Political Theory (Medieval Islamic Civilization: An Encyclopedia)

POLITICAL THEORY and rule of law. These points are neatly demonstrated by a letter addressed by Fatimid ruler al-‘Aziz to his vizier, Ya‘qub ibn Killis. In 373/983–984, a foreign merchant was murdered and robbed at a covered market (qaysariyya) in Fustat. Rashiq, the slave of the chief of police, made several arrests, but people accused him as being behind the murder and claimed that he had arrested innocent people. A petition to that effect was submitted to al-‘Aziz, who wrote to the vizier instructing him ‘‘to cleanse this disgrace from our dynasty and the grief it had caused to it.’’ indeed, the chief of the police was temporarily removed from his post. Justice was considered as an Islamic virtue and rulers declared their commitment to the rule of justice. Thus, the involvement of Muslim rulers with the administration of criminal justice is perfectly understood, but it raises the question whether the holy law was strictly implemented in those cases or the emphasis was more on summary justice. It seems that in the twelfth century the status of the chief of police was on the decline. During the 1120s in Fatimid state receptions and ceremonies, the chiefs of the two police forces in the capital were at the bottom of the list of state functionaries, preceding only the heads of the non-Muslim communities and nonMuslim secretaries. During the thirteenth century the terms police and chief of police disappeared from the sources, and new appellations wali (meaning the chief of police forces in Fustat and Cairo) and ma’una (meaning police) became common. The police as an urban institution completely degenerated during the Mamluk period. This development is in line with Ira M. Lapidus’ observation that ‘‘The Mamluks governed not by administration, but by holding all of the vital social threads in their hands’’. Thus, many aspects of urban life were left to the discretion of the Mamluk emirs, and the distinction between administrative responsibilities and police functions was blurred. The same process is attested to for Damascus and Aleppo. The existence of a police force (shurta) in Damascus during the second half of the tenth century is well attested to by the sources. However, during the twelfth century the term shurta disappeared from the sources and was replaced by a new urban official: the shihna, who combined in his hands the authority of an urban prefect and a military governor. This new institution was also very prominent in thirteenth-century Aleppo. YAACOV LEV

Primary Sources Anonymous. Siyasat al-Muluk. Edited by J. Sadan. ‘‘A New Source of the Buyid Period.’’ Israel Oriental Studies IX (1979): 355–376.

Ibn Jawzi. Al-Muntazam fi Ta’rikh al-Umam wa-l-Muluk. Edited by ‘Ata, Muhammad ‘Abd al-Qadir and ‘Ata, Mustafa ‘Abd al-Qadir. Beirut, 1992, vol.12, 124; vol.13, 316. Ibn al-Ma’mun. Akhbar Misr. Edited by A. F. Sayyid. Cairo, 1983. Itti’az al-Hunafa’. Edited by Al-Shayyal, Jamal al-Din. Cairo, 1967, vol. 1, 262–263. Kindi. The Governors and Judges of Egypt (together with fragments of Raf’ al-Isr by Ibn Hajar). Edited by R. Guest. London, 1912. Maqrizi. Kitab al-Muqaffa al-Kabir. Edited by M. Yalaoui. Beirut, 1991, vol.5, 433–434.

Further Reading Crone, Patricia. Slaves on Horses. The Evolution of the Islamic Polity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980, 248, n.474. Donner, Fred M. ‘‘The Shurta in Early Umayyad Syria.’’ In The Fourth International Conference on the History of Bilad al-Sham. Amman, 1989, 247–262. Lapidus, Ira M. Muslim Cities in the Later Middle Ages. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967. Lecker, Michael. ‘‘Shurtat al-Khamis and Other Matters: Notes on the Translation of Tabari’s Ta’rikh.’’ Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 14(1991): 276–288. Lev, Yaacov. ‘‘Charity and Justice in Medieval Islam.’’ Rivista degli Studi Orientali LXXVI (2002): 1–16.

POLITICAL THEORY The title ‘‘Islamic political theory’’ should be understood as a euphemism only for the sake of convenience and as a shorthand description to signify diverse strains of political thought in medieval Islamic history. Political theories emerged as responses to various challenges including the debate over the legitimacy of the caliphate, providing advice to sovereigns, guiding the political institution in certain directions, and elaborating an ideal political regime. All strains of thought followed a course of evolution in direct contact with the sociopolitical realities of their surroundings, and therefore not only rationalized the conceptualization of the political process but also contributed with novel particularities to political thought in response to specific challenges. In this necessarily brief survey, only the broad outlines of three traditions will be given: legal paradigm, siyasa (practical governance), and political philosophy. Apart from references for the purposes of comparison, political thought of the Shi‘is and Mu’tazilites has not been examined here. Also, this treatment cannot offer a comprehensive survey of the diversity and nature of Islamic political theories. Any detailed examination must treat the discussion of reason and revelation as applied in political theory to dispel the mistaken 623

POLITICAL THEORY impression that Islamic political thought has been fully and overtly religious, with no room for human morality and rationality. Appropriate attention must also be given to the Mu’tazilites, Shi‘is, and Philosophers whose political views surfaced and resurfaced in the ideological and intellectual compromises of the post-Mongolian political milieu.

Qur’an Most frequently cited Qur’anic terms that are used to construct political views in medieval Islamic history are to possess or to dominate, m-l-k; to judge or to rule over, h-k-m; to succeed, kh-l-f; and finally, to lead, a-m-m, although they occur in the Qur’an in unrelated or only slightly relevant contexts. Although the Qur’an itself does not offer a vision that can be defined as political, it certainly encourages the believers to pursue an organized social and distinctly urban life. The revelations in the Qur’an brought a new sense of community and mission to the faithful, which probably encouraged political organization. Some suggestive broad political maxims in the Qur’an make reference to kingship and even traditional tribal leadership. A number of verses refer to the Egyptian Pharaohs as kings in the context of the stories of Moses and Joseph (al-Zukhruf 51; Yusuf 43, 50, 54, 72). Israelites ask Moses for a king to lead them in warfare (al-Baqara 246); David is given a kingdom (al-Baqara 251); and Israelites were made kings over other nations (alMaida 20). Except for one verse (al-Naml 34: ‘‘When kings enter a country, they despoil it, and make the noblest of its people its meanest; thus do they behave’’), the outlook of the Qur’an to kingship may be defined as mirroring a historical institution without a particular stance for or against it. Also significant is the Qur’anic sympathy for city life, especially visa`-vis nomadic modus vivendi, for which the Qur’an displays a clear disdain (al-Quraysh; al-Tawba 101, 120). It is conceivable that the Qur’anic references to city life, to politically organized societies, and to kingship in neutral and even positive terms preconditioned, without pointing out any details and direction, the Muslim community to appreciate and even seek a political framework beyond the nomadic–tribal social organization of North Arabia.

Caliphate The establishment of the caliphate in 632 was certainly a groundbreaking achievement politically and intellectually in medieval Islamic history. Muhammad 624

was above all a messenger transmitting God’s revelations to his community. He was also the leader of his community, in charge of its political organization in Medina. His position in Medina had therefore created a context to which his followers responded in his absence. Indeed, his death prompted a controversy among his followers in respect to his political legacy on two fundamental issues: the form of his political community and the nature of his religious prerogatives—whether transferable to a successor, real or corporeal. The birth of the caliphate (khalifa, or deputy, from khalafa, meaning ‘‘to succeed’’) immediately after his death in 632 was a response to both challenges. This new institution secured the political unity of the community against centrifugal tendencies partially responsible for the first civil war and its aftermath and set the political organization on a path of centralized government. The second matter, however, proved to be a contentious issue for at least the first two centuries in the history of the caliphate. As such, how the early Muslim community understood the meaning and nature of the caliphate remains disputed among scholars. Nonetheless, by the tenth century the caliphate seems to have been stripped of its pretensions to religious prerogatives in a long contestation with religious scholars, although the caliph was privileged with an aura of holiness. One must, however, modify that assertion by at least one condition that it was still possible for the caliph to claim, like his counterpart rulers in the Latin West, religious authority by invoking messianic expectations, which did happen in a number of cases. However, this was more of an exception rather than the rule. As an institution, the caliphate evolved in constant reciprocal relation with its political realities, tribal and sedentary Arabic political traditions, local customs, and Islamic values taking shape within the society. The conventions of appointment and succession, nature of authority, qualifications of the caliph owed much to this multifaceted relationship and affected the content of political thought. The historical political institution for and against which political views were articulated reflected certain features. First of all, the caliphate was confined to the members of Quraysh. Secondly, the method of appointment and succession to rule was not uniform; it ranged from election (shura) to appointment (ahd), to even military cue/ usurpation (ghlaba). The caliph was appointed ad vitam until his death or removal from office by force. The nature and limits of his authority were not defined and was, in fact, contested by tribal centrifugalism, opposition of religiopolitical movements, and later by military commanders and more significantly sultans. Competing caliphates in Egypt (the Shi‘i Fatimids) and Spain (Umayyads) in the tenth century

POLITICAL THEORY put to the test the unity of the caliphate in both practice and theory. When the Buyids and later the Seljuks occupied Baghdad and turned the caliph into a secondary and increasing shadow figure in the eleventh century, onward they brought with them the discussion of the position of the sultan vis-a`-vis the caliph. Seljuk migration from Central Asia in the eleventh century and particularly the Mongol conquests in the thirteeneth century brought about a new type of sovereigns who derived their legitimacy not from jurisprudential delegation of authority (although the Seljuks did benefit from such provisions) but from their dynastic birthright. With such dynasties came also new sources of law based on secular nomadic customs rendering impossible to limit the discussion on politics to caliphate. As the succession to the caliphate and policies of caliphs were matters of controversy in an age of rapid expansion and organization, the issue of legitimacy and competition for the office led not only to civil wars but also to ideological disputes within the Muslim community. Right from the beginning, the controversy over the caliphate involved the identity of the rightful candidate for the office. The first civil war during the reigns of Uthman and Ali (656–661) led to the separation of the Kharijites from the rank of Ali, while the second civil war (683–692) helped the crystallization of Shi‘i, Umayyad, and anti-Umayyad opposition, squeezing out in the process the initial political discussions around the qualification of the caliph and the legitimacy of his rule. With the consolidation of the conquests, the growth of urban centers and urban classes, the establishment of the ‘Abbasid caliphate in 750 onward, and more significantly the religiopolitical developments among the Mu’tazilites, the Shi‘is (Imami and Zaydi varieties), and proto-Sunnites (and later Sunnites) supplied new debates and new ideas into political thought on subjects ranging from necessity of the imamate to identity and qualifications of the imam. One must add to this the spread of political ideologies of state bureaucrats, mostly promoting initially Sasanian, but later Turkic and Hellenistic political practices, and of Greek political philosophies, which were elaborated through translations and writings of Muslim philosophers. It was against this rich background that political theories were formulated and reformulated.

Pioneering Debates One might be surprised to read that the debate over the free will and predestination or the position of the sinner in faith had anything to do with political thought. Yet a position on each one of these questions

had ramifications for recognizing or denying the legitimacy of the Umayyad caliphs. As the Umayyads believed their rule to be something ordained by God, they promoted predestinarian views, whereas some of their opposition supported the idea of free will and held Umayyads accountable for their actions. Likewise, if the Umayyads could be described as sinners for a number of reasons (least of which killing and religious laxity), were they still a part of the community of faithful and therefore legitimate caliphs despite their sins? Another front where political views were articulated was the comparative merit or excellence of the first four caliphs. In the seventh and eighth centuries the order of excellence was not yet stable. Whereas the non-Shi‘is seem to draw a line between the reign of the first two caliphs (Abu Bakr and Umar) and later ones (Uthman and Ali), the former being the most excellent, and displayed conflicting views about the latter, the Shi‘is questioned the legitimacy of the historical caliphate in toto as they were in the process of developing the idea of a divinely appointed imam. A corollary debate involved the distinction between the reign of the first four caliphs and later caliphates (caliphate vs. kingship). One of the most important debates among the opposition to the Umayyads concerned the succession to rule, particularly the call for shura and election against Umayyad practices of family succession. During ‘Abbasid times, however, the call for shura remained a distant echo in the Kharijite opposition and, in few instances, in dynastic competition. The Shi‘i opposition during the Umayyad caliphate promoted a Hashimite right to the caliphate. However, as the ‘Abbasids excluded the Alids from their dynastic lineage the Shi‘i opposition became increasingly focused on Alid lineage, eventually settling on a particular imam among the Alids. Since much of the debate about politics in early Islamic centuries involved legitimacy of the caliph and qualification of an ideal candidate for the office, political thought became increasingly focused on the personality of the candidate. The rise of powerful sultanates in the eleventh century onward provided the necessary historical background for an elaborate discussion of the theories of the sultanate, which proliferated especially in the wake of the Mongol conquests. Such developments gradually rendered the classical theory centered on the caliph obsolete and provoked rational responses among religious scholars to modify their views. The modification came as shifting the focus of discussion onto the conduct of the holders of coercive power in the House of Islam, the Amirs and Sultans, who were finally vested after the Mongol conquest with legal political authority instead of the caliph. After the Mongol conquests the discussion of politics 625

POLITICAL THEORY no longer involved in any serious measure the caliphate rather the proliferating sultanates. One may examine medieval Islamic political thought in three main groups, which are not necessarily aligned with sectarian divisions: First is the theory formulated by legal scholars and theologians, which we may call legal theory because it was based to a large extent on jurisprudential reasoning. Second is siyasa, which represented the views promoted by bureaucrats or secretaries and which evolved into the genre of mirror for princes and incorporated ethics (akhlaq) into political thought. The third is political philosophy advanced by Muslim philosophers.

Legal Theory Legal theories of politics were put forth by the protoSunni and Sunni religious scholars in an atmosphere of debate and interaction with three major fronts: alternative religiopolitical currents, including the Shi‘is, Kharijites, and Mu’tazilites; secretaries; and finally, the caliphate itself. Overall tenor of the legal theories may be described as defending the historical caliphate against its political and sectarian opposition as legal scholars saw the caliphate as the source of unity and welfare of the Muslim community. Yet at the same time political views came about as a conscious attempt to place the caliphate on a trajectory more agreeable to the legal framework already in formation and less amenable to the intellectual legacy of Sasanian imperial tradition—ideological and intellectual background of ‘Abbasid secretaries. It is in this delicate balance between recognizing the legitimacy of the historical caliphate and steering it in the direction of the ideal imamate that we find the distinction the legal scholars made between the rightful imamate and kingship. Legal theory holds that appointing an imam is necessary—even a religious obligation for the community—contrary to many Mu’tazilites who thought that the imamate was neither necessary nor religiously obligatory. It is also required that the caliph be Muslim from the tribe of Quraysh, a view that again many Mu’tazilites and Kharijites did not require or even accept. The Shi‘is, on the other hand, limited the imamate to the descendants of Ali, at best the politically active members of Banu Hashim (Zaydites). Legal theory emphasized that the imam should be elected. The terms of election were rational enough to accommodate practical necessities. The election could be either through a selection of one well-qualified individual or a group of qualified electors (ahl al-hall wa al-aqd). It could also, as stipulated by al-Ghazali (1111) in the age of Sultanates, be

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through the selection of ahl al-shawka, or holders of coercive power, that is, sultans. The imam could also be appointed by his predecessor or win himself the seat through a successful military cue (ghlaba). While the emphasis on election was clearly a response to the Shi‘i view of the divinely appointed imam (nass), its ramifications cannot be confined to sectarian competition. The provision that the imam must be the most excellent of the community was generally reserved by the tenth century for the first four caliphs and involved to a large extent the debate over the legitimacy and the comparative merit of the Rightly Guided Caliphs (Rashidun), although it certainly was also intended for improving the historical conditions of the caliphate, which was not always in line with religious scholars’ expectations. Zaydites advocated the imamate of the most excellent among the family of the Prophet, whereas the Mu’tazilites allowed the imamate of the less qualified for practical reasons and to prevent dissension. There can be only one imam at a time, although al-Baghdadi (1037) stipulated that it was acceptable to have more than one imam if two regions were separated from each other by a significant barrier such as a large body of water. Legal theory as elaborated by al-Mawardi (1058) and later scholars identified some qualifications for the caliph: knowledge of laws, legal probity, and physical and mental fitness to carry his political and military duties. The duties of the caliph, on the other hand, simply comprised the governance of the caliphate, leading armies in warfare, protecting the community against military threats, assuring the implementation of laws, distribution of justice, and appointing lesser administrators who represented the caliph in their respective responsibilities. (By the time of alMawardi, this included the de facto rulers as well). Because legal theory held the unity of the community to be one of the foremost aims of the caliphate, it frowned upon dissension and advocated obedience to the ruling caliph as long as the laws of Shari’a were not violated, in which case obedience becomes not only unnecessary but also prohibited—a condition that allowed, significantly, legitimate dissent to keep the power of the ruler in check. Nevertheless, legal political theory does not, in general, stipulate a regulation for deposing the caliph apart from apostasy, loss of freedom, and of sanity. Political theory of legal scholars was first initiated to some extent in the jurisprudential corpus (such as Abu Yusuf ’s Kitab alKharaj), which was mostly based on Hadiths attributed to the Prophet and the practice of the first four caliphs. It was elaborated in Hadith works of the ninth century and given a prominent place in the works of theology (Kalam), beginning with al-Ash’ari.

POLITICAL THEORY Siyasa or Mirror for Princes Already during the late Umayyad period, but increasingly with the establishment of the ‘Abbasid caliphate, the genre of political advice (produced in a range of literary styles from fables to poetry and for the consumption of rulers and educated lay) occupied a substantial place in medieval Islamic political imagination. Expressed and elaborated in treatises of advice to governors, caliphs, princes, and secretaries this genre began largely with transmitting Sasanian imperial practice as exemplified in the activities of Ibn al-Muqaffa (757). However, it gradually became a genre incorporating aspects of practical ethics (akhlaq), jurisprudence, and Greek political philosophy, thus forming an influential political ideology that Amirs and Sultans of the late ‘Abbasid period aspired to follow. This genre proliferated in the postMongol political and cultural environment and was primarily addressed to rulers for the purpose of improving governance by discussing the necessary moral qualifications of the ruler and of advising him on manners to help in practical politics. Despite all of its practical purposes, it also promoted and advocated a distinct vision of politics and governance. Foremost is the promotion of kingship and king, who must be obeyed at all costs, as the central theme of its political theory. It was the duty of the king to protect his domains against any enemy who committed to disturb the sociopolitical equilibrium. Contrary to paradigmatic legal theory, which saw the caliphate embedded in religious law, siyasa saw royal authority and religion as twins whose survival depends on the welfare of the other. Such concern with balancing religion and kingship for the survival of royal authority is also reflected in the emphasis on social equilibrium, which is accomplished only by keeping every class in its respective place. It is no other than justice, a notion that was largely inherited from Near Eastern imperial traditions and supplanted by experiences from actual practice in Islamic context, that can maintain this equilibrium. The famous circle of justice aptly demonstrates the centrality of the king, the pragmatic organization of social order, the function of each class in society, and the necessary medium to keep this order in balance for the prosperity of all: No royal authority is possible without military; military needs finance and finance depends on taxes levied on subjects; subjects can be maintained only by justice and justice is provided by royal authority. Remarkably, the references to religious law (Shari’a) do not figure prominently in this genre. Shari’a law was certainly taken into account as social conduct and moral attitude derived much from it, but royal authority and justice were not dependent on Shari’a law, as was the

case with legal theory. To the extent that the Shari’a law was a part of the society, the ruler and his subjects were obliged to respect its stipulations for maintaining political and social harmony; religion was, after all, one of the twins. First of all, the siyasa was much more interested in practical governance and the ways by which this should be accomplished. Secondly, the reality was that dynastic laws were based on extrareligious traditions and customs and did not derive their legitimacy from religious laws. In fact, siyasa flourished better and was more meaningful and effective in situations where political legitimacy rested on inherited dynastic right or divine mandate, as was the case with Turkic, Persian, and Mongolic sultanates in Central Asia and the Middle East.

Political Philosophy It would be futile to cramp down the views expressed in political philosophy into highly condensed lines, because political theories vary widely from Philosopher King of al-Farabi to Governance of the Solitary of Ibn Bajja. Rather, a broad sketch of common aspects of political philosophy will be given. Among the work translated from Greek heritage into Arabic, political philosophy formed a portion. Swinging between advice (Epistles of Salim) and theoretical exposition of political authority, political philosophy emerged finally as a creative merger of ancient philosophical heritage, late antique royal legacy, and new Islamic experience. Similar to the legal theory and siyasa, the elaboration of political philosophy needed courtly patronage, yet unlike the genre of siyasa, it did not concern itself primarily with advising the ruler; it did not address them either. Political philosophy offered a theoretical exposition of politics under the rubric of tripartite practical philosophy. Furthermore, contrary to the legal theory and siyasa, political philosophy dealt extensively with raison d’etre and origins of political authority, which gave it, together with philosophy’s general orientation, a distinct humanistic and rational dimension. Whereas legal theory and siyasa approached political organization as a given, philosophical exposition started from scratch with the assumption that political authority arose from human’s need to organize themselves into peaceful communities. Stage by stage, from household management headed by the male member of the family, human beings organized their respective domains of authority, leading their subordinates closer toward perfection and happiness. Similarly the king/imam, by his personal virtues and intellectual capacity, leads his subjects according to their intellectual and moral capacities to moral and intellectual perfection and 627

POLITICAL THEORY happiness. In the body of political philosophy the king figures as central to the whole system: He rests at the top of the social hierarchy and represents the highest moral and intellectual level. Similar to the genre of mirror for princes, political philosophy, too sidestepped Shari’a as a basis for political community. Shari’a laws were certainly incorporated into the legal system required for any political organization since not all of the subjects were of the same social, moral, and intellectual capacity and level. Inspired by the Greek sages, Plato and Aristotle, Muslim philosophers created a political vision that took into account Muslim political experience but did not respond to it directly. Rather, unlike legal theory and mirror for princes, the vision set forth the conditions for the ideal rule. HAYRETTIN YUCESOY See also Ibn Khaldun Further Reading Black, Anthony. The History of Islamic Political Thought: From the Prophet to the Present. Routledge, 2001. Crone, Patricia. Gods Rule: Government and Islam. Columbia University Press, 2004. ———. Medieval Islamic Political Thought. Edinburgh University Press, 2004. Lambton, Ann K. S. State and Government in Medieval Islam: An Introduction to the Study of Islamic Political Theory: The Jurists. Oxford University Press, 1981. ———. Theory and Practice in Medieval Persian Government. Ashgate Pub Co, June 1, 1980. Mahdi, Muhsin. Alfarabi and the Foundation of Islamic Political Philosophy. University of Chicago Press, 2001. Rosenthal, Erwin Isak Jakob. Political Thought in Medieval Islam. Greenwood Press Reprint, 1985. Watt, W. M. Islamic Political Thought. Edinburgh University Press, 1998. EI. 2nd ed.Khalifa (A. K.S. Lambton). EI. 2nd ed. Imama (W. Madelung). EI. 2nd ed. Nasihat al-Muluk (C. E. Bosworth).

POPULAR LITERATURE

without taking into consideration different social structures, priorities, and aesthetic contours, and without allowing for the fact that our knowledge of economic and social life in many parts of the early medieval Islamic world remains extremely patchy and hence prone to wild conjectures. The essential constituents of the study of popular literature—the methods of composition, the performance and location of performance, as well as the different ways of production and memorization, the range of participating audience and solitary readership, and the changes in the content and diction in time and place—have on the whole not received the attention they deserve. With the exception of The Arabian Nights, which since the growth of interest in magical realism as a universal genre has become a staple diet of academic courses on comparative literature, popular texts in Arabic and other languages of medieval Islamic culture have been used mostly as quarries for motif-indices without much attention to other contextual, literary, and historical implications. For example, one of the last examples of traditional popular Persian prose narratives, The Adventures of Amir Arsalan, was first recited at the Qajar court in Iran in the second half of the nineteenth century and contains many themes of much earlier medieval popular narratives, including incidents illustrating the wiles of women, a favorite and recurrent theme in medieval literature, perennial clashes between good and evil viziers, and that hallmark of most popular adventures from Hellenistic romances to Victorian bodice rippers: the ongoing though constantly interrupted amorous escapade. This and other similar examples encourage us to reexamine the use of terms such as courtly and medieval as working definitions and labels of demarcation. Moreover, the occurrence of many of the themes of popular literature, such as the ‘‘wiles of women,’’ or the importance of the shrewd tutor or governess as an eminence grise in manuals of advice and other less strictly popular genres, shows again how blurred the contours can be in a culture in which the notions of entertainment and instruction, popular piety, and sectarian beliefs were often indistinguishable and yet firmly insisted upon and vociferously stated.

Definitions The contours of what is ‘‘popular’’ and ‘‘polite’’ literature differ from culture to culture, and the aesthetic assumptions implicit in this binary division have often been questioned. Most scholarly works on the literary history of medieval Islamic literature in Arabic, Persian, and Turkish have followed the already existing format of literary histories of Western languages and cultures, adopting their divisions and terminology 628

Rise of Islam These connections and tensions appear from the first centuries of Islamic history and are reflected in the early commentaries on the Qur’an. Two denunciations of ‘‘Tales of the ancients’’ (asatir al-awwalin) in the Qur’an (VIII, 31; LXXXIII, 13) provide early exegetes with an opportunity to explain and expand