The impact of the Arab conquest of the Middle East on Christians is something that has attracted considerable attention over the years, often along the lines of competing narratives that accentuate either the sufferings of Christians under their new Muslim masters or the benefits that those masters brought to their new subjects. All too often the voice of the Christians who actually experienced the advent of Islam and its growth under the Umayyads and early Abbasids is not part of the conversation or is only listened to selectively. This volume sets out to correct that oversight by systematically surveying over 60 Syriac Christian sources from the 7th to 9th centuries and synthesising their observations of life under Muslim rule.
Michael Penn, a Professor of Religious Studies at Stanford University, has carefully sifted through and analysed the available sources, both published and unpublished, resulting in this highly informative and readable book, replete with numerous passages translated by the author from the relevant Syriac texts. The volume consists of four chapters sandwiched between an Introduction and Conclusion, followed by an extensive section of Endnotes, Bibliography and Index. Each chapter, opening with a selected quotation from sources like Jacob of Edessa, the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius, Thomas of Marga and the Chronicle of Zuqnin, addresses a major aspect of Muslim-Christian interactions during the first 200 plus years of Islam.
The Introduction presents a brief review of scholarship on the subject along with an overview of the book itself, framed in part by a discussion of the “Clash of Civilizations” model of inter-religious contact, a theme that is revisited in the book's Conclusion. Penn observes that Syriac sources are often excluded from discussion about early Muslim-Christian interactions because “they were written in the ‘wrong’ language” (p. 2), unlike the Latin and Greek sources that have frequently been used to capture the Christian perspective on the topic. In particular, two tendencies of Syriac sources are noted: they contain “a much more positive Christian depiction of Islam” than most other Christian sources and they demonstrate “a much greater continuum between the categories of early Christianity and early Islam” than many scholars have previously acknowledged (pp. 3–4).
In the words of the author, the book “asks how seventh- through ninth-century Syriac Christians navigated a world in which Christianity and Islam were much less distinct than is commonly imagined” (pp. 4–5) and argues that “Syriac texts reflect a much more substantial and long-lasting overlap between Christianity and Islam than the standard narrative allows” (pp. 10–11). As a result, the goal of the book's investigation is “to challenge today's widespread cultural assumptions about the history of Christian-Muslim relations as well as recent scholarly reconstructions of early Christian-Muslim interactions” (p. 13).
Chapter One examines Syriac Memories of the Islamic Conquests, investigating “how Syriac depictions of the Islamic conquests changed over time” (p. 11). As the full chapter title suggests, the most difficult thing facing these Syriac authors was explaining what was going on when “good things happened to other people” (p. 17); how could God have allowed the Arabs to conquer and rule over the Christians? The author proceeds to examine no fewer than eighteen Syriac sources in order to trace the portrayal of the Arab conquests over the first two centuries of Muslim rule. Amongst other things, he concludes that during the seventh century, “Syriac authors did not anticipate that their conquerors would be around very long [and] they did not speak about Islam as a religion” (p. 19). Various interpretations of the Muslim conquest are offered by the Syriac writers, from acknowledging that “God has given rule over the world” to the Muslim Arabs (p. 21) to viewing them in apocalyptic terms, “as a harbinger of the end times” (p. 22).
The latter approach became more prevalent in Syriac sources after the second Fitna and the subsequent Islamisation programme of caliph ‘Abd al-Malik (late seventh century); this apocalyptic trend is perhaps best seen in the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius. However, what transpired was not the end of the world or even the end of Arab rule, but rather “an increasingly stable, increasingly assertive, and increasingly Islamic caliphate” (p. 32), leading to a more general acceptance of Muslim rule by Syriac authors, many of whom viewed things increasingly through the lens of theodicy. Despite this, Penn's conclusion to the first chapter pushes back against “many modern accounts that portray Syriac Christians as welcoming Muslim rule”, asserting rather that “until Dionysius [of Tel Maḥrē]’s Chronicle… Syriac sources were unanimous in seeing the conquests as a lamentable development” (p. 51).
Chapter 2 considers Syriac Narratives of Religious Identity, discussing “how memories of the conquests changed over time [along with] Syriac conceptualisations of Islam” (p. 11). Put another way, the chapter deals with the “crisis of differentiation” (p. 54) faced by Christians after the emergence of Islam and seeks to answer questions like “how did Islam become a religion in the eyes of those under Muslim rule?” (p. 54). It turns out that the answer is quite complex, resulting in “a complicated whodunit… [involving] language… knowledge… conceptualization… motive… and utility” (p. 56). The author discusses the interconnected nature of race and religion in antiquity, considering key terms like ṭayyāyē, ḥanpē, Saracens, Hagarenes and Ishmaelites (pp. 57–63), concluding that what Syriac writers initially knew “about their conquerors’ beliefs and practices… [was] not much” (p. 63).
As with views of the Arab conquest, changes in Syriac perceptions of the religious identity of Muslims emerged after the decisive reforms instituted by ‘Abd al-Malik. Amongst the Syriac writers surveyed, the West Syriac bishop Jacob of Edessa plays a key role, as demonstrated by the space that Penn devotes to him in this chapter. Notably, “the distance between Christians and Hagarenes [in Jacob's writings] was smaller than one might first imagine” (p. 68), resulting in a certain amount of “categorical fuzziness” (p. 69). Also significant during this period are disputation texts, such as John and the Emir and the Bēt Ḥālē Disputation. Here too, as with Jacob of Edessa, “religious boundaries remained surprisingly permeable” (p. 73).
The mid-eighth century Abbasid Revolution brought about yet more changes for Syriac Christians, resulting in works like the Zuqnin Chronicle, which depicts “Islam as a religious entity that was fairly distinct from Christianity” (p. 77). Potentially even more significant Syriac views of Islam under the Abbasids can be found in the works of two East Syriac scholars discussed at length by the author: Timothy I (pp. 79–83) and Theodore bar Koni (pp. 83–86). Consistent with the aforementioned “fuzzy categories” is the depiction in Theodore's Scholion (a traditional dialogue between teacher and student) of the student as “now and then a ḥanpā [pagan], sometimes almost Jewish, occasionally a confused Christian, and [one who] most likely considered himself Muslim” (p. 85).
The last section of Chapter Two addresses several ninth-century sources (including the Bahira Legend and Dionysius of Tel Maḥrē) which “encountered Islam as a much more fully formed and religiously defined entity” (p. 98). However, even here (specifically in Thomas of Marga) there are examples of “boundary-crossing activities” such as a Muslim woman “possessed by Arabic-speaking demons… [proclaiming that] there is no faith or truth except among the holy Christian people” (p. 98). The chapter ends with a discussion of the theoretical aspects of “how groups use the category of religion to create and reinforce power hierarchies” (p. 98) and the unique ways in which Syriac Christians (who were not in the dominant position in the Muslim-Christian power dynamic) wrestled with “the proximate other… [the fact that] the beliefs and practices of their conquerors were ‘too much like us’” (p. 100).
In Chapter Three, Penn looks at Narratives of Islamic Rulers, “case studies of how Syriac authors used the literary figure of a Muslim ruler to think through the ambiguities of Muslim rule” (p. 11). The aforementioned “crisis of differentiation” involved the need to “reckon with Muslim rulers”, both “sympathetic… [and] hostile figures” (p. 103). In the process, these leaders became symbolic of what united the Christian subjects with their Arab masters and what divided the two from each other. This process of “using Muslims to think with”, as the full chapter title proclaims, began with Muḥammad. Early Christians needed to determine how they would view the prophet of Islam – was he God's messenger, a military commander, a political leader or something else? Equally importantly, should Christians accept such claims or refute them? Different Syriac authors came to different conclusions on the matter. Perhaps the most diplomatic of all was Patriarch Timothy I, who presented Muḥammad “as a righteous, commendable monotheist” (p. 109).
Beyond the figure of Muḥammad, Syriac authors also wrote about other Muslim rulers, both the nasty and the noble. Insidious practices such as “murder[ing] peasants”, or “raz[ing] monasteries and roast[ing] abbots alive”, not to mention taxation policies that combined “economic exploitation, unjust confiscation, and outright torture” (pp. 116–117), all come in for condemnation from Syriac scribes. However, there is also considerable Syriac ink devoted to ‘the figure of the good Muslim ruler’, such that there are even handbooks describing how to address Muslims in positions of authority. These are full of statements of “praise of Muslim authorities and repeated assurances of Christian support for their rule” (p. 119), a far cry from the way in which most Greek and Latin authors consistently speak ill of Muslims.
As the author notes, “in their depictions of [both] good [and] evil rulers, many Syriac authors were clearly revisionist with their history” (p. 121), highlighting the fact that these texts were motivated by more than a desire to stick to the facts; “we are dealing more with literary tropes than with accurate descriptions” (pp. 121–122). Indeed, these tropes often further authorial agendas that have little to do with the Muslim rulers themselves; rather they can serve to highlight “the miraculous deeds of Christian holy men” (p. 123) or present an “East Syriac critique of Miaphysite and Chalcedonian theology” (p. 130). Monastic histories and disputation texts offer frequent interesting examples of these literary dynamics in action. Again, contrasts with Greek and Latin texts can be drawn, particularly with the disputation texts; “the propensity of Syriac sources to depict less hostile Muslim rulers allowed Syriac authors to emphasize the civility of the debate” (p. 133).
Chapter Three concludes with a discussion of the role of Muslim rulers in the process of “thinking one's way to Orthodoxy” (p. 134), whether the protagonists are Maronite, Miaphysite or East Syriac. The stories found in this section are full of demon-possessed monks, reanimated relics, splinters of the true cross, and “monks who impregnated a prostitute” (p. 136). Surely no-one could accuse these authors of spinning boring yarns! Tales from the Qenneshre Fragment and the Life of Rabban Hormizd, not to mention the story of “the dog who can't stay dead” which begins the chapter (pp. 102–103) are sure to put a smile on the lips of many a reader (at the same time perhaps provoking some to reconsider the tendency to differentiate hagiography from historiography, as Penn discusses at the end of the chapter).
Chapter Four surveys The Continuum Between Early Christianity and Early Islam, a consideration of the transition “from narratives about Islamic rule to the negotiation of life under Islam” (p. 12). The author begins with an account of Muslims marrying ‘Syrians’ (suryāyē), bearing ‘Syrian’ children and basically becoming indistinguishable from the local Christian community, an example of the way in which religious boundaries between the two faiths were often blurred during the early centuries of their interactions. The chapter goes on to describe shared sacred spaces, shared meals between religious leaders, shared military exploits and shared educational situations. The questions to be considered included: Should a Christian priest teach Muslim children? Can a Christian take another Christian to court in front of a Muslim judge? A major concern in many instances is “the desire of elites to shore up confessional boundaries and their inability to do so” (p. 145). The frequent references in Syriac texts to the punishments to be incurred by those bringing legal matters “before the leaders of the world” indicates that “Syriac Christians continued to seek more favourable rulings in Muslim courts [than they were able to find in ecclesiastical courts]” (p. 149).
One of the most serious issues for church elites was that of intermarriage between Christians and Muslims. This raised questions like, “If a Christian woman married a Muslim man, was it permissible for a priest to offer the Eucharist to her?” More specifically, “What if the Muslim husband threatened to kill the priest if he did not offer her the Eucharist?” (pp. 150–151). Although it is unlikely that all such references in Syriac legal texts represent actual cases, it still points towards “particularly messy circumstances” (p. 152) that church leaders had to deal with as a result of Muslim-Christian intermarriage. As Penn notes frequently in this chapter, the “boundary maintenance” (or rather “purity regulation”) efforts of ecclesiastical elites seem to have been largely unsuccessful, given the continual references to intermarriage and other examples of regular Muslim-Christian contact in these sources which “challenge the modern assumption of clearly defined boundaries between early Christianity and early Islam” (p. 155).
The rest of Chapter Four addresses “Christian-Like Muslims”, “Muslim-Like Christians”, and “Conversion Accounts”. A philanthropic Muslim who receives divine visions and whose child is healed by drinking holy water, a governor who seeks the blessing of a Christian holy man and a Muslim fishermen who prays in the name of a Christian ascetic are just some of the characters presented here who are technically Muslim but whose “primary concern was not religious allegiance but ritual efficacy” (p. 159). More challenging to the Syriac sources and their readers were those who “attended church… sang psalms… took the Eucharist, and… had been baptized” (p. 162), but whose “theology was much closer to that of early Muslims than ancient elites… felt comfortable with” (p. 165).
But the most threatening situation faced by such elites was the “permeability of people” that was demonstrated through conversion “from one community to another” (p. 168), typically from Christianity to Islam. Syriac writers variously saw those who converted as “never really Christian in the first place” (p. 170), as having traded “Christ for Satan, and paradise for ‘unquenchable fire’” (p. 172), or even as victims of clerical error… or was that an initial conversion, followed by a return to Christian faith and subsequent martyrdom (pp. 174–175)? As for conversions from Islam to Christianity, most Syriac sources are hesitant to spell things out completely, preferring instead to take “the narrative to the point where one would expect the Muslim character to convert, but then… no further” (p. 179).
The book concludes with a consideration of the fall-out from Samuel Huntingdon's famous argument which highlights the idea that Islam and “the West” are involved in an inevitable “Clash of Civilizations”, an argument that has been repeated and developed in numerous popular works since Huntingdon's 1993 article. As Penn notes, Syriac sources can offer “an important corrective to models of inevitable, unmitigated conflict between Christians and Muslims” by providing “a much more nuanced view of early Christian-Muslim encounters” (p. 185).
The book was generally well edited, with only the following typos slipping through the cracks: “took on greater important” of course should be “took on greater importance” (p. 18); “covenant of nuns” must be understood as “convent of nuns” (p. 24); “Hebrews 12:8” should be “Hebrews 12:6” (p. 38); “elided” should become “elided the distinction between” (p. 68); “Michael the Syria” should read “Michael the Syrian” (p. 90); “the [Miaphysite tribe of ṭayyāyē] the Tanukh” should become “the [Miaphysite tribe of ṭayyāyē] Tanukh” (p. 115); “God guards and bḷesses him” should be “God guards and blesses him” (p. 119); “what was previous hidden” should read “what was previously hidden” (p. 142); “should no be more than” should read “should not be more than” (p. 171) and “Worse of all” should read “Worst of all” (p. 172).
These minor issues aside, this is a volume that should be on the bookshelf of every scholar dealing with early Christianity or Islam, especially their interactions with each other. Grounded in careful research and expressed in well-measured prose, Envisioning Islam is eminently readable and will appeal to both academic and more popular audiences alike. The author's survey of Syriac texts not only goes a long way towards improving our knowledge of how the Christian and Muslim worlds connected with each other, but also demonstrates the important role that Syriac literature can play in helping us to understand the Middle East in Late Antiquity and the Medieval period.
