Notes
N o t e s Introduction 1. Crone and Cook, Hagarism. 2. Unless otherwise indicated, all dates in this study are ce. On the nature of the sources for this period, see, e.g., Haldon, Byzantium in the Seventh Century, 1–2; Herrin, The Formation of Christendom, 133. Regarding the particular value of the Syriac historical tradition for this period, see Conrad, “Varietas Syriaca”; and Robert Hoyland’s contribution to Palmer, The Seventh Century, xxiv–xxvi. 3. Wansbrough, Quranic Studies; Wansbrough, The Sectarian Milieu. A brief and helpful introduction to Wansbrough’s methods and conclusions can be found in Rippin, “Literary Analysis of Qurʾān.” One should also see the special issue of Method and Theory in the Study of Religion that was devoted to Wansbrough’s legacy in the study of early Islam: Berg, “Islamic Origins Reconsidered.” On the significance of both Crone and Cook’s Hagarism and Wansbrough’s works for integrating Islam better into the study of religion in the early medieval Near East, see esp. Hawting, “John Wansbrough, Islam, and Monotheism.” 4. See, e.g., Wansbrough, “Review of Hagarism,” 155–56; Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 547. 5. Wansbrough, The Sectarian Milieu, 116–17. 6. In fact, some recent archaeological studies suggest something like Crone and Cook’s hypothesis in Hagarism: see Pentz, The Invisible Conquest; and Magness, The Archaeology of the Early Islamic Settlement. Pentz’s analysis of the archaeology of sixth- and seventh-century Syro-Palestine essentially argues that the transition to Arab rule came primarily as a result of economic changes and took place gradually as the nomadic cultures on the margins of civilization came to exercise increasing authority over the settled communities. Pentz additionally concludes that the archaeological evidence contradicts the Islamic historical tradition’s account of a massive campaign of conquest, involving major battles and considerable destruction of property: “The 7th century ‘conquest’ of Syria is—in archaeological terms—totally invisible. That is to say, archaeological evidence is abundant, while the archaeologist looking for a break in the material is searching in vain” (74). This observation is largely confirmed by Magness in her study, which concludes that there is no archaeological evidence for the widespread violence and destruction described in the Islamic accounts of the conquest of Palestine. The implication of both studies would seem to be that the Arabs who took political control of the Near East came not in a massive invasion from the Ḥijāz but were instead Arabs living on the fringes of the Roman and Persian empires who gradually assumed control without the dramatic and destructive battles recorded by the Islamic historical tradition. See also in this regard now Walmsley, Early Islamic Syria. 7. For a range of negative reactions, see, e.g., Rahman, Major Themes of the Qurʾān, xiii–xiv; Stover, “Orientalism and the Otherness of Islam”; Abdul-Rauf, “Outsiders’ Interpretations of Islam”; Rahman, “Approaches to Islam”; Serjeant, “Review of John Wansbrough”; Wansbrough, The Sectarian Milieu, 116–17. 8. See Wansbrough, The Sectarian Milieu, 116–19. 9. Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 597–98. 10. The famous phrase is from Leopold von Ranke, the nineteenth-century founder of modern, critical history. For more on van Ranke and his significance for modern history , see White, Metahistory, 163–90, esp. 163–64. 11. See, e.g., Hoyland, Seeing Islam, and numerous works by Lawrence I. Conrad, esp., e.g., Conrad, “The Conquest of Arwad.” 12. Crone and Cook, Hagarism, 3–4, 24, 152–53 n. 7. Nevertheless, Crone and Cook do elsewhere (p. 24) assess the significance of this tradition, which they assume to be correct, considering how and why the later Islamic tradition has revised its earliest history on this point. 13. See also the helpful survey of sources in Penn, “Syriac Sources.” 14. Hoyland, Seeing Islam, 592–94. 15. Ibid., 594–95. 16. Ibid., 595–97. 17. For a discussion of the importance of this particular criterion in historical Jesus studies, see Porter, The Criteria for Authenticity, 82–89, 102; see also the following representative examples: Meier, A Marginal Jew, 1: 174–75; Theissen and Merz, The Historical Jesus, 116–17; Ehrman, Jesus, 90–91. 18. See, e.g., Ehrman, Jesus, 91–94; Meier, A Marginal Jew, 1: 168–71. In the study of early Islam, this principle was perhaps first and most influentially articulated by Goldziher : see Goldziher, Muslim Studies, 2: 39–40. 19. Hoyland, “Writing the Biography,” 585. 20. Watt, Muhammad at Mecca, 103. 21. Hoyland, “Writing the Biography,” 585; see Burton, “Those Are the High...
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