New Evidence on the Origin of the Hikayat Muhammad Hanafiyyah

Many scholars have studied the contribution of the Hikayat Muhammad Hanafiyyah to Malay Islamic literature. Some of them, including Van Ronkel, Winstedt, Braginsky, and, especially, Brakel, have paid particular attention to the structure and content of the story. These scholars have all suggested that this hikayat was copied from an unidentified Persian manuscript and that the Malay version includes some sections not found in the Persian one. In this study, several manuscript copies of a Persian text, preserved in various libraries around the world, are examined in order to investigate whether this text could be the original source of the Malay version of the Hikayat Muhammad Hanafiyyah. In order to follow up on and test some previous scholarly conclusions, this study highlights the similarities and differences between both the content and the structure of the Malay and Persian versions on the basis of Brakel’s edition of the text.Nombreux sont les chercheurs à avoir étudié la contribution de l’Hikayat Muhammad Hanafiyyah à la littérature islamique malaise. Une partie d’entre eux, notamment Van Ronkel, Winstedt, Braginsky, et, plus spécialement, Brakel, se sont particulièrement intéressés à la structure et au contenu de l’histoire. Tous ces chercheurs ont suggéré que cet hikayat a été copié d’un manuscrit persan non identifié et que la version malaise comprend des passages ne figurant pas dans le texte persan. Dans cette étude, plusieurs copies manuscrites d’un texte persan, conservées dans diverses bibliothèques du monde entier, sont examinées afin de voir si ce texte pourrait être la source originelle du Hikayat Muhammad Hanafiyyah. Afin de poursuivre et de tester certaines conclusions savantes antérieures, cette étude met en lumière les similitudes et les différences entre le contenu et la structure des versions malaise et persane sur la base de l’édition du texte réalisée par Brakel

Shi‘ite-perso views towards abusing wine and opium: is it addiction or culture?

In this essay, one of the most serious problems highlighted with respect to contemporary Iranians, who are mostly known as Shi‘ite-Perso (Shi‘ite-Persian) citizens of Iran, and what their view toward abusing wine and opium is. On one hand, the wealthy Persian literature is full of poems, narrations and notes with reference to wine and opium, while on the other hand, many parts of Shi‘ite-Islamic thought deem wine unclean and illegal, and abusing opium is forbidden except under certain [hard-fulfilling] conditions. Hereby, in this essay the aim is to express why the question “are drinking wine and abusing opium known as addiction or literal culture?” is suspended throughout the young Iranian generation. In this regard, the standpoints of Persian poets and Iranian religious figures towards wine and opium will be considered

Middle Eastern and Islamic Materials in Special Collections, University of Otago

An inventory of Middle Eastern and Islamic Materials in Special Collections at the University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand

Middle Eastern and Islamic Materials in Special Collections, University of Otago (Working Paper)

compiled and edited by Donald Kerr and Majid DaneshgarLiteraturangabe