Books by Essam Ayyad
The Islamic History and Thought Series (Piscataway NJ: Gorgias Press, 2019)
In the absence of reliable archaeological evidence, the question of how the mosque was made repre... more In the absence of reliable archaeological evidence, the question of how the mosque was made represents a real challenge. Its origin remains moot despite many attempts to settle the question. While the structure built by the Prophet Muḥammad at Madina, soon after the Hijra in 622 AD, is believed by many to have later provided the prototype of the mosque, the dominant theory that it was only a private residence casts doubt on that belief. The current study provides fresh evidence, based on the Qurʾān, ḥadīth and early poetry, that this structure was indeed built to be a mosque. The study further investigates what such a finding may have to say apropos a number of undecided issues such as the immediate origins of the mosque type and the kind of impulses and modalities that determined its design and character. More particularly, this study seeks to explore whether early Islam, within the framework of the Prophet’s teachings and practices, as well as the Qurʾān, might have provided the necessary prompts for the making of the mosque and the shaping of its essential functional and architectural features. It also investigates how such religious imperatives may have interacted with the political, cultural and socio-economic contexts in which the mosque type materialized. As such, this book scrutinizes two dominant tendencies regarding the mosque type: the modern Western views on its non-Islamic origins and the Islamic legalistic views on what it should look like. This survey is positioned at the intersection between art, historiography, religious sciences and politics; it is not a typical monograph on architecture. As we shall see, it cuts across topics such as early Islam’s outlook on visual arts and aesthetics in general.
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Papers by Essam Ayyad
Journal of Al-Tamaddun, 2024
Compared to other religious systems rooted in Late Antiquity, Islam placed greater emphasis on th... more Compared to other religious systems rooted in Late Antiquity, Islam placed greater emphasis on the transcendent, assigning less value to physical forms per se. This article seeks to explore conceptions relating to what made a place 'holy' in early Islamic places of worship, delving into understanding the significance of sacred spaces in Islam, and dissecting the procedures and beliefs instrumental in the consecration of such locations. The primary focus rests on mosques, which were deemed the pinnacle of sacred spaces during the nascent Islamic period. This discourse deliberately omits discussion on Islamic funerary structures, which emerged in the classical form later in the third/ninth century. Instead, it analyzes the cases of the Ka'ba in Mecca and the Prophet's mosque in Medina. The former serves as an exemplar of Islamized sanctuaries, whereas the latter epitomizes the prevalent archetype of sacred spaces in early Islam.
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Journal of Religions, 2022
In medieval Islam, traditional primary educational practices laid special emphasis on learning th... more In medieval Islam, traditional primary educational practices laid special emphasis on learning the Qurʾān by heart. Ideally, a pupil was primed to memorize the entirety of the Holy Book―a feat known as khatma or ḥadhqa. The successful learner would earn the prestigious sobriquet of “ḥāfiẓ”, for which he/she was to be proudly known for the rest of his/her life. Muslim youngsters continue up to present times to memorize the Qurʾān, in conceivably more or less the same way, in traditional Qurʾānic schools. In a sense, this practice developed into a symbol of Islamic conservatism and nationalism in the face of modern non-Islamic ideological forces. Against this backdrop, recent pedagogical trends tend to lay blame on rote learning as a markedly ineffective teaching method. The pedagogical issues of contemporary educational apparatus in the Muslim countries and the traditional Qurʾānic preschools in and beyond the Muslim world are usually ascribed to persistence of “abortive” medieval practices in such institutions. However, this hypothesis and the lingering presumptions related to it are based on defective modern applications of such medieval educational practices and inaccurate conceptions of how these practices are described by the sources. Generally, the intrinsic characteristics of traditional Islamic pedagogy have been explored, albeit partly, by only a limited number of Western surveys. This paper seeks to re-evaluate the efficiency of the pedagogies related to memorizing the Qurʾān in medieval Muslim primary schools. It opens the vista to explore the extent to which such pedagogies resonated with the educational and cultural milieus of the time. To that end, the paper applies literature and theoretical analysis of classical scholars. It also examines primary and secondary Islamic texts as well as the Qurʾān, ḥadīth and fragments of poetry. The main finding is that, contrary to modern misconceptions and generalizations, rote memorization was intertwined in the classical Islamic pedagogy with the ability to contemplate, reflect and understand. It was a multidimensional learning experience that was set to advance a plethora of cognitive, linguistic and intellectual abilities.
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Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 2021
In medieval Islamic times and afterwards, the kuttāb was a modest institution for elementary ed... more In medieval Islamic times and afterwards, the kuttāb was a modest institution for elementary education, with most emphasis being placed on learning the Qurʾān by heart―hence a ‘Qurʾānic school’ in English. Thus far, the topic of the kuttāb has been addressed by only a few modern works, leaving inadequately researched a number of critical related issues. This article is an attempt to give insights into the intellectual development of Muslim pedagogy in such archetypal primary schools. It looks into the teaching programmes and methods adopted for that intellectual preparation as well as their assumptions, rationales, implications, and consequences. The kuttāb's objectives are usually thought of as being universally identical, to help in the formation of a good Muslim. The picture, however, was more multifaceted, and the objectives, as well as means of their realisation, were moulded based on what a ‘good Muslim’ would mean according to those in command. Administrating the katātīb was a source, and a symptom, of competitive rivalry between the different intellectual tendencies in medieval Islam, who jostled for control over these critically significant institutions. The article thus delves into the intellectual, cultural, and socio-economic contexts in which primary education materialised and was practiced in pre-modern Islam.
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Journal of Islamic Studies, 2019
Investigating the first/seventh-century mosques is essential for an understanding of the history ... more Investigating the first/seventh-century mosques is essential for an understanding of the history and development of the mosque type and, more generally, the evolution of the Muslim community. This is difficult, however, owing to the problematic nature, sometimes total absence, of archaeological evidence: some of these earliest mosques were made of ephemeral materials, and most repeatedly altered or utterly superseded by more spacious ones to accommodate the continually escalating numbers of congregants. Archaeological evidence for those built before 40/660 is not yet available. That being so, the study, analysis, and reconstruction of such crucial, albeit missing, structures must depend heavily on Arabic literary sources, whose disputed reliability represents yet another challenge. Focusing mainly on the cases of the mosques at Madina, Baṣra and Kūfa, this article attempts to analyse such sources, with the aim of identifying the extent to which they can be used to build a picture of the historical mosques—especially where archaeological evidence is scanty, awkward to interpret, or totally lacking—in which we can have some confidence.
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Journal of Islamic Studies, Sep 2013
In the absence of reliable archaeological evidence, the question of how the mosque type was made ... more In the absence of reliable archaeological evidence, the question of how the mosque type was made represents a real challenge. Its origin remains moot despite many attempts to settle the question. While the structure built by the Prophet in Madina, soon after the Hijra, is believed by many to have been the prototype of the mosque, the currently dominant theory that it was only a ‘house’ has cast doubt on such a belief. The building was traditionally known as the ‘Mosque of the Prophet’ until Caetani, followed by Creswell et al., theorized that it could not have been a place of worship in the time of the Prophet, mainly because of the nature of the non-sacred activities it is reported to have accommodated and also because of the non-specific use of ‘masjid’ in the Qurʾān. This paper evaluates the Caetani–Creswell theory and the responses to it by Western and Muslim scholars. It explains why the whole question needs to be revisited, what conceiving the building as a ‘house’ or a ‘mosque’ means in terms of a number of undecided issues such as the immediate origin of the mosque and the kind of impulses that shaped its design. The paper goes on to examine, mainly from Qurʾān and ḥadīth, which of the two designations, ‘house’ or ‘mosque’, should be accepted and why. In particular, it investigates whether early Islam, within the framework of the Qurʾān and the teachings and practices of the Prophet, could have provided the necessary prompts for the making of the mosque and the shaping of its essential functional and architectural elements.
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Journal of the General Union of Arab Archaeologists, Nov 6, 2014
العُشاري عنصرٌ زخرفيٌّ طَريف على هيئة زورقٍ صغير يعلو بعض القباب والمنائر في عمارة مصر الإسلامية... more العُشاري عنصرٌ زخرفيٌّ طَريف على هيئة زورقٍ صغير يعلو بعض القباب والمنائر في عمارة مصر الإسلامية على وجه الخُصوص، ومثالٌ عليه ذلك المركب النُّحاسي الذي كان موجودًا فوق منارة الجامع الطولوني (265هـ/879 م)، والذي ظلّ محتفظًا بمكانه عليها حتى بعد أعمال البناء والترميم التي قام بها المنصور لاجين عام 696هـ/1296م. وأغلب الظن أنه قد نُزع ثم أعيد إلى مكانه مرةً أخرى بعد أعمال لاجين. ومهما يكن من أمر فلقد سقط ذلك المركب عام 1105هـ/1693م، كما نعرف من الجبرتي، إثْر ريحٍ عاتية أتت على المدينة بأسرها. إلاّ أنه أُعيد إلى مكانه مرةً أخرى―أو لعله استبدل بآخر―لأنه يظهر في عدد من الرسومات التي نُفّذت لمنارة الجامع الطولوني في القرن التاسع عشر. فيما لا تزال القبة القبلية لخانقاة فرج بن برقوق بالصحراء، والتي بنيت في الفترة ما بين 802هـ/1400م و814هـ/1411م، تحتفظ بمركبٍ صغيرٍ من النحاس. إلّا أنّ أشهر تلك العشاريات قاطبةً هو ذلك المركب البرونزي الصغير الذي تزدان به قبة الإمام الشافعيّ الضريحية بالقاهرة (608هـ/1211م)، والذي تُفيد المصادر بأنه كان يُملأ بالحبوب لتقتات عليها الطيور السائبة، في حين ذهب البعض إلى أنه رمزٌ لما كان عليه الشافعيّ من سعة العلم والمعرفة، حتى لُقّب ببحر العلوم. يعتقد بعضُ مؤرخي الفنون أنّ العشاري مأخوذٌ من العمارة المصرية القديمة، وأنه أخذ هذا الاسم من شكله الذي على هيئة زورق العشاري الصغير الحجم. أمّا البعض الآخر فيرى أن مسمّى العشاري قد جاء من كونه كان يُملأ بعشور الحبوب على وجه الصدقة. وعلى الرغم من قلة النماذج الباقية للعشاري، فإن ما يتصف به هذا العنصر الزخرفيّ من الطرافة والتميز قد لفت إليه أنظار الرحّالة والمؤرخين ودارسي الفنون في الماضي والحاضر. غير أنّ مجموع ما كتب عنه لا يكاد يشفي غلةً أو يدفع أُوَارًا؛ فمعظمها كتابات وصفية مقتضبة ومكرّرة. لذا يهدف هذا البحث إلى تتبع نشأة العشاري ودراسة نماذجه، سواء الباقية أو تلك التي اندثرت، وكذا معرفة الوظيفة التي كان يؤديها والقيمة التي عسَاه يرمز إليها.
الكلمات الدالة: العشاري، مركب، قبة، مئذنة، اشتقاق، وظيفة، رمزية
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Islamic Studies, 2023
Medieval Muslim sources convey two extremely opposing pictures of schoolmasters. Alongside the of... more Medieval Muslim sources convey two extremely opposing pictures of schoolmasters. Alongside the official, aspirational image of the virtuous providers of knowledge, another subversive stream of literature lampoons them as despicable charlatans (although the main subject they taught was the Quran). This provocative enigma raises many questions and calls for in-depth investigation to clarify its reasons, implications, manifestations and repercussions. The present article sets out to spell out the dichotomy noted in the sources vis-à-vis the stature of schoolmasters in pre-modern Muslim societies. In particular, it tries to identify the source of this paradox and contextualise the conundrum of a transmitter of sacred knowledge (i.e. the Quran) being ridiculed in a presumably religion-centred community. It also analyses the reasons behind the satires against schoolmasters by notable Muslim informants in medieval times. While so doing, the article tries to give answers and identify nuances concerning a number of related and more inclusive questions.
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Journal of Islamic Architecture, 2017
Professor Keppel Archibald Cameron Creswell (1879–1974), better known as K.A.C. Creswell or simpl... more Professor Keppel Archibald Cameron Creswell (1879–1974), better known as K.A.C. Creswell or simply Creswell, was definitely one of the most prominent and prolific scholars in the field of Islamic art and architecture. His gigantic two-volume Early Muslim Architecture, of which Volume I was first published in Oxford in 1932, remains widely acknowledged as the most important reference for early Islamic architecture so far. Nevertheless, Creswell’s hypothesis on the genesis of the mosque type and his perception of the first mosque in Islam betray a considerable amount of dubiety and suffer a myriad of critical deficiencies. As he maintains, the first true congregational mosque in Islamic history is due not to the Prophet, as commonly known, but to Ziyād b. Abīh when he reconstructed the mosque of Baṣra in 44/665. Astonishingly, these views of Creswell were adopted and further enhanced by quite a number of notable specialists over eighty-five years. In this article, we will subject such views to scrutiny with the aim of identifying the first mosque in Islam and the religious as well as historical contexts in which it emerged. This discussion becomes more persistent, however, given the dominant misconceptions about the topic in Western as well as Muslim scholarships.
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The Islamic Quarterly, 2018
In early Islam, the mosque was the mainstay of the community. It played a myriad of religious, di... more In early Islam, the mosque was the mainstay of the community. It played a myriad of religious, didactic and socio-political roles, and its overall importance transcended that of any other institution, including the dār al-imāra, which was hardly more than the ruler’s private abode. As such, the study of the early mosques is palpably significant for any proper perception of the early Muslim community and how it evolved. This is, however, hindered by the fact that the originals of many of such mosques, particularly those built in the first/seventh century, were either considerably modified, overwritten by later structures or totally vanished. The resultant absence of archaeological evidence for many of such mosques could be equally attributable to the ephemerality of the materials which were used to construct them. The study of these important structures has, per se, primarily depended on the Arabic literary sources whose credibility is questioned by many Western academics. This article is an attempt to see how this textual evidence would be checked against other existing evidence of different types. To that end, the article will shed light on incidents where the 'veracity' of the Arabic historical writings on early mosques can be contrasted with: archaeology, epigraphy, urban-morphology, numismatics, papyrology and early non-Arabic writings. Our main objective is to explore the extent to which such counter-proofs can serve as a practical benchmark to weigh up the accounts we have of those mosques for which archaeological evidence is problematic or misplaced.
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The Islamic Quarterly, 2015
In a recent article, I have tried to investigate the primary nature of the building which the Pro... more In a recent article, I have tried to investigate the primary nature of the building which the Prophet reportedly built at Madina soon after his emigration to it in 622 AD. The evidence available argues in favour of the building being a real mosque, and not just a private residence as believed by a majority of Western scholars as well as quite a number of Muslim scholars. Such a finding, attesting to early Islam’s capacity to produce the mosque type as institutionally and architecturally defined, would introduce a fresh perspective as far as the making of the mosque is concerned. A mosque built by the Prophet would furnish a paradigm for later mosques and give reason to discuss the many mosque-related ḥadīths; the Prophet must have given advice and/or commands concerning the form of his mosque and the mosque in general. Such a discussion became more plausible in view of the recent shift in modern scholarship toward the reception of ḥadīth, attempting to make a sensible use of it for historical purposes. To what extent could these two determinants―the Prophet’s mosque as a practical framework and his relevant ḥadīths as a theoretical one―represent the Prophet’s approach regarding mosque form? This article sets out to deal with this question. It will further investigate the features of such a prophetic model of the mosque, should it exist, and explore whether it was binding or only elective. Such an inquiry, as we shall see, intersects with topics such as Islam’s outlook on visual arts and aesthetics in general.
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Journal of Islamic and Human Advanced Research, Nov 1, 2013
Ḥadīth forms a controversial topic for Muslim as well as non-Muslim scholars. Generally, both gro... more Ḥadīth forms a controversial topic for Muslim as well as non-Muslim scholars. Generally, both groups believe that a great number of ḥadīths, having been mainly written in the 3rd/9th century, were doctored or totally fabricated in later times to serve political or sectarian agendas. This article underlines the recent shift in modern scholarship à propos the reception of Ḥadīth. It also explains the reasons behind such a shift. However, the article’s main theme is giving an insight into how Ḥadīth was transmitted from the earliest years of Islam down to the 3rd/9th century. The main finding of this survey is that none of the dominant radical perspectives, whether dismissive or receptive, fits the case. Ḥadīth was not systematically documented from the very beginning, but there is evidence that the compilations we possess today are the upshot of an early organic phase where oral traditions concurred with, and then evolved into, written ones.
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The Western interest in studying the artistic patrimony of the Muslim world began as early as the... more The Western interest in studying the artistic patrimony of the Muslim world began as early as the late-nineteenth century. Since then, huge efforts have been made to document, analyse and conserve the gems of Islamic architecture. Nonetheless, mainly drawing on Arabia’s slender architectural heritage in pre- and early Islamic times, a majority of Western scholars have tended to credit the mosque type to non-Islamic origins. Although most of these theories were put forward about a century ago, they still largely shape the dominant wisdom in Western scholarship. This article tries to look closely into the earliest mosques, particularly those built in the first/seventh century, with the aim of investigating whether and how these mosques were influenced by the local pre-Islamic types. To do so, we will consider the early Arabic sources as well as the findings of the relevant excavation works. It is of interest to note that all hypotheses on the non-Islamic origins of the mosque were too weak to withstand the scrutiny of subsequent research. A typical case in the literature is that a group of scholars adopt a theory which is soon demolished by another group who themselves propose their own that is disproved by a third group and so on. All these views failed to provide convincing answers for such central questions as when, where and how a certain architectural type, or types, inspired the mosque. The stark simplicity of the earliest mosques, and which derived from the simplicity of the Islamic rituals themselves, does not seem to have required, particularly in the earliest phase, the borrowing of any foreign architectural type. Later, the mosque layout, while greatly retaining its distinctive Islamic character, was influenced by some architectural types in the conquered territories. A noted example is the use of the transept in the Umayyad mosque in Damascus. The presence of such influences is natural and could well have been dictated by variant climatic conditions, but should not be taken to attribute the mosque type to non-Islamic origins—especially that it was only at a later date when such influences found their way to mosque architecture.
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JAAUTH, Volume 11, Issue 2, Dec 15, 2014
Although the commemoration of the dead is a universal and a long-standing tradition, early Islam ... more Although the commemoration of the dead is a universal and a long-standing tradition, early Islam is widely known to have resisted it. After a relatively long period of observing prevention, such a persistent practice found its way to Islamic culture. It is true that celebrating the dead was introduced to the realm of Islam before the Shīʿī Fatimids founded their caliphate in Egypt in 358/969, but it was under them that this praxis reached the zenith. The Fatimids were succeeded by the Ayyūbids who, in spite of being a zealous Sunnī dynasty, upheld the tradition of celebrating the departed notables, particularly the pious ones (awliyāʾ). The aim in this paper is to explore how such an observance, which is mainly deemed unorthodox in the eye of Sunni Islam, was maintained in Egypt under the Ayyūbids (567/1172-648/1250). In particular, the paper attempts to give an insight into: (i) the types of the dead dignitaries that were celebrated in Ayyūbid Egypt; (ii) the features needed for their biographies to be canonized―in the Islamic sense; (iii) the architectural expressions that were employed to celebrate their memory; (iv) and the meaning of such a procedure.
Keywords: The dead, Ayyūbid, mausolea, Egypt, funerary, pious, celebration, public.
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Book Reviews by Essam Ayyad
The Muslim World Book Review, 2021
In medieval Cairo, the Qarāfa, a cemetery where Cairene Muslims used to bury their deceased, was ... more In medieval Cairo, the Qarāfa, a cemetery where Cairene Muslims used to bury their deceased, was not merely a necropolis, but it hosted on a regular basis a variety of public events. According to Egypt’s key medieval chronicler, al-Maqrīzī (d. 845/1442), the laypeople were allured to visit and, quite surprisingly, stay at the Qarāfa by the abundance of meat, desserts and other assortments of food and beverage which were either carried to or prepared there. As described by al-Maqrīzī and others, the Qarāfa took the form of a white settlement that was in a better condition than that of any other quarter in the city. Still populated until today, it was a recreational area for the people of medieval Cairo who assembled there during moonlit evenings, where they were regaled by a variety of entertainment including performances by minstrels. At that time, frequent visits to graves were paid not only by the rank and file like nowadays but also by religious scholars. The discrepancy in incentive and conduct of both groups may help us understand why it was legally allowed for the latter and disallowed for the former.
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Journal of Islamic Studies, 2018
As indicated by its title, this festschrift is a tribute to Renata Holod by eleven of her loyal f... more As indicated by its title, this festschrift is a tribute to Renata Holod by eleven of her loyal former PhD students. Holod is currently a professor and curator in the Near East Section at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. She was offered a teaching position at the University of Pennsylvania in 1972, the year that she completed her PhD in Harvard. The book begins with a thoughtful preface by the editor, David J. Roxburgh (Harvard), on Renata’s biography and how she developed into a widely acknowledged name in the field of Islamic art and architecture. Starting with her early years in Toronto to which she—as an infant—emigrated with her family from Ukraine, the preface casts light on Renata’s eventful career,...
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Journal of Islamic Studies, Jul 2015
This is the first monograph to present Madina in modern Saudi Arabia as a model of sacred space a... more This is the first monograph to present Madina in modern Saudi Arabia as a model of sacred space and a holy city in western Arabia in early Islam. Based on Munt’s doctoral thesis, ‘The Sacred History of Early Islamic Medina: the Prophet, Caliphs, Scholars and the Town’s Ḥaram’, it is an earnest attempt to put within historical framework the conversion of Yathrib, the pre-Islamic name for Madina, into Madīnat rasūl Allāh. The study’s main objective is to define and contextualize the different phases of Madina’s taḥrīm (lit. ‘sanctification’), during the first three centuries AH (seventh to ninth AD), and to integrate its findings with the religious, political, legal and perhaps socio-economic contexts in which this process emerged. Madina is particularly honoured for having served as the dār al-hijra or muhājar rasūl Allāh, ‘the emigration place of God’s Messenger’. The city is more widely known, however, as al-Madīna al-Munawwara, ‘the illuminated city’, i.e., the city which has been enlightened by the Prophet taking it as his place of emigration. It is the place which accommodates his mosque and grave and to which faith, as stated in a ḥadīth, comes creeping ‘just as a serpent creeps to its hole’.
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Book Chapters by Essam Ayyad
Routledge Handbook of Islamic Ritual and Practice, 2022
The dominant wisdom in modern scholarship is that the seventh century Arab conquests were associa... more The dominant wisdom in modern scholarship is that the seventh century Arab conquests were associated with intensive activities of appropriation of earlier non-Islamic sacred spaces in subjugated territories. According to this standpoint, such pre-existing sanctums were initially shared between the Muslim victors and local non-Muslim communities. Soon afterwards, particularly in the Umayyad period, as Islam gained more adherents from other faiths, such shared spaces would be entirely expropriated and converted into mosques. These were to be joined by the proliferation of custom-built mosques in the subsequent years as Islam gained yet more adherents, while throughout the Muslim empire the transformation of non-Muslim places of worship into mosques continued but in a seemingly less systematic way. The present chapter aims to scrutinise this theory, analysing textual and archaeological evidence to investigate the extent of early Islamic adaptation of non-Muslim sanctuaries to serve as mosques. The chapter also explores the practicality, legal acceptability and religio-political implications of such a practice, with special emphasis on the conversion of churches in the early period.
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Conference Presentations by Essam Ayyad
The conquest of Egypt by the Fatimids in 358/969 created a context of radical religious and polit... more The conquest of Egypt by the Fatimids in 358/969 created a context of radical religious and political transformation: a context in which the Shīʿī polity sought, and indeed implemented strategies, to propagate their sect amongst a setting of Sunnī adherents. Perhaps the most workable weapon they applied was the introduction of mashhads, funerary domed structures devoted to the burial of their Fatimid imams, who claimed the ultimate descent from ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib and Fātima, the Prophet’s daughter. However, many of these were just cenotaphs (mashāhid ruʾyā). Although Islam holds strict traditions against funerary structures, the Fatimid mashhads did the trick; they were, and still are, highly venerated by the Sunnī populace of Egypt. They even continued to be employed by the zealous Ayyūbid sultans, albeit under a different name: ḍarīḥs. This time, they were dedicated to notable Sunnī imams, such as al-Shāfiʿī (d. 204/820), and had a different function; the Ṭurbat al-Zaʿfarān, where the Fatimid caliphs and their families were buried, was not set in the necropolis of their imams, while the Ayyūbid mausoleum of al- Shāfiʿī was intended at the outset to serve as a royal burial complex. The present study is an attempt to reach a better understanding of the incentives and/or impediments of both sects towards the erection and veneration of funerary domes. Further, the study holds an architectural comparison between the Fatimid mashhads and the Ayyūbid ḍarīḥs with the aim of exploring whether and how the Shīʿī and Sunnī doctrines influenced the architectural, rather than, ornamental features of such funerary types.
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University of Birmingham
A close survey of the usage of the mosque (masjid) in the Qurʾān is essential. Not only because t... more A close survey of the usage of the mosque (masjid) in the Qurʾān is essential. Not only because the Qurʾān is a widely acknowledged source for the study of early Islam, but also because the main rationale for those doubting the existence of a mosque in the Prophet’s time is the so-called 'Qurʾān’s non-specific use of the term ‘masjid’'. The word ‘masjid’, is mentioned 28 times in the Qurʾān, 22 in the singular and 6 in the plural. Of these: 15 occurences denote the Masjid al-Ḥarām in Makka. The Masjid al-Aqṣā is referred to twice—once explicitly and once implicitly. ‘Masjid’ is also used to refer to other pre-Islamic places of God worship. However, such a wide-ranging usage does not necessarily suggest that the mosque type was not established in the time of the Prophet. The Qurʾānic use of the term 'masjid' to denote earlier God-worship sanctuaries does not mean that the term had not been Islamized by early Islam; rather, it is the case that such sanctuaries were deemed Islamic. A careful discussion of the relevant Qurʾānic passages, that also takes philology into account, provides enough evidence that the mosque, whether as an institution or as a structure, was indeed known to the 'generation of the Qurʾān'.
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الكلمات الدالة: العشاري، مركب، قبة، مئذنة، اشتقاق، وظيفة، رمزية
Keywords: The dead, Ayyūbid, mausolea, Egypt, funerary, pious, celebration, public.
Book Reviews by Essam Ayyad
Book Chapters by Essam Ayyad
Conference Presentations by Essam Ayyad
الكلمات الدالة: العشاري، مركب، قبة، مئذنة، اشتقاق، وظيفة، رمزية
Keywords: The dead, Ayyūbid, mausolea, Egypt, funerary, pious, celebration, public.
Keywords: ʿushārī, boat, dome, minaret, derivation, function, symbolism
Filled with anguish for what happened to the majestic Notre Dame de Paris, I went to bed struggling to put my mind to sleep with scenes still popping up of the proud cathedral battling the desolating flames. I woke up the following day rubbing my eyes and grabbing my phone to check my email, as usual. There was a message with the title “Al Aqsa”. I hurriedly took to news outlets and social media to see what happened to the iconic mosque, and I was relieved to learn that the blaze there was quenched tout de suite. The fire, that was reportedly inadvertently started by a group of playful children (according to Palestinian Waqf officials), broke out quickly in the guardroom of the courtyard of al-Muṣallā al-Marwanī (the Marwānīd Prayer Hall), better known in the West as the Solomon’s Stables. For many non-Muslims, this fire may have been the first time they had heard of the Aqṣā mosque, despite it being one of the holiest places in Islam. So, I thought this might be as good an opportunity as any to introduce the readers of The Public Medievalist to its storied past and offer a guided historical tour of this edifice that has survived fire, earthquakes, and even a few Crusaders in its time.