JOURNAL OF ARABIC AND ISLAMIC STUDIES

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Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies 11 (2011)
simple and uniform core variant: anna l-nabiyy a , ṣalʿam, unzila ʿalay-hi
[l-waḥy u ]/ ūḥiya ilā l-nabī, ṣalʿam. This variant may be attributed to
Qatāda b. Diʿāma. In comparison to the variants of the preamble found
in the Saʿīd b. Abī ʿArūba cluster, their counterparts in the Qatāda b.
Diʿāma cluster reveal a lesser degree of fictionalization and may be
associated with the CL with a higher degree of confidence.
Second, a considerable number of the preamble variants through
Qatāda are grammatically disconnected from the prophetic dictum.
Furthermore, they do not state unambiguously that the notion of
revelation relates to the dual-penalty maxim. The obvious cleavage
between the preamble and the following prophetic dictum may be
thought as an indication of two independent traditions having been
merged into a single narrative.
Third, whereas the traditions on the authority of Ibn Abī ʿArūba
almost invariably draw on the dual-penalty maxim as found in the
traditions of Shuʿba b. al-Ḥajjāj and Yaḥyā b. Saʿīd al-Qaṭṭān, there are
no traces of al-Qaṭṭān’s rajm un bi-l-ḥijāra in the Qatāda cluster. In fact,
the latter lacks the uniformity of the dictum variants that pass through
Ibn Abī ʿArūba. At times we stumble at the Shuʿba version (Muʿādh b.
Hishām), at others we find the Hushaym b. Bashīr version (ʿAbd al-
Razzāq and al-ʿAlāʾ b. ʿAbd al-Jabbār), and in still others we face
instances of compound narratives that draw on features specific of both
Shuʿba and Hushaym (Ibn Ḥanbal and al-Ṭabarānī).
References to the wording of Shuʿba and Hushaym may in general be
considered as an indication of an earlier provenance compared to
narrative features specific of Shuʿba’s and Yaḥyā b. Saʿīd al-Qaṭṭān’s
matns. In particular, however, one expects to find in the Qatāda cluster a
far more consistent bearing on the Shuʿba tradition. Shuʿba, it will be
recalled, is the earliest CL in the non-revelation cluster; his wording
therefore should bear the closest relationship to the wording of the dualpenalty
maxim that would have been circulated by Qatāda b. Diʿāma.
A far greater problem is that Shuʿba, who quotes Qatāda directly and
should have been well aware of his version, does not cite the revelation
preamble. As we have seen, the same goes for al-Qaṭṭān with respect to
Ibn Abī ʿArūba. How can one reconcile the versions of Shuʿba and al-
Qaṭṭān, which exclude the revelation preamble, with the versions of their
informants, Ibn Abī ʿArūba and Qatāda, which include the preamble?
Was the revelation preamble as we know it part of the traditions that
might have circulated in the first half of the second century AH or even
earlier? Let us turn to the cluster of al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī for a possible
answer