A fundamental question in the field of classical Arabic literature is the nature of the link between the oral and the written. I submit that the prime locus of this link centers in the complex relationship between the oration (khuá¹bah) and the chancery epistle (risÄlah).1 In the late 2nd/8th century, as the society began its move from a predominantly oral to a highly literate milieu, the orationâs once powerful reach waned swiftly. But as the orationâs dominance declined in the face of the epistleâs ascendancy, it left behind a powerful legacy in the enduring saga of Arabic prose. A written form of the Friday and Eid sermon that perpetuated many conventions of the oral period continued to be declaimed on a regular basis from the pulpits of the Muslim world. Even more significantly, oral period oration enormously influenced the art and idiom of written artistic prose. Many of its functions were transferred onto the chancery epistle, and its style, structure, and themes penetrated the newly emerging genre, infusing it with a rhythmic and graphic aesthetic derived from oral mnemonics. As the first written prose form in Arabic, which gained currency in the late Umayyad period, the epistle continued the parallelism and themes of early oration, but had longer sentences and more complex syntax, and eventually full consonant rhyme. Through the epistle, oration would have a continuing impact on evolving genres of written Arabic prose.
In the following pages, I grapple with these intricate issues and interdependent relationships: I first frame the societyâs transformation from an oral to a writing culture. I then examine the influence of early oration texts on medieval scribes (kuttÄb, sing. kÄtib) and preachers, and the convergent styles of epistle and sermon and their divergent functions, assessing religious versus political utility. I close with remarks on oratorical influence on the maqÄmÄt prose genre and on literary theory. Overall, this chapter teases out strands of oral-written hybridity in post oral-period literature, while also establishing the essential influence of oration on the development of Arabic prose.
Scholars of medieval Muslim oration have analyzed important historical and thematic religio-political aspects. Paul Walker provides an anthology of Friday and Eid sermons from the 4th/10th- to 6th/12th-century Fatimid dynasty of North Africa and Egypt. Linda Jones focuses on different kinds of Muslim preaching in Spain from the 6th/12th through the 9th/15th centuries. Jonathan Berkey discusses preaching in the same time period, particularly in Egypt, as a manifestation of the flowering of popular Sufi practices. Daniella Talmon-Heller examines the battle-theme orientation of Friday sermons at the time of the Crusades in 6th/12th- and 7th/13th-century Syria under the Zangids and Ayyubids. Scholars of the Abbasid period have also done a tremendous amount of work on various aspects of its literary scene. I draw on these studies for insights on medieval Muslim preaching, while relying on the chancery and literary-critical works of the period to trace the influence and interaction between oration and epistle.
1 Transformation from a Predominantly Oral to a Highly Literate Culture
A synopsis of the story of early Arabian societyâs transformation from an oral to a writing culture will set the stage for the subsequent discussion on the interaction of oration and epistle. As discussed at length in Chapter One, the largely oral societies of 1st/7th- and early 2nd/8th-century Arabia laboriously inscribed their important documents, using unwieldy materials. Their Byzantine and Sassanian neighbors were more writing-oriented societies, but they too had recourse to only parchment and papyrus. In the early or mid-2nd/8th century, Muslim armies and settlers in Central Asia came into contact with Chinese populations who taught them the art of paper-making.2 Paper was cheaper to produce and simpler to use, and suddenly writing in Islamic lands became easier and more affordable. Authors began consciously producing books for dissemination through written publication. Meanwhile, in the late 1st/7th century, the Umayyad caliph Ê¿Abd al-Malik had converted the language used by government scribes from Greek, Persian, and Syriac squarely to Arabic. By the late Umayyad and early Abbasid period, a stylized epistolary genre for writing official epistles and edicts had emerged from the state chancery as a powerful aesthetic and political force. By the end of the 2nd/8th century, a number of eminent scribes had made their mark on the Arabic literary scene. Propitiously for the move to a writing-oriented society, the introduction of paper and the shift to Arabic as the language for chancery records coincided with the growth of an imperial, urban culture. The Abbasids had extended their rule over a wider spread than the Umayyads, and the governance of their realms was directed in large part from their capital, Baghdad. They immediately began using paper for imperial decrees. Scholarly writing in Baghdad and other metropolitan centers blossomed. Within a century, books of ten, twenty, and thirty volumes were being composed, thousands of tomes were being copied and disseminated, sizeable libraries with upto a million and a half manuscripts were being built, and the earlier, oral productions of poetry, hadith, historical reports, and orations were being systematically transcribed. In the twinkling of a metaphorical eye, the scholarly and elite milieu of this largely oral society had been transformed into a highly literate culture.
Written and oral forms of literature had co-existedâalbeit unequallyâeven in the oral period. The same people often practiced both, and a number of famous early orators are known to have composed epistles. Muḥammad wrote epistles to contemporary rulers inviting them to Islam,3 and Ê¿AlÄ« wrote epistles to governors and adversaries, as did MuÊ¿Äwiyah.4 Two eloquent Umayyad governors had ties to the emerging state chancery: ZiyÄd rose to prominence in his youth as an official scribe in Iraq,5 and ḤajjÄj also composed several epistles.6 However, the earliest epistles had been brief and to the point. As writing took over as the principal form of artistic verbal production, characteristics of written literary production, such as consistent rhyming, complex syntax, and longer sentences, began to take hold. Nonetheless, features of early oratory, such as parallelism, nature imagery, and emphatic particles, continued to be used extensively in sermons. These features also filtered into the epistle, which imbibed the stylistic and functional traits of its oral parent.
2 Early Oration Texts as Models for Post Oral-Period Epistle and Sermon
In the post-oral period, earlier oration texts were held up as exemplars for both epistle and sermon.
2.1 The Scribeâs Exemplar: Chancery Manuals Prescribe Study of Oration Texts
Chancery scribes of the 2nd/8th century incorporated the themes, images, and parallelism of early orators into the genre of literary epistle newly emerging from their pens. Among the best known was Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d al-KÄtib, whose elegant epistles are deemed the founding texts of written Arabic prose. When Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d was asked about his training in the art of the word, he repliedâas mentioned earlier in Chapter Threeâthat he had learned eloquence by memorizing the words of that most famous of orators, Ê¿AlÄ«. In fact, in Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«dâs version of the reply, Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d specified, âI memorized seventy orations from the orations of Ê¿AlÄ«, and they flowed and flowed.â7 Within a hundred and fifty years after Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d, memorizing exemplary orations had become part of the formal curriculum of a scribeâs training. Toward the end of the 3rd/9th century, we see the first chancery manuals appear, at the forefront of a genre that would become known as âthe scribeâs cultureâ (adab al-kÄtib). Over the next few centuries, a large number of books were written in this genre. They lay out a host of skills and qualifications that a scribe must master in order to be successful at his job, as well as sources he should draw on and models he should emulate. Prominent among these sources and models was the oration.
Ibn al-Mudabbir (d. ca. 257/ 870), a high official in the court of the Abbasid caliph Mutawakkil, composed one of the first treatises in the genre of chancery manuals,8 calling it, because of the freshness of the field it addressed, al-RisÄlah al-Ê¿adhrÄʾ (The Virgin Treatise).9 Among the curricular materials he lists for the scribe, he includes grammar and lexicography, rules of writing, fine epistles, historical narratives, logic, Arabic and Persian proverbs, and Persian testaments, andâthe genre relevant to our discussionâorations.10 Likewise, he enjoins scribes to follow the way of orations, i.e., by stating at the onset of their epistle the point of their communication.11 Additionally, he sets up contemporary orators (along with master scribes and poets) as adjudicators of good scribal writing, instructing the novice to use them as a sounding board in order to check his own skill.12
About half a century later, the eminent Egyptian philologist AbÅ« JaÊ¿far al-NaḥḥÄs (d. 338/950) devoted one of ten sections in á¹¢inÄÊ¿at al-kuttÄb (Craft of the Scribes) to the oration. Describing the study of oration texts as an integral component in a scribeâs training (referring, I think, particularly to their rhymed praise openings), he says, âThey are among the most valuable resources of the scribe.â13 In his earlier section titled âEloquence,â NaḥḥÄs had already allocated four full chapters to orations and maxims by Ê¿AlÄ«.14 In the later section titled âOratory,â he provides model texts by those he considered master orators, in this order: Muḥammad and his family, again including Ê¿AlÄ«; Ê¿AlÄ«âs son Ḥasan, and his great-grandson Zayd; the first two Sunni caliphs, AbÅ« Bakr and Ê¿Umar; the Umayyad caliph Ê¿Umar; the Umayyad governor ḤajjÄj; and the Abbasid caliph MaʾmÅ«n. NaḥḥÄs characterizes Zaydâs sermon of pious counsel as being âamong the most beautiful of orations,â adding that it was âone that scribes and litterateurs avidly memorize.â15
The scholar who discoursed most fully on early oration as a vital component of the scribeâs training was QalqashandÄ« (d. 821/1418), author of the celebrated 14-volume encyclopedia of the chancery sciences titled á¹¢ubḥ al-aÊ¿shÄ fÄ« á¹£inÄÊ¿at al-inshÄ (Morning of the Night-Blind: A Book about the Craft of Epistolary Writing). QalqashandÄ«âs emphasis is normatively pitched, and indicates not only the continuing influence of early oratorical materials on scribal writing in his time, but also its effect on the epistolary genre earlier, when it had first emerged. He cites NaḥḥÄsâs line that orations âare among the most valuable resources of the scribe,â then validates the statement as follows:16
This is because orations are repositories of the secrets of eloquence and stores of wisdom. Bedouins used orations to propagate their glories when they assembled, and caliphs and princes delivered them from their pulpits. Oration bestows distinction to the art of speech, and it can be used to address the select few as well as the general public. It is on the loom of oratory that epistolary writings are woven, and on the path trodden by orators that scribes walk.
In a following chapter, QalqashandÄ« records orations of seventeen early orators that scribes must study. His list overlaps with the one cataloged by NaḥḥÄs, but also has important differences. It includes, chronologically: pre-Islamic orators, including Muḥammadâs ancestor KaÊ¿b ibn Luwayy, his uncle AbÅ« ṬÄlib, and Quss ibn SÄÊ¿idah (also lauded elsewhere in á¹¢ubḥ al-aÊ¿shÄ, along with SaḥbÄn al-WÄʾilÄ«);17 orators of early Islam, viz., Muḥammad, AbÅ« Bakr, Ê¿Umar, Ê¿UthmÄn, Ê¿AlÄ«, and Ḥasan ibn Ê¿AlÄ«; several Umayyad caliphs and governors, viz., MuÊ¿Äwiyah, Ê¿Utbah, ZiyÄd, Ê¿Abd al-Malik, ḤajjÄj, AbÅ« Bakr ibn Ê¿AbdallÄh, and KhÄlid ibn Ê¿AbdallÄh; and the KhÄrijite commander Qaá¹arÄ«. He also praises the oratorical eloquence of the Umayyad caliph Ê¿Umar, and the Abbasid caliphs Manṣūr, RashÄ«d, and MaʾmÅ«n.18
Following the texts, QalqashandÄ« explains why memorizing eloquent orations was vital to a scribeâs rhetorical success:19
If the [scribe] diligently memorizes a large number of eloquent orations, learning from them themes of oratory, sources of pure language, and grounds of eloquence; if he gains close acquaintance with brilliant, famous orators; then, his domain in the art of the word will expand, rough regions of prose will become smooth, unruly motif-camels will become docile, and all these things that have lodged between his ribs will flow smoothly upon his tongue. He can now instinctively position them within his prose and include them within his epistles. He does not need to brood over the extraction of novel themes, nor does he have to weary himself by assiduously searching for pure Arabic expressions. His own thoughts would not have been able to come up with their like even if he had tried his utmost. His imagination would not have arrived at their like even if he had done his best.
âOrations,â he continues, âare an intrinsic part of chancery writing,â because scribes have to use them (referring to the praise formulae of orations in particular) in the openings of their epistles, pledges, and decrees.20 Moreover, says QalqashandÄ«, the best scribes were acutely aware of their oratorical forebears: QÄá¸Ä« l-FÄá¸il (d. 596/1200) and á¸iyÄʾ al-DÄ«n Aḥmad ibn Ê¿Umar al-Qurá¹ubÄ« (d. 657/1259)âeminent scribes themselvesâcited the pre-Islamic orators Quss and SaḥbÄn as models of eloquence.21
As we have seen from the remarks made by Ibn al-Mudabbir, NaḥḥÄs, and QalqashandÄ«, many scholars strongly advocated that scribes study early orations. To be sure, other prescriptive works did not, among them RisÄlah ilÄ l-kuttÄb (Letter to the Secretaries) by the aforementioned Umayyad scribe Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d,22 Adab al-kÄtib (Rules for the Scribe) by the Abbasid literary critic Ibn Qutaybah (d. 276/889),23 and QÄnÅ«n dÄ«wÄn al-rasÄʾil (The Chancery Rule Book) by the Fatimid chancery official Ibn al-á¹¢ayrafÄ« (d. 542/1147).24 Nevertheless, these authors too display an awareness of oratory as a field relevant to scribal training. Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d, as mentioned earlier, credited Ê¿AlÄ«âs orations for his training in Arabic literary arts. Ibn Qutaybah declared that the scribe should study the histories and words of Muḥammad and his Companions, who were the epitome of âwisdom and judgmentâ (ḥikmah and faá¹£l al-khiá¹Äb).25 Ibn al-á¹¢ayrafÄ« included in his list of curricular items âeloquenceâ (balÄghah), in which oratorical materials have traditionally played a large part.26 In contrast, á¸iyÄʾ al-DÄ«n Ibn al-AthÄ«r (d. 637/1239) in al-Mathal al-sÄʾir (Popular Proverbs) enjoins the aspiring scribe not to bother with memorizing prose because it is not sufficient in quantity, while poetry is in abundance and contains the bulk of literary themes; he should memorize lots of poetry and then âuntieâ it (ḥall al-naáºm, a technical term) in his writings.27 But elsewhere in the same work he changes his tune and says âfamiliarity with the poetry and prose [my emphasis] of the ancients is replete with benefits, because from these we can learn about their aspirations and the fruits of their thought, and from those we can learn the goals of each group among them.â28
Over the ensuing centuries, medieval scribes gave more prominence to written exemplars, but they also appear to have continued to study oration texts. A case in point is provided by the 365-folio catalog of the Topkapi Palace Library of the Ottoman Sultan Bayazid in Istanbul, dated 908/1502. The catalogâs ten-page section on chancery worksâpresumably used by Ottoman chancery scribes as referencesâlists mostly writing manuals, but it includes three works with the word âorationâ in the titleâKhuá¹ab Ibn NubÄtah (The Orations of Ibn NubÄtah al-Khaá¹Ä«b, post-oral period, more on him momentarily), Uṣūl al-khuá¹ab bi-l-Ê¿imÄrah al-MurÄdkhÄniyyah (Principles of Orations in MurÄd KhÄnâs Edifice), and al-á¹¢alÄḥ bayn al-qarīḠwa-l-khuá¹ab (Reconciling Poetry and Oration)âpresumably as scribal training material.29
2.2 The Preacherâs Exemplar: the Early Orationâs Influence on the Medieval Friday Sermon
Although the medieval production of scribes and orators was manifested in crafted works, preachers also continued to be influenced by the more spontaneous style of master orators of yesteryear. Ibn TaghrÄ«birdÄ« (d. 874/1470) tells us that in the 4th/10th century, the famous preacher of Aleppo, Ibn NubÄtah al-Khaá¹Ä«b, had memorized a large number of the orations of Ê¿AlÄ« (as had the Umayyad scribe Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d, mentioned earlier).30 Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«d (d. 655/1257) affirms this point in his presentation of Ibn NubÄtahâs battle orations, in which he finds clear echoes of a piece by Ê¿AlÄ«.31 Ibn NubÄtahâs sermons in turn were used by many as model orations.32 Moreover, the influence of past orators, early and medieval, was not confined to the Islamic East. Describing the curriculum of medieval preachers in Andalusia, Linda Jones affirms that they studied from written collections of sermons. The Valencian historian, poet, and chancery official Ibn al-Ê¿AbbÄr (658/1260) stated that Muḥammad ibn [â¦] Ê¿Abd al-JabbÄr of Murcia (d. 599/1203), for example, âstudied the written orations of AbÅ« Ê¿Ämir ibn Sharwiyyah.â33
Since the Friday and Eid sermon was a platform for both political and religious authority, it was not only the state that was invested in its mores. Eventually, its practice came firmly under the domain of jurists. Scholars of different legal schools expounded on the importance of the ritual sermon, as well as on the details of its contents and structure. In the 8th/14th century, the Damascene Sunni ShÄfiÊ¿Ä« jurist Ibn al-Ê¿Aá¹á¹Är (d. 724/1324) composed a treatise devoted to the subject, titled Adab al-khaá¹Ä«b (The Preacherâs Culture). In the mode of works on prescriptions for rulers and judges, he describes the qualifications, duties, and comportment of the preacher, and the components and etiquette of the Friday and Eid sermon. By his time, these rules had become rigidly stipulated. For example, Qurʾan citation, a visible though not an essential feature of the sermon in early Islam, appears to have become a requisite component. JÄḥiẠhad stated that quoting verses from the Qurʾan was already favored in the Friday and Eid sermons of early Islam.34 Ibn al-Ê¿Aá¹á¹Är makes this a mandatory âpillar,â alongside praise of God, blessings on the Prophet, exhortations to piety and obedience, and praying for believers (and he proscribes the citation of poetry). He lists, moreover, standard Qurʾanic verses that must be cited.35 A curious example of Qurʾanic referencing is found in a sermon by the Marrakesh judge Ê¿IyÄḠibn MÅ«sÄ (d. 544/1149), in which he inserts the names and themes of all 114 surahs, playing on them to create a preaching narrative.36 While some features of oration, such as direct address and public audience, persisted, others, such as improvisation, use of Qurʾanic and poetic quotations, and the praise introduction format, were steadily modified.
The influence of early oration on later forms was not confined to style and theme. Sword, staff, and lance continued to be deployed as physical symbols of power. The custom appears to have been a matter of some controversy, judging from the fact that JÄḥiáº, in the early Abbasid period, had to defend its use. Citing the Qurʾanic examples of Solomon and Moses, he says both prophets used a staff for preaching.37 Elsewhere he states: âThe orator may preachâif he mustâwithout a wrapper, robe, gown, or cloak, but he must don a turban and carry a staff.â38 The Fatimid imam-caliphs used a staff studded with precious gems, and Musabbiḥī (d. 420/1030) presents his own eyewitness report of áºÄhir (r. 411â427/1021â1036) preaching a Friday sermon in Ramadan of the year 415/1024 in the Anwar Mosque (also known as the Mosque of ḤÄkim), carrying âthe jeweled staffâ of the dynasty, and shaded by âthe parasol circled with gold thread.â39 In another account, Musabbiḥī tells us that âin [áºÄhirâs] hand was the staff, he was girded with a sword, and he carried the lance, as was usually done.â40 Also like some early state orators, medieval caliphs sometimes had principal office bearers ascend the pulpit with them. Ibn ZÅ«lÄq says of MuÊ¿izz (r. 341â386/953â96) that âwith him on the pulpit were Jawhar, Ê¿AmmÄr ibn JaÊ¿far, and ShafÄ«Ê¿, bearer of the royal parasol.â41
The ubi sunt content of the early oration, among other themes of politics and warfare, is also carried forward. In an interesting nod to this tradition, the anonymous 3rdâ4th/9thâ10th-century group known as âPure Brethrenâ (also rendered as âBrethren of Purity,â IkhwÄn al-á¹¢afÄʾ), in their treatise on The Case of the Animals versus Man before the King of the Jinn, clothe âthe preaching larkâ (al-qunbur al-khaá¹Ä«b) in a âdusky turbanâ and have this reverend bird âascend a pulpit,â trilling lines of an ubi sunt homily:42
Where are the intelligent and the thoughtful?Where are the traders and those who heaped profits?If they had planted one seed in the stony ground,They would have reaped seventy times its count:Gifts from the one, forgiving God.Take heed, O people of perception!
3 Oral and Written Hybridity in Post Oral-Period Literature
The oration-epistle relationship of the medieval Islamic world was a two-way street. Oral and written interacted vigorously, and at times it became difficult to categorize a text definitively as one or the other. Just as chancery officials studied oration texts as part of their epistolary training, on occasion they drafted sermons to be delivered by state-appointed preachers in all the mosques in the empireâs domains. In addition, as Friday sermons began to be prepared in writing, epistles were formulated as texts for public proclamation. Overlapping style, theme, and presentation ensured that the line between oral and written continued to remain fuzzy.
3.1 Orality of the Epistle
Although a written genre, epistles were read out from the pulpit, which continued to be a physical locus of religio-political power.43 In addition to victory and policy epistles, an associated genreâthe appointment letter for government officials (taqlÄ«d)âwas also composed in the chancery then read out from the pulpit. In Fatimid Cairo, the decree appointing Ê¿AlÄ« ibn al-NuÊ¿mÄn as chief judge was read out in 366/976 in the Azhar Mosque; and YÄzÅ«rÄ«âs decree of investiture as chief missionary (in addition to his duties as vizier) was read out among the people in 442/1050.44 Epistles and decrees were probably often recited at the time of the Friday prayer; since the public would be gathered then, it was a logical time for dissemination of vital information. Oral delivery of chancery epistles facilitated the message reaching the still largely unlettered populace.
The blending of the oral and the written resulted in amalgamated traits. We have an interesting example of the confusingly similar presentations of oration and epistle in the early Abbasid era. In Sharḥ Nahj al-balÄghah, the MuÊ¿tazilite scholar Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«d (d. ca. 655/1258) challenged the categorization of an Abbasid text recorded in ṬabarÄ«âs History.45 ṬabarÄ« had introduced the text as an epistle written in 284/897 by the caliph MuÊ¿taá¸idâs vizier Ê¿UbaydallÄh ibn SulaymÄn to his governors, to be read out from the pulpit in various towns.46 But Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«d contendedâin an intricate argument based on the textâs presentation and functionâthat it was an oration and not an epistle:47
This is ṬabarÄ«âs rendering of the epistle, but to me it is an oration and not an epistle, because that which is delivered as an oration is an oration. An epistle is written to a governor or a prince or someone like them. It may be read out from the pulpit, thus seeming like an oration, but it is not an oration; rather, it is an epistle that has been read out to the public. Perhaps this piece was composed as an epistle, to be dispatched to the far corners of the empire, ordered to be read out to the public; this, after it had first been read out to the people of Baghdad (as an oration).
Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«d pauses to acknowledge that the text ended with a statement that it was âwritten by Ê¿UbaydallÄh ibn SulaymÄn in the year 284â¯H,â but he explains away the irregularity, saying the piece was written because it was meant to be read out in the mosques of Baghdad (as an oration) and not because it was an epistle.
The confusion between categorizing the text as an oration or an epistle probably arises from the fact that by this time they were stylistically so similar that there was little to distinguish between them. It is interesting that despite what appears to be strong evidence to the contraryâṬabarÄ«âs earlier categorization, and the tag specifying a chancery official had written the textâIbn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«d insists on calling it an oration. The text itself offers no definitive evidence for categorization. It is long, and it would seem that epistles were generally longer than orations, but then again, not always. In any case, the disagreement is a manifestation of the overlap of style, form, and even content between the two genres. Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«dâs remarks show that by his time, in the 7th/13th century, perhaps even much earlier, when the piece was composed in the late 3rd/9th century, the stylistic fabric of oration and epistle had become almost uniform.
AbÅ« HilÄl al-Ê¿AskarÄ« (d. 395/1005) explains the similarities between oration and epistle (and also the differences between those two genres together versus poetry) in a rich passage in KitÄb al-á¹¢inÄÊ¿atayn: al-kitÄbah wa-l-shiÊ¿r (Book of the Two Crafts: Epistolary Writing and Poetry). Noting resemblances in the two prose genresâ use of assonant phrases (fawÄá¹£il) and choice of vocabulary, he asserts that one could easily be converted into the other:48
You should know that epistles and orations are so similar because they are both forms of speech not circumscribed by meter or rhyme. They are also similar in terms of their words and assonant units. In their simplicity and sweetness, words spoken by orators resemble words written by scribes. Likewise, assonant units in orations are similar to assonant units in epistles; there is no real difference between the two, except that the oration is spoken and the epistle is written. With very little effort, an epistle can be turned into an oration, and an oration can be turned into an epistle. This is not true of poetry; changing a poem to an epistle would require an enormous amount of work. In the same way, an epistle or oration cannot be turned into a poem except with great exertion.
In another chapter, AbÅ« HilÄl insists that parallelism is required in both oration and epistle.49 It would seem that the syntactically balanced phrases characterizing the epistolary oeuvres of Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d and Ibn al-MuqaffaÊ¿ reflect a direct influence of the early oration and indicate a continuity in expectations of what constituted good Arabic prose.
Although these centuries saw an efflorescence of writing, the materials they produced were permeated with an oral ethos. Reflecting the long-standing primacy of the spoken word, dictionaries, beginning with KhalÄ«lâs (d. 175/791) KitÄb al-Ê¿Ayn (and including later works, such as AzharÄ«âs (d. 370/980) TahdhÄ«b al-lughah), arranged words according to a phonetic system that differentiated between guttural and labial sounds. Later dictionaries would be arranged alphabetically according to the âAbjadâ register, and even later, according to the resequenced alphabet of âA, B, T, Thâ based on orthographic conventions.50
In the legal sphere, although the increased use of documents forced the question about which was better evidence, jurists still gave primacy to a witnessâs oral word over a written record.51 Oral testimony was considered more reliable because there was no doubt that the witness, in person, vouched for the veracity of his or her statement. A judge, if he wanted to question further and assess, had the witness right in front of him. Whereas written materials could be fabricated or fudged; in order to be considered fully effective, they needed a living personâs oral testimony to back them up.
Toorawa notes that one of the curious effects of writing is that it does not reduce orality but, rather, enhances it by organizing into an art the principles by which it is practiced. In Greece, this produced rhetoric. This was partly the result of assumptions that oral verbalization was the same as written verbalization.52 Even as the societies we are looking at shifted from a largely oral to a largely written state of being, they continued to speak much and write some, and they wrote almost as they spoke. This was a cultureâto use Ongâs termâwith massive oral residue.53
3.2 Inscription of the Oration
Just as oration impacted epistle writing, epistle writing also impacted oration. Responding to the transition from an oral culture to an increasingly written milieu, and from a tribal, nomadic lifestyle to a progressively urbanized way of life, orations that were prepared first as written texts became common. Written notes had been in use for teaching sessions in history and hadith even earlier, from the late 1st/7th century.54 As early as the latter part of the 2nd/8th century, some preachers transcribed their orations beforehand, or had someone write them for them. The Abbasid caliph RashÄ«d (r. 170â193/786â809) is said to have been the first who committed to memory sermons prepared by others and then delivered them as his own. His son the caliph AmÄ«n (r. 183â189/809â13) instructed his teacher, the distinguished philologist Aá¹£maÊ¿Ä«, to prepare for him ten model sermons.55
By the 3rd/9th century, we have numerous reports of oration texts being prepared in writing, often relying on model orations and other written materials. The texts were then memorized and delivered pseudo-extemporaneously to a live audience, usually with a smaller or larger quantity of spontaneous embellishment. It is true that we continue to find examples of eloquent master orators who discoursed fluidly and extemporaneously, such as the Fatimid imam-caliph Manṣūr (d. 341/953).56 Many of the appointed mosque-preachers presumably also preached in a relatively impromptu fashion, drawing on standard formulae and themes. But we also find reports indicating that the use of written texts had become common practice. Manṣūr himself is reported to have written his own sermon for ʿĪd al-Fiá¹r and delivered itâhis son and successor MuÊ¿izz showed the text to QÄá¸Ä« l-NuÊ¿mÄn.57 Ibn NubÄtahâs (d. 374/985) sermons originated as written texts.58 Al-Muʾayyad al-ShÄ«rÄzÄ« (d. 470/1078) writes about a missionary in the East (probably referring to himself), who âprepared a sermonâ for the ShiÊ¿ite Eid of GhadÄ«r Khumm, which he âread out over the heads of numerous witnesses.â59 For the Islamic West, Linda Jones points to the preserved Sufi sermons of Ibn Ê¿AbbÄd of Ronda (d. 792/1390), and the profusion of anonymous medieval collections probably used by professional preachers as model sermons.60 We also have reports of chancery scribes producing sermons that a caliph or governor read out from the pulpit. Ibn al-Ṭuwayr (d. 617/1220) narrates that he saw the Fatimid-HafiáºÄ« caliph (perhaps Ê¿Äá¸id, r. 555â567/1160â1171), who ascended the pulpit in Cairo on a Friday, then âdelivered a short sermon from a prepared text presented to him by the chancery.â61 A report about the Ê¿Uqaylid ruler of northern Iraq, QirwÄsh ibn al-Muqallad, who switched allegiance from the Abbasids to the Fatimids, states that in 401/1010 he handed a written text to the mosque preacher in Mosul to read out, signaling the change. The sermon, whose text is preserved, and which was presumably drafted by the chancery, contained a prayer for the Fatimid imam-caliph ḤÄkimâa key embedded religio-political message. This sermon was then sent to other cities, where it was also read out from the Friday pulpit.62
Both oration and epistle in this period gradually came to use consistent consonant rhyme (sajÊ¿)âits emergence as the primary rhetorical device of stylized prose is perhaps the most important aesthetic development in the post-oral period. The earliest attestations of full consonant rhymeâpre-Islamic soothsayersâ rhymed pronouncementsâare oral. The Qurʾan also deploys it in short surahs from the Meccan period, although most sections of the Qurʾan maintain rhythm through the use of assonance and parallelism, rather than consonant rhyme. Full consonant rhyme in oral-period texts was manifested in pithy pieces averaging two to five lines. In the 4th/10th century, however, consonant rhyme became de rigueur for any artistic prose worth its salt. Moving away from the light-rhyme, heavy-parallelism style of Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d and Ibn al-MuqaffaÊ¿, and also from the freer essay style of JÄḥiẠand TawḥīdÄ«, artistic prose came to be dominated by the so-called âchancery styleâ (inshÄʾ), for which the most visible feature was consonant rhyme.63 Among the major early collections are the epistles of IbrÄhÄ«m ibn HilÄl al-á¹¢ÄbÄ« (d. 384/994), Ibn al-Ê¿AmÄ«d (d. 360/970), á¹¢Ähib ibn Ê¿AbbÄd (d. 385/995), AbÅ« Bakr al-KhwÄrazmÄ« (d. 383/993), BadÄ«Ê¿ al-ZamÄn al-HamadhÄnÄ« (d. 398/1008, also the author of the MaqÄmÄtâmore on them later), and SharÄ«f al-Raá¸Ä« (d. 406/1015), as well as the collection of model chancery letters of IbrÄhÄ«m al-á¹¢ÄbÄ«âs grandson, HilÄl ibn al-Muḥassin al-á¹¢ÄbÄ« (d. 448/1056). In the first half of the 4th/10th century, IbrÄhÄ«m al-á¹¢ÄbÄ«âs and Ibn al-Ê¿AmÄ«dâs epistles already contained a large quantity of consonant rhyme; a few lines here and there are not rhymed, and some of the rhyme is of a lighter variety, based on pronominal suffixes and on assonance rather than repeated end-consonants.64 Going forward a generation and more, á¹¢Ähibâs, KhwÄrazmÄ«âs, and BadÄ«Ê¿ al-ZamÄnâs epistles are almost wholly rhymed,65 as are those by HilÄl al-á¹¢ÄbÄ« and SharÄ«f al-Raá¸Ä«.
Orations produced as written collections traversed the same stylistic route as the epistle. They continued to employ parallelism, vivid nature imagery, and emphatic particles, features inherited from the oral-period Arabic oration. But now, rhyme supplanted parallelism as the predominant aesthetic trait. AbÅ« HilÄl, as we have seen, required parallelism in both oration and epistle. He also issued a warning against forcing consonant rhyme, an indication that people may have begun to do so to a point that alarmed him.66 At about this same time in the late 4th/10th century, Ibn NubÄtah al-Khaá¹Ä«b, mentioned earlier, was writing his book of model sermonsâthemselves influenced in themes and imagery by the sermons of Ê¿AlÄ«âalthough his, unlike Ê¿AlÄ«âs, were entirely rhymed. This stylized, or âmannerist,â feature would take wings and fly. Some orations and almost all literary epistles would from now on be fully rhymed. Ibn Jubayr (d. 614/1217) writes in his travelogue that he heard an extempore sermon delivered by Ibn al-JawzÄ« in Baghdad in full rhyming prose.67
Oration and epistle also shared features of structure. Both genres began with a formulaic praise-to-God introduction, and, as we have seen, chancery writers such as NaḥḥÄs and QalqashandÄ« used the word âkhuá¹bahâ to signify this laudatory preamble. Curiously, the term âkhuá¹bahââin addition to its primary meaning of oral orationâalso denotes the praise preface of an epistle (or book).68 This is probably a result of the epistleâs adoption of three of the oration-openingâs featuresâformulaic structure, parallelism, and consonant rhymeâas well as its content of praising God and blessing the Prophet.69 The celebrated critic Ê¿Abd al-QÄhir al-JurjÄnÄ« (d. ca. 474/1081) stated that the epistleâs opening âkhuá¹bahâ should âconsciously include parallelism and rhyme.â70 Ibn ManáºÅ«r emphasized the connection between rhyme and the term âkhuá¹bahâ even more strongly, claiming that any rhymed prose may be termed âkhuá¹bah.â71 Additionally, both oration and epistle employed the phrase âhere is what comes afterâ (ammÄ baÊ¿d), which signaled transition from the praise preface to the body of the oration. Routinely found in the earliest orations, the phrase is also found in a few epistles from the early period.72 But given the paucity of its use in early epistles, it is more likely that the required appearance of the phrase in medieval epistles is a carry-over from its use in the oration, rather than from earlier epistolary practice.
The medieval preacherâs training seems to have been less formal than the scribeâs, and the sources do not say much about it. Nuggets of data here and there provide clues that this training was also linked to the chancery. When JÄḥiẠclaimed that the orator acquired his skills by pure inspiration and osmosis,73 he was referring to pre-Islamic and early Islamic orators. By his time, in the 3rd/9th century, there are indications that preachers underwent some form of training. Ibn Ê¿Abd Rabbih tells us that âthe orator IbrÄhÄ«m ibn Jabalahâ of the early 3rd/9th century was âteaching some youths oratoryâ (most likely for the Friday pulpit), when the Iraqi MuÊ¿tazilite leader Bishr ibn MuÊ¿tamir (d. 210/825) came along and handed him a parchment on which he had written a detailed account of important oration skills.74 This source mentions early preacher training independent of the chancery, but another offers advice about composition to both groups in a single breath: QudÄmah ibn JaÊ¿far (d. 337/948), who lists parallel, rhymed, and homonymous words in his JawÄhir al-alfÄẠ(Jeweled Essences of Words), states that he has composed this book for the benefit of orators and scribes.75 Three centuries later, Ibn al-AthÄ«r, in al-JÄmiÊ¿ al-kabÄ«r fÄ« á¹£inÄÊ¿at al-manáºÅ«m min al-kalÄm wa-l-manthÅ«r (A Large Compendium of Materials for the Craft of Verse and Prose), discusses the importance of choosing beautiful language to convey significant ideas, and he asserts the importance for scribe, poet, and orator to edit and polish their words (tanqīḥ, lit. âpare the knots of a palm trunkâ), presumably before presenting.76 Ibn al-AthÄ«râs comments capture the ethos of the 7th/13th century. We have moved far away from the oral, spontaneous production of early oration.
Concurrently with oration, other genres of preaching were also being composed in writing and then read out, and they overlapped in form, style, and function. Among these written-to-oral genres were the Fatimid majÄlis al-ḥikmah (assemblies of wisdom) taught by the missionary agents of that dynasty, prime examples being the works of NuÊ¿mÄn (d. 363/974) and Muʾayyad (d. 470/1078).77 These âassembliesâ included features of oration, such as the praise opening, direct address, and prayer ending, and they contained homiletic material that was also part of the orationâs repertoire. The converse was also practiced, where materials initially presented orally were subsequently written down as texts. The genre of amÄlÄ« (dictations) is well known, including the AmÄlÄ« of QÄlÄ« (d. 356/967), SharÄ«f al-Murtaá¸Ä (d. 436/1044), and Ibn al-ShajarÄ« (d. 542/1148), which are teaching sessions recorded by students that have come down to us in several recensions. Related to the hybridity of oral and written forms, the practice of voicing written scriptures is a remnant from the transitional phase in this saga, straddling both oral and written milieus.78
4 Divergent Function of Oration and Epistle: Religion versus Politics
Oration and epistle may have converged in style, but in function they gradually moved apart, the oration ceding to the epistle both literary and utilitarian primacy. Many of the orationâs earlier political services of communication and governance were taken over by the new written form. As the chancery began composing epistles to be read out from pulpits all over the empire, the orationâs domain receded almost wholly to that of the ritual religious sermon given at the mosque on Fridays and at the prayer ground on Eid, largely devoid of substantial political and military content. AbÅ« HilÄl makes a stark distinction on this count, maintaining that while the two are twin supports of Islam, oration serves religion, while the epistle serves the state:79
It is also well known that unlike poetry, oratory and epistle writing are dedicated to religion and state; the house of Islam depends on them. The state depends upon epistle writing, and oratory possesses the largest share in religion. The oration is a part of the foundation of religion, the ritual-prayer. Its performance is required at the Eid festivals, Fridays, and prayer-gatherings. It includes advice that the imam is duty bound to proffer to his subjects, so that the traces of Godâs revelation will be continually sown in their hearts. And there are many more benefits of oration.
By the heyday of the Abbasid dynasty, oration had lost much of its political clout to the epistle. While both were public expressions, the changing nature of authority and governance, in addition to the ready availability of paper, led to the epistleâs gradual assumption of the orationâs political functions. In the time of the Prophet, the early caliphs, and the Umayyads, the government had been relatively egalitarian. Policies were negotiated on the basis of tribal power blocs. Although some groups and individuals were more powerful than others, especially in the Umayyad period, all males at the center of events (and some high-ranking females) potentially had a say in government. In Umayyad times, Iraqi towns were major centers of power and numerous orations are recorded from Kufa and Basra. Abbasid polity had a more spread-out constituency. The general public was no longer an active part of the government, and policies formulated behind the closed doors of palaces and bureaus were made known to the public as fait accompli through the epistolary form (a seamless development perhaps from the speeches of Umayyad governors, which for the most part also notified rather than negotiated). With the centralization of power, combined with the caliphâs increased seclusion from public view, the epistle became the voice of the ruler. As a text that could be read out to multiple audiences across the empire, it reached the far corners of his domain.
But AbÅ« HilÄlâs dictum notwithstanding, oration did not completely relinquish its political relevance. Although confined within the domain of Friday and Eid sermons, preachers continued to fold political messages into their preaching. One particular feature of the Friday sermonâpraying for the ruler by nameâbecame a strategic symbol of rule, along with the minting of coinage (sikkah). An element that had originated in ad hoc fashion in the Umayyad period, perhaps even earlier, inserting the rulerâs name into the Friday sermon became a prime political tool in Abbasid and Fatimid polities. Entreaties to God to grant the ruler aid, long life, and prosperity became de rigueur, and they indicated, among other things, the divinely sanctioned nature of the caliphâs authority. Moreover, because naming a caliph constituted a proclamation of allegiance, it became an important religio-political implement. The Fatimid imam-caliph Ämir used the metaphor of the pulpit when he announced the birth of his son and successor, Ṭayyib. In an imperial epistleâSijill al-bishÄrah (Register of Glad Tidings)âwritten in 524/1130 to the á¹¢ulayḥid queen al-Ḥurrah al-Malikah, who was head of the Fatimid mission in Yemen, Ämir connected Ṭayyibâs name to the pulpit and thus to the leadership of the Muslim community with the line, âThe royal pulpits revel in the fragrance (á¹Ä«b) of the mention of his [name].â80 Across the medieval Islamic world, local princes often indicated a switch of allegiance to one of the two caliphates, Abbasid and Fatimid, from the pulpit.81 I have earlier mentioned QirwÄshâs switching allegiance in this manner. Alongside the caliph, the name of the regional prince was also often invoked; history books repeatedly indicate which prince was in power and when, by saying so-and-so was named in the Friday sermon on a certain date.82 The flip side of that coin was cursing the enemies of the state. As discussed earlier, the Umayyads had required their governors to curse Ê¿AlÄ« and his family from the pulpit. The Fatimids, who claimed descent from Ê¿AlÄ«, in their turn pronounced maledictions on the earlier Umayyads and also on the Spanish Umayyads, who were cursing them in their sermons.83
Some announcements of a political nature continued to be made in the Friday sermon. In the aftermath of the devastating KhÄrijite revolt of the so-called DajjÄl, or Antichrist, the chamberlain of the Fatimid imam-caliph Manṣūr, JaÊ¿far al-ḤÄjib, delivered a sermon in the mosque in Kairouan in 335/946, in which he announced that Manṣūr had remitted all state taxes for the year, âout of kindness to them, and to aid them in refurbishing their land and steppes.â84 Maribel Fierro notes a diplomatic use of oration in 4th/10th-century Andalusia, mentioned in several medieval sources: Upon the arrival there of the Byzantine emperorâs emissary, the Spanish Umayyad caliph Ê¿Abd al-RaḥmÄn III had a courtier deliver a sparkling oration in order to show his visitor the power of Arab-Muslim speech and the refinement of their culture.85
In MawÄdd al-bayÄn (Stores of Eloquent Speech), the Fatimid chancery official Ê¿AlÄ« ibn Khalaf (d. after 437/1046) did not preclude orationâs share in the workings of government. First, deeming the art of epistolary writing nobler than the art of oratory, he argued that the functions of oratory are more circumscribed. But thenâdeeming oratory, in its turn, nobler than poetryâhe explained that this is because, among other things, the Friday sermon brings together âreligionâ (dÄ«n) and âstateâ (sulá¹Än).86 This seems to be a statement on the practice in his time. Be that as it may, as the Andalusian scholar ḤumaydÄ« (d. 488/1095) pointed out, âoratorical eloquenceââcompared to âcompositionalâ and âepistolaryâ eloquenceâwas âpure seriousness,â presumably referring to its propagating preparation for the hereafter.87
As is evident from the mixed religious and political content of the Friday and Eid sermon, the boundary between state and religion in the medieval Islamic world was not clear cut. In addition to praying for the caliph by name in the sermon, the preachers who preached these sermons were themselves appointed by the state. Rulers themselves most often did not separate state priorities from issues of religion. Fatimid rulers asserted full spiritual authority as imams who stood in place of the Prophet Muḥammad. Even Abbasid caliphs, whose claims did not rise as high, viewed themselves as religious heads of an Islamic state. Consequently, policies of their states continued to be grounded in religious rhetoric and oration was a prime blend of the secular and the spiritual.
5 Influence of the Arabic Oration on MaqÄmÄt and Literary Theory
In addition to its fundamental influence on the medieval epistle and Friday sermon, oration also played a smaller role in (1) the development of the genre of maqÄmÄt and (2) the discipline of literary criticism.
5.1 Influence on the MaqÄmÄt Genre
I have already discussed the orationâs impact on the chancery epistle in some detail. The epistle, in its turn, played a part in the development of the picaresque, rhythmic, rhymed, quasi-novel with an eloquent rogue as its hero, termed maqÄmÄt. The maqÄmÄt was the first genre of self-proclaimed fiction in the high literature of Arabic, and emerged from the pen of a prose-writer from Hamadhan nicknamed Marvel of the Age, BadÄ«Ê¿ al-ZamÄn (d. 398/1008). The evolution of the maqÄmÄt has been a matter of some interest for scholars of Arabic literature, who believe that its prime antecedent in content and form is the anecdotal, anthology-oriented (adab) works of early Abbasid authors such as Ibn al-MuqaffaÊ¿, JÄḥiáº, and TanÅ«khÄ«. But in style, the maqÄmÄt draw mainly on the epistle. BadÄ«Ê¿ al-ZamÄn himself authored a number of ornate epistles, and his MaqÄmÄt echo that genre in parallelism and rhyme. Indeed, because of their similarity in style, the terms maqÄmah and risÄlah were sometimes used interchangeably.88
In addition to the orationâs indirect influence on the maqÄmÄt through the epistle, four direct links may also be suggested: (1) By this time, some orationsâlike those by Ibn NubÄtah al-Khaá¹Ä«bâwere fully rhymed, and, along with the rhymed epistles of the time, they could have exerted influence on the maqÄmÄtâs mannerist aesthetic. (2) One proposed etymology of the term maqÄmÄt, from the verb qÄma (âhe stoodâ), refers to the verbal artistâs âstanding.â It contrasts with another medieval verbal art form, the majÄlis, from the verb jalasa (âhe satâ), which refers to a mostly unrhymed discourse presented in a teaching assembly in which the scholar speaks while sitting.89 (3) Elements in the maqÄmÄt parody the oration: Douglas Young points out that BadÄ«Ê¿ al-ZamÄnâs âAsylumâ and âExhortation,â ḤarÄ«rÄ«âs âBasra,â and Saraqusá¹Ä«âs unnamed twenty-first maqÄmah subvert the sermonâs sententious discourse through irony, transforming it into a parodic counter-genre.90 As Young also points out, Saraqusá¹Ä« includes twelve fictionalized sermons in his MaqÄmÄt.91 (4) The maqÄmÄt are a performative genre, continuing the performative tradition of the oration. David Wacks explains the similarity thus:92
The importance placed on oratory in Arabic culture lends its literature a performative aspect ⦠The maqÄma displays traits of such rhetorical performance. The maqÄmaâs name itself suggests a public act of oratory. Since maqÄma, like majlis, can be defined as an assembly of important people, and since such a meeting is a common forum for eloquent oratory, it is a natural metonymy for the word maqÄma to denote the act of oratory itself.
MaqÄmÄt flourished through the late medieval and early modern periods, and Devin Stewart and Régis Blachère, who have written major articles on the genre, concur that it exerted influence on diverse modern Arabic literary forms including drama, the novel, the short story, and even the newspaper article.93 Through epistle and maqÄmÄt, then, one can find traces of the oration in many different forms of Arabic literature.
5.2 Influence on Literary Criticism
The orationâs influence extended beyond Arabic prose to impact the fields of rhetoric and poetics. The earliest critics of the 3rd/9th and 4th/10th centuries equated the indigenous term for rhetoric/eloquence âbalÄghah,â with the term âkhaá¹Äbah,â which denoted the art of oratory. Ê¿AttÄbÄ« (d. ca. 220/835), a poet and prose-writer in the court of the Abbasid caliphs RashÄ«d and MaʾmÅ«n, was asked âWhat is balÄghah?â and he replied, âIf you wish to have a tongue that dazzles all others and is envied by every orator, then do such and suchâânote the use of the word âoratorâ to answer a question on âeloquence.â Ê¿AttÄbÄ«âs pronouncement was cited by major litterateurs, including JÄḥiáº, Ḥuá¹£rÄ«, and AbÅ« ṬÄhir al-BaghdÄdÄ«.94 JÄḥiẠfocused front and center on oratory as the face of balÄghah, and a large number of the selections in his literary anthologies were orations. He also used the two terms interchangeably: apparently assuming them to be identical, he switched back and forth between them without clear distinction.95 Another important early critic, Mubarrad (d. 286/900), affirmed that he had studied and memorized many orations and epistles as part of his literary training.96 While exhorting scribes to memorize orations, QalqashandÄ«, cited earlier in this chapter, affirmed that orations are ârepositories of the secrets of eloquence.â97 The scribe and critic IsḥÄq ibn IbrÄhÄ«m al-KÄtib (fl. 4th/10th c.) characterized balÄghah as the use of rhymed prose and deemed it a component of khaá¹Äbah and epistle-writing.98 Ibn al-NadÄ«m (d. ca. 388/998), in contrast, differentiated between khaá¹Äbah and balÄghah along the fault-line of oral versus written eloquence.99 JurjÄnÄ« (d. ca. 474/1081) mentioned khaá¹Äbah alongside poetry as an art that draws essentially on the imaginary (takhyÄ«l).100 Characterizing khaá¹Äbah through the lens of Greek rhetoric, Muslim philosophers such as FÄrÄbÄ« (d. 339/950) and Ibn Rushd (d. 595/1198, known in the West as Averroes) focused on logic, the syllogism, and persuasion, alongside subordinate concerns about style and delivery.101
In a carefully reasoned article on the ârhetorizationâ of Arabic poetics, Wolfhart Heinrichs argued that the notion of balÄghah originated in discussions of the oration, which he called âthe earliest avatar of Arabic artful prose.â102 In an earlier entry in the Encyclopaedia of Islam, Heinrichs had already contended that the real founders of literary criticism were chancery scribes.103 In the ârhetorizationâ article, he analyzes QudÄmahâs JawÄhir al-alfÄáºâthe manual of word-phrase lists for orators and scribes mentioned earlierâalongside the same authorâs work on poetics, Naqd al-shiÊ¿r (Assaying Poetry), and works by other early critics to take this thesis further. This is the three-part gist of Heinrichsâ proposition: (1) balÄghah originally referred to the ornate prose of early orators and scribes, (2) which was embodied in figures of speech later subsumed under the term badÄ«Ê¿. (3) Gradually, these figures of speech invaded poetry and produced its ârhetorization.â Noting the segue from oratory to scribal writing to poetics, Heinrichs argued that the concept of badÄ«Ê¿ (here, rhetoric) originated in the scribesâ critical handling of the twin genres of oration and epistle.
6 Concluding Remarks
In the oral period, oratory had served dynamic political, ethical, religious, and military functions. With the rise of a more centralized system of government in the late Umayyad and early Abbasid period, coupled with a rapid increase in the volume of writing after the introduction of paper to the Islamic heartlands in the early to mid-2nd/8th century, the orationâs functions were progressively taken over by the chancery epistle, while the oration was gradually circumscribed within the sphere of Friday and Eid services. This transformation dramatically altered the literary landscape. But even as the epistle took over many of the orationâs functions, norms set by early masters of oratory shaped the style of the emerging epistolary genre, and aspiring scribes studied, memorized, and used early oration texts as models. Chancery writing adopted conventions and practices of early oration. Moreover, although the epistle was produced as a written text, it was commonly meant for aural consumption, to be read out to large, public audiences; and conversely, chancery scribes themselves frequently produced Friday and Eid sermon texts to be delivered by state-appointed preachersâthere was abundant give and take between the oral and the written. Just as oration influenced epistolary writing, epistolary writing also influenced oration. This two-way engagement resulted in a hybrid style, where early epistlesâwhich straddled the oral-written divideâemployed the orationâs parallelism-based oral mode.
For many centuries of world history, public speaking remained the paradigm of all discourse. For the ancient Greeks, the idea of eloquence had been connected with speechmaking; rhÄtorikÄ, or rhetoric, meant public speaking. A similarly archetypal role can be posited for oration vis-Ã -vis Arabic belles-lettres. The oration exerted tremendous stylistic, thematic, performative, and structural influence on the chancery epistle as it developed in the late-oral and post-oral 2nd/8th and 3rd/9th centuries. It also influenced the development of the picaresque novel of the maqÄmÄt genre and the elaboration of literary criticism. Even as its earlier powerful reach rapidly declined, the oration continued to play a vital role in these literary, religious, and political spheres. For all these reasons, we can state in no uncertain terms that oration was a foundational genre in Arabic literature.
For an overview of the epistle and the scribe in this period, see Sellheim and Sourdel, âKÄtib,â EI2; and the following EI3 entries: Astrid Meier, âArchives and Chanceries: Arab Worldâ; Maaike L.M. van Berkel, âArchives and Chanceries: pre-1500, in Arabicâ; Jaakko Hämeen-Anttila, âAdab a) Arabic, Early Developmentsâ; as well as Riá¸Ä, al-RasÄʾil al-fanniyyah fi l-Ê¿aá¹£r al-IslÄmÄ«, and DurÅ«bÄ«, al-RasÄʾil al-fanniyyah fi l-Ê¿aá¹£r al-Ê¿AbbÄsÄ«. Used nearly synonymously with risÄlah, the term kitÄb is also used in this period to mean epistle.
ThaÊ¿ÄlibÄ«, Laá¹Äʾif, 126, s.v. âSamarqandâ; see details of the introduction and dissemination of paper in the Islamic world in Bloom, 8â9, 42â45 and passim, and Rustow, Lost Archive, ch. 4.
See texts and provenance of these epistles in ḤamÄ«dallÄh, passim.
Raá¸Ä«, ch. on âEpistles,â 490â624. Ê¿AlÄ«âs epistles, and replies by MuÊ¿Äwiyah and others, are collected by Ḥaydar, RasÄʾil al-imÄm Ê¿AlÄ«.
ṬabarÄ«, TÄrÄ«kh, 4:29. ZiyÄd was scribe for Ê¿Umar ibn al-Khaá¹á¹Äbâs governor.
á¹¢afwat, Jamharat rasÄʾil al-Ê¿arab, 2:140â253, passim.
(â®ØÙطت سبعÙ٠خطبة ٠٠خطب اÙأصÙع ÙÙاضت Ø«Ù Ù Ùاضتâ¬â), Sharḥ Nahj al-balÄgha, 1:24.
On this genre, see Rudolf Veselý, âChancery Manuals,â EI3.
See Gottschalk, âIbn al-Mudabbir,â EI2.
Ibn al-Mudabbir, 177. The Arabic terms he uses are khuá¹ab and maqÄmÄt, the latter meaning not the fictional genre that would be invented by BadÄ«Ê¿ al-ZamÄn a century later, but oratorical admonitions by ascetic preachers addressing powerful rulers.
Ibn al-Mudabbir, 182.
Ibn al-Mudabbir, 186.
(â®ÙÙ٠٠٠أÙÙد ٠ا ÙØتاج اÙÙاتب Ø¥ÙÙÙâ¬â): NaḥḥÄs, 253. QalqashandÄ« (1:210, more on him soon) quotes this line by NaḥḥÄs.
NaḥḥÄs, 219â222, 225â227.
(â®ÙÙ Ù Øس٠٠ا ÙÙ Ùذ٠اÙخطب Ù Ù Ùا Ùر٠اÙÙتÙاب ÙاÙ٠تأدÙبÙÙ ØÙظÙا خطبة زÙد ب٠عÙÙÙâ¬â): NaḥḥÄs (257â259) includes the isnÄd and the oration text.
(â®ÙØ°Ù٠أÙ٠اÙخطب ٠٠٠ستÙدعات سر٠اÙبÙاغة Ù٠جا٠ع اÙØÙÙ . بÙا تÙاخرت اÙعرب Ù٠٠شاÙدÙÙ ÙبÙا ÙØ·Ùت اÙØ®ÙÙاء ÙاÙأ٠راء عÙÙ Ù ÙابرÙÙ . بÙا Ùت٠ÙÙز اÙÙÙا٠ÙبÙا Ùخاطب اÙخاص٠ÙاÙعا٠Ù. ÙعÙÙ Ù ÙÙا٠اÙخطابة Ùسجت اÙÙتابة ÙعÙ٠طرÙ٠اÙخطباء ٠شت اÙÙتÙاب.â¬â): QalqashandÄ«, 1:210 (pace the editor, who incorrectly reads them as lines coming from NaḥḥÄs himself).
Qalqashandī, 1:226.
QalqashandÄ«, 1:211â225.
(â®Ùإذا Ø£Ùثر صاØب Ùذ٠اÙصÙاعة Ù Ù ØÙظ اÙخطب اÙبÙÙغة ÙعÙÙ Ù Ùاصد اÙخطابة ÙÙ Ùارد اÙÙصاØØ© ÙÙ ÙاÙع اÙبÙاغة Ùعر٠٠صاÙع اÙخطباء Ù٠شاÙÙرÙ٠ٱتÙسع Ù٠اÙØا٠Ù٠اÙÙÙا٠ÙسÙÙت عÙÙ٠٠ستÙعرات اÙÙثر ÙØ°ÙÙÙت Ù٠صعاب اÙ٠عاÙÙ ÙÙاض عÙÙ ÙساÙÙ ÙÙ ÙÙت اÙØاجة ٠ا ÙÙ Ù ÙÙ Ø°Ù٠بÙ٠ضÙÙع٠Ùأردع٠ÙÙ Ùثر٠Ùض٠ÙÙ Ù٠رسائÙÙ ÙٱستغÙ٠ع٠شغ٠اÙÙÙر Ù٠ٱستÙباط اÙ٠عاÙ٠اÙبدÙعة ÙÙ Ø´ÙÙØ© اÙتعب Ù٠تتبÙع اÙØ£ÙÙاظ اÙÙصÙØØ© اÙÙت٠Ùا تÙÙض ÙÙرت٠ب٠ثÙÙا ÙÙ٠جÙد ÙÙا ÙØ³Ù Ø Ø®Ø§Ø·Ø±Ù Ø¨ÙظÙرÙا ÙÙ٠دأبâ¬â): QalqashandÄ«, 1:225â226.
(â®Ø¥Ù٠اÙخطب جزء ٠٠أجزاء اÙÙتابة ÙÙÙع ٠٠أÙÙاعÙا ÙØتاج اÙÙتÙاب Ø¥ÙÙÙا Ù٠صدÙر بعض اÙÙ Ùاتبات ÙÙ٠اÙبÙعات ÙاÙعÙÙد ÙاÙتÙاÙÙد ÙاÙتÙاÙÙض ÙÙبار اÙتÙاÙÙع ÙاÙ٠راسÙÙ ÙاÙÙ ÙاشÙر عÙ٠٠ا سÙأت٠بÙاÙÙ ÙÙ Ù Ùضع٠إ٠شاء اÙÙ٠تعاÙÙ Ù٠ا ÙعÙÙÙ ÙÙشئ٠٠٠خطبة صدا٠أ٠رساÙØ© Ø£Ù ÙØÙ Ø°ÙÙâ¬â): QalqashandÄ«, 1:226.
Qalqashandī, 1:226.
Although Ê¿Abd al-ḤamÄ«d does not list orations specifically among the tools of the scribe, the genre may perhaps be indicated within other, wider categories that he does list, namely, the accounts of the battle days of the Arabs (ayyÄm al-Ê¿arab) and their sayings (aḥÄdÄ«th) and life stories (siyar), (RisÄlah ilÄ l-kuttÄb, in JahshiyÄrÄ«, 75).
Ibn Qutaybah, Adab al-kÄtib, 15â16; his list includes hadith, law, narratives, philology and logic. See Lecomte, 45â64.
Ibn al-á¹¢ayrafÄ«, 10â12: his list includes rhetoric, Qurʾan, poetry, and philology.
Qurʾanic reference to the Prophet DÄʾūd (the biblical King David), Q á¹¢Äd 38:20; Ibn Qutaybah, Adab al-kÄtib, 12. Ibn Qutaybah also differentiated between speech and writing, saying some words are hard to pronounce, and should be avoided in speech, but others are waḥshÄ« l-gharÄ«b (strange and rare words) and taÊ¿qÄ«d al-kalÄm (overly complicated language), and should be avoided in writing (Ibid., 19).
Ibn al-Ṣayrafī, 10.
Ibn al-AthÄ«r, Mathal, 1:99. On ḥall al-naáºm, see ThaÊ¿ÄlibÄ«, KitÄb Nathr al-naáºm wa-ḥall al-Ê¿iqd.
Ibn al-AthÄ«r, Mathal, 1:46; Makdisi (237) translates (incorrectly) the pronoun referring to these materials as âwritings.â
MS Török F. 59, fols. 218â228 (see forthcoming ed. by G. Necipoglu et al. as Treasures of Knowledge), which list chancery materials as a subsection of the chapter on literary materials, and they include books on proverbs, chancery manuals and collections of letters, accounting, and ciphers. On the use of these texts as scribal curricular materials, see T. Qutbuddin, âBooks on Arabic Philology and Literature.â
Ibn TaghrÄ«birdÄ« (4:150) says Ibn NubÄtah al-Khaá¹Ä«b had memorized the entire Nahj al-balÄghah, but this cannot be accurate, since Ibn NubÄtah died in 374/985, a quarter-century before the compilation of the Nahj in 400/1010. Perhaps what he means is that Ibn NubÄtah had memorized a large quantity of Ê¿AlÄ«âs orations and sayingsâby Ibn TaghrÄ«birdÄ«âs time, the Nahj was recognized as the major collection of the words of Ê¿AlÄ«.
Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«d, 2:80â85, 93, comm. on orations §â¯27, 28.
Ibn KhallikÄn, 3:339; cited by Talmon-Heller, 104.
Jones, Power of Oratory, 197â208, and 204â205, citing Ibn al-Ê¿AbbÄr, Takmilah, 2:80.
JÄḥiáº, BayÄn, 1:118.
Ibn al-Ê¿Aá¹á¹Är, 127â129.
App. §â¯67.1; see also §â¯118.1.
JÄḥiáº, BayÄn, 3:30â31, citing Q Sabaʾ 34:14, ṬÄhÄ 20:63. Elsewhere, he says in a tongue-in-cheek assessment that the preacherâs use of a staff [to lean on] was a sure sign that the oration would be long (JÄḥiáº, BayÄn, 3:117).
JÄḥiáº, BayÄn, 3:92. JÄḥiẠdescribes the kinds of staffs used by orators, with regard to their size and appearance, as well as the species of wood from which they were fashioned.
Musabbiḥī, 64; paraphrased by MaqrÄ«zÄ« in IttiÊ¿Äáº, 2:160, full passage translated in Walker, Orations, 32. Another report of áºÄhir carrying âthe jeweled staffâ is for ʿĪd al-Aá¸á¸¥Ä of the same year in Musabbiḥī, 80; MaqrÄ«zÄ« paraphrase in IttiÊ¿Äáº, 2:167; translated by Walker in Orations, 33.
Musabbiḥī, 65; paraphrased by MaqrÄ«zÄ« in IttiÊ¿Äáº, 2:161, trans. Walker, Orations, 32.
MaqrÄ«zÄ«, IttiÊ¿Äáº, 1:137, after Ibn ZÅ«lÄq, trans. Walker, Orations, 23.
RasÄʾil IkhwÄn al-á¹¢afÄʾ, 2:251â252; The Case of the Animals, 106 (Arabic), 166â167 (trans. Goodman), my translation here differs.
An example is found early in the Abbasid period, in 145/763, when RiyÄḥ al-MurrÄ«, governor of Medina, read out the caliph Manṣūrâs epistle from the pulpit (YaÊ¿qÅ«bÄ«, 2:375).
Ê¿AlÄ« ibn al-NuÊ¿mÄn: Ibn Ḥajar, RafÊ¿, 281â282. YÄzÅ«rÄ«: Muʾayyad, SÄ«rat, 88; Ibn al-á¹¢ayrafÄ«, 76.
Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«d, 15:180. The epistle contains instructions to the populace to curse MuÊ¿Äwiyah and the Umayyad caliphs, prefaced by several pages documenting MuÊ¿Äwiyahâs challenge to Ê¿AlÄ«, and YazÄ«dâs killing of Ḥusayn, among the Umayyadsâ heinous crimes against Islam.
Full text in Ibn AbÄ« l-ḤadÄ«d, 15:173â180.
Ibn Abī l-Ḥadīd, 15:180.
AbÅ« HilÄl, á¹¢inÄÊ¿atayn, 136, quoted twice by QalqashandÄ«, 1:210, 225. See Kanaziâs (139â140) analysis.
AbÅ« HilÄl, á¹¢inÄÊ¿atayn, 159.
On Arabic orthography and lexicography, see Tilman Seidensticker, âLexicography: Classical Arabic,â EALL; Beatrice Gruendler, âArabic Alphabet: Origin,â EALL.
Wakin, 4â10.
Toorawa, 11 and passim.
Ong, 36.
See Schoeler, The Oral and the Written, and The Genesis of Literature in Islam.
TanÅ«khÄ«, 3:163â164; cited by Mez, 318. For a Friday sermon by RashÄ«d, see App. §â¯107.1.
Ibn ḤammÄd, 22; MaqrÄ«zÄ«, MuqaffÄ, 2:129â180, §â¯780; NuwayrÄ«, 28:118; NuÊ¿mÄn, MajÄlis, 126 (with synopsis of contentsâarguments establishing the Imamate and exposing the usurpersâ oppression). See also discussion in Walker, Orations, 13â14.
NuÊ¿mÄn, MajÄlis, 239â240.
See texts of his collected orations in DÄ«wÄn Khuá¹ab Ibn NubÄtah, and text of two orations in Mez, 319â325.
Muʾayyad, MajÄlis, §â¯254.
Jones, Power of Oratory, 27.
Ibn al-Ṭuwayr, 174. The full passage is translated by Walker, Orations, 48â50.
Ibn TaghrÄ«birdÄ«, 4: 225â228; see discussion of this event and further references in Walker, Orations, 3â5.
For the development of the inshÄʾ style, see Julie Meisami, âArtistic Prose,â EAL.
See samples of Ibn al-Ê¿AmÄ«dâs writing in ThaÊ¿ÄlibÄ«, YatÄ«mah, 3:190â197, and of á¹¢ÄbÄ«âs in RasÄʾil al-á¹¢ÄbÄ«.
E.g., á¹¢Ähibâs epistle §â¯10. Everett Rowson (âal-á¹¢Äḥib,â EAL) writes: âHe was an influential proponent of the trend towards increasing elaborateness in artistic prose, and his own famed correspondence, both official and private, displays a persistent reliance on parallelism and rhyme, combined with complex word play, which contrasts with the more chaste style of his predecessor Ibn al-Ê¿AmÄ«d and his contemporary the Baghdad secretary IbrÄhÄ«m ibn HilÄl al-á¹¢ÄbÄ«, whom he saw as his chief rival.â And, e.g., KhwÄrazmÄ«âs epistles, 66â67. And, e.g., BadÄ«Ê¿ al-ZamÄn, RasÄʾil, 99.
AbÅ« HilÄl, á¹¢inÄÊ¿atayn, 159.
Ibn Jubayr, 196â198.
See examples in Qalqashandī, 1:302, 14:353.
The sense of direct address conveyed by the root KhṬB would appear at first glance to be the connecting feature between the epistle and the oral khuá¹bah; but this is not the case, for although the epistle has a direct addressee, the taḥmÄ«d khuá¹bah of the epistle often takes the third grammatical person.
JurjÄnÄ«, 9.
Ibn ManáºÅ«r, s.v. âKh-Ṭ-B.â
See the use of the âammÄ baÊ¿dâ phrase in an epistle attributed to Muḥammad, ḤamÄ«dallÄh, 166; and two attributed to Ê¿Umar, ibid., 192, 198.
JÄḥiáº, BayÄn, 3:12â13, 27â28.
Ibn Ê¿Abd Rabbih, 4:52â53. Jones has a relevant section on âThe Making of a Medieval khaá¹Ä«bâ (Power of Oratory, 197â208).
QudÄmah, JawÄhir, 2. A list with examples and comparisons with NaḥḥÄs and KhwÄrazmÄ«, as well as with QudÄmahâs own Naqd al-shiÊ¿r, are provided in Heinrichs, âEarly Ornate Proseâ 220â228.
Ibn al-AthÄ«r, JÄmiÊ¿, 23. His magnum opus, the 4-volume Mathal, does not say much about orations.
Texts of these majÄlis are collected in NuÊ¿mÄn, AsÄs al-taʾwÄ«l and TaʾwÄ«l al-daÊ¿Äʾim, and Muʾayyad, MajÄlis. For references to their being prewritten and then read out, see Muʾayyad, MajÄlis, 89â90; Ibn al-Ṭuwayr, 111â112; MaqrÄ«zÄ«, Khiá¹aá¹, 1:391. For analysis of the Fatimid majÄlis see T. Qutbuddin, al-Muʾayyad al-ShÄ«rÄzÄ«, 85â86, and idem, âPrinciples of Fatimid Symbolic Interpretationâ; Halm, 17â29; Walker, âFatimid Institutions,â 182â186.
I thank Edmund Hayes for this observation.
AbÅ« HilÄl, á¹¢inÄÊ¿atayn, 136. A lengthy comparison follows between epistles/orations and poetry.
Idrīs, 7:301.
Data for certain switches of this nature, and a discussion of the implications of these switches, is provided in Walker, âIslamic Ritual Preaching.â See also examples in MaqrÄ«zÄ«, IttiÊ¿Äáº, 2:254, cited in Walker, Orations, 10.
Kraemer, 38. See also numerous entries on individual rulers in EI2 that speak to this issue and provide primary references, e.g., âMukhtÄr b. Ê¿Awf al-AzdÄ«,â âal-Malik al-Raḥīm,â âal-KundurÄ«,â âAlaá¹£ MÄ«rzÄ,â âal-NasawÄ«,â âṬoghril (II),â âá¹¢amá¹£Äm al-Dawla,â âṬÄhir b. al-Ḥusayn,â âOzbeg b. Muḥammad PahlawÄn,â âFasandjus,â âSayyids,â âIbn ṬabÄá¹abÄ.â
IdrÄ«s, 5:218â220; NuÊ¿mÄn, MajÄlis, 176, 285, 294; Walker, Orations, 5, 91â92.
IdrÄ«s, 5:393â394; MaqrÄ«zÄ«, MuqaffÄ, 2:138â139; trans. Walker, Orations, 100.
Fierro, âKhuá¹ba,â after BunnÄhÄ«, ḤumaydÄ«, YÄqÅ«t, and ZubaydÄ«.
Ê¿AlÄ« ibn Khalaf, 160â161. He also ranks oratory higher than poetry because Muḥammad had been an orator and not a poet, and because orations are âbased on truth and pious counsel,â and poetry is not. Ibn Khalafâs presentation is a bit tangled. Describing oration types and themes in pre-Islamic and early Islamic times, he focuses solely on pious counsel, and mentions nothing of political speeches and battle orations.
(â®ÙاÙبÙاغة تÙÙس٠ثÙاثة Ø£Ùسا٠⦠بÙاغة خطبÙÙØ© ÙبÙاغة تأÙÙÙÙÙØ© ÙبÙاغة رسائÙÙÙØ©. ÙاÙخطبÙÙØ© جد٠٠Øضâ¬â): ḤumaydÄ«, TashÄ«l, 6, full passage quoted in Arabic and translated in Heinrichs, âEarly Ornate Prose,â 215.
See examples in Blachère, âMaḳÄma,â EI2.
Beeston, âal-HamadhÄnÄ«,â 126â127. Blachère and Masnou (Choix de maqÄmÄt, 132) list five authors with compositions styled as maqÄmÄt, which are simply orations clothed in sajÊ¿; it seems there was enough overlap between orations and maqÄmÄt (in addition to the overlap between epistles and maqÄmÄt, and between epistles and orations) to cause further confusion in terminology.
Young, Rogues, 47.
Young, âPreachers and Poets,â passim, where he discusses the popular sermon in Andalusian MaqÄmÄt.
Wacks, 183â184, expanding on the ideas of Brockelmann and Pellat.
Stewart, âMaqÄma,â 145; Blachère, âMaḳÄma,â EI2.
JÄḥiáº, BayÄn, 1:113, Ḥuá¹£rÄ«, Zahr, 1:106, AbÅ« ṬÄhir al-BaghdÄdÄ«, 66. Equating balÄghah with khaá¹Äbah, AbÅ« ṬÄhir (64) quotes an Indian treatise: âthe first part of balÄghah is gathering the instruments of balÄghah, namely, that the orator should be composed, still, and so on.â
E.g., JÄḥiáº, BayÄn, 1:92. Moreover, under his category of âthe best person in terms of khaá¹Äbah,â (akhá¹ab al-nÄs), he often mentions the popular preacher and storyteller (wÄÊ¿iẠand qÄṣṣ), indicating that he considers khaá¹Äbah, at least in this context, to be the more general concept of eloquence, rather than one defined within the narrower context of the ritual sermon (ibid., 1:291, and passim).
Mubarradâs words cited in Ibn al-AthÄ«r, JÄmiÊ¿, 22.
Qalqashandī, 1:210.
IsḥÄq, 191.
Ibn al-NadÄ«m (Fihrist, 181) lists orators under âkhuá¹abÄʾâ and scribes under âbulaghÄʾ.â
JurjÄnÄ«, 270.
FÄrÄbÄ« wrote a commentary on Aristotleâs Rhetoric titled with the very term al-Khaá¹Äbah, in which (1, 25) he defined âkhaá¹Äbahâ (= oratory/rhetoric) as âa syllogistic skill (á¹£inÄÊ¿ah qiyÄsiyyah), the goal of which was persuasion (iqnÄÊ¿).â He went on to sayâhighlighting an aspect of Greek rhetoric that overlaps with Arabic oratoryâthat khaá¹Äbah used modes of persuasion that were ânot specialized, but shared by all.â Ibn Rushd reiterated these ideas in his gloss, TalkhÄ«á¹£ al-khaá¹Äbah. The lexicographer FÄ«rÅ«zÄbÄdÄ« (s.v. âKhṬBâ), after defining khaá¹Äbah in its oratorical aspect as âa literary prose art, whose purpose was the persuasion of the audience, or [its] counsel,â added that âin the science of logic, [khaá¹Äbah] was a syllogism consisting of premisesââalso touching on an aspect overlapping with Arabic oratoryââthat were axiomatic or assumedâ [= Aristotleâs enthymeme]. Ibn ManáºÅ«r (s.v. âKhṬBâ), wrote a slightly longer but similar definition of the philosophical khaá¹Äbah in his LisÄn al-Ê¿arab, in which he included examples of syllogisms. He stated that the active participle of khaá¹Äbah, its agent, was, like the orator, called a khaá¹Ä«b. Cheikho in Ê¿Ilm al-adab (vols. 3â4) discusses khaá¹Äbah from these and other philosophical and ethical sources.
Heinrichs âEarly Ornate Prose,â 215â234.
Heinrichs, âNaḳd,â EI2.