JOURNAL OF ARABIC AND ISLAMIC STUDIES

Pavel Pavlovitch
and then adds a second clause describing the exact punishment to
be meted out to each category of transgressors.
3. In its second clause, the maxim digresses from Shuʿba’s version
by preferring genitive compounds to the verbal forms used by
Shuʿba. The locution rajm un bi-l-ḥijāra is a clear reference to the
version of Yaḥyā b. Saʿīd al-Qaṭṭān.
JAIS
ONLINE
199
Do these features allow us to conclude that Ibn Abī ʿArūba is a CL,
notwithstanding the rather negative evidence of the isnāds? I have noted
that Yaḥyā b. Saʿīd al-Qaṭṭān relates his non-revelation tradition on the
authority Saʿīd b. Abī ʿArūba. Another important CL in the non-
revelation cluster, Shuʿba b. al-Ḥajjāj, was acquainted with Ibn Abī
ʿArūba and together with him and Hishām al-Dastuwāʾī was regarded as
one of the most reliable transmitters from Qatāda b. Diʿāma. 125 Given
that neither Shuʿba (d. 160/776) nor al-Qaṭṭān (d. 198/813) appear to
have been familiar with the revelation version, Saʿīd b. Abī ʿArūba (d.
156/772) would have been hardly so. One may think that if Ibn Abī
ʿArūba should be treated as al-Qaṭṭān’s actual informant and that he
knew a tradition that was confined to the dual-penalty maxim. The
revelation preamble would have been attached to Ibn Abī ʿArūba’s
tradition much later, perhaps only after the death of al-Qaṭṭān.
Alternatively, al-Qaṭṭān may have forged his isnād through Ibn Abī
ʿArūba. In this case we face considerable problems, as the isnāds of the
revelation traditions that pass through Ibn Abī ʿArūba do not reveal but a
single (S)CL, Yazīd b. Zurayʿ. By any standard, this is far from
sufficient to substantiate conjectures about the wording of Ibn Abī
ʿArūba’s matn. It should be noted that the constituent traditions of the
Ibn Abī ʿArūba cluster, albeit taking advantage of a resembling wording
and a similar set of revelation imagery, draw exclusively on external
narrative material. The penal maxim is entirely dependent on the nonrevelation
cluster. As noted, the revelation preamble is a highly
fictionalized narrative. Units of expression like idhā nazala/nuzzila
ʿalay-hi, tarabbada wajh u -hu, kuriba li-dhālika and fa-lammā surriya
ʿan-hu are widespread in the Muslim exegetical and juristic literature.
They are commonly used to describe the theophany and may not be
treated as unique to any specific tradition. Nevertheless, it is possible to
divide the revelation preamble into two textual layers. The first one
includes the symptoms of revelation (tarabbada wajh u -hu, kuriba li-
125 Al-Mizzī, Tahdhīb al-Kamāl, 11:9.