Tilman Nagels " ‚Authentizität‘ in der Leben-Mohammed-Forschung". Eine Antwort

This contribution is a response to Tilman Nagel's essay " ‘Authentizität' in der Leben-Mohammed-Forschung” [‘Authenticity' in the research on the Life of Mohammed] in which the author again presents the main theses argued in his monograph Mohammed. Leben und Legende and responds to criticism. Whereas his critics agree with Nagel that complete ‘authenticity' is unattainable in principle, yet an asymptotic approximation of Mohammed as a figure is indeed possible, the way to attain such an approximation remains a matter of dispute. Contrary to Nagel, the proponents of the so-called isnad-cum-matn analysis hold this method, which offers the possibility to date ḥadīṯs (traditions) and reconstruct texts in circulation in the 1st cent. H., for one of the most successful towards achieving this goal. Another successful procedure of proven value is the evaluation and appraisal of the corpus of traditions traced back to ʿUrwa b. az-Zubayr (d. c. 712), one of the earliest and most important collectors of historical material in Islam. Proponents of both of these procedures do not apply the term ‘authentic', as asserted by Nagel, in the sense of ‘what exactly happened', but rather use this term if the transmitters of a tradition are historical figures and when the process of transmission is proven to have ensued as indicated in the chain of transmissio

The constitution of the Koran as a codified work : Paradigm for codifying Hadith and the Islamic sciences?

Based on observations that the codification process of both Koran and hadith exhibits considerable similarities and that the codification of many Arabic-Islamic sciences proceeds analogously to that of hadith, the following will examine whether the codification of the holy book of Islam was paradigmatic for the codification process of hadith and the other Arabic-Islamic sciences. "Paradigm" here is understood not as a "mystical" prefiguration, but as a pattern of development that repeats itself two or more times because the same or similar prerequisites elicit the same or similar effects. The question as to whether such a pattern exists can demand a certain interest: if a positive answer can be arrived at, it would be possible to demonstrate a regularity according to which the development from speech to writing took place in Islam.Issue title: Oral Tradition in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam

Torah orale et hadith : transmission, interdit de l'écrit, rédaction

I. « Le Hadith entretient avec le Coran la même relation que, dans le judaïsme, l’enseignement oral vis-à-vis de l’enseignement écrit ». Cette analogie en soi évidente, telle qu’elle a été formulée par Josef Horovitz, n’est nullement admise de manière unanime dans les études islamiques. Ignaz Goldziher ne l’a mentionnée dans son étude fondamentale « Ueber die Entwickelung des Hadīth » (« Sur le développement du Hadīth ») que pour la rejeter aussitôt énergiquement comme « trompeuse » et « inex..

First-Century Sources for the Life of Muhammad? A Debate

This article proposes to interpret Surah 97 based on research undertaken in the framework of the Corpus Coranicum, project. The first part scrutinizes Christopn LUXENBERG'S seriously flawed argument that Surah 97 can be understood as a Qur'anic hymn on the Nativity of Jesus if some of its key expressions are read against the semantic background of Syriac, while the remainder of the article endeavours to develop a more tenable understanding of the text. This involves an attempt to date Surah 97 relative to other Qur'anic texts and to detect possible additions to it. In addition, the article discusses the meaning and reference of its most central term, laylat al-qadr. Finally special attention is given to the question whether the text might not, in spite of the circularity of LUXENBERG'S reading, contain implicit references to the Nativity. © Walter de Gruyter 2012

Le savant et son époque à travers sa correspondance Seeger A. Bonebakker (1923-2005) et quelques notes sur Ḫalīl b. Aybak al-Ṣafadī (696-764/1297-1363)

This article proposes a survey of two great scholars’ in Arabic literature correspondences: a European of the 20th century, Seeger Adrianus Bonebakker, who is of special interest for us because he bequeathed all of his great library, personal notes and correspondence to Università Ca’ Foscari, and a subject of study of the former, Ḫalīl b. Aybak al-Ṣafadī, great littérateur and scholar of the first century of the Mamluk period. Letters sent and received are preserved in both cases and are primary sources on their network, but also on their personal life, personality and methodology

Grundsätzliches zu Tilman Nagels Monographie Mohammed. Leben und Legende

This contribution is a review article of Tilman Nagel’s book Mohammed. Leben und Legende. My critique concerns some basic assumptions and hypotheses which this book is based on. 1. The first point of criticism is directed at Nagel’s view of the authenticity of the sources de-scribing the life of Muḥammad. He considers the extant Sīra- and Maġāzī-works by Ibn Isḥaq (d. 767) and al-Wāqidī (d. 823), in spite of their late date, as being, nevertheless, a suitable base for the reconstruction of the historical facts. However, according to Nagel, we have to uncover and leave aside the distortions caused by certain tendencies to discover the real events: we are dealing here, most importantly, with a tendency to de-historicize the person of Muḥammad (‘the destruction of history’) and certain legendary formation principles, e.g. ‘the demotion of Mecca to the categorically bad’. – In contrast to this stance, I propose to demonstrate that a de-historicization did not exist as a generally operating principle. Rather, historical traditions are to be found next to legal traditions from the outset and at any time (cf. the historical chapters in al-Buḫārī’s Ṣaḥīḥ). – In order to distinguish between authentic and inauthentic material, we have to take a radically different approach than Nagel did. 2. The second point of criticism concerns the fact that Nagel throughout his book uses late compilations as his main sources. However, since A. Noth’s seminal investigations, it has become clear that in these late compilations ‘good’ and ‘bad’ traditions are to be found side by side. Thus, these works are absolutely not suited as a starting point to find out ‘what really happened’. – On the basis of a critical examination of Nagel’s presentation and interpretation of the ḥadīṯ al-ifk, the tradition of the slander against ʿĀʾiša, I will demonstrate that Nagel’s method leads to seriously wrong results. 3. Nagel maintains that al-Wāqidī can be regarded as an outstanding, almost modern historian who allegedly applied methods fitting contemporary empirical standards. Nagel therefore mostly relies on al-Wāqidī’s versions. However, the fact of the matter is that this historian compiled (i.e wrote up) reports of widely varying quality from any number of sources. He studiously fails to mention his main source, Ibn Isḥāq, and very often also other sources (ʿAbd ar-Razzāq, Mūsā ibn ʿUqba). 4. As to Nagel’s use of secondary literature, it must be said that he does not know, or intentionally ignores, fundamental investigations. Illustrated by his translation and interpretation of the taṣliya (eulogy after the name of the Prophet Muḥammad) I will show that a grave and embarrassing flaw would have been avoided if he had used a fundamental and easily available monograph on the subject by an outstanding German-speaking scholar of the second half of the 20th century

Tilman Nagels „,Authentizität‘ in der Leben-Mohammed-Forschung“. Eine Antwort

This contribution is a response to Tilman Nagel's essay “ ‘Authentizität’ in der Leben-Mohammed-Forschung” [‘Authenticity’ in the research on the Life of Mohammed] in which the author again presents the main theses argued in his monograph Mohammed. Leben und Legende and responds to criticism. Whereas his critics agree with Nagel that complete ‘authenticity’ is unattainable in principle, yet an asymptotic approximation of Mohammed as a figure is indeed possible, the way to attain such an approximation remains a matter of dispute. Contrary to Nagel, the proponents of the so-called isnad-cum-matn analysis hold this method, which offers the possibility to date ḥadīṯs (traditions) and reconstruct texts in circulation in the 1st cent. H., for one of the most successful towards achieving this goal. Another successful procedure of proven value is the evaluation and appraisal of the corpus of traditions traced back to ʿUrwa b. az-Zubayr (d. c. 712), one of the earliest and most important collectors of historical material in Islam. Proponents of both of these procedures do not apply the term ‘authentic’, as asserted by Nagel, in the sense of ‘what exactly happened’, but rather use this term if the transmitters of a tradition are historical figures and when the process of transmission is proven to have ensued as indicated in the chain of transmission