Journal of Persianate Studies 1 (2008) 206-217 www.brill.nl/jps

Among the Chosen Cities: Tbilisi in the Shiʿi Tradition

Grigol Beradze Th e G. Tsereteli Institute of Oriental Studies, Tbilisi

Following the setting up in the late 730s-early 770s A.D. of the Tbilisi emir- ate,1 its administrative center Tbilisi, the former capital of the Christian king- dom of Kartli (Eastern Georgia), now run by the Arabs, became involved in the political-religious and cultural life of the Caliphate, soon becoming one of the important strongholds of Islam in South Caucasus.2 Hence, it is not surprising that, beginning with the mid-8th century A.D., the written sources often refer to Muslim scholars and other persons whose biography and activi- ties are to some extent connected with the city of Tbilisi (Tefl is) and who accordingly bore the nesba “al-Tefl isi.”3 Th e majority of such persons were Sunnis, which is quite natural if we recall that offi cial Sunni Islam dominated in the Tbilisi emirate (as well as in other parts of the Caliphate), and that fol- lowers of orthodox Sunni denominations (mazhab) prevailed in the intellec- tual circles of the local Muslim community. At the same time, Shiʿites are also

1 On the Tbilisi emirate, see Lordkipanidze, 1951, pp. 185-201; idem, 1973, pp. 489-506; idem, 1979, p. 611; idem, 1988, pp. 349-353; idem, 2002a, p. 519; Alasania, pp. 21-26; Djaparidze, 1999a, pp. 72-74; . 2 Tbilisi was liberated from Muslim political rule by King David IV the Builder (r.1089- 1125) four century later, in 1122. King David made it the capital of the kingdom of Georgia, and treated the religion, culture, and customs of the local Muslim residents with great tact and respect. Th is is attested by Ebn al-Azraq al-Fāreqi, who visited Tbilisi in 548/1135: “He (i.e., King David) guaranteed to the Muslims everything they wished, according to the pact which is valid even to-day . . . He was extremely kind to the Muslims; he honoured the scholars and sūfīṣ by respecting their rank and[granting them] what they do not enjoy even among the Muslims. I witnessed all these privileges (shurūt) when I entered Tifl is in the year 548/1153. And I saw how the king of the Abkhaz, Dīmitrī (1125-1156), in whose service I was, arrived in Tifl is and sojourned there some days . . . And I witnessed on his part such esteem towards the Muslims as they would not enjoy even if they were in Baghdad”; see Minorsky, pp. 33-34. 3 Djaparidze, 1983, pp. 795-804; idem, 1989, pp. 77-78; idem, 1990, pp. 65-78; idem. 1995, pp. 200, 242-243, 255; idem, 1999b, pp. 75-76; idem, 2002, p. 547; Sikharulidze, pp. 45-53; Lordkipanidze, pp. 1991, 66-67, 69, 92; Dawlatābādi, pp. 88, 353, 356-358, 360- 361, 363; Baindurashvili, pp. 568-69; Dānesh-nāma-ye adab-e fārsi V, pp. 118, 132, 166, 168, 209-11, 303, 433-36, 455, 476; Amir Ahmadiyān, pp. 344-345, 347-349.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2008 G. Beradze / Journal of Persianate Studies 1 (2008) 206-217 207 mentioned in the sources among the earliest Muslims bearing the above nesba. Although concrete evidence on the activity of the latter in Arab-occupied Tbilisi is very scanty, it still points to the rather early penetration of the oppo- sitional Shiʿism and Shiʿite propaganda into the indicated region. Th e activists of the Shiʿite movement in Tbilisi emirate in the 8th-early 9th centuries A.D. will be referred to below. First, however, special attention should be paid to a little-known Shiʿite tradition whose content seems to have a direct bearing on the aspect of the history of Tbilisi discussed here. Th e tradition to be discussed below is found in a number of Arabic and Persian sources of which the earliest is Tārikh-e Qom, a medieval chronicle on the history of the city of Qom (Arab. Qumm), the famous Shiʿite center in Iran. It was composed originally in Arabic apparently in 378/988-89 by Hasan b. Mohammad b. Hasan Qomi (d. 406/1015-16). Th e Arabic original has, regrettably, not survived. Only the Persian translation of its fi rst fi ve chapters, done in the early 15th century A.D. by Hasan b. ʿAli b. Hasan b. ʿAbd al- Malek Qomi, has come down to us.4 Here I shall not go into a detailed description and assessment of this impor- tant historical source.5 I shall only touch upon the eighth section of the fi rst chapter, which is devoted to extolling the excellent qualities and virtues of Qom and its inhabitants. In this section of the text the “exclusiveness” of Qom and its signifi cance as a bastion of Shiʿism is illustrated with numerous legends and Shiʿite traditions containing sayings of great religious authorities.6 Th e majority of the sayings cited in this work are ascribed to the sixth Shiʿite Imam Abu ʿAbd Allāh Jaʿfar al-Sādeq (d. 148/765). It is in one such authoritative dictum that we fi nd the mention of the name of Tbilisi (Tefl is), in a very curi- ous and somewhat unexpected context. Th e translator of this historical work, proceeding from the text of the Arabic original, adduces in Persian translation a Shiʿite tradition referring to Kufa, Qom, and Tefl is as the three choice cities of God, then follows a report to the

4 Tārikh-e Qom (hereafter TQ) belongs to the category of Iranian local (or city) histories of the pre-Mongol period, about which C. E. Bosworth (p. 235) remarks: “It is noteworthy that many of the earlier of these histories were fi rst composed in Arabic but then had Persian translations or epitomes—presumably aimed at a wider audience than the narrow circle of those scholars literate in Arabic—made from them, often with continuations; and not infrequently, it has been the latter versions, rather than the Arabic originals, which have survived till today”; cf. Cahen, p. 125. 5 For more information on this historical work, see Rieu, pp. 59-60; Storey, I/2, pp. 348-349, tr., pp. 1008-1009; Lambton, 1948, pp. 586-96; idem, 1990, pp. 322, 325 ff ; idem, 1991, pp. 229, 233-34; Spuler, pp. XXV-XXVI (cf. Oriens 4, 1951, 187-89); Rosenthal, pp. 160-61; Sezgin, pp. 352-53; Modarresi Tabātabāʾi, pp. 10-43; Monzavi, 1974, pp. 4264-65; idem, 1996, pp. 893-94; Dustov, pp. 25-26; Drechsler, 1999, pp. 11-14, 21-24, 47 ff ., 368; idem, 2005. 6 TQ, pp. 90-100; cf. Ebn al-Faqih, p. 364; Mohammad b. Mahmud Hamadāni, pp. 471-72; Schwarz, p. 561, notes 9-10.