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16 - Popular religious narratives

from Part IV - Popular prose

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

By
Kamal Abdel-Malek
Edited by
Roger Allen  and
D. S. Richards
Roger Allen
Affiliation:
University of Pennsylvania
D. S. Richards
Affiliation:
University of Oxford
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Summary

Many Arabic popular religious prose narratives from the post-classical period exist mostly in manuscript; relevant sources are few and their tone is dismissive, if not downright disdainful. As a result, the main sources of information on the composers and transmitters (qussās) of these religious narratives are polemical works, such as Ibn al-Jawzī’s (d. 1200) Kitāb al-qussās wa’l-mudhakkirīn (The Book of Story-Tellers and Preachers) and al-Suyūtī’s (d. 1505) Tahdhīr al-khawāss min akādhīb al-qussās (On Guarding the Elite Against the Falsehoods of the Story-Tellers). Few modern scholars have treated popular religious writings in Arabic and other Islamic languages as worthwhile literature.

The genre of popular religious narrative surveyed here, the qissa, typically includes a tale of the contest of good and evil and the ultimate triumph for good; tales about the meek who, armed with no more than their piety and fear of God, stand up to and overcome the mighty and wicked. The heroes of such tales are prophets, saintly figures (awliyā’), and pious men and women, who are granted this divine gift of working miracles and marvels (mu‘jizāt and karāmāt).

Some of these popular religious narratives derive their material from the Koran, its various narratives about the biblical and non-biblical figures before Muhammad, such as Abraham, Joseph, the Children of Israel, Mary, Hūd and Sālih, among others. Other sources include hadīth reports, non-Koranic tales derived from Jewish sources (isrā’īliyyāt) and tales about Sufi masters and their miracles (karāmāt).

Type
Chapter
Information
Arabic Literature in the Post-Classical Period , pp. 330 - 344
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2006

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