Early Medinan Suras - The Birth of Politics in the Qur’an

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Publication date Pub: 17 October 2024

The central conceptual intervention of this article is that of connecting questions of chronology in the Qur’an with larger problems to do with processes of identity formation in early Islam. More specifically, I propose a new division of the Medinan Qur’anic period. Through a detailed analysis of Sura 16 (Sura al-Naḥl), this article will show that it was revealed in Medina after the Hijra and before the Battle of Badr, contrary to the common view that approaches this and other similar Medinan suras (including Suras 7 and 29) as Meccan composed and Medinan adjusted. My analysis demonstrates that approaching suras like Sura 16 as chronological composites is neither necessary nor defensible. By attempting to reorient our understanding of the Qur’an’s chronology, this article tries to break new ground in how we imagine the limits of Muslim identity during this immensely significant transitional moment in the life of the Prophet, the Qur’an, and Islam.

Introduction

This article proposes a new division of the Medinan suras of the Qur’an. I argue that Medinan suras can be roughly divided into an early stratum that predates the Battle of Badr and a later stratum that postdates the Battle of Badr. Scholarly consensus has long favored the view that the relocation of Muhammad to Medina (hijra) immediately triggered a new compositional style in Qur’anic suras that was distinct from the compositional style of the pre-hijra (or Meccan) Qur’anic suras. Consequently, the so-called composite suras – suras that exhibit both Meccan and Medinan characteristics – are understood by Western scholars and Muslims alike as pre-hijra Meccan compositions that were enlarged in post-hijra Medina. However, I seek to demonstrate that some of these purportedly composite suras were actually fully composed in Medina in a two-year period spanning between the hijra and the Battle of Badr. This understanding of such suras will solve an essential question in the compositional history of the Qur’an, namely, how the transition from the Meccan style to the Medinan style took place. I propose that the two-year period between the hijra and the Battle of Badr (that is to say, the early Medinan period) marks a transitional period, not only in the career of Muhammad but also in the style of the suras of the Qur’an. During this period, an intermediate style is observable, one that is still fully anchored in late Meccan rhetoric yet accommodating and dealing with the new reality of the early Medinan phase of Muhammad’s career.

As an example of this early Medinan phase, this article offers a detailed analysis of Sura 16 and how it fits into this historical phase of Muhammad’s career. More importantly, it will show that approaching this sura as a composite Meccan and Medinan production, as so far has been the argument, is neither necessary nor convincing. The host of suras that belong to this early Medinan period (Sura 29, among others) were composed in a new intermediate style, one that was late Meccan yet exhibited a different mode of argument; new ideas that were the result of a new environment were introduced through an already existing style that had been extensively developed in Mecca. Unlike the early Meccan period, this early Medinan phase was a brief period of the Qur’an’s history, outshone by the dramatic success of Muhammad’s career in Medina.

The move to Medina has rightly been seen as a turning point in the Qur’an’s discourse. This understanding of the Medinan period in the Qur’an is tied, in my opinion, not to the 622 date of the Hijra (and the Constitution of Medina), but to the post-Battle of Badr reconfiguration of the Muslim community. I argue that what we currently understand as Medinan suras stem from a post-Badr Qur’an, a Qur’an that has shed all signs of hesitation, a document addressed to a community that has all of the major classical components that characterize a society with a clear leadership and nascent structures of governance, including a fighting army and taxes. However, such aspects of communal development are not instantaneous, which is why it is unlikely that the discourse and rhetorical style of the Qur’an turned on a dime immediately after Muhammad’s relocation from Mecca to Medina. Instead, a transitional phase is more likely, one that has the structure and form of the late Meccan Qur’an with new features that were no longer possible to avoid due to the new Medinan reality. The whole of Sura 16 is set in a new Sitz im Leben and reflects on what it means to be a Muslim in Medina.

The observation that some suras contained material from both Mecca and Medina is not new. Muslims themselves confronted these “mixed” suras with their conflicting verses and offered a solution, that Muhammad inserted some new verses into the old Meccan suras after moving to Medina. The potency of this observation is that there are indeed many suras that do fit this paradigm. There is however a marked difference in what I am arguing here between these mixed suras, and the suras that I argue are early Medinan. The Meccan suras that have been revisited in Medina usually only contain one or at most a few verses that were clearly inserted after the migration to Medina. Many of the inserted verses use stock Medinan phrases that were added to some of the very early Meccan suras to lessen their bleak assessment of human destiny and to make space for a thriving community of believers in the imagined history of humanity that concludes with the arrival of the Day of Judgment. The added verses were usually much longer than the original verses of these Meccan suras, thus breaking the rhythm of parallelism and sometimes even the rhyme. These suras are easy to spot and this understanding of their composition has been accepted by most modern scholars. However, the suras that I am calling early Medinan are a continuation of the late Meccan phase in terms of style, but with new content against a Medinan backdrop, and because of this close stylistic similarity they were so far not easily disentangled from that late Meccan phase. The sections that were supposedly inserted in Medina are moreover substantial, and they are not limited to one part of the sura. The argument that these were added later does not explain the fact that these suras show a remarkable coherency and a complex structure. These are not short insertions, and the usual explanation does not seem to provide sufficient understanding of the suras’ overall structure. These suras were major compositions that were addressing a new environment and new power relations. Each of the early Medinan suras was addressing this new reality, a tentative new setting, where power and relations with other communities were being negotiated. New terms were being used, if only experimentally, before they solidified into formulaic use. Most significantly, what appears to be the “Meccan” of these suras must be understood in a new light; it has to be read in a different context. What appears to us as hackneyed Meccan themes are not so when interpreted in light of the new Medinan power relations.

Yet, these are not the only theoretical underpinnings of my approach, for there is a far more fundamental argument I am making – that the Qur’an’s composition was, from the beginning, a written exercise. The supposed oral nature of the Qur’an has come to play a strange role in Qur’anic studies, appealed to whenever something unclear needs to be accounted for. Were the Qur’an orally composed, one would have expected a Medinan-colored Qur’an – as Muhammad’s style evolved, his revisions and reiterations of what was supposedly an oral corpus would have changed the whole structure and the wordings of previous revelations. Instead, what we see are documents frozen in time, indeed suras that were better off discarded but were preserved, largely unrevised, although sometimes modified through discreet insertions that were infelicitous, to say the least.

A Review of Previous Analysis of Sura 16 (al-Naḥl)

Sura 16 has not attracted the attention it deserves. A lone example of an attempt at a detailed assessment has been Rudi Paret, who in his Kommentar und Konkordanz had a two-page analysis of the first verse of the sura. I relied extensively on his documentation of the secondary literature, and his concordance remains the alpha and omega of Qur’anic studies. He is clearly of the opinion that this ought to be a Medinan sura, but the consensus is against him. He is aware that there are disagreements on its dating and does mention the various opinions of previous scholars, which reflects a disagreement as to where to place it. Nöldeke and Schwally place it in the late Meccan period (third phase). Bell has a more confusing assessment and Paret only quotes his statement: “In the main it is Medinan but it contains Meccan elements … which have been revised and adapted for Medinan purposes” (Paret 1989: 282). Bell’s introduction, by contrast, is far more dismissive. He starts his analysis by stating: “This surah is so confused in structure that it is impossible to unravel its composition with certainty” (Bell 1939: 248). He allocates various parts to different periods, and ventures that the first two verses might have been revealed after the Battle of Badr, which he considers “early Medinan” (ibid. 1939: 248). Yet other parts are placed after or around the Battle of Uḥud which took place a year after the Battle of Badr. However, one cannot make sense of Bell’s analysis, since he seems to think this was a badly constructed and haphazardly composed sura. The connection with the Battle of Badr is an idea that Paret dwells on when discussing the first verse. The attempt to connect the opening verses to Badr is however unconvincing, and Paret’s attempt at support remains conjectural as he himself states. Régis Blachère, on the other hand, counts the sura as part of the third Meccan period in his general introduction to his translation (Blachère 1966: 16). Nevertheless, in the introduction to the sura, he mentions that various Muslim scholars considered this sura as fully Meccan, while others considered it Meccan with Medinan additions, and a third group that considered it as fully Medinan. He himself ends his short paragraph by stating: “There is reason to think that this sura is made up of several series of revelations” (ibid. 1966: 291). Clearly, neither Bell nor Blachère see this sura as significant enough to warrant extensive attention. Paret does not push his case for a Medinan provenance and seems to leave the position of the sura undecided. None of his comments on the rest of the verses raise the issue of provenance again. These scholars all agree, however, that this is a composite sura with some new verses added later or extensively reworked.

More recently, Angelika Neuwirth places the sura in the third Meccan period (or late Meccan Suras, “spätmekkanischen Suren”), and designates verses 106–128 (or the last three pages in the Saudi edition) of the sura as “partly Medinan additions” (teilweize medinische Zusätze) (Neuwirth 1981: 301). It is not clear which sections she is referring to specifically, but she is clearly basing her statements on Nöldeke and Schwally (1909–38: 145–7). 1 We are not told by Neuwirth why of all the late Meccan suras, Sura 16 would be revised by Muhammad. More interestingly, verses 16:41–42, which speak of hijra (migration), are placed by Neuwirth in square brackets in the schemata of the sura without further explanation (Neuwirth 1981: 301). The implication is clear that this is also a later addition. The analysis of Sura 16 has been predetermined, with most of the interest directed to the end of the sura where it was clearly Medinan, and apart from Paret who wrote extensively on the first verse, the beginning parts of the sura which were considered “Meccan” were never investigated.

A New Analysis

Sura 16 is longish, comprised of 128 verses which fill 15 pages in the Saudi edition; it is the eighth longest sura in the Qur’an. A closer look at the sura shows some of the features that I have also detected in a late Meccan group of suras (Suras 10–15), especially the motif of the tardiness of punishment (ta’khir, thus verse 16:61) and what seems to be a constant demand that it come, a demand of a hurriedness for it (istiʿjāl, 16:1). 2 There is, however, no despair, no forlorn voice here. Rather, Sura 16 is upbeat and celebratory of creation and of the bounties of life, if there was ever such a celebration in the Qur’an. Take for instance the pericope in Q. 16:2–18, which is a long hymn to the bounties of life that ranges from the creation of humans from semen, to the cattle they use and eat, to the water that pours down from heaven, to the vegetation and trees, to the night, day, sun and moon which are there for humans, to the sea with its bounties and pearls. What is remarkable about this bounty pericope is that it connects the act of creation by God to human beings directly – God created these things “for you” (lakum, or li); particles that are repeated more than ten times in this pericope after the mentioning of every bounty. This intimacy is remarkable, and the refrains at the end of each verse are positive. Q. 16:18 caps this long list of amenities God created for human beings by stating: “If you were to count the bounties of God you will not be able to encompass them, God is forgiving and merciful”. God’s mercy is central here. A similar verse from the Meccan period, Q. 14:34, shows the difference in tone as it reads: “And He gave from everything you asked for, and if you were to count the bounties of God you will not be able to encompass them, human beings are indeed oppressors and ungrateful”. The bounty pericope in Sura 14 is remarkably short, just two verses before this verse (Q. 14:32–33). The bounties are mentioned to emphasize human perfidy. Similarly, a longer bounty pericope from the late Meccan period is remarkably harsh and non-celebratory of life as found in Q. 6:94–106. By contrast, the root n-ʿ-m which denotes bounties or blessings extended to humans, occurs ten times in Sura 16 (v. 18, 30, 53, 71, 72, 81, 83, 112, 114, and 121), which equals the number of times this root was used in Sura 2 (a Medinan sura which is the longest sura in the Qur’an and almost four times longer than Sura 16). “Bounties” is thus a central Medinan word that was first extensively used here in Sura 16, signaling a turn from the Meccan emphasis on the apocalypse and its imminent arrival to life on earth. My argument here is that what is considered as “Meccan” material in Sura 16 should be read as belonging to a different (Medinan) context. This bounty pericope in Sura 16, unlike bounty pericopes in Meccan suras, is a celebration of life as lived here. The vision of Muhammad now includes the possibility of a good earthly life. A cosmic devastation of earthly life need not be hurried any longer.

The second pericope of this sura (Q. 16:20–63), which concerns itself with the fate of unbelievers and argues against all that they hold dear, is also remarkable in that it promises the believers “on this earth a good reward (ḥasanah)” (Q. 16:30). This phrase is repeated three times in this sura (Q. 16:30, 41, and 122) and only three other times in the rest of the Qur’an. 3 Never has life been portrayed in such a positive light in the Qur’an. What is remarkable is that this phrase is picked up at the very middle of the pericope in Q. 16:41. This verse, Q. 16:41, starts in the same manner as the beginning of the pericope at verse 20 with the indicative phrase “those who”. This time it refers to those who migrated in God (hājarū fī Allāh), a phrase that anticipates the famous “in the path of God” (fī sabīl Allāh). This verse leaves no doubt that the structure of this pericope is tied to other parts of the sura and that verse 41 is not just a mere addition. It mirrors the phrasing of the beginning of the pericope (“those who are calling other gods beside God create nothing and are created” and “those who migrated in God after they have been wronged, we shall give them in this life a good reward”). Thus, the adroit weaving of the verses with a perceptible intra-sura coherence bespeaks a composition that is neither haphazard nor indicative of a composite sura.

The third pericope (Q. 16:64–81) returns to the bounties motif and more astonishingly, conveys praise for progeny and family life, which is not common in the Meccan Qur’an and runs contrary to its very bleak view of earthly life. Q. 16:72 speaks of sons and grandsons and the given bounties (ṭayyibāt) – the only instance in the Qur’an where the word grandsons (ḥafadah, a hapax legomenon) is ever used. Life on earth, with family and procreation, long and prosperous, is praised in ways not seen before in the Qur’an. These are not themes of a beleaguered community. The pericope ends with a summation of this theology of creation as good and therefore good for the believers. Q. 16:81, which states “thus God perfects his bounties upon you so that you may become Muslims”, ties the giving of bounties with a perfect life, a Muslim lived life. There is a remarkable absence of the end of the world, of the usual drawn-out descriptions of the rewards in paradise. The voice of certitude from Muhammad’s early ministry is back but with a different focus, and it does not seem to be certain of the coming apocalypse but of the joy of living life.

The first section of the sura is summed up in the fourth pericope Q. 16:82–89. The opening of this pericope is decidedly Meccan in style: “If they turn their backs on you, what can you do? You only need to proclaim this message”. But this time there is a new description of these recalcitrant unbelievers. Q. 16:88 describes them as “those who obstruct the path of God” (ṣaddū ʿan sabīl Allāh). This phrase is mostly Medinan, appearing in the most militant of the Medinan suras, 4 and was also used in the opening for Sura 47, which sets one of the harshest tones for a sura in the Qur’an. The presence of such terms that are mostly Medinan may suggest that they are not Meccan.

I have given detailed attention to the first section of this sura because it has so far been assumed by Western scholars to be Meccan which, in turn, results in it being glossed over. Late Meccan suras suffer from the damning Ur-judgment of Nöldeke and Schwally, which is one of the most uncharitable of assessments on the style and content of these suras and it still casts a shadow to this day. The language of late Meccan suras is described by Nöldeke and Schwally as “drawn out, dull and prosaic”, the stories unconvincing, and Muhammad as shamelessly “eternally” repeating himself, having lost all originality. 5 They finished their assessment with what is perhaps the most cruel judgment of all: “Were it not for an interest in the original language and out of academic interest in the history of religions, no scholar would care to ever read these suras again”. 6 The late Meccan period is, I have argued, profoundly complex and is one of the most interesting phases of Muhammad’s preaching. Characterizing this period in detail is what allowed me to see that there were certain suras that did not belong to it and were rather from a different phase in Muhammad’s career. It is patently obvious to me that Sura 16 is markedly different from the late Meccan suras with their utter despair, self-doubt, and the realization that the career of Muhammad had stalled. Here is a joy not seen elsewhere in the Qur’an. The bounty of God is the predominant theme of this sura, and some of it can be enjoyed now in this world, without waiting for paradise. The opening of the sura is almost a recanting of the whole Meccan vision of history. Such is the celebration of earthly life in Sura 16 which contains the only mention of the joy of inebriation in the Qur’an. Q. 16:67 celebrates dates, grapes, and the inebriating drink made of them, as one of the many bounties of God. This uncharacteristically positive mention of intoxication remains the only celebration of drunkenness as one of the amenities of social life on this side of the grave. The Qur’an consistently views drunkenness as an abhorrent state of consciousness. While wine has a complex status in the Qur’an, intoxication is never celebrated in any other verse. All other mentions of drunkenness are negative: death is akin to a stupor of drunkenness (Q. 50:19); the dwellers of Sodom and Gomorrah were in a raging drunkenness seeking to violate the guests of Lot (Q. 15:72); the apocalypse, when it comes, will turn people into a drunken state although they have not really drunk wine (Q. 22:2). These figurative uses of the state of drunkenness are not positive, tied as they are to death, indecency, and the witnessing of the apocalypse. The only time drunkenness as a physiologically induced state is mentioned is when believers are asked not to pray in a drunken state (Q. 4:43). Sura 16 is itself the result of a moment of euphoria in the career of Muhammad, marking his escape from Mecca, establishing a new community, and experiencing a new sense of joy after a failed career.

The Medinan Nature of Sura 16

If the first section of Sura 16 was unremarkable in the eyes of scholarship, by verse 90 it takes a turn such that it had to be conceded that the remaining sections cannot be Meccan. There is no agreement or certainty among scholars on every pericope that comes after verse 90, but at least one or more scholars would notice elements from each of the remaining pericopes of the sura that point to Medina for its provenance. Take the pericope in Q. 16:90–97, which is the most magisterial proclamation for the God of the Qur’an as the God of Justice (ʿadl) and rectitude (iḥsān). The very opposite terms are also decried, inequity (baghiy) and indecency (munkar). The term ʿadl (justice as a social term) is mostly, if not solely, Medinan, appearing in militant suras like suras 2 and 4. The term is in the abstract, and it already appeared in a parable in Sura 16 in verse Q. 16:76. There is, however, nothing like pericope Q. 16:90–97 elsewhere in the whole of the Qur’an, and it moves quickly to an inordinate concern with oaths, vows and their keeping. Indeed, this sura contains what remains to be the most solemn proclamation of the sanctity of oath-keeping in the Qur’an. There is here a rather new role for God as a party that is deeply interested in vows and their keeping. I always wondered if one would find an echo of the Constitution of Medina in the Qur’an. This new prophet, writing a treaty with the Jews of Medina and among the believers, does he keep his word? I think that this unique pericope is the most direct connection to that document. This was a prophet whose God sanctifies the keeping of oaths. This is the very same God that is invoked as the guarantor of the Constitution. The Constitution of Medina only makes sense if it is honored as a vow, and keeping one’s vows seems to be the essence of what its God cares about. Contracts are the beginning of politics, and if there is a moment that documents the turn of Muhammad to politics, it is here in Sura 16. 7

In a remarkable pre-emptive statement, Nöldeke and Schwally dismiss the opinion of those who think that this pericope could refer to the new contracts established between Muhammad and the tribes in Medina (Nöldeke and Schwally 1909–38: 148). The irony is that Nöldeke and Schwally saw this connection and warned against it. The pericope had also attracted the attention of Frantz Buhl. In an article written in 1924, he zeros in on this pericope and declares it to be Medinan. He states: “In any case I consider it very likely that these verses originated in Medina and it is to me unlikely that in the Meccan period there was such a situation where strife between different umam existed” (Buhl 1924b: 105). 8 Buhl is interested in this pericope because of the debate about Sura 9 and he seems to think that this pericope refers to the breaking of the treaty between Muhammad and the tribes. It is not clear to me why he did not tie this pericope to the Constitution of Medina. However, Buhl was not off the mark to see in this pericope too legal and communal an issue to stem from Mecca. It is important to note that the word for “contract” (ʿahd) is legal and denotes a contract between human beings, as Buhl rightly noted.

The pericope ends with verse 97 which reads: “To whoever male or female does good deeds and has faith, we shall give a good life (فلنحيينه حياة طيبة) and reward them according to the best of their actions”. This is the only time in the Qur’an that we have a coupling of the words “life” and “good”, which is one of the clearest signs that the main feature of this sura is its optimism – there is here a rediscovery of life as joyous and worth living. This is what I meant by rereading the usual Meccan discourse in a new light: the whole sura’s celebration of creation and of God’s power and nature’s bounty belong now to the believers. The sura uses bounties and the good life as a refrain throughout. There is not one instance in this sura where “life here” (al-ḥayāt al-dunyā) is maligned as is usual in the Meccan Qur’an.

The Qur’an Pericope in Sura 16 (v. 98–105)

Verses Q. 16:98–105 constitute another pericope and it is the most radical passage of this sura. It starts by establishing the public form of Qur’anic recitation. Muhammad is told to utter an apotropaic phrase against the Devil before reciting the Qur’an (Q. 16:98). This is a rather late command from God in the ministry of Muhammad, as he would have been reciting the Qur’an for a long while now. This rather late command makes sense if we presume that the Qur’an is suddenly an officially publicly proclaimed scripture and that such proclamations are in need of a marker to signal to the listeners that what follows is a Qur’anic quotation. There is also an increased concern to assure the believers that they are immune from the Devil’s power, which speaks of a Medinan provenance. The only other instance of an apotropaic usage of this formula is from Sura 3:36, a Medinan sura, uttered in the story of Mary. Moreover, the new prominent role of the Devil as a tempter in the Qur’an is mostly a Medinan phenomenon.

This pericope, Q. 16:98–105, is also unique in the Qur’an, for it has a verse that is at odds with previous assertions. Q. 16:101 points to a realization, and an admittance, that conditions are changing and forcing a confrontation with the previous revelatory Qur’anic material. Suddenly the Qur’an admits to what it refused to countenance before, that God’s word could be changed, tabdīl. Verses like Q. 6:34, 115 and Q. 17:27 had the refrain “there is no changing (mubaddil) for the words of God” as a retort to the accusation against the prophets and the veracity of their revelations. Take a verse like Q. 10:15 as another example of this theology:

When our clear revelations are recited to them, those who do not expect to meet with Us say: Bring a different Qur’an or change (baddilhu) it, say: it is not for me to change it of my own accord, I only follow what is revealed to me for I fear the torment of an awesome day.

Verse Q. 16:101 instead declares: “If We exchange (baddalnā) a verse instead of another they would say you are a fabricator, No, they themselves are ignorant”. Then the pericope defends Muhammad against the malicious rumors that someone is teaching him his revelations; the verse states how could that be when “the one they are pointing to is not an Arabic speaker, while this Qur’an is in clear Arabic (Q. 16:103)”. The Qur’an is coming down to Muhammad from God via a holy spirit (rūḥ al-qudus), verse 102 proclaims emphatically. The Qur’an is protected from the Devil, it is from God and transmitted by a holy spirit. It is not from a human either, and certainly not from a Christian or a Jew.

Verse Q. 16:101 is thus revolutionary. The verse seems to be admitting to a new reality that is unavoidable: that the Qur’an is now changing some fundamental principles in its preaching. This, to me, is one of the clearest indications that we have here a moment of self-justification that was necessitated by a radical shift in the setting of the proclamations of Muhammad. He is no more a lone voice, beleaguered and mocked. A man making treaties and acting as a judge is not the same as the Muhammad of Mecca. This pericope has already been noticed by Gustav Weil, who correctly stated that verses Q. 16:101–103 could only be a Medinan pericope, notwithstanding the objections of Nöldeke and Schwally. 9

Hijrah and Escape: Pericope Q. 16:104–113

This pericope has already been universally noted as Medinan by both Muslims and Western scholars. It is not hard to see why. It speaks of a group of Muslims (most probably those who opted to stay in Mecca) who are forced to renounce their faith by duress (ikrāh), the sura gives them the license to hide their faith (Q. 16:106). More importantly it speaks of those who “migrated” (hājarū). This verse, Q. 16:110, cannot be discussed alone, but needs to be discussed with verse Q. 16:41 because both verses refer to the hijra as an act that the believers have undertaken; both verbs are also in the plural. Verse 41 is exceptionally odd, as not only does it not fit with the Meccan period, but it also does not accord with the post-Badr period of the Qur’an. It is the only verse in the Qur’an in which the verb hājarū is not coupled with concepts such as “struggled” جاهدوا (cf. 2:218; 8:72; 9:20) or “fought” قاتلوا (cf. 2:195). In the verse just after (Q. 16:42), believers are described as being patient and trusting in God (sabarū). This formulation is reminiscent of Meccan formulations that order Muhammad to turn away from the unbelievers and be patient (Q. 73:10). The formulation “those who are patient” is late Meccan. I suggest that this is the first reference to hijra as a communal act in the Qur’an and the first reference to the hijra. Hijra is still not fully tied with the Muslims’ capacity to fight and hence ability to be less patient. They have migrated, but they have not yet begun to fight.

By verse 16:110, we have the usual Qur’anic tentative coupling of h-j-r (immigrate) and j-h-d (strife), not conjoined as a phrase, but in the same verse. Yet even here the formulation is still unique. In verse 110, we have a unique phrase justifying the act of hijra, that Muhammad’s followers migrated “after they were persecuted” (من بعد ما فتنوا), which is just like verse 41, where they migrated “after they were wronged” (من بعد ما ظلموا). 10 Both justifications are unique and are clearly referring to a fresh wound. Yet even here in verse 110 we find the word sabarū (be patient), coupled with jāhadū. It is not clear here that jāhadū means “to fight”, but nor is it clear that it does not. The shift to war is approaching; what is missing in both formulations is the phrase “in the path of God” (في سبيل الله). It is clear that we have here the first mention of hijra as a group action, by a defined body of believers. We have here also a promise of the now and here, a promise of delight in this world. Thus verse 41 reads: “and those who immigrated in God after they were wronged, we shall give them in this life (dunyā) a good thing (ḥasanah), and in the next life their reward will be greater, were they to know”. This promise of an earthly reward is a far cry from the waiting for the judgment of God and the chastisement for the unbelievers, a total reversal of its previous assessment of life in this world – dunyā being mostly a negative term in the Meccan Qur’an.

Also interesting is the formulation at the beginning of verse 110 – “your God is for those who migrated” (ثم ان ربك للذين هاجروا). This Qur’anic expression, which is only found in this sura (again in v. 119), is peculiar. The sura is clearly using some phraseology that is unique to it, phrasings that were later abandoned. It is also a formulation that reflects an assessment (if not hesitation) over the reward of hijra – to the degree that one has lived so far as a believer with a Muhammad concerned with one God and a promised heaven; and now one is embroiled in a transmutation of one’s life that is nothing short of disastrous (the believers turned refugees), but what for? What is this hijra now? What is its place in the whole preaching of Muhammad? Hijra is not a good deed, ʿamal saliḥ, or if it is, then it is not readily apparent that it was a condition of the faith in Muhammad’s previous preaching. It was a political decision. Muhammad knew it and those who paid the price knew it. The Qur’an is now declaring it to be also a religious act. That Sura 16 has two verses about hijra, quite apart, which show unique phraseology thereby making it highly unlikely that they were later insertions. Later insertions are usually formulaic, and repetitive; and if the root h-j-r in this sura was a later insertion, why not the proper formulaic phrase with jihād?

The Kashrut and Sabbath Pericope: Q. 16:114–125

The end of the sura and its last pericope exhibits a deep interest in dietary rules and food taboos that mirror Jewish Rabbinic concerns. In conversation with these rules, the pericope has a discussion of the exalted status of a monotheist Abraham, and a direct connection between him and Muhammad. More interestingly, the pericope mentions the Sabbath of the Jews which would have been the most arresting public feature of Rabbinic Judaism that one would encounter (v. 124). The list of dietary restrictions imposed on Muslims reflects the list of restrictions from Acts 15:28–29, a connection that Erwin Gräf has discussed extensively. 11 The whole pericope bespeaks Muslim communal anxiety when confronted with an established monotheistic community with rituals and food taboos. The Sabbath observance by the Jews is given the same justification as the food taboos imposed on this community; both are special Jewish observations. The implication is that Muslims should not expect the same restrictions. The sura also reflects hesitation toward these regulations, as Muhammad was already showing signs of distrust of Jewish observances (verse 118, where food restrictions are seen as some sort of self-inflicted punishment) and distancing himself from some of them. Abraham (Q. 16:120) is declared a nation unto his own (ummah), and Muhammad is asked to follow his example and be his inheritor. That this is an echo of the Constitution of Medina is clear, for the word ummah is mentioned several times in this sura. The sura ends with a command for Muhammad to call people to God through wisdom, good preaching, and to dialogue with people with good intentions (v. 125). It then turns to Muslims and asks them to exact the same punishment that was meted out to them, a sort of equal measured treatment that is qualified by enjoining patience as the better road (v. 126), only to turn back to Muhammad in the penultimate verse to ask him specifically to be patient, and not to feel sorrow over the bad deeds of others nor to worry about the schemes of his enemies. The sura concludes by using the root ḥ-s-n to describe those who God is with, muḥsinūn (good doers), this is the same root that has been the backbone of this sura, which was used to describe what God would give to the believers in this life. The concluding verse of Sura 16 is tied to verse 16:30 by using the root ḥ-s-n, with the believers. Such continuous weaving of cross-references in the sura is impossible if it was not composed as a unit.

Q. 16:1 and the Meaning of Sura 16

Because of its significance to the understanding of the whole sura, I have left the first verse of Sura 16 to discuss last. This is the verse that Rudi Paret dealt with extensively in his commentary. Q. 16:1 reads “The command (or affair) of God (amr Allāh) has come, so do not hurry it (Him), praised be He and exalted be He from what they associate with Him”. Paret offered three possible understandings of this perplexing verse. He, however, first established that amr Allāh (affair of God) in the Qur’an usually denotes the apocalyptic punishment meted out for unbelievers (Paret 1989: 281). Yet this predominant meaning is not the only meaning for the term, that is amr Allāh can be understood in different ways in the Qur’an, in rather specific meanings; Paret, for example, suggested the Battle of Badr as another meaning for this term (ibid. 1989: 282). He then takes the statement of the verse at face value: that whatever this “amr Allāh” was, it has come, and has already happened (atā, had come). In light of these two points, Paret dismisses the first two possibilities he offered and settles on what I consider to be one of his most penetrating analyses of a verse in his concordance. He states that Muhammad, all too aware of the “ambiguous meaning of the term amr Allāh”, reconfigured its import and changed its meaning from an apocalyptic understanding to denote his own mission. That is, verse 2 of the sura explains this “amr Allāh” in verse 1, and it is the very mission of Muhammad. 12 Instead of understanding the amr Allāh as a final punishment, the very ministry of Muhammad is now the affair of God. Such an understanding would entail that this sura is Medinan, Paret declares, and then as evidence states that most scholars put Sura 16 in the late Meccan period or a Medinan reworking of an earlier sura.

I build on this insight of Paret and go further in analyzing Q. 16:1. Paret was absolutely right that the issue here is a transformation in the manner in which God’s amr is fulfilled, yet this amr is not Muhammad’s mission but his relocation and new role in Medina. I have already highlighted elsewhere the debate about the tardiness of punishment at the end of the Meccan period in the Qur’an, and how jihād would eventually become the transmuted instrument of God’s judgment (Saleh 2016: 119–21). God’s chastisement of the unbelievers would come at the hand of his warriors. Therefore, it is unlikely that verse Q. 16:1 refers to the sum total of Muhammad’s mission as Paret suggested but actually to a very specific event, namely the relocation to Medina. This sura is celebrating the most radical change in the career of Muhammad since he declared himself a messenger. The sura seems to be stating that a new foundation has been laid: God’s affair has come, no need to hurry Him any longer. This statement seems to be directed to the believers themselves, for not only were the unbelievers wondering where God’s chastisement was but even more so the believers. They had spent all their believing lives waiting for this chastisement of their foes. This sura is meant for them, God is declaring that His affair (resolution of the state of unbelievers) has arrived, and it no longer needs to be hurried. The profound theological crisis of the late Meccan period, the tardiness of punishment, had been resolved. Muhammad’s message in Mecca hinged on the promise he came to deliver: that if his people do not convert, they will be chastised by a genocidal obliteration; this punishment, however, never materialized. This tardiness became the very proof of Muhammad’s falsity to the Meccans, and a serious theological problem for him in the late Meccan period. Muhammad’s move to Medina was not a mere relocation, it was a resolution to a profound theological crisis in his preaching. God and Muhammad had a new plan, a new saved community that would thrive, and this community was about to start a chastisement. Sura 16 is thus one of the most intriguing parts of Muhammad’s preaching, at the very beginning of a new phase of his ministry, and it betrays a profound understanding of what is coming; an innocence has been shed, and a prophet with treaties and armies has arrived. No wonder it is the most euphoric of all his preaching. If Muhammad was clueless about the political implications of his preaching monotheism in Mecca, he was all too aware of the revolutionary potential of it now in Medina. 13

The Two Enigmatic Parables of Q. 16

When we read this sura in the light that God’s chastisement was to be carried out by Muhammad and his followers, the mysterious two parables in Q. 16:75–76, become understandable. These two parables read:

75: “God strikes a parable, a slave owned (mamlūkan) incapable of anything (lā yaqdir ʿlā shay’), while another whom we have given good bounties (rizqan qasanan), and he spends from it secretly and in public, are they equal? Thanks be to God, for most of them know not”.

76: “God strikes [another] parable, two men, one is mute incapable of anything (lā yaqdir ʿlā shay’), and he is a burden on his master, wherever his [owner] sends him the [slave] comes back empty handed, is this person equal to the one who enjoins justice (ya’mur bi-al-ʿadl) and is on the right path?”

These two parables remained inscrutable for scholars who dealt with them. It is not difficult to see why. They are at first instance inconsequential, for the two parables are in quite unique ways inscrutable. Why is God using human beings to refer to him and to the other gods? Frantz Buhl (1924a: 1–11) was damning in his analysis of these two parables as he declared them “quite clumsily formulated” (ibid. 1924: 7). 14 Buhl then added that

the portrayal is so unclear and inappropriate (unsuitable), that the interpreter, with justification, can claim rightly and at the same time, that the two people mentioned can represent God and the other gods, or might as well be the unbelievers and the believers. (Ibid. 1924: 8) 15

He then finished by stating, rather sardonically, “perhaps such parables, notwithstanding such state, were capable of making an impression on the citizens of Mecca” (ibid. 1924: 8). Rudi Paret (1989: 290) quotes the analysis of Buhl, and implies by his analysis that they should be understood as a parable about God’s power and the false gods’ incapacity. Paret does not defend the coherency of these parables as part of the sura.

Paret’s understanding of the parables as referring to God and the false gods is cogent; the location of the parables is in a discourse on God and his powers and the false gods and their incapacity (Q. 16:73). Yet, these two parables remain unique in the Qur’an, for they speak of human beings as free agents, capable of action, in contrast to enslaved, mute incapable human beings. The setting is of empowerment and speaks of a comparison of Muhammad’s situation in Mecca and his new situation in Medina. Buhl was not wrong after all; God is like a free active human being. Muhammad is now in the image of his God: capable. Muhammad is no longer a passive messenger awaiting instructions from his God, which amounts only to a verbal declaration. Muhammad is a man of action. These two parables are about power (yaqdir, to be capable is used in each parable) and as such politics. That slavery is central to the two parables is not coincidental, it represent the absence of power and incapacity – a burden of sorts. The Qur’an has finally discovered politics, as Muhammad has by his relocation to Medina.

Conclusion

Sura 16 demarcates the birth of the political in the preaching of Muhammad. Sura 16 is thus a unique sura in the corpus of the Qur’an. Its euphoric celebration of life remains utterly singular. Its admittance to change in the message of God is brave, if unavoidable. There is a migrant group now, but they seem to have not been solely identified with fighting yet. A sura this long has not one mention of other prophets or their stories, apart from declaring Abraham a monotheist and a nation unto himself. Suddenly the God of Muhammad is a guarantor of contracts (ʿahd) which, in turn, reflects the new political reality of Muhammad as corroborated by the Constitution of Medina. More intriguingly, Muslims now can mete out punishment! Verse Q. 16:126 offers advice that was impossible to fulfill in Mecca: that you mete out the same punishment you receive. This is the Golden Rule behind the Constitution of Medina. Muhammad in Medina was offering a coherent political program, and its elements are laid down in this sura: honoring contracts and equal treatment.

This sura belongs to a small group of suras written just after relocation to Medina and before the momentous Battle of Badr. I think that Sura 29 and Sura 7 are closely related to this sura and belong to the same early Medinan phase. Sura 64 could count as the last Sura in this group, though it is easier to argue for its status as such since Sura 64 is universally considered a Medinan sura. It is my hope that we now treat this group of suras as a distinct category in the corpus of the Qur’an. They have characteristics that distinguish them from what came before them and what came after. They also document a period of a Medinan period in the life of Muhammad that should be considered separately from his career after the Battle of Badr.

Footnotes

  1. R. Bell (1939) The Qur’ān. Translated, with a Critical Re-arrangement of the Surahs, Volume 1. Edinburgh: T&T Clark.
  2. R. Blachère (1966) Le Coran. Paris: G.-P. Maisonneuve & Larose.
  3. F. Buhl (1924a) Über Vergleichungen und Gleichnisse im Qur’ân. Acta Orientalia. 2: 1–11.
  4. F. Buhl (1924b) Zur Ḳorânexegese. Acta Orientalia. 3: 97–108.
  5. E. Gräf (1959) Jagdbeute und Schlachttier im islamischen Recht: eine Untersuchung zur Entwicklung der islamischen Jurisprudenz. Bonn: Orientalischen Seminars der Universitaet Bonn.
  6. M. Lecker (2012) “Constitution of Medina”, in K. Fleet et al. (eds.). Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE.
  7. A. Neuwirth (1981) Studien zur Komposition der mekkanischen Suren. Berlin: W. de Gruyter, 1981.
  8. T. NöldekeF. Schwally (1909–38) Geschichte des Qorâns, Volume 1. Leipzig: Dieterich.
  9. R. Paret (1989) Der Koran: Kommentar und Konkordanz. Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer.
  10. W. Saleh (2016) “End of Hope: Sūras 10–15, Despair and a Way out of Mecca”, in A. NeuwirthM. A. Sells (eds.). Qur’ānic Studies Today. London: Routledge: 105–23.
  11. W. Saleh (2018) The Preacher of the Meccan Qur’an: Deuteronomistic History and Confessionalism in Muḥammad’s Early Preaching. Journal of Qur’anic Studies. 20 (2): 74–111.
  12. H. M. Zellentin (2013) The Qur’ān’s Legal Culture: The Didascalia Apostolorum as a Point of Departure. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck.