Draft Article on Surat al Fil

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Reply #60 - May 07, 2015, 06:22 PM

As Hassan said, I'd take it as indication that you're on the right track.

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Reply #61 - November 26, 2015, 11:57 AM

Ian David Morris on the Year of the Elephant

https://mobile.twitter.com/iandavidmorris/status/669826971023638528

https://mobile.twitter.com/iandavidmorris/status/669836807060791296

https://mobile.twitter.com/iandavidmorris/status/669844438156500996

https://mobile.twitter.com/holland_tom/status/669845799866642432

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Reply #62 - November 29, 2015, 10:28 AM

Quote from: Zaotar on March 12, 2015, 11:46 PM
Thanks for the comments Countjulian --- I'm actually quite surprised nobody seems to have made this argument before, at least that I could find (I wouldn't be shocked to find some scholars have made the same points, I just couldn't find it), and I searched hard to find an example of somebody else who had criticized the historicity of Abraha's expedition, with de Premare being the only guy I found who just straight out rejects it. Interestingly the essay was almost complete when I ran across de Premare's essay, and I'd hoped he would have some great new arguments against its historicity that I could add. But no. He basically just says it's a bunch of legendary bullshit, distinguishes the Murayghan inscription in largely the same way, and moves to textual and linguistic analysis.

You might be interested in this:

Abraha and Sennacherib: A Talmudic Parallel to the Tafsīr on Sūrat Al-Fīl
Author(s): Gordon D. Newby
Source: Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 94, No. 4 (Oct. - Dec., 1974), pp. 431-437

Can't post a link but - (jstor.org/stable/600585)
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Reply #63 - November 29, 2015, 11:34 AM

^Thanks - the first page can be read here: http://www.jstor.org/stable/600585?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
Quote
Abstract
According to tradition, the occasion for Sūrat al-Fīl is to remind Muhammad and the Makkans of the deliverance of the Ka'bah from the attack of the Abyssinian Abraha and his army. Without reference to the historicity of this event, it can be seen that its literary treatment in the Sīrah of Ibn Isḥāq and in certain Qur'ān commentaries parallels the literary representation of Sennacherib's equally unsuccessful attempt to capture Jerusalem. The larger setting for the Sīrah's account uses the Abraha story as an eschatological description of the hastening of the advent of the final kingdom of Islam and its messianic apostle, Muḥammad. The prior and parallel source for the eschatological use of the siege motif is the Talmud's account of Sennacherib's siege of Jerusalem in which the Holy City becomes the focal point for the events of the Last Day.

Sennacherib's siege of Jerusalem (wiki): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrian_Siege_of_Jerusalem

Welcome to the forum by the way.

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Reply #64 - August 14, 2016, 06:27 PM

Philip Rance - Elephants in warfare in late antiquity

http://www.iandavidmorris.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Elephants_in_Warfare_in_Late_Antiquity.pdf

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Reply #65 - August 15, 2016, 04:37 PM

Love it. Thanks for the post Zeca. Great articles about war elephants are very hard to come by!

Incidentally, I nowadays think of Q 105 as quite probably functioning as a general anti-Sassanid message, i.e. the believers are supposed to remember what happened to the companions of the elephant before when they attempted to oppress the believers. Probably composed during the Sassanid-Byzantine wars from 602-628 CE, I would guess very early on in that period, reminding the believers that God would intervene and punish the rampaging Sassanid infidels.

This is consistent with my article, and I wrote a brief paragraph discussing this context, but if I was revising it (which I might do) I would write a section emphasizing its connection with the anti-Sassanid and pro-Byzantine sentiments in the Qur'an, particularly Q 30:1-4 and the adaptation of the Alexander Legend.
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Reply #66 - September 01, 2016, 09:04 PM

Jan Retsö giving a talk tomorrow about 'the background and meaning of the sura of the elephant' at a conference on ancient Souh Arabia: http://orientalistik.ruzicka.net/conference2016/program.pdf

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Reply #67 - September 01, 2016, 09:50 PM

How interesting! I may email him and see if he can send me an abstract. He's very big on arguing for South Arabian influence on the Qur'an.

https://www.academia.edu/8558076/The_Contradictory_Revelation_a_reading_of_Q_27_16-44_and_34_15-21

"There is evidence that early Islam was pro-Roman and anti-Iranian. This is shown by e.g. sura 30:1 but also by the legend of the emigration to Ethiopia. The situation had become critical after 610 when Iran threw out Roman power from the Middle East, occupying Anatolia, Syria and Egypt. By then Hijaz with the nascent Islamic movement was surrounded."

Note how he argues for the anti-Sassanid orientation of the Hijaz, which ties in with what I was saying above. I don't read much into the Ethiopian legend, but the Qur'an clearly hates Iranian power (which, interestingly, is also associated with the Jews ...), and I read Q 105 as basically an attempt to remind the believers of the prior biblical instances when God saved his pious faithful from the threat of encroaching polytheist armies and their war elephants. In other words, this exact same thing has gone down before, and remember how God dealt with it? Don't worry about the Sassanid threat, have faith in your Lord.
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Reply #68 - September 01, 2016, 10:01 PM

Yes, I'd be interested to know what his line of argument is if you find out.

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Reply #69 - September 01, 2016, 11:49 PM

I doubt I will agree with his position though! He is extremely conservative from what I've seen..for example, he argues that the Arabic of the Qur'an is the same as the 'Arabiyya, the supposed poetic koine. And he seems to generally accept traditional Islamic historical narratives (like the flight to Ethiopia), as well as a rather traditional jahiliyah context.

So I would guess that he largely accepts Islamic narratives about Abraha's attack, i.e. he may quibble with some of the details, but he wouldn't accept that the tradition had almost no idea what Q 105 originally referred to, since that calls into question the accuracy of traditional Islamic narratives more generally.
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Reply #70 - December 14, 2016, 12:07 AM

As tweeted by Gabriel Said Reynolds: https://mobile.twitter.com/GabrielSaidR/status/808617238358097920

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Reply #71 - April 26, 2017, 07:28 PM

Elephants at Najran: https://mobile.twitter.com/shahanSean/status/857004315910733827

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Reply #72 - August 26, 2017, 07:18 AM

Medieval elephants: http://www.uliwestphal.de/elephas-anthropogenus/index.html

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Reply #73 - March 30, 2018, 07:49 PM

Reynolds again:

https://mobile.twitter.com/GabrielSaidR/status/978618780174741504

https://mobile.twitter.com/GabrielSaidR/status/978618977491542016

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Reply #74 - March 30, 2018, 07:56 PM

Quote from: zeca on August 26, 2017, 07:18 AM
Medieval elephants: http://www.uliwestphal.de/elephas-anthropogenus/index.html

that picture of elephants may be valid if these two words "Medieval and elephants" are deleted from that link dear zeca

http://www.uliwestphal.de/elephas-anthropogenus/soloelephants/jpgs/~1385.jpg

http://www.uliwestphal.de/elephas-anthropogenus/soloelephants/jpgs/1479.jpg

are they children cartoons?

Do not let silence become your legacy.. Question everything
I renounced my faith to become a kafir,
the beloved betrayed me and turned in to a Muslim
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Reply #75 - January 22, 2020, 11:15 PM

Thread from Sean Anthony: https://mobile.twitter.com/shahanSean/status/1220097304889307136

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