this and made a tumult (ḍajjū) and it was said: ‘according to the doctrine (madhhab) of the House of the Prophet (ahl al-­bayt) he is to become a Muslim, and this is (also) what al-­Shāfiʿī says,’ whereupon (qadi al-­Dhuhlī) ruled that the child was a Muslim.”111 Under circumstances in which the couple was divorced, following the mother’s conversion to Islam, social arrangements required further legalization. Already in his Kitāb al-­umm, al-­Shāfiʿī made sure that the child’s mother would be given adequate support: If a dhimmī woman embraces Islam while married to a dhimmī man being ­pregnant, she is entitled to maintenance (bi-­l-­nafāqa) until she gives birth. And if she nursed her newborn, she is entitled to the wage of nursing, and she is like a Muslim woman absolutely separated by divorce (ka-­l-­mabṭūṭa) who is pregnant.112

In addition to regulating the religious identity of children resulting from mixed marriages, early Muslim jurists were also concerned with the manner in which sons who converted to Islam should treat their non-­Muslim mothers. Whereas the normative principles addressed in the previous chapter appeared in the framework of a wider endeavor to prioritize religious over kinship loyalties, the relevant legal principles reflect real-­life dilemmas, whereby normative uncertainties required practical solutions. Questions as to the proper conduct of Muslims in the event of 110 Ibid. 111  Al-­Kindī, al-­Wulāt wa-­l-­quḍāt, 586. 112  Al-­Shāfiʿī, Kitāb al-­umm, 5: 659 (no. 23).

116  Female Power and Religious Change their non-­Muslim parents’ death could be read not only within their narrow ­setting but also within a broader legal context of regulating filial relations within the boundaries of Islamic norms. Ibn ʿAbbās’s instructions to a Muslim whose Christian mother died to “wash her, shroud her, and bury her,” rested on the example of ­al-­Ḥ ārith b. Abī Rabīʿa, who “followed her (his mother) funeral procession within a party from among the Companions.”113 Questions as to whether a Muslim son may participate in the funeral procession of his Christian mother, and the responsibility of Muslim children to take care of their needy non-­Muslim parents, are yet further indications of an endeavor to introduce normative order to a religiously mixed family setting.114 Concerns over the religious identity of children resulting from mixed marriages were premised on the negative influence that parents may have on their children in the event of religious differences. As we shall see in Chapter  5, the problem gained special relevance with regard to mothers. The underlying assumption was that family ties with former coreligionists had a damaging effect. The point was made rather explicitly by al-­Jāhiẓ (d. 254–5/868–9), explaining the reason for suspecting the religious sincerity of Christian converts to Islam: Indeed, no other people have furnished so many hypocrites and waverers as the Christians. This results, naturally, when weak minds attempt to fathom deep problems. Is it not a fact that the majority of those who were executed for parading as Muslims, while hypocrites at heart, were men whose fathers and mothers were Christians? Even the people who are under suspicion today have come mostly from their ranks.115

Social alienation Negative attitudes towards converts and those who engaged in extra-­religious kinship relations were not exceptional in pre-­modern Islamic history.116 They served to justify calls for separation between religious transgressors, namely apostates and those who chose to marry outside the fold on the one hand, and

113  Al-­Sarakhsī, Kitāb al-­mabsūt ̣, 2: 55. See Sizgorich, Violence and Belief in Late Antiquity, 260–1; Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 446–7. 114  See, e.g., al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 217–18, ch. 112 (nos. 619–28); Ibn Abī Shayba, Muṣannaf, 3: 32–3 (nos. 11844, 11945, 11895); Saḥnūn, al-­Mudawwana, 3: 267, 365. 115  Al-­Jāḥiẓ, Thalāth rasāʾil, 3; Fletcher, “Anti-­Christian polemic in early Islam,” 70; discussed in Sizgorich, Violence and Belief in Late Antiquity, 250; Sizgorich, “Mind the gap,” 172–3; Hackenburg, “Voices of the converted,” 5–6. See also al-­Jāḥiẓ, Thalāth rasā’il (Cairo, 1344), 17 (from al-­radd ʿalā l-­naṣārā), where the Muslim writer argues that among those who were found to hold disbelief (zandaqa) were Muslims whose parents were Christians. 116  El-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion,” 29–33, 140–1; Safran, “Identity and differentiation,” 579; Simonsohn, “Conversion to Islam.”

Religiously Mixed Families  117 their kinsfolk on the other.117 The former have received a rather extensive treatment in Medieval Islamic law, reflecting a tension between two principal approaches. Whereas one approach spares the lives of repenting apostates of non-­ Muslim origin, the second decrees instant death to apostates, irrespective of their personal history.118 Yet whether given the opportunity to repent or not, Muslim apostates who chose to remain outside the Muslim fold forfeited their place among the living. And, in the context of matrimony, the sweeping proscription of unions between non-­Muslim males and Muslim females entailed in most cases an inevitable annulment of marriage in the event of the wife’s conversion to Islam (or the apostasy of the Muslim husband). Similar attempts to distance Christians from their non-­Christian relatives are  well attested in West and East Syrian legal collections and canon laws. A West  Syrian canon law issued in the vicinity of Antioch in 168/785 banned Christian women who married Muslim men from entering the church,119 and a regulation found in the legal collection of the East Syrian catholicos Išōʿ bar Nūn (r. 207–12/823–8), forbids any form of contact with such women, even on the part of her closest relatives.120 We may assume that similar attitudes were held towards women who converted to Islam, particularly given the frequent equation in Syrian ecclesiastical sources between the act of marrying out and apostasy. It is in this vein that by the ninth century apostasy was already firmly held as sufficient ground for the annulment of marriage according to East Syrian legal principles.121 The scenario of a Christian divorcing an apostate recurs in a regulation regarding a woman’s remarriage following her divorce from a non-­Christian,122 and again in the ninth century, in a regulation from catholicos Išōʿ bar Nūn’s law book permitting a Christian woman to divorce an apostate.123 The legal reasoning at the basis of these regulations has been understood in the context of Iranian traditions.124 Both Zoroastrian and ecclesiastical endorsements of matrimonial breakups in the event of apostasy suggest an attempt to remove apostates from the fold. For example, we find positions in the ninth-­century Rivāyats of Ēmēd ī Ašawahištān that stipulate that a Zoroastrian apostate who does not repent his sin  within a year is considered one who is worthy of death (margarzān—­a 117  Similar motivation was at play behind late antique hagiographic tales depicting moments of kinship separations following inter-­religious marital arrangements. In some of the related cases the severance of ties was initiated by families as a means of pressure on those who were about to cross religious lines; see Walker, Legend of Mār Qardagh, 224; Payne, A State of Mixture, 51. 118 Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 121–59; Simonsohn, “ ‘Halting between two opinions’. ” 119 Vööbus, Synodicon, 375: 4 (Syr.)/376: 5 (Eng.), canon 13. 120 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2: 170 (Syr.)/171 (Ger.), reg. 119. 121  Note the regulation already mentioned from the law book of catholicos Timothy I, conceding to divorce in the case of a Christian man who threatens to apostatize if he is not allowed to divorce his wife. 122 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2: 107 (Ger)/108 (Syr.), reg. 74. We may assume that the husband apostatized, for otherwise the marriage would not have been ecclesiastically endorsed to begin with. 123  Ibid., 168 (Ger.)/169 (Syr.), reg. 114. 124 Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 74.

118  Female Power and Religious Change death-­deserving sin according to Zoroastrian law); and that a descendant of a Zoroastrian family who does not revert from his apostasy within a year loses his share in his family’s estate.125 There is also some indication that, by the geonic period, certain rabbinic authorities, particularly the ge’onim from the academy of Sura, endorsed the idea that Jewish apostasy constituted ample reason for dissolving kinship ties. This approach stood in contrast to the basic rabbinic position which did not accommodate the notion of apostasy in its Christian sense, as an act which rendered the apostate excluded from the fold.126 According to Rav Yehudai, a woman whose apostate husband died, while the couple had no children, is released from a ­levirate marriage with the apostate’s brother, since “he (i.e. the apostate) is not (considered) his brother.”127 And while Rav Sherira proposed a different legal course of action, he too was of the opinion that apostasy resulted in the cutting of kinship ties: “The principle of the law in this case is that the wife of an apostate does not perform levirate marriage, but only gets a ḥ alitsa (i.e. released),128 since God said [the levir] establishes a name for his brother in Israel, and yet this one is not his brother and is not from Israel.”129 At the same time, in a reverse situation, namely when the brother of the deceased was the apostate, certain ge’onim released widows from levirate marriage as well. Their position was based on a reasoning that, if the brother had apostatized prior to the betrothal, he may no longer assume the role of establishing a name for his deceased brother. Here again, apostasy was seen as an act that affected the kinship status of the apostate. The question of an apostate’s inheritance seems to have prompted a similar reasoning on the part of Natronai bar Hilai. Natronai was of the opinion that an apostate son does not inherit from his Jewish father, since he apostatized, he has gone out of the sanctity of Israel and the sanctity of his parents and an inheritance is only for an Israelite who traces his lineage to his father. As it is written: “And I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien . . .” (Gen. 17: 8). . . . [However,] excluding this apostate who does not trace his lineage to his Israelite father.130

What appears to stand at the crux of Natronai’s position is the idea of a disrupted lineage caused by the act of apostasy.131 125  Rivāyat-­I Hēmīt-­I Ašawahistān, 2: questions 25: 1–8; discussed also in Hjerrild, Studies in Zoroastrian Family Law, 75–6. See also de Menasce, “Problèmes des mazdéens dans l’Iran musulman” (also in English: “Questions concerning the Mazdaeans of Muslim Iran”); Simonsohn, “The introduction and formalization of civil law.” 126  See n. 81. See also Boyarin, Border Lines, 199–200. 127 Lewin, Otsar, Yebamot, 36, no. 83. 128  Ḥ alitsa refers to the act of releasing a woman from levirate marriage, i.e., the widow of a childless man from marrying his brother. 129  Ibid. 83, no. 185. 130  Ibid., Qiddushin, 30, no. 80. 131  For a full discussion, see Oded Irshai, “The apostate as an inheritor.”

Religiously Mixed Families  119 These few samples of a broad and rich literature convey a strong image of s­ eparation between converts, or apostates (depending on one’s point of view), and their former coreligionists, relatives, and community members at large; they suggest a social culture that cuts across creedal lines, according to which a shift in spiritual attachments entailed radical social alienations, if only in theory. They offer further indication of the primacy of religious commitments over those of kinship from the perspective of religious agents. At the same time, they also speak of a social mechanism that was designed to discourage conversion, given the terrible personal cost it would entail. The demand to cut off transgressors from their next of kin appears to align with the ideals of kinship detachments discussed in the previous chapter. Yet here, they should be read not only in the context of tensions between kinship and religious loyalties but also in relation to communal attempts to assign family members roles of religious gatekeeping, a point to which we shall return in Chapter 6.

Patriarchal arrangements The prospect of kinship detachment following marriage or conversion to a different religion was often articulated as a communal demand. However, as we have seen, communal authorities also reacted in accommodating ways towards religiously mixed kinship arrangements, especially if these could be enlisted for the purpose of sustaining believers within the fold or even drawing in new ones. The question of sustaining patriarchal roles in the context of religious difference was one that appears to have demanded special attention on the part of Muslim jurists. It often shows up in Islamic jurisprudence in relation to the role of non-­ Muslim male figures as guardians of their ­Muslim female relatives and performers of sacrosanctity by consanguinity (maḥ ram). Muslim jurists, for example, introduced regulations that applied to instances in which it was unclear whether a father could give his Muslim daughter in matrimony, or if a non-­Muslim male could accompany his Muslim mother or sister outside the domicile.132 Here, images such as that of the Prophet’s wife Umm Ḥ abība, who we have already met in the introduction, is referred to as illustrative proof (dalīl): The Messenger of God married Umm Ḥ abība bt. Abī Sufyān and [the one] who served as the guardian of her marriage [was] Ibn Saʿīd b. al-­ʿĀṣ, who was a Muslim, while Abū Sufyān (i.e., Umm Ḥ abība’s father) was alive. This therefore

132 Saḥnūn, al-­Mudawwana, 5: 496; al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 2: 147–51, ch. 75 (nos. 416–26); Ibn Qudāma, al-­Mughnī, 4: 337–8 (no. 540); for differing opinions, see al-­Sarakhsī, Kitāb al-­mabsūt ̣, 4: 11; for the Shāfiʿite position, see al-­Khāt ̣ib al-­Shirbīnī, Mughnī al-­muḥ tāj, 4: 210.

120  Female Power and Religious Change proves (the principle) that there is no guardianship between relatives if the two religions differed, even if [one of them] was [the bride’s] father, for (a man’s) guardianship [over a bride is conditioned on] kinship and compatibility in religion.133

According to al-­Māwardī, the guardianship of a non-­Muslim father vis-­à-­vis his Muslim daughter is prohibited on account of the same reasoning as the basic Islamic principles pertaining to marriage between Muslims and non-­Muslims. Yet in opposite cases, when a question arises regarding the permissibility of a Muslim father to serve as guardian of his non-­Muslim daughter, the prohibition is issued in the interest of affirming communal boundaries: The origin of this (i.e., of the principle according to which when a father and his daughter are of different religions, the father cannot serve as her guardian for marriage) is that agreement in religion [constitutes] a condition for the appointment of guardianship over the women who is to be married. For an unbelieving man may not serve as guardian for a Muslim woman and a Muslim man may not serve as guardian for an unbelieving woman, on account of what He said, may He be exalted: “God will not grant the unbelievers any sway over the believers” (Q 4: 141) and also his saying: “Take not Jews and Christians as friends; they are friends of each other” (Q 5: 51). These two verses show that the unbelieving man does not have guardianship over a Muslim woman; and He said, may He be exalted: “And the believers, the men and the women, are friends one of the  other” (Q 9: 71), whereby indicating that the Muslim man does not have guardianship over an unbelieving woman and because the Prophet, who wished to marry Umm Ḥ abība bt. Abī Sufyān and her father and brothers were unbelievers, while she was a migrating Muslim in the land of Abyssinia, the one who married her off was from her closest relatives among the Muslims, and he is Khālid b. Saʿīd b. al-­ʿĀṣ . . .134

Nonetheless, according to Ibn Qudāma, despite the prohibition, certain restrictions did not apply: Aḥmad (b. Ḥ anbal) said regarding a Jew or a Christian whose daughter embraced Islam: He may not travel with her, [since] he is not an unmarriageable protector for her (maḥram) in the course of travel. As for gazing [at her], she is not required to conceal herself from him, since Abū Sufyān came to Medina being a polytheist, whereupon he entered his daughter Umm Ḥ abība’s place, who folded

133  Al-­Shafi’i, Kitab al-­umm, 6: 19 (no. 2195).

134  Al-­Māwardī, al-­Ḥ āwī al-­kabīr, 9: 115–16.

Religiously Mixed Families  121 the mattress of the Messenger of God, lest he sit on it, [but] she did not cover herself from him and the Prophet did not order her to do so.135

Umm Ḥ abība’s precedent allowed jurists like Ibn Qudāma some space to ­maneuver between principles of religious segregation and sentiments of kinship attachment. Although a non-­Muslim father would forfeit his guardianship in relation to his Muslim daughter on account of religious differences, some level of affinity between them was nonetheless acknowledged. Here, as in other instances, jurists appear to have come to terms with the fact that religious differences did not, or could not, bring about complete detachment in kinship ties.

Material dependencies The question of inheritance between family members of different religions serves to illustrate once more the attempts of jurists to bridge the gap between communal expectations and familial attachments. Its significance derived not only from its relevance to the enduring ties between former coreligionists but also because of the much-­contested matter of family property. The scope of its treatment in legal sources of diverse religious provenances was accordingly sizeable. A central issue that cuts across these sources concerned the inheritance of apostates. The question at hand was whether an apostate could inherit from his or her former coreligionist father. And although legal authorities of different religious traditions were equally preoccupied with the problem, their solutions to it were not necessarily the same. Whereas Muslim jurists ruled against the possibility of members of two different religious communities inheriting from each other, Eastern Christians showed little concern with the question at first, Zoroastrians offered a  gradation of sanctions, and rabbinic Jews, at least initially, saw no reason to ­hinder apostates from the father’s legacy.136 Disinheritance was undoubtedly a harsh sentence for those who chose to leave the religious fold or for their heirs. The motivation seems to have been straightforward, namely a powerful sanction which was bound to cause religious dissenters second thoughts, given the implication it would have on their wellbeing or that of their loved ones. Material dependencies were one of the main foundations on which kinship ties were established and sustained over time. By disinheriting apostates, religious authorities were in fact attempting to further loosen their attachments to their families. Yet whereas disinheritance in the event of religious conversion might have been a feasible 135  Ibn Qudāma, al-­Mughnī, 9: 259. 136  On the different legal opinions regarding cross-­religion inheritance, see Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 56–7; Hjerrild, Studies in Zoroastrian Family Law, 75–6. See also Menasce, “Problèmes des mazdéens dans l’Iran musulman” (also in English: “Questions concerning the Mazdaeans of Muslim Iran”); Irshai, “The Apostate as an Inheritor”; Simonsohn, “Are gaonic responsa a reliable source.”

122  Female Power and Religious Change sanction, other aspects of economic dependency required a measure of lenience on the part of religious authorities. Another uncertainty related to family property in the event of religiously mixed family ties had to do with the compensation and satisfaction of family members who were in economic need. A rather exceptional legal problem that arose in consequence of mixed religious kinship ties is addressed in the legal work of the Imāmī scholar Muḥammad al-­Ṭ ūsī (d. 458–9/1066–7). The problem concerned the payment of ransom money following the slaying of a Muslim man by another when the victim’s family were non-­Muslims. Al-­Ṭ ūsī cites Imām Jaʿfar al-­Ṣādiq who ruled that the non-­Muslim relatives should be offered the opportunity to embrace Islam and receive the ransom money. However, should they choose not to convert, a Muslim religious authority (imām) will serve as the victim’s legal guardian and decide as to the penalty that should be meted out.137 Ransom money in the event of murder can be considered more than a mere penalty, but as compensation to a family that lost one of its members and as a result experienced also the economic hardship such a loss would entail.138 In this particular case, however, the religious difference between the victim and his relatives prevented the latter from claiming the ransom money so long as they remained non-­Muslims. In other instances, however, Muslim jurists were able to offer a more humane set of arrangements for non-­Muslim individuals who were in need and relied on the support of their Muslim relatives. A recent study of Ibn Qayyim al-­Jawziyya’s (d. 751/1350) Aḥ kām ahl al-­dhimma (“rulings pertaining to the protected people”) notes the Ḥ anbali scholar’s awareness of the social implications of conversion to Islam.139 Unlike many of his predecessors, Ibn al-­Qayyim ruled that a Muslim son is obliged to support his needy non-­Muslim parents, basing himself on the Qurʾanic injunction to be kind to one’s parents (Q 29: 8). Ibn al-­ Qayyim further deduced that God “censored those who broke the bonds of blood relation (qāṭ iʿī al-­raḥ m) and rendered the dissolution of ties a great sin. He further made the claim of blood relation obligatory, even if it be to an unbeliever.”140 According to Ibn al-­Qayyim, blood relations were reason enough for sustaining economic solidarities between members of different religions. Remarkable as it may have been, Ibn al-­Qayyim’s position was not innovative. Almost two centuries before him, the Ḥ anafī al-­Kāsānī (d. 587/1189) offered a similar stand: It is incumbent upon a Muslim to provide for his parents and their relatives (ābāʾihi wa-­umahāʾihi) who are from among the protected people (ahl al-­dhimma). And it is incumbent upon the protected person (dhimmī) to provide for his small children to whom the rule of Islam has been applied on account of their 137  Al-­Ṭ ūsī, Tahdhīb al-­aḥ kām, 10: 178 (sec. [697] 12). 138  See Schacht, “Ḳ iṣāṣ,” EI2, s.v. 139 Bosanquet, Minding their Place, 62. 140  Ibn al-­Qayyim, Aḥ kām, 2: 417; tr. Bosanquet, Minding their Place, 247.

Religiously Mixed Families  123 mother’s Islam and for his adult Muslim children who are from among those entitled for support in accordance with what we have noted. The difference stems from two aspects; the first is that obligation of this maintenance is in line with the kinship (al-­ṣila) and the obligation to behave kindly to one’s kindred does not apply in other (forms of relations) than that of the parents when there is difference in religion. The obligation to do good to one’s relatives applies to parents despite difference in religion, on account of the proof (dalīl) that a Muslim may seek to kill his brother from the Abode of War, but he may not seek to kill his father from the Abode of War. The Exalted One has already said: “Keep them company honorable in this world” (Q 31: 15).141

These considerations are worthy of our attention. They underscore a principal Islamic position which we have already detected in the previous chapter, namely that kinship ties, especially those that run through the bonds of parenthood, supersede religious differences so long as they do not undermine them. It is based on this position that al-­Kāsānī was able to justify a Muslim son’s care for his non-­ Muslim parents. The same principles worked also in the opposite direction, namely a non-­Muslim parent’s material support of his Muslim children. The only limitation, however, was the nature of relations, as support could be offered to parents and vice versa, but not to siblings. Although al-­Kāsānī and Ibn al-­Qayyim’s positions were not universal, they do represent a juristic attempt to compromise between religious ideals and the mundane exigencies of their communities. A similar approach was adopted by other jurists, both Muslims and non-­Muslims, with regard to matters pertaining to marital affairs, the upbringing of children, and patriarchal arrangements. This was often a pragmatic approach which did not always align with the prioritization of religion over kinship.

Conclusions As noted in the previous chapter, legal principles and positions, irrespective of the genre in which they were articulated, were considered a central mechanism for implementing and sustaining the normative orders of religious communities. Whether meant to address real-­life situations or merely theoretical cases, legal sources introduce us to the conceptual worlds of their composers and speak of their preoccupations with what they conceived as feasible social scenarios. With regard to religiously mixed families, the contents of the extant legal corpora allow us to reconstruct some of the main circumstances that enabled the formation of such families. For example, legal treatments of intermarriage suggest that in most

141  Al-­Kāsānī, Badāʾiʿ al-­ṣanāʾiʿ, 5: 155–6.

124  Female Power and Religious Change cases marriage between members of two different religions were between a male member of the dominant religious community, namely Islam, and a female member of subordinate religious background, namely Judaism or Christianity. While initially mixed marriages appear to have taken place in the context of the Muslim conquest, there is much to suggest that in later periods they were often consequent to the conversion of one of the spouses. Legal sources speak also of the implications of mixed marriages for other family members, specifically children. While it can be expected that the descendants of mixed couples would choose to adhere to the religion of their Muslim parent, legal deliberations and principles reveal scenarios in which children of converts to Islam clung to the religion of their non-­Muslim parent. Their choice could be attributed to a variety of factors, among them what has been designated as single-­ generation conversions, whereby a non-­Muslim would convert to Islam while the rest of his family remained non-­Muslim. In other instances, non-­Muslim children can be seen to be fully formed in terms of their religious identity by the time their parent chose to become a Muslim. Under both circumstances, it was often thanks to the non-­Muslim parent that children chose to sustain their non-­Muslim identity. And while it would be tempting to attribute religious conversion primarily to fathers, there is enough in our sources to suggest that such decisions were not necessarily gender-­specific. The general picture, then, is of religious differences in a variety of directions, between spouses, parents and children, and between siblings. Finally, religious differences were not limited to the nuclear family. If we accept the model presented in Chapter 1 of extended families operating as social networks, we may assume that kinship ties among members of different religions transcended the nuclear household setting. The attempts of legal authorities of diverse religious backgrounds to regulate circumstances of religiously mixed family relations speak of a sizeable enough phenomenon to command their attention. Different forms of legal instruction suggest intermarriage as a cause of considerable concern. The notion at the base of early rabbinic and ecclesiastical objections to intermarriage was of defilement and its negative impact on the religious integrity of Jews and Christians, respectively. The Islamic position, however, stemmed from a social reasoning, whereby matrimony was conditioned on a suitability that was compatible with social status. Non-­Muslim men could not become husbands of Muslim women, given the incompatibility between the hierarchies of gender and religion. And while Muslim authorities were equally concerned with marriage between Muslims and others and the status of marriages following the conversion to Islam of one of the spouses, ecclesiastical and rabbinic sources are less comprehensive. Whereas geonic responsa focus on questions emanating from marriages between Jews and apostates, West and East Syrian canon laws and regulations are primarily, though not exclusively, directed towards matrimony between Christian women

Religiously Mixed Families  125 and non-­Christian men. These were followed by further regulations pertaining to the ritual needs of non-­Muslim women in Muslim households, parental responsibilities in the event of religious differences between spouses or between parents and children, and most importantly, the religious identity of children whose parents were of a different religion than their own. Another related phenomenon that received notable attention was that of apostasy. Both Muslim and Christian regulations refer to apostates as individuals who forfeited their place within their former communities and whose reacceptance into the fold following change of mind was not immediate. Similar ideas show up in rabbinic positions at a relatively late stage, around the ninth century, whereby some of the ge’onim spoke of apostasy as an act that annulled kinship ties and rendered the sinner a non-­Jew. With respect to women, their choice to convert to Islam while their spouses and other family members remained non-­Muslim held implications for patriarchal arrangements. Women’s conversion to Islam would affect their relations with their spouses as well as with their fathers, both of whose custodial roles were bound to be terminated in the event of religious differences. Conversion and apostasy are terms that reflect perspective—­the former from the standpoint of the absorbing community and the latter from that of the deserted one. Yet the principal objective that appears to have cut across the legal positions of different authorities, whether Muslim, Christian, or Jewish, was to sustain their religious communities. Their positions reflect an effort to curtail religious diversity, or at least minimize it, in order to safeguard communal boundaries. Much of this effort was directed towards women, specifically wives and mothers, who were considered highly capable of influencing the religious identity of their partners and children. These women are at the center of the next chapter, as targets of communal regulation, on account of their roles within their families.

4 “No bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another” (Q 53: 38) The Liminal Position of Women in Religiously Mixed Families

As noted in the previous chapter, the presence of women in religiously mixed households was for the most part the result of either religious conversion, intermarriage, or slave concubinage. Just as a man’s choice to convert was not necessarily followed by his wife and children, so the marriage of a non-­Muslim woman outside her religious community did not necessarily result in her religious conversion. At the same time, the formation of kinship ties across religious boundaries did not affect only immediate family members, but had ramifications over broader family and social circles. The present discussion is premised on the argument that the endurance of ties between non-­Muslim women and their natal groups and religious communities rendered their position highly liminal. As such, women acted as mediators between different religious settings due to their kinship attachments. Ecclesiastical regulations of the West and East Syrian Churches from the early and medieval Islamic periods offer highly tangible images of this liminality. For example, a West Syrian synod of 231/846 included a canon which threatened to excommunicate “a [Christian] woman who of her own will becomes [a wife] to one of those (i.e., a pagan, Jew, or Zoroastrian).”1 It is safe to assume that, despite her intention to marry outside her Christian community, a woman targeted by such a canon had no desire to leave the fold. Otherwise, the threat of excommunication would be futile. A few decades earlier, a regulation in the legal collection of  the East Syrian Catholicos Išōʿ bar Nūn suggests the endurance not only of communal affiliations but also of kinship ties between such women and their natal group: If a Christian man gives his daughter in marriage to a Jew, or a Zoroastrian, or to a member of other religions, that one shall be estranged from the church. If,  however, his daughter rebelled against him, and married one of those

1 Vööbus, Synodicon, 375: 44 (Syr.)/376: 47 (Eng.), canon 23.

Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East. Uriel Simonsohn, Oxford University Press. © Uriel Simonsohn 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.003.0005

128  Female Power and Religious Change [members of other religions], having fled her father’s home—­if it is possible to bring her back and she is not brought back, he (i.e., her father) shall receive judgment. If she marries [a non-­Christian] out of her own will, her judgment will be before God and the holy church, that she may not be conversed with as long as she lives, even by her mother and siblings, for she has shamed them twice: first, in fleeing [her parent’s house], and second, in consenting to marriage with [members of] other religions.2

The regulation begins with the common arrangement whereby parents, specifically fathers, marry off their daughters, only here to a non-­Christian man. The prospect of enduring ties between a woman who married outside the fold and her Christian family is anticipated in the second part of the regulation, referring to an instance of a Christian girl that acted on her own initiative. The demand to cut off  such Christian girls from any form of contact with their Christian family members would not have been required unless the endurance of these ties was anticipated. Although it clearly aligns with the objective to prioritize community over kinship, the threat of kinship ostracism must have been a central consideration for those Christian women who married non-­Christian men but sought to maintain close contacts with their parents and siblings. The discomfort showed by Muslim authorities towards ties between non-­ Muslim women and Muslim men tell another side of the same story. Although seemingly removed from the ecclesiastical regulations just cited, later Muslims attitudes to the presence of non-­Muslim women in Muslim households were founded on ideas that were cultivated centuries earlier. The detailed images extracted by Tamer el-­Leithy with regard to first-­generation converts to Islam in Ayyubid and Mamluk Egypt are particularly helpful for capturing the family dynamics of households whose male head became Muslim while the rest of the family remained non-­Muslim.3 The biographies of these men indicate once again that conversion to Islam was often motivated by short-­term considerations. Yet the harsh criticisms that came from the direction of Muslim polemicists, as well as personal rivals, were not voiced in a void. They stemmed from the expectation that non-­Muslim family members, specifically wives and mothers, would have a negative impact on the religious integrity of the convert.4 The liminal position of non-­Muslim women who were in matrimony with Muslim men is at the center of the present chapter. It argues that non-­Muslim women were in a position to introduce foreign practices and ideas into 2 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2, 170 (Syr.)/(Ger.) 71, reg. 119. See also ibid., 122 (Syr.)/23 (Ger.), reg. 10: “If a man marries his daughter to a pagan, Jew, or someone of the other religions, he should no longer visit the church or take part in the holy mysteries.” 3  El-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion in medieval Cairo,” 67. 4  Ibid., esp. 72–3, 195.

The Liminal Position of Women  129 Muslim-­dominated households, owing to their unique roles as wives and mothers. Yet whereas ecclesiastical positions opposed these unions in an attempt to stem the tide of communal degeneration, rabbinic authorities seldom expressed their opinions in their regard, and Muslim ideas and norms reflect a profound preoccupation with their threat to the religious integrity of Muslim family members. The ensuing discussion builds on ecclesiastical and rabbinic normative texts in order to shed light on the liminal position of non-­Muslim women, and on Islamic ones in order to capture instances in which this position was perceived as endowing non-­Muslim women with religious agency. The chapter ends with some suggestions as to the syncretic consequences of religiously hybrid family ties, based on the attempts of ecclesiastical authorities to regulate them.

The potential effects of enduring kinship ties—­the story of Ṣafiyya bt. Ḥ uyayy b. Akht ̣ab It is related that the Messenger of God entered upon Ṣafiyya while she was crying, whereupon he said to her, “What is causing you to weep?” To which she replied, “It has come to my knowledge that ʿĀʾisha and Ḥ afṣa are slandering me and saying: ‘We are better than Ṣafiyya; we are the daughters of the uncle of the Messenger of God and his wives.’ ” He said, “Did you not say to them, ‘How are you better than me, when my father is Hārūn, my uncle is Mūsā, and my husband is Muhammad?” ’5 . . . The slave girl of Ṣafiyya came to ʿUmar b. al-­Khaṭtạ̄ b and said, “Ṣafiyya cherishes the Sabbath and is in kinship ties with the Jews.” ʿUmar then sent her (someone) who asked her, to which she said: “As for the Sabbath, I do not cherish it since Allāh has replaced it for me with the Friday and as for the Jews, indeed I share with them kinship (raḥ im) and I honor my debt to them.” She then said to the slave girl, “What caused you to do what you have done?” She said, “The devil.” She said, “Be off then, you are free.”6 Ṣafiyya bt. Ḥ uyayy b. Akhṭab—­the Messenger of God chose her from among the captives of al-­Nadhīr, later emancipated her, married her, and made her emancipation her dowry. She is the one whom Zaynab bt. al-­Ḥ ārith the Jewess gave a poisoned lamb from which the Messenger of God ate . . .7

5 Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, al-­Istīʿāb, 2: 1872 (no. 4005). 6  Ibid.; al-­Dhahabī, Siyar aʿlām al-­nubalāʾ, 1: 2033 (no. 2539). 7  Al-­Māwardī, al-­Ḥ āwī al-­kabīr, 9:27. Cf. Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 3: 287; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 516, according to which Zaynab served the Prophet directly.

130  Female Power and Religious Change Like many among the first generations of Muslims, Ṣafiyya—­the Prophet’s wife who converted to Islam from Judaism—­entered the Muslim fold on her own, leaving behind her closest kin. Ṣafiyya was from the Jewish tribe of Banū al-­Naḍīr. She was captured by the Muslims in 6/628, shortly after the tribe’s expulsion from Medina in 4/626 and settlement in Khaybar. Muhammad, captivated by Ṣafiyya’s beauty, redeemed the young Jewish slave girl, whereupon she embraced Islam and the two were married. The events surrounding her conversion to Islam, marriage with the Prophet, and attitude towards her Jewish kinfolk are found in a series of reports in ṭabaqāt collections. Her loyalty to Islam was often questioned according to her later biographies, owing to her Jewish background. Already at the outset, Muhammad is portrayed as suspecting that Ṣafiyya would be reluctant to convert due to her sentiments for her father. Later on, Muhammad’s wives attempt to undermine her character on the basis of her lineage. Finally, her slave girl’s suggestion that Ṣafiyya retained Jewish sentiments, owing to her Jewish kinship ties, is perhaps the most instructive expression of Muslim suspicion towards a woman who has left behind her non-­Muslim kinfolk. Yet the extant narratives are not only indicative of moments of rivalry between kinship and communal sentiments. The arguments put forward by the Prophet, in favor of Ṣafiyya’s loyalty to Islam and equal standing with other Muslims, serve to dismiss potential allegations and suspicions towards a non-­Muslim woman who married a Muslim man. The events surrounding Ṣafiyya’s conversion to Islam and subsequent marriage to the Prophet appear particularly remarkable given her notably close ties with her family, specifically her father and uncle. Her own report in the Sīra is noteworthy in this respect:8 “I was the favorite child of my father and my uncle Abū Yāsir. When I was present, they took no notice of their other children.” As much as her father and uncle loved Ṣafiyya, they felt enmity towards Muhammad—­her future leader and husband. The contrast does not seem accidental: When the apostle was staying in Qubāʾ with the Banī ʿAmr b. ʿAwf, the two went to see him before daybreak and did not return until after nightfall, weary, worn out, drooping and feeble.  I went up to them in childish pleasure as I always did, and they were so sunk in gloom that they took no notice of me. I heard my uncle say to my father, “Is he he? Do you recognize him, and can you be sure?” “Yes!” “And what do you feel about him?” “By God I shall be his enemy as long as I live!” 

The seeds of Ṣafiyya’s conflicting sentiments, between her love for her Jewish ­family and her commitment to her Muslim husband, are made evident in  this

8  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 2: 160; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 241–2.

The Liminal Position of Women  131 brief passage. They present us with the background to the exchange between Muhammad and Ṣafiyya in Ibn Saʿd’s (d. 230/845) compilation: When Ṣafiyya entered before the Prophet, he said to her, “Your father was one of my greatest adversaries from among the Jews until Allah killed him.” She said, “O Messenger of God, Allah said in His Book ‘That no bearer of burdens will bear the burden of another’ (Q 53: 38).” Then the Messenger of God said to her, “Choose, and if you choose Islam, I shall take you for myself, and if you choose Judaism, then I should manumit you and you shall join your people.” She then said, “O Messenger of God, I have become fond of Islam and believed in you before you called upon me, as I have joined your journey and I have no need for Judaism and I have in it neither father nor brother. You have offered me the choice between disbelief and Islam, and Allah and his Messenger are dearer to me than emancipation and returning to my people.”9 

The potential of Ṣafiyya’s emotional struggle is seen here in Muhammad’s ­expectation of her reluctance to convert to Islam. Perhaps in an attempt to remove possible doubts as to her uncompromising commitment, Ṣafiyya responds as unambiguously as she can. Her choice to become a Muslim had materialized prior to Muhammad’s calling upon her, indicating a decision that resulted from conviction rather than social opportunism. Further indication of Ṣafiyya’s early predisposition towards Islam and the Prophet can be gathered from a reference in the Sīra to a dream she had while married to her former husband: Now Ṣafiyya had seen in a dream when she was the wife of Kināna b. al-­Rabīʿ b. ʿAbd al-­Ḥ uqayq that the moon would fall into her lap. When she told her husband he said, “This simply means that you covet the king of the Ḥ ijāz, Muhammad.” He gave her such a blow in the face that he blacked her eye! When she was brought to the apostle the mark was still there, and when he asked the cause of it, she told him this story.10 

The portrayal of Ṣafiyya as a woman who suffered hardship from her husband and separation from her Jewish kin because of her identification with the Prophet and his message should be read as more than an attempt to glorify her. Suggestions regarding her unequal standing vis-­à-­vis other wives of the Prophet show up early on in Islamic sources. ʿĀʾisha and Ḥ afṣa’s allegations against her, noted above and included in al-­Tirmidhī’s (d. 278/892) hadith collection,11 appear to have been

9  Ibn Saʿd, Kitāb al-­tạ baqāt, 10: 119 (no. 4965). 10  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 3: 285; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 514–15. 11  Al-­Tirmidhī, Sunan al-­Tirmidhī, 6: 187 (no. 3892). See also al-­Iṣbahānī, Ḥ ilyat al-­awliyāʾ, 2: 66 (no. 137).

132  Female Power and Religious Change substantial enough to draw the attention of the anonymous Christian author, bearing the pseudonym ʿAbd al-­Masīḥ b. Isḥāq al-­Kindī, who composed in the ninth century a work known to Western scholars as the Apology:12 Of Zeinab he relates that after Mahomet had thrice sent her her portion of meat she flung it back in his face, whereupon he swore that he would not go near his wives for a whole month; but, not having patience to wait till the end, he approached them after nine-­and twenty days. Safia, the Jewess, was taught by the prophet, when upbraided by her sister wives, to answer, saying, Aaron is my father, Moses my uncle, and Mahomet my husband.

The connection that the writer of the Apology makes between Muhammad’s two wives—­Zaynab bt. al-­Ḥ ārith and Ṣafiyya—­deserves our attention. As we saw at the beginning of the present chapter, a similar association is found in al-­Māwardī’s al-­Ḥ āwī al-­kabīr. As such, it may be reminiscent of further attempts to discredit Ṣafiyya’s character, this time by ascribing her the act of feeding the Prophet with poisoned meat, an act that is normally attributed to Zaynab. The literary attempts to bolster Ṣafiyya’s credibility in the Sīra, hadith, and ṭabaqāt literature should be read against allusions to her enduring sentiments towards her Jewish kin and consequent Muslim distrust towards her. Her continued contacts with Jewish relatives, despite her conversion to Islam, serve to premise legal principles regarding the execution of a Muslim’s will by a non-­Muslim relative. The question is treated in ʿAbd al-­Razzāq’s Musannaf: Ṣafiyya, the Prophet’s wife, sold a house she had to Muʿāwiya for a hundred-­ thousand, whereupon she said to her relative from among the Jews, “Embrace Islam, and if you embrace Islam, you will inherit me.” He declined, and she therefore appointed him as executor of her will (fa-­awṣat lahu).13

Ṣafiyya’s example continued to feature in Islamic jurisprudence, particularly Ḥ anbalī compendia, in relation to the question of Muslims appointing their non-­Muslim relatives as executors of their wills and as administrators of their charitable endowments (waqf ).14 The usefulness of her figure for justifying legal arrangements between Muslims and their non-­Muslim relatives suggests that, at  least among certain scholarly circles, Ṣafiyya retained close contact with her ­former coreligionist kinsfolk. We may surmise that Muslim jurists were inferring 12  The Apology of al-­Kindy, 10. On the dating, provenance, and thematic arrangement of the Apology, see Bottini, “The Apology of al-­Kindī.” 13  ʿAbd al-­Razzāq, al-­Musannaf, 6: 33 (no. 9913). Cf. ibid. (no. 9914) “her brother.” 14  See also al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 227, ch. 120 (no. 645); 228, ch. 120 (no. 647); Ibn Qudāma, ­al-­Mughnī, 7: 552, 8: 242—permitting Muslims to endow a waqf to a dhimmī on the grounds that Safiyya did the same to her Jewish brother; and in Ibn Qayyim al-­Jawziyya, Aḥ kām ahl al-­dhimma, 1: 305.

The Liminal Position of Women  133 from the notions of distrust that were directed towards Ṣafiyya and her close ties with her paternal household recorded in the Sīra. Their assumption, perhaps expectation, was that the Jewish convert to Islam, despite her declared allegiance to the Prophet and the Islamic creed, was not entirely detached from her Jewish past, suggesting her disposition towards Judaism. It is worth entertaining such notions when we think about the durability of kinship ties across religious boundaries. In the case of Ṣafiyya, conversion to Islam was not deemed sufficient cause for terminating her relationship with her Jewish kinsfolk. The endurance of kinship ties in this case finds resonance in a more general observation regarding women who remained part of their natal group long after they joined their husband’s household.15 The retention of these ties also meant the retention of the identity of their patriline, a feature that may have played a role in the passage of certain norms and practices from one household to another. Ṣafiyya’s example can also help us think more concretely about the retention of kinship ties between non-­Muslim women and their family members, while married to Muslim husbands, and about the perceived dangers of these ties to the religious integrity of Muslim families.

The liminal position of non-­Muslim women The retention of kinship ties with non-­Muslim family members is further attested in ecclesiastical regulations and canons laws, geonic responsa, and Islamic legal principles. These refer to the role of non-­Muslim women as links, if not mediators, between families of different religious affiliations. As wives of Muslim husbands, some of them recent converts, it was thanks to their simultaneous participation in the affairs of their Muslim household and in those of their non-­Muslim family and community that they were in a position to forge meaningful ties between their Muslim and non-­Muslim kin. As mediating figures, passing through religious boundaries that were now compromised by kinship attachments, non-­Muslim women rendered communal boundaries permeable. It is here that we should refer back to the features of Near Eastern urban family arrangements, recalling their complexity which, to a large extent, was dictated by their multiple social utilities. By noting the religious affiliation of non-­Muslim women who were implicated in such entangled kinship arrangements, we may begin thinking of them as individuals who stood and operated in between religious communities, serving as links between members of discrete religious communities and as couriers of religious ideas and practices across these communities.

15  Abu-­Lughod, Veiled Sentiments, 54. See also Chapter 1.

134  Female Power and Religious Change Signs of this dual standing of non-­Muslim women are attested from the very beginning of the Islamic era. The canon laws and legal regulations that were issued by the leaders of the East and West Syrian Churches against intermarriage targeted Christian women who sought to continue partaking in the communal lives of their Christian congregations while married to non-­Christian husbands.16 An illustration of this state of affairs can be found in an answer of the West Syrian bishop Jacob of Edessa (r. 64–9/684–9, 89/708) to the priest Addai, regarding the permissibility of giving communion to a Christian woman who married a Muslim (mhaggrāyā).17 While the bishop encouraged the woman’s participation in communal service, the question alone lends itself to an image of Christian women who were simultaneously bound to a Muslim household and a Christian community. As we saw in the previous chapter, the phenomenon of Christian women married to non-­Christian husbands was well anticipated already in the Gospels and the writings of the Church Fathers. Its persistence into the early and medieval Islamic periods reflects an ambivalent approach on the part of ecclesiastical leaders. Their failure to curtail instances in which Christian women married outside the fold resulted in attempts to minimize the negative effects of the problem by encouraging these women to raise their children as Christians. We shall come back to the matter later on. The point which should be noted at this stage, however, pertains to the mediating role of such Christian women. As wives of Muslim husbands who continued to partake in the congregational life of their Christian communities, these women were most likely sustaining not only spir­it­ual contacts with their coreligionists but also kinship relations with members of their natal family. Although recorded in different contexts and in relation to different circumstances, instances of marital ties between Jewish women and Jewish men who apostatized, most likely converts to Islam, in contemporary geonic responsa allow us to view Jewish women in similar capacities to those of their Christian counterparts. Geonic responsa speak of two types of links between Jews and their apostate relatives—­a social link and a legal one. While we often come across instances in which kinship ties appear to have endured through the religious conversion of a family member, there is also indication that, when social ties may have ceased, legal ties persisted, owing to the nature of Jewish law. The latter scenario is illustrated in the case of an apostate Jew who moved to another land, while his role as levir persevered with respect to his Jewish sister in-­law, following the death of her husband and his brother.18 The matter was brought to the discretion of the head of Pumbedita Rav Paltoi Ga’on (fl. 226/841–4/58), who was asked whether there is a solution in the case of a childless widow, whose apostate brother-­in-­law now 16  Simonsohn, “Communal membership despite religious exogamy.” 17 Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 604–5, question 75; Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 374. 18 Lewin, Otsar, Yebamot, 34, no. 77.

The Liminal Position of Women  135 lived among non-­Jews in the so-­called land of the Barbarians, most likely referring to somewhere in North Africa. In reply, Paltoi answered: This betrothed woman, who has fallen before an apostate levir, is chained and remains [so] forever. There is no solution for her, and she cannot marry until the apostate performs a ḥ alitsa for her (i.e., releases her). Since his conception and birth was in sanctity (i.e., he was born as a Jew), she requires yibbum (the fulfillment of the levirate obligation) and that chained woman is not released until he performs a ḥ alitsa for her.

Paltoi’s position was not uncommon. It resonates with the principled position attributed to the ge’onim: “The early ge’onim wrote that a widowed sister-­in-­law that appeared before an apostate [brother-­in-­law] is [legally] chained to him [for her release] and remains bound until he performs ḥ alitsa.”19 The principle rested on the perception of apostates as Jews for matters pertaining to marriage and parenthood.20 The responsum, however, also offers an example of an instance where religious conversion may have dissolved kinship relations, but was not forceful enough to dissolve the legal commitments resulting from them, owing to the binding position of the widow in question. The principles of levirate marriage were forceful enough to remind apostates of their enduring attachments to their former coreligionists. The effect Jewish women had on the endurance of the communal links of apostates with their former coreligionists in the circumstances of levirate marriages surfaces not only with regard to apostate brother-­in-­laws but also with regard to apostate husbands. The question of levirate marriage in the case of an apostate’s widow was met by a resolute geonic ruling in favor of their applicability. The ga’on further observed that, “even if he (the apostate) married a non-­Jewish woman when he was an apostate, who gave him sons and daughters,” the Jewish widow would still require yibbum or ḥ alitsa.21 His position thus served to retain the affinity of the apostate to the Jewish fold, owing to the presence of his Jewish wife. Although the case at hand concerned the Jewishness of the apostate after his death, it was bound to act as a reminder, perhaps a warning, to husbands that their Jewishness, even if they renounced it, would continue to affect their wives, after their death. The mediating role of Jewish women between apostates and their Jewish kinsfolk is further suggested in relation to Jewish daughters and their apostate fathers.

19  Ibid., 36, no. 82. 20 Blidstein, “ ‘Who is not a Jew?,’ ” 382. See also Sa‘adya Ga’on’s responsum in Lewin, Otsar, Yebamot, 196, no. 474, discussed in Chapter 3. 21 Lewin, Otsar, Yebamot, 34, no. 76.

136  Female Power and Religious Change In a case brought to the discretion of Sa‘adya Ga’on concerning the inheritance of a Jewish woman, the ga’on ruled in favor of the right of the Jewish woman to inherit from her apostate father:22 An Israelite woman whose father apostatized inherits him, and even [were] her father a complete non-­Jew [she would inherit from him], as we have learned: “If a proselyte and a non-­Jew inherit their father, a non-­Jew: the Israelite (originally: proselyte) may say to the non-­Jew (i.e. his non-­Jewish brother), ‘You take the idols, I [will take] money’; ‘you take the wine and I will take fruit.’ But once they have come into the Israelite’s (originally: the proselyte’s) possession, this [exchange] is forbidden” (bQid. 17b). . . . From this we learn that the non-­Jew has heirs.

The significance of such cases in which Jewish women remained in touch with apostate relatives, whether their husbands or fathers, cannot be overstated. They offer us far more than instances in which women were present in different phases of religious conversion, whereby their legal standing served to link male apostates with their Jewish community and families. Legal requirements pertaining to matters of marriage, divorce, and inheritance rendered the legal, and consequently the social, ties of apostates to their former coreligionists indissoluble. Although the agency of Jewish women under these circumstances was passive, instances in which they maintained contact with apostates—­that is to say, converts to Islam—rendered them crucial for sustaining kinship ties across religious boundaries.

Muslim perceptions of non-­Muslim female agency Recent scholarship explains the persistence of non-­Muslim religious practices among converts to Islam in their lack of interest in the theological meaning of those practices.23 This line of argument, however, cannot stand alone when we think about the permeability of religious boundaries. Further attention should be given to the role of kinship ties in this context, and in particular the role of figures who were able to move back and forth across these boundaries. It is here that women who married outside their religious communities, or remained in matrimony with converts to Islam, possessed unique capacities as agents of religious praxis. Under these circumstances, non-­Muslim women who became members of Muslim households, whether they chose to retain their religious affiliation or embrace Islam, were in a position to undermine the religious integrity of their 22 Lewin, Otsar, Qiddushin, 29, no. 76. 23 Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, ch. 12.

The Liminal Position of Women  137 Muslim relatives, especially husbands and children. Their position was accordingly perceived as a dangerous one, evoking notable distrust as to their motives and their respect for the religious identity of their Muslim family members. A great deal of this suspicion derived from the liminal features embedded in the position of non-­Muslim women. These features received some discussion in Chapter 1 from the perspective of gender arrangements within Near Eastern household arrangements. There is more to be said, however, about the liminal position of women in the context of religious differences. As liminal figures, these women represented the obverse of the very order on which religious communities were founded, and were, therefore, in a position to undermine their boundaries, traditions, and definitions.24 These women undoubtedly faced challenges arising from leaving behind aspects of their former communal affiliations and integrating into new ones. Their place therefore necessitated regulation and restriction, a conclusion that appears to have been well acknowledged by Muslim jurists, as the following part aims to show. Muslim jurists expressed considerable uneasiness when it came to the integration of non-­Muslim women in Muslim households. Al-­Shāfiʿī’s reservation towards marriage with non-­Muslim women from the Abode of War (dār al-­ḥ arb) is indicative of broader apprehensions: “We prefer that a man does not marry a woman from the Abode of War, out of fear that his child will be abducted. And it is disliked that he marries her even if she (i.e. his wife) was a Muslim among the people of the Abode of War, out of fear for his child that they might snatch him or tempt him (yastariqūhu aw yaftinūhu).”25 Despite her conversion to Islam, the mother’s child, owing to her ties with her non-­Muslim family, posed a threat to her child’s Islamic identity. Al-­Shāfiʿī’s position was premised on the expectation that a child would be exposed to non-­Muslim influence, temptation, perhaps even a spiritual abduction, due to his mother’s proximity to her former coreligionist family members. Further indication of the suspicion that was directed towards female converts to Islam can be found in Islamic exegesis for Q 60: 10 which, as already noted in Chapter 2, was revealed following the migration of Umm Kulthūm bt. ʿUqba to Medina during the time of the Ḥ udaybiyya treaty. Umm Kulthūm’s admission was permitted, despite the treaty’s stipulation of the return of deserters, from either the Muslim or the Qurayshī sides, back to their original communities. The verse, however, specifies that women were not to be returned to the pagan side if, following verification, they were found to be true believers. To that end, a test was devised: “O believers, when believing women come to you as emigrants, test them. God knows very well their belief. Then, if you know them to be believers, return them not to the unbelievers.” Muslim exegetes explained the rationale 24 On the threats attributed to liminal figures, see Horvath, Modernism and Charisma, 4–5; Jacobson, Liminality, Hybridity, and American Women’s Literature, 3. 25  Al-­Shāfiʿī, Kitāb al-­umm, 5: 655 (no. 20).

138  Female Power and Religious Change behind the test as the interest to verify the sincerity of female converts to Islam. The reasoning here suggests the prospect of insincere conversion for the sake of personal ends, a consideration which we already came across in the previous chapter. Female converts were, therefore, to be questioned about their motivation: “And if what brought them was anger over the spouses or a matter of jealousy, or resentment, then they do not believe, and therefore you should return them to their spouse.”26 The concerns of Muslim scholars with the motivations and actions of female converts to Islam were relatively modest in comparison to the ones which they expressed in relation to non-­Muslim wives of Muslim husbands and mothers of Muslim children. Yet the examples cited offer a prelude to some of the notions that underpinned that distrust. One is that enduring kinship ties rendered the place of non-­Muslim women as cultural go-­betweens. Another has to do with the fact that kinship relations were often motivated by interests of social improvement and access to resources of various kinds. Under such circumstances, religious boundaries were likely to have had little consequence, whereby their crossing did not entail the abandonment of religious beliefs and practices. It is in this context that we should read into Muslim concerns with non-­Muslim maternal agency. The recurring motif in a few of the biographies of the Prophet’s Companions discussed in Chapter 2, whereby infants of a Muslim father and a non-­Muslim mother were naturally disposed towards the latter, is significant for assessing non-­Muslim maternal authority in Muslim households.27 It serves to remind us yet again of the crucial role mothers played in the formative years of the child owing to their initial natural bond. Under circumstances of religiously mixed parenthood, non-­Muslim mothers were ascribed significant agency in relation to their children’s religious identity. An intriguing report by Ibn Ḥ awqal (d. 377/988), regarding the rural parts of Fatimid-­governed Sicily in the second half of the tenth century, refers to the religious identity of children that were brought up by Muslim men and Christian women. The Muslim geographer uses an obscure term, mushaʿmidūn, in relation to the Muslims, perhaps rendering the Hebrew meshumad into an Arabic plural form.28 By Ibn Ḥ awqal’s day, the term was understood in rabbinic contexts as referring to apostates. It has been postulated that the term was introduced to Ibn Ḥ awqal by Arabic-­speaking Jews.29 Ibn Ḥ awqal further reports that, whereas the boys resulting from these unions “were assigned to their fathers as mushaʿmidūn,” 26  Mujāhid b. Jabr, Tafsīr al-­imām Mujāhid b. Jabr, 655–6. 27  See Chapter 2. 28  Meshumad, lit. “annihilated,” is considered in the vast majority of cases discussed in classical rabbinic literature as a Jew who committed a grave sin and in geonic literature as an apostate. On the rabbinic evolution of meshumad from biblical, through classical rabbinic literature, and onto the middle Islamic period, see Yoskovich, “Apostate (= Meshumad) in Jewish Babylonia.” 29 Jäckh, “Ibn Ḥ awqal on Christian–­Muslim marriages in Sicily.” The etymology of meshumad deriving from the Aramaic mushaʿmad (lit. baptized), has been discussed in modern scholarship, esp. based on a remark attributed to Rav Hayya: Kohut, Aruch Completum, 85; cf. Pines, “Notes on the parallelism between Syriac terminology and Mishnaic Hebrew,” 210.

The Liminal Position of Women  139 the girls were brought up as Christians, like their mothers.30 The account is strikingly similar to instances reported in Abu Yūsuf ’s (d. 182/798) Kitāb al-­kharāj, al-­Ṭ abarī’s Taʾrīkh, and Ibn Ḥ anbal’s responsa, discussed in Chapter 3, according to which arrangements with Mesopotamian conquered tribes would often concede to the non-­Muslim upbringing of daughters resulting from mixed unions.31 While the historicity of these reports may be cast in doubt, their only underlying scenario could have been marriages between Muslims, perhaps recent converts to Islam, and non-­ Muslim women, most likely Christians. The insistence upon the Islamic upbringing of the male descendants of these unions suggests there was good reason to anticipate that they would be otherwise brought up in a way contrary to Islamic principles and norms. Such an anticipation was most likely founded on the importance ascribed to the maternal influence of non-­Muslim women. References to the capacity of such women to undermine religious boundaries as slave concubines of Muslim masters or as wives to Muslim husbands in Andalusī court settings are indicative of the perceived harmful potential of their presence.32 Against the assertion that non-­Muslim women who were bound to Umayyad rulers through slavery or marriage were in a position to introduce external cultural habits, we find one which argues for their thorough Arabization and strict confinement to Islamic social practices.33 The Andalusī context of such debates appears relevant to other strata of Muslim-­dominated societies, in other parts of the early and medieval Islamic world. Likewise, an apocalyptic account recorded in Nuʿaym b. Ḥ ammād’s (d. 228/843) Kitāb al-­fitan wa-­l-­malāḥ im (“Book of trials and fierce battles”) refers to the suspicion of children of Christian slave concubines retaining ties with the Byzantines.34 Seen in the context of early Islamic court cultures, non-­Muslim concubines, who were initially solicited for purposes of procreation, were to attain pivotal roles not only on account of their consort status but also due to their maternal services. These women, though perhaps Arabized and even converted to Islam, were bound to retain sentiments towards their religious and cultural pasts to the extent that they were suspected of passing them on to their children in the course of their rearing.35 30  Ibn Ḥ awqal, Kitāb ṣūrat al-­arḍ, 129, tr. Theresa Jäckh. 31  The History of al-­Tabari, 13: 62. See also in Abū Yūsuf, Kitab al-­kharāj, 67–81 (nos. 181–91). 32  Ruggles, “Mothers of a hybrid dynasty,” 66. 33  Barton, “Marriage across frontiers,” 8. 34  Al-­Marwazī, Kitāb al-­fitan, 274–5; cited and discussed in Urban, Conquered Populations, 122. Nuʿaym b. Ḥ ammād was originally from Marw al-­Rudh, but had spent a considerable time in Baghdad; see Pellat, “Nuʿaym b. Ḥ ammād”, EI2. 35  Ruggles, “Mothers of a hybrid dynasty,” 76. Negative perceptions of non-­Muslim slave c­ oncubines were not unanimous. The biographical collection of al-­Mizzī (d. 742/1341) reports that, although initially the people of Medina disliked the practice of taking umm walads, they later changed their mind, following the birth of “the reciters, the noble masters: ʿAlī b. al-­Ḥ usayn b. ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭ ālib, al-­Qāsim b. Muḥammad b. Abī Bakr al-­Ṣiddīq, and Sālim b. ʿAbdallāh b. ʿUmar, who surpassed the people of Medina in their knowledge, piety, worship, and godfearingness”; al-­Mizzī, Tahdhīb, 10: 150. According to Ibn Ḥ ajar, the concubines were from among the daughters of the Sasanian monarch Yazdegerd (r. 632–51); Ibn Ḥ ajar, Tahdhīb, 3: 438. I wish to thank Luke Yarbrough from bringing these passages to my attention.

140  Female Power and Religious Change Further indications of ascribing a negative impact to non-­Muslim mothers can be drawn from the mathālib (lit. faults, defects, vices) literature—­a literary genre that was initially used to disparage the reputation of tribes and ethnic groups.36 Within a few centuries following the Muslim conquest, mathālib works are found focusing on individuals whose genealogical backgrounds were considered tainted on various accounts. One such account was the ethnic, religious, and perhaps also political, background of a man’s mother. For example, the Kūfan Ibn al-­Kalbī (d.  205 or 206/821 or 822) dedicated a chapter in his Kitāb mathālib al-­ʿarab (“The book of the vices of the Arabs”) to the mothers of prominent early Muslim figures. His reference, among others, to the Christian, Byzantine, and Jewish affiliations of these mothers is highly telling.37 Not only does it underscore the value ascribed to the decisive roles of mothers in forming their children’s character, but more importantly, it gives away the serious reservations that were directed towards Muslims of non-­Muslim maternal backgrounds.38 Our sources offer some references to the non-­Muslim mothers of male members of Muslim dynasties, including Maysūn, the Christian wife of the founder of the Umayyad dynasty Muʿāwiya b. Abī Sufyān (r. 40–60/661–80), who mothered Yazīd (r. 60–3/680–3),39 the Galician mothers of Umayyad leaders in al-­Andalus,40 and the Greek Christian mother of the Fatimid caliph al-­Ḥ ākim bi-­Amr Allāh (r.  386–411/996–1021).41 The phenomenon did not escape the penetrating observations of al-­Jāhiẓ,42 whose discomfort towards the descendants of Christian parents we encountered already in Chapter 2. Yet perhaps the best known example is that of the Umayyad governor of Iraq Khālid al-­Qasrī (r. 105–20/724–38), often called Ibn al-­Naṣrāniyya (“son of the Christian woman”), whose adversaries criticized his favorable leaning towards Christians and Christianity.43 According to al-­Balādhurī (d. 278/892), Khālid dedicated a church to his mother in Kūfa,44 had a Christian bishop bless a fountain which he installed in a nearby mosque,

36  Pellat, “Mathālib,” EI2; see also Lecker, “A note on early marriage links between Qurashīs and Jewish women”; Lecker, “Were there female relatives of the Prophet Muḥammad among the besieged Qurayẓa?.” 37  Ibn al-­Kalbī, Kitāb mathālib al-­ʿarab, 225–7, 234–6. See also Ibn Ḥ abīb, Kitāb al-­muḥ abbar, 305–6; Ibn Rusta, al-­Mujallad al-­sābiʿ min kitāb al-­aʿlāq al-­nafīsa, 191. 38 Cf. Urban, Conquered Populations, 106. According to Urban, concerns with the identity of “concubine-­born men” did not arise before the Marwanid period. 39  Lammens, “Maysun,” EI2. 40 Zorgati, Pluralism in the Middle Ages, 92; see also Safran, “Identity and differentiation,” 580. 41 Halm, Die Kalifen von Kairo, 219; Lev, “Aspects of the Egyptian society in the Fatimid period,” 12. 42  Al-­Radd ʿala al-­naṣārā, tr. Colville, 75–6; discussed in Sizgorich, Violence and Belief in Late Antiquity, 250. 43  See Hawting, The First Dynasty of Islam, 81; Hawting, “Khālid al-­Kạ srī,” EI2. See also the indicting words of the poet al-­Farazdaq (d. c.109–12/728–30), quoted in al-­Balādhurī, Ansāb, 7: 382; ­al-­Balādhurī, Jumal, 9: 36; Ibn Khallikān, Wafayāt al-ʿayān, 2: 228–9; discussed in Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 450; Yarbrough, Friends of the Emir, 59. 44  Al-­Balādhurī, Jumal, 9: 60; Balādhurī, Kitāb futūḥ al-­buldān, 286 (Eng. tr. available in Hitti, Origins of the Islamic State, 1: 445).

The Liminal Position of Women  141 and went as far as to declare Christianity superior to Islam.45 A reference to Khālid’s close relations with the East Syrian catholicos Pethion (r. 113–22/731–40) in Kitāb al-­majdal (“Book of the tower”) by the East Syrian author Mārī b. Sulaymān (d. c. twelfth century) enhances the reliability of this report.46 Others accused him of mocking the memorization of the Qurʾan47 and charged him with being a Manichean.48 The background to these charges may have been the prominence of non-­Muslim, particularly Christian, officials in Kūfa during that time.49 Luke Yarbrough notes in this regard a verse by the poet Ibn Nawfal al-­Ḥ imyārī which associates the allegations of Khālid’s Christian leanings with his administrative appointments.50

Aspects of non-­Muslim female agency The blemished reputation of prominent Muslim figures on account of their non-­ Muslim maternal upbringing, along with reports such as the one about Khālid al-­Qasrī’s Christian mother and his resulting controversial, if not abhorrent, policies, are useful for thinking about perceptions of non-­Muslim motherhood. They are indicative of a broader set of values that link behavioral features with maternal upbringing in general, and of the negative influence non-­Muslim mothers were thought to have on their children. As wives and mothers, tied to their natal groups and affiliated in various degrees to their non-­Muslim religious communities, non-­Muslim women possessed notable cultural mediating capacities. Women’s presence in religiously mixed families was a matter of concern already in late antique Jewish and Christian sources. From a Jewish perspective, the matrilineal principle, whereby a person’s Jewishness is determined through the mother, renders Jewish affiliation a biological quality, inscribed in the newborn once it emerges from the womb (or perhaps already in the process of its making within it).51 Under circumstances of mixed marriages, the principle would allow the securing of the newborn’s future membership in the Jewish community, irrespective of its father’s religious affiliation. Yet whereas the matrilineal principle ascribed the mother a passive significance, a passage in the Palestinian Talmud regarding the Palestinian rabbi Elisha ben Abuya (d. c. first half of the second century ce) is premised on the idea that the mother who carried the fetus in her womb also bears responsibility for its religious identity.52 Here, Elisha’s heretical inclinations

45  Al-­Balādhurī, Jumal, 9: 63. 46 Gismondi, Maris Amri et Slibae de patriarchis nestorianorum commentaria, 1: 66. 47  Al-­Isfahānī, Ag̲hāni, 19: 62–3. 48  Ibn al-­Nadīm, al-­Fihrist, 2: 803–4. 49 Yarbrough, Friends of the Emir, 59. 50 Ibid. 51  Koren, “The ‘Foreskinned Jew’, ” 436; see also Cohen, “The origins of the matrilineal principle in rabbinic law.” 52  See Rubenstein, “Elisha ben Abuya: Torah and the sinful sage,” 146.

142  Female Power and Religious Change are seen as deriving from his mother’s actions during a crucially formative stage in his life: “His mother, when she was pregnant with him used to pass by houses of idolatry and she smelled of that thing, and that smell penetrated her body like the venom of a snake.”53 Further rabbinic apprehensions regarding the potential negative impact of non-­Jewish women are premised on the scriptural teaching in Exod. 34: 16: “And you will take wives from among their daughters for your sons, and their daughters who prostitute themselves to their gods will make your sons also prostitute themselves to their gods.”54 The verse speaks of the danger in marrying daughters of the non-­Jewish inhabitants of the Land of Israel, who are bound to entice their Jewish husbands towards idolatry.55 Whereas early rabbinic ideals underscored the necessity of separation between Jewish women and non-­Jewish men, reflecting along the way a notable leaning on matrilineal agency, early Christian teachings sought to curtail non-­Christian female influences by cementing principles of gender hierarchy. References to non-­Christian women in apostolic literature, for example, were heavily couched in the notion of female subordination, whereby men were exhorted to prevent women from teaching or having “authority over men”; they are to “keep silent” (1  Tim. 1: 2). Their submission to men was paralleled to the submission of the church to Christ and of Christ to God (Eph. 5: 24; Col. 3: 18; 1 Cor. 11: 3). At the base of these urgings stood an ancient hierarchy, according to which women were to submit to the authority of their husbands. This ancient hierarchy was now extended, whereby women were “to worship and to know only the gods that her husband believes in.”56 Similar apprehensions to those expressed in early Jewish and Christian normative sources can be seen with regard to non-­Muslim female threats to the religious integrity of their Muslim relatives. In contrast to images of female subordination, dependency, and disposition towards male authority and convictions, there is much to suggest the ability of women to influence the religious integrity of their spouses and children, to the extent of compromising it. We have already come across ʿUmar I’s comment about the seductive qualities of non-­Muslim women in the context of early Muslim–­non-­Muslim marriages (Chapter 3). Around the late eighth century, the Abbasid governor of Mosul Musā b. Muṣʿab (r. 166–7/783–4) is reported to have issued a decree resonating with ʿUmar’s earlier notion. Its objective was to locate Muslims who had married Syrian women, most likely Christians, and assimilated among the local Aramaic peoples. Whether it was due to their union with Syrian women that Muslim men were now indistinguishable

53 yḤ ag 2. 77b. 54  See also Deut. 7: 4. 55  Cohen, “The origins of the matrilineal principle in rabbinic law,” 22. 56 Plutarch, Praecepta conjugalia, 2: 311, 140: 19.

The Liminal Position of Women  143 from the indigenous population of al-­Jazīra, the decree does not disclose, yet the reference to the practice and the state of affairs in tandem seems instructive.57 In order to further assess the mechanisms by which non-­Muslim women were in a position to undermine the religious integrity of their Muslim family members we must enter the domicile; its internal court, kitchen, dining room, and even its bedrooms.58 Viewed through the lens of Islamic legal discourse, these different venues afforded a variety of instances in which non-­Muslim women were able to introduce ideas and practices that were considered hazardous in the eyes of the jurists. It is in this vein that we should read al-­Shāfiʿī’s requirement that the non-­Muslim woman cleanse herself prior to sexual intercourse with her Muslim husband: If a Christian woman who is married to a Muslim became clean at the end of her period (her menstruation came to its end), she should be compelled to perform the major ritual ablution (ghusl). If she refrains (from doing so), she should be disciplined until she does. [This is] since she is obstructing him (her husband) from having intercourse with her in a time it is permitted to him . . . he is forbidden to go to his wife unless she cleanses herself from menstruation and cleanses with water, . . . as for the washing from “major ritual impurity” (janāba), he is allowed to have intercourse with her while in a state of ritual impurity . . . [but] she is commanded to perform the major ritual ablution [before intercourse] and obliged to do so also when she is defiled by filth and smoke.59

Whereas the first part of al-­Shāfiʿī’s instruction, namely the cleansing following menstruation, is a common requirement, irrespective of a woman’s religious affiliation, the second part highlights a consideration unique to relations with non-­ Muslim women, namely, their intrinsic ritual impurity.60 Although the Muslim husband is allowed to have intercourse with his Christian wife even if she is ritually impure, the concern over her contact with elements taken from her ritual practices is evident. Further indication of preoccupations with the ritual needs and practices of non-­Muslim female spouses can be gathered from al-­Shāfiʿī’s position regarding their freedom to attend their houses of worship or consume forbidden foods: [H]e (a Muslim husband) can prevent her (his wife) from [going to] church and going out to the [Christian] festivals, and for other [purposes] than this for 57 Chabot, Chronicon anonymum Pseudo-­Dionysianum, 2: 256; discussion in Penn, Envisioning Islam, 142–3; Sahner, Christian Martyrs under Islam, 34. 58  See also Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 189; Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 442–5, 448–9, 452–5. 59  Al-­Shāfiʿī, Kitāb al-­umm, 5: 660, ch. 25; see also Maghen, “Strangers and brothers.” 60  See also al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 46–7, ch. 22 (nos. 112–13).

144  Female Power and Religious Change which she wishes to go out. If he may prevent the Muslim [wife] from going out to a mosque and he is just (in doing so), he may prevent the Christian from going to church . . . He can also prevent her from drinking alcohol because it drifts her mind, and from eating pork if he might be defiled by it.61

These questions resurface in Ibn Ḥ anbal’s responsa. In addition to questions as to whether a Muslim can forbid his Christian wife from drinking wine and going out to church, Ibn Ḥ anbal was also asked whether he could forbid her from bringing a cross into the house.62 Like al-­Shāfiʿī, Ibn Ḥ anbal was confined to the limitations of Islamic law when it came to restricting non-­Muslim female practices. Yet unlike his teacher, he offered no reasoning that would allow a Muslim husband to prevent his wife from consuming wine. As for her going to church, his explanation for preventing her from doing so rested on the general principle of a husband’s right to restrict the movement of his wife outside the home. Yet whereas the ability of jurists to curtail non-­Muslim practices within the private sphere were quite limited, their concern with them seems evident. Some indication of the reason for this concern can be extracted from an exchange between two of Ibn Ḥ anbal’s contemporaries: “Muhannā (i.e. ibn Yaḥyā al-­Shāmī; d. 248/862) asked Abū ʿIṣām (Rawwād b. al-­Jarrāḥ al-­ʿAsqalānī; d. unknown) about the harm of the woman drinking wine, to which he said: ‘If she drank it may drop into the child’s body.’ ”63 The fear of a forbidden food entering the body of the Muslim child was of course pertinent to the question of safeguarding its religious identity. It constitutes part of additional Islamic legal references to the prospect of ­forbidden foods in religiously mixed households.64 Of special note is their treatment in the Mālikī manual by Saḥnūn (d. 241/856)—the Mudawwana (“body of laws”)—regarding the dangers posed by the presence of a non-­Muslim woman in a Muslim household.65 The problem features here  through a question posed by  either Asad b. al-­Furāt (213/828) or  Saḥnūn to  Ibn al-­Qasim (d. 191/806), Malik b. Anas’s disciple.  Here, the scenario of a non-­Muslim mother’s custody over a Muslim child introduces us to the nature of Muslim concerns, although the proposed solution is markedly different: Regarding the child custody (ḥ aḍāna) of the mother, I said: “In your opinion, if her husband divorced her, when he is Muslim and she is Christian or Jewish, and she has small children, who has more right over her children?” He said: “She has more right over her children, and she is considered a Muslim woman with regard to her children, unless he (the husband) fears concerning her 61  Al-­Shāfiʿī, Kitāb al-­umm, 6: 20–1; see also Spectorsky, “Women of the People of the Book.” 62  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 354–5, ch. 184 (no. 994). 63  Ibid., 355. 64  See also al-­Ṭ ūsī, al-Istibṣār fī­mā ikhtalafa min al-­akhbār, 3.1: 179 (no. 652); Ibn Babawayh al-­ Qummī, al-­Muqniʿ wa-­l-­hidāya, 102; Freidenreich, “The implications of unbelief.” 65 Saḥnūn, al-­Mudawwana, 2: 300; discussed in Safran, “Identity and differentiation,” 583–4.

The Liminal Position of Women  145 (the mother) that a young female among them (the children) has reached the age of  maturity, that they (the children) will be unprotected (by the father’s guardianship).” I said: “This one (i.e., the mother) will have them drink wine and feed them pork, why then do you make her with regard to her children in the status of a Muslim woman?” He said: “She was already with him before he divorced her, and she could have fed them pork and wine if she wanted to. Yet if she wanted to do something like this, she should be prevented from it, but the children should not be separated from her. If there is concern that she will do [so after her divorce], she should be attached to people from among the Muslims, lest she does.” I said: “What is your opinion if she was a Zoroastrian whose husband embraced Islam, and she has small children and she refuses to embrace Islam, consequently the two were separated; who has greater right over the children?” He said: “The mother has a greater right. The Jewish, Christian, or Zoroastrian woman are all the same in this, like a Muslim woman.”66

The case at hand illustrates the implementation of two legal principles which were already noted in previous chapters: maternal child custody (ḥ aḍāna) in the event of divorce, and the Mālikī ruling which established that a child’s religious identity is based on that of its father. Under such circumstances, there appears to have been concern that the non-­Muslim mother of the children would feed them forbidden foods, a concern which should be seen within the broader interest of preserving the child’s religious identity.67 While Ḥ anafī jurists were willing to condone the custody of a non-­Muslim mother over Muslim children,68 both Ḥ anbalī and Shāfiʿī authorities objected to it. The latter based their objection on the very argument expressed in the passage above from the Mudawwana, namely that her disbelief endangered the child.69 It is, therefore, safe to surmise that the introduction of non-­Muslim practices in general, and food in particular, was considered hazardous from the standpoint of legal authorities. The focus on non-­ Muslim wives and mothers in this context suggests they were ascribed considerable means to compromise the religious integrity of their Muslim kinsfolk. Centuries later, similar questions were further addressed in Ḥ anbalī jurisprudence.70 Ibn al-­Qayyim ruled that a Muslim cannot prevent his non-­Muslim wife from the fast which is incumbent upon her, and from prayer to the east in his 66 Saḥnūn, al-­Mudawwana, 2: 359. 67  See also a fatwā from the Andalusī qadi Ibn Zarb (d. 380/991), regarding the non-­Muslim parental custody of a Muslim child, in al-­Wansharīsī, al-­Miʿyār, 2: 354. 68  Al-­Zaylaʿī, Tabyīn al-­ḥ aqāʾiq, 3: 49. 69  Al-­Shīrāzī, al-­Muhadhdhab, 2: 169; Ibn Qudāma, al-­Mughnī, 11: 412–13; discussed in Linant De Bellefonds, “Ḥ aḍāna,” EI2. 70  See Bosanquet, Minding their Place.

146  Female Power and Religious Change house; he cannot force his Jewish wife to violate the Sabbath and similar religious duties; and he should not prevent her from reading in her book, if she refrains from raising her voice.71 Ibn al-­Qayyim’s rulings highlight a subtle balance between the legal resources to which a Muslim man can resort in order to restrict his wife’s movement and behavior, and the non-­Muslim wife’s right to fulfill her spiritual needs.72 The fact of the matter remains, however, that like his predecessors, Ibn al-­Qayyim appears to have been conscientious not only about the implementation of patriarchal principles within the household but also about those pertaining to religious boundaries. For example, despite Ibn al-­Qayyim’s acknowledgment that a Muslim cannot prevent his wife from consuming alcohol, he advises him to ask her to wash her mouth before kissing her.73 It is in this context that we should also read into the reservations expressed by some Muslim jurists regarding marriage with kitābī women. These were partially grounded on the negative impact such women might have on their husbands and children, to the extent of apostasy.74 This, according to Mālik, is since the non-­Muslim wife, “eats pork and drinks wine, and he (her Muslim husband) has sexual intercourse with her and kisses her, whilst this (forbidden food) is in her. And she begets children from him and nourishes her child in accordance to her religion, and feeds him (her husband) forbidden foods and serves him wine.”75 The risky consequences that Mālikī jurisprudence ascribed to Muslim–­non-­Muslim marital relations and, even more so, to non-­Muslim maternal care have been understood with regard to early Islamic Iberian realities.76 Such realities, however, clearly indicated in jurisprudence across Sunni legal schools, suggest that non-­Muslim women were in a position to introduce their religious practices within Muslim-­dominated households. As El-­Leithy notes with regard to the non-­Muslim wives of converts to Islam who were employed in the Mamluk state apparatus: “unconverted women were the agents of pollution,” considered as links “for the transmission of religious and ethnic identities.”77 Questions regarding the various ritual practices which non-­Muslim women might carry out in the domestic sphere speak of the domicile as a distinct arena of female devotion. Non-­Muslim women were in a position to introduce both ritual practices as well as the objects that were required for their implementation. A brief account in ʿArīb b. Saʿd al-­Qurṭubī’s (d. 369/980) Ṣillat taʾrīkh al-­Ṭabarī (“An extension to al-­Ṭ abarī’s history”) offers a rare indication of the passage of a holy object across religious lines thanks to the intimacy of kinship ties. A Muslim who sought appointment in the Abbasid administration by winning the favorable influence of Christian officials attempted to draw their attention to his Christian 71  Ibn al-­Qayyim, Aḥ kām ahl al-­dhimma, 2: 441. 72 Bosanquet, Minding their Place, 255. 73  Ibn al-­Qayyim, Aḥ kām ahl al-­dhimma, 2: 439. 74  Tsafrir, “The attitude of Sunnī Islam toward Jews and Christians,” 329. 75 Saḥnūn, al-­Mudawwana, 2: 306. 76  Safran, “Identity and differentiation”; Fernández Félix, “Children on the frontiers of Islam.” 77  El-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion in medieval Cairo,” 258–9.

The Liminal Position of Women  147 ancestral background. The Muslim noted an instance in which a cross fell out of  the sleeves of his Muslim grandfather, the vizier ʿUbayd Allāh b. Sulaymān (fl. 278–289/892–902) who served under caliph al-­Muʿtaḍid (r. 278–89/892–902). The vizier explained the strange occurrence in the habit of Christian women to place a cross in a man’s clothes without his knowledge.78 A possible context for the practice reported in this anecdote was the personal nature of female cultic practices. These, we are reminded, were highly homebound.79 Under such circumstances, various objects, whether crosses, icons, lamps, oil or water from a shrine, and various embroidered designs, served to compensate for the lack of access to houses of worship and sanctuaries.80 Objects of this kind were often part of a woman’s personal property following matrimony. Marital arrangements recorded in the Nessana papyri, East Syrian law books, Geniza documents, and Muslim court records from Egypt and Palestine, include lists of personal items with which the bride would enter her new home.81 The detailed lists of marital gifts found in the Geniza, for example, mention not only jewelry, clothing, furniture, bedding materials, and other household utensils but also books.82 Their introduction, particularly those bearing cultic imageries and designs, into the Muslim household was not merely a means for expressing religious sentiments, but also a highly personal form of contact with sacred objects. The observable signs of religious segregation, spatial demarcation, and gender hierarchy that were characteristic of houses of worship, sanctuaries, and pilgrimage sites, were hardly enforced, if it all, within the domicile, facilitating numerous opportunities for cross-­cultic experiences. Under Mamluk rule, the dangers of such unsupervised mixings would prompt confiscation initiatives on the part of government officials in search of “remnants of Christianity in the womenfolk of converts.”83

Syncretic consequences The concerns of Muslim jurists with the presence of non-­Muslim women in Muslim households, due to their enduring ties with their non-­Muslim communities and relatives, as well as the introduction of non-­Muslim practices appear especially justified when considered against references to the syncretic upbringing of children of Muslim fathers and Christian mothers. Some indication of this upbringing can be gleaned from another question that the priest Addai referred to Jacob of Edessa 78  Al-­Qurt ˉ̣ubī, Ṣ illat ta’rīkh al-­ Ṭ abarī, 164; discussed in Fiey, Chrétiens syriaques sous les Abbassides, 120. 79 Herrin, Unrivalled Influence, 61. 80  See Smith, “Material Christianity in the early medieval household.” 81  See Chapter 1; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, 29, 114; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 125, 128. 82 Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 364–93. 83  El-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion in medieval Cairo,” 198.

148  Female Power and Religious Change regarding the appropriateness of a priest instructing Muslim children in the event of severe pressures on the part of their father.84 Jacob allowed this, not merely in consideration of the priest’s wellbeing, but also because of its benefit. Indeed, if  we accept Jack Tannous’s highly plausible suggestion to consider this as an instance of religiously mixed parenthood of a Muslim father and a Christian mother, we can also view Jacob’s position in alignment with that of his contemporary, the West Syrian patriarch Athanasius of Balad (r. 63–6/683–6).85 The contents of the patriarch’s encyclical letter resonate with ecclesiastical attempts to minimize the damaging effects of marriages between Christian women and non-­ Christian men. Athanasius made no attempt to conceal his discomfort towards these women, yet at the same time appears to have realized the limits of his power. He, therefore, offered a solution that would allow retaining them and their children within the Christian fold: wretched women mingle anyhow with the pagans (ḥ anpe) unlawfully and indecently, and all at times eat without distinction from their sacrifices. They are going astray in their neglect of the prescriptions and exhortations of the apostles who often would cry out about this to those who believe in Christ, that they should distance themselves from fornication, from what is strangled and from blood, and from the food of pagan sacrifices, lest they be by this associates of the demons and of their unclean table. . . . [R]eprimand them, warn them, especially the women who unite with such men, that they should abstain from the nourishment of their sacrifices, strangled (flesh), and their illegal commerce; that they should try also, with all their force, to baptize their children that they had through their unions with them (the pagans). If you are able, those who behave in a complete Christian manner, do not hinder them from participation in the divine mysteries, [if] only on account of [the fact] that they had united with pagans openly and visibly.86 

Athanasius was clear: the association of Christian women with non-­Christian men was unlawful, indecent, and a critical breach of communal boundaries.87 In this sense, he was merely reiterating the positions of his apostolic and ecclesiastical predecessors. Future ecclesiastical leaders would make similar claims and 84 Lamy, Dissertatio, 158. 85  See Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 443. 86  Letter of West Syrian patriarch Athanasius of Balad in 64/684: Nau, “Littérature canonique syriaque inédite,” 128–9; tr. partially taken from Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 148–9. 87  On the suggestion that the pagans referred to here were Muslims, see Zellentin, The Qurʾan’s Legal Culture, 7. Cf. Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 148–9. Robert Hoyland rightly notes that the term ḥ anpe (pagans) would denote Muslims only in the late eighth century, yet at the same time is inclined to believe that “Muslims were uppermost in Athanasius’ mind.” Although acknowledging the ambiguity in Athanasius’ original meaning, Michael Penn draws our attention to the fact that in later versions of the letter, ambiguity was removed by a replacement of “pagans” with “Hagarenes,” thus providing a clear indication of reference to Muslims: Penn, “Monks, manuscripts, and Muslims,” 244–6.

The Liminal Position of Women  149 issue similar admonishments against a phenomenon that appears to have continued for centuries. At the same time, Athanasius’s letter should also be read in light of the enduring ties between Christian women who entered into matrimony with non-­Christian men and their natal Christian communities. The patriarch’s request of his clergy, that they should encourage these women to maintain a Christian way of life and bring up their children in a Christian manner, cannot but indicate that such women submitted to ecclesiastical authority. Moreover, should these women comply with ecclesiastical instructions, they were not to be hindered from attending Christian congregational service. Yet of particular relevance to the present discussion is the manner in which Christian women who were married to non-­Christian men were to secure the Christian upbringing of their children, namely through baptism. Centuries later, Muslim parents are recorded as seeking baptism for their children.88 Around the mid-­twelfth century, a synod headed by the West Syrian patriarch John of Mardin (r. 520–60/1126–65) included a canon that instructed that the baptism of Muslim children be performed in a separate baptismal font than the one for Christian children and on a different day: In the case of the children of Muslims (mašlmāne), . . . we carefully order you and speak to you with an apostolic commandment that there is no authority from God for priests to baptize them with the children of believers and in our holy font. Instead, let them have a different baptism, apart, on a different day, either before or after, in ordinary [i.e., non-­consecrated] water.89

Around the same time, Michael the Syrian reported an incident that took place in  the first half of the eleventh century, whereby the Byzantine authorities ­baptized three West Syrian bishops “in the water [with which] they had baptized Muslims.”90 And Bar Hebraeus cited in his Nomocanon an eighth-­century canon warning priests against the practice of baptizing non-­Christians. Whereas these instances may suggest the endurance of a Christian practice among societies that had long forgotten their Christian origins, in other instances we may attribute the baptism of Muslim children to their Christian mothers.91 It is partially in this regard that Eric Dursteler brings to light the stories of non-­Muslim women who converted to Islam under early Ottoman rule, one of whom was Maria Gozzadini from the Greek island of Milios. Maria was a Christian woman who converted to  Islam around the turn of the sixteenth century. Despite her conversion, she “continued to live very devotedly as a Christian,” baptizing and subsequently 88 See Hasluck, Christianity and Islam under the Sultans, 31–4; Vryonis, Decline of Medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor, 487–9; Taylor, “The Syriac baptism of St John.” 89 Vööbus, Synodicon, 375, 246 (Syr.)/376, 259–60 (Eng.): canon 25. 90 Chabot, Chronique, 3: 144. Discussed and translated to English in Taylor, “The Syriac baptism of St John,” 446–7. 91  Taylor, “The Syriac baptism of St John,” 436.

150  Female Power and Religious Change raising her children as Christians. Her case serves to exemplify the role of women in the retention of non-­Muslim cultic practices in Muslim-­dominated social ­settings.92 It resonates ecclesiastical exhortations from the early Islamic period that were directed towards Christian women who married outside the fold, to raise their children in a Christian manner. At the same time, it further affirms the retention of Christian cultic practices among Muslim families, owing to the clandestine Christianity of female members.

Conclusion The lives of the women that feature in this book were governed by two primary sets of normative principles—­religious and patriarchal. These further entailed an insistence on communal boundaries, the prioritization of God over kin, and a gender hierarchy that endowed male family members with notable authority and control over their female relatives. Such restrictions, however, rendered the ability of non-­Muslim women to undermine the coherence of communal affiliations particularly remarkable. As wives of Muslim men and mothers to Muslim children, non-­Muslim women were subject to a considerable amount of suspicion on the part of communal agents and were often held responsible for the introduction of ideas and practices that compromised the religious integrity of their Muslim kin. These notions are well attested in diverse literary works, most notably legal, biographical, and genealogical. They point to a variety of instances in which non-­Muslim women were perceived as dangerous through the introduction of forbidden foods, ritual practices, objects, and even their mere presence. To a notable degree, these perceptions resulted from the unique liminal positions of non-­Muslim women as they partook in two overlapping circles of communal and kinship affiliation. The charges that were directed towards Ṣafiyya bt. Ḥ uyyay, accusing her of retaining ties with her Jewish kinsfolk, although perhaps a mere literary device, were couched in concrete notions regarding the durability of kinship ties across religious lines. The fact that Ṣafiyya was a convert to Islam rendered similar suspicions towards non-­Muslim women even more realistic and substantiated. Non-­ Muslim women were anticipated to maintain ties with their non-­Muslim natal groups and communities, acting as links, if not mediators, between families and communities. These were not mere anxieties, or uncertainties, resulting from the presence of figures of mixed affiliations. The sources of syncretism in the context of Near Eastern family life can be traced back, at least in some cases, to the practices of non-­Muslim women in Muslim households. 92 Dursteler, Renegade Women, 79–80.

The Liminal Position of Women  151 This chapter has drawn attention to liminality as one of the primary sources of female agency in religiously mixed families. It therefore referred not only to the thresholds of communal boundaries as spheres of considerable negotiation between religious and kinship affiliations but also to the crucial place of women in their midst. As already noted in Chapter 2, kinship ties were not only instrumental in processes of cultural transmission but were often perceived as efficient proselytizing resources. The next chapter turns to discuss women’s conversion to Islam and their ability to draw others to their new religion thanks the very patriarchal system that restricted their choices.

5 Female Conversion to Islam Religious Defiance and Feminine Resistance

On the day of the conquest, Hind bt. ʿUtba embraced Islam, as well as Umm Ḥ akīm bt. al-­Ḥ ārith b. Hishām, wife of ʿIkrima b. Abī Jahl, the wife of Ṣafwān b. Umayya, (and) al-­Baghūm bt. al-­Muʿadhdhal of the  Kināna, and Fāṭima bt. al-­Walīd b. al-­Mughīra, and Hind bt. Munabba b. al-­Ḥ ajjāj, who is Umm ʿAbdallāh b. ʿAmr b. al-­ʿĀṣ, among ten women from Quraysh. They went to the Messenger of God at al-­Abṭaḥ , whereupon they pledged allegiance to him and entered his presence, while with him were his wife and his daughter Fāṭima, as well as women from among the women of the Banū ʿAbd al-­Muṭtạ lib. At this point Hind bt. ʿUtba spoke and said, “O Messenger of God, praise to Allah who has granted victory to the religion (aẓhara al-­dīn) which He chose for Himself, so that I be granted your mercy. O Muhammad, I am a woman who believes in Allah and affirms (her belief).” She then unveiled and said, “Hind bt. ʿUtba.” And the Messenger of God said, “Welcome.” . . . (upon the pledging of the other women and the bestowing of the Qurʾan) . . . the Messenger of God said, “I do not shake the hand of women, for my word to a hundred women is the same to one.”1 One could see the account in Kitāb al-­maghāzī (“Book of expeditions”) about the  conversion to Islam of a group of Meccan women making its way to the front  pages of some of the leading tabloids of our own time. The list of female Companions it records comprises a star-­studded cast whose name and fame would come to dominate numerous aḥ ādith, biographical, historiographical, and jurisprudential narratives. These are some of the heroines of early Islam, who serve to exemplify Islamic ideals of religious piety, communal commitment, and family life. Their conversion to Islam, specifically its procedure, meaning, circumstances, and ramifications vis-­à-­vis other family members, was to offer guidance and inspiration to future generations of Muslim women. Such details not only applied to social realities far beyond those of seventh-­century Arabia but also

1  Al-­Wāqidī, Kitāb al-­maghāzī, 2: 850–1.

Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East. Uriel Simonsohn, Oxford University Press. © Uriel Simonsohn 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.003.0006

154  Female Power and Religious Change allow some insight as to the social conventions, arrangements, and dynamics that were conceived by their narrators. Similar to the act of marrying outside the fold, conversion to Islam was also met with negative responses. Both scenarios speak of instances of a female agency that was manifested through defiance. In both cases, non-­Muslim women behaved in a manner that conflicted with their membership in non-­Muslim communities. Yet their defiance was with respect not only to their communities but also to their kin. The present chapter considers female religious conversion to Islam not merely as an act of religious change, but as one that defied patriarchal conventions. Female apostates were not only violating a sacred pact, but as wives, daughters, and sisters they were also acting counter to the authority of their husbands, fathers, and brothers. Despite communal expectations, however, female defiance did not always result in the severance of kinship ties, but rather in the conversion to Islam of additional family members, many of them male, speaking of the proselytizing agency of female converts as one that prevailed over patriarchal authority.

Late antique prototypes Stories about female converts in late antiquity herald some of the features of early and medieval Islamic narratives. For example, the biography by John Rufus (d. c. 518) of the renowned anti-­Chalcedonian theologian Peter the Iberian (d. 491) relates the conversion to Christianity of Eugenia—­a Jewish girl from an aristocratic family from Tyre, who later also became a nun in a monastery near Caesarea in Palestine.2 The brief account highlights three crucial phases in the life of the convert: living in error, responding to the missionizing call of a holy man, and religious conversion followed by a change in mode of living. The radical steps taken by Eugenia were exemplary and were undoubtedly fashioned in a manner that served the edifying objectives of Peter’s biography. Yet we should also pay attention to the few gendered features to which the story alludes, namely the significance of Eugenia’s step in the context of patriarchal restrictions, her renunciation of material security, and her choice of celibacy. In patriarchal societies, where a woman’s commitments and choices were supervised by her male patrons, Eugenia’s choice was much more than a mere shift in religious affiliation.

2 Rufus, The Lives of Peter the Iberian, Theodosius of Jerusalem, and the Monk Romanus, 227–9; discussed in Mann, “Book of Palestinian halachic practice,” 12; Rosen, “An apostate Jewess from Tyre”; Kofsky, “Observations on Christian-­Jewish coexistence,” 441. Cf. Newman, The Ma‘asim of the People of the Land of Israel, 106; Newman concedes that Eugenia’s mother was Jewish, but argues she was not perceived that way, but as a pagan; the point has already been made in Juster, Les Juifs dans l’empire Romain, 2: 49, n. 1. Newman concludes that Eugenia’s deceased father was most likely a pagan.

Female Conversion to Islam  155 Her sacrifice and gain were made clear and as such presented as an example for those who were to follow her path. Another side to female conversion, also in a late antique Christian setting, can  be seen in a woman’s ability to draw additional converts. Admittedly, our information about the career of Melania the Elder (d. 410) derives from Western sources. Yet her conversion to Christianity and adoption of an ascetic life, first in Egypt and later in Palestine, brings to the fore the image of a woman whose choices were not so far removed from those of her Near Eastern female counterparts.3 Of particular interest, however, is the choice of five of her relatives to join the Christian fold, a development that speaks highly of Melania’s impact.4 Likewise, we can imagine that Monica, Augustine’s Christian mother, must have had a similar influence on her son thanks to her enduring patience with her pagan husband.5 In other instances, Christian mothers are seen serving the same cause by taking a more active stance, protecting their Christian children from the anger of their non-­Christian fathers.6 At the same time, from an early Christian standpoint, it was precisely owing to their submissive place that women were endowed with an exceptional capacity to guide their infidel husbands towards the right belief (1 Peter 3: 1–6). Their presence in the household possessed a mediating quality that would introduce the church to those outside it.7 The biographies of the female Companions of the Prophet appear to have been premised on similar notions as those underlying stories of early female converts to Christianity. In both cases we are dealing with fictional snapshots of realities conceived of as feasible from the perspective of those who transmitted, recorded, and narrated them. These are stories about women whose characteristics were valorized for the sake of other women who faced similar conflicts between their religious and kinship sentiments in different times and places. They suggest yet another sphere in which women possessed crucial agency for affecting change within their families, as they drew their children and husbands towards con­form­ ity with their own religious inclinations.

Female conversion to Islam in biographic narratives Conversion to Islam, particularly in the tribal context of seventh-­century Arabia, was bound to have meant something very different from the spiritual experiences 3 On Melania the Elder bringing about the conversion of family members, see also in Meyer, Palladius: The Lausiac History, 134–6. See also Brown, “The patrons of Pelagius”; Wilkinson, “The Elder Melania’s missing decade.” On the careers of Eastern Christian female holy women, see Harvey, “Women in early Syrian Christianity”; Brock and Ashbrock, Holy Women of the Syrian Orient. 4  Bodin, “La conversion au christianisme,” 3. 5 Augustine, Confessions and Enchiridion, 9: 19, p. 143. 6  Saint-­Laurent, “Images de femmes dans l’hagiographie syriaque,” 206. 7  MacDonald, “Was Celsus right?,” 176.

156  Female Power and Religious Change that were often used to describe the acts of exemplary figures of the early Christian movement.8 And while the present discussion is concerned with notions of conversion to Islam and its social ramifications in later centuries, perceptions of what it might have meant to ally with the Prophet and embrace his creed are crucial for our understanding of their literary manifestations. Conversion to Islam meant different things to different people, at different times, under different c­ ircumstances.9 As one scholar judiciously remarked, the act of religious conversion does not have an exact parallel in Classical Arabic.10 Thus, rather than imposing our own notion of religious conversion we should pay attention to the manner in which our sources define it and the meanings they assign to it. A useful starting point is the Qurʾanic specification in Q 60: 10, discussed in Chapter  2. The verse prescribes a test for women who seek to join the Muslim community: “O believers, when believing women come to you as emigrants, test them. God knows very well their belief. Then, if you know them to be believers, return them not to the unbelievers.” As we have seen, the Sīra, biographical reports, and exegetical discussions explained the revelation of this verse in relation to the migration of Umm Kulthūm to Medina at the time of the Ḥ udaybiyya treaty. Umm Kulthūm’s intention was to become a Muslim, an objective which she accomplished by leaving her pagan family, moving to a new location, soliciting the companionship of a male escort from the Banū Khuzāʿa, and pleading for the Prophet’s patronage. Yet whereas the risks and hardships that Umm Kulthūm endured constituted sufficient reason for her acceptance and sheltering within the early Muslim community in Medina, the absorption of future female converts was conditioned upon the Qurʾanic test. The purpose of the test was to verify the sincere intentions of these women by subjecting their belief to scrutiny. According to the Kufan traditionist ʿAṭiyya al-­Awfī (d. 110/729), women who wished to join the Muslim fold were to be asked to proclaim the shahāda. To this, al-­Māwardī added his interpretation of “God knows very well their belief,” as reference “to what is in their heart.”11 It is worth recalling here once again Ṣafiyya bt. Ḥ uyayy’s words in reply to Muḥ ammad’s proposition to either manumit her as a Jew or marry her as a Muslim: “O Messenger of God, I have embraced Islam and believed in you before you have called upon me . . . You have offered me the choice between disbelief and Islam.”12 As in the case of Umm Kulthūm, Ṣafiyya’s admission into the fold follows separation from her former coreligionists, an ideological (“I have joined

8  Munt, “What did conversion to Islam mean?” 9  See the recent overview and summary of scholarship on the topic in Hurvitz et al., Conversion to Islam in the Premodern Age, 1–30. 10  Watt, “Conversion in Islam at the time of the Prophet,” 34. 11  Al-­Māwardī, al-­Nukat wa-l-ʿuyūn, 5: 522. See also al-­ Qurṭubī, al-­Jāmiʿ li-­aḥkām, 20: 412; ­al-­Suyūṭī, al-­Durr al-­Manthūr, 14: 416. 12  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 119 (no. 4965).

Female Conversion to Islam  157 your journey”) and theological (“the choice between disbelief and Islam”) ­conviction, as well as an expression of sincere intent. Likewise, in the case of Maria, Muhammad’s Coptic concubine. The aspect of her belief serves to explain Muhammad’s preference of her over her sister. According to the account in Ibn ʿAbd al-­Ḥ akam’s Futūḥ Miṣr, Muhammad had the two girls proclaim the shahāda, whereupon Maria complied immediately and her sister only an hour later.13 These and similar precedents appear to have formed the basis upon which Muslim traditionists and jurists, as early as ʿAbd al-­Razzāq, showed interest in assessing the sincerity and commitment of women towards Islam. Referring once again to the time of the Prophet, ʿAbd al-­Razzāq cites a hadith according to which one of the members of the anṣār brought a slave girl to the Prophet to see whether she was a Muslim believer. Muhammad then tested her, asking her whether she  attests that there is no God but Allah, that Muhammad is His Messenger, and  whether she believes in the resurrection (al-­baʿth baʿd al-­mawt). Having responded affirmatively to all three questions, Muhammad ordered the Muslim master to emancipate her.14 In another instance, noted by ʿAbd al-­Razzāq, Muhammad tested a slave girl whether she also believed in the truth of heaven and hell.15 Lastly, in a third instance, Muhammad asked a different slave girl “where is your lord?,” to which she responded by pointing to the sky.16 There is no reason to assume that men had to demonstrate different forms of devotion, as, for  example, late tenth-­century Andalusī notary forms for conversion to Islam indicate.17 Yet a striking feature in the sample cases just noted is the dependence of female converts on their family members, communities, and most of all, on a variety of male figures. Their submission to male authority, whether that of their relatives, their masters, or the Prophet himself, suggests a different set of considerations in the course of conversion to Islam. Although the setting of the stories about the first female Muslims is that of the nascent Muslim community in Arabia, future generations of women would face similar challenges when it came to choosing between kinship and religious commitments.

The question of female conversion to Islam A common perception in modern scholarship is that women were less prone to convert to Islam than men. The assertion has been founded on two principal observations, namely the relatively meager evidence for the conversion of women and the limited motivation women were bound to have to go ahead with the act. Women, it has been argued, were primarily confined to the private domain. 13 Ibn ʿAbd al-­Ḥ akam, Futūḥ Miṣr, 120. 14  Al-­Ṣanʿānī, al-­Muṣannaf, 7: 175 (no. 16814). 15  Ibid. (no. 16815). 16  Ibid. (no. 16816). 17  Ibn al-­ʿAttār, Kitāb al-­wathāʾiq, 405–12; tr. and discussed in Jones, “Notarial forms,” 160–6.

158  Female Power and Religious Change They were thus more closely attached to their non-­Muslim kinsfolk, who were arguably in a position to deter them from a step entailing the severance of ties that constituted a source of considerable emotional and material support.18 In other instances, where a woman might be likely to convert in defiance of the inclinations of non-­Muslim family members, her conversion, alone, in the absence of male company or some familial support, entailed serious risks to her material and social wellbeing. While there is good reason to accept these arguments, and while it is impossible to measure the scope of women’s conversion to Islam, let alone compare it to that of men, the extant evidence, albeit mostly indirect, suggests that women’s conversion was not a minor phenomenon. Considered in their edifying capacity, the stories about Muhammad’s first female followers fulfill a role far more significant than mere folktales of moral and historiographical value. In fact, their historicity aside, the details of these stories seem to exceed their particular setting, assuming relevance to the lives of women centuries ahead. As already noted by Gertrude Stern, in a pioneering essay about the first generation of women converts to Islam, early biographical collections contain more than 350 accounts of such women.19 Varied in length and focus, these accounts speak of numerous women who chose to follow the Prophet of their own accord, either leaving behind husbands, parents, and siblings or drawing them to follow suit. Many of them are reported to have experienced hardships, trials, and suspicion, and all of them resorted to some form of male patronage. The relevance of these stories to societies outside Arabia, centuries after the death of the Prophet, becomes apparent in their incorporation in a vast body of Islamic legal materials dealing with the multifaceted nature of female conversion to Islam. The stories of Umm Kulthūm bt. ʿUqba and Ṣafiyya bt. Huyayy, discussed in previous chapters, offer examples of how narrative and law were integrated in order to address social situations that involved female conversion to Islam. Muslim jurists addressed the variety of legal ramifications of the phenomenon in a manner which often brought to life the images of early female exemplars, thus signaling their lasting memory and significance. The phenomenon of female conversion to Islam appears in Islamic jurisprudence in relation to a variety of concerns. A primary one was of course that of intermarriage, whereby jurists of all legal schools stipulated separation between the spouses in the event of the woman’s conversion. Variations as to how and when separation should occur, and its consequences for the couple’s children and

18 Goitein, Med. Soc. 2, 299–303; Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 11–12; Coope, “Religious and cultural conversion to Islam,” 60; Shatzmiller, “Marriage, family, and the faith,” 236–7; Zorgati, Pluralism in the Middle Ages, 67–9. Cf. on conversion as an empowering option for non-­Muslim women; el-­Leithy, “Coptic culture and conversion in medieval Cairo,” 80–3. On the improvement of property and conjugal rights through conversion: Shatzmiller, “Marriage, family, and the faith”; Dursteler, Renegade Women, 17; Baer, “Islamic conversion narratives of women,” 426–7. 19  Stern, “The first women converts.” See also Abbott, “Women and the state.”

Female Conversion to Islam  159 shared property, are where differences between the legal schools can be discerned. These have already been addressed in detail and are beyond the scope of the present discussion.20 Its elaborate treatment in Islamic jurisprudence, however, deserves our attention, suggesting that women were converting to Islam while tied in wedlock. Based on the precedents set by the Prophet and his Companions, Islamic legal regulations from the late eighth–­early ninth centuries onwards depict scenarios in which non-­Muslim women chose to embrace Islam, irrespective of their husbands’ choice to remain non-­Muslim.21 From a legal perspective, a woman’s choice to embrace Islam challenged principles of religious hierarchy, whereby Islamic law could not tolerate a social arrangement that placed a Muslim woman beneath a non-­Muslim man. This in itself might explain the considerable amount of discussion the problem has received in Islamic jurisprudence. Yet the issue held far greater consequences for the societies under consideration; a woman’s conversion to Islam was both an expression of religious defiance and of feminine resistance to patriarchal conventions. Her decision to convert at the cost of marital breakup seems remarkable, given her dependence on her male patron. In fact, the majority of Islamic legal regulations dealing with a woman’s conversion to Islam are discussed in relation to her male relatives. Questions arise as to whether a non-­Muslim father, brother, or son may escort such a woman outside the private domain; whether a non-­Muslim father can give her in matrimony; whether such a father can administer her property; and what is the nature of her relations with her non-­Muslim male siblings.22 Further indication of female conversion to Islam and its legal implications with regard to male patronage can be found in Jewish legal sources. Despite the legally warranted marital breakup, a handful of extant geonic responsa suggest Jewish husbands and Jewish women who converted to Islam remained in matrimony. A responsum from Natronai bar Rav Hilai Ga’on indicates that, although halakhic principles dictate the termination of kinship ties between the husband and his apostate wife and disallow sexual relations between them, the couple could have continued living together.23 The ga’on was asked about a man’s wife who apostatized and died. If she was bound to her husband, presumably at the time of her apostasy and death, can he claim her marriage contract and everything he gave her? The ga’on expressed the opinion that, since the woman apostatized, “she has made herself a forbidden object and [the husband] is prohibited 20  See Chapter 3. 21  Shatzmiller, “Marriage, family, and the faith,” 240; Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 163–4. See, e.g., ʿAbd al-­Razzāq, al-­Musannaf, 6: 67 (no. 10117); 7: 137 (no. 12711); al-­Shāfiʿī, Kitāb al-­umm, 6: 16, 9: 250–1; al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 178–80, ch. 89 (nos. 510–13; 184–5), ch. 92 (nos. 521–3); 186–8, ch. 93 (nos. 526–36; 189–95), ch. 93 (nos. 537–49). 22  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 138 (nos. 419–20, 422; 147), ch. 75 (nos. 416–19); 149–51 (nos. 424–6); Ibn Qudāma, al-­Mughnī, 4: 337–8, 12: 100; al-­Sarakhsī, Kitāb al-­mabsūṭ, 4: 11; al-­Khāṭib al-­Shirbīnī, Mughnī al-­muḥtāj, 4: 210; Saḥ nūn, al-­Mudawwana, 5: 496. 23 Lewin, Otsar, Ketubbot, 356, no. 790.

160  Female Power and Religious Change from having sex with her.” The husband may therefore seize what he has given her through the marriage contract.24 At the same time, however, the husband does not inherit her dowry, on the grounds that, following her apostasy, the woman is no longer “his nearest kin.” A similar legal problem features in a query addressed to Hayya Ga’on, from which we learn of a Jewish woman whose dowry included “fields, houses, and vineyards”; at some point after marriage she apostatized, whereupon her relatives and her husband claimed the property.25 Once again, it appears that the couple remained married, despite the woman’s apostasy. This is since the legal problem is concerned with who has the right to inherit her property, rather than whether she may hold on to her dowry in the event of divorce. In legal terms, her husband argued that her apostasy rendered her status the same as that of a dead person, thus making him the sole heir to her dowry. Yet the ga’on disagreed, stipulating that, being an apostate, the woman may “take everything which she had given to her husband through her dowry, even clothes and jewelry.” He further notes that, rather than being considered dead, the woman is in the status of an adulteress (zona), therefore ruling that her heirs, presumably members of her father’s household, inherit her dowry.26 A harsher tone emerges from a responsum attributed to ‘Amram Ga’on (head of the Sura academy; fl. 247–58/861–72), in which the apostate woman was declared far more than a grave sinner.27 Responding to the query whether the father of an apostate woman may claim her marriage contract, the ga’on ruled that the husband should inherit from his wife. At the same time, however, he also commented on the question of whether the husband should bury her: And even though the rabbis enacted (the principle) that her marriage contract is in exchange for her burial, that is he who buries a woman inherits her marriage contract, that one (i.e., the apostate woman) forfeited the right to a Jewish burial . . . an apostate woman who was taken as wife in a fitting manner and she herself had gone out of the community has forfeited the right to be buried among Israel.

24 See Lewin, Otsar, Qiddushin, 35, no. 89. See also Mosseri VII.178.1, Glick, Seride teshuvot, 275–6: a responsum attributed to Maimonides regarding evidence that would support the case of a Jewish woman who converted to Islam to claim her marriage contract through a qadi’s court. 25 Lewin, Otsar, Ketubbot, 356, no. 789. 26  See Hayes, “Palestinian rabbinic attitudes to intermarriage,” 19, 43. Hayes refers us to the Book of Jubilees and other Second Temple sources which treat forbidden sexual contacts between Jews and non-­Jews as zenut (lit. prostitution), i.e. illegal or inappropriate. This type of sin is ­perceived to be generating moral impurity and genealogical pollution. Hayes further notes that “in relation to lay Israelites, only unconverted Gentile women are zonot (women outside the bounds of legal marriage) because of their (presumed) commitment to idolatry.” See also Hayes, Gentile Impurities, 172. 27  See Lewin, Otsar, Qiddushin, 35, no. 90.

Female Conversion to Islam  161 A rare reference to the conversion to Islam of a Jew in Baghdad confirms the ­scenarios noted in geonic responsa, whereby in some instances Muslim women and non-­Muslim men led a conjugal life despite the unambiguous Islamic position on the matter. This is a brief passage from Ibn Rajab’s (d. 794/1392) Kitāb al-­dhayl ʿalā ṭabaqāt al-­ḥanābila (“The book of the appendix to the generations of Ḥ anbalī [scholars]”), citing the Baghdadi historian Ibn al-­Qādisī (d. 632/1235):28 Ibn al-­Qādisī noted in his Taʾrīkh: there was a Jew in Baghdad who was ­married to a Muslim woman and impregnated her with two children. The Jew, however, was afraid, whereupon he embraced Islam. Then the jurists assembled and issued a legal opinion in his matter, saying (quoting the prophetic hadith): . . . “[conversion to] Islam nullifies what [was committed before it]” (al-­islām yajubbu ma qablahu).29

While direct references in the extant sources are hard to come by, the treatment of female conversion to Islam in Islamic legal compendia and geonic responsa allows us to think of the phenomenon in tangible terms. The problems that demanded the jurists’ attention highlight the religious, social, and gender ramifications of a woman’s decision to shift her religious affiliation. At the same time, the endurance of family ties across religious lines appears to resurface. Despite their conversion to Islam, questions pertaining to the relationships of female converts to Islam with their non-­Muslim relatives, whether these were economic (administration of property, inheritance, dowry, marriage contract), technical (marital procedures and commitments), or normative (guardianship), remained relevant.

Narrative depictions of female torments following conversion The legal dilemmas, uncertainties, and problems noted above serve to remind us of the scale of challenges women who sought conversion were bound to face in a social setting which required their dependency on male patronage. Female difficulties were anticipated in early Islamic narratives, mirroring the torments of kinship separation through the images of courageous ṣaḥ ābiyyāt. A particularly archetypal figure in this regard is that of Sumayya bt. Khayyāt (also known as Sumayya Umm ʿAmmār, wife of Yāsir b. ʿĀmir) who was a client of the Banū Makhzūm. According to a hadith in Ibn Abī Shayba’s (d. 234/849) collection, she was the only woman among the first seven people to have proclaimed Islam: 28 Muḥammad b. Aḥ mad b. Muḥammad b. ʿAli, Abū ʿAbdallāh al-­Qādisī al-­Kutbī, continuer of Ibn al-­Jawzī’s Muntaẓam. 29  Ibn Rajab, Kitāb al-­dhayl, 2: 68 (no. 237).

162  Female Power and Religious Change “The Messenger of God, Abū Bakr, Bilāl, Khabbāb, Ṣuhayb, ʿAmmār, and Sumayya Umm ʿAmmār.” Each one of them experienced some form of opposition and hardship from their relatives: The Messenger of God – his uncle (i.e., Abū Lahab) opposed him, Abū Bakr – his family opposed him, and the others were seized, adorned in coats of iron, and they left them to bake in the sun, till the exertion exhausted them, and they gave them what they asked for. Then, each one’s family brought a leather water skin and cast it by each one of them. Later, they were carried separately, except for Bilāl. At nightfall, Abū Jahl came and began reviling Sumayya, speaking in  an obscene manner (yarfuthu; specifically, towards a woman). Then he stabbed her and killed her, and she was the first martyr to die for the sake of Islam (wa-­hiya awwal shahīd ustushhida fī-­l-­Islām).30

Later biographies of Sumayya emphasize the fact that she was the first to die as a Muslim martyr and detail the sufferings she underwent prior to her death. According to her earliest biography, she converted to Islam early on in Mecca and “was among those who suffered for the sake of Allāh, pressed to turn away from her religion (dīn).”31 According to the entries in the collections of al-­Khaṭīb al-­ Baghdādī (d. 463/1071) and Ibn ʿAsākir (d. 519/1125), Muhammad offered consolation to her family: “Be patient, people of Yāsir, for you are destined to be in heaven.”32 Sumayya’s pioneering act of martyrdom, her torment, death, and the subsequent words of the Prophet appear time and again in the collections of Ibn al-­ Athīr (d. 606/1210) al-­ Nawawī (d. 675/1277), al-­ Mizzī (d. 741/1341), al-­ Dhahabī (d. 748/1348) al-­Ṣafadī (d. 764/1363), and Ibn Ḥ ajar (d. 853/1449).33 The story of Sumayya, albeit brief, was evidently deemed important enough to be included in biographical collections throughout the medieval Islamic period and beyond it. For the most part, the details of her life were transmitted without change, with special emphasis on the fact of her being the first to die for Allah and the reward that awaited her kinsfolk. The only gender-­related feature in the story about Sumayya shows up in the hadith, where the verb yarfuthu, denoting a form of obscene speech against women, is used to depict Abū Jahl’s verbal aggression. Otherwise, Sumayya is presented on the same level as those who first proclaimed Islam and were willing to suffer on account of their religious choices.

30  Ibn Abī Shayba, al-­Muṣannaf, 7: 12–13 (no. 33869). See also al-­Malaṭī, al-­Tanbīh, 103. 31  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 251 (no. 5039); Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Kitāb al-­istīʿāb, 2: 534–5 (no. 3397). See also Laḥḥām, Sumayya bt. Khayyat; Cook, Martyrdom in Islam, 14. 32  Al-­Khaṭīb al-­Baghdādī, Taʾrīkh madīnat al-­salām, 1: 487; Ibn ʿAsākir, Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq, 43: 360. 33  Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 152 (no. 7013); al-­Nawawī, Tahdhīb, 1.2: 37 (no. 30); al-­Mizzī, Tahdhīb, 21: 216, 423 (no. 4173); al-­Dhahabī, Siyar aʿlām al-­nubalāʾ, 1: 2880 (no. 4189); al-Ṣafadī, al-­ Wāfī, 15: 279 (no. 5190); Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 8: 189–90 (no. 11342).

Female Conversion to Islam  163 The story about Umm Sharīk al-­Dawsiyya, however, already takes us through the particularities of a woman’s path towards religious conversion. Umm Sharīk, Ghuzayya bt. Jābir b. Ḥ akīm al-­Dawsiyya (d. c. seventh century) is first mentioned in Yūnus b. Bukayr’s (d. 198/814) recension of the Sīra.34 Following her resolution to join the Prophet in Medina, she sought a male companion who would lead her through the desert. Perhaps owing to the pagan animosity towards the Prophet, the person chosen for the task was a Jewish man, though the plot would soon confirm the Qurʾanic objection towards taking Christian and Jews as allies (Q 5: 51). As the two camped out one night, Umm Sharīk asked the Jew for water, yet the latter responded with the condition that she first becomes Jewish. Umm Sharīk’s determination to persevere for the sake of God is then manifested for the first time as she proclaims: “By God, I shall never become Jewish after God has guided me to the Islamic faith.” Shortly after, she is awakened by the cool sensation of a water vessel that descended from the sky, allowing her to satisfy her thirst. In another version of the story, her earliest recorded biography, Umm Sharīk is captured by her husband’s family. They question her and upon her proclamation of Islam, they afflict her with a terrible torment: They placed me on a slow camel, [with] the worst and coarsest stirrups. They fed me bread with honey but did not provide me with even a drop of water, until midday when the sun became hot. While we were in the blistering heat, they descended, set up their tents, and left me in the sun till I lost my mind, and my senses and sight were gone. They did this to me for three days, whereupon they said to me on the third day: “Leave that which you are adhering to.” . . . [B]ut I did not know what they were saying, only word after word, whilst I pointed to the sky with my finger [proclaiming] the unity [of God].35

Umm Sharīk’s endurance and survival results in the subsequent conversion to Islam of her oppressors. According to another report, prior to her ordeal, Umm Sharīk attempted to draw additional converts from amongst the women of Quraysh.36 Her story speaks of a woman who was courageous enough to leave her family, her husband, and set out alone into the desert, placing her fate in the hands of a stranger in one story, and falling into captivity in another. The strength of her character is then amplified with details about her physical torments, and finally with an expression of uncompromising belief. This is a story that would 34  Yūnus b. Bukayr, Sīrat Ibn Isḥ āq, 264–5. 35  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 150 (no. 4978). 36  Al-­Iṣbahānī, Ḥ ilyat al-­awliyāʾ, 1: 3518 (no. 4112). Ibn al-­Athīr’s collection contains the story’s two versions, the one which includes the Jewish man in an entry devoted to Umm Sharīk and the one mentioning the people of Mecca in an entry devoted to her husband Abū al-­ʿAkr; Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 6: 222 (no. 6108); 7: 351 (no. 7488). The same two accounts also appear in Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥāba, 8: 416 (no. 12102). See also Ibn Abī Shayba, al-­Muṣannaf, 3: 562 (no. 17173); al-­ Shaybānī, Musnad al-­imām Aḥ mad b. Ḥ anbal, 45: 592 (no. 27621); al-­Nasāʾī, al-­Sunan al-­kubrā, 8: 167 (no. 8879).

164  Female Power and Religious Change serve in later centuries to authenticate the message of Islam and the veracity of Muhammad’s prophecy.37 Yet beyond its theological significance, Umm Sharīk’s trials were bound to spark the imagination of women whose conversion to Islam entailed risk and hardship. Although staged in an Arabian setting, the patriarchal restrictions and kinship ties to which Umm Sharīk was chained were not very different from those of women who lived centuries later in other Muslim-­ dominated regions. Her awe-­inspiring achievements, narrated time and again in biographical dictionaries of diverse provenance, were both empowering and reassuring.38 As we shall see in Chapter  6, perseverance and the suppression of emotions were commendable ideals in Islamic biographies of the early believers with regard to moments of religious conflict. The example of Umm Ḥ abība bt. Abī Sufyān is relevant here as well. It speaks of an early female convert to Islam who displayed exemplary fidelity towards the Prophet and his message, initially participating in the little hijra, shortly afterward enduring life with an apostate husband, and later, when back in Medina, keeping a distance from her pagan father: She embraced Islam in Mecca and migrated to Abyssinia with her husband ʿUbayd Allāh b. Jaḥsh, who converted to Christianity in Abyssinia, where he also died. She refused to convert to Christianity and remained firm in her Islamic faith. While she was in Abyssinia the Prophet married her . . . it is said (also) that the Prophet married her in Medina. [According to a report from Muslim b. al-­Hajjāj (d. 261/875),] Abū Sufyān (her father) asked the Prophet to marry her, to which he responded favorably. And this is considered [to be] from Muslim’s imagination, since the Prophet married her while she was in Abyssinia, before Abū Sufyān embraced Islam. When Abū Sufyān came to Medina, before the conquest (of Mecca), when Quraysh attacked the Khuzāʿa and violated the pact with the Prophet, he was afraid and came to  Medina to renew the pact. He entered upon his daughter Umm Habība, but she did not allow him to sit on the Prophet’s bed, saying “you are an infidel (mushrik).”39

Umm Ḥ abība’s life next to a husband who converted to Christianity and a pagan father draws attention to the challenges facing Muslim women in general and recent female converts in particular, who continued living or retained ties with non-­Muslim family members. Her story should be seen alongside similar ones 37  Al-­Bayhaqī, Dalāʾil al-­nubuwwa, 6: 123–4. 38  See also Simonsohn, “Female conversion to Islam,” 13–14. 39  Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 115–16 (no. 6924); see also ʿAbd al-­Razzāq, al-­Muṣannaf, 7: 169–71 (nos. 12646–7); 10: 94–8 (no. 4961); History of al-­Tabari, 8: 164; al-­Dhahabī, Siyar aʿlām al-­nubalāʾ, 2: 1700 (no. 2081); Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 8: 142 (no. 11191).

Female Conversion to Islam  165 about female Companions who sustained their piety and spiritual devotion, and even drew others to join them in religion, despite the pressures, or mere presence, of their non-­Muslim kinsfolk. Such ideals feature also in the account of Umm Sulaym bt. Milḥ ān al-­Anṣāriyya (d. c.30/650), the mother of the Companion Anas b. Mālik (d. 90–2/709–11): Her husband came to her after being absent and asked her: “Have you had an affair?” She replied, “I did not, but I believe in this man (i.e. Muhammad).” She said, “I began to instruct Anas (her son),” she guided him: “say there is no god but Allah, say I testify that Muhammad is the messenger of God”, which he did. His father said to her: “Do not corrupt my son,” to which she answered: “I am not corrupting him!” Then Mālik Abū Anas set out and came across an enemy who killed him. When the news about his killing reached her, she said: “Indeed, I shall not wean Anas until he lets go of the breast while still alive, and shall not marry until Anas orders me”. He used to say (as an adult man): “I have finished what she has,” and he let go of the breast, whereupon Abū Ṭ alḥa asked for her in marriage while being an infidel, hence she refused. She then said to him: “Did you see the stone which you worship, does it harm or benefit you, or a tree which the carpenter forms for you, does it harm or benefit you?” He said that what she said has entered his heart. He went to her and said so and then believed. She then said, “I shall marry you but not take from you a dower except it (his conversion to Islam).”40

Umm Sulaym features in Islamic tradition as a model of rationality, piety, and most importantly, steadfastness.41 The above account portrays her in a variety of moments of religious and gender-­related conflicts and dilemmas. She is initially seen resisting the rebuking, perhaps even hostile, tone of her pagan husband, taking a pious stand which is magnified in the context of patriarchal arrangements. She then displays her maternal agency by raising her child in an Islamic way, instructing him, and attending to his nourishment in a manner that shields him from external influence. The child Anas, the second male figure in the account, being Muslim, is endowed with the patriarchal power his pagan father lacked, as he is endowed with the authority to decide when to let go of his mother’s breast and permit her to remarry. Finally, both Umm Sulaym’s qualities and her theological wisdom bring about the conversion to Islam of her second husband, Abū Ṭalḥ a.

40  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 396 (no. 5400). See also ʿAbd al-­Razzāq, al-­Muṣannaf, 6: 179 (no. 10417); al-­Tayālisī, Musnad, 3: 533–4 (no. 2168); al-­Nasāʾī, al-­Sunan al-­kubrā, 5: 215 (no. 5478); Ibn ʿAbd al-­ Barr, Kitab al-­istīʿāb, 2: 584–5 (no. 3573); Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 345 (7471); Ibn al-­Mustawfī, Taʾrīkh Irbīl, 2: 246 (no. 85); Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 8: 408–11 (no. 12077); idem, Tahdhīb al-­tahdhīb, 12: 471–2 (no. 2954). 41  See Giladi, “ ‘Ṣabr’ (steadfastness) of bereaved parents.”

166  Female Power and Religious Change The manner in which gender-­related themes and religious difference coalesce in this account is noteworthy. Although it clearly highlights the unique aspects of female religious fidelity, it also underscores how kinship roles can be utilized in a symbolic manner to advance religious ideals.

The proselytizing agency of female converts Images of female converts as agents of proselytization vis-­à-­vis various family members are not a rare sight in Islamic literary and legal sources. A rather well-­ known example is the story of the conversion to Islam of caliph-­to-­be ʿUmar b. al-­Khaṭt ạ̄ b following that of his sister Fāṭima. The account in the Sīra begins by noting that Fāṭima and her husband had concealed the fact of their conversion from ʿUmar.42 As the pagan ʿUmar was on his way to confront the Prophet, he was informed of his sister’s conversion. Shortly afterwards, he finds his sister, her husband, and the aforementioned ṣaḥ ābī Khabbāb b. al-­Aratt engaged in reading the Qurʾanic sura Ṭā Hā. ʿUmar confronted his sister and the men, accusing them of having converted to Islam. As he was about to assault his brother-­in-­law, Fāṭima came to her husband’s defense and as a result took a blow from ʿUmar. The latter was filled with remorse once he realized his sister’s wound, a phase in the plot that marks a turn in events: ʿUmar becomes interested in the Qurʾanic text and asks to read it. His sister, who “had hopes that he would become a Muslim,” asked her brother to first purify himself. As he reads the page he becomes impressed by its contents (“How fine and noble is this speech”). The exclamation is followed by ʿUmar’s encounter with the Prophet and embracing of Islam. The account suggests that it was thanks to Fāṭima that ʿUmar ended up converting to Islam: ­initially by drawing ʿUmar’s attention thanks to her conversion, then by softening his heart following her demonstration of fragility, and finally, by introducing him to Islamic ritual (purification) and its scriptural messages. The manner in which the events unfold highlight Fāṭima’s agency as gender-­specific. ʿUmar’s aggressive tone and Fāṭima’s apologetic position correspond to their social places. Yet it is within the frame of their respective hierarchies that Fāṭima manages to influence her brother and eventually bring about his conversion. To an extent, it might be argued that Fāṭima’s physical weakness was compensated for by her perseverance. She overcame her brother’s assault, not to mention insult, remaining focused on her proselytizing agency. It was also perseverance and communal commitment that motivated Umm Sulaym’s condition to Abū Ṭalḥa. Her agency consisted of displaying steadfastness in the face of her first pagan husband and subsequently drawing her second pagan

42  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 1: 370–2; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 156–7.

Female Conversion to Islam  167 husband to Islam. Islamic biographical collections contain several cases in which pagan men like Abū Ṭalḥ a surrendered to the demands of female Companions that they first convert to Islam before they marry them.43 In contrast to Muslim men featuring as rulers, warriors, or religious scholars, by whose hands conversion to Islam took place forcefully or voluntarily, proselytizing women appear to resort to a different set of powers.44 Among the better-­known literary representations of female power are those that show up in romantic contexts, whereby emotional attachment, seduction, and sexual attraction constitute effective means of proselytizing. Seen from a non-­Muslim standpoint, the thirteenth-­century Coptic martyrdom of John of Phanijōit suggests that perceptions of female erotic power were not limited to Islamic narratives.45 John, a flax merchant from Old Cairo, is portrayed being seduced by a Muslim woman and subsequently converting to Islam. Female seduction in an attempt to convert a Christian protagonist is further attested in the Martyrdom of St Michael the Sabaite (c. mid-­ninth century), where the Christian martyr not only resists conversion despite the advances of the caliph’s wife but also condemns the Islamic attempt to draw converts in through sexual temptation.46 In contrast to the story of Michael, however, that of John of Phanijōit is one of female success, namely the male protagonist’s inability to resist temptation and his conversion as a result. The trope is an old one, going back to biblical, classical rabbinic, and early Christian stories about the seductive powers of female religious others who attempt to draw pious figures towards apostasy.47 For example, the mechanism by which Gentile women were in a position to lead Jewish men astray is suggested in 43  See, e.g., Umm Qays in al-­Isbahānī, Maʿrifat al-­ṣaḥāba, 1: 3547–8 (no. 4159); Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 380 (no. 7564); Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 8: 454 (no. 12215); Sawda, among the migrants of the little hijra, in Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 42–3 (no. 4933). See also Umm Hakīm and Zaynab bt. Muḥ ammad, discussed below. 44  On the alluring qualities of non-­Muslim women and their proselytizing agency, see El Cheikh, Women, Islam, and Abbasid Identity, 83. Early Islamic reluctance toward intermarriage may have been founded on notions like the one attributed to the caliph ʿUmar I (r. 634–44), who ascribed a dangerous lure to non-­Muslim women: History of al-­Tabari, 12: 159. An anecdote in the Kitāb al-­diyārāt (“Book of the monasteries”), attributed to Abū al-­Faraj al-­Iṣfahānī (d. 356/967), tells of the failed attempt of a Christian slave girl to bring about the apostasy of a Muslim ascetic who had fallen in love with her: al-­Iṣfahānī, Kitāb al-­diyārāt, 48–52; Cook (tr.), “A monk’s conversion to Islam,” 152–5; discussed in Kazhdan, Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, s.v. “Forty-­two martyrs of Amorium”; El Cheikh, Women, Islam, and Abbasid Identity, 7. On the diyārāt literature and similar stories, see also Kilpatrick, “Monasteries through Muslim eyes”; Sizgorich, “The dancing martyr.” For similar suggestions by the thirteenth-­century English chronicler Mathew Paris regarding Jewish women, see Tartakoff, Conversion, Circumcision, and Ritual Murder, 26. 45  See Decobert, “Le martyre de Jean de Phanidjoit”; MacCoull, “Notes on the martyrdom of John of Phanijoit”; Zaborowski, The Coptic Martyrdom of John of Phanijōit. 46 See Peeters, “Passion de S.  Michel”; Vasiliev, “Life of St Theodore”; Schick, Christian Communities, 174–5; Griffith, “Michael, the martyr”; Griffith, “Christians, Muslims, and neo-­martyrs,” 172–83; Vila, “Christian martyrs,” 160–77; Swanson, “Christian al-­Maʾmūn tradition,” 69–86; Sahner, Christian Martyrs under Islam, 127–30. 47 Zaborowski, The Coptic Martyrdom of John of Phanijōit, 19.

168  Female Power and Religious Change the Babylonian Talmud, recounting the story about the second-­ generation Palestinian sage (tana) Rabbi Tsadoq who was tempted by a non-­Jewish noblewoman to have sex with her.48 In order to overcome his mental weakness (“My heart is weak and I am incapable”), the woman offered him forbidden food. Excluding the sage’s eventual refusal to consume the food that was offered to him, the entire scene is couched in the immorality surrounding the relationship between a Jewish man and a non-­Jewish woman on account of the terrible temptations that accompanied it.49 Although motivated by different didactic objectives, such stories serve to illustrate perceptions of female proselytizing agency. Yet unlike their Christian and Jewish literary counterparts, the Muslim female protagonists of medieval compositions of fiction take on a more assertive stand vis-­à-­vis non-­Muslim men. A case in point is the medieval pseudo-­Wāqidī’s Futūḥ al-­Shām (“History of the conquest of Syria”). Franz Rosenthal characterized it as “a novelistic elaboration of the edifying theme of the Muslim conquest of Syria, of which the basic materials are certainly medieval,”50 thereby lending greater significance to the literary choices of its author than to the historical facts it claims to report. The women featuring in Futūḥ al-­Shām often appear as fierce advocates for Islam following their conversion. For example, the wife of the Byzantine commander Romanus engages in a loud argument with her husband to the amusement of the Muslim general Khālid b. al-­Walīd (d. 21/642). The woman, who converted to Islam following a dream she had about an encounter with the Prophet, threatened to seek divorce unless her husband converts as well, yet soon discovered that her husband had already converted.51 In another instance, the Christian daughter of the Byzantine lord of Aleppo is reported converting to Islam, subsequently prompting the son of the lord of the nearby town of ʿAzāz to do the same and win her hand in marriage. Her extraordinary character is further developed as she has her new husband assassinate her Christian father.52 Similar portrayals intensify in medieval Arabic popular literature, such as in the infamous Arabian Nights and popular epics (sīra), where Muslim warrior women are seen overcoming their non-­Muslim adversaries in battle. Their image is imbued with a combination of exceptional beauty, physical strength, and outstanding combat skills. Once converted to Islam, their defeat of their male opponent results in the latter’s conversion as well. Once again, in some cases the warrior girl ends up killing her non-­Muslim parents.53 While clearly fictional and rich in literary motifs, designed to draw interest and inspire awe on the part of their readers (or auditors), the juxtaposition of female 48  bQid 40a. 49  See also Calderon, A Bride for one Night, 85–90; Levinson, “An-­Other woman.” 50 Rosenthal, “Fiction and reality,” 13. See also Shoshan, The Arabic Historical Tradition, 13, ­suggesting the Crusades as a plausible context of the composition. 51  Al-­Wāqidī, Kitāb futūḥ al-­shām, 1: 21. 52  Ibid., 1: 186. 53 Kruk, The Warrior Women of Islam, 26. See also Christie, “Noble betrayers of their faith”; Christie, “Fighting women in the crusading period.”

Female Conversion to Islam  169 gallantry and conversion to Islam suggest a didactic agenda. The authors of stories that valorized the achievements of female combatants in the Arabian Nights made sure these were on the “right” side of the religious divide at the cost of reversing gender roles. Their story is about courage, power, and the triumph of Islam, manifested through their own conversion and that of their male counterparts. Like the female Companions of the Prophet, or the women presented in Futūḥ al-­Shām, popular fiction narratives ascribed women considerable proselytizing agency. Centuries later, Ibn al-­Qayyim would sanction cohabitation of a Muslim woman with her non-­Muslim husband beyond the usually prescribed ʿidda, although without having sexual intercourse.54 Under such circumstances, Ibn al-­Qayyim argued, the power shifts to the woman as she is now in control of the marriage bond, possessing the ability to break it at any given moment. Yet more importantly, owing to the endurance of the marital bond and the affection between husband and wife, Ibn al-­Qayyim anticipated the eventual conversion of the non-­Muslim husband.55 Returning to Umm Sulaym’s example, her biography is also helpful for thinking about the maternal agency of female converts to Islam. As she teaches her son to recite the shahāda from infancy, resists her husband’s attempt to interfere with his upbringing, and insists on breastfeeding Anas till he lets go of her breast, Umm Sulaym displays not only uncompromising devotion but also a unique power thanks to her maternal role. We have already noted the ability of non-­ Muslim mothers to introduce non-­Muslim practices into a Muslim-­dominated household. Under reversed circumstances, however, we should also consider the role of Muslim mothers to impact the religious identity of their children. As we have seen in Chapter 3, a consensus appears to have been shared by most Sunni legal scholars regarding the principle which determined a child’s Muslim identity based on that of either his father or mother. According to the minority opinion held by Mālikī jurists, a child becomes Muslim following his father’s Islam only. In response, we find a rather instructive opinion from al-­Māwardī, who argued for the decisive role of the mother in determining the child’s identity. Al-­Māwardī explicated that the Mālikī opinion is wrong since while the child is merely supposedly (ẓannan) from its father, it is in certainty (yaqīnan) from its mother. Therefore, if the child may be considered Muslim based on his father, this is all the more so based on its mother.56 Al-­Māwardī’s argument finds resonance in that of the Ḥ anbalī Ibn Qudāma cited in Chapter 3, according to whom the mother takes precedence in determining the child’s Muslim identity on the same grounds. Al-­Māwardī and Ibn Qudāma’s observations are useful for thinking about the religious agency of female converts to Islam vis-­à-­vis their children. The intimacy and the biological bonds that tie mothers to their children constitute 54  Bosanquet, “The kitābī wife’s conversion to Islam,” 194. 56  Al-­Māwardī, al-­Ḥ āwī al-­kabīr, 14: 246.

55  Ibid., 205.

170  Female Power and Religious Change considerable means for drawing the latter to the Muslim fold at an early stage of their life. We should not underestimate the significance of these theoretical deliberations. A rare testimony of a Jewish woman’s conversion to Islam and the anticipated Islamic identity of her daughter is found in a letter to the girl from her Jewish father—­Ṭoviyya ben Moshe—­written around 431/1040.57 The writer is known from other documents preserved in the Geniza as a Karaite scholar of Byzantine origin who was an official in the Fatimid administration in Egypt and Palestine.58 He writes to his daughter, who was with her mother, that he is a man of means and would like to support her, yet she needs to decide: “Are you with the Jews who are of your father’s race, or with the race of your mother, with the Gentiles?” As Moshe Yagur rightly observes, Ṭoviyya’s question is indicative of a child’s choice to follow the religion of either one of its parents in circumstances of religiously mixed families. One could see how stories about the conversion of the first generation of Muslim women and its effect on their non-­Muslim family members could be relevant to the concerns of women such as Ṭoviyya’s renegade wife. While the extant sources do not offer direct evidence for the utility of biographical accounts in the lives of Muslims in later periods, their incorporation in legal compendia for purposes of legal reasoning and illustration are indicative of the enduring memory of their protagonists and their exemplary roles.59 The simultaneous literary codifications of legal and biographical materials during the late eighth–­early ninth centuries suggest some affinity between them, both in content and objective. As in the cases of Umm Kulthūm bt. ʿUqba and Ṣafiyya bt. Ḥ uyayy, those of the Companion Umm Ḥ akīm and the Prophet’s daughter Zaynab serve to illustrate how legal principles pertaining to the position of female converts vis-­ à-­vis their families resonated with biographical lore. The events surrounding their conversion echo the attributes of agency already discussed. Their marriages to husbands who did not convert with them at first are given as examples of marriages that remained intact since the husbands ended up converting within the ʿidda. At the same time, their cases are frequently referred to in Islamic jurisprudential materials of all Sunni schools, reaffirming the vitality of their moralistic value. 57  CUL. Or. 1080 J21; Gil, Palestine, 2: doc. 293. It has been previously argued that the woman was originally a Christian who converted to Judaism and later reverted. See De Lange, “Jews and Christians in the Byzantine Empire,” 31. Yet the use of the term goyim (Gentiles) has been argued by Goitein to refer to Muslims in Goitein, Palestine during its Arab and Crusader Periods, 264. Goitein’s proposition is that the mother and her sister were originally Muslim and were later taken as captives by the Byzantines to Constantinople, where they were bought by local Jews as slave girls and subsequently converted to Judaism and married Jews, one of whom was Ṭ oviyya. At some point, however, Ṭ oviyya’s wife reverted to Islam and moved to Egypt, taking their daughter with her. Cf. Yagur, “Religious identity and communal boundaries,” 261–2. I am inclined to accept Yagur’s assertion that the woman was not a convert to Judaism, but an original Jewess who converted to Islam. 58 Ankori, “Correspondence”; Gil, Palestine, nos. 938–9; Rustow, Heresy and the Politics of Community, 262–4. 59  On legal contents of female biographies, see Afsaruddin, “Islamic biographical dictionaries,” 30.

Female Conversion to Islam  171

Zaynab bt. Muhammad As would be expected, the earliest reports about Zaynab are found in the Sīra. Her marriage with a pagan is a well-­known affair in Islamic tradition. Zaynab had married the Qurayshī merchant and nephew of Khadīja, Abū al-­ʿĀṣ b. al-­Rabīʿ (d.  12/634) and remained with him in Mecca until shortly after the Hijra, whereupon she migrated with her father to Medina. The Sīra’s narrative reflects an acknowledgment of the complicated arrangement during the time in which the couple cohabited in Mecca: “Islam had made a division between Zaynab and her husband Abū al-­ʿĀṣ, but they lived together, Muslim and unbeliever.”60 Following the Battle of Badr in 2/624, Abū al-­ʿĀṣ was taken captive by the Muslims while Zaynab was still in Mecca. It was thanks to kinship ties, we may presume, that her father agreed to release Abū al-­ʿĀṣ from captivity: When the Meccans sent to ransom their prisoners, Zaynab sent the money for Abū al-­ʿĀṣ; with it she sent a necklace which Khadīja had given her on her marriage to Abū al-­ʿĀṣ. When the Messenger of God saw it his feelings overcame him and he said: “If you should like to let her have her captive husband back and return her money to her, do so.” The people at once agreed and they let him go and sent her money back.61

At this point, however, Abū al-­ʿĀṣ was still a pagan and it was only following an unpleasant business trip to Syria that he finally pledged allegiance to the Prophet and embraced Islam: [S]hortly before the conquest (of Mecca), Abū al-­ʿĀṣ went to Syria trading his own money and that of Quraysh . . . Having completed his business, he was on his way home when one of the apostle’s raiding parties fell in with him and took all he had . . . Abū al-­ʿĀṣ went into Zaynab’s house under cover of night and asked her to give him protection. She at once did so.62

According to a tradition cited in Abū Bakr al-­Khallāl’s (d. 310/923) compendium of Ibn Ḥ anbal’s responsa, Zaynab intervened in favor of her husband by reminding her father of the pact between the Muslims and their dependents: “O Messenger of God, is it not that the pact (ʿahd) of the Muslims and theirs is one? . . . I testify that I had extended temporary protection (ajartu) over Abū al-­ʿĀṣ (in what pertains to his life and property).” To which Muhammad responded: “The people

60  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 2: 294; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 314; see also al-­ Wāqidī, Kitāb al-­maghāzī, 2: 554. 61  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 2: 295; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 314. 62  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 2: 296; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 316–17.

172  Female Power and Religious Change (i.e., the Muslims) have therefore left (him) alone.”63 Once Zaynab extended her protection over her husband, Muhammad was able to restore the lost property to him, which Abū al-­ʿĀṣ then distributed among his fellow Qurayshīs. With the property restored and the matter resolved to the satisfaction of all parties concerned, Abū al-­ʿĀṣ was ready to embrace Islam. The reports in the Sīra about Zaynab and the pagan Abū al-­ʿĀṣ highlight instances in which a woman was socially empowered thanks to her conversion to Islam. It was thanks to her communal membership and kinship ties that she was able to assist her husband on more than one occasion. While still in Mecca, Zaynab brought about her husband’s release from captivity by appealing to her father’s sentiments through the use of an object (Khadīja’s necklace) that appears to have softened his heart to the extent that he was willing to emancipate Abū al-­ ʿĀṣ. Later, when Abū al-­ʿĀṣ faced the unfortunate circumstances of plunder and subsequent loss of his partners’ merchandise, he was able to recover the property thanks again to his wife who not only vouched for his safety in Medina but also prompted the Prophet to resolve the problem. The narrative leads us to understand that Abū al-­ʿĀṣ converted to Islam after realizing the truth of the Prophet’s message. Yet one cannot ignore the context of his conversion and the events that ended in his favor thanks to his Muslim wife. We are thus given to understand that Zaynab’s conversion to Islam was the source of her empowerment vis-­à-­vis her community and her agency vis-­à-­vis her husband. After the Sīra, the story about Zaynab and Abū al-­ʿĀṣ was included in later biographical dictionaries.64 Its incorporation in Islamic legal narratives and principles suggests its relevance to social realties that were far removed from the one that unfolded in early Islamic Arabia. A question that was posed to Ibn Ḥ anbal by his son ʿAbdallāh is a case in point: I asked my father regarding a woman if she left Byzantium being a Muslim. To which he responded: “There are those who say that her husband has the greatest right over her as long as she was within the limits of the waiting period (ʿidda). Others say that if she left then that which is between them had been cut off and she has the greatest right over herself. And there are those who refer to the prophetic hadith, according to which he (Muhammad) returned his daughter to Abī al-­ʿĀṣ.” . . . (Following a chain of transmission:) He returned her during their first marriage (i.e., during the ʿidda), others say after two years, and some after three.65

63  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 182, ch. 90 (no. 518); see Yarbrough, “Ijāra,” EI3. 64  See, e.g., Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 33–4 (no. 4928); Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Kitāb al-­istīʿāb, 2: 527–8 (no.  3370); Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 130–1 (no. 6856); al-­Dhahabī, Siyar aʿlām al-­nubalāʾ, 2: 11–12; see also Ibn Ḥ anbal, Musnad, 3: 369 (no. 1876), 4: 195 (no. 2366); Abū Dāʾūd, Kitāb sunan, 3: 92 (no. 2233); al-­Tirmidhī, al-­Jāmiʿ al-­kabīr, 1: 434–6 (nos. 1142–4). 65  Al-­Khallāl, Ahl al-­milal, 180–1, ch. 90 (nos. 514–15).

Female Conversion to Islam  173 Whereas the passage speaks of the utility of the story in the Sīra for validating conjugal relations between a non-­Muslim husband and a Muslim woman, for other jurists the marriage between Zaynab and Abū al-­ʿĀṣ, and more importantly its endurance despite Abū al-­ʿĀṣ’s paganism, presented a challenge. According to the Sīra, Zaynab would have converted around 621, shortly before the Hijra, whereas Abū al-­ʿĀṣ converted after the Battle of Badr in 2/624, perhaps even a few years later. In fact, Muslim jurists have offered varying opinions, proposing different time gaps between Zaynab’s and Abū al-­ʿĀṣ’s conversions. The contradiction between a situation in which the Muslim Zaynab remained in matrimony with the pagan Abū al-­ʿĀṣ on the one hand, and the stipulated divorce beyond the ʿidda on the other, required explanation. According to Abū Ḥ anīfa, for example, the couple remained married after Zaynab’s conversion and “it was therefore made necessary that she would be forbidden to him on account of Islam, whether he embraced Islam after her or he did not embrace Islam.”66 Zaynab’s later migration to Medina is presented in this line of reasoning as an indication of the couple’s separation, whereby Abū al-­ʿĀṣ would remarry her only after his conversion to Islam.

Umm Ḥ akīm The legal complexity surrounding Zaynab and Abū al-­ʿĀṣ’s marriage is often expounded by reference to the parallel cases of the female Companions Umm Ḥ akīm bt. al-­Ḥ ārith b. Hishām and Baraza bt. Masʿūd b. ʿAmr al-­Thaqafī, who both converted to Islam on the day Muhammad seized Mecca, while their husbands remained infidels.67 Umm Ḥ akīm’s earliest biography offers little detail about the events surrounding her conversion to Islam. Ibn Saʿd provides a brief account of her, mentioning the fact that she embraced Islam on the day of the conquest of Mecca while she was married to ʿIkrima b. Abī Jahl, after which she went to the Messenger of God and swore allegiance to him.68 Despite the relatively meager attention she receives in biographical notices, Umm Ḥ akīm is a well-­ known figure. According to the report in al-­Ṭabarī’s Taʾrīkh, after converting to Islam, Umm Ḥ akīm asked Muhammad to issue her pagan husband, who had fled to Yemen, an assurance of safety, to which he agreed. She then went after ʿIkrima, all the way to Yemen, from where she brought him back to Muhammad. According to al-­Ṭabarī, “people relate” that in Yemen, ʿIkrima was preparing to sail to Abyssinia. Yet before boarding the ship, the captain demanded that he first

66  Al-­Māwardī, al-­Ḥ āwī al-­kabīr, 9: 259. Discussed also at 14: 29, 259, where the explanation offered is founded on an initial permission to Muslim women to marry non-­Muslim men. 67 Friedmann, Tolerance and Coercion, 193. 68  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 249 (no. 5034). See also Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 321 (no. 7413).

174  Female Power and Religious Change declare his loyalty to the one God and repudiate any other, at which point ʿIkrima embraced Islam.69 Whereas hadith reports offer a similar sequence,70 the story was told differently following its incorporation as a proof (dalīl) in legal principles. Here, the slightly modified version presents ʿIkrima’s conversion to Islam as being in response to Umm Ḥ akīm’s proselytizing endeavor. Thus, in a hadith recorded in Mālik’s Muwaṭtạ ʾ (“The well-­trodden path”): According to Mālik, Ibn Shihāb reported that Umm Ḥ akīm bt. al-­Ḥ ārith b. Hishām was married to ʿIkrima b. Abī Jahl. She embraced Islam on the day the Muslims returned to Mecca in triumph. Her husband ʿIkrima fled that very day as a result of Islam’s victory, taking refuge in Yemen. Umm Ḥ akīm set out after him, finally catching up with him there, and she urged him to embrace Islam, so he did. He went to the Messenger of God in that same year. When the Messenger of God saw ʿIkrima, he welcomed him warmly, going out to greet him without even first bothering to put on his cloak. ʿIkrima shortly thereafter pledged his loyalty to him. The marriage of ʿIkrima and Umm Ḥ akīm continued without interruption.71

It is this sequence of events, in the course of which Umm Ḥ akīm plays a decisive role in her husband’s conversion, which forms the basis for subsequent legal deliberations and principles.72 As in Zaynab’s case, here too Umm Ḥ akīm’s example serves the purpose of illustrating an instance in which the wife converts to Islam before her husband, yet the marriage remained intact. The line of argument articulated in related legal discussions is also the same, namely since Umm Ḥ akīm’s husband ended up converting within the ʿidda, there was no need for separation.73 Zaynab’s and Umm Ḥ akīm’s recurring appearance and treatment in hadith, fiqh, and ṭabaqāt compositions over centuries of Islamic intellectual activity, in different parts of the medieval Islamic world, are direct testimonies to the vitality of their exemplary images in Islamic thought and discourse. Yet it is the relevance of literary and documentary sources to social realities that renders their images valuable for assessing female agency roles in the context of conversion to Islam. Like their fellow ṣaḥ ābiyyāt, the stories of Zaynab and Umm Ḥ akīm were about figures whose pious deeds were deemed worthy to recount. At the same time, the social dilemmas they faced given their husbands’ delayed conversion served as 69  History of al-­Tabari, 8: 180. 70  See, e.g., al-­Ṭ abarānī, al-­Muʿjam al-­kabīr, 17: 371–3 (nos. 1018–21); al-­Ḥ ākim al-­Naysābūrī, al-­ Mustadraq, 3: 269–72 (nos. 5055–62). 71  Mālik b. Anas, Muwaṭtạ ʾ, 2: 545 (no. 46); Eng. tr. in al-­Muwaṭtạ ʾ, 489–90 (no. 1709). 72 See also ʿAbd al-­Razzāq, al-­Muṣannaf, 7: 170 (no. 12646); al-­Bayhaqī, al-­Sunan al-­kubrā, 7: 302–6 (nos. 14064 ff.). 73  Al-­Shāfiʿī, Kitāb al-­umm, 5: 665–6, 8: 647, 9: 252; al-­Māwardī, al-­Ḥ āwī al-­kabīr, 9: 259; Saḥnūn, al-­ Mudawwana, 2: 299–300; Ibn Qudāma, al-­Mughnī, 9: 346–8; Ibn Qayyim al-­Jawziyya, Aḥ kām, 2: 653.

Female Conversion to Islam  175 useful case studies for jurisprudential discussions which were meant to guide Muslim conduct in later centuries. Both cases present women who possessed meaningful agency vis-­à-­vis their spouses thanks to their membership in the Muslim fold. In both instances we find them initially securing the safety of their husbands and attending to their wellbeing through their connections to the Prophet. And it is on the basis of the social benefits that they were able to extend to their pagan men that the latter ended up embracing Islam. The intersection of religious change and social power was crucial for their achievements, signaling the social empowerment of religious conversion in general and its effect on the patriarchal balance in particular.

Conclusions Full answers as to why and under which circumstances women converted to Islam in the early and medieval Islamic periods seem out of reach. The difficulty stems predominantly from the nature of the extant sources that refer to the phenomenon. For the most part these consist of either stories and accounts whose historical kernel is difficult to ascertain, or legal principles and positions of highly theoretical nature. Nonetheless, the scope and detail of these sources suggest a real phenomenon and while its size is impossible to measure, there is good reason to think that women’s conversion to Islam was not as marginal as previously thought. Yet this chapter has been an attempt to go beyond the historical question of female conversion and focus on its meanings and consequences. More importantly, it has been an attempt to reconstruct the agency that women possessed vis-­à-­vis their family members as a result of their conversion, in particular their agency for bringing about the conversion of their family members thanks to their place within their families. By considering narratives about the female Companions of the Prophet and establishing their enduring memory across time and space, the discussion in this chapter highlighted perceptions and expectations of female agency in moments of conversion to Islam. Some of the biographies of first-­generation women converts to Islam portray them enduring the hardships resulting from family breakups, social ostracism, and hostility, to the extent of physical violence, on the part of relatives. In other instances, we find these women socially empowered and consequently in a position to draw others towards Islam. Their images highlight their commitment, survival, resourcefulness, and strength in moments of tension between kinship and community, between their old sentiments and their new allegiance to Islam. Read next to stories about early Christian women, we observe a similarity in conflicts and opportunities, underscoring similar circumstances of gender-­based arrangements. Accordingly, female conversion to Islam should be understood not only in the context of religious change but also in the context of patriarchal

176  Female Power and Religious Change restrictions. Different forms of agency were enlisted in different moments. Under circumstances of distress, resulting from the hostile attitudes of former coreligionist family members, agency presented itself by means of faith, as in the cases of Sumayya and Umm Sulaym, or alliance with a new male patron, as in the cases of Umm Sharīk, and previously Umm Kulthūm. Conversely, moments of social empowerment following conversion to Islam afforded opportunity, whereby gender hierarchy was reversed and Muslim women were presented proselytizing their pagan relatives, as in the cases of Umm Sharīk with respect to her oppressors; Umm Sulaym with respect to her son and future husband; and Zaynab and Umm Ḥ akīm with respect to their spouses. And although of legendary nature, the seductive qualities of Muslim women that feature in Christian martyrologies should be read while keeping in mind the significance of emotional attachments. These did not only appear in contemporary Islamic folktales but were also instrumental in biographical narratives as driving forces behind the conversion of pagan men following their wives during the time of the Prophet. While the accounts surveyed in this chapter offer different social scenarios and portray women resorting to different forms of social capital, it is mostly their ability to defy patriarchal authority that stands out in moments of religious conflict. At the same time, there is a strong sense of authorial approval of female defiance and of the reversal of gender hierarchies, as these are presented serving a superior ideal, namely conversion to Islam. It should be noted, however, that similar capitals were enlisted for opposite purposes as well. Whereas the cases presented here served to encourage conversion and proselytizing, in the following chapter we turn to explore literary instances that present women resisting conversion as well as preventing others from it.

6 Precarious Gatekeepers Female Power and Religious Conflict

According to the West Syrian patriarch and historian John of Ephesus (d. 586), the Sasanian monarch Khosrow I (r. 531–79), shortly after his capture of Dara, gave orders to select “two thousand virgins” from the Christian captives of the city, “full-­grown, and of perfect beauty.”1 He further gave orders that these women were to be brought before him, “adorned in everything like brides . . . and sent as a present to the barbarians who dwell in the heart of his territories, and who are called Turks.” These young women were then escorted by troops in order to be handed over to the Turks. The historian leaves little doubt as to the misery of the young women, who were in “deep grief, not only because of their separation from their fathers and brothers, and other relatives, but also because of their souls, which would be lost by their removal from Christian instruction.” The image of the helpless captives is clear. As such, it amplifies the magnitude of their resolve to remain together and resist their terrible fate by resorting to the little agency they had left: They hastily therefore conferred with one another, and said, “Let us all understand, that when, in company with the heathen, we have polluted ourselves with their heathen ways, and impure meats, and horseflesh, and things that have died or been strangled, and have lost our Christianity, we must still finally all die, and go to the judgment of doom. Whereas now we are all sisters, and Christians, and the daughters of Christian parents: let us not, then, separate from one another, but with one will and one soul and one mind, let us all firmly hold to one purpose, and before our bodies are defiled by the barbarians, and our souls polluted, and death finally overtake us, let us now, while our bodies are still pure, and our souls free from heathenism, in the Name, and trusting to the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, offer unto Him in purity both our souls and bodies, by yielding ourselves up now to death, that we may be saved from our enemies, and live for evermore. For it is but the pain of a moment which we have to endure in defense of our Christianity, and for the preservation of our purity in body and in soul.” And upon these words, they all firmly united in one purpose and secret

1  John of Ephesus, Ecclesiastical History, part 3, bk. 6, 398–1. Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East. Uriel Simonsohn, Oxford University Press. © Uriel Simonsohn 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.003.0007

178  Female Power and Religious Change covenant; and having pledged themselves to one another by a solemn oath, they all in a body threw themselves into the river, and were drowned, and so escaped the hands of the barbarians; nor was there any one who did not cheerfully embrace this resolution.

Torn away from their families, enslaved by an Iranian army, and about to be turned over to barbarian hands, the torment of the Christian women at the center of this account stems from separation from their families and the loss of Christian instruction. They now fear the defilement of their bodies by non-­Christian men. They seem helpless, and indeed they are, in more than one respect. Nonetheless, they are still in possession of their will and bodies. And it is through their spir­it­ ual kinship, as sisters and daughters of Christian parents, that they are able to offer relief to one another, taking charge of their fate by collectively committing suicide. They choose to prioritize their faith over worldly life, preserving their purity through death, rendering their bodies as sites of a spiritual resistance to an abhorrent mixing with non-­Christians. The late antique and Christian settings of this narrative remain relevant for thinking about women in religiously mixed kinship arrangements in the early and medieval Islamic periods. Considered in its didactic context, the legendary motifs of the story remind us of the anxieties of religious authorities about the religious integrity of their coreligionists and of their particular concern with women in moments of religious conflict. At the same time, they serve to highlight some of the contingent features of female power and its significance for advancing religious agendas. This chapter follows directly from the previous one, focusing its attention on women’s agency in moments of religious conversion. Yet rather than exploring a woman’s ability to bring about the religious conversion of others, the present discussion focuses on her capacity to resist it. The chapter considers literary works of diverse genres and religious backgrounds that present women as possessing the means to retain their religious identity and to safeguard that of their children, spouses, and siblings. These works also vary in context and reasoning. Whereas in some instances we find a woman preventing a family member from crossing religious lines in accord with patriarchal conventions, in others she is seen overcoming gender limitations and even assuming a superior position vis-­à-­vis her male counterpart. Although seemingly contradictory, both kinds of depictions stem from a perception of women as inherently precarious. Next to circumstances in which women are seen operating inside the limits of their precarity thanks to their gender-­assigned roles within the family, we see their endeavors met with success following their adoption of male-­associated qualities. In both instances we are once again reminded of the edifying objectives of the narratives at the center of our discussion. As such, they offered women mental inspiration and normative guidelines that would allow them to retain religious fidelity within the parameters of patriarchy.

Precarious Gatekeepers  179

A precarious state As already noted in Chapters 2 and 3, religious differences within the household were a source of both danger and opportunity from the perspective of religious authorities. Accordingly, early ecclesiastical positions were premised on the assumption that men were able to draw their wives to their religious side, a feature that may explain their notable focus on Christian women marrying outside the fold.2 At the same time, ecclesiastical positions also reflect a particular concern with the religious integrity of Christian women as the consequence of life together with non-­Christians. A canon issued in the synod of Isaac in 410 convened at Seleucia-­Ctesiphon stipulates that, whereas Christian men can “take wives from all the nations (ʿammīn) . . . their women, namely their daughters,” are not to be given to non-­Christians, for in doing so “they shall take them away from their Christianity and may cause them to be brought into paganism and Judaism.”3 We may assume similar apprehensions in the background of two additional canons that were issued in the same synod. These stipulate that “If a believing woman will be to (i.e. marry) a man who is not a believer, she shall be expelled from the community”;4 and that “if a believing man gives his daughter or sister—­when they have no knowledge [of this]—to an unbelieving man; [women such as] those shall be suspended from the church.”5 Later into the Islamic period, the trend persisted. A canon that was issued in the East Syrian synod of catholicos Mār Gīwārgīs (r. 40-­60/661-­80) in 56/676 warned Christian women from cohabiting with and marrying “pagans,” noting the dangers resulting from uniting with men whose religious disposition is “contrary to the fear of God.”6 Some concern over the spiritual wellbeing of women who chose to join the Muslim ranks, while their husbands remained non-­Muslim is suggested as well. The biography of the Companion Ḥ awāʾ bt. Yazīd reports that Muhammad admonished her pagan husband for harassing her ever since she had become a Muslim. From that point on, Ḥ awāʾ was able to practice her religion openly without fearing her husband. The latter then proclaimed, “I had promised Muhammad

2  Simonsohn, “Communal membership”; Weitz, Between Christ and Caliph, ch. 8. 3 Vööbus, Mārūtā of Maipherqaṭ, 439: 71, 440: 62, canon 20. The canon is one of the seventy-­three canons that was introduced by the Roman emissary to the East, Mārūtā bishop of Maipherqaṭ, and thus attributed to the Council of Nicaea. See Kaufhold, “Sources,” 297–301. The acts of the synod include twenty-­one canons along with the so-­called seventy-­three canons of the 318 Fathers of the Council of Nicaea. The first set of canons was published in Chabot, Synodicon, 23–33 (Syr.)/263–71 (Fr.); the seventy-­three canons of the Fathers of Nicaea were published in Vööbus, Mārūtā of Maipherqaṭ. For the canons dealing with marital affairs, see Vööbus, 1: 80–2; 2: 68–70, nos. 32–5. In the introduction, the canons are attributed to the alleged translation from Greek to Syriac of the seventy-­three pseudepigraphal canons of the 318 Fathers of the Council of Nicaea by the Roman emissary to the East, Mārūtā bishop of Maipherqaṭ. 4 Vööbus, Mārūtā of Maipherqaṭ, 439: 80, 440: 69, canon 33. 5  Ibid. 439: 81, 440: 69, canon 34. 6 Chabot, Synodicon, 224 (Syr.)/488 (Fr.), canon 14.

180  Female Power and Religious Change I shall not harm her and shall take care of her.”7 The precarious state of women in moments of conflicting religious and kinship sentiments is referred to in the case of another female Companion—­Muhammad’s paternal aunt Arwā bt. ʿAbd al-­ Muṭtạ lib. According to her biographical entry, after her son Ṭ ulayb b. ʿAmr converted to Islam, he informed her about his decision to follow the Prophet, to which Arwā responded: “Verily, the worthiest person whom you have supported and stood up for is your cousin on your mother’s side (i.e., Muhammad).” Arwā appears to be referring here to an earlier incident in which Ṭ ulayb defended Muhammad from his Qurayshī aggressors who were led by his staunch adversary Abū Jahl. She then comments about the difficulties facing women who wish to offer the Prophet similar loyalty: “By God, if only we could do the same as the men can, we would follow him and defend him.” At this point Ṭ ulayb asked his mother, “And what prevents you, mother, from embracing Islam and following him, for your brother Ḥ amza has already embraced Islam?” To this Arwā responded that she will first see what her sisters had done and act accordingly.8 The accounts about Ḥ awāʾ and Arwā speak of women whose personal wellbeing was in danger, hence their dependency on the patronage of male figures. As such, they resonate with the case of Umm Kulthūm bt. ʿUqba, who beseeched the Prophet that he allow her to remain in Medina, given the limits of her own power: “For I am a woman and the feebleness of women is something you know of.”9 Other forms of literary testimony highlight the material and physical constraints women were bound to experience in the event of religious differences with their next of kin. We have already come across in this book Ḥ anbalī positions stipulating that a non-­Muslim father may not serve in the capacity of maḥ ram for his Muslim daughter.10 Questions suggesting opposite scenarios are addressed in Zoroastrian legal correspondences from the early Islamic period, indicating that a Zoroastrian renegade could no longer act as the legal guardian of his female relative. The ninth-­century Zoroastrian collection of the Rivāyats of Ādurfarnbag ī Farroxzādān addresses the question of what is to become of a Zoroastrian woman whose family members apostatize.11 The underlying concern has to do with the fact that the apostasy of her relatives has left her with no guardians for entering

7  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 305–6 (no. 5132); Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Kitāb al-­istīʿāb, 2: 503 (no. 3316); Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 73–4 (no. 6857); al-­Ṣafadī, al-­Wāfī, 13: 131–2 (no. 3903); Ibn Hajr, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 8: 91–2 (no. 11070). 8  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 42–3 (no. 493); see also Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Kitāb al-­istīʿāb, 2: 480–2 (no. 3237); Ibn ʿAsākir, Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq, 3: 121–2; Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 7–8 (no. 6694); al-­Ṣafadī, al-­Wāfī, 8: 236 (no. 1451). 9  Al-­Wāqidī, Kitāb al-­maghāzī, 2: 63; see also Chapter 2. 10  Ibn Qudāma, al-­Mughnī, 12: 100; 4: 337–8. 11 Anklesaria, The Rivāyats of Ēmēd ī Ašawahištān, 1: 9–12; tr. Sahner, “Zoroastrian priests,” 132–3; discussed in Hjerrild, Studies in Zoroastrian Family Law, 51; Sahner, “Zoroastrian law and the spread of Islam in Iranian society,” 14.

Precarious Gatekeepers  181 into marriage (i.e. pādixšāy marriage).12 Financially, references to Jewish wives of apostates in alms lists and court records found in the Geniza suggest that the conversion of a husband to Islam could have dire implications for a woman’s material wellbeing in the event of divorce.13 The decision of medieval rabbinic authorities to condone marriages between Jewish apostates and their Jewish wives may have been in consideration of such circumstances.14

The enduring identity of Jewish women Years ago, Goitein published and discussed a petition that was sent to the head of the Jews in Egypt, the Nagid, David son of Yushu‘a, known as David II Maimonides (r. 755–768/1355–67), in which a Jewish woman complained that her husband had left her and her children for a Sufi order in the desert.15 The woman asked the Nagid to bring back her husband so he might attend to his paternal roles and the study of divine law in the synagogue. The woman further noted her concern that the entire family will have to relocate close to her husband, away from the Jewish community, Jewish education, and the study of Torah. Worst of all, she expressed her anxiety that there is a good chance that both the husband and children will convert to Islam. One can easily see, as Goitein remarks, the woman’s expressed concerns in the context of her office as “the mother of the house, who while only indirectly partaking in the religious life, watches most eagerly over its proper functioning.”16 The letter was written around the mid-­fourteenth century, a time which is rather later than the period of the present discussion. Yet the reality it portrays and the setting in which it was written echoe earlier ones in more than one respect. The reason for noting it, however, is its uniqueness. It offers a rare instance in which we find a Jewish woman featuring so explicitly as a guardian of religious boundaries. She does so as the one who is entrusted with domestic order, in correspondence to patriarchal conventions. While we may assume similar impulses on the part of other Jewish women, we have very little testimony of it. Instead, the extant evidence allow us to

12  See also Anklesaria, Pahlavi Rivāyat of Āturfarnbag, 1: 2–3, 101, 2: 48; Rezai Baghbidi, Revāyat of Ādur-­Farrōbay, 2–3. I wish to thank Christian Sahner for drawing my attention to this passage. 13 See Cohen, Poverty and Charity, 152. Cohen notes that some of the names of the women recorded in alms recipient lists found in the Geniza offer indications of their personal backgrounds, such as in the case of “the wife of the apostate living in the inn of Abū Thinā,” in T-­S K15.2v, left-­hand page, line 7. See also Goitein, Med. Soc. 2, 302, 451, 592, n. 12; Gil, Documents of the Jewish Pious Foundations, 36; Shatzmiller, “ ‘Marriage, family, and the faith,’ ” 236. See also TS Arabic Box 40, 96, referring to the divorce of a Jewish woman from her renegade husband following the latter’s ten-­year absence; discussed in Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 301. 14  Yagur, “Religious identity and communal boundaries,” 250. 15  Goitein, “A Jewish addict to Sufism.” 16  Ibid. 44.

182  Female Power and Religious Change ascribe to Jewish women similar significance yet based on a different aspect of their relative agency, namely their legal status within the family. As noted in Chapter 3, the halakhic ethos according to which a Jew can never really strip himself of his Jewish identity was retained to a notable degree by the ge’onim and their Western successors.17 This does not mean, however, that Jews who converted to Islam were interested in retaining that identity. In fact, there is some indication, as we shall shortly see, that among those who left the Jewish fold, some made a considerable effort to distance themselves from their former coreligionists. In other instances, we hear about converts who remained in close proximity to Jews, particularly those who stayed married to Jewish women, although there is nothing that alludes to their sentiments regarding their past identity. What we do find, however, is a tendency of some to convert and revert, a phenomenon that has been registered among other religious groups as well.18 While the motives of reverting apostates are in most cases difficult to recover, it stands to reason that a reverting apostate would be bound to retain a certain level of contact with his former coreligionists in general, and his former coreligionist kinsfolk in particular. It is in this context that Jewish women were highly instrumental in retaining, perhaps reviving, the Jewishness of their apostate family members. They were able to do so by remaining in marriage with their apostate husbands, retaining ties with their apostate fathers, and, as childless widows, requiring the levirate services of their apostate brothers-­in-­law. In contrast to indications of the legal exclusion of Jewish women who married non-­Jews in antiquity,19 geonic responsa suggest that at least some Jewish women who were tied to apostates retained their membership in the Jewish community on both legal and social levels. Their role in preserving the Jewish identity of apostates, albeit a passive one, deserves consideration, as their ties with apostates contributed to the enduring attachment of the latter to the Jewish community, if only on a formal level. Whereas private letters, court records, and other forms of documentary evidence found in the Geniza offer sporadic testimony of enduring ties between Jewish women and apostate family members, geonic responsa attest a phenomenon that was anything but marginal.20 When combing through the responsa, searching for the place of women in the context of conversion to Islam, two types of links between Jews and their apostate relatives emerge immediately, namely a social link and a legal one. As we shall see, both types of links could operate in conjunction, in contrast, or in interplay. The conjunction of the legal and social in 17  See Katz, “ ‘Though he sinned, he remains an Israelite’ ”; Blidstein, “Who is not a Jew?”; Blidstein, “The status of prisoner and apostate women”; Irshai, “The apostate as an inheritor”; Simonsohn, “The legal and social bonds of Jewish apostates.” 18  See Simonsohn, “ ‘Halting between two opinions’. ” 19  Cohen, “The origins of the matrilineal principle in rabbinic law,” 22. 20  On relevant cases found in Geniza documents, see Chapter 3.

Precarious Gatekeepers  183 what pertains to the enduring ties of apostates to their Jewish communities is nicely illustrated in a responsum attributed to the head of Sura, Rav Sar Shalom Ga’on (fl. 233–8/848–53): Thus said Mar Shalom Ga’on: One should not borrow [money] from an Israelite apostate at interest and lend him at interest, since he betroths an Israelite girl [his betrothal is valid] in her regard, and cannot be dissolved but through a get (i.e. divorce). As for a get, he shall give [one] to his wife and [thus] release her. As for the wife of his brother, he performs a ḥalitsa for her. This is since he is considered an Israelite with respect to his betrothal, get, and ḥalitsa, as it has  been said, perhaps he will regret and repent; and the merciful one said (Deut. 23: 20): “On loans to another Israelite you may not charge interest.”21

According to the ga’on, apostasy does not nullify a person’s Jewish legal state and he is therefore to be treated as Jew with respect to loans, betrothal, divorce, and levirate marriage. The line of reasoning here is instructive: just as an apostate’s betrothal is held valid, his bill of divorce is obligatory, and his levirate duties are mandatory, so is he held accountable for giving and taking a loan with respect to a fellow Jew. It is noteworthy, however, that the validity of an apostate’s legal commitments hinged upon the place of a female relative, either wife or sister in-­law. She is chained to the apostate regardless of his religious choices and therefore serves as a reminder of his Jewishness. Although the responsum does not state so explicitly, the remaining validity of an apostate’s legal commitments, and the consequent endurance of his Jewish identity, could have been at the base of the ga’on’s suggestion that the apostate “will regret and repent.” Put differently, an apostate’s legal commitments to his Jewish female relative might work to draw him back to the fold. Further indications of the legal significance of the enduring Jewishness of an apostate can be discerned from a query sent to Rav Natronai bar Hilai whether a man could divorce his wife while being an apostate.22 The ga’on saw no reason against it: “He who divorces his wife as an apostate, his divorce (get) is perfectly good and valid.” Natronai based his position on the validity of the initial betrothal between the couple. If the betrothal was valid so is the divorce, irrespective of the husband’s apostasy. On the face of it, the entire matter seems within the boundaries of male concerns. And, to an extent, that would be correct. Yet beyond the immediate question of the legal state of the bonds of marriage and their dissolution, there is also the question of apostasy, or detachment from the Jewish fold. It is here, consequent on the need to find a legal solution for the Jewish wife, that the Jewishness of the

21 Weinberg, Teshuvot Rav Sar Shalom Ga’on, 109, no. 90. 22 Lewin, Otsar, Gittin, 207, no. 487; see also Otsar, Yebamot, 197, no. 475.

184  Female Power and Religious Change apostate husband surfaces.23 In the latter part of the responsum, the ga’on appears rather explicit: “If this is not so, what would be the solution for that poor Israelite girl? Will she be in eternal need?” Natronai would note in another responsum regarding the divorce of apostates that “this is our practice that all apostates give a get to their wives while (i.e., although) being in a non-­Jewish state and we permit her (the divorced wife) to marry another. Thus we have learned from our early masters.”24 We find that the Jewishness of an apostate for matters such as marriage and mamzerut (i.e. being in a state of a bastard in halakhic terms) served to maintain the links between apostates and their former coreligionists. The crucial role of the woman at the center of the events seems evident. Sherira Ga’on’s responsum regarding the religious identity of the newborn son of an apostate father and a Jewish mother discussed in Chapter 3 is a case in point.25 The responsum mentions a Jewish man who apostatized, “while married to an Israelite woman and [later] had a child born by her on a Sabbath.” The question at hand was clearly not about the permissibility of performing the circumcision—­a ceremony that entails bloodletting (haqazat dam)—on a Sabbath, as circumcision precedes the law of the Sabbath.26 An explicit reference to the cause of concern underlying the question is absent, yet it may be inferred that there was some uncertainty regarding the infant’s religious identity. Thus, if the infant was to be regarded as a Gentile its circumcision was to take place on a regular weekday. The ga’on answered, however, that the child was to be circumcised on the Sabbath: He is an offspring of Abraham and . . . the generations of apostates do not become entrenched [in this specific case], but it is just one [person] who apostatized and perhaps he will rethink [it] and leave his son in the Jewish religion. Furthermore, for [the child’s] mother is an Israelite and perhaps he (i.e., the child) will follow her; and we do not presume that he will go astray, therefore we do not have the power to forbid his circumcision on a Sabbath.

The concern regarding the child’s Jewish identity is confirmed by the ga’on’s in­sist­ ence that the father’s apostasy applies only to himself (“the generations of apostates do not become entrenched”). Yet rather intriguingly, the ensuing statement appears to offer an alternative to the position that bases a child’s Jewish identity on that of his mother: here, the child’s future status as a Jew is conditioned by his choice to follow his mother and not his apostate father.27 The reference to the role 23  See also Newman, The Ma‘asim of the People of the Land of Israel, 154–5, no. 25. 24 Lewin, Otsar, Gittin, 207, no. 488. 25 Lewin, Otsar, Shabbat, 130, no. 398; see also Chapter 3. 26  Lev. 12: 3; mShab 18.3. 27  See Cohen, “The origins of the matrilineal principle in rabbinic law,” 30. The uncertainty regarding the child’s Jewish identity may derive from a reading into mQid, 3: 12 [8]: “If the betrothal is valid and no transgression befell, the standing of the offspring follows that of the male [parent] . . . . If the betrothal was valid but transgression befell, the standing of the offspring follows that of the blemished party.”

Precarious Gatekeepers  185 of the mother, upon whom the future identity of her child’s rests, could not have been more explicit.28 Admittedly, we know nothing about the woman who features in this responsum, as in the case of other women referred to in geonic responsa. It seems safe to assume, however, that they lived in a land that was dominated by Islam, most likely in Egypt, North Africa, or al-­ Andalus.29 Although they are voiceless, their ties with apostate relatives are evident and significant in the sense that their halakhic state served to remind those who chose to leave the Jewish fold of their legal and monetary obligations. In the context of conversion to Islam, the binding effect of such commitments was to imbue the ties of former Jews with their Jewish families and communities with vitality. This latter objective was achieved to a great extent when Jewish women refrained from taking a similar path to their apostate family members.30

Christian women as guardians of faith and community While the faithful were enjoying tranquility, since there were no agitations or disagreements among the leaders of the church, the devil brought about persecution in Serugh through the intervention of a pagan who was possessed by satanic zeal. He was going around and inquiring about those who had reverted to Christianity after they had apostatized, in order to compel them to become Muslims again. Several of them were seized and suffered the torments courageously. Then, the storm ceased and was calmed by a woman from the village of Bashman, who quite courageously resisted in the course of the battle and was not enfeebled at all by the violence of torments, as the others who succumbed [to it].31

28  Sherira’s optimistic scenario was of course not the only possible development. See, e.g., T-­S K15.95, dated 11 Muḥarram 545/16 May 1150: A Geniza fragment noting a claim made by apostate sons upon their widowed Jewish mother for a share in their father’s will through an Islamic tribunal. The image of legal contention in this case suggest that the mother’s Jewishness was insufficient to circumvent her children’s conversion to Islam; discussed in Goitein, Med. Soc. 3, 291. Yet going back to the question of circumcision, we may assume that even when both parents had converted, they would still be interested in circumcising their newborn. Or so we should at least understand from another question that was referred to Abraham Maimonides whether a Jew can circumcise the newly born son of a converted couple who “violated the Sabbath publicly”; Freiman and Goitein, Teshuvot Rabenu Avraham ben ha-­Rambam, 54–5, no. 53. The question implies an interest in performing the ritual of circumcision, despite the apostasy of both parents, specifying the parents’ desire to have their children circumcised according to the Jewish ritual. It therefore suggests the endurance of Jewish sentiments among apostates, a useful reminder of the incomplete nature of religious conversion, not to mention the liminal state in which converts would often find themselves, between their former and new religious orientations. 29  On the responsa, their circulation, and addressees, see Brody, The Geonim of Babylonia, ch. 12. 30  Cf. Lamdan, A Separate People, 192, 218. 31 Chabot, Chronique, 3: 97; discussed in Sahner, Christian Martyrs under Islam, 38.

186  Female Power and Religious Change The event recorded in Michael the Syrian’s Chronicle took place around the year 222/837. It is one of numerous similar depictions of anti-­Christian acts of violence that feature in late antique and medieval Syriac historiographical accounts.32 These depictions often include literary elements that imbue the dry sequence of events with a moral significance, thus serving a variety of didactic ends. In this particular case, the bold resistance of a Christian woman is presented in contrast to her coreligionists, as she endured the physical torments inflicted upon her. True or false, the report about a female heroine sustaining the pressures of religious violence was bound to have an effect on its audience. Her image would assume a moral significance, setting an example for others to follow. At the same time, it seems sufficient to argue that in the case of women it was the household that constituted the main battleground. The household was the center of their daily concerns and therefore the primary arena in which they were to circumvent religious violence in the form of apostasy. It is in this context that ecclesiastical authors and lawmakers sought to furnish women with moral justifications and the practical means for safeguarding communal boundaries. In that sense, ecclesiastical compositions of the early and medieval Islamic periods were not very different from those of the early Christian movement. Their contents speak of the family as a hub of communal ideals and of the female members of the family as agents of communal boundaries whose primary capital derived from their unique gender attributes. As we have seen in previous chapters, East Syrian and West Syrian ecclesiastical regulations and canon laws are explicit in their reference to women who married outside the Christian fold while retaining membership in Christian congregational life. In many, if not most, of the instances that are treated in ecclesiastical legal sources we may presume scenarios in which Christian women were married to non-­Christian men, most likely Muslims. Whereas intermarriage was condemned and highly opposed by ecclesiastical leaders, some of them, such as Jacob of Edessa and Athanasius of Balad, offered a rather pragmatic approach in an attempt to minimize damage by retaining the transgressing women within the fold. At the same time, however, as we saw in Chapter 3, there are also a few allusions in Islamic and Christian legal sources to the apostasy of Christian men who were married to Christian women.33 As such, they suggest social instances that were similar to the ones referred to in the geonic responsa discussed above, namely of non-­Muslim women remaining in matrimony with converts to Islam. The Islamic example also finds some resonance in ecclesiastical legal sources from roughly the same period. Although referring to the permissibility of remarriage in the case of a Christian woman following divorce from a non-­believing man (d-­la mhaymen, i.e. a non-­Christian), a regulation from Timothy I’s lawbook 32  See Sizgorich, Violence and Belief in Late Antiquity. 33  See Chapter 3, on al-­Shaybānī regarding “a man from the People of War, if he embraces Islam.”

Precarious Gatekeepers  187 suggests that the latter apostatized. This is since the question of remarriage would otherwise be irrelevant in an ecclesiastical legal context.34 A similar scenario is addressed in Išōʿ bar Nūn’s book in which a woman is given permission to divorce. The reasoning and the circumstances are much clearer this time: If there is a Christian woman who was [married] to a Christian man and later Satan entered into him and (as a result) he apostatized and he also forced her to apostatize, it is appropriate for her according to the law of the church to release herself from him. And if she wishes to leave him even if he is not compelling her [to apostatize], also then she may do [so].35

The few indications in ecclesiastical legal sources of male apostasy while in wedlock, coupled with similar references in Islamic legal sources, should be read alongside the extensive treatment of religious exogamy in Christian sources. Like their Jewish counterparts, Christian women were simultaneously linked to households of two different religious affiliations, namely that of their Muslim husbands and that of their natal families. Further to the west, in Fatimid Egypt, under circumstances not very different from those of the Christian communities that feature in Syriac ecclesiastical sources, we find the story of martyrdom of George (Jirjis, also known by his Muslim name as Muzāḥim).36 This is a tale about a youth from the town of Damīra in lower Egypt; the third son of seven children born to a Muslim father (perhaps a Bedouin) and a Christian woman (who was forced to marry her husband). As a child, he would accompany his mother to church, at which point, so the story goes, he was introduced to Christianity for the first time and was enchanted by it. His mother, however, did not allow him to take communion, as he was not baptized. Nonetheless, George’s mother prayed that her son might become a Christian and be rescued from becoming a Muslim. When his father discovered his sentiments towards Christianity, his mother protected him by hiding him in another village. Although he failed to receive baptism as a youth, George was eventually baptized and subsequently married a Christian woman. His apostasy was shortly afterwards made known to the Muslims. He was then arrested and brought before the Muslim governor, as similar figures are often

34 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2: 107 (Syr.)/108 (Ger.), reg. 74. An explicit permission to divorce in the context of apostasy finds no precedent prior to late eighth-­century East Syrian legislation. See Weitz, “Syriac Christians,” 130, where the author suggests that an expansion of the legal grounds for divorce had originated with Išōʿbōkt, who drew on Iranian traditions. 35 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher, 2: 168 (Syr.)/69 (Ger.), reg. 114. See also Chapter 3, n. 121. 36  Swanson, “The monk Mīnā,” 460–3; Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 368, n. 101; Swanson, “The other hero of The Martyrdom of Jirjis (Muzāḥ im)”; Swanson, “The Martyrdom of Jirjis (Muzāḥim)”; Sahner, Christian Martyrs, 68–70. The martyrdom, which dates back to the second half of the tenth century, was included in a fourteenth-­century manuscript of the Coptic Synaxarium.

188  Female Power and Religious Change depicted in neo-­martyrolgies from this period.37 At this point, a third Christian woman enters the plot—­the Muslim governor’s wife. She prevents her husband from executing George and instead orders his imprisonment. Saywālā, George’s Christian wife, offers counsel to her husband and instructs him in proper belief on more than one occasion during his different sojourns in prison, before he is finally put to death by his Muslim persecutors. The wife’s role is crucial at this point, as a primary source of support for her husband. Her figure is even further magnified as she is depicted suffering for her husband’s sake following her own arrest and torture in four different instances. Throughout the story, Saywālā appears as a highly authoritative figure, instructing her husband as if he were her disciple. The martyrdom highlights the role of different female figures in George’s life. First and foremost, his mother, who introduced her son to Christianity, prayed for him, sheltered him, and attempted to facilitate his formal conversion through baptism. It was despite her Muslim husband, and against his will, that she was able to draw her son to Christianity. Then, albeit briefly, the reference to the Muslim governor’s Christian wife and her role in saving George from execution is another example of female courage and agency within the limits of male authority and Muslim domination. Yet it is the martyr’s wife, who serves as his guide and moral supporter, that features as the most dominant female figure of them all. Like his mother, George’s wife faces the challenge of being married to a spouse whose commitments towards the Muslim community are evident. The moral objectives of the martyrology appear to be similar to those of the neo-­martyr genre, fulfilling the edifying role of offering hope and guidance to Christians who bore witness to the conversion of their relatives.38 The events surrounding George’s conversion to Christianity, his subsequent arrest, torture, and, finally his death, were couched in a reality that was familiar to the targeted audience of the story. It was a reality that was not limited to Fatimid-­ ruled Egypt, but one that was known “across the medieval Middle East,” as Christian Sahner has recently argued.39 This audience was a mixed one, composed of both men and women, who would find the images of George, his mother Mary, and his wife Saywālā, inspirational in their respective social capacities. The religiously mixed family setting in which their figures featured was firmly tied to concerns and ideals that transcended family circles. This is made evident through the content and authorship of the story, namely the explicit indications of the vested interests of the Muslim authorities in the religious choices of the protagonists and the narration of the events in an ecclesiastically authored text. As such, the links between kinship and community in the martyrdom were similar not 37 See, e.g., Griffith, “The Arabic account of “Abd al-­Masīḥ an-­Naǧrānī al-­Ghasānī”; McGrath, “Elias of Heliopolis”; Sizgorich, “For Christian eyes only?”; Sahner, Christian Martyrs, 94, 166. 38  See Griffith, “Christians, Muslims and neo-­martyrs.” 39 Sahner, Christian Martyrs, 69.

Precarious Gatekeepers  189 only to those manifested in Syriac legal sources but also to those of other religious provenances. The story of George’s martyrdom highlights the central importance that was attributed not only to Christian wives but also to mothers, as communal gatekeepers. We have already noted the significance of maternal power through the introduction of non-­Muslim practices into Muslim households and references to female proselytizing agency. The central role ascribed to George’s mother should be read in a similar context. This was the line of argument of Athanasius of Balad, when he called upon Christian women who married pagan men to remain diligent in abiding by “the prescriptions and exhortations of the apostles,” by keeping a distance “from fornication, from what is strangled and from blood, and from the food of pagan sacrifices.”40 Most importantly, “they should try also, with all their force, to baptize their children.”41 Athansius’s letter offered Christian women who were married to non-­Christians a set of basic principles as to how they were to conduct themselves in a religiously mixed household. To that end, the letter echoes earlier expectations from Christian mothers to raise their children in a Christian manner. Their task was not a simple one and was bound to encounter resistance from their non-­Christian husbands. The anger of George’s father upon discovery of his son’s Christian sentiments was most likely not very different from that of the pagan fathers of Christian saints who feature in late antique Syriac hagiography.42 Such depictions emerged from a Christian perception of maternal figures fulfilling crucial roles in safeguarding the Christian faith of their offspring. According to Cornelia Horn, similar perceptions can be detected in the History of the Patriarchs of the Coptic Church of Alexandria.43 In one instance, dated to the tenure of Patriarch Peter I (r. 300–11), we find the Christian wife of an apostate from Antioch taking great pains to baptize her two children. She is depicted as traveling by ship to Alexandria with her children, without her husband’s consent, in the course of which voyage the ship was struck by a storm and the mother expressed her readiness to sacrifice herself and her children for the sake of God. She only asked God to let her children be baptized before they die. At this point, the mother cuts her right breast, in order to use the blood dripping out to make the sign of the cross on her children’s foreheads and over their hearts, evoking the Holy Trinity, before baptizing them in the sea.44 Horn remarks that similar motifs can be found in the Synaxarium of the Arabic-­Jacobite tradition and in the writings of John Chrysostum (d. 407) and Eusebius of Emessa (d. 360).45

40  Cf. Acts 15: 29: “that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from fornication.” 41  See Chapter 4 n 86. 42  Saint-­Laurent, “Images de femmes dans l’hagiographie syriaque,” 207. 43  Horn, “Reconstructing women’s history.” 44  Evetts, “History of the patriarchs,” 1.4: 385. 45  Horn, “Reconstructing women’s history,” 435; for the Synaxarium of the Arabic-­Jacobite tradition, see Basset, “Le Synaxaire Arabe Jacobite (rédaction copte).”

190  Female Power and Religious Change Irrespective of their different ends, these stories bring to the fore once again the courageous acts of Christian mothers who took upon themselves the perilous task of assuring the Christian upbringing of their children. Centuries later, the story about Bakchos the Younger would echo some of these literary motifs in the setting of late-­eighth-­century Palestine. Once again, the protagonist’s father was a non-­Christian, a convert to Islam, and his mother a devout Christian.46 Bakchos (also known by his Muslim name Ḍaḥḥāk) was the only one of seven children who retained a strong commitment towards Christianity, a fact which the story attributes to his mother’s regular, yet clandestine, attendance in church, and her unceasing prayer for her children’s reversion to Christianity. Bakchos grew up preparing himself for monasticism and, after his father’s death, he set off for Jerusalem, and was later baptized at the monastery of Mar Saba in the Judean desert. In his subsequent encounter with his mother, Bakchos makes it explicit that his conversion to Christianity was thanks to her prayers. His conversion is followed by that of his siblings, who renounce their property and receive baptism along with their families, all except for the wife of one of his brothers. She brings about Bakchos’ martyrdom by informing the Muslim authorities about his apostasy. Like their late antique archetypes, neo-­martyr stories from the early and medieval Islamic periods served to promote a set of ideals through the valorization of heroic figures. These ideals were in correlation to the challenges faced by Christian communities in the form of persecution, apostasy, and declining ecclesiastical resources. Under these circumstances, the family would constitute a crucial stronghold of enduring Christian sentiments. Here, images of religiously mixed family ties were woven into legendary narratives in order to bolster ideals of spir­ it­ual fidelity, communal commitment, piety, and ritual observance. Displays of their implementation in highly contested settings that were always dominated by non-­Christian paternal figures worked to enhance the reputation of steadfast Christians. The martyrologies of George and Bakchos, like those from fourth-­ century Iran and Egypt, offer representations of spiritual triumphs that were achieved thanks to the endurance and courage of Christian mothers. Their achievements, however, were not founded exclusively on their maternal qualities, but also on their willingness to defy the authority of non-­Christian men, as they shielded their children and raised them to be exemplary believers. Their struggle 46 Combefis, Christi martyrum lecta trias, 61–126; Demetrakopoulou, “ Ἅγιος Βάκχος ὁ Νέος.” On the work and its historical and literary contexts, see Griffith, “Christians, Muslims, and neo-­martyrs,” 196–8; Vila, Christian Martyrs in First Abbasid Century, 287–96; Foss, “Byzantine saints in early Islamic Syria,” 116–17; Efthymiadis, “The Life of Bacchus the Younger,” 598–9; Tannous, Making of the Medieval Middle East, 455–3; Sahner, Christian Martyrs, 62–6. Sahner notes the recording of Bakchos’s feast in the Synaxarium of Constantinople and in the Melkite Syriac calendar, thus underscoring the enduring significance of his martyrdom and the events surrounding it. See Delehaye, Synaxarium, 310–12; Binggeli, “Calendrier melkite de Jérusalem,” 191; Garitte, Calendrier palestino-­géorgien, 59, 197.

Precarious Gatekeepers  191 was twofold in the context of non-­Christian dominance and patriarchal conventions. As such, the figures of Christian mothers were elevated far beyond their restricted stations.

Islamic topoi of strong Muslim women Images of female heroines in Muslim-­authored narratives, some of them with an explicit Islamic doctrinal objective, suggest a thread of normative principles running through different religious traditions. Intriguingly, contrary to notions of female feebleness noted earlier in this chapter, the difficulties of being a woman in a family dominated by a male religious other were overridden thanks to the very limitations of female power. A particularly useful literary method in this respect was the Islamic adaptation of biblical stories that featured in the form of Tales of the Prophets (qiṣaṣ al-­anbiyāʾ). Referring to the figure of Āsiya (Pharaoh’s wife) as one of Muhammad’s four most venerated female figures (in addition to Maryam, Khadīja, and Faṭīma), al-­Thaʿlabī (d. 429/1038) included an account of her trials in his Qiṣaṣ al-­anbiyāʾ al-­musamā ʿarāʾis al-­majālis (“Tales of the prophets titled ‘brides of the councils’ ”).47 Āsiya is portrayed as “a believer in the true God who willingly suffered for her faith at the hands of her unbelieving husband, Pharaoh.”48 Her account is given in relation to Q 66: 11, where it is said that God has made an example for the believers in the image of Āsiya who wished to be delivered from the oppression of her unbelieving husband. She is presented among the children of Islam, “a sincere believer who worshipped God in secret.”49 Consequent to Pharaoh’s discovery of her deeds, he endeavored to dissuade her by inciting her mother as he threatened to execute her daughter. Despite her mother’s efforts, Āsiya persisted in her belief and was eventually put to death, after suffering terrible torture. It has been argued that she set an example of a woman who retained her faith, “even if against the will of a tyrannical husband.”50 The story captures many of the motifs we have already encountered in Christian martyrolgies, most notably female steadfastness in the context of religiously mixed kinship arrangements. Beyond the thematic thread, it is also the Judeo-­ Christian lore underpinning Islamic displays of piety that allows us to think about shared images of female power among diverse religious traditions. Yet whereas Christian women were featured resisting religious violence, their Muslim counterparts were often staged in scenes of combat and warfare, displaying heroic

47  Al-­Thaʿālibī, Qiṣaṣ al-­anbiyāʾ, 258–9. On Āsiya in the Islamic tradition, see also Ibn Kathīr, Qiṣaṣ al-­anbiyāʾ, 2: 8; Thackston, The Tales of the Prophets of al-­Kisaʾi, 217; Stowasser, Women in the Qurʾan, 59–60. 48 Renard, Windows on the House of Islam, 130. 49 Ibid. 50 Stowasser, Women in the Qurʾan, 60.

192  Female Power and Religious Change achievements that would have a lasting effect on generations to come.51 Such was the case of Umm Ḥ aram bt. Milḥān, a Companion of the Prophet, and the sister of Umm Sulaym whom we have already met in the previous chapter. Her shrine, near Larnaca in Cyprus, frequented by Muslims to this day, offers a testimony to her enduring memory. According to tradition, she was buried there in 28/649, following her death shortly after the beginning of Muʿāwiya b. Abī Sufyān’s campaign in the island.52 A late twelfth–­early thirteenth-­century Turkish account speaks of Umm Ḥ aram as one of the earliest female martyr warriors, whose biographical details were diligently gathered by a certain Shaykh Mustafa Efendi during a visit to Constantinople in 606/1210.53 Around the same time, the Syrian traditionist and Sufi sympathizer ʿAbd al-­Ghānī al-­Maqdisī (d. 599/1203), composed his Manāqib al-­nisāʾ al-­ṣaḥ ābiyyāt (“The merits of the female Companions”).54 Here, the stories about the heroic deeds of the ṣaḥ ābiyyāt are elevated to the level of manāqib, namely laudatory depictions of a hagiographical nature.55 In his treatise, al-­Maqdisī referred also to Muhammad’s aunt, Ṣafiyya bt. ʿAbd al-­Muṭtạ lib.56 She was among the first converts to Islam and is one of the better-­known exemplars of female courage.57 The earliest mention of her is found in the Sīra. There, she is reported to be staying in the fort of Ḥ assān b. Thābit, along with the women and children of Medina during the Battle of the Trench (ghazwat al-­khandaq) in 5/627. At the sight of a Jewish man, apparently spying the environs of the fort, Ṣafīyya said to Ḥ assān: “This Jew, as you can see, is circling the fort; he is seeking to expose our weakness to the Jews who are behind us, while the apostle of God and his companions are occupied for our sake; go down and kill him.”58 Subsequent to Ḥ assan’s reluctance to perform the task, Ṣafīyya went down herself and killed the Jew with a spear. She then asked Ḥ assān to go down, this time to strip the man of his arms, claiming she could not do so for he was a man, a request which Ḥ assān declined as well. Ṣafīyya’s brave acts were later recorded in a series of biographical collections, beginning in Ibn Saʿd’s and as late as Ibn Ḥ ajar’s. According to the report in Ibn Saʿd’s collection, the events noted in the Sīra took place during the battle between Muhammad and a Meccan force in 625—the Battle of Uḥud.59 The Muslims lost this battle and the account in Ibn Saʿd’s 51  See Mikati, “Fighting for the faith?” 52  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 404–5 (no. 5401); Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Kitāb al-­istiʿab, 2: 578 (no. 3547); Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 8: 375 (no. 11971). 53  Cobham, “The Story of Umm Ḥ arám,” 87. See also Renard, Crossing Confessional Boundaries, 191. 54  Al-­Maqdisī, Ḥ adīth al-­ifk. 55  See Pellat, “Manāḳib”, EI2, s.v. 56  Al-­Maqdisī, Ḥ adīth al-­ifk, 53–5. 57  See also Sonbol, “Rise of Islam,” 6–7; Sayeed, Women, 46. On the heroic image of pre-­Islamic Arabian women, see Lichtenstadter, Women in the Aiyam al-’Arab, 20 ff. 58  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 3, 178–9; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 458. 59  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 41 (no. 4932). See also al-­Iṣfahānī, Akhbār al-­nisāʾ, 194–5; al-­Iṣbahānī, Maʿrifat al-­ṣaḥ aba, 2: 3250 (no. 3766); Ibn ʿAsākir, Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq, 3: 121; Ibn al-­Athīr, Usd al-­ghāba, 7: 173 (no. 7059); al-­Dhahabi, Siyar aʿlām al-­nubalāʾ, 1: 354 (nos. 10–20); Ibn Ḥ ajar, al-­Iṣāba fī tamyīz al-­ṣaḥ āba, 8: 213–14 (no. 11411).

Precarious Gatekeepers  193 collection relates Ṣafīyya’s appearance before the defeated Muslim force, holding her spear and admonishing the Muslim warriors for their defeat: “Ṣafīyya bt. ʿAbd al-­Muṭtạ lib came on the day of Uḥud, after the people were defeated, holding a spear which she struck before the people, saying: ‘You have fled, [leaving behind] the Messenger of God!’ ”60 Ṣafīyya’s strong image is further empowered in this account by her insistence on seeing the dead body of her brother Ḥ amza. Shortly after her rebuke of the defeated warriors, Muhammad noticed her, upon which he called to her son, Zubayr, saying “The woman!”, indicating that she should not witness the terrible sight of her dead brother: “Ḥ amza’s belly had been split, and the Messenger of God disliked (the prospect) of her seeing him, for she was his sister. Then Zubayr said: ‘O mother, attention, attention (ilayki ilayki),’ to which she responded: ‘Go away, you do not have a mother! (tanaḥ ḥ la umm laka),’ whereupon she set forth and gazed at Ḥ amza.” This latter part of Ṣafīyya’s biography corresponds well to her portrayal as a strong figure. It is also of particular relevance to matters of kinship and community. Confronted by her son’s call and her resolve to witness the terrible state of her dead brother, Ṣafīyya also stood at the center of conflicting gender expectations. As a woman, the sight of her brother’s mutilated corpse was to be kept from her, hence Muhammad’s exclaiming “The woman!”. At the same time, if she was to live up to the standards of a devout Muslim, man or woman, she should be able to overcome her feminine limitations and assume an equal place among the men. She makes this point quite explicitly as she snaps at her son with the terrible exclamation, “Go away, you do not have a mother!” Her message was clear and simple: on the battlefield, when duty calls, her maternal status becomes secondary. It was not only courage, we are led to understand, but also a readiness for sacrifice, that was valorized in Ṣafīyya’s case; two of the principal qualities that women were expected to exhibit in moments of religious conflict. Such ideals were later recorded not only in biographical dictionaries but also in other genres of medieval Islamic historiography. The familial contexts in which Muslim women are portrayed fighting for the Islamic cause should not escape our attention. We have already come across the proselytizing agency of Muslim women in the medieval work of pseudo-­Wāqidī’s Futūḥ al-­Shām. In the case of Khawla bt. al-­Azwar, however, the image is of a warrior woman disguised as a man. Following her extraordinary performances in battle, she revealed her true identity to the Muslim general Khālid b. al-­Walīd, noting her brother’s captivity by the Byzantines and her intention to rescue him.61 The image of Khawla is perhaps better known to later generations of Muslims.62 As an exemplar of courage and piety, whose tomb is located on the outskirts of Damascus, she is venerated to this day. Her heroic deeds were recorded in the Futūḥ al-­Shām along those of 60  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 41 (no. 4932). 61  Al-­Wāqidī, Futūḥ al-­Shām, 1: 27–33. 62  Booth, “Exemplary lives, feminist aspirations,” 143; Jacobsen, “Calling on women,” 18–19.

194  Female Power and Religious Change other women whose valor in battle is depicted in relation to that of their brothers, husbands, and fathers.63 As already noted, images of female warriors are a recognized trope in early and medieval Islamic narratives. The spectacular images of these women were not merely anecdotal, but expressions of the utmost piety and religious fidelity in the form of extreme manifestations of courage. We may assume, however, that their images were more sources of moral inspiration, rather than models for concrete behavior, as Muslim women were not known to have taken part in combat. As devout believers, however, women were in a position to play a pivotal role in safeguarding communal lines and the religious integrity of their kinsfolk. A report in the History of al-­Ṭ abarī regarding the conversion to Islam of a force of Daylamites during the time of ʿUmar b. al-­Khaṭtạ̄ b suggests that the mere presence of a Muslim wife constituted ample reason for her husband’s religious zeal. When Abū Mūsā al-­Ashʿarī (d. 59/679) criticized the Daylamite commander for his soldiers’ lack of enthusiasm, his response was: “Yes, but we are not as attached to your religion as you are . . . we lack the enthusiasm you have and, living among you, we have no wives to protect, while you have not assigned the most generous stipends to us (i.e., as we stipulated). And whereas we have weapons and animals, you face the enemy not even wearing helmets!”64 The images of ṣaḥ ābiyyāt, as well as female warriors, speak of women who were actively advocating for Islam, fighting for its cause, if only by presenting a counter image to that of their sinful husbands. In the previous chapter we noted Umm Ḥ abība bt. Abī Sufyān’s fidelity to the Prophet following her conversion to Islam, the apostasy of her husband, and despite the paganism of her father. From ­al-­Balādhurī’s Kitāb ansāb al-­ashrāf (“The book of the genealogies of the notables”) we are made to understand that what had caused her husband to apostatize was his weakness: And it is related about Umm Ḥ abiba that she saw in her sleep her husband ʿUbayd Allāh in the worst condition and tattered. When she woke up, he informed her that he had converted to Christianity and apostatized, yet she held on to Islam. He fell to [drinking] wine and continued drinking it till his death. It is said that his death was due to immersion in wine.65

Central to Umm Ḥ abība’s Islamic fidelity is her perseverance. Despite the religious rupture with her husband, her decision to cling to Islam is presented as a sign of strength. Her resolve and courage seem different from those that were displayed by female Companions who took part in battle. Nonetheless, in battle 63  Rosenthal, “Fiction and reality,” 13. 64  History of al-­Tabari, 13: 143–4. 65  Al-­Balādhurī, Kitāb jumal min ansāb al-­ashrāf, 2: 574.

Precarious Gatekeepers  195 as at home, the size of their achievements is enhanced when considered in a patriarchal context. Their stance is active, in the course of which they take choices that are unleashed from the bonds of male authority. The defiance of patriarchal authority, however, is excused given its compatibility with Islamic communal agendas. The examples here are taken from a variety of literary works of diverse geographical origins that were composed from as early as the ninth century and as late as the fifteenth. The extracted passages focus on female figures whose name and fame were deeply rooted in the memory of Muslim believers owing to their association with a distant past that was to set an exemplary precedent. Their ability to overcome patriarchal limitations and challenge preconceptions of female power is what ties them together. They are seen partaking in combat, putting their lives in danger, assuming leadership roles, as well as resisting male authority and rendering kinship ties secondary to their communal commitments. These motifs of female power are common features in Islamic lore in the context of religious conflicts. Their impression is particularly forceful when they show up in scenes of maternal piety. In the previous chapter we were able to note some of the unique features of maternal agency through the literary manifestation of Umm Sulaym. Her commitment to raising her son according to Islamic principles would have been of interest to Muslim women who experienced hardships resulting from religious discord with other family members. Taking advantage of a mother’s close relationship with her child during its first years, Umm Sulaym insisted on instructing Anas in Islam by pronouncing the shahāda as his first words. Her devotion is further illustrated in her continuous nursing of the child, ceasing only upon the latter’s command. A second expression of Umm Sulaym’s heroic character is noted in relation to the time after her marriage with Abū Ṭ alḥa. According to a report in the Sīra, she attended the Battle of Ḥ unayn in 8/630 while pregnant. Umm Sulaym appears in the scene calling upon the Prophet to kill Muslim combatants who run away from battle and even expressed her readiness to enter into combat using a dagger she was carrying with her.66 The image of a pregnant woman in a setting of warfare might in itself seem unsettling, yet here we find Umm Sulaym placing her own safety and that of the child she was bearing secondary to the fate of her community as she prepares to take part in combat. Her set of priorities is evident, as she time and again favors her commitment to Islam over her personal wellbeing and even that of her most dear ones. Finally, a third scene, recording her behavior following the death of a child she had with Abū Ṭ alḥa, offers a rather powerful expression of her profound commitment to Islamic ideals. The child died while Abū Ṭ alḥa was away from home in his gardens. Umm Sulaym washed the child’s 66  Ibn Hishām, al-­Sīra al-­nabawiyya, 4: 89–90; tr. Guillaume, Life of Muhammad, 570; Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 395 (no. 5400).

196  Female Power and Religious Change corpse, shrouded it, perfumed it, and covered it with a cloth. She then ordered those around her not to tell Abū Ṭ alḥa about the child’s death before she does. Yet rather than delivering the news to Abū Ṭ alḥa upon his return, she first served him dinner and had intercourse with him. Only then did she break the terrible news to her husband, but noted that he should expect a reward in compensation for their loss, whereupon she became pregnant and gave birth to another son.67 The story about Umm Sulaym and Abū Ṭ alḥa’s child appears in hadith collections and was incorporated centuries later in consolation treatises for bereaved parents in Syria and Egypt.68 The authors of these treatises placed particular emphasis on the ideal of ṣabr (steadfastness, patience, perseverance).69 Bereaved parents were to exercise ṣabr and thus avoid critique of God’s decision. Umm Sulaym’s decision to hide her son’s death from Abū Ṭ alḥa, if only temporarily, stands in stark contrast to what we would expect from a mother under such circumstances. Moreover, her pragmatic conduct, specifically conceiving anew, speaks once again of her choice to prioritize her fidelity to Islam over her motherly impulse. The Qurʾan regards care for children, like care for worldly possessions, as a distraction when it comes to serving God: “O believers, let not your possessions neither your children divert you from God’s remembrance; who so does that, they  are the losers” (Q 63: 9). The preference of God over children is further attested in a hadith that promises women protection from hell after they had lost their sons for the sake of Allah: The women said to the Prophet: “The men have overcome us in your regard (i.e., they have all your attention), therefore devote to us a day.” He then promised them a day in which he would meet them. He admonished and ordered them, in the course of which he said to them: “There is not a woman among you who sends forth three of her children [to the other world] and does not have protection from the fire.” A woman then said: “And two?”, and he said: “And two.”70

The most terrible of sacrifices a mother could make, couched in an ideal celebrating the suppression of basic human instincts, is presented as a sign of uncompromising piety. It is also in this context that we should read into the account regarding the early Islamic poetess Tamadhur bt. ʿAmr, also known as al-­Khansāʾ (d. c.23/644).71 A late ninth-­century account of her actions at the battle of al-­ Qādisiyya in 14/635 features in Ibn Aʿtham’s (d. 352/963) Kitāb al-­futūḥ (“The book of conquests”).72 As the Muslim and Sasanian armies were about to engage in battle, al-­Khansāʾ turned to her four sons who were among the warriors: 67  Ibn Saʿd, Ṭ abaqāt, 10: 401–2. 68  Giladi, “ ‘Ṣabr’ (steadfastness) of bereaved parents.” 69  See Wensinck, “Ṣabr”, EI2, s.v.; Halevi, “Wailing for the dead,” 13. 70 Bukhārī, Ṣaḥ īḥ al-­Bukhārī, 38 (no. 101). 71  See van Gelder, Classical Arabic Literature, 12. 72  Ibn Aʿtham, Kitāb al-­futūḥ , 1: 163.

Precarious Gatekeepers  197 O my sons! You have embraced Islam submissively and migrated out of choice, and by God you are the sons of a single man as you are the sons of a single woman. And by God, I have not disparaged your noble descent and did not offend your status. You have seen the extent to which the Persians have prepared [for the fight against] the Muslims. When you enter into combat join the army, seek its center, and fight at its head. You will then gain booty; wellbeing, nearness and honor are in the house of triumph and dignity.73

Ibn Aʿtham reports that al-­Khansāʾ’s sons were killed in battle one after another, noting, however, that “she did not shed a tear, and this was on the day of salvation.”74 In a similar report found in Abū al-­Faraj al-­Isfahānī (d. 356/967), Akhbār ­al-­nisāʾ (“Accounts of women”), al-­Khansāʾ is further quoted promising her sons reward in the afterlife.75 And in Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr’s Kitāb al-­istīʿāb fī maʿrifat al-­ aṣḥ āb (“An exhaustive book on the knowledge of the Companions”), her words conclude with a clear reference to the notion of ṣabr, as she cites the Qurʾanic verse: “O believers, be patient, and vie in patience; be steadfast; and fear God in joy so you may prosper” (Q 3: 200; yā ayyuhā alladhīna amānū iṣbirū wa-­ṣābirū wa-­rābiṭū wa-­ attaqū Allāh laʿallakum tufliḥ ūna).76 Like Umm Sulaym, al-­ Khansāʾ’s image is of a woman of remarkable courage, manifested in a moment of conflict between her motherly instincts and her communal loyalty. Both women abide by ideals of favoring the communal cause over their own wellbeing and that of their children. They thus present the audiences of their accounts with powerful illustrations of the meaning of female perseverance as they render their love to their children secondary to their devotion to Allah.

The story of the mother and seven sons An assessment of Umm Sulaym’s literary figure has drawn attention to similar motifs of female perseverance in Jewish exegetical literature such as Avot de-­Rabbi Nathan (“The fathers according to Rabbi Nathan”) and Midrash Mishle (“Midrash on Proverbs”), as well as the Talmudic-­based folktales in Nissim ben Jacob b. Shāhīn’s (d. 454/1062) Kitāb al-­faraj baʿd al-­shidda (“A composition concerning relief after adversity”).77 These similarities, it has been argued, stemmed from cross-­communal perceptions, thereby indicating that authors of Muslim and non-­Muslim backgrounds were often motivated by similar didactic objectives. The case of Umm Sulaym serves to remind us, however, that common perceptions not only were informed by the same norms but also drew from shared 73 Ibid. 74 Ibid. 75  Abū al-­Faraj al-­Iṣfahānī, Akhbār al-­nisāʾ, 112. See also Chapter 2. 76 Ibn ʿAbd al-­Barr, Kitāb al-­istīʿāb, 2: 493 (no. 3273). 77  Giladi, “ ‘Ṣabr’ (steadfastness) of bereaved parents,” 13–15.

198  Female Power and Religious Change literary traditions. As in other instances of Muslim–­non-­Muslim literary affinities, stories about female heroines were influenced by biblical and apocryphal stories.78 The transmission and adaptation of the Maccabaean story of the mother and her seven sons is a case in point and will be treated in this chapter in relative detail in order to highlight the relevance of its didactic objectives over time and across different religious communities. The following analysis is built on both a philological and a literary analysis. Whereas the former speaks of a set of shared ideals among authors and transmitters of diverse religious affiliations, the latter will allow us to tease out these ideals in relation to female agency. The story of the mother and seven sons appears for the first time in 2 Maccabees 7 and in a much more elaborated version in 4 Maccabees 8–18. It takes place shortly before the Maccabaean revolt against the Seleucid Empire in the second century bce. The mother, along with her seven sons, was arrested by the Seleucid authorities and brought before the Seleucid monarch, Antiochus IV Epiphanes (r.  175–164 bce), who attempted forcibly to feed them all pork. The boys are depicted as being brought before the king in turn, each one refusing to surrender to the king’s demand, subsequently being severely tortured and put to death in the presence of their mother, who is finally martyred as well. This rich narrative offers a set of ideals, most notably a profound commitment to God, specifically God’s law, by making the greatest of sacrifices—­a mother’s loss of her children. It is perhaps owing to the terrible impression the story makes that it has been continuously retold throughout history in compositions of diverse religious backgrounds and literary genres. These retellings have come down in different versions, at times retaining and in others leaving out some of its original details. The earliest Syriac reference to the story appears in Aphrahat’s (c.270 to after 345) Demonstrations (5: 20), written in 336/7,79 and later in a commentary by Ephrem (c.306–73). In both cases, and henceforth in Syriac literature, the mother is named Shmuni. The story is later included in the Greek writings of Gregory Nazianzus (d. 390), Syriac writings by Jacob of Serugh (d. 521), and Greek (and later translated to Syriac) writings by Severus of Antioch (d. 538).80 Around the same time, the story features in three different classical rabbinic sources: Eichah Rabbah 1: 50 (“The midrash on Lamentations”; fifth or sixth century ce), which names the mother Miriam bat Tanḥum, the Babylonian Talmud Gittin 57b (c. fifth–­seventh centuries), and the

78  See Wansbrough, The Sectarian Milieu, 40–1; Frye, The Great Code, esp. chs 2 and 3; Lazarus-­ Yafeh, Intertwined Worlds, 19; Lassner, Demonizing the Queen of Sheba; Rissanen, Theological Encounter, 100–3; Tottoli, Biblical Prophets in the Qur’an and Muslim literature; Wheeler, Moses in the Qur’an and Islamic Exegesis; Griffith, The Church in the Shadow of the Mosque, 61–94. 79  On the dating of Aphrahat’s Demonstrations, see Brock, “Aphrahaṭ.” 80  For discussion and references, see Witakowski, “Mart (y) Shmuni.”

Precarious Gatekeepers  199 midrash collection Pesikta Rabbati 43 (c. sixth century). These draw primarily, although with considerable differences, from the story’s version in 2 Maccabees.81 In the early Islamic period, the centrality of the story is attested in the Syriac tradition through its regular commemoration in ecclesiastical calendars from the time of Jacob of Edessa and onward. According to Jean Maurice-­Fiey, there are more churches in north Mesopotamia dedicated to St Shmuni than to any other saint, apart from St George.82 Unlike its early manifestations in the Syriac literature, however, the story takes on an elaborated narrative form in its medieval adaptations.83 It is included in major Syriac historiographical works, such as the Chronicle of Pseudo-­ Dionysius of Tel Maḥ re,84 the Chronicle of Michael the Syrian,85 the Chronicle of Bar Hebraeus,86 and in the so-­called 6 Maccabees—­an anonymous medieval narrative poem (memre),87 that appears to be paraphrasing 4 Maccabees and is believed to have originated in the twelfth or thirteenth cen­tury.88 As might be expected, the story was absorbed in the literary traditions of Christian communities in Byzantium as well. These highlight the significance of the story not only in the strict sense of its plot but also as a source for similar motifs in narratives about other female martyrs.89 In medieval Jewish literature, the story shows up in the tenth-­century book of Josippon from southern Italy, in which the mother is named Hannah for the first time.90 Shortly after, a Judeo-­Arabic version of the story is found in the aforementioned work by the head of the rabbinic academy in Qayrawān, Nissim ben Jacob b. Shahin, Kitāb al-­faraj baʿd al-­shidda—­a collection of retellings of Talmudic legends as well as Jewish adaptations of Islamic narratives.91 The collection that was later translated into Hebrew under the title Ḥ ibbur yafeh min ha-­yeshuʿa (“An elegant treatise concerning salvation”) is known to have circulated among medieval Jewish communities in both the Islamic and Christian orbits.92 The work, 81  See Joslyn-­Siemiatkoski, “The mother and seven sons in late antique and medieval Ashkenazi Judaism.” See also Duran, “The martyr”; Cohen, “Hannah and her seven sons in Hebrew literature.” 82 Fiey, Assyrie chrétienne, 449. 83  Witakowski, “Mart (y) Shmuni,” 163. 84  Pseudo-­Dionysius, Chronicon, 48. 85 Chabot, Chronique, 1: 125–7. 86  Bar Hebraeus, Chronography, 42. 87  Bensly and Barnes, The Fourth Book of Maccabees, 3–54 (Syr.). 88 See Witakowski, “Mart (y) Shmuni”; Brock, “A calendar attributed to Jacob of Edessa”; Rouwhorst, “The cult of the seven Maccabean brothers,” 184–6, 194–5; Brock, “Eleazar, Shmuni and her seven sons.” On 6 Maccabees, Peterson, “Martha Shamoni”; Brock, “Eleazar, Shmuni and her seven sons,” 330; Minov, “Syriac,” 122. 89 Himmelfarb, “The mother of the seven sons in Lamentations Rabbah”; Smith Lewis, Select Narratives of Holy Women, 1: 118–44; Rotman, Insanity and Sanctity in Byzantium, 114. 90 Joslyn-­Siemiatkoski, “The mother and seven sons in late antique and medieval Ashkenazi Judaism,” 133. 91  See Sela, “The history of the Hasmonean period.” The first edition was published by Obermann, Studies in Islam and Judaism. Later editions include Hirschberg, Hibbur yafeh me-­ha-­yeshuʿah; Abramson, R.  Nissim Gaon libelli quinque; and Brinner, An Elegant Composition Concerning Relief After Adversity. 92 Brinner, Elegant Composition, pp. xvi–­xxxi.

200  Female Power and Religious Change despite its Jewish provenance, should be seen alongside other compositions within the Arabic literary genre of “relief after adversary,” such as the one by the tenth-­century Iraqi qadi Abū ʿAlī al-­Muḥassin al-­Tanūkhī.93 Ibn Shāhīn’s Kitāb al-­faraj, however, is distinctively moral in nature and the tales incorporated within it present images of pious figures. Like the story about the mother and her seven children, other stories about women that feature in the collection are couched in religious morals as well.94 And while most of the stories are centered on figures whose initial literary appearance had occurred in classical rabbinic literature, their medieval adaptation is folkloristic, suggesting their relevance to audiences beyond scholastic circles.95 The folkloristic character of the stories in Ibn Shāhīn’s Kitāb al-­faraj in general, and that of the mother and her seven children in particular, is noteworthy in relation to Muslim–­Jewish literary links, if not interplays. The unique features of Jewish folk literature that originated in medieval Islamic lands have been understood not only as consistent with earlier rabbinic narratives but also as being in response to the daily realities of Jewish communities and in affinity to parallel Islamic lore.96 With regard to the story of the mother and her seven sons, the fact that it was retold among Jewish communities in lands and times far beyond those of medieval Islam underscores its moral significance.97 Islamic lore suggests two primary modes in which the story was incorporated by Muslim authors. The first is found in Ibn Ḥ anbal’s Musnad, in the so-­called ḥ adīth al-­māshiṭa (“the tradition of the hairdresser”). Here, the female protagonist serves as the hairdresser of Pharaoh’s daughter.98 The hadith reports that, in consequence of the hairdresser’s objection to Pharaoh’s claim to divinity and her proclamation of faith in God, she and her five sons were put to death, by being thrown into a copper cow. A recent analysis of the ḥ adīth al-­māshiṭa has highlighted a few motifs in common with the Maccabaean story, most notably the mother’s proclamation of faith, her dialogue with the tyrant monarch, and her dialogue with her last, youngest son.99 The hadith version later received some adaptation in al-­Thaʿālibī’s collection of tales of the prophets. The story was woven into the tale about the Qurʾanic figure of the believer of Pharaoh’s folk 93  Schippers, “Some remarks on the women’s stories,” 277. 94  Ibid., 278. 95  Baker, “Judaeo-­Arabic material in the Cambridge Genizah collections,” 452; Baumgarten and Kushelevsky, “From ‘the mother and her sons’ to ‘the mother of the sons’, ” 304. 96 See also Drory, The Emergence of Jewish-­Arabic Literary Contacts; Rotman, “Folktales/Folk Literature”; Polliack, “Implementation as innovation,” 202. 97  See Attia, Romancero Seferadi, song no. 87, “Hannah’s seven sons,” 194–5; Hassan and Romeo, “Qinot paraliturgicas: Edicion y variantes”; Gutwirth, “A Judeo-­Spanish Planctus”; cited in Joslyn-­ Siemiatkoski, “The mother and seven sons in late antique and medieval Ashkenazi Judaism,” 127, n. 3; see also Baumgarten and Kushelevsky, “From ‘the mother and her sons’ to ‘the mother of the sons’, ” 302. 98  Ibn Ḥ anbal, Musnad, 5: 30–1 (no. 2821). 99 For a thorough and comprehensive study of the ḥ adīth al-­māshiṭa, see Rafael and Maristo, “Death in the ‘contact zone’. ”

Precarious Gatekeepers  201 (muʾmin āl farʿūn) in Q 40:28, whose wife was māshiṭat āl farʿūn (“the hairdresser of Pharoah’s folk”). Once again, the woman is seen contesting the attribution of divinity to the Egyptian monarch and is consequently put to death along with her five sons.100 Yet while the ḥ adīth al-­māshiṭa reflects a rather limited adaptation of features from the Maccabaean story, a second mode of Islamic literary reworking of the story testifies to its almost full absorption. Perhaps the earliest extant version of an Islamic adoption of the story is in the composition of the Baghdadī Muslim scholar Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā (d. 281/894), al-­Ṣabr wa-­l-­thawāb ʿalayhi (“Patience and the rewards for it”).101 According to Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā, the story was passed down through a chain of transmitters, starting with the Yemenite scholar Wahb b. Munabbih (d. 101/720). An almost identical version to that of Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā is found in the heresiographic work of the Shāfiʿī scholar al-­Malaṭī (d. 376/987) who was originally from south-­east Asia Minor—­al-­Tanbīh wa-­l-­radd ʿalā ahl al-­ahwāʾ wa-­l-­badʿ (“The book of warning and refutation of the people of desire and innovation”).102 And another, third version shows up in the historiographical composition of the Ḥ anbalī Baghdadi scholar Ibn al-­Jawzī (d. 597/1201)—al-­ Muntaẓam fī taʾrīkh al-­mulūk wa-­l-­umam (“The well-­organized [book] concerning the history of kings and peoples”).103 Less than a century ago, Georges Vajda commented that the Arabic narrative in Islamic sources does not stand in direct affinity to the one in 2 and 4 Maccabees and that it is quite plausible that it emerged out of an intermediary text.104 Vajda could only offer this modest observation, as little is known about how the Maccabaean story made its way into medieval works. Whereas the literary kernel of the apocryphal narrative is evident, interplays within religious literary traditions or between them are almost impossible to trace without risking considerable speculation. At the same time, however, the numerous references to the story, its retellings, adaptations, and commemorations in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic texts of diverse literary genres and over the centuries, serve as clear indications of its centrality and significance. It also seems evident that the story’s literary manifestations in works from the medieval Islamic period are the product of editorial interventions. These are worthy of our attention, given the enduring moral significance of the story, at least from the perspective of those who chose to record it. Notwithstanding its different versions, the story contains motifs of female power which we have already encountered in this chapter, namely courage, sacrifice, perseverance, and most importantly, the prioritization of God over kin. Their display by the mother accords her a distinct place in the story and the praise of the different narrators. The mother is depicted as urging her sons to prefer death 100  Al-­Thaʿlabī, Qiṣaṣ al-­anbiyāʾ, 257. I wish to thank Luke Yarbrough from bringing the passage to my attention. 101  Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā, al-­Ṣabr wa-­l-­thawāb ʿalayhi, 77–80. 102  Al-­Malaṭī, al-­Tanbīh, 101–2. 103  Ibn al-­Jawzī, al-­Muntaẓam, 1: 428–9. 104  Vajda, “Judaeo-­arabica: 3,” 96.

202  Female Power and Religious Change to idolatry, supporting them, witnessing their torture and subsequent death, and eventually giving up her own life as well. Her laudable achievement is attributed to her maternal agency. It is here that the bonds between the mother and her children, formed already in the womb, and later during the early years of infancy, are of crucial importance. They endow the mother with a guiding authority over her sons and the latter with a fraternal sense of unity that allows them to overcome their terrible torments.105 The point is already made in 2 Maccabees in the dialogue between the mother and her seventh son, as she reminds him of the time when she bore him and later nursed him: “I carried you nine months in my womb, and nursed you for three years, and have reared you and brought you up to this point in your life, and have taken care of you” (2 Macc. 7: 28). And again in 4 Maccabees, as it calls upon the reader to “Observe how complex is a mother’s love for her children, which draws everything toward an emotion felt in her inmost parts” (4 Macc. 14: 13). The reference to the mother’s womb in the context of her maternal love resurfaces in relation to her pregnancy: “In seven pregnancies she had implanted in herself tender love toward them” (4 Macc. 15: 6). Additional maternal sentiments feature later in Eichah Rabba through a heartbreaking scene in which the mother pleads the emperor to allow her to embrace her son one last time, “By your life, Caesar, give me my son, so I may hug and kiss him.” She then performs an act which symbolizes her relationship with her child in the most explicit manner, as “she took out her breasts and gave him milk.”106 These sentiments made their way to the story’s medieval recording in Ibn Abī al-­ Dunyā’s treatise, again, in the dialogue between the mother and her seventh child: My little son, you should know that I have a right over every man from among your brothers, and over you twice a right. And this is since I breast fed each one for two years, whereas your father died while you were in the womb, and I gave birth to you. I breast fed you for four years due to your weakness and my compassion towards you.107

And in 6 Maccabees, the intensity of maternal sentiments features once again through physical gestures in different parts of the homily, as the mother embraces her sons just before they are about to endure torment and death. These signs of maternal love serve to underscore the close relationship between the mother and her children and, as a result, the latter’s commitment and obedience to the ­former. At the same time, they also highlight the terrible conflict between a mother’s love for her children and her love for God, “between temporary safety or salvation at the word of Antiochus, and what leads to eternal life according to God.”108 105  Rajak, “The mother’s role in Maccabaean martyrology.” 106 Neusner, Lamentations Rabbah, 175–8. 107  Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā, al-­Ṣabr wa-­l-­thawāb ʿalayhi, 79. 108  Young and Levine, “The woman with the soul of Abraham,” 77.

Precarious Gatekeepers  203 The Maccabaean narrative makes it clear that, in prioritizing God over her sons, the mother acted against her maternal instincts by enlisting a masculine virtue. In 2 Maccabees: “She reinforced her woman’s reasoning with a man’s courage” (2 Macc. 7: 21). And in 4 Maccabees, the mother’s figure echoes the biblical model of Abraham: “But sympathy for her children did not sway the mother of the young men; she was of the same mind as Abraham” (4 Macc. 14: 20). And again, her ability to overcome her sentimental weakness was through the adoption of manly reason: “But devout reason, giving her heart a man’s courage in the very midst of her emotions, strengthened her to disregard, for the time, her parental love” (4 Macc. 15: 23). The Greco-­Roman context of the narrative should not escape our attention, whereby virtues such as prudence, temperance, justice, and courage were perceived as utterly masculine. Accordingly, the ability to exercise reason as a means for subduing passion was considered a male trait as well.109 In order for the mother to witness her children’s torture and death, and even to encourage them towards such a horrible fate, she was to adorn herself with the virtue of andreia, that is, the notion of courage and manliness.110 Yet whereas the Maccabaean narrative likens the mother to Abraham, in Eichah Rabba she is made seven times greater than him. When the last son persisted in his insolence towards the emperor, “His mother threw herself upon her child and hugged and kissed him, saying to him, ‘My son, go tell Abraham, our father: “Now see, my mother built seven altars and offered up seven sons in one day. And yours was only a test, but I really had to do it.” ’ ” Likewise, in the Babylonian Talmud: “She said to him: ‘My son, go and say to your father Abraham, “Thou didst bind one [son to the] altar, but I have bound seven altars” ’ Then she also went up on to a roof and threw herself down and was killed.”111 Syriac versions of the story from the medieval Islamic period reiterate the analogy to Abraham, while underscoring the Hasmonean lineage of the family. In the Chronicle of Pseudo-­Dionysius of Tel Maḥ re and the Chronicle of Michael the Syrian, we find a direct link between the story of the mother and her seven sons to the Maccabaean revolt. According to Pseudo-­ Dionysius, the head of the Maccabaean family was one of the sons: “At that time Mattathia from [a family of] priests, son of Shmuni, from the village of Modiʿim, together with his sons rose against the commanders of Antiochus.” And according to Michael, “Mattathia, the father of the Maccabees, and ʿAbd Shalom, the father of Shmuni, were brothers.” These links, as can be expected, are also noted in 6 Maccabees, only now the seven sons are registered as the sons of Mattathia. The author of 6 Maccabees later notes that the sons were also descendants of Abraham. The significance of these links is first and foremost didactic, so the mother tells her 109  Moore and Anderson, “Taking it like a man,” 252. See also Cobb, “Putting women in their place.” 110  See Penrose, Postcolonial Amazons, 11–14, ch. 1. 111  bGit 75a; tr. Epstein, The Babylonian Talmud.

204  Female Power and Religious Change third son: “Call to mind our ancestors Abraham and Isaac, the deceased ones. And do not forget the law of Moses, which was written on tablets, and never let the slaying of your brothers be erased from before your eyes. Rather, imitate them and endure for an hour, for if you die, you will live.”112 The connection will reach full circle towards the end, through further analogy to the biblical Binding of Isaac in order to advance the didactic message of the story: “our father Abraham, father of all nations, in what manner he bound Isaac tightly, and put him on pieces of wood and put a knife to the throat of him who was the son of the promises. He did not tremble, for the reason that he expected unending life.”113 At the same time, however, the connections which the different narratives make not only to Abraham but also to Mattathia and the Maccabaean revolt remind us that the main heroes of the historical affair were male, highlighting the mother’s “male” achievements. Finally, the analogy to Abraham is also remarked in Ibn Shāhīn’s Kitāb al-­faraj, presumably in correspondence to the version in Eichah Rabba and the Babylonian Talmud: Then she said to the youth, “My child, accept nothing of what this infidel tells you and you will meet your brothers and walk in their company until you see an old man of splendid mien, and that will be our father Abraham. Tell him, ‘You built one altar for your son Isaac, but you did not sacrifice him upon it, whereas we have sacrificed our lives to God Most High and did not violate His command, and our mother is witness [to this] for us.’ ”114

The salient analogy to the biblical binding that features throughout the different versions of the story creates a clear link between the mother and Abraham as parents who were willing to sacrifice their children for the sake of God. Yet whereas the Maccabaean narrative is heavily couched in the Greco-­Roman ideals stemming from the notion of andreia, it is the cord of lineage (spiritual or biological) in rabbinic, Christian, and Islamic texts that facilitates the mother’s achievements. At the same time, in all versions of the story we find a constant tension between its female and male protagonists. In addition to the obvious confrontation between the mother and the emperor, the mother is seen ­making claims of authority vis-­à-­vis her sons on the grounds of her maternal role. And in the rabbinic versions, she claims to have surpassed Abraham’s ­sacrifice as her figure outweighs the ideal of courage that was set forth by the biblical patriarch.115 Courage and perseverance are two of the fundamental traits which allow the mother to prioritize God over her children. The Maccabaean author was clearly 112  English tr.: Peterson, “Martha Shamoni,” 231. 113  Ibid., 259. 114 Brinner, Elegant Composition, 31–2. 115  Cf. Hasan-­Rokem, Web of Life, 118.

Precarious Gatekeepers  205 aware of that: “The mother was especially admirable and worthy of honorable memory. Although she saw her seven sons perish within a single day, she bore it with good courage because of her hope in the Lord.” (2 Macc. 7: 20). Her virtuous piety is later briefly referred to in the Chronicle of Pseudo-­Dionysius, where she is praised for it along with her sons: “At that time Shmuni and her sons excelled in testimony to the fearing of God.” And in Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā’s al-­Ṣabr, she is quoted as saying that disobedience to God would amount to mourning the death of her children: “Should I combine disobedience to Allah with my bereavement over my children?” According to the account in Ibn Shāhīn’s Kitāb al-­faraj, the mother explains to the king why she urged her youngest and last son to disobey him like the rest of his brothers: “Had I obeyed you, I would have separated him from his brothers.”116 In both the Islamic and medieval Jewish versions, the mother’s piety merges with her care for her children. The principal message that emerges from all versions of the story is stoic, namely a mastery of the passions and a demonstration of courage by means of reason for the purpose of upholding God’s law.117 In 2 Maccabees: “the Creator of the world . . . will in his mercy give life and breath back to you again, since you now forget yourselves for the sake of his laws” (2 Macc. 7: 23). And perhaps the most stoic scene in the narrative is the dialogue that takes place between the mother and her youngest son, the last to endure and die, in which the mother implores the boy: “Accept death, so that in God’s mercy I may get you back again along with your brothers” (2 Macc. 7: 30), after which the boy exclaims “I will not obey the king’s command, but I obey the command of the law that was given to our ancestors through Moses.” While these ideals and passages are omitted from the late antique versions, they receive varying degrees of representation in Islamic-­era versions. In the Chronicle of Michael the Syrian, “Shmuni and her sons were crowned together with Eleazar the priest.” The latter, “who was seized in order that he should make sacrifice, refused [to do so]. After [suffering] tortures he died for the sake of the Law.” In 6 Maccabees the point could not have been more explicit from the very start: “They who [died] for the sake of the law and for the sake of the commandments.” The point is later explicated in the mother’s speech to her fourth son, where it is the laws of Moses that are the reason for the great sacrifice: “Be strengthened, my son, and have no fear at all of the sufferings they bring upon you, these accursed ones and deceivers; and do not renounce the law of your ancestors, and the established accounts, the writings of Moses, all-­fulfilled, the first-­born of all the prophets.” In Ibn Abī al-­Dunyā’s al-­Ṣabr, the mother calls upon her last son to endure torture and death, lest he violate divine instruction:

116 Brinner, Elegant Composition, 32. 117  Young and Levine, “The ‘woman with the soul of Abraham’,” 71; Rajak, “The mother’s role in Maccabaean martyrology,” 117.

206  Female Power and Religious Change I beseech you in the name of Allah and on account of my right over you, for what you are about to endure and your avoidance from eating a thing of what Allah has forbidden to you, lest I meet your brothers on the Day of Judgment while you are not with them. He then said: “Praise Allah who made me hear this from you, for I feared you wished to urge me to eat what Allah has forbidden me.”

And in Ibn Shāhīn’s Kitāb al-­faraj, we see the mother’s promise to her son that he is about to meet his brothers and the patriarch Abraham.118 The image of the mother beseeching and exhorting her sons to prefer the next world over this one is carried on from the Maccabaean narrative to its medieval versions. We have here an image of an exemplary woman whose achievements are praised on account of not only her sacrifice but also her didactic agency. Her example, so the author of 6 Maccabees anticipates, will be commemorated by generations to come: How good and honorable is your commemoration, O martyr Shamoni! . . . For when the accursed one rebuked your sons with tortures, right in front of you, and through him their souls were taken away to the country of the righteous, your rational mind and your wisdom did not depart from you, and your enduring courage restored the rational mind of the youths. And by the power of your counsel their childish reasoning was reconstituted and therefore not one of them complied with the words of the fool . . . And therefore your amazing story is told over and over again among all nations, and congregations in the four quarters of the world are built in your name. And your name is reckoned among the righteous.119

Likewise in Ibn Shāhīn’s Kitāb al-­faraj, the monarch’s admission towards the end of the story of the truth of the Jewish religion speaks of the strength of the message that emerges from the martyrdom: “When the king saw what the mother and her children had done, he said to himself, ‘if the religion of these people were not true, they would not have surrendered themselves to death in this fashion.’ ”120

Conclusions This chapter began with a scene of women sacrificing their lives for the sake of their purity and ended with a scene of a mother sacrificing the lives of her sons and her own on account of their fidelity to divine law. Such tragic choices, it has been argued, are to be seen as signs of female power in the framework of male restrictions. The freedom to choose death over idolatry was not only an act of 118 Brinner, Elegant Composition, 32. 120 Brinner, Elegant Composition, 32.

119  Peterson, “Martha Shamoni,” 257–8.

Precarious Gatekeepers  207 piety but also an expression of female autonomy. The terrible scenes of sacrifice, perseverance, and danger that featured throughout this chapter underscore a common perception across religious traditions of both female precarity and female agency. While women were expected to operate within the boundaries of male authority, they were nonetheless afforded the means to stand fast and resist threats to their religious integrity and to that of their kin. In addition to free will, women possessed capital that stemmed from their maternal and spousal offices. This gave mothers the means to exhort their children towards belief and personal sacrifice; present their husbands with counter images of piety and fidelity; and resist different forms of religious violence. The literary scenes capturing these instances corroborate the social cases presented in legal texts. These refer to circumstances in which Christian women married outside the fold; Christian and Jewish women remained married to apostates; and female converts to Islam faced the conflict of separation from their non-­Muslim husbands. Yet women were not alone in these moments of conflict between their religious and kinship affiliations, as their choices affected others as well, including their children, husbands, members of their natal group, and their communities at large. Accordingly, tales of female heroic performances should be read with an eye to their moral significance rather than as parallels to real-­life situations, not to mention depictions of real events. For women who faced the challenge of living and raising their children within a kinship setting dominated by a religious other, stories about extraordinary forms of female power were to serve as sources of spiritual inspiration and courage. While the authors of these stories were undoubtedly male, and the ideals they put forward stemmed from male expectations, the social and religious dilemmas they reflected were very much female oriented.

  The Paradox of Female Religious Power Women played a crucial, yet hitherto overlooked, part in the religious transformation of the Near East following the rise of Islam. Any attempt to address the complex process that resulted in the Islamization of the region will prove lacking as long as women remain outside our framework of inquiry. Yet writing the history of women poses a notable challenge to the historian, given their marginal presence in historical records. The challenge is further amplified as we move to locate the center of their activities in private domains that were for the most part removed from the observations of historiographical records. To that end, I have sought to incorporate in this study a host of literary references, many of which speak of women and their agency indirectly or symbolically. Despite their obvious limitations, symbolic discourses can prove useful when read in their didactic context alongside documentary sources. Hence the choice to read folktales, hagiographies, and biographies in conjunction with legal lore. Whereas the former genres were meant to inspire and motivate their audiences, the latter was instrumental in regulating, curtailing, or encouraging modes of conduct. Read together, they not only complete and confirm each other but also reveal the mindset, ideals, and conceptual frameworks of literary elites of different religious convictions. This book has focused on the place and agency of women in family settings in consideration of their kinship ties. Both family and kinship bear a host of formal definitions and less formal meanings in different contexts, places, and times. Yet irrespective of these differences, family and kinship imply commitments, attachments, and expectations among their members. As a result, it was in the framework of the family that kinship ties provided a highly durable social glue that was founded on common ancestry, shared experience, and material interests. The family was simultaneously generating and being generated by norms and practices that provided its members with a microcosmic communal setting in which parents, spouses, siblings, and second-­degree relatives participated and interacted. The family, in contrast to the market, the legal court, centers of higher learning, not to mention the governmental sphere, was a space in which women held positions that endowed them with considerable capital. This was not only in their capacities as managers of their households, as wives and mothers, but also as daughters and sisters whose kinship affiliations were instrumental in bargaining for their personal safety and wellbeing. Mothers were seen as the source of life and as possessing a pivotal role during the formative stages of their children; wives were assigned managerial responsibilities in the household and moral Female Power and Religious Change in the Medieval Near East. Uriel Simonsohn, Oxford University Press. © Uriel Simonsohn 2023. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192871251.003.0008

210  Female Power and Religious Change agency vis-­à-­vis their husbands; a daughter required her father and brother’s guardianship; and siblings remained in a life-­long bond of mutual commitments. These relationships were for the most part reciprocal and consequently rendered a woman’s position active, in contrast to her otherwise relatively peripheral, if not passive, place in the public sphere. Another communal feature of medieval Islamic urban families is their interconnectedness within a network of households through kinship ties, as well as shared spaces. For example, marital unions served to forge kinship ties between the families of the young couple, and shared courtyard arrangements created opportunities for inter-­family contacts and collaborations through daily routines. Young women, who became simultaneously affiliated with their natal families and those of their husbands, even if not physically moving into their husbands’ households, assumed a highly liminal position. Their liminality was further enhanced in the course of their daily movements through the courtyard and beyond it, when visiting their natal families, embarking on pilgrimages, or contributing to the economic endeavours of their households. As liminal figures, women were in a mediating position to carry objects, ideas, and practices across family boundaries. Although patriarchal conventions delimited their roles, they did not undermine their religious agency as brokers of ideas and practices, as proselytizers, or as gatekeepers. It was due to the communal nature of the family that communal authorities—­ rabbis, ecclesiastics, and ʿulamāʾ—worked hard to instill ideals that would prioritize the religious community over kinship. These took on special urgency with regard to religiously mixed families that facilitated occasions for undesirable religious mixings. Yet it was more than that. Religiously mixed families represented the obverse of communal ideals. Religious exogamy, family ties with apostates, or contacts among members of different religious affiliations within the intimate setting of the domicile served to undermine communal visions of religious unity. In carrying out their daily routines in the company of religious others, communal members were seen as endangering the religious community, whereby personal sentiments and interests could come at the expense of communal loyalties. Accordingly, the complex balance between kinship and community has featured throughout this book. The fact that women were at the center of these tensions can be discerned from the elaborate treatment they receive in normative discourses, namely, legal regulations and edifying narratives. As women married outside the religious fold or remained in matrimony with apostates and as women converted to Islam or apostatized, they constituted a central concern from a communal perspective. Their relations with family members of different religions required supervision and regulation, measures that not only speak of communal apprehensions but also attest to the scope of female religious agency. This might seem like a paradox when considered in the context of male-­dominated societies, whereby a woman’s daily decisions were largely governed by various forms of

The Paradox of Female Religious Power  211 male guardianship. The paradox is further enhanced through literary depictions that variably present women as frivolous, resourceful, cunning, pious, sinful, and devout. Yet the answer to the question of female power appears to lie in this very paradox. Take, for example, the early medieval midrash of Pirqe de-­rabbi Eliʿezer (“The chapters of Rabbi Eliʿezer”). Referring to the biblical scene of the original sin, it explains the Serpent’s choice to approach Eve on the following grounds: “The Serpent deliberated to himself and said: If I go and speak to the man, I know he will not listen to me, for man is stubborn about his opinions. But if I go and speak to the woman, who is easy to influence, I know she will listen to me, for women listen to all creatures, as it says, ‘Women are naive and know not . . .’ (Prov. 9:13).”1 Yet, later on, in reference to the Revelation on Mount Sinai, God commands Moses: “Go, and speak to the daughters of Israel. Ask them whether they will accept the Torah, for it is customary for men to follow the opinion of their wives.”2 The Serpent approached the sinful and feeble-­minded Eve with Adam as his main target. His hope to influence Adam was most likely premised on the very notion of men following the opinion of their wives that shows up later in the midrash. Female weakness, we may therefore surmise, was a source of both power and agency. What might seem to be a state of social inferiority, restricted by male authority, was often translated into capital. While most Muslim jurists insisted upon a strict correlation between gender and religious hierarchies, allowing marriage between a Muslim man and a Christian or Jewish woman, some went as far as rejecting such unions altogether. Muslim positions resonate with ecclesiastical regulations that focused their rejection of religious exogamy on women. Yet whereas Muslim jurists were mainly concerned with the religious integrity of the Muslim husband and the couple’s Muslim children, ecclesiastics appear to have been primarily concerned with the potential apostasy of Christian women. Different concerns, resulting in different prescriptions, are a clear testimony to the power balance between Muslim and non-­Muslim communities; a balance between a majority convert-­absorbing community and a minority one, fearful of the potential desertion of its members. This inter-­religious rivalry was further manifested in the attempts of ecclesiastics to retain control over Christian women and in those of Muslim jurists to supervise non-­Muslim women’s ritual activities. These endeavors leave little doubt about the agency of non-­Muslim women as mediators of ideas and practices across religious lines. In other instances, the enduring marital unions between non-­Muslim women and converts to Islam served as a reminder to the latter of their former religious community. This held particularly valid in a rabbinic context, whereby Jewish law, and accordingly most of the ge’onim, did not relieve male apostates from their legal obligations towards 1  Pirqe de-­rabbi Eliʿezer, ch. 13; English tr. in Adelman, The Return of the Repressed, 91. 2  Ibid., 172.

212  Female Power and Religious Change their wives and sisters-­in-­law. The liminal position of non-­Muslim women was the primary source of their agency. At the same time, their liminality allows us to observe the ongoing tension between kinship sentiments and communal expectations and speaks of the overlap between kinship and communal affiliations as a sphere of religious hybridity. The conversion of non-­Muslim women to Islam and their ability to draw others towards conversion was the source of non-­Muslim communal preoccupations with religious exogamy. In both cases we are dealing with women who acted in defiance of religious principles. Yet seen from a social perspective, their acts were equally defiant of the patriarchal authority of their non-­Muslim fathers when they married outside the fold and that of their non-­Muslim husbands when they converted to Islam. It is here that communal agendas coalesced with those of ­kinship, specifically patriarchy. The maintenance of the former was contingent upon the upholding of the latter. Yet from a Muslim perspective, the very same acts were legitimized by rendering patriarchal norms secondary to those of Islamic objectives. Accordingly, stories about the female Companions of the Prophet served to valorize the bold decisions and acts of women who were willing to leave their pagan families behind and risk their personal wellbeing for the sake of their belief. In many instances, such acts required alternative male patrons, as in the case of Umm Kulthūm bt. ʿUqba who found a male escort who would take her to Medina and who eventually entrusted her fate to the Prophet. Yet women’s conversion to Islam was also a blunt expression of the reversal of gender hierarchies, particularly when women were able to bring about the conversion of their male patrons. Whether or not the contents of female biographies were anchored in a concrete reality, their plots speak of different perceptions of female agency as well as of their moral significance. Historically, we are admitted into the conceptual world of male Muslim authors regarding female power. Yet the value of their accounts increases once we think of them as vehicles of a symbolic discourse that were to inspire future generations of Muslims in general and of Muslim women in particular. Read along other forms of literary evidence, Islamic and non-­Islamic, they suggest that the phenomenon of female conversion to Islam was not as marginal as some historians have maintained. Legal sources confirm that this was a multifaceted phenomenon, bearing implications not only for the converts themselves but for their families, and their children in particular. This was even more so when converts sustained ties with their non-­Muslim family members, whereby a host of questions of legal, economic, and normative natures would arise. In terms of their didactic value, stories about women converts highlight some remarkable traits, among them exceptional perseverance, uncompromising commitment to the religious community, a willingness for self-­sacrifice and sacrifice of loved ones, courage, piety, and more. These qualities were sanctified, not only as a means for encouraging conversion but also for resisting it. Such moral

The Paradox of Female Religious Power  213 encouragements, we may surmise, were of considerable value to women who were pressured to apostatize or were forced to witness the imposition of a different religion on their children. Next to stories valorizing the acts of female converts we find others that speak highly of women who withstood different forms of religious violence. Once again, their achievements came at the cost of violating patriarchal conventions, a price that was considered legitimate when weighed against abiding by communal ideals. Tales about women retaining their belief and safeguarding that of their children within their assigned family roles offer testimonies to the outlooks of different religious writers throughout the ages. The trope is an ancient one, drawing from biblical prototypes. In its Islamic context, it continued to underscore the force of female agency within the limitations of patriarchal authority. Here, the motif of ṣabr took on special significance, resonating with Hellenistic conceptions of masculinity, whereby women were seen overcoming their inherent precarity through the adoption of a male form of rationality. It is this rationality which was to allow them to subdue their passions and favor God over their own wellbeing and, more importantly, that of their children. Depictions of this sort are clearly indicative of the male perspective of their narrators. Yet the edifying role of female protagonists and the symbolic significance of their actions speak of moments in which women faced conflicts between their kinship commitments and their religious ones. They serve to corroborate once again the images extracted from legal sources, namely of women married outside the fold; women who remained married to apostates; and women converts to Islam who faced the conflict of separating from their non-­Muslim husbands. The hardship of living and raising children within a kinship setting dominated by a religious other may have been reduced by stories about extraordinary forms of female power. While the authors of these stories were undoubtedly men, and the ideals they put forward resulted from their male expectations, the social and religious dilemmas they reflected were very much drawn from the world of women. An acknowledgment of the complexity of female agency, its resilience, and its adaptation to changing circumstances within the constraints of patriarchal conventions and religious ideals, is pertinent to an inquiry into the place of women in moments of religious change. Through it we may learn to appreciate the often silent, yet highly decisive, role of these women in the religious transformations that informed the Near East and adjacent lands in the centuries following their takeover by Islam.

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Index For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages. Abbasid administration 146–7 caliph 100–1 concerns 96n.4 era 100n.28 governors  80–1, 142–3 ʿAbd al-Ḥ amīd al-Salama  78 ʿAbd al-Ḥ āmid b. Jaʿfar 77 ʿAbdallāh b. ʿAbd al-Ḥ akam 96n.4 ʿAbd al-Masīḥ b. Isḥāq al-Kindī  75n.73 Apology 131–2 ʿAbd al-Razzāq  157 al-Muṣannaf  100–3, 132 ʿAbd Shalom  203–4 Abode of War  92, 100, 114, 122–3, 137, see also People of War, war/warfare Abraham  63–4, 74–5, 184, 203–4 Abraham Maimonides  46n.123, 113n.103, 185n.28 Abū ʿAbbās (Ibn ʿAbbās)  77, 85, 88–9, 115–16 Abū al-ʿAkr 163n.36 Abū al-ʿĀṣ b. al-Rabīʿ 171–3 Abū al-Faraj al-Isfahānī  197 Abū al-Ṭ āhir al-Dhuhlī  115 Abū Bakr  161–2 Abū Bakr al-Khallāl  171–2 Abū Ḥ udhayfa b. ʿUtba 82–3 Abū Hurayra  72–3 Abū Jahl  162, 179–80 Abū Lahab  162 Abū Maryam ʿAbdallāh b. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān  82, 191–2 Abū Saʿīd al-Iṣtạ khrī 78 Abū Salāma al-Anṣārī 78 Abū Sufyān b. Ḥ arb b. Umayya  16–17, 119–21, 164 Abū Ṭ alḥa  165–7, 195–6 Abyssinia  120, 164, 173–4 Adam and Eve  15–16, 210–11 Africa  12–13, 134–5, 184–5 Aghlabid court  84 Aḥmad b. Ḥ anbal  96–7, 120–1

Ahmed, Leila  9 al-Andalus/Andalusī  51–2, 139–41, 157, 184–5 al-Baghūm bt. al-Muʿadhdhal 153 al-Balādhurī 140–1 Kitāb ansāb al-ashrāf 194 al-Dhahabī 162 Aleppo 168 Alexandria  81–4, 86–7, 189–90 al-Ghazālī  51, 70–1 Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-dīn  41, 51–2 al-Ḥ ākim bi-Amr Allāh  140–1 al-Ḥ ārith b. Abī Rabīʿa 115–16 al-Ḥ asan b. Ayyūb  81–2 al-Jāhiẓ  116, 140–1 al-Kāsānī 122–3 al-Khat ̣īb al-Baghdādī  162 al-Kindī 115 Kitab al-wulāt wa-l-quḍāt fī Miṣr 115 al-Madāʾin 23–4 al-Mahdī 100–1 al-Māwardī  41–2, 85, 90–1, 120, 156, 169–70 al-Ḥ āwī al-kabīr 132 al-Mizzī  139n.35, 162 al-Muʿtaḍid 146–7 al-Nawawī 162 al-Qāsim b. Yaḥyā al-Maryamī  81 al-Ṣafadī 162 al-Samawʾal al-Maghribī  84 al-Shāfiʿī  90–1, 115, 137, 143–4 Kitāb al-umm  92, 115 al-Shaybānī  99, 186n.33 al-Shīrāzī 78 al-Ṭ abarī  76–7, 81–2, 146–7, 194 Taʾrīkh  138–9, 173–4 al-Tanūkhī  59, 199–200 al-Faraj baʿd al-shidda 59 al-Tirmidhī 131–2 al-Ṭ ufayl b. ʿAmr al-Dawsī  78–80 al-Ṭ ūsī 122 al-Walīd b. ʿAbd al-Malik  81, 89 al-Wāqidī 89–90 Kitāb al-maghāzī 153–4

254 Index ʿAmram Ga’on  160 Anas b. Mālik  72–3, 164–5 Anastasius of Sinai  104 Antioch  117–18, 189–90, 198–9 Antiochus IV Epiphanes  198, 202–4 apostasy/apostates  16–17, 64, 73–5, 73n.62, 82–7, 98–9, 101–14, 116–19, 121–2, 124–5, 134–6, 138–9, 145–6, 154, 159–60, 164, 167–8, 180–91, 194, 206–7, 210–13 Arabia  9, 16–17, 48, 65, 84n.106, 97–8, 153–8, 172 Arabian matriarchate system  48 nobleman 78–9 poets 71–4 setting 163–4 societies 48 tribes  9, 32, 100–2 women 192n.57 Arabs  16, 60, 83–4, 140 ʿArīb b. Saʿd al-Qurt ̣ubī Ṣillat taʾrīkh al-Ṭ abarī 146–7 Aristophanes Lysistrata 10–11 Arwā bt. ʿAbd al-Mut ̣t ̣alib 179–81 Asad b. al-Furāt  144 Asmāʾ b. Khārija  49 Asmāʾ bt. Abī Bakr  77 Athanasius of Balad  147–9, 186–7, 189–90 ʿAt ̣iyya al-Awfī  156 Augustine of Hippo  76–7, 155 Babylonia  40–1, 106 Babylonian form of agreement  40–1 marriage 41n.82 sages 111–12 Sefer ha-she’iltot de-rav Aḥay 106 Talmud  5, 68–9, 71–2, 73n.62, 111–12, 167–8, 198–9, 203–4 Baghdad  12–13, 23–4, 80–1, 87, 139n.34, 161 Baghdadi historian 161 literary salons  24–5 mystic 80–1 scholars 200–1 Bakchos the Younger (Ḍ aḥḥāk) 189–91 Banū ʿAbd al-Mut ̣t ̣alib 153 Banū al-Naḍīr 130 Banū Daws  78–9 Banū Khuzāʿa  90, 156, 164 Banū Makhzūm  161–2 Banū Taghlib  101–2 Banū Tanūkh  100–1

Baraza bt. Masʿūd b. ʿAmr al-Thaqafī  173–4 Bar Hebraeus  51, 199 Ecclesiastical History 100–1 Ethicon  51–2, 109n.80 Nomocanon 149–50 Battle of al-Qādisiyya  71–2, 196 Battle of Badr  82–3, 171, 173 Battle of Ḥ unayn 195–6 Battle of the Trench  191–2 betrothal  73n.62, 98–9, 107, 113n.103, 118, 135, 183–4, 184n.27, see also brides, intermarriage, levirate marriage, marriage, matrimony, mixed marriages Bible  23, 67–8, 70–1 Acts 189n.40 Colossians 142 Corinthians  107–9, 142 Ephesians 142 Genesis  63, 118 Gospels  64–5, 134 Maccabees  198–9, 201–6 Matthew  64–5, 69–70 New Testament  70–1 Peter 155 Proverbs 51–2 biblical archetypes  3, 13–14 figures 13–16 literature 138n.28 matriarchs 88 motifs 14–15 narrative 74–5 patriarch 204 prototypes 212–13 stories  3, 24–5, 72, 167–8, 191–2, 197–8 texts 108 times 106 Binding of Isaac  26, 63, 74–5, 203–4 biographical accounts  20–1, 170 collections  21, 23–4, 90–1, 139n.35, 158, 162, 166–7, 191–2 compositions 78–9 dictionaries  27, 163–4, 172, 193–4 literature  13–14, 150 narratives  19–20, 153–7, 175–6 notices 173–4 reports 156 Blidstein, Gerald  73n.62 Book of Jubilees  160n.26 brides  40–1, 43–4, 52, 54, 99, 119–20, 146–7, 177, 191–2, see also betrothal, intermarriage, levirate marriage, marriage, matrimony, mixed marriages

Index  255 brothers  7–8, 10–11, 33, 39n.74, 47–9, 63–5, 73–5, 73n.62, 78–9, 82–4, 86–90, 103, 118, 120, 122–3, 131, 132n.14, 134–6, 154, 159–60, 166, 177, 179–80, 182–3, 189–90, 192–4, 202–6, 209–10 Bryson 37 Bulliet, Richard  95–6 Būlus b. al-Rajā  74–5 Byzantine  67–8, 85n.112, 92, 140, 149–50 Byzantines  59–60, 139, 168–70, 170n.57, 193–4 Byzantium  172, 199 Caesarea 154–5 Cairo  23–4, 34–5, 167 Calderini, Simonetta  12–13 catholicoi  87, 109n.82, 113–14, 117–18, 127, 141–2, 155 Celsus 76–7 childbirth  10–11, 13, 36, 38n.62, 68–9, 88, 112–13, 113n.102, 115, 135, 196, 202, see also newborns child custody  5, 38–9, 52, 54, 78, 144–5 children  4–6, 19–20, 36–9, 37n.59, 46–7, 56, 63–5, 67–8, 70–7, 84, 88–9, 96–7, 99–104, 110–16, 112n.95, 118, 122–5, 127, 130, 134, 136–43, 145–50, 155, 158–9, 161, 169–70, 178, 181–2, 184–5, 187–92, 195–207, 209–13 Christian communities  24–5, 64–5, 127, 134, 148–9, 187–8, 190–1, 199 Christianity  4–5, 48–9, 63–4, 66, 71–3, 75n.73, 81–2, 84, 85n.110, 87n.118, 88n.122, 95, 99–101, 107–9, 113–15, 123–4, 140–1, 146–7, 149–50, 154–5, 164–5, 177–9, 185, 187–90, 194 Christian women  10–11, 87, 97–8, 100–1, 108–9, 108n.74, 117–18, 124–5, 127–8, 134, 138–43, 146–50, 175–6, 178–9, 185–92, 206–7, 211–12 Christ/Jesus  64–5, 74–5, 83–4, 88, 108, 142, 148, 177–8 Chronicle of Pseudo-Dionysius of Tel Maḥre  199, 203–5 Church Fathers  48–9, 70–1, 134 circumcision  72, 85n.112, 86n.115, 113, 184, 185n.28 cohabitation  41, 96n.5, 97–8, 99n.18, 168–9, 171, 179 Cohen, M. R.  181n.13 Cohen, S. J. D.  35n.44 Community of Believers  61–2, 67–8, 88–9 Companions of the Prophet  18–19, 27, 29, 70–1, 73–4, 76–7, 80–3, 92, 103, 110–11, 115–16, 138, 153–5, 158–9, 164–70, 175, 179–80, 191–2, 194–5, 197, 212, see also saḥābiyyāt

concubines/concubinage  104, 127, 139, 156–7 Constantinople  170n.57, 191–2 Constitution of Medina  48, 61–2 conversion to Christianity  73, 75n.73, 87n.118, 99, 108–9, 154–5, 164, 188–90 to Islam  1, 9, 16–17, 26–7, 65–6, 74–5, 78–83, 85, 87, 89–90, 97–103, 104n.54, 110–11, 114–17, 122, 124–5, 128, 130–9, 145–6, 150–1, 153–61, 163–70, 172–6, 181–7, 189–92, 194, 206–7, 211–13 to Judaism  63, 73n.62, 170n.57 see also female converts/conversion Coptic calendar 83 concubine 156–7 deacon 82 language 70–1 martyrs  82–3, 167 officials 100n.28 patriarchs  71–2, 84n.106 sermons 15 Synaxarium  83n.104, 187n.36, 189–90 Cordoba  23–4, 100–1 Cortese, Delia  12–13 Damascus  23–5, 193–4 daughters  1, 5, 7–8, 12–13, 16–17, 29–30, 39n.74, 40–1, 46–7, 49, 51n.166, 64–5, 71–2, 77, 100–3, 107, 107n.71, 108n.78, 111–12, 119–21, 127–9, 135–6, 138–9, 139n.35, 141–2, 153–4, 164, 168–70, 172, 177–81, 191–2, 200–1, 209–11 David II Maimonides  181–2 Davis, Natalie Z.  6–7 Dioscorus of Alexandria  82–4 divorce  5, 42–3, 55–6, 63, 86–7, 86nn.113–14, 87n.118, 99n.18, 112, 115, 117–18, 136, 144–5, 160, 168, 173, 180–1, 183–4, 186–7 Donner, Fred M.  65–6 Dursteler, Eric R.  149–50 East Syrian canon laws  124–5 catholicoi  87, 109n.82, 113–14, 117–18, 127, 140–1, 179 churches  87, 127, 134 law books  146–7 legal collections  117–18 legal principles  117–18 legal regulations  97–8, 124–5 legislation  87n.121, 187n.34 regulations 186–7 scholar 80–1

256 Index ecclesiastical authorities  27, 128–9, 189–90 authors  186, 188–9 calendars 199 compositions 186 endorsements  117–18, 117n.122 exhortations 149–50 hierarchies  66, 101n.31 instructions 53 lawmakers 108–9 leaders  26, 108–9, 134, 148–9 legal opinions  105–6 legal sources  111, 186–7 legislation 108–9 positions  107–8, 113–14, 128–9, 179 regulations  23–4, 108–9, 127–8, 133–4, 186–7, 211–12 resources 190–1 sources  117–18, 124–5, 187–8 vocabulary 64–5 Ecclesiastes Rabba 63 ecclesiastics  66, 210–12 Edessa  15, 23–4, 134, 147–8, 186–7, 199 Eichah Rabba  198–9, 201–4 Egypt  1, 11–12, 36n.52, 52n.170, 53, 70–1, 84n.106, 96–101, 101n.35, 105n.57, 128, 146–7, 155, 169–70, 181–2, 184–5, 187–91, 195–6 Egyptians  74–5, 81, 96n.4, 200–1 Egyptian women  14–15 El Cheikh, Nadia M.  51–2, 167n.44 Elisha ben Abuya  141–2 el-Leithy, Tamer  100n.28, 128, 145–6 Eugenia of Tyre  154–5 family life  6–7, 39, 45–6, 57, 66–70, 78, 92–3, 96, 150, 153–4 settings  1, 5–7, 47–8, 53–4, 56–7, 61–2, 88, 115–16, 188–9, 209 structures  29–31, 34–5, 41–3, 52–3, 56–7, 61–2, 66, 93 ties  29, 52–3, 56–7, 61–6, 73, 85, 95–9, 103–4, 116, 122, 128–9, 161, 190–1, 210–11 see also brothers, daughters, fathers, husbands, mothers, sisters, sons, wives father–child bonds  36 fathers  3–11, 16–17, 33–41, 47–50, 52, 54–6, 60–1, 63–5, 69–84, 100–4, 112–16, 118–25, 127–32, 134–6, 138–9, 144–8, 154–5, 158–60, 164–6, 168–72, 177, 180–2, 184–5, 187–90, 193–4, 197–8, 202–4, 209–10, 212 Fāt ̣ima bt. al-Walīd b. al-Mughīra  153, 164, 166

Fatimid administration 170 caliph 140–1 Egypt 187–9 Sicily 138–9 times 82–3 Fayyum  45–6, 83–4, 96n.5 female converts/conversion  27, 85, 137–8, 153–76, 181–2, 212–13 folktales  9–10, 13–14, 21–3, 158, 175–6, 197–8, 209 Frantz-Murphy, G.  101n.35 Fust ̣āt ̣  43–6, 86–7 Galilee 45–6 gender  9–10, 21–3, 36–7, 49–50, 52, 71–2, 91–2, 124–5, 154–5, 161–2, 165–6, 175–6 arrangements  30, 136–7 asymmetry 48–9 attributes 186 characteristics 6 differences 7 expectations 192–3 hierarchies  14–15, 27–8, 49, 142, 146–7, 150, 175–6, 211–12 inequalities  40, 48–9 limitations 178 negotiations 7–8 relations 7–8 roles 168–9 segregation 45n.115 system 20 theories 6–7 Geniza  11n.63, 12–13, 23–4, 34–5, 39n.71, 41–3, 45n.116, 46–7, 49–51, 52n.170, 54–6, 70n.45, 86–7, 98–9, 103–4, 112–13, 146–7, 169–70, 180–3, 185n.28 Gentiles  86, 107, 111–13, 113n.103, 169–70, 184 Gentile women  98–9, 106, 160n.26, 167–8 geonic discourse 64 enactment 86 literature 138n.28 period 118 responsa  64, 98–9, 101–4, 111–12, 124–5, 133–5, 159–61, 182–7 ruling 135 sources 33 George, Saint (Jirjis, Muzāḥim)  187–91, 199 Giladi, Avner  72n.60 Gil, Moshe  48 Goitein, S. D.  11n.63, 15n.86, 34–5, 39n.71, 47n.133, 170n.57, 181–2, 185n.28 Mediterranean Society 31 Gozzadini, Maria  149–50

Index  257 Greco-Roman author 37 ideals 204 ideals of marriage  40–1 ideals of parenthood  39 narrative 203 notions of gender  48–9 Greek Christian 140–1 taxation 115 writings 198–9 Gregory Nazianzus  198–9 Martyrdom of Andrew 73 Orations 73 hadith  9–10, 12–19, 33, 36–41, 46–9, 70–3, 75, 77, 103n.46, 114, 132, 157, 160–2, 167–8, 171–4, 200–1 halakhic compendium 50n.158 ethos 182 perspective 111–12 principles 159–60 question 112–13 state 184–5 status 111–13 terms 184 Ḥ amza  179–80, 192–3 Ḥ anafī 122 jurisprudence 99 jurists 145 Ḥ anbalī authorities 145 compendia 132–3 jurisprudence 145–6 positions 180–1 scholars  122, 161, 169, 200–1 school 114–15 Hasmonean lineage  203–4 Ḥ awāʾ bt. Yazīd  179–81 Hayes, C. E.  160n.26 Hayya Ga’on  105n.57, 107, 138n.29, 160 Hebrew  138–9, 199–200 Hebrew Bible  67–8, 70–1 Ḥ ijāz 131 Hijra  89–90, 167n.43, 171, 173 Hind bt. ʿUtba  82–3, 153 History of Išōʿsabran 107 History of the Patriarchs of the Coptic Church of Alexandria  71–2, 74–5, 82, 189–90 Hirschler, Konrad  24–5 households  1–6, 9–13, 17, 24–6, 31, 33, 37–9, 41–3, 45–6, 51–2, 55–6, 65–70, 75–7, 87–9, 97–8, 100–1, 108, 124–5, 127–9, 132–4 Hoyland, Robert  148n.87

Ḥ udaybiyya  89–91, 137–8, 156 Huebner, Sabine R.  52n.170 husbands  3, 7–11, 15–16, 19–20, 36–8, 39n.74, 40–1, 43–4, 46n.123, 47–53, 55–6, 67n.28, 73, 77, 85–92, 97–101, 103, 108–13, 115–18, 117n.122, 124–5, 129–39, 141–6, 154–5, 158–60, 163–76, 179–84, 187–96, 206–7, 209–13 Iberia  4–5, 27, 145–6 Ibn ʿAbd al-Ḥ akam Futūḥ Miṣr 156–7 Kitāb futūḥ Miṣr wa-akhbāruhā 14–15 Ibn ʿAbd Rabbih al-ʿIqd al-farīd 51–2 Ibn Abī al-Dunyā  201–2 al-Ṣabr wa-l-thawāb ʿalayhi  200–1, 204–5 Kitāb al-ʿayāl 37n.58 Ibn Abī Shayba  161–2 al-Muṣannaf 97–8 Ibn Abū Hunayda  89 Ibn al-Athīr  162, 163n.36 Ibn al-Jawzī  200–1 Kitāb mathālib al-ʿarab 140 Ibn al-Munajjim Burhān 80–1 Ibn al-Qādisī  161 Taʾrīkh 161 Ibn al-Qasim  144 Ibn al-Qayyim al-Jawziyya  123, 145–6, 168–9 Aḥkām ahl al-dhimma  122, 132n.14 Ibn ʿAsākir 162 Ibn Ḥ ajar  139n.35, 162, 163n.36, 164 Ibn Ḥ anbal  97–8, 101–2, 105, 138–9, 144, 171–2 Musnad 200–1 Ibn Ḥ awqal 138–9 Ibn Kathīr  76–7 Ibn Miskawayh Tahdhīb al-akhlāq 41 Ibn Qudāma  103n.46, 114–15, 120–1, 169–70 Ibn Rajab Kitāb al-dhayl ʿalā ṭabaqāt al-ḥanābila 161 Ibn Saʿīd b. al-ʿĀṣ  119–20, 130–1, 173–4, 191–3 Ibn Yaḥyā al-Shāmī  144 Ibn Ẓafar Kitāb anbāʾ nujabāʾ al-abnāʾ 81 Ibn Zarb  145n.67 idolatry  27–8, 79, 107, 141–2, 160n.26, 201–2, 206–7 ʿIkrima b. Abī Jahl  153, 173–4 intermarriage  3–5, 60, 85n.110, 87, 97–9, 106–11, 113–14, 123–5, 127, 134, 158–9, 167n.44, 186–7, see also betrothal, brides, levirate marriage, matrimony, mixed marriages, marriage

258 Index Iran  1, 73, 108–9, 190–1 Iranian army 178 lands 85 narratives 107 traditions  117–18, 187n.34 Iraq  98–9, 105, 140–1 Iraqis  102–3, 200–1 Isaac  63, 203–4, see also Binding of Isaac Isaac of Alexandria  84n.106 Isaac of Seleucia–Ctesiphon  179 Isfahan  23–4, 73–4 Islamization  1, 32, 209 Išōʿ bar Nūn  117–18, 127, 186–7 Išōʿbokt  103–4, 133, 187n.34 Israel  64, 67–8, 107, 118, 141–2, 160, 210–11 Israelites  112, 118, 158–9, 160n.26, 183 Israelite women  113, 136, 184 Jacob of Edessa  134, 147–8, 186–7, 199 Jacob of Serugh  198–9 Life of Daniel 74–5 Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq  95, 122 Jarash 45–6 Jewish communities  24–5, 106, 112–13, 136, 181–3, 199–200 Jewishness  110–12, 113n.102, 135, 141–2, 182–4, 185n.28 Jewish women  12–13, 49, 56n.199, 86, 87n.118, 98–9, 102n.43, 106, 111–13, 134–6, 141–2, 159–60, 167n.44, 169–70, 181–5, 206–7, 211–12 John of Ephesus  177 John of Mardin  148–9 John of Phanijōit  167 Judaism  40n.78, 63, 66, 73n.62, 123–4, 130–3, 170n.57, 179 jurisprudence  13–14, 99, 111, 119, 132–3, 145–7, 158–9 jurists  40–1, 91–2, 97–8, 99n.18, 100–1, 103–4, 114–16, 119, 121–3, 132–3, 136–7, 143–8, 157–9, 161, 169, 173, 211–12 Kandiyoti, Deniz  7–8, 43n.100 Kashgar, prince of  51–3 Kertzer, David I.  33 Khabbāb b. al-Aratt  166 Khadīja  171–2, 191–2 Khālid al-Qasrī (Ibn al-Naṣrāniyya) 140–2 Khālid b. al-Walīd  168, 193–4 Khālid b. Saʿīd b. al-ʿĀṣ 120 Khosrow I  177 Kināna b. al-Rabīʿ b. ʿAbd al-Ḥ uqayq 131

Kināna tribe  80–1, 153 kinship  16–17, 26–7, 33–5, 41, 45, 56, 62–9, 77–8, 87–92, 122–3, 128, 175–6, 188–9, 192–3, 210–12 affiliations  17, 26, 150–1, 209–10 affinities  57, 62 arrangements  29–30, 119, 133, 178, 191–2 attachments  35–6, 43–6, 93, 121, 127, 133 boundaries 46 commitments  61–2, 64–5, 67, 73, 77, 157, 212–13 detachments  95–6, 119, 122–3 loyalties  115–16, 119 manipulations 85–7 networks 10–11 practices 32–3 relations  34–7, 45–6, 61–2, 93, 116–17, 134–5, 137–8 roles 165–6 sentiments  88–9, 105–6, 130, 155, 179–80, 211–12 separations  95–6, 117n.117, 161–2 settings  27, 206–7, 213 systems  23, 34–5, 41–2 ties  1, 3–4, 8–9, 25–6, 29–31, 34–7, 40–4, 46–7, 56–7, 61–2, 66–73, 78–84, 87, 91–2, 97–8, 104–5, 118, 121–5, 127, 129–38, 146–7, 150–1, 154, 159–60, 163–4, 171–2, 195–6, 209–10 Koran, see Qurʾan Krakowski, E.  22n.131, 34–5, 42–3, 51, 52n.170 Ktābā d-neshē 13–14 Kūfa 140–1 Kūfans  49, 140, 156 LaFosse, Mona T.  52nn.170–1 law  13, 21–5, 66–7, 77–8, 86–7, 89–90, 92–3, 97–8, 101n.32, 103–4, 108–11, 117–18, 124–5, 133–5, 144, 146–7, 149, 158–9, 181–2, 184, 186–7, 198, 203–7, 211–12 law books  117–18, 146–7, 186–7 lawmakers  66–7, 108–9, 186 levirate bonds 86–7 duties 183 marriage  86–7, 118, 135, 183, see also betrothal, brides, intermarriage, marriage, matrimony, mixed marriages obligation 135 services 181–2 Lieu, J. M.  18n.101 Life of Abraham 15 liminality  5, 25–6, 54–5, 61–2, 95–6, 127, 151

Index  259 Maccabaean narrative  203, 206 revolt  198, 203–4 story  27–8, 197–8, 200–1 Mahmud, Saba  7–8 Maimonides 160n.24 Malik b. Anas  114–15, 144–6, 174 Mālik b. Ṭ awq 80–1 Mālikī school  115, 144–6, 169 Mamluk Egypt 128 elite 20n.117 rule 146–7 state apparatus  145–6 Management of the Estate  38–9, 41–2, 49–52, 55–6 Mār Aḇā I  108n.78 Mārī b. Sulaymān Kitāb al-majdal 140–1 Mār Joseph  108n.78, 113–14 marriage  3, 16–17, 26–7, 39n.74, 40–3, 47n.133, 49, 51, 51n.166, 52n.170, 53, 55–6, 66, 68–9, 72, 95–6, 98–9, 104, 110–13, 116–17, 119–20, 127–8, 130, 136–7, 139, 142–3, 145–6, 148, 159–61, 165, 168–74, 180–4, 195–6, 211–12, see also betrothal, brides, intermarriage, levirate marriage, matrimony, mixed marriages martyrdom  73, 162, 167, 187–90, 206 Martyrdom of St Michael the Sabaite 167 martyrologies  23–4, 73, 75n.73, 76n.79, 175–6, 188, 190–1 martyrs  13–14, 17–18, 71, 74–5, 82–4, 162, 167, 188, 190–2, 199, 206 Martyrs of Syracuse 84 Maʿrūf al-Karkhī  80–1 Maslama b. ʿAbd al-Malik  33, 59, Malik  59–60 maternal agency  138, 165–6, 169, 195–6, 201–2 authority 138 backgrounds 140 bonds 29 care 145–6 figures  4–5, 189–90 imagery 67–8 influence 138–9 instincts 203 love  37n.59, 202 offices 206–7 piety 195–6 power  36, 189–90 qualities 190–1 responsibilities 71–2

right 36n.49 roles  38–9, 55–6, 169, 204 sentiments 201–2 services 139 status 192–3 upbringing 141–2 see also mothers matriarchs  48, 88 matrimonial agreement 41 arrangements 40–1 bonds  33, 86–7 breakups 117–18 commitments 87 contract 41–2 gifts 11–12 proceedings 67 relations 49 restrictions 106 strategies 41–2 ties 101–2 matrimony  40–2, 107–11, 116–17, 119, 124–5, 128–9, 136–7, 148–9, 158–60, 173, 186–7, 210–11, see also betrothal, brides, intermarriage, levirate marriage, marriage, mixed marriages Maysūn 140–1 Mecca  78–9, 90–2, 100–1, 162, 163n.36, 164, 171–4 Meccan dissenters 90 family 92 force 192–3 women 153–4 Medina  48, 61–2, 73–5, 80–1, 85, 88–90, 120–1, 130, 137–8, 139n.35, 156, 163–4, 171–3, 180–1, 191–2, 212 Mediterranean  5, 23–4, 29–31, 46, 48, 85, 108–9 Melania the Elder  155 Mēna of Nikiou  84n.106 Mernissi, Fatima  9 Mesopotamia 101–2 Mesopotamia  111–12, 138–9, 199 Messenger of God  70, 78–9, 89–90, 111n.93, 119–21, 129, 131, 153, 156–7, 161–2, 165, 171–4, 192–3, see also Muhammad, Prophet Michael the Syrian  100–1, 149–50 Chronicle  186, 199, 203–5 Milios 149–50 Monica 155 Moses  37n.59, 132, 203–5, 210–11 Mosul 100–1

260 Index mothers  1, 4–6, 8–13, 19–20, 25–30, 33, 36–9, 47, 52–4, 56, 61, 63–5, 69, 73–9, 82, 86n.115, 88, 92, 100–4, 111–16, 119, 122–3, 125, 127–9, 137–42, 144–5, 147–50, 155, 164–6, 169–70, 179–82, 184–5, 187–93, 195–207, 209–10, see also maternal Muʿāwiya b. Abī Sufyān  140–1, 191–2 Muhammad  16–21, 67–8, 70–1, 75, 78–81, 84–5, 90–2, 130–2, 153, 156–8, 162–5, 171–4, 179–80, 191–3, see also Messenger of God, Prophet Munabba b. al-Ḥ ajjāj 153 Musā b. Muṣʿab 142–3 Muṣʿab b. Saʿd 76–7 Muslim communities  16–17, 23–4, 65, 72n.60, 110–11, 156–7, 188 Muslim women  1–3, 12–13, 20, 59–60, 63, 70, 90–1, 97–8, 124–5, 127–30, 132–6, 145, 150, 153–4, 158–9, 161, 164–5, 167–9, 173, 175–6, 191–7, 212 Nahray ben Nissim  86–7 Natronai bar Hilai  86, 103–4, 118, 159–60, 183–4 newborns  36, 72n.60, 101–3, 113–15, 141–2, 184, 185n.28, see also childbirth Newman, H. I.  154n.2 Nissim ben Jacob b. Shāhīn Kitāb al-Faraj baʿd al-shidda  197–200, 204–6 non-Christian women  108–9, 142 non-Muslim women  1–2, 97–8, 104, 124–5, 127–30, 132–9, 141–50, 154, 158–9, 158n.18, 167n.44, 186–7, 211–12 Nuʿaym b. Ḥ ammād Kitāb al-fitan wa-l-malāḥim 139 pagan animosity 163 beliefs 73–4 families  156, 212 fathers  83, 164–6, 189–90 husbands  97–8, 155, 165–7, 173–4, 179–80 kinsfolk 88–9 nobility 48–9 philosopher 76–7 sacrifices  148, 163 paganism  173, 179, 194 pagans  73, 103–4, 108n.78, 127, 137–8, 148n.87, 154n.2, 166, 171–2, 174–6, 185 Palestine  96–7, 106, 111–12, 146–7, 154–5, 169–70, 189–90 Palestinian circles  40–1, 50 compendium 99 Talmud 141–2

Palestinians  111–12, 141–2, 167–8 Paltoi Ga’on  134–5 parent–child relations  36, 39 parents  4–5, 12–13, 35–7, 37n.59, 46–7, 59–93, 101–4, 108n.78, 112–16, 116n.115, 118, 122–5, 128, 140–1, 148–9, 158, 168–70, 177–8, 185n.28, 195–6, 204, 209 patriarchal arrangements  8–10, 92, 119–21, 123, 125, 165–6 authority  27, 175–6, 194–5, 212–13, see also male authority balance 174–5 control 7–8 conventions  1–2, 10–11, 54–5, 154, 158–9, 178, 181–2, 190–1, 210, 212–13 exchange 17 expectations  13–14, 19–20 frameworks  48, 93 ideals  3, 51–4, 56–7 limitations 195–6 model 49 norms  7–8, 43–4, 46, 212 order  23, 25–6, 54–5 power 165–6 principles  7, 21–3, 145–6, 150 restrictions  154–5, 163–4, 175–6 roles 119 settings  7–9, 87–8 societies  8–9, 154–5 system  31, 151 values 8–9 patriarchs  42–3, 71–2, 74–5, 82, 147–8, 163 patriarchy  8n.35, 48–9, 179–80 patrilineal kinship 32–3 structures 35n.44 traditions 48 values 31 patrilocal arrangements  31–2, 52 marriages 52n.170 practices 42–3 Pauline instructions 108–9 intent 108–9 license 107–8 objection 108 principle 108 Penn, Michael  73, 148n.87 People of the Book  95, 110–11 People of War  99–100, 186n.33, see also Abode of War, war/warfare Peter I, Patriarch  189–90 Peter the Iberian  154–5

Index  261 Pethion 140–1 Pharaoh  14–15, 191–2, 200–1 Pirqe de-rabbi Eliezer 210–11 polytheists  77, 90–1, 101–2, 110–11, 120–1 proselytizing  167, 175–6 agency  154, 166–70, 167n.44, 189–90, 193–4 agents 88 effects of kinship ties  73 endevour 174 potential 166 resources 151 uility of kinship ties  78–84 women 166–7 prostitution  15, 107, 141–2, 160n.26 pseudo-Dionysius  175–6, 199, 203–4 pseudo-Wāqidī Futūḥ al-Shām  168, 193–4 Pumbedita  86, 107, 134–5 Qayrawān  23–4, 199–200 Qurʾan  9–10, 12–15, 18–19, 21–3, 37–9, 41, 49–50, 61–2, 65–6, 68–71, 73–7, 88–91, 110–11, 122, 140–1, 153, 156, 163, 166, 196–7, 200–1 Quraysh  78–9, 89–90, 137–8, 153, 163–4, 171–2, 180–1 rabbinic academies  103–6, 199–200 attestations 87n.119 attitudes 73n.62 authorities  103–4, 106, 118, 128–9, 180–1 circles 50 communities 111–12 compendia  50n.158, 98–9 contexts  38n.62, 138–9, 211–12 court 112–13 deliberations 63 discourse  27, 39, 73n.62 families 35n.44 ideals 141–2 Jews 121–2 Judaism 40n.78 law  86–7, 86n.116, 111 legal opinions  64, 105–6 literature  21–3, 56n.193, 62, 138n.28, 199–200 menstrual control  67n.28 narratives  73, 199–200 positions  12n.64, 64–5, 103–4, 118, 125 prescriptions 107 principles 86n.114 references to women  15–16 responsa 23–4 sages  26, 48–9

sources  38, 64, 70–1, 73n.62, 107, 124–5, 198–9 stories 167 texts  67–8, 128–9, 204 theology 88 rabbis  40–1, 50, 66, 69, 106, 111–12, 141–2, 160, 167–8, 197–8, 210–11 Rapoport, Yossef  49 Rawwād b. al-Jarrāḥ al-ʿAsqalānī 144 Rayḥāna bt. Shamʿūn 104n.54 responsa  98–9, 113–14, 138–9, 144, 171–2, see also geonic responsa Rivāyats of Ādurfarnbag i Farroxzādān 180–1 Rivāyats of Ēmēd ī Ašawahištān 117–18 Roman Egypt 36n.52 emissary  108n.78, 179n.3 nobility 48–9 vocabulary 33 Roman Empire  25, 42–3, 66 Romanus 168 Rosenthal, Franz  24n.146, 168 Saʿadya Ga’on  98–9, 102n.43, 111–12, 135–6, 135n.20 Sabbath  86n.115, 112–13, 129, 145–6, 184, 185n.28 Saʿd b. Abī Waqqāṣ 76–7 Ṣafiyya bt. ʿAbd al-Mut ̣t ̣alib 191–3 Ṣafiyya bt. Ḥ uyayy b. Akht ̣ab  104n.54, 129–33, 150, 156–8, 170, 191–3 Ṣafwān b. Umayya  153 saḥābiyyāt  18–20, 174–5, 191–2, 194 Saḥnūn 144 al-Mudawwana 144 Salzman, M. R.  85n.110, 88n.122 Sar Shalom Ga’on  182–3 Sasanian armies  196 Sasanian monarchs  139n.35, 177 Schaefer Riley, Naomi  3–4, 6 Schremer, Adiel  33 Scott, Joan W.  6–7 Sefer ha-maʿasim  99, 111–12 Sefer ha-she’iltot de-rav Aḥay 106 Seleucia–Ctesiphon  23–4, 179 Serugh  74–5, 185, 198–9 Serur bar Ḥ ayyim 98–9 Severus of Antioch  198–9 sexual abstinence 10–11 access 40 attraction 167 contacts 138n.26 impetus 41 intercourse  112n.98, 143, 146–7, 168–9

262 Index sexual (cont.) outlet 41 promiscuity 17–18 relations 159–60 temptation  15–16, 167 Shepherd of Hermas 50 Sherira Ga’on  86, 113–14, 118, 184, 185n.28 Shimʿon b. Yoḥai 111–12 Shmuni  198–9, 203–5 Sicily 138–9 Sīra  18–19, 21, 78–9, 130–3, 156, 163, 166, 171–2, 191–3, 195–6, 202 sisters  1, 7–8, 29–30, 39n.74, 47, 61, 64–5, 80–4, 88, 119, 154, 156–7, 166, 177–80, 183, 191–3, 209–12 slaves/enslavement  14–15, 40–1, 48–51, 84, 85n.112, 103–4, 107, 110–12, 127, 129–30, 138–9, 157, 167n.44, 170n.57, 178 sons  8–11, 27–8, 36n.49, 47, 53, 55–6, 60–1, 63–5, 67, 71, 74–7, 79, 81–2, 84, 86n.115, 89, 98–104, 111–13, 115–16, 118, 122–3, 135, 140–2, 155, 158–9, 163–5, 167–9, 172, 175–6, 179–82, 184, 185n.28, 187–8, 192–3, 195–207 Stark, Rodney  85n.110 Stern, Gertrude  98n.10, 158 Stories of the Arabian Nights  24–5, 168–9 Sumayya bt. Khayyāt (Sumayya Umm ʿAmmār)  161–2, 175–6 Sura academy  98–9, 103–5, 118, 160, 182–4 Swain, Simon  37n.60, 50n.155 synods  109n.81, 113–14, 127, 148–9, 179 Syracuse 84 Syria  12–13, 32n.18, 168, 171, 195–6 Syriac  2, 13–14, 179n.3, 203–4 calendar 190n.46 ecclesiastical sources  187–8 hagiographies  88, 189–90 historiographical accounts  186 historiographical works  199 legal sources  188–9 literature/writings 198–9 terminology 138n.29 tradition 199 Syrian canon laws  23–4 Christian tribe  100–1 ecclesiastical authorities  27 Orthodox Church  101n.31 traditionist 191–2 women 142–3 see also East Syrian, West Syrian Tales of the Prophets  191–2, 200–1 Talmud, see Babylonian Talmud, Palestinian Talmud

Talmudic discussions  16n.95, 33 ethos 73n.62 folktales 197–8 legends 199–200 Tamer el-Leithy  128 Timothy I  87, 109n.82, 113–14, 117n.121, 186–7 Torah  15–16, 107, 181–2, 210–11 Ṭ oviyya ben Moshe  169–70 Transoxiana 73–4 Treaty of Aqaba  89n.132 Tyre 154–5 Tsadoq 167–8 ʿUbayd Allāh b. Jaḥsh 164 ʿUbayd Allāh b. Sulaymān  146–7 Umāma bt. al-Ḥ ārith 51n.166 ʿUmar b. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz 96–7 ʿUmar b. al-Khat ̣t ̣āb  103, 129, 166, 194 ʿUmar I  98–9, 101–2, 110–11, 142–3, 167n.44 ʿUmar II  96n.4 ʿUmayra bt. Abī al-Ḥ akam Rafīʿ b. Sinān  77 Umayyad caliph 96–7 dynasty 139 leaders 140–1 mosque 24–5 Umm Ḥ abība bt. Abī Sufyān  16–17, 119–21, 164–5, 194–5 Umm Ḥ akīm bt. al-Ḥ ārith b. Hishām  110–11, 129, 153, 170, 173–6 Umm Kulthūm bt. ʿUqba b. Abū Muʿayt ̣ 85, 89–92, 100–1, 137–8, 156–8, 170, 175–6, 180–1, 212 Umm Sharīk al-Dawsiyya  163–4, 175–6 Umm Sulaym bt. Milḥān al-Anṣāriyya 164–7, 169, 175–6, 191–2, 195–8 unbelievers  78, 85, 89–90, 108, 120, 122, 137–8, 156, 171, see also believers ʿUrwa b. al-Zubayr  89 ʿUthmān b. ʿAffān  85n.112, 103 Vajda, George  201 warrior women  168, 191–4 Wāthila b. al-ʿAsqāʿ al-Laythī  80–1 West Syrian bishops  149–50, 163 canon laws  117–18 churches  87, 134 ecclesiastical regulations  186–7 legal collections  117–18 legal regulations  97–8 maphrian 100–1 patriarchs  147–9, 148n.86, 177

Index  263 wives  1, 7–8, 15–17, 27, 29–30, 38, 40–1, 47, 49–56, 64–5, 67–8, 73, 75, 77–83, 86–9, 97, 99–101, 104, 107–14, 116–20, 127–35, 137–46, 150, 153–4, 159–62, 167–70, 172, 174–6, 179–81, 183–4, 187–92, 194, 200–1, 209–12 Women’s Pledge  89n.132 Yagur, Moshe  169–70 Yarbrough, Luke  96n.4, 139n.35, 140–1, 201n.100 Yāsir b. ʿĀmir 161–2 Yazīd b. Qatāda  103

Yehudai Ga’on  50n.158, 105, 118 Yemen  173–4, 200–1 Yūnus b. Bukayr  163 Zakariyyā b. Ibrāhīm  95 Zaynab bt. al-Ḥ ārith  129, 132 Zaynab bt. Muhammad  110–11, 170–6 Zinger, Oded  47n.131, 56, 86n.117 Zoroastrian Hērbedestān  99 Zoroastrians  73–5, 96–7, 99, 101–2, 103n.45, 107, 112n.95, 113–14, 117–18, 121–2, 127–8, 145, 180–1