A040 - Ibn Ishaq

 

Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad
Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad (Muhammad ibn Ishaq) (Muhammad ibn Ishaq ibn Yasar) (c.704-767).  One of the main authorities on the biography of the Prophet.  His work, known as Life of the Prophet was edited by Ibn Hisham.

Muhammad ibn Ishaq ibn Yasar is known as the author of the first complete biography -- the first complete sira -- of Muhammad.  Ibn Ishaq was born in Medina into a non-Arab Muslim family of Traditionists.  Ibn Ishaq collected traditions, stories, and poems about Muhammad from many sources and, though renowned for his knowledge, came itno conflict with more conservative authorities. 

In Baghdad, under the patronage of the ‘Abbasid Caliph al-Mansur, Ibn Ishaq wrote the biography of Muhammad as a school text for the prince al-Mahdi.  The work was modeled on the Bible, the history of the world from creation to Muhammad comprising the “Old Testament” portion, and the life of Muhammad comprising the “New Testament” portion.  Ibn Ishaq’s work portrays Muhammad as the new Abraham, Moses, Jacob, and particularly Jesus, among others, although it is reasonably historical for Muhammad’s Medinan career.  Abridged by Ibn Hisham, Ibn Ishaq’s biography became the most popular biography of Muhammad in the Muslim world.

Muḥammad ibn Isḥaq ibn Yasār, or simply Ibn Isḥaq (meaning "the son of Isaac") was an Arab Muslim historian and hagiographer. He collected oral traditions that formed the basis of the first biography of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. This biography is usually called Sirat Rasul Allah ("Life of God's Messenger").

Ibn Isḥaq was born circa 704 C.C., in Medina. He was the grandson of a man, Yasār, who had been captured in one of Khalid ibn al-Walid's campaigns and taken to Medina as a slave. He became the slave of Ḳays b. Makhrama b. al-Muṭṭalib b. ʿAbd Manāf b. Ḳuṣayy and, having accepted Islam, was manumitted and became his mawlā , thus acquiring the nisba al-Muṭṭalibī. Yasār's three sons, Mūsā, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, and Isḥāq, were all known as transmitters of akhbār, who collected and recounted tales of the past. Isḥāq married the daughter of another mawlā and from this marriage Ibn Isḥāq was born.

There are no details of his early life, but in view of the family nature of early akhbār and ḥadīth transmission, it was natural that he should follow in the footsteps of his father and uncles and become specialized in these branches of knowledge. In 737, he arrived in Alexandria and studied under Yazīd b. Abī Ḥabīb.  Ibn Isḥāq returned to Medina from Egypt, before finally travelling eastwards towards what is now ‘Irāq. There, the new Abbasid dynasty, having overthrown the Umayyad caliphs, was establishing a new capital at Baghdad. Ibn Isḥaq moved to the capital and likely found patrons in the new regime. He died in Baghdad around 767 C.C.

Ibn Isḥaq wrote several works, none of which survive. Apart from the Sīra an-nabawiyya he is credited with a Kitāb al-Ḵhulafāʾ, which al-Umawwī related to him and a book of Sunan.

His collection of traditions about the life of Muhammad also called Sīrat Nabawiyya or Sīrah Rasūl Allāh, survives mainly in two sources:

    * an edited copy, or recension, of his work by his student al-Bakka'i, as further edited by Ibn Hisham. Al-Bakka'i's work has perished and only Ibn Hisham's has survived, in copies.
    * an edited copy, or recension, prepared by his student Salamah ibn Fadl al-Ansari. This also has perished, and survives only in the copious extracts to be found in the volumimous works of historian al-Tabari's.
    * fragments of several other recensions.




Muhammad ibn Ishaq see Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad
Muhammad ibn Ishaq ibn Yasar see Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad