Poetry in Ibn Ishaq
klei...@astound.net
enough to appreciate the poetry, but I gather that what is in Ibn Ishaq
is not, on the whole, good poetry. In fact it might all be bad poetry.
But, and this seems to never have been acknowledged, it is a genuine
source of information older than Ibn Ishaq himself. Even if it is no
older than the time of Umar II that is older than other direct
testimony. That is, a poem written by pseudo-Hassan ibn Thabit in the
last days of Abdullah ibn Umar is a more authentic bit of information
than a hadith about Ibn Umar, even one passed on by Nafi. They both may
have come down to Ibn Ishaq in the oral tradition, but the nature of
poetry makes it more stable and more likely to be accurately
transmitted.
But when was the poetry actually composed? Some of it is said to be
pre-Islamic and indeed it might be. Let me restrict that question
poetry having to do with Muhammad and people of his times. Some of it
could be from the lifetime of Muhammad. I don't know how we could tell.
Some of it surely later. How late?
I believe Ibn Ishaq quoted poetry in good faith. That is, he really
belived the poems he quoted were from the time of Muhammad (or earlier
and, as he notes, a few were later). I also believe he made an effort
to collect the relevant poetry and, if he has no poetry about some
event, it is because there was none.
A case in point is the expedition to Tabuk. Unless Ibn Hisham cut it
all out (always a possibility, but not Ibn Hisham's usual practice)
there is no poetry at all about the expedition to Tabuk.
This suggests that the terminal date for the poetry is earlier or the
same as the creation of the story about the expedition to Tabuk. This
is not much help other than to suggest that the poetry is older rather
than newer.
The expedition to Tabuk adds nothing to the Sirat. There was no more
than one brief skirmish, involving Khalid ibn alWalid rather than
Muhammad, one "Byzantine" casualty and no Muslims killed (a hadith says
one died). Tabuk submitted to Muslim rule, but there is no mention of
any conversions.
However there is a list of 18 "mosques" between Medina and Tabuk. This
surely means an 18 member list of way-stations, interpreted as
Muhammad's stopping places and therefore as sanctified locations. I do
not believe this list gave rise to the idea that Muhammad actually
visited Tabuk. It was interpreted as his itinerary after the Tabuk
story was created.
The possible source of the story was a document which Ibn Ishaq says
"they still had". Ibn Ishaq has the text (p607 in Guillaume's
transation). There are other similar documents with similar stories
attached. For example, at the Christian monastery on Mount Sinai. The
document surfaced (I doubt its authenticity) and had to be accounted
for. Collecting documents apparently started with al-Zuhri and
therefore the entire Tabuk story may have originated with alZuhri. It
had collected a few subsidiary hadiths by Ibn Ishaq's time.
I admit the use of poetry I just made is indirect - but I did make a
deduction from the poetry in Ibn Ishaq. Is there any more information
of any value?