THE SÎRA AND SÎRA LITERATURE

The sîrat rasûl Allah or al-sira al-nabawiyya or just al- sîra, is the Arabic term used for the various traditional Muslim biographies of Muhammad. In the Arabic language the word sîra (or sîrat comes from the verb sâre (present tense: yesîru), which means to travel or to be on a journey. A person sîra is that person’s journey through life, or biography, including their birth, events in their life, manners and characteristics and their death. In Islamic literature, the plural form siyar, could also refer to the rules of war and dealing with non-Muslims. The phrase sîrat rasûl Allah, or al-sîra al-nabawiyya, refers to the study of the life of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.

In the first two centuries of Islamic history, sîra was more commonly known as maghâzî (literally, stories of military expeditions), which is now considered to be only a subset of sîra. Early works of sîra consist of multiple historical reports, or akhbâr, and each report is called a khabar. Sometimes the word hadith or tradition is used instead.

Content: The sîra literature includes ancient legends, Muhammad’s early life and mission, and his wars. The sīra also includes a number of written documents, such as political treaties (e.g., Treaty of Hudaybiyyah or Constitution of Medina), military enlistments, assignments of officials, letters to foreign rulers, and so forth. It also records some of the speeches and sermons made by Muhammad, like his speech at the Farewell Pilgrimage. The sīra literature also includes verses of poetry commemorating certain events and battles.

Early compilations of sîra (Literature): There are three domains of Arabic literature, which, as sources for the sayings and doings of the Prophet, have to be considered: hadith, sîra, and tafsîr. The ground- element of all three domains is the individual report, which appears in each of them in the same form, that of a pronouncement (matn al-hadith) introduced by a chain of witnesses (isnâd).

The first author to be known as an especial on maghâzî was Abân, the son of the caliph ‘Uthman. He was born in c.20 and took part in the campaign of Talha and Zubayr against his father’s slayers. He died about c.100. A man of much greater importance was Urwa b. al- Zubayr b. al-Awwam (c.23-94). Urwa’s mother was Abu Bakr’s daughter Asma. He was a recognized authority on the early history of Islam, and the Umayyad caliph Abdu’l- Malik applied to him when he needed information on that subject. It is uncertain whether he wrote a book, but the many traditions that are handed down in his name by Ibn Ishaq and other writers justify the assertion that he was the founder of Islamic history.

Another important person was Wahb b. Munabbih (c Another important person was Wahb b. Munabbih (c.34-110), a Yamanite of Persian origin. His father probably was a Jew. Some of his works survive as quotations found in works by Ibn Ishaq, Ibn Hisham, Ibn Jarir al-Tabari. Ibn Shihâb al-Zuhrî (51-124), a central figure in sīra literature, who collected both ahadith and akhbār. He was a member of a distinguished Meccan family, He attached himself to Abdu’l- Melik, Hisham, and Yazid, and wrote dowan some traditions for his princely pupils. He is often named as an authority in the Sîra.

Musa ibn Uqba (55-141) a student of al-Zuhrî, and wrote Kitāb al-Maghāzī, a notebook used to teach his students; now lost. Some of his traditions have been preserved, although their attribution to him is disputed. Muhammad ibn Ishaq (85-151), another student of al-Zuhrî, who collected oral traditions that formed the basis of an important extant biography of the Prophet. His work survived through that of his editors, most notably Ibn Hisham and Ibn Jarir al-Tabari.