"Ṣabr" (Steadfastness) of Bereaved Parents: A Motif in Medieval Muslim Consolation Treatises and Some Parallels in Jewish Writings
Aḥmad ibn Abī Ḥajalah, who lived in Egypt, and Muḥammad ibn Nāṣir al-Dīn al-Qaysī of Damascus, are the authors of consolation treatises composed for bereaved parents in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries respectively. In their efforts to praise the steadfastness (ṣabr) of parents who have lost t...
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Penn Press
1989
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| In: |
The Jewish quarterly review
Year: 1989, Volume: 80, Issue: 1/2, Pages: 35-48 |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Aḥmad ibn Abī Ḥajalah, who lived in Egypt, and Muḥammad ibn Nāṣir al-Dīn al-Qaysī of Damascus, are the authors of consolation treatises composed for bereaved parents in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries respectively. In their efforts to praise the steadfastness (ṣabr) of parents who have lost their offspring, both authors include in their compilations a narrative, taken from "ḥadīth" collections, about a mother from the first generation of Muslims who, as a steadfast believer (ṣābirah), refrains from telling her husband that their young son is dying until after she conceives anew on the following night. As a parallel they present another story, also attributed to the prophet Muḥammad, in which the merits of a Jewish woman are commended for the same reason. The appearance of these two heroines in Muslim consolation treatises from the late Middle Ages indicates the existence of a similar pattern of narratives in both Jewish and Muslim medieval cultures. In addition to the relevant Muslim sources such as "ḥadīth" reports with their various versions of the story, and the late consolation treatises in which the story was interwoven, this study also deals with the pattern of the narrative as it appears, in several versions, in Jewish sources, "Avot de-Rabbi Nathan," "Midrash Proverbs," and R. Nissim ben Jacob's "al-Faraj ba'd al-shidda." Due to the difficulties in establishing the exact date of the first two Jewish sources, it is impossible to identify precisely the origin of the story and the stages of the consolidation of its various versions. Nevertheless, it seems reasonable to assume that the pattern was consolidated through a process of elements exchanged between Jewish and Muslim sources, although each group retained some characteristic elements of its own. |
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| ISSN: | 1553-0604 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: The Jewish quarterly review
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.2307/1454325 |