Islamo-biblical and pseudepigraphical texts

IN PROGRESS 2009-10

Stephen Lambden (Ohio University), Athens, Ohio.

 Pseudepigrapha (pl. “falsely ascribed writings”) and related terms have a range of meanings. Definitions are in a state of flux (Chazon, Stone, 1999). One basic sense is texts ascribed to past prophets, sages or worthies. Note in this connection the seminal Reeves (1994 ed. ) volume and the Wasserstrom article as well as his 2000  article in Hary et, al., ed. and other related seminal papers. The Pseudepigrapha are not simply “pseudo-writings” but highly valuable non-canonical Jewish or Christian (or other) texts commonly ascribed to biblical worthies. A pseudepigraphon is a pseudynonymous work of this kind.  Islamic generated pseudepigrapha are sometimes new reflections of the Jewish or Christian Bibles which often exhibit a distinctly Islamic universe of discourse. They are neo-biblical yet post-biblical or meta biblical. They may echo or mirror the Biblical text(s) but express an Islamic intertextuality or metatextuality  that passes beyond mere borrowing.

        The Islamic psedepdigrapha include texts ascribed to Adam, Noah, Abraham and Moses and numerous later pseudepigraphal writings including recensions of a Kitāb al malāḥim li Dāniyāl (The Book of the Conflagration of Daniel) Shī`ī recensions of which include one with an introduction by Muhammad Baqir Majlisī’s pupil Ni`mat Allāh al Jazā’irī (d. 1112/1701)  transmitted by Radi al-Din Ibn Ṭāwūs (d. 664/1226). Shī`ī tradition has it that knowledge of the cryptic predictions in the Malḥamat Dāniyāl induced the Sunnī Caliphs Abū Bakr and `Umar to gain successorship after the passing of Muhammad (Fodor 1974:85ff; Kohlberg 1992:143).

        Pseudepigraphon ascribed to biblical and/or qur’anic figures exist in Islam as in Judaism and Christianity. Their presence and significance in Islam remains little studied; most texts remaining unread and unpublished (Sadan, in Sharon, ed. 1986: 373ff). Works in this category were considered important enough to be ascribed to past sages and prophet figures as Adam, Enoch, Hermes, Moses, Solomon, Daniel, Jesus and others. Examples include a proto-qur’anic Munājāt Mūsā  (“Supplications of Moses”) and even an Islamic Tawrāt  (“Torah”) divided, like the Qur’ān,  into sūrahs! Such Islamo-biblical recreations of pre-Islamic scripture are worthy of serioud scholarly attention. They can be viewed as the fruits of a creative scriptural symbiosis among diverse “people of the Book” and should not be dismissively or derisively ignored as merely pseudo-biblical literary phenomenon.

            These citations sometimes parallel Jewish Aramaic Targumic renderings which translate and make the Biblical Hebrew text meaningful for succeeding generations. Islamo-biblical and neo-biblical texts are no more “false” than Christian recreations or re-translations of texts of the Jewish, Hebrew Bible for apologetic and interpretive purposes. Related Abrahamic religions shared in being, to use a qur’ānic expression,   “peoples of the Book” (Ar. ahl al-kitāb).  As Christianity expanded and interpreted anew the Hebrew Bible, in like manner, some Muslims both broke with and re-scripturalized aspects of their biblical and extra-biblical heritage. They cited the Bible in new patterns and configurations, utilizing an Islamic hermeneutic.  Some pious Muslims even showed their continuing love for the Bible by composing neo-Islamic equivalentsof biblical texts such as  an Islamic “Tawrāt” (= Torah, Pentateuch, Bible), Zabūr (Psalter; Psalms) and Injīl (Evangelion; Gospel[s])  Others, unable to abandon their Abrahamic scriptural legacy, attributed portions of it in new registers to Muhammad or other Muslim Imams, sages and worthies. Of this there are thousands of examples.                     

        Though genuine manuscripts representative of the early Arabic bible translation are few, Islamic pseudepigraphical texts and writings are numerous. Some Muslims claim to have rediscovered or creatively invented allegedly "genuine" texts or portions of the  tawrat (Pentateuch) of Moses, the zabūr  ("Psalms") of David, the injīl  (Gospel) of Jesus as well as and other books ascribed to pre‑Islamic prophets such as David.  A modern example is the so-called “Gospel of Barnabas”.

 

 

The Pseudepigrapha

 

DiTommaso, Lorenzo 

  • 2001 A bibliography of Pseudepigrapha research 1850-1999 (= Journal for the study of the Pseudepigrapha. Supplement series 39 ) . Sheffield : Sheffield Academic Press, 2001 1067 pp. ; 24 cm. ISBN 1841272132 / 1841272027

 

NAG HAMMADI TEXTS

Robinson, J.M.

  • 1972-84 (ed.), The Facsimile Edition of the Nag Hammadi Codices, 12 vols.; Leiden, 1972-84.
  • 1996 Nag Hammadi: The First Fifty Years (New York, 1996);
  • 1988 3rd ed., The Nag Hammadi Library in English. San Francisco

Scholer, D.M.

  • 1971 Nag Hammadi Bibliography, 1948-1969. Leiden: Brill. 1971

 

 

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

Fodor, A.

·  `Malhamat Daniyal.’  In The Muslim East, Studies in Honour of Julius Germanus.  Ed. Gy. Kaldy-Nagy.  Budapest, 1974, 85-133, plus 26 pages of reproduction of the anonymous Najaf n.d. ed. of  Malhamat Danīyal.

Khātūnābādī, Muhammad Bāqir ibn Ismā`īl Ḥusaynī  

· Tarjamih-yi anājil-i arba`ih. Ed. Rasūl Jāfaryān (= Persian Literature and Linguistics 10).Tehran: Nuqṭih Press, 1375/1996 

Leder, S et al. eds.

· 2002 Studies in Arabic and Islam, Proceedings of the 19th Congress, Union Européenne des Arabisants et Islamisants, Halle 1998. (= Orientalia Louvaniensia Analecta -108-) Paris-Sterling, VA : Uitgeveru Peeters. viii+541 pp. : ill. ; 25 cm. 

Lee, Samuel (d. 1852).

  • 1824 Controversial Tracts on Christianity and Mohammedanism by the late Rev. Henry Martyn, B.D... and some of the most eminent writers of Persia translated and explained.  Cambridge: Cambridge: J. Smith, 1824.

Sadan, J.

·  1986 ‘Some Literary Problems concerning Judaism and Jewry in Medieval Arabic Sources.  In Studies in Islamic History and Civilization in Honour of Professor David Ayalon. Ed. Moshe Sharon. 353-394, Jerusalem: Cana.

Reeves, John. C., ed.

· 1994 Tracing the Threads, Studies in the Vitality of Jewish Pseudepigrapha. Atlanta, Georgia: Scholars Press.

·  2004 (ed.) Bible and Quran: Essays in Scriptural Intertextuality.  Leiden,  New York: Brill Academic.

Wasserstrom, S. M.

· 1992 ` Who were the Jewish Sectarians under Early Islam?’  in Menahem Mor (ed.)  Jewsih Sects, Religious Movements and Political Parties.  Omaha, Nebraska : Creighton University Press, pp. 101-112.

· 1994 `Jewish Pseudepigrapha in Muslim Literature: A Biographical and Methodological Sketch’ in Reeves ed., 87-114... 

· 1994 [IOS] “The Šhī`īs are the Jews of our Community”, IOS XIV (1994). Leiden: Brill.

·  1995 Between Muslim and Jew: the problem of symbiosis under early Islam.  Princeton: Princeton University Press.

·  1997 [IOS] ‘Šahrastānī on the Magāriyya.’  In Israel Oriental Studies XVII: Dhimmis and Others: Jews and Christians and the World of Classical Islam.  Ed. Uri Rubin and David J. Wasserstein.  Tel Aviv: Eisenbrauns, Inc.

  • 2000  article in Hary et, al., ed.  ADD THIS

THE ISLAMO-BIBLICAL `GOSPEL OF BARNABAS'.

The 222 chapter (200+ page) “Gospel of Barnabas”  (= GB) ascribed to a Christian companion of Paul originally named Joses then Barnabas (fl. 1st cent CE., Acts 4:36, Chs. 11-15). It is essentially a 16th century CE Islamic created Gospel harmony extant in only  a few 16-17th mss. of Spanish and Italian Morisco (Crypto-Muslim) provenance. Most likely without any ancient mss. basis the so-called Gospel of Barnabas' has been frequently reprinted and translated in the Muslim world (Arabic, 1908; Urdu, 1916; Persian 19XX, etc). This from the 1907 English translation of an Italian MS. in the Imperial Library at Vienna by Lonsdale and Laura Ragg but without the critical introduction in which this text is exposed as a Medieval forgery. Many Muslims today view the GB as the only remaining authentic Gospel despite the fact that western scholarship has for long remained unconvinced of its veracity (Ragg, 1907; Sox, 1984; Slomp, URL)A massive literature now surrounds the debate over this and related issues of scriptural preservation, transmission, falsification and veracity. Abrahamic religionists have long accused each other of tampering with sacred writ and of misquoting established scripture to suit selfish or polemical purposes.

Ragg, Laura and Lonsdale.

  • 1907 The Gospel of Barnabas. Oxford: Clarendon, 1907. Translation of the Italian mss.
  •  

Bernabé Pons, Luis F. ( Spanish manuscript =)

Luis F. Bernabe Pons, 1992> In Spanish:

  • Luis F. Bernabé Pons, Edicio  n y estudio del manuscrito EspanÄ ol del Evangelio de Bernabe . Evangelio hispano-isla mico de autor morisco (siglos XVI-XVII). (Alicante: Ph.D. thesis 1992);

  • El Evangelio de San Bernabé : un evangelio islamico espanÄ ol (Alicante: University Press 1995).

  • El texto morisco del Evangelio de San Bernabé. Granada: Universidad de Granada e Instituto de Cultura Juan Gil Albert, 1998.

    • El texto morisco del Evangelio de San Bernabé Granada: Universidad de Granada, 1998.

    Luis F. Bernabe Pons,

    •  ' Zur Wahrheit und Echtheit des Barnabasevangeliums , Religionen im GespraÈ ch vol. 4 (1996), p. 133-188.

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    Campbell,  William.

    • The Gospel of Barnabas, Its True Value (Rawalpindi: Christian Study Centre, 1989).

    Hvalvik, Reidar.

    • The Struggle for Scripture and Covenant. The Purpose of the Epistle of Barnabas and Jewish-Christian Competition in the Second Century Tubingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1996.

    Cirillo, Luigi + Michel Frémaux,

    • Évangile de Barnabé. Paris: Beauchesne, 1977.  A  facsimile of the Italian manuscript+ French translation.

    Luigi Cirillo and Michel Frémaux,

    •  Evangile de Barnabe  , Recherches sur le composition et l’origine. Texte et traduction. Paris: Beauchesne, 1977.

    van Koningsveld, P. S. 

    • `The Islamic Image of Paul and the Origin of the Gospel of Barnabas' , Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam vol. 20 (1996), p. 218. 23.

    Mikel de Epalza,

    • ' Sobre un posible autor espanÄ ol del evangelio de Barnabe ' , al-Andalus (Madrid) vol. 28 (1963), p. 479- 491.
    •  'Le milieu hispano-moresque de l’Evangile islamisant de Barnabe' , Islamochristiana vol. 8 (1982), p. 159-183.

    John Fletcher,

    • “The Spanish Gospel of Barnabas,” Novum Testamentum 18 (1976) 314–20.

    Jan Joosten, 2001-2

    • "Tatian's Diatessaron and the Old Testament Peshitta" Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 120, No. 3 (Autumn, 2001), 501-523

    • "The Gospel of Barnabas and the Dietessaron" Harvard Theological Review 95.1 (2002), 73-96.
       

    Jomier, Jaques

    •  `Une enigme persistante: l’Evangile dit de Barnabe ' , MIDEO vol. 14 (1980), p. 271± 300

    Leirvik, Oddbjùrn

    • `History as a Literary Weapon: The Gospel of Barnabas in Muslim-Christian Polemics' Studia Theologica 54 (2001), pp. 4-26.
    •  

    Slomp, Jan

    Slomp, Jan.

    • "The Gospel in Dispute." Islamochristiana 4 (1977): 67-112.
       

    Sox, David.

    • The Gospel of Barnabas (London: Allen & Unwin 1984).
    • 1984 The Gospel of Barnabas. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1984.

    Stichel, Rainer.

    • "Bemerkungen żum Barnabás-Evangélium." Byzantinoslavica 43 (1982): 189-201.
       

    Prigent, Pierre.

    • Les testimonia dans le christianisme primitif I. 'Épître de Barnabe Í-XVI  et ses sources. Paris: Gabalda, 196l.
       

    Pulcini, Theodore.

    • ` In the Shadow of Mount Carmel: the Collapse of the’Latin East’ and the Origins of the Gospel of Barnabas' , Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations vol. 12 , no. 2 (2001), 191- 209.

    Sale, George.

    • The Koran: commonly called the Alcoran of Mohammed; translated into English immediately from the original Arabic, with explanatory notes, taken from the most approved commentators, to which is prefixed a preliminary discourse, by George Sale, Gent. London: William Tegg, 1863, See  sect. IV, p. 53.

    Temple Gairdner, W. H.

    • The Gospel of Barnabas. An Essay and Enquiry. Cairo, 1907.

    Toland, John.

    • Christianity Not Mysterious. London. 1696.
    • Nazarenus or Jewish, Gentile and Mahometan
    • Christianity. London, 1718.
    • Tetradymus. London, 1720.

     "John Toland, Christianity Not Mysterious (London 1696) had a rationalistic understanding of the miracles narrated in the New Testament. In his work Nazarenus he attributes at the same time a great probability to the Gospel of Barnabas going back to the very first centuries A.D.: John Toland, Nazarenus or Jewish, Gentile and Mahometan Christianity (London 1718). He defended the Gospel of Barnabas against the common charge from the Christian side as being a willful forgery of a renegade of the Middle Ages: "How great ... is the ignorance of those, who make this an original invention of the Mahometans." J. Toland, Nazarenus, p. 17. Or: "After this mature examination I could safely say, that this Gospel might in the main be the ancient Gospel of Barnabas." J. Toland, Tetradymus (London 1720), p. 148." (Schirmacher, in Wardenburg, 1999: 278).
     

    Wiegers, Gerard A. 

    • 'Muhammad as the Messiah. A comparison of the polemical works of Juan Alfonso with the Gospel of Barnabas' , Bibliotheca Orientalis vol. LII, no. 3- 4 (1995),

     

     

    Miscellaneous editions of the Gospel of Barnabas.

    • The Gospel of Barnabas. Daru'l Kitab. M. Z. Sharfi, Karachi, Pakistan, 1988 (xxxiii + 229pp.).
    • The Gospel of Barnabas. Foreward by Muhammad Armiya Nu`man. Brooklyn, New York, A & B Publishers Group, 1993 (xxvii + 273pp.).

     

    Islamic Apologetic materials

    Durrani, M.H.

    • The Forgotten Gospel of  St. Barnabas. Karachi: International Islamic Publishers, 1982 (125pp.)

    Yussef,  M. E.  (ed.),

    • The Gospel of Barnabas. Indianapolis: American Trust Publications, 1990.
    • The Dead Sea Scrolls, The Gospel of Barnabas and the New Testament. Indianapolis: American Trust Publications, 1990.