Book of Muhammad's Ladder

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Illustration of Muḥammad on a ladder, from the sole copy of the Livre de l'eschiele Mahomet

The Book of Muḥammad's Ladder is a first-person account of the Islamic prophet

Ibn ʿAbbās (died 687), the work is in fact spurious
and dates to the 13th century.

Belonging to the genre of apocalyptic literature, Muḥammad's Ladder details Muḥammad's miraculous transportation by the angel Gabriel from Mecca to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem and from there upward to the seven heavens. It also includes sections on Muḥammad's visit to the seven regions of Hell and his face-to-face vision of God, during which he was granted the power to intercede on behalf of believers on Judgement Day.

The work was known to Dante Alighieri (died 1321), whose Divine Comedy has sometimes been regarded as inspired by Muḥammad's Ladder.

Origins

See also: Literature of Alfonso X

Muḥammad's Ladder has a complicated history. It survives only in

Bonaventura da Siena to translate the Castilian into Latin and French. A colophon indicates that he completed the French translation in 1264.[2] The Castilian version, now for the most part lost, was probably produced before 1262.[3]

Doubts have been raised about the ascription of the French translation to Alfonso X and Bonaventura. It has been argued that the French translation was made from the Latin shortly after 1264 by a translator from Provence and probably not on Alfonso X's orders.[2] It has also been argued to the contrary that the French translation is earlier than the Latin.[4]

Sources

There is debate about the nature of the Arabic original with which Abraham of Toledo worked. No Arabic text corresponding to Muḥammad's Ladder is known. It may be that the Arabic work was a compilation of

Qurʾān and Qurʾānic commentaries. The influence of Christian (and Jewish) commentaries may be explained by the author's reliance on popular traditions and less authoritative ḥadīths, which had already incorporated such material.[5] There is little doubt that the text of Muḥammad's Ladder as it stands is a composite work.[6]

Ana Echevarría identifies three Arabic Islamic texts that "certainly had a share in the making up" Muḥammad's Ladder. These were

Kitāb al-miʿrāj of al-Qushayrī.[7]

Early Latin biographies of Muḥammad do not incorporate the isrāʾ and miʿrāj. The first to do so was the Vita Mahometi of the early 13th century. Around the same time, Muḥammad's journeys were incorporated into the Chronica of Lucas de Tuy, the Historia arabum of Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada and Alfonso X's Estoria de España. Rodrigo's connection with Mark of Toledo suggests that the Arabic works on which Muḥammad's Ladder is based were available in Toledo in the first decades of the 13th century.[9]

Synopsis

By

Ibn ʿAbbās is said to have recorded Muḥammad's account.[12]

Manuscripts

Decorated initial at the start of the Liber scalae Machometi in BnF lat. 6064

The Castilian version is lost,

Francisco Eiximenis (14th century) and Antonio de Torquemada (15th century) show knowledge of the Castilian version.[13] It has been suggested that the Castilian version was only ever a draft, with the Latin product being the only one intended for publication.[1] The Latin version survives in two manuscripts and the French in one.[14][15] All the manuscripts date to the 13th century[14] or 14th century:[15]

There have been many editions and modern translations of the text.[19]

Legacy

Muḥammad's Ladder was almost certainly translated because it was believed to be a work of the greatest importance in Islam. It was taken by its translators to be an authentic record of Muḥammad's words. In the two Latin manuscripts, Muḥammad's Ladder is copied alongside the

Toledan Collection, a group of 12th-century translations of authentic Muslim writings into Latin.[15] It came to be regarded by Christians as Muḥammad's "second book" after the Qurʾān, a claim which denied the divine inspiration of either.[20] The French preface makes clear that the reader is to perceive in the work "the errors and unbelievable things" of Islam.[15]
The response of Muḥammad's kinsmen to his account probably reflects how the translators expected the work to be received by Christian readers:

You wish to have us understand thereby that in a single night you went to the Temple in Jerusalem and saw everything that is within it and, afterwards, you saw all the heavens and all the lands and celestial gardens and regions of hell! ... And we know indeed that it is at the very least a month's journey from here all the way to the said temple! How, then, do you expect us to believe you regarding anything that you recounted to us?[21]

Muḥammad's Ladder was known to

Primera Crónica General.[22] In 1907, Miguel Asín Palacios first proposed that it was a possible source for Dante's Divine Comedy.[23] The extent of its influence on Dante has been heavily debated ever since. It has been argued that the Divine Comedy was composed as a kind of Christian counter to Muḥammad's Ladder, although there is as yet no scholarly consensus.[24]

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d e f g Echevarría 2012, p. 425.
  2. ^ a b c d Hyatte 1997, p. 21.
  3. ^ Echevarría 2005, p. 135.
  4. ^ Colby 2008, p. 156.
  5. ^ a b c d e Hyatte 1997, p. 19.
  6. ^ Colby 2008, p. 158.
  7. ^ a b Echevarría 2005, pp. 136–138.
  8. ^ Colby 2008, pp. 156–157.
  9. ^ Echevarría 2005, pp. 137–140.
  10. ^ Hyatte 1997, p. 26.
  11. ^ Hyatte 1997, p. 25.
  12. ^ Hyatte 1997, p. 20.
  13. ^ a b c Cerulli 1969.
  14. ^ a b c Echevarría 2012, p. 426.
  15. ^ a b c d Hyatte 1997, p. 22.
  16. ^ Digitized online
  17. ^ Digitized online
  18. ^ Partially digitized online
  19. ^ See the list in Echevarría 2012, pp. 426–427. An English translation is in Hyatte 1997, pp. 97–198.
  20. ^ Echevarría 2005, pp. 135–136.
  21. ^ Hyatte 1997, p. 24.
  22. ^ Echevarría 2005, pp. 142–144.
  23. ^ Echevarría 2005, pp. 133–134.
  24. ^ Hyatte 1997, p. 25–26.

Bibliography

  • ISBN 978-8-81200032-6
    .
  • Colby, Frederick S. (2008). Narrating Muḥammad's Night Journey: Tracing the Development of the Ibn ʿAbbās Ascension Discourse. State University of New York.
  • Echevarría, Ana (2005). "Eschatology or Biography? Alfonso X, Muhammad's Ladder and a Jewish Go-Between". In Leyla Rouhi; Cynthia Robinson (eds.). Under the Influence: Questioning the Comparative in Medieval Castile. Brill. pp. 133–152.
  • Echevarría, Ana (2012). "Liber scalae Machometi". In David Thomas; Alex Mallett (eds.). Christian–Muslim Relations: A Bibliographical History. Vol. 4 (1200–1350). Brill. pp. 425–428.
  • Hyatte, Reginald (1997). The Prophet of Islam in Old French: The Romance of Muhammad (1258) and The Book of Muhammad's Ladder (1264). Brill.
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