Institutionalization of Muslim Scholarship and Professionalization of the 'Ulamā' in Medieval Damascus Author(s): Joan E. Gilbert Source: Studia Islamica, No. 52, (1980), pp. 105-134 Published by: Maisonneuve & Larose Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1595364 Accessed: 18/06/2008 12:19 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=mal. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1995 to build trusted digital archives for scholarship. We work with the scholarly community to preserve their work and the materials they rely upon, and to build a common research platform that promotes the discovery and use of these resources. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. http://www.jstor.org INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF MUSLIM SCHOLARSHIP AND PROFESSIONAITZATION OF THE 'ULAMA' IN MEDIEVALDAMASCUS Introduction Following the Islamic conquests, companions of Muhammad (sahaba) left Mecca and Medina. As Muslims spread across the world from Spain to Central Asia, scholars eager to keep alive Muhammad's teachings traveled back and forth through Islamic lands to discuss religious questions, to exchange inform- ation, and to teach. The first generation of scholars of Islam after the companions of Muhammad are designated followers (tabi'iin), subsequent generations are called 'ulama'. Scholars is the essential meaning of the word 'ulamd'. As generations of Muslims sought to order society on the basis of the principles of Islam, the term 'ulamd' came to connote scholars of religion and religious law; and 'ulama' became a collective word referring to all manner of scholars of religion, including the judges who administered the law of Islam, professors of Islamic law, hadlth transmitters, imams, preachers, legal advisers, sufts, and private individuals with some proficiency in religious matters. In each episode of Islamic history, 'ulama' have been a general 106 J. E. GILBERT body of scholars of religion who filled one or more of the fore- going specific religious roles. Yet, when scholars of religion are considered in the context of the whole of Islamic society, the general term 'ulama' fails in precision, for the broader social roles of the 'ulama' have varied over the centuries. During the course of Islamic history 'ulamd' have been both proponents of social change and preventers of it. In diverse times and places 'ulamd' have either shunned or accepted state appointments. In the early centuries of Islam private, independent scholars representing all levels of society informally associated with one another. In the later Islamic centuries 'ulamd' served as salaried bureau- crats and permitted the incorporation of their scholarly organi- zation into the state. The present article concentrates on the 'ulama' of medieval Damascus between the years 468/1076 and 658/1260. Throughout this period interaction between the 'ulama' and the ruling families of Damascus increasingly promoted the endowment of religious establishments, the institutionalization of Muslim scholarship, and the professional- ization of the 'ulamd'-developments which mark a significant change in Islamic social structure and Muslim community life. During two separate epochs of Islamic history Damascus served as a capital city and as the source of political, social, cultural, and intellectual trends that influenced the entire Islamic world. The first such era lasted approximately one hundred years, from the mid-seventh to the mid-eighth century. The second period of special importance for Damascus extended through the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. In this period Turkish and Kurdish rulers replaced local militias with imperial troops for external defence and with a police force for internal control. The city enjoyed growing agricultural and manu- facturing activity and increased trade. Expansion of the religious establishment was part of the renaissance of twelfth and thirteenth-century Damascus. Although 'ulama' were active in Damascus throughout previous centuries, during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries they enjoyed unprecedented opportunities. Scores of new religious institutions were established, large numbers of salaried posts INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF MUSLIM SCHOLARSHIP 107 for teachers and stipends for students became available, and increasing numbers of religious scholars from around the Islamic world came to study, many to settle, in Damascus. The International System of Scholarship Before the crystallization of Muslim scholarship in twelfth and thirteenth-century Damascus, and from earliest Muslim times, companions of Muhammad, tabi'iin, and subsequent generations of 'ulamd' journeyed throughout the Islamic territories to pursue and disseminate religious knowledge. This tradition of travel in search of learning continued to dominate the educational and career patterns of later 'ulama'. As conquest and conversion brought diverse ethnic and linguistic groups into the original Arabo-Islamic empire, Muslim scholars from areas as distant as Spain, North Africa, and Central Asia sought personal communication with one another. A network of scholarly contacts began to extend across the Islamic world. Muslim scholars traveled as participants in a host of professional and social as well as religious practices that grew up around the exchange of religious information. These organized pur- suits constituted an international system of Muslim learning. Scholars of religion in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries typically studied first in their native city and began to travel, usually to several places, in order to continue their education. When they had accumulated enough knowledge and the documents certifying proficiency, they looked for positions either at home or abroad. Wherever they lived they both taught and carried forward their education, profitting from both resident and traveling 'ulamd'. Scholars sought to gain students and to increase their reputation, for future employment might depend upon popularity and fame. Contemporaries and biographers did not hesitate to compare one scholar with another, and the numbers of students and sizes of crowds in attendance were significant ingredients in a scholarly reputation. In every generation two or three scholars were acknowledged as outstanding, and others went 108 J. E. GILBERT to meet and study with these men. The biographies of contemporary 'ulama' show that they traveled to the same towns and that they nearly always studied with the same famous individuals. Religion was the basis of the system of international scholar- ship and the overriding motivation for itinerant scholars. For example, persons became muhaddiths for the sake of the religious experience of being part of a continuous chain of transmitters extending back to Muhammad. Scholars directed their travels to study with the most noted men of their generation in order to insure their place in chains of authorities stretching into the past and, through their own students, into the future. They were in their own estimation living links between generations of scholars. (1) Pilgrimage and traveling to gain religious knowledge were frequently combined. Essential to the functioning of the international scholarly system were personal contacts. Social connections integrating the system included acquaintance with influential scholars at home and around the Islamic world, contact with other students engaged in similar careers, and the establishment of marriage alliances. Some students studied with many professors; others stayed with a single professor for years, holding a job or two under him and acting as his companion or junior colleague. In some cases a student studied with only one individual, followed his professor from place to place, and settled himself in the new locale to which his teacher had migrated. A scholar might wed the daughter of a native-born or immigrant professor in his home town or in the course of his travels, and a new professor in town might marry into an established scholarly family. Thus, inter-city marriage alliances began to exist, further reinforcing the international association of scholars. (2) (1) Ibn Khallikan, Ibn Khallikan's Biographical Dictionary, trans. by Mac Guckin de Slane, 4 vols. (Paris, 1843-1871; reprinted Beirut: Librairie du Liban, 1970), II, pp. 387-388. (2) Ibn Rajab, Kitdb al-Dhayl 'ald Tabaqdt al-Hanabila, ed. by Muhammad Hamid al-Fiqi, 2 vols. (Cairo: Al-Sunna al-Muhammadiyya, 1952-1953), II, pp. 294, 296, developed a formula for describing the scholar that studied, married, and had children abroad: sami'a bihd, tafaqqaha bihd, tazawwaja bihd, wa wulida lahu. INSTITUTIONALIZATION OF MUSLIM SCHOLARSHIP 109 The strength of scholarly relationships explains how persons could arrive alone or with a single companion (often father and son or two brothers) and be accepted, cared