0021-1818_islam_98-1-2-i-259

146 Daniella Talmon-Heller, Raquel Ukeles
gid and Ayyubid dynasties than as a moralist, 28 targets a number of customs he
claims to have been mistakenly regarded as pious acts – from unwarranted minute
technical details of Qur’an recitation, to the introduction of congregational
prayers on the basis of fabricated hadith. While in some cases Abu Shama is prepared
to accord the status of a commendable innovation to a meritorious act
of piety, 29 he devotes a long chapter to the refutation of the popular notion that
salat al-ragha#ib is meritorious, meanwhile relating the history of its undeserved
success. 30
Four other Damascene scholars devoted their energies to combatting this
success. The grammarian Diya# al-D\n Ibn al-Ath\r 31 deals with it in a rather unexpected
place: in the chapter devoted to the rhetorical device of itnab (exaggeration)
of his guidebook for the study of rhetoric, al-Mathal al-sa#ir. Here, the
prayer of great rewards is mentioned in a certificate of appointment of a muhtasib
(the supervisor of public morals), 32 as one of the nominee’s future targets in his
struggle against innovations.
After having been designated as the preacher of the Friday sermon (khatib) in
the Umayyad Mosque of Damascus, ^Izz al-D\n al-Sulam\ launched his campaign
for the revivification of the sunna and the killing-off of bida^ in Damascus with an
oral attack on the prayer of great rewards, delivered from the pulpit. He then published
a written „Call to abstain from salat al-ragha#ib,” where he argues that the
prayer cannot be regarded as a commendable innovation, as it violates several
legal prescriptions and accepted norms. 33 For example, the prayer violated the
Prophet’s decree that the eve before Friday should not be singled out for prayer.
Or, as an example of how salat al-ragha#ib broke the norms of prayer, al-Sulam\
declares that the multiple repetitions of surat al-ikhlas and surat al-qadar and excessive
prayer rak^as contradicted the normative mode of praying with stillness
Innovation, and the Construction of Knowledge in the Medieval Near East,” Past and Present 146
(1995): 38–6; Ukeles, Innovation, esp. 96–117.
28 On Abu Shama and his work, see L. Pouzet, “Abu Åama (599–665/1203–1268) et la société
damascaine de son temps,” BEO 37–38 (1988): 115–126; K. Hirschler, “Social Contexts of
Medieval Arabic Historical Writing: Court Scholars Versus Ideal/Withdrawn Scholars – Ibn Wasil
and Abu Åama,” in Egypt and Syria in the Fatimid, Ayyubid and Mamluk Eras, vol. 4, ed. U. Vermeulen
and J. van Steenbergen, Leuven 2005, 311–332.
29 Ukeles, Innovation, 103.
30 See text # 7–9, 13, 22.
31 On Diya# al-D\n, the brother of the famous historian ^Izz al-D\n Ibn al-Ath\r, see Cl. Cahen,
“La correspondence de Diya# al-D\n ibn al-Ath\r,” BSOAS 14 (1952): 34–43; F. Rosenthal, “Ibn al-
Ath\r,” EI 2 3: 724–25.
32 On hisba, see R. P. Buckley, The Book of the Islamic Market Inspector, Oxford 1999.
33 See text # 22–23.