Article

Quranic Apocalypse

The Quranic corpus insists heavily on the impending end of the world. Many verses and sūras are more or less directly dedicated to it. This is particularly the case for a great number of the final sūras, the shorter ones, known to be the oldest ones, whose archaic language and literary style are in any case remarkable, close to the rhymed prose (sajʿ) that the pre-Islamic Arab seers used in their ecstatic visions. These passages announce the dramatic cosmic changes of the end times, invite incredulous mankind to repent and to purify itself in order not to undergo God’s wrath, to follow the straight path in order to be part of the pious and good people to whom salvation is promised. The imminence of the end times is further alluded to in many periscopes. It is par ticularly underlined by the use of the term al-sāʿa, the Hour, in order to designate the coming of that end.

Furthermore, according to certain passages, the signs of Judgement Day are already here: “… But those who are guided aright, them He increases in guidance, and gives them their godfearing. Are they looking for aught but the Hour, that it shall come upon them suddenly? Already its tokens have come (…)” (Qurʾān 47: 17‒18). Thus, the contemporaries of the revelation shall be witnesses of the Hour during their lifetime: “Whosoever is in error, let the All-merciful prolong his term for him! Till, when they see that they were threatened, whether the chastisement, or the Hour (…)” (Qurʾān 19:75); “But they disbelieved in it; soon they shall know! (…) So turn thou from them for a while, and see them; soon they shall see! What, do they seek to hasten Our chastisement? When it lights in their courtyard, how evil will be the morning of them that are warned! (…)” (Qurʾān 37: 170‒177).

Among the authors of the most decisive studies about the apocalyptic dimen sion of the Qurʾān and of the Ḥadith as well as of the figure of Muḥammad, let us mention:

Snouck Hurgronje, in particular in his study on the Mahdist movements and in his debate with Hubert Grimme (S. Hurgronje, “Der Mahdi”, Revue coloniale internationale 1 (1886): 239‒273; idem, “Une nouvelle biographie de Mohammed”, Revue de l’Histoire des Religions 15, no 30 (1894): 48‒70 et 149‒178); Paul Casanova who wrote a well-documented and solidly argued monograph despite the fact that a great number of sources corroborating his hypothesis were not known at that time (P. Casanova, Mohammed et la fin du monde. Etude critique sur l’Islam, Paris, 1911‒1913); Tor Andrae in particular in his fundamental study on the origins of Islam (T. Andrae, “Der Ursprung des Islams und das Christentum”, Kyrkohistorisk Årsskrift 23 (1923): 149‒206; 24 (1924): 213‒292); Patricia Crone and Michael Cook in their provocative Hagarism (P. Crone/M. Cook, Hagarism: The Making of the Islamic World);

Suliman Bashear in many articles on Muslim apocalyptic visions (S. Bashear, “The Title ‘Fārūq’ and its Association with ʿUmar I”, SI 72 (1990): 47‒70; “Apoca lyptic and Other Materials on Early Muslim-Byzantine Wars: A Review of Arabic Sources”, JRAS 1 (1991): 173‒207; “Riding Beast on Divine Missions: An Examination of the Ass and Camel Tradi tions”, JSS 37 (1991): 37‒75; “Muslim Apocalypses and the Hour: A Case-Study in Traditional Re interpretation”, IOS 13 (1993): 75‒100); David Cook in many articles as well as in numerous passages of his precious monography on the same subject (D. Cook, “Muslim Apocalyptic and Jihād”, JSAI 20 (1996): 66‒105; “Muslim Materials on Com ets and Meteorites”, Journal of the History of Astronomy 30 (1999): 131‒160; “Messianism and Astronomical Events During the First Four Centuries of Islam”, in M. Garcia Arenal, ed., Mah disme et millénarisme en Islam, no. special de la REMMM 91‒94 (2000‒2001): 29‒52); Edouard-Marie Gallez whose voluminous work Le Messie et Son Prophète, con stitutes a veritable mine of information and that despite ideological stands and methods that sometimes spark off reservations (E.-M. Gallez, Le messie et son prophète. Aux origines de l’islam, tome 1: “De Qumrân à Muham mad” and volume 2: “Du Muhammad des Califes au Muhammad de l’histoire”, Paris, 2007‒2008); finally, Stephen J. Shoemaker in his very solidly documented work dedicated to the divergences regarding the date of the death of Muḥammad and their multiple and important implications.

There is first of all “the ḥadith of the two fingers”. Accord ing to the Musnad of Ibn Ḥanbal (d. 241/855), the Prophet is said to have declared: “The Hour is coming. My coming and the Hour are separated from one another like these two” and he showed his index and his middle finger (Ibn Ḥanbal, Musnad, Beirut, 1969, 6 vols., vol. 3, 310‒311). In his work dedicated to the life of Muḥammad, Aloys Sprenger examines the same ḥadith according to a report of Ibn ʿAbbās mentioned by al-Wāḥidī (d. 411/1020‒1021). According to that narration, after the revelation of the verse “The Hour is coming” (Qurʾān 54:1) the non-believers worried for a while. Then noticing that nothing had happened, they went back to their dissolute life style. God then revealed the verse: “Nigh unto men has drawn their reckoning, while they in heedlessness are yet turning away” (Qurʾān 21:1). The unbelievers had once more the same worries and then the same carelessness. Then the following verse was revealed: “God’s command (amr) comes; so seek not to hasten it.” (Qurʾān 16:1). Then the Messen ger of God declared: “My coming and the Hour are separated from one another as are my index and my middle finger” (A. Sprenger, Das Leben und die Lehre des Moḥammad, Berlin, 18692, vol. 1, 533).

Ibn Saʿd (d. 230/845) reports in his Ṭabaqāt that Muḥammad had been sent at the same time as the Hour in order to warn his people of the coming of a painful chastisement (Ibn Saʿd, Ṭabaqāt, ed. E. Sachau, 9 vols., Leiden, 1904‒1908, vol. 1.1, 65; Casanova, op.cit., 3 et sqq.; Shoemaker, op.cit., 172). Casanova cites another prophetic ḥadith according to the Khiṭaṭ of al-Maqrīzī (d. 845/1442): “My coming and that of the Hour are concomitant; the latter even almost came before me” (Casanova, “Description historique et topographique de l’Egypte”, 3rd part, Mémoires de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale du Caire, 3 (1906), 18). **The same al-Maqrīzī, quoting al-Kindī (d. 260/873‒874), reports these words of Muḥammad addressing his people: “Compared to the peoples that have preceded you the time that is left for you to live is like the white hair on the hide of the black bull (or the black hair on the hide of a white bull)”, meaning an extremely short time **(Casanova/al-Maqrīzī, “Description”, 20; idem, Mohammed, 17). Another time, according to the Musnad of Ibn Ḥanbal, Muḥammad is said to have been missioned at the moment of the coming of the Hour (Ibn Ḥanbal, Musnad, vol. 2, 50 and 90). The same scholar and his contemporary, the great traditionist Ibn Abī Shayba (d. 235/849) reports a prophetic tradition where Muḥammad declares: “Those who see me or listen to my words will see al-Dajjāl (the Islamic Antichrist) during their life time” (Ibn Abī Shayba, al-Muṣannaf, vol. 15, 135 et 168; Ibn Ḥanbal, Musnad, vol. 1, 195).

It does not seem useful to me to dive into the rather futile debate about the more eschatological rather than apocalyptic character of the Qurʾān (Andrew Rippin, David Cook, Fred Donner (A. Rippin, “The Commerce of Eschatology” in S. Wild, ed., The Qurʾān as Text, Leiden, 1996, 125‒136; D. Cook, Studies in Muslim Apocalyptic, 301; F. Donner, “Was Early Islam an Apocalyp tic Movement?”) or its fundamentally apocalyptic nature (Carlos Segovia) (C. Segovia, “Thematic and Structural Affinities Between 1 Enoch and the Qurʾān: A Contri bution to the Study of the Judaeo-Christian Apocalyptic Setting of the Early Islamica Faith” in C. Segovia and B. Lourié, eds., The Coming of the Comforter: When, Where and to Whom? Stud ies on the Rise of Islam and Various Other Topics in Memory of John Wansbrough, Piscataway, 2012, 231‒267, passim and in particular p. 240 and footnote 50 (reference to the introduction of J.J. Collins to his collective work, Apocalypse: the Morphology of a Genre, Missoula, 1979, 1‒20). See also J. J. Collins, The Apocalyptic Imagination. An Introduction to Jewish Apocalyptic Liter ature, Cambridge, 1998). Regarding this matter, Michel Cuypers considers, in my eyes quite correctly, that the last 33 sūrahs are apocalyptic and he shows it quite convincingly (M. Cuypers, Une apocalypse coranique : une lecture des trente-trois dernières sourates du Coran). With respect to the non-advent of the Hour and the still-existing world, what would have motivated later Muslim scholars to fab ricate that type of literature and to attribute it to Muḥammad at a time when this prophetic revelation had lost its credibility by evidence? That is the central argu ment of Casanova and more recently that of Shoemaker in order to support the thesis according to which the announcement of the end times constituted the main message of the Muḥammadan mission, a message that the Muslim authori ties had all interest in concealing.

Some remarks on the religious milieu of Muḥammad

The first half of the 6th century to the first half of the 7th century in the immense region currently called the Near and Middle East), are strongly marked by intense apocalyptic expectations illustrated in all the religious traditions. The never-ending and bloody wars between the Byzantines and the Sassanians, and to a lesser degree, the violent conflicts causing bloodshed from Ethiopia to Yemen, with their lot of massacres, destructions, displacements of population and diseases, making the defeated of yesterday the victors of tomorrow, all of this created a world replete with uncertainty and anxiety. The messianic uprisings are frequent, especially among the Jews, seeking to liberate Jerusalem from Byzantine domination and to rebuild the Temple: in 530, in Palestine, under the guidance of Julian who proclaimed himself Messiah; in 602 at Antioch where the Christian patriarch and thousands of faithful were killed; under Her aclius under whom the Jewish uprisings facilitated the occupation of Palestine by the Persians between 614 and 628 (A. Couret, La prise de Jérusalem par les Perses en 614. Trois documents nouveaux, Orléans, 1896, introduction; J.-G. Février, La religion des palmyréniens, Paris, 1931, 219 sqq. (who quotes authors such as Théophanes, Zonaras, Cedrenus …); F.-M. Abel, Histoire de la Palestine depuis la conquête d’Alexandre jusqu’à l’invasion arabe, Paris, 1952, 386 sqq.; G. Dagron, “L’Eglise et la chrétienté byzantines” in J.-M. Mayeur, Ch. Pietri, A. Vauchez et M. Venard, eds., Histoire du christianisme, Paris, vol. 4, 1993, 70 sqq.; A.-L. De Prémare, Les fondations de l’islam. Entre écriture et histoire, Paris, 2002, 160 sqq).

Apocalyptic Jewish writings such as the “Apocalypse of Zorobabel” or “The Secrets of Rabbi Shimʿôn ben Yohai” have had a great deal of religious influence among certain Jews who impatiently expected the deliverance of Jerusalem and who, after the coming of Muḥammad, would have considered the latter as the providential instrument of that liberation (I. Lévi, “L’Apo calypse de Zorobabel”, Revues des Etudes Juives 68 (1914): 129‒160; 69 (1919): 108‒121; 70 (1920): 57‒65; English translation and analysis by M. Himmelfarb, “Sefer Zerubbabel” in D. Stern and M. Jay Mirski, eds., Rabbinic Fantasies: Imaginative Narratives from Classical Hebrew Literature, Philadelphia, 1990, 67‒90. On the second one, see for example B. Lewis, “An Apocalyptic Vision of Islamic History”, BSOAS 13 (1950): 308‒338 (in particular pp. 321‒330); Crone/Cook, Hagar ism, 4 sqq.; J. C. Reeves, Trajectories in Near Eastern Apocalyptic: A Postrabbinic Jewish Apoca lypse Reader, Leiden, 2006, 76‒89; Shoemaker, Death of A Prophet, 27‒33).

Apocalyptic beliefs were also present among Zoroastrian Sasanian circles of that time, as it appears throughout texts such as the Zand-ī Wahman Yasn (who’s precise dating poses problems), the Jāmāsp Nāmag or the history of the Armenian Sebēos (Zand-ī Wahman Yasn. A Zoroastrian Apocalypse, Rome, 1995; T.W. Greenwood, “Sasanian Echoes and Apocalyptic Expectations: A Re-evaluation of the Armenian History Attributed to Sebeos”, Le Muséon 115 (2003): 323‒397; F. Grenet, “Religions du monde iranien ancien, I) Le rayonnement de l’eschatologie et de l’apocalyptique iraniennes; II) Le Zand î Wahman Yasn”, Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, section des Sciences Religieuses, Annuaire, t. 115, 2006‒2007, 103‒109 et t. 116, 2007‒2008, 109‒112 ; D. Agostini, “La conquête arabe de l’Iran et la chute du zoroastrisme: processus eschatologique ou réalité historique? Une réponse d’après les sources pehlevies” in E. Aubin-Boltanski and C. Gauthier, eds., Penser la fin du monde, Paris, 2014, 147‒165).

But the most numerous sources of that kind have been composed by Christian authors, especially in Syriac, some of them dating a few years after the Arab conquests and therefore set off by them: the Testament of the Twelve Apostles, the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodus, the Apocalypse of Baḥīrā, the Apo calypse of Pseudo-Esdras, the Sermon on the End Times of the Pseudo-Ephrem, the Apocalypse of the Pseudo-Athanasius, etc (S. P. Brock, “Syriac Views of Emergent Islam”, in G.H.A. Juynboll, ed., Stud ies on the First Century of Islamic Society, Carbondale-Edwardsville, 1982, 9‒21 and 199‒203; P. J. Alexander, The Byzantine Apocalyptic Tradition, Berkely, 1985; F.J. Martinez, “Eastern Chris tian Apocalyptic in the Early Muslim Period: Pseudo-Methodus and Pseudo-Athanasius”, un published doctoral thesis, The Catholic University of America, 1985; A. Palmer, S. Brock and R.G. Hoyland, eds., The Seventh Century in the West-Syrian Chronicles, Liverpool, 1993; P. Ubierna, “Recherches sur l’apocalyptique syrienne et byzantine au VIIe siècle: la place de l’empire romain dans une histoire du salut”, Bulletin du Centre d’Etudes Médiévales d’Auxerre (BUCEMA), hors série no 2 (2008); B. Roggema, The Legend of Sergius Baḥīrā: Eastern Christian Apologetics and Apocalyptic in Response to Islam, Leiden, 2009; many articles (M. Debié, L. Greisiger, H. Suer mann, etc.), in D. Thomas, B. Roggema et alii, eds., Christian-Muslim Relations: A Bibliographical History, volume I (600‒900), Leiden-Boston, 2009. Also the volume edited by P. Canivet and J.-P. Rey-Coquais, La Syrie de Byzance à l’Islam, VIIe‒VIIIe siècles. Actes du colloque international Lyon-Maison de l’Orient Méditerranéen et Paris – Institut du Monde Arabe, 11‒15 septembre 1990, Damascus, 1992; as well E. van Donzel and A.B. Schmidt, Gog and Magog in Early Syriac and Islamic Sources: Sallām’s Quest for Alexander’s Wall, Leiden-Boston, 2009; S. Shoemaker, “‘The Reign of God Has Come’”, 541 sqq).

The emergence of a new prophet among the Arabs, the sudden conquests of the latter inside the two greatest empires of the region and the civil wars opposing the followers of Muḥammad between themselves constitute a non-negligible part of the apocalypses written down or developed after the coming of the latter (H. Suermann, “Muḥammad in Christian and Jewish Apocalyptic Expectations”, Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations 5 (1994): 12‒27; R.G. Hoyland, Seeing Islam as Others Saw It: A Sur vey and Evaluation of Christian, Jewish and Zoroastrian Writings on Early Islam, Princeton, 1997, especially pp. 275‒335; Shoemaker, Death of a Prophet, ch. 1, 18‒72).

The Quranic apocalyptic belongs, in a certain way, to that rich literature that was widespread during its period. Contrary to what later Muslim apologetics will maintain, pre-Islamic Arabia was not that of the “era of ignorance” (al-jāhiliyya) and idolatry, nor was Islam the beginning of Arab monotheism. Probably idolatry no longer existed there for many centuries, except among a few non-sedentary Bedouins (G. Hawting, The Idea of Idolatry and the Emergence of Islam: From Polemic to History, Cambridge, 1999; P. Crone, “How Did the Quranic Pagans Make a Living?”, BSOAS 68 (2005): 387‒399). Apart from numerous epigraphic, archeologic and historical proofs, especially outside of the Hijāz, as the numerous studies by scholars like Iwona Gajda, Frederic Imbert, Christian Robin or Jan Retsö have proven, the most evident textual confirmations are found in the Qurʾān itself: the massive presence of figures of the Ancient and New Testaments, the allusive character of biblical narratives that demonstrate that the audience knew them well otherwise these allusions would have remained completely unintelligible, the onomastic of the biblical characters derived from those of Oriental Christianities of Syro-palestinian culture, of Hebrew, Aramean and Syriac technical terms as important as qurʾān, sūra, āya, zakāt and ṣalāt or ḥajj and ʿumra, the role of Ethiopian Christianity, etc.

The phenomenon has been largely studied by many specialists of various disciplines throughout hundreds of works the synthesis of which is yet to be undertaken (M. Kropp, ed., Results of Contemporary Research on the Qurʾān. The Question of a Historico-critical Approach, Beirut-Würzburg, 2007; G.S. Reynolds, The Quran and Its Biblical Sub text, London, 2010; idem, ed., The Quran in Its Historical Context, London, vol. 1, 2008 and vol. 2, 2011; G. Dye and F. Nobilio, eds., Figures bibliques en islam, Bruxelles-Fernelmont, 2011; F. Déroche, C. J. Robin and M. Zink, eds., Les origines du Coran, le Coran des origines, Paris, 2015).

On the influence of Judaism see for example:

D. S. Margoliouth, The Relations Between Arabs and Israelites Prior to the Rise of Islam, London, 1924; Sh. D. Goitein, Jews and Arabs: Their Contacts Through the Ages, New York, 1955; A. I. Katsch, Judaism and the Koran: Biblical and Tal mudic Backgrounds of the Koran and Its Commentaries, New York, 1962; Crone/Cook, Hagar ism, passim; M. Lecker, Jews and Arabs in Pre- and Early Islamic Arabia, Aldershot, 1998; H. Busse, Islam, Judaism and Christianity: Theological and Historical Affiliations, Princeton, 1998; U. Rubin, Between Bible and Qurʾān: the Children of Israel and the Islamic Self-image, Princeton, 1999; H. Bar-Zeev, Une lecture juive du Coran: Essai, Paris, 2005; Many articles in A. Neuwirth, N. Sinai and M. Marx, eds., The Qurʾān in Context: Historical and Literary Investigations into the Qurʾānic Milieu, Leiden, 2010; H. Mazuz, The Religious and Spiritual Life of the Jews of Medina, Leiden, 2014; see also the very recent J. Costa, “ʿOlam ha-zel/ ʿolam ha-ba, al-dunyā/al-ākhira: étude comparée de deux couples de termes dans la littérature talmudique et le Coran”, Arabica 62.2‒3 (2015): 234‒259.

On the influence of Christianity:

See for example T. Andrae, Les origines de l’Islam et le Christianisme; R. Bell, The Origin of Islam and Its Christian Environment, London, 1926; K. Ahrens, “Christliches im Quran”, ZDMG 48 (1930): 15‒68 and 148‒190; D. Thomas and B. Roggema, eds., Christian Muslim Relations; many article by S. H. Griffith some of which are now published in The Church in the Shadow of the Mosque: Christians and Muslims in the World of Islam, Princeton 2008; many articles by C. Gilliot of which, among the most recent: “Mohammed’s Exegetical Activity in the Meccan Arabic Lectionary”, in C. Segovia and B. Lourié, eds., The Coming of the Comforter, 371‒398; many works by G. Gobillot of which, among the most recent: “Des textes pseudo-clémentins à la mystique juive des premiers siècles et du Sinaï à Maʿrib” in C. Segovia and B. Lourié, eds., Op.cit., 3‒89; many articles by J. Van Reeth, of which, among the most recent: “Les prophéties oracu laires dans le Coran et leurs antécédents : Montan et Mani”in D. De Smet and M.A. Amir-Moezzi, eds., Controverses sur les Ecritures canoniques de l’islam, Paris, 2014, 77‒145; multiple collective works and articles by G. Dye, of which, among the most recent: “Lieux saints communs, part agés ou confisqués : aux sources de quelques péricopes coraniques (Q 19: 16‒33)”, in I. Dépret and G. Dye, eds., Partage du sacré : transferts, dévotions mixtes, rivalités interconfessionnelles, Bruxelles, 2012, 55‒121; many contributions in J.C. Reeves, ed., Bible and Qurʾān: Essays in Scrip tural Intertextuality, Atlanta, 2003; M.H. Zellentin, The Qurʾān’s Legal Culture: the Didascalia Apostolorum as a Point of Departure, Tübingen, 2013.

On the influence of Manicheism:

See for example M. Gil, “The Creed of Abū ʿĀmir”, IOS 12 (1992): 9‒57; R. Simon, “Mānī and Muḥammad”, JSAI 21 (1997): 118‒141; M. Sfar, Le Coran, la Bible et l’Orient ancien, Paris, 1998, passim and especially chapters 9 and 11; J. Van Reeth, “La zandaqa et le prophète de l’islam”, Acta Orientalia Belgica XX (2007), “Incroyance et dissidences religieuses. Jacques Ryckmans in memoriam”, 65‒79. As has already been said before, often the studies on the Jewish, Christian and Manichean influences are inseparable and therefore a great number of studies that have been mentioned here and in the preceding footnotes deal with all those religious traditions or what articulates them between themselves.

The hypo thesis that at the beginning of the 7th century there existed if not Arab transla tions of entire biblical books, at least anthologies in Arabic of quotes from the Bible or other parallel texts of Jewish or Christian apocalyptic texts” (A.-L. de Prémare, Les fondations de l’islam, 267‒269). It is true that the term “Judeo-Christian” remains ambiguous if not vague. Historically speaking non-trinitarian Judeo-Christian sects would have disappeared as such around the 4th and 5th centuries of the common era ( B. Bagatti, The Church from the Circumcision: History and Archaeology of the Judaeo-Chris tians, transl. E. Hoade, Jérusalem, 1971, 143 sqq.; R. A. Pritz, Nazarene Jewish Christianity: From the End of the New Testament Period until Its Disappearance in the Fourth Century, Jerusalem-Lei den, 1988, passim; J. E. Taylor, Christians and the Holy Places: the Myth of Jewish-Christian Or igins, Oxford, 1993, 5‒47).

However a great number of doctrines seem to have survived in a “nebula” as is often the case under the name of “Ebionites” or Nazareans/Nazoreans (the naṣārā of the Qurʾān?) in particular on the margins of the Byzantine empire in general and in particular among the Arabic speaking peoples, from Syria to Egypt including Arabia and Yemen. A great number of researchers, since the second half of the 19th century, have studied the question with minutia:

Sprenger, Das Leben und die Lehre des Moḥammad, vol. 1, 21‒45; H.-J. Schoeps, Theologie und Geschichte des Judenchristentum, Tübingen, 1949, 334 sqq.; H. Corbin, “Epiphanie divine et naissance spirituelle dans la gnose ismaélienne”, Eranos Jahrbuch XXIII (1954‒1955), reprint in idem, Temps cyclique et gnose ismaélienne, Paris, 1982, partie 2; idem, “De la gnose antique à la gnose ismaélienne”, talk given at the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei in 1956, included Temps cyclique et gnose ismaélienne, part 3; M.P. Roncaglia, “Eléments Ebi onites et Elkasaïtes dans le Coran”, Proche-Orient Chrétien 21 (1971): 101‒125; J. Wansbrough, The Sectarian Milieu: Content and Composition of Islamic Salvation History, Oxford, 1977; Crone/ Cook, Hagarism; J. M. Magnin, Notes sur l’ébionisme, Jérusalem, 1979; J.S. Trimingham, Chris tianity Among the Arabs in Pre-Islamic Times, London-New York, 1979, especially pp. 49, 68, 82 sqq., 153, 157, 166, 186; G. Rizzardi, Il problema della cristologia coranica. Storia dell’ermeneu tica cristiana, Milan, 1980, 115 sqq.; S. Pines, “Notes on Islam and on Arabic Christianity and Judaeo-Christianity”, JSAI 4 (1984): 135‒152;

J. Van Reeth, “Le prophète musulman en tant que Nâṣir allâh et ses anrécédents: le “Nazôraios” évangélique et le Livre des Jubilés”, Orientalia Lovaniensia Periodica 23 (1992): 251‒274; Hawting, The Idea of Idolatry; S.C. Mimouni, “Les Na zoréens. Recherche étymologique et historique”, Revue Biblique 105 (1998): 232‒244; F. de Blois, “Naṣrānī (Nαζώραίος) and Ḥanīf (έθνικός): Studies on the Religious Vocabulary of Christianity and Islam”, BSOAS 65 (2002): 1‒30; Ch. and F. Jullien, “Aux frontières de l’iranité: “Naṣrāyē” et “Krystyonē” des inscriptions du Mobad Kirdīr : enquête littéraire et historique”, Numen 49 (2002): 282‒335; Y.D. Nevo and J. Koren, Crossroads to Islam: the Origins of the Arab Religion and the Arab State, Amherst, 2003; Gallez, Le messie et son prophète; J. Gnilka, Die Nazarener und der Koran: Eine Spurensuche, Freiburg, 2007; Segovia, “Thematic and Structural Affinities Between 1 Enoch and the Qurʾān”; P. Crone, “Jewish Christianity and the Qurʾān (Part One)” JNES 74.2 (2015): 225‒253; for a bibliographical overview see now G.G. Stroumsa, “Jewish Chris tianity and Islamic Origins”, in B. Sadeghi, A.Q. Ahmed, A. Silverstein and Robert G. Hoyland, eds., Islamic Cultures, Islamic Contexts: Essays in Honour of Patricia Crone, Leiden, 2015, 72‒96. 35 S.-C. Mimouni, Le judéo-christianisme ancien. Essais historiques, Paris, 1998, 22.

Simon C. Mimouni goes even to the point of declaring: “Ebionite and elkasaite groups (Aramaic speaking) have lived on long after the birth of Islam ‒ at least until the 8th century. One of them, the Ebionites, has probably dissolved into the new religion to the point of where we should not ask ourselves if it has not to some extent participated in its birth” (S.-C. Mimouni, Le judéo-christianisme ancien. Essais historiques, Paris, 1998, 22). The transmission, including a textual one, has been operated mainly through dif ferent East-Syrian and Mesopotamian dyophysicist Christian and/or West-Syrian, Egyptian and Ethiopian miaphysicist currents (R. Duval, La littérature syriaque, Paris, 1907 (3rd ed.), 79‒86; S. Pines, “The Jewish Chris tians of the Early Centuries of Chrsitianity According to a New Source”, PIASH 2.13 (1966): 1‒73; many articles in J.C. Van der Kam and W. Adler, eds., The Jewish Apocalyptic Heritage in Early Christianity, Minneapolis, 1996; A.-L. de Prémare, Les fondations de l’islam, 324 sqq). Daniel Boyarin has pertinently underlined, the term “Judeo-Chris tian” can designate a non-sectarian group of spiritual movements, very often of the messianic type, sharing a certain number of dogmas and practices with Judaism and Christianity (D. Boyarin, ed., Judaeo-Christianity Redivivus, special number of The Journal of Early Chris tian Studies 9.4 (2001): 417‒509).

A great number of the doctrines and reli gious practices that the Christian theologians and heresiographs like Irenaeus in his Contra Haereses, Origen in his Contra Celsum¸ Epiphanus in his Panarion or even Augustin for example in his Letter on Heresies to Quodvultdeus, attribute to these Ebionites and Nazareans (those who call themselves Christians yet wish to live according to Jewish law), have a massive presence in the message of Muḥam mad: a strict monotheism that refuses the divinity of Jesus but that considers him to be the Christ and the Messiah (both words are said masīḥ in Arabic, literally “anointed”; I shall come back to it),** the belief in the imminence of the end of the world and the coming of Judgement Day, regular prayer, fasting, alms and the practice of charity, the centrality of ritual purity, the practice of circumcision and the prohibition of the consumption of pork and wine.**

The Coming of the Messiah

Indeed, if Muḥammad and his message came from a monotheism of “Judeo-Chris tian sensibility” (the expression is of Guillaume Dye41) and if they were intended for an audience that belonged to the same environment, and if they announced the end of the world – all this being largely attested in the Qurʾān and the Ḥadith – then the Prophet might probably have spoken about the central figure of Jewish and Christian apocalyptic and messianism, that is the Messiah (al-masīḥ from the Hebrew mashiaḥ “anointed”). The Qurʾān does not say anything on an announce ment done by Muḥammad of the imminent coming of the Messiah. According to Paul Casanova (Mohammed et la fin du monde, chapter VI, 54‒67 and chapter VII, 68‒69), it is impossible that the Qurʾān, an apocalyptic book in its most ancient layers and an extension of the holy books of the Judeo-Christian tradition, would have said nothing about the Messiah. However, the non-Islamic works that are contemporary of the Arab prophet mention the proclamation of the coming of the Messiah by Muḥammad. For example, in the Doctrina Jacobi, also known as Didascaly of Jacob, a Christian work authored in Greek, probably shortly before the year 640, a certain Abraham, a Jew of Cae sarea, addresses his brother Justus, the source of the alleged author Jacob: “… a prophet has appeared with the Saracens (i.  e. the Arabs), proclaiming the coming of the awaited Christ, the Messiah.

Once in Sykamine, I went to an old man versed in the Scriptures and asked him: ‘What can you tell me concerning the prophet who appeared among the Saracens? He replied sighing: ‘He is a false one! Proph ets do not come with a sabre and a war chariot …’” ( Doctrina Jacobi in Patrologia Orientalis, 1903, vol. 8, 715 sqq., V.16; also Dagron and V. Déro che, eds., Doctrina Jacobi nuper Baptizati in “Juifs et Chrétiens dans l’Orient du VIIe siècle”, Travaux et mémoires 2 (1991): 47‒219 (citation, p. 209); see also Crone/Cook, Hagarism, 4‒6 (for whom ʿUmar is that Messiah); Hoyland, Seeing Islam as Others Saw It, 55 sqq. and 400‒409; Gallez, Le messie et son prophète, vol. 2, 109 sqq. (citation, p. 110); Shoemaker, The Death of a Prophet, 20 sqq. (citation, p. 22). On the dating problems regarding this source see also S.W. Anthony, “Muḥammad, the Keys to Paradise and the Doctrina Iacobi: A Late Antique Puz zle”, Der Islam 91.2 (2014): 243‒265. In his Chronography of the year 622, Theophanes highlights as well that certain Jews considered Muḥammad as one of their prophets; see F. Nau, “Un col loque du Patriarche Jean avec l’Emir des Agaréens et faits divers des années 712 à 716”, Journal Asiatique 11.5 (1915): 225‒279, quote, p. 258. Fred Donner does not agree with that interpretation of the text that attributes the expectation of the Messiah to all followers of Muḥammad. Accord ing to him only a few Jews among them professed that belief (F. Donner, “La question du mes sianisme dans l’islam primitif”, in M. Garcia-Arenal, ed., Mahdisme et millénarisme en Islam, no spécial REMMM 91‒94 (2000):17‒27). It is true that Donner considers the first community of the followers of Muḥammad as being interconfessional, (see his work Muhammad and the Believers: At the Origins of Islam, Cambridge, Mass., 2010; see however the report by J. Tannous in Expo sitions 5.2 (2011): 126‒141).

Toward the end of the 7th century, the Syriac chron icler Jean Bar Penkaye writes in the Rīsh mellē: “… (the Umayyad) had received, as I told you, from (Muḥammad) who had been their mhadyōnō, an order favor ing the Christian people and the order of monks …”** Indeed, many textual confirmations prove that for the first followers of Muḥammad and probably for himself, the Messiah of the end times was none other than Jesus Christ** (M. Hayek, Christ de l’Islam, Paris, 1959; G. Par rinder, Jesus in the Quran, London, 1965; G.C. Anawati, “ʿĪsā”, EI2, vol. 4, 82‒87. For other stud ies about Jesus in Islam see the introduction by G. Dye and F. Nobilio to Figures bibliques en islam, note 52, in fine, p. 28 and in the same volume J. Van Reeth, “La typologie du prophète selon le Coran: le cas de Jésus”, 81‒105).

The passage 43:57‒61, while obscure truth be told, seems to even indicate that Jesus is a sign of the Hour that the people of Muḥammad would have rejected: “And when the son of Mary is cited as an example, behold, thy people turn away from it (…) He is a sign of the Hour; doubt not concerning it, and follow me. This is a straight path” (Parrinder, Jesus in the Quran, 34; Anawati, “ʿĪsā”, 84). In his letter to John the Stylite, James of Edessa (d. 708) writes: “the Mahgraye (most probably an Aramaic transliteration of muhājirūn, a name, along with the muʾminūn, that designated the first followers of Muḥammad) … all confess firmly that Jesus is the true Messiah that was supposed to come and that had been predicted by the prophets; on this point there is no dispute with us (Christians)” ( F. Nau, “Lettre de Jacques d’Edesse sur la généalogie de la sainte Vierge”, Revue de l’Orient Chrétien 4 (1901): 512‒531). A great number of studies are consecrate to the identification of the Messiah, as saviour of the end times, with Jesus Christ by the followers of the Prophet during the first times of Islam (H. Michaud, Jésus selon le Coran, Neuchatel, 1960; W. Madelung, “Kāʾim Āl Muhammad”, EI2, vol. 4, 456‒457; idem “al-Mahdī”, ibid., vol. 5, 1230‒1238; idem, “ʿAbdallāh b. al-Zubayr and the Mahdī”, JNES 40 (1981): 291‒305; idem, “The Sufyānī between Tradition and History”, SI 63 (1984): 1‒48; G.S. Reynolds, “Jesus, the Qāʾim and the End of the World”, RSO 75 (2001): 55‒86. See also G. van Vloten, Recherches sur la domination arabe, le chiitisme et les croyances mes sianiques sous le khalifat des Omayades, Amsterdam, 1894, passim; E. Moeller, Beiträge zur Mahdilehre des Islams, Heidelberg, 1901, passim; S. M. Zwemer, The Moslem Christ: An Essay on the Life, Character and Teachings of Jesus Christ According to the Koran and Orthodox Tradition, Edinburgh-New York, 1912).

**This is most likely the reason why Muḥammad would not have presented himself as the Messiah** (C. Segovia, The Quranic Noah and the Making of the Islamic Prophet, Berlin-Boston, 2015, “Afterword”, 114‒117).

ʿAlī and Jesus

“Addressing ʿAlī the Prophet declared: Something about you resembles Jesus the son of Mary (fīka shibh min ʿĪsā b. Maryam) and if I did not fear that certain groups of my Community would say about you what the Christians have said about Jesus I would reveal something about you that would have made the people pick up the dust of your footsteps in order to seek blessings from it” (Al-Kulaynī, al-Rawḍa min al-Kāfī, ed. H. Rasūlī Maḥallātī, Tehran, 1389/1969, vol.1, p. 81, no 18). This tradition, under lining the theological similitude between Jesus and ʿAlī, is reported by Muḥam mad b. Yaʿqūb al-Kulaynī (d. 328 or 329/939‒40 or 940‒941), one of the most rec ognized authorities of so-called “moderate” twelver Shiʿite ḥadith.

These circles take their roots deep into the beginnings of Islam in the entourage of the Imams Muḥammad al-Bāqir (d. circa 119/737) and Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq (d. 148/765), at the edge of the first and second Hijri centuries (H. Halm, Kosmologie und Heilslehre der frühen Ismāʿīlīya. Eine Studie zur islamischen Gnosis, Wiesbaden, 1978; idem, Die islamische Gnosis. Die extreme Schia und die ʿAlawiten, Zu rich-Munich, 1982; J. van Ess, Theologie und Gesellschaft im 2. und 3. Jahrhundert Hidschra. Eine Geschichte des religiösen Denkens im frühen Islam, vol. 1, Berlin-New York, 1991, 233‒403 and especially 306 sqq.; idem, Der Eine und das Andere. Beobachtungen an islamischen häresiogra phischen Texten, Berlin-New York, 2011, passim; Amir-Moezzi, Le Guide divin dans le shiʿisme originel; M. Asatryan, Heresy and rationalism in Early Islam: the Origins and Evolution of the Mu faḍḍal Tradition, PhD Thesis, Yale University, 2012, “The Second Century Shiʿite ghulāt: Were they Really Gnostic?”, Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies 5.2 (2003‒4): 13‒61), in fact even in the entourage of ʿAlī and hence possibly during the time of Muḥammad himself (Gh. Ḥ. Ṣadīqī, Jonbesh hā-ye dīnī-ye īrānī dar qarn hā-ye dovvom va sevvom-e hejrī (completed and updated version of the author’s thesis by himself: Les mouvements religieux iraniens au IIe et IIIe siècles de l’hégire, Paris, 1938), Tehran, 1372 hs/1993, 225 sqq.; E. Kohlberg, “Some Imāmī Shīʿī Views on the Ṣaḥāba”, JSAI 5 (1984): 143‒175, especially 145‒146 (= idem, Belief and Law in Imāmī Shīʿism, Aldershot, 1991, article no 9); M.A. Amir-Moezzi, “Considérations sur l’ex pression dīn ʿAlī. Aux origines de la foi shiʿite”, ZDMG 150.1 (2000): 29‒68).

That is why later texts transmitting traditions relevant to us often refer to early reports corroborated incidentally by information provided by heresiographical works on early Shiʿite esoteric and gnostic circles and the great Alid “heresiarchs”. “People! I am the Christ (anā l-masīḥ), says ʿAlī; I who heal the blind and the lepper, who creates birds and chasses the clouds (allusion to Qurʾān 5:110) … I am the Christ and he is me … Jesus son of Mary is part of me and I am part of him (huwa minnī wa anā minhu). He is the greater Word of God (kalimat Allāh al-kubrā)”. ʿAlī is not a reincarnation of Jesus. His identification with the son of Mary is explained in ancient Shiʿism through the doctrine of the transmission of the sacred deposit (al-waṣiyya), of the Light of the divine Alliance or Friend ship (nūr al-walāya), of the divine spark (juzʾ ilāhī) or of “metemphotosis” (“the movement of light”, as I have translated the term tanāsukh) (U. Rubin, “‘Pre-existence and Light’. Aspects of the Concept of Nūr Muhammad”; idem, “Prophets and Progenitors in Early Shīʿa Tradition”, JSAI 1 (1979): 41‒65).

It is the passage, the inherence of a luminous divine force in the members of a long chain of ini tiated saints, making them inspired ones capable of communicating with God in order to transmit to mankind the messages from Above and even, in certain cases, transforming them in the locus of manifestation of God (maẓhar, majlā); a doctrine that, on many points, reminds of the one of the Paraclete as we have just seen (Amir-Moezzi, Religion discrète, index s.  v. and also J. Van Reeth, “Melchisédech le Prophète éternel selon Jean d’Apamée et le monarchianisme musulman”, Oriens Christianus 96 (2012): 8‒46, especially pp. 17, 23 and 46; idem, “Who is the ‘Other’ Paraclete?”, 428 and 445).

The parallelism between ʿAlī and Jesus is no doubt the reason why the docetic conception of the death of Jesus, illustrated in the Qurʾānic verses 4:157‒158, would have been applied to ʿAlī by his unconditional followers. According to the heresiographer ʿAbd al-Qāhir al-Baghdādī (d. 429/1037): “When ʿAlī was assas sinated, (his follower) ʿAbdallāh Ibn Sabaʾ pretended that the killed person was not ʿAlī but a demon (shayṭān) that had for the people taken on the shape of ʿAlī. As for the latter one, he has been elevated to heaven, just like Jesus, son of Mary. Ibn Sabaʾ said as well: Just as the Jews and the Christians lie in affirming the assassination of Jesus, likewise the enemies (of ʿAlī and his family: nawāṣib) and the Kharijites lie in affirming the murder of ʿAlī. The Jews and the Christians have seen a person being crucified and it seemed to them that that person was Jesus (allusion to the verses previously mentioned from the Qurʾān). Likewise those who pretend that ʿAlī has been killed have only seen a dead man and mistook him for the latter. But, ʿAlī ascended to heaven. Subsequently he will come back to earth and shall take revenge on his enemies” (Al-Baghdādī, al-Farq bayn al-firaq, ed. M. ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd, Beirut, 1393/1973, 223‒224). Moreover in dozens of Shiʿite traditions, ʿAlī bears the two “Judeo-Christian” messianic titles of Fārūq (from the Hebrew and Aramaic pārūqa, redeemer, saviour) (J. Levy, Neuhebräisches und chaldäisches Wörterbuch über die Talmudim und Midra schim, Leipzig, 1876‒1889, s.  v. paroqa; A. Jeffery, The Foreign Vocabulary of the Quran, Baroda, 1938, 227‒229) and of Ṣiddīq (after the Qumran Master of Justice Ṣeddēq) ( Jeffery, op.cit., 195; see also C. Melchert, “The Interpretation of Three Quranic Terms (Si yāḥa, Ḥikma and Ṣiddīq) of Special Interest to the Early Renonciants” in S.R. Burge, ed., The Meaning of the Word. Lexicology and Quranic Exegesis, London, 2015, 89‒116, in particular 102‒103.

On the survival of beliefs of Qumranian origin in Islam see Van Reeth, “Who is the ‘Other’ Paraclete?”, 428, 432, 434, 442). We know that in Sunnism these titles are given respectively to ʿUmar and Abū Bakr, but the Alids have always considered that it was yet another usurpation of ʿAlī’s rights (See for example Kitāb Sulaym b. Qays al-Hilālī, ed. M.B. al-Anṣārī al-Zanjānī al-Khuʾīnī, 3 vols., Qumm, 1426/1995, tradition no 26, vol. 2, 780‒781; al-Ṭabrisī, al-Iḥtijāj, ed. M.B. al-Kharsān, 2 vols., Najaf, 1386/1966, vol. 2, 15; Yūsuf al-Baḥrānī, al-Durar al-najafiyya, Qumm, copy of litho. ed., s.  d., 281 and 287; al-Majlisī, Biḥār al-anwār, 110 vols., Tehran-Qumm, 1376‒1392/1956‒1972, vol. 33, 173 sqq.; vol. 44, 128).

Rewriting history and making a new memory

1. Only God has knowledge of the Hour (ʿilm al-sāʿa, see verses 7:187; 31:34; 41:47; 43:85), that “a day of God” is the equivalent of a thousand human years (verses 22:47 et 32:5); it can even last up to 50.000 years (verse 70:4).
2. Besides expressions manifesting the nuances and hesitations (ʿasā an, “it could be that … ”; laʿalla “perhaps”) concerning the coming of the Hour or the invitations to patience are used in other verses (e.  g. 11:8; 17:51‒52; 27:72; 33:63; 40:77; 72:25; see also 22:55 or 70:6‒7) (Shoemaker, The Death of a Prophet, 162‒163). The same evolution seems perceptible in the ḥadith when the Prophet declares that the coming of the Hour could take a century (Sprenger, Das Leben und die Lehre, vol. 1, 535‒536; Casanova, Mohammed et la fin du monde, 17; Bashear, “Muslim Apocalypses”, 90‒91). Other recurring data reported by various sources are only explainable if Muḥammad had not considered the end of the world to be imminent in his lifetime, for example: his ardent desire to have a male descendant (Q108:3), his insistence on the marriage of ʿAlī and Fāṭima, the rich oasis of Fadak left as an heirloom to his daughter Fāṭima and her family, in par ticular his only two male descendants, al-Ḥasan and al-Ḥusayn (W. Madelung, “Social Legislation in Sūrat al-Aḥzāb” in A. Cilardo, ed., Islam and Globalisation. Historical and Con temporary Perspectives. Proceeding of the 25th Congress of l’Union Européenne des Islamisants et Arabisants, Louvain-Paris-Walpole, 2013, 197‒203; idem, “Introduction” to the part titled “Histo ry and Historiography” in F. Daftary and G. Miskinzoda, eds., The Study of Shiʿi Islam: History, Theology and Law, London-New York, 2014, 3‒16). Thus he could very well have thought about his succession. The choice of ʿAlī, the father of his sole male offspring (not to mention other privileged relations that would have tied both men), seems an obvious one, all the more if the Prophet considered him as the Saviour of the end times.

In his letter to caliph ʿAbd al-Ma lik (reign 65‒86/685‒705), the renowned Umayyad governor of Iraq, al-Ḥajjāj b. Yūsuf (d. 95/714) declares that the caliph is superior to the prophet-messenger (rasūl) because in the eyes of God he fulfils a more important role in realizing God’s will. Certain strongmen around ʿAbd al-Malik considered that the circum ambulation rituals around his palace were more rewarded by God than doing the same around the tomb of Muḥammad (Crone-Hinds, op.cit., 19 sqq.; Gallez, Le messie et son prophète, vol. 2, 441). The public cursing of ʿAlī from the chairs of the mosques but also the propaganda of the state apparatus become systematic since the reign of Muʿāwiya I, the first Umayyad caliph. The hatred of ʿAlī, his family – and of course that of the Prophet – and of his partisans reached its peak in Karbalā and the massacre of al-Ḥusayn b. ʿAlī, the grandson of the Prophet, and almost all his close ones on the order of the caliph Yazīd I in 61/680 (Amir-Moezzi, Le Coran silencieux et le Coran parlant).

An offi cial version of the Qurʾān, established according to the demands of the caliphal power is elaborated and released in the great cities of the empire; at the same time the other recensions of the Qurʾān are sought after and destroyed. Likewise the initiative of the constitution of an official corpus of Ḥadith of the same nature is undertaken mostly in the entourage of ʿAbd al-Malik and of the court scholar Ibn Shihāb al-Zuhrī (d.124/742) (S. Bashear, “Qurʾān 2:114 and Jerusalem”, BSOAS 52 (1989): 251‒238 (included in idem, Studies in Early Islamic Tradition, article no II); Hoyland, Seeing Islam as Others saw it, 560‒573; De Prémare, Les fondations de l’islam, especially chapters 15, 278 sqq.; idem, Aux origines du Coran, passim; Amir-Moezzi, Coran silencieux, chapter 2; F. Déroche, Qurans of the Umayyads. A First Overview, Leiden, 2013, especially the introduction; idem, “Con trôler l’écriture. Sur quelques caractéristiques de corans de la période omeyyade”, in M. Azaiez et S. Mervin, eds., Le Coran. Nouvelles approches, Paris, 2014, 39‒55; on al-Zuhrī see for example. M. Lecker, “Biographical Notes on Ibn Shihāb al-Zuhrī”, JSS 41.1 (1996): 21‒63 (included in idem, Jews and Arabs in Pre- and Early Islamic Arabia, Aldershot: Variorum, 1998, article no 16); H. Motzki, “The Collection of the Qurʾān. A Reconsideration of Western Views in Light of Recent Methodological Developments”, Der Islam 78 (2001):1‒34).
Being the clever politician he was, Muʿāwiya, based in Syria – a largely Christian country – had adopted a strongly pro-Chris tian attitude and policy (nevertheless without any reference to the Qurʾān, nor to Muḥammad or Jesus, nor to any other prophet), recovering by the same token the “Judeo-Christian tendency” of the message of Muḥammad and of his first fol lowers while attempting to conceal the messianic dimension of the latter, largely maintained in Alid circles (Crone-Cook, Hagarism, 11; G. Hawting, The First Dynasty of Islam: The Umayyad Caliphate AD 661‒750, Carbondale and Edwardsville, 1987; Bashear, “Qibla Mushar riqa and Early Muslim Prayer in Churches”, MW 81 (1991): 267‒282 (= Studies in Early Islamic Tradition, article no VI); R. Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 485 sqq.; Donner, Muhammad and the Be lievers, 176sq., 180 sqq., 192 sqq., 222; idem, “Umayyad Efforts at Legitimation: the Umayyad’s Silent Heritage” in A. Borrut and P.M. Cobb, eds., Umayyad Legacies: Medieval Memories from Syria to Spain, Leiden, 2010, 187‒211. See also A. Borrut, Entre mémoire et pouvoir: l’espace syrien sous les derniers Omeyyades et les premiers Abbassides (v. 72‒193/692‒809), Leiden, 2011; idem, “Introduction : la fabrique de l’histoire et de la tradition islamiques” in idem, ed., Ecriture de l’histoire et processus de canonisation dans les premiers siècles de l’islam, no spécial REMMM, 129 (2011–1): 17‒30). That is most probably the reason why he is without question the heavily incensed hero of most Syriac chronicles of the period that, in order to probably go in the direction of Umayyad propaganda, remove ʿAlī from the list of Arab “kings” after Muḥammad. And yet ʿAlī remains very much present in the history of early Islam. He even constitutes in a way one of the centers of gravity given that attitudes toward him determine events and doctrines. He distinguishes himself notably through a series of exceptions: among the unique names and/or surnames of that period ‒ we have seen the examples of Muḥammad, ʿUmar, Jaʿfar – his, ʿAlī, is the only one that is also a divine name (see above). He is even the only character in the entourage of Muḥammad with whose name the term “religion” is associated, in the expres sion dīn ʿAlī (Madelung, The Succession to Muhammad, 178‒179). A great fighter alongside Muḥammad, known in the sīra and other sources for his martial and strategic exploits, he did not, however, take part in any of the great conquests contrary to other notable figures of the Quraysh (De Prémare, Les fondations de l’islam, 113‒114). Moreover there is still no convincing explanation as to the fact that during his caliphate ʿAlī moved the capital of Islam from the Hijaz to Iraq, to be more precise from Medina to Kūfa (J. Van Reeth, “Ville céleste, ville sainte, ville idéale dans la tradition musul mane”, Acta Orientalia Belgica, special no “Décrire, nommer ou rêver les lieux en Orient. Géo graphie et toponymie entre réalité et fiction. Jean-Marie Kruchten in memoriam”, 24 (2011):121‒131, especially p. 125; idem, “Le Coran silencieux et le Coran parlant. Nouvelles perspectives sur les origines de l’islam”, RHR 230.3 (juillet‒septembre 2013): 385‒402).
Was it because of the proximity of the city of Ḥīra, the old effervescent intellectual and spiritual center of the Sassanian empire?109 Is it another element to be added to the still shadowy dossier of the convergences between ʿAlī, pre-Islamic Iran and the Iranian converts, convergences that have lead the Greek Theophanes to call him “ʿAlī the Persian” in his Chronographia? (I. Toral-Niehoff, Al-Ḥīra. Eine arabische Kulturmetropole im spätantiken Kontext, Leiden, 2013; Ph. J. Wood, “Ḥīra and her saints”, Analecta Bollandiana 132 (2014): 5‒20. see also M. Tardieu, “L’arrivée des manichéens à al-Hira” in P. Canivet and J.-P. Rey-Coquais, eds., La Syrie de Byzance à l’Islam VIIe‒VIIIe siècle, Damas 1992, 15‒24). Finally it is interesting to notice that in the letter sent around 719 by the Emperor Leo III to the Umayyad caliph ʿUmar II it is said that in the program of systematic destruction of the recensions of the Qurʾān established by al-Ḥajjāj b. Yūsuf the only surviving text was the Codex of ʿAlī (called here by his kunya Abū Turāb).111 The idea that comes out of this report is that the Quranic recension of ʿAlī would have been more protected than others, probably because it had a singular impor tance among the followers of the latter; in any case the “Quranic” quotes not being part of the known Qurʾān and reported in ancient Shiʿite works are said to be extracted from the Quranic codex of ʿAlī (muṣḥaf ʿAlī).