Envisioning Islam

Reconstruction of the earliest Islamic history is a highly debated topic among scholars of Islam, due primarily to the fact that Islamic sources are not contemporaneous to the events they describe. Efforts to illuminate the formative period of Islam have led some Islamicists to consult non-Islamic sources. Such is the case with the controversial work Hagarism: The Making of the Islamic World (1977) by Patricia Crone and Michael Cook, and Robert Hoyland's Seeing Islam as Others Saw It (1997). Not only does Michael Penn's Envisioning Islam constitute a great and welcome contribution to this project, but its significance is associated with two other scholarly discourses. First, the study presents a comprehensive Syriac (Eastern) perspective on early Islamic history and Christian–Islamic interactions that offers a clearer and closer portrayal than the unbalanced and hostile image of Islam found in Greco-Roman (Western) sources. Second, the book engages with scholarship on these subjects and challenges modern discussions about the nature of the early encounters between Christianity and Islam. Penn argues that “not simply Syriac authors were slow to distinguish Islam from Christianity, but that Syriac texts reflect a much more substantial and long-lasting overlap between Christianity and Islam than the standard narrative allows” (11). In terms of methodology, the book follows an inclusive approach that offers a contextualized and synthetic examination of diverse collections of Syriac writings on Islam composed between the seventh and ninth centuries. The book consists of four chapters in which the first two are arranged chronologically, while the other two follow a thematic organization.Applying the theoretical approach of collective memory, Penn dedicates the first chapter to Syriac narratives of Islamic conquests and Christian reactions. He claims that these writings reflect intra-Christian conflicts and shifts in the attitudes toward Islam, as well as the terms used to describe Arabs/Muslims. While early Syriac accounts portray negative impacts of the conquests, one finds a relatively positive outlook in sources written after the mid-ninth century. Political changes within the Islamic empire also influenced Syriac writings in terms of recollection and genres. After the consolidation of the Umayyad caliphate under ʿAbd al-Malik b. Marwān (r. 685–705), Syriac texts can be characterized as apocalyptic in nature, accounting for the reasons behind Muslims' victory with “intricate, intertextual revenge fantasies” (32). Syriac conquest accounts, composed from the first half of the eighth century on, downplay the significance of conquests either by presenting them as a change of worldly power or by finding biblical parallels to depict them as a temporary punishment for Christians' sins. As a result of increased interactions between Christians and Muslims during the Abbasid period, Syriac conquest writings focused on contemporary concerns, such as intra-Christian religious debates and Christian–Jewish rivalries.In chapter 2 Penn examines religious and ethnic perceptions of Islam in Syriac sources and analyzes how these changing attitudes influenced their religious distinctions and self-identity. He claims that political changes in Islamic rurlership affected both the amount of information that Syriac Christians had about Islam and their conceptual categorizations. Shifts in nomenclature are reflected in the varying terms used by Syriac authors to refer to Muslims between the seventh and eighth centuries. Such is the case with ḥanpē (“pagans”), mhaggrāyē (“Hagarenes”), and later ishmaʿelāyē (“Ishmaelites”). Penn adds that between the mid-seventh and early eighth centuries, Syriac perceptions shifted from characterizing Islam as a derivative of Christianity to a distinguished, and even challenging, religious group. These Syriac–Islamic interactions paved the way for Syriac writers to expand and develop their knowledge of Islam during the early Abbasid period when not only did Syriac authors provide more information about Islam's religious nature, but they also portrayed Islam as a distinct religion. This orientation is evident in the Chronicle of Zuqnin and Timothy I's writings, where for the first time we see the designation of the term mashlmānē as “a unique abstract noun to speak of Islam” (77). Penn also adds that Syriac writings composed during the Abbasid period “reflected both their authors' more frequent dealings with Muslims and their audiences' increased knowledge of Islam” (86).In chapter 3 Penn, following cross-traditional genre categories, examines the portrayals of Muslim leaders in Syriac writings. To begin with, Prophet Muḥammad's image in Syriac works underwent a number of shifts, ranging from political leader and military commander to lawgiver and prophet. These representations of Muḥammad were not, as Penn demonstrates, objective accounts of a seventh-century Muslim ruler. Rather, “Syriac writers used these characterizations of Muhammad to further both apology and polemic” (112). Penn also shows that representations of Muḥmmad in Syriac writings were more informed and balanced and less hostile than those in the Greek and Latin texts, such as the works of Niketas of Byzantium (fl. ninth century.) or the Venerable Bede (d. 735). Syriac descriptions of later Muslim rulers, characterized by a bifurcation of good and evil traits, were constructed works “more concerned with literary convention than with narrative consistency” (123). These portrayals serve primarily to extoll the miraculous abilities of Syrian Christian holy men, settle intra-Christian rivalries, or merge anti-Islamic and anti-Jewish polemics. The employment of Muslim figures in these literary settings, therefore, “helped Syriac authors better define Christianity” (141).In chapter 4 Penn examines interreligious interactions between Muslims and Christians and how these contacts affected religious-communal boundaries and confessional identity. Analyzing Syriac sources (both legal and literary works), Penn illustrates that Christians and Muslims maintained close daily interactions and interreligious contacts that in certain cases blurred confessional divides. Syriac texts “challenge the modern assumption of clearly defined boundaries between early Christianity and early Islam” (155). This orientation of religious ambiguity and cross-confessional interaction can be also seen in Syriac accounts of conversion. Penn does agree with some Islamicists (such as Fred Donner) suggesting that Muslims during Islam's formative stage were not a distinct religious group; rather Jews, Christians, and other religious entities were part of the umma. Unlike other Islamicists, Penn claims that Syriac writings “point towards a world characterized by continued religious ambiguity and border crossing that did not end under ‘Abd al-Malik” (181). However, this claim is not convincing because it is based entirely on a Syriac source without taking into consideration the Islamic sources.Penn's Envisioning Islam is a great addition to the study of the earliest period of Islam and Muslim–Christian interactions during that stage of Islamic history. Not only do his comprehensive presentation and thorough analysis of Syriac sources offer a constructive perspective on Muslim–Christian relations, but they also debunk some of the modern claims of “clash of civilization,” showing that Christian–Muslim relations were interconnected and more complex than commonly imagined. Despite the advantages demonstrated in the way Penn analyzes Syriac sources, we ought to be reminded of problematic aspects of these sources, such as consistency, interpretations, and religious or political powers' influence on the sources. Any discussion of early Islamic history, therefore, will be lacking without the inclusion of Islamic (including Arab Christian) sources. Hence, pairing Syriac accounts with relevant Islamic writings on these subjects could strengthen the book's arguments and offer a clearer picture of the earliest history of Islam and early Muslim-Christians encounters

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