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

156 Daniella Talmon-Heller, Raquel Ukeles
noting down acts of obedience and erasing sins. And whoever attends [these festivals]
intending only to pass through the mosque at night and to meet friends for
obscene and immoral behavior belongs to the later (khalaf, i.e., evil) generation
of men who have neglected [obligatory] prayer and followed their desires. You
should send people to teach them a painful lesson and give them a beating so that
their eyes fill with reverence and their hearts with the fear of God. May the houses
of God become purified from such contamination; they had not been built for evil
men but for the people, and should be attended only by those who kneel and
prostrate, or who remember and praise the Lord. 68
15) Men who want to exert themselves („athletes for God”) adopt it enthusiastically
Ibn al-Jawz\ (d. 597/1200): The one who fabricated it achieved something creative
(abda^a, [a play on bid^a]), for one who prays it is required to fast [beforehand],
better yet on a very hot day, and if he fasts then he cannot eat until he prays
the evening prayer (maghrib), and then he would have to stand for [the ragha#ib
prayer], with its long praise utterances (tasbih) and long prostration cycles, and
he would suffer greatly! But I am jealous for Ramadan and its night prayer (tarawih):
how can it compete (zuhima) with this! Yet this [prayer] is considered to be
greater and more beautiful by the masses, and even those who do not attend the
[normative] congregational prayers attend it. 69
The Debate About the H · adīth
16) The identity of the supposed fabricator
Ibn al-Jawz\: ^Al\ b. ^Abdallah b. Jahdam [d. 414/1023], Abu al-0asan the Sufi,
author of Splendor of the Secrets (Bahjat al-Asrar), was the shaykh of the Sufis and
passed away in Mecca. 70 He was known to be a liar (kadhdhab) and it was said that
he fabricated [the hadith about] salat al-ragha#ib. Our teacher Ibn Nasir informed
68 Ibn al-Ath\r, al-Mathal al-sa#ir fi adab al-katib wa-l-sha^ir, Cairo 1939, 2: 150; included also
in Qalqashand\, Subh al-a^sha fi sina^at al-insha#, ed. M.H. Shams al-D\n, Beirut 1987–88, 11:
67–70. For commentary on the text see I. Goldziher, Muslim Studies, ed. and trans. S.M. Stern
and C.R. Barber, London 1967, 1:235.
69 Ibn al-Jawz\, al-Mawdu^at, 2:48. On Ibn al-Jawz\’s attitude towards bid^a see, Ukeles, Innovation,
98–99.
70 Shaykh al-sufiyya bi-haram Makka, according to Ibn Hajar, Lisan al-Mizan, ed. M. A. al-
Mar^ashal\, Beirut 1995, 5: 47.