Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T20:31:11.691Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

One Thousand Years of Islamic Education in Najaf: Myth and History of the Shiʿi Ḥawza

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Zackery M. Heern
Zackery M. Heern*
Affiliation:
Middle East and Islamic Studies at Idaho State University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

According to Shiʿi tradition, the seminary (ḥawza) in Najaf, Iraq is 1,000 years old. The origins of the ḥawza are closely associated with the famous scholar Shaykh al-Ṭūsī (385/995‒459/1067). This paper addresses the question of whether or not there is sufficient historical evidence to support the tradition that the ḥawza of Najaf is indeed 1,000 years old. On the basis of Arabic sources, the article argues that although Shiʿi educational institutions in Najaf were incepted a millennium ago, Najaf was rarely the locus of Shiʿi education prior to the thirteenth/nineteenth century. Based on statistical and historical analysis of Shiʿi scholars in Najaf, this paper outlines a short history of scholarly activity in one of the oldest college towns in the world. In addition to developing a working definition of the term ḥawza, the paper situates the rise of Shiʿi educational systems in the broader context of the evolution of Islamic scholarly institutions, including colleges (madrasas).

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 50 , Issue 3 , May 2017 , pp. 415 - 438
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 2017

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

The initial version of this paper was developed as part of a grant provided by the Clerical Authority in Shiʿite Islam Project sponsored by the British Academy. The author thanks Robert Gleave for including him in the Ḥawza Project, and Ahab Bdaiwi for commenting on an earlier draft of this paper.

References

Abisaab, Rula Jurdi. Converting Persia: Religion and Power in the Safavid Empire. London: I. B. Tauris, 2004.Google Scholar
Abtahi, Hojjat Movahhed. Ashnaʾi ba howzeha-ye ʿelmiyyeh-ye Shiʿa dar tul-e tarikh. Isfahan: Howza-ye ʿElmiyyeh, 1986.Google Scholar
Akhtar, Wahid. Early Shiʿite Imāmiyyah Thinkers. New Delhi: Ashish Publishing House, 1988.Google Scholar
Algar, Hamid. Religion and State in Iran 1785–1906: The Role of the Ulama in the Qajar Period. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Āl Maḥbūba, Jaʿfar al-Shaykh Bāqir. Māḍī al-Najaf wa-ḥāḍiruhā. Beirut: Dār al-Aḍwaʾ, 1986.Google Scholar
Amīnī, Muḥammad Hādī. Muʿjam al-maṭbūʿāt al-Najafiyya. Najaf: Maṭbaʿat al-Ādāb, 1966.Google Scholar
Amīnī, Muḥammad Hādī. Muʿjam rijāl al-fikr wa-al-adab fī al-Najaf khilāla alf ʿām. 3 Vols. Najaf, 1992.Google Scholar
Arjomand, Said Amir. “The Law, Agency, and Policy in Medieval Islamic Society: Development of the Institutions of Learning from the Tenth to the Fifteenth Century.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 41, no. 2 (1999): 263–293.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
al-Āṣafī, Muḥammad Mahdī. Madrasat al-Najaf wa-taṭawwur al-ḥaraka al-iṣlāḥiyya fīhā. Najaf: Dār al-Nuʿmān lil-Ṭibāʿa wa-al-Nashr, 1965.Google Scholar
Aslan, Rose S. “From Body to Shrine: The Construction of Sacred Space at the Grave of ʿAlī Ibn Abi Talib in Najaf.” PhD diss., University of North Carolina, 2014.Google Scholar
al-Bahādilī, ʿAlī. Muʿālam al-ḥawza al-ʿilmiyya fī al-Najaf. Beirut: Dār al-Aḍwaʾ, 1995.Google Scholar
al-Bahādilī, ʿAlī. al-Najaf: Jāmʿatuha wa dawruha al-qiyāda. Beirut: Muʾassasat al-Wafaʾ, 1989.Google Scholar
Baḥr al-ʿUlūm, Sayyid Muḥammad Mahdī. al-Dirāsa wa tārīkhuha fī al-Najaf. Baghdad: Dār al-Taʿrīf, 1387AH.Google Scholar
Balaghi, ʿAbd al-Hujjat. Tarikh-e Najaf-e ashraf va Hireh. Tehran: Chapkhaneh-ye Mazaheri, 1949.Google Scholar
Barnes, John Roberts. An Introduction to Religious Foundations in the Ottoman Empire. Leiden: Brill, 1987.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bayat, Mangol. Mysticism and Dissent: Socioreligious Thought in Qajar Iran. New York: Syracuse University Press, 1982.Google Scholar
Berkey, Jonathan P. The Formation of Islam: Religion and Society in the Near East, 600–1800. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003.Google Scholar
Berkey, Jonathan P. The Transmission of Knowledge in Medieval Cairo: A Social History of Islamic Education. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cahen, C. “Buwayhids or Būyids.” EI2. Brill Online. Accessed July 15, 2012.Google Scholar
Cetinsaya, Gokhan. Ottoman Administration of Iraq, 1890–1908. London: Routledge, 2006.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ceylan, Abubekir. The Ottoman Origins of Modern Iraq: Political Reform, Modernization and Development in the Nineteenth-Century Middle East. London: I. B. Tauris, 2011.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cole, Juan. Sacred Space and Holy War: The Politics, Culture and History of Shiʿite Islam. London: I. B. Tauris, 2002.Google Scholar
Cole, Juan R. I., and Momen, Moojan. “Mafia, Mob and Shiism in Iraq: The Rebellion of Ottoman Karbala, 1824–1843.” Past & Present, no. 112 (1986): 112–143.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Daftary, Farhad. The Ismāʿīlīs: Their History and Doctrines. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dakake, Maria Massi. The Charismatic Community: Shiʿite Identity in Early Islam. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2007.Google Scholar
Dodge, Bayard. Al-Azhar: A Millennium of Muslim Learning. Washington, DC: Middle East Institute, 1961.Google Scholar
Dodge, Bayard. The Fihrist of al-Nadim: A Tenth-Century Survey of Muslim Culture. New York: Columbia University Press, 1970.Google Scholar
Dodge, Bayard. Muslim Education in Medieval Times. Washington, DC: Middle East Institute, 1962.Google Scholar
Ephrat, Daphna. A Learned Society in a Period of Transition: The Sunni ʿUlamaʾ of Eleventh-Century Baghdad. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000.Google Scholar
Ephrat, Daphna. “Madhhab and Madrasa in Eleventh-Century Baghdad.” In The Islamic School of Law: Evolution, Devotion, and Progress, edited by Bearman, Peri et al. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005.Google Scholar
Fakhr al-Dīn, Muḥammad Jawād. Tārīkh al-Najaf: ḥattā nihāyat al-ʿaṣr al-ʿAbbāsī. Beirut: Dār al-Rāfidayn, 2005.Google Scholar
Gharawī, Muḥammad. al-Ḥawza al-ʿilmiyya fī al-Najaf al-ashraf: dirāsa tārīkhiyya mutawāḍiʿa tabḥathu ʿan bidāyat al-jāmiʿa al-ʿilmiyya al-dīniyya fī al-Najaf al-ashraf. Beirut: Dār al-Aḍwāʾ, 1994.Google Scholar
Gharawī, Muḥammad. Maʿa ʿulamāʾ al-Najaf al-ashraf. Beirut: Dār al-Thaqalayn, 1999.Google Scholar
al-Ghurayfī, Muḥammad Riḍā al-Sayyid Muḥyī al-Dīn Mūsawī. Fikra ʿan al-ḥawza al-ʿilmiyya fī al-Najaf. Najaf: Muʾassasat al-Sayyida al-Maʿṣūma, 2008.Google Scholar
Gleave, Robert, ed. Religion and Society in Qajar Iran. New York: RoutledgeCurzon, 2005.Google Scholar
Gleave, Robert. “Shiʿi Jurisprudence during the Seljuq Period: Rebellion and Public Order in an Illegitimate State.” In The Seljuqs: Politics, Society and Culture, edited by Lange, Christian and Mecit, Songul. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2011.Google Scholar
Gleave, Robert. “The ijāza from Yūsuf al-Baḥrānī (d. 1186/1772) to Sayyid Muḥammad Mahdī (d. 1212/1797–8).” Iran 32 (1994): 115–123.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gutas, Dimitri. Greek Thought, Arabic Culture: The Graeco-Arabic Translation Movement in Baghdad and Early ʿAbbasid Society (2nd–4th/8th–10th centuries). London: Routledge, 1998.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Haider, Najam. The Origins of the Shīʿa: Identity, Ritual, and Sacred Space in Eighth-Century Kūfa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hairi, Abdul-Hadi. Shiʿism and Constitutionalism in Iran: A Study of the Role Played by the Persian Residents of Iraq in Iranian Politics. Leiden: Brill, 1977.Google Scholar
al-Ḥakīm, ʿAbd al-Hādī. Ḥawzat al-Najaf al-Ashraf: al-niẓām wa-mashārīʿ al-iṣlāh. Baghdad: Muʾassasat Afāq lil-Dirāsāt wa-al-Abḥāth al-ʿIrāqiyya, 2007.Google Scholar
Halm, Heinz. The Fatimids and their Traditions of Learning. London: I. B. Tauris, 1997.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heern, Zackery M. The Emergence of Modern Shiʿism: Islamic Reform in Iraq and Iran. London: Oneworld Publications, 2015.Google Scholar
Heern, Zackery M. “Thou Shalt Emulate the Most Knowledgeable Living Cleric: Redefinition of Islamic Law and Authority in Usuli Shiʿism.” Journal of Shiʿa Islamic Studies VII, no. 3 (2014): 321–344.Google Scholar
Hodgson, Marshall G. S. The Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilization. Vol. 2. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1974.Google Scholar
Ibn Battuta, . The Travels of Ibn Battuta. Translated by Lee, Samuel. London: Darf, 1984.Google Scholar
Ibn Manẓūr, Muḥammad Ibn Mukarram. al-Rubāʿī al-muḍāʿaf min lisān al-ʿArab li-Ibn Manẓūr. Riyadh: Dār al-Tadmuriyya, 2010.Google Scholar
Jafri, Husain M. Origins and Early Development of Shiʾa Islam. London: Longman, 1979.Google Scholar
Kadhim, Abbas. Reclaiming Iraq: The 1920 Revolution and the Founding of the Modern State. Austin, TX: University of Austin Press, 2012.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kashmīrī, Muḥammad ʿAlī. Nujūm al-samāʾ fī tarājim al-ʿulamāʾ: sharh-e hal-e ʿulamaʾ-ye Shiʿeh-ye qarnha-ye 11–13. Tehran: Amir Kabir, 2003.Google Scholar
Kibari, ʿAlireza Sayyid. Howzeha-ye ʿelmiyyeh-ye Shiʿa dar gostareh-ye jahan. Tehran: Amir Kabir, 2000.Google Scholar
Kohlberg, Etan. A Medieval Muslim Scholar at Work: Ibn Ṭāwūs and his Library. Leiden: Brill, 1992.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kraemer, Joel L. Humanism in the Renaissance of Islam: The Cultural Revival During the Buyid Age. Leiden: Brill, 1986.Google Scholar
Lassner, Jacob. “Massignon and Baghdad: The Complexities of Growth in an Imperial City.” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 9, no. 1/2 (1966).Google Scholar
Lambton, Anne. “Internal Structure of the Saljūq Empire.” In The Cambridge History of Iran. Vol. V. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968.Google Scholar
Leiser, Gary. “The Madrasa and the Islamization of the Middle East: The Case of Egypt.” Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt 22 (1985): 29–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Litvak, Meir. “Continuity and Change in the Ulama Population of Najaf and Karbala, 1791–1904: A Socio-Demographic Study.” Iranian Studies 23, no. ¼ (1990): 31–60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Litvak, Meir. Shiʿi Scholars of Nineteenth-Century Iraq: The ʿUlamaʾ of Najaf and Karbalaʾ. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.Google Scholar
Louer, Laurence. Transnational Shia Politics: Religious and Political Networks in the Gulf. New York: Columbia University Press, 2008.Google Scholar
Makdisi, George. “Muslim Institutions of Learning in Eleventh-Century Baghdad.” BSOAS 24, no. 1 (1961).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Makdisi, George. The Rise of Colleges: Institutions of Learning in Islam and the West. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1981.Google Scholar
al-Maqrīzī, . Kitāb al-Khiṭaṭ al-Maqrīziyya, Part 4. al-Nil Press, 1906.Google Scholar
Marcinkowski, Muhammad Ismail. “Rapprochement and Fealty during the Būyids and Early Saljūqs: The Life and Times of Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥasan al-Ṭūsī.” Islamic Studies 40, no. 2 (2001): 273–296.Google Scholar
Marjānī, Ḥaydar. al-Najaf al-ashraf qadīman wa-ḥadīthan. Baghdad: Jamʿiyyat al-Tawjīh al-Dīnī, 1986.Google Scholar
Markaz, Karbalāʾ lil-Buḥūth wa-al-Dirāsāt. al-Najaf al-ashraf: ishāmāt fī al-ḥaḍāra al-insāniyya: waqāʾiʿ al-nadwa al-ʿilmiyya allatī ʿaqadahā markaz Karbalāʾ lil-buḥūth wa-al-dirāsāt fī Landan. London: Būk Ikstrā, 2000.Google Scholar
al-Mashhadī, Muḥammad ʿAlī Hāshimī. al-Ḥawza al-ʿilmiyya tudīn al-inḥirāf. Beirut: Dār al-Ḥusaynī lil-Maṭbūʿāt, 2001.Google Scholar
Mervin, Sabrina. “La quete du savoir a Najaf: Les etudes religieuses chz les chiʾites imamites de la fin du xixc siecle a I960.” Studia Islamica 81, no. 1 (1995).Google Scholar
Momen, Moojan. An Introduction to Shiʿi Islam: The History and Doctrines of Twelver Shiʿism. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985.Google Scholar
Mottahedeh, Roy P. Loyalty and Leadership in an Early Islamic Society. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1980.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mottahedeh, Roy P. The Mantle of the Prophet: Religion and Politics in Iran. Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 2002.Google Scholar
Mottahedeh, Roy P. “The Najaf Ḥawzah Curriculum.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 26, no. 1/2 (2016): 341–351.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moussavi, Ahmed Kazemi. “The Institutionalization of Marjaʿ-i Taqlid in the Nineteenth Century Shiʿite Community.” The Muslim World 83 (1994): 279–299.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Muḥammad, Suʿād Māhir. Mashhad al-Imām ʿAlī fī al-Najaf wa-mā bihi min al-hadāyā wa-al-tuḥaf. Cairo: Dār al-Maʿārif, 1969.Google Scholar
Nakash, Yitzhak. “The Conversion of Iraq’s Tribes to Shiʿism.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 26, no. 3 (1994): 443–463.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nakash, Yitzhak. The Shiʿis of Iraq. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nakash, Yitzhak. “The Visitation of the Imams and the Shiʿi Mujtahids in the Early Twentieth Century.” Studia Islamica, no. 81 (1995).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nashabe, Hisham. Muslim Educational Institutions: A General Survey followed by a Monographic Study of al-madrasah al-Mustansiriyah in Baghdad. Beirut: Librairie du Liban, 1989.Google Scholar
Newman, Andrew J. The Formative Period of Twelver Shiʿism: Hadith as Discourse between Qum and Baghdad. Richmond: Curzon, 2000.Google Scholar
Peacock, A. C. S. Early Seljuq History: A New Interpretation. London: Routledge, 2010.Google Scholar
Peacock, A. C. S. The Great Seljuk Empire. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2015.Google Scholar
al-Qazwini, Jawdat. “The School of Najaf.” In Ayatollahs, Sufis, and Ideologues: State, Religion and Social Movements in Iraq, edited by Jabar, Faleh. London: Saqi Books, 2002.Google Scholar
Ramyar, Mahmud. “Shaikh Ṭūsī: The Life and Works of a Shiʿite Leader.” PhD diss., University of Edinburgh, 1977.Google Scholar
Rifāʿī, ʿAbd al-Jabbār. Tatawwur al-dars al-falsafī fī al-ḥawza al-ʿilmiyya. Beirut: Dār al-Hādī, 2005.Google Scholar
Safi, Omid. The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam: Negotiating Ideology and Religious Inquiry. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2006.Google Scholar
al-Ṣāliḥī, ʿAbd al-Ḥusayn. al-Ḥawzāt al-ʿilmiyya fī al-aqṭār al-Islāmiyya. Beirut: Bayt al-ʿIlm lil-Nābihīn, 2004.Google Scholar
Schmidtke, Sabine. “Forms and Functions of ‘Licences to Transmit’ (Ijāzas) in 18th-Century-Iran: ʿAbd Allāh Al-Mūsawī Al-Jazāʾirī al-Tustarī’s (1112–73/1701–59) Ijāza Kabīra.” In Speaking for Islam: Religious Authorities in Muslim Societies, edited by Kramer, Gundur and Schmidtke, Sabine. Leiden: Brill, 2006.Google Scholar
Sindawi, Khalid. “Ḥawza Instruction and Its Role in Shaping Modern Shiʿite Identity: The Ḥawzas of al-Najaf and Qumm as a Case Study.” Middle Eastern Studies 43, no. 6 (2007): 831–856.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stewart, Devin J. “The Portrayal of an Academic Rivalry: Najaf and Qum in the Writings and Speeches of Khomeini, 1964–78.” In The Most Learned of the Shiʿi: The Institution of the Marjaʿ Taqlid, edited by Walbridge, Linda S. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001.Google Scholar
Stewart, Devin J. “The Structure of the Fihrist: Ibn al-Nadim as Historian of Islamic Legal and Theological Schools.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 39, no. 3 (2007): 369–387.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tabaa, Yasser and Mervin, Sabrina. Najaf: The Gate of Wisdom: History, Heritage and Significance of the Holy City of the Shiʿa. UNESCO Publishing, 2014.Google Scholar
Takim, Liyakat. The Heirs of the Prophet: Charisma and Religious Authority in Shiʿite Islam. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2006.Google Scholar
Tehrani, Aqa Bozorg. Ṭabaqāt aʿlām al-Shīʿa wa-huwa al-nābis (5th–8th centuries). Beirut: Dār al-Kitāb al-ʿArabī, 1971.Google Scholar
Tehrani, Aqa Bozorg. Zendeginameh-ye Shaykh-e Tusi. Tehran: Farhangestan-e Adab va Honar-e Iran, 1982.Google Scholar
Teixeira, Pedro. The Travels of Pedro Teixeira: With His “Kings of Harmuz” and Extracts from His ‘Kings of Persia’. Translated by Sinclair, William F. London: Hakluyt Society, 1902.Google Scholar
Tibawi, A. L. “The Origins and Character of the Madrasa,” BSOAS 25 (1962): 225–238.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
al-Ṭūsī, Abī Jaʿfar Muḥammad Ibn al-Ḥasan Ibn ʿAlī. al-Nihāya fī mujarrad al-fiqh wa-al-fatāwā. Tehran: Chapkhaneh-ye Daneshgah, 1963.Google Scholar
al-Ṭūsī, Muḥammad Ibn al-Ḥasan. al-Fihrist. Iran: al-Muʾassasa, 1996.Google Scholar
al-Ṭūsī, Muḥammad Ibn al-Ḥasan. Amālī al-Shaykh al-Ṭūsī: qaddama lahu Muḥammad Ṣādiq Baḥr al-ʿUlūm. Baghdad: al-Maktaba al-Ahliyya, 1964.Google Scholar
Uqaylī, Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ibn ʿAlī Ibn Muḥammad Ḥirz al-Dīn al-Muslimī. Tārīkh al-Najaf al-ashraf: hadhdhabahu wa-zāda ʿalayhi ʿAbd al-Razzāq Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ḥirz al-Dīn. Qom: Dalil Ma, 2006.Google Scholar
Waines, David. The Odyssey of Ibn Battuta: Uncommon Tales of a Medieval Adventurer. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2010.Google Scholar
Walbridge, Linda S., ed. The Most Learned of the Shiʿi: The Institution of the Marjaʿ Taqlid. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walker, Paul E. “Fatimid Institutions of Learning.” Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt 34 (1997).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wehr, Hans. A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic: (Arabic–English). Edited by Cowan, Milton. Ithaca, NY: Spoken Language Services, 1994.Google Scholar