A SHII-JEWISH "DEBATE" (MUNAZARA) IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.

• Author: MOREEN, VERA B.
• Position: Jewish-Muslim polemical literature

THE HISTORY OF POLEMICS between Jews and Muslims still has a number of unexplored comers even if the basic framework and arguments used by both sides were largely formulated as early as two centuries after the advent of Islam, and have been repeated, with little variation, ever since.(2) However, because practically all the surviving information comes from the Sunni milieu, one potential area yet to be investigated lies in the field of explicit polemical exchanges between Shi is and Jews.

A full account of the history of the Jews in Shi i lands, particularly of the ancient Iranian Jewish community, is yet to be written. Although some of the later chapters of this history, particularly in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, are now better known(3) significant lacunae remain regarding most aspects of Jewish welfare since the establishment of the Safavid Shi i state in 1501 and from the mid-eighteenth century until the present.(4) There are many reasons that account for the difficulty of filling in these gaps,(5) and yet only a full-scale investigation would enable us to compare adequately the treatment of religious minorities in Shi i as opposed to Sunni territories.(6)

Documents that deal directly with various aspects of Jewish-Shi i relations are scarce; thus we are justified in exploring whatever evidence might help shed light on the subject. One such text, an account of a debate that is said to have taken place in Iraq toward the end of the eighteenth century (1796) between a famous Shi i mujtahid, commonly known by the honorific (laqab) Bahr al- Ulum ("Ocean of the Sciences"), and the representatives of a small Jewish community, is the subject of this study. Referring to this particular debate in his article on "Muslim-Jewish Polemics" in The Encyclopedia of Religion under the rubric "Decline of the Genre" [of polemics] and notes, Moshe Perlmann, without elaborating on the content, remarks that the Arabic account of the disputation shows it to have been "characterized by uncommon mildness and magnanimity"(7) In order to arrive at a proper historical assessment, however, we need to consider the circumstances of the debate, the personalities involved, and the nature of the arguments employed by both sides. The accuracy of Perlmann's comment can only be determined through close scrutiny of the actual text of the debate, which, unfortunately, has not yet come to light.

EVIDENCE FOR THE DEBATE

The only account of this disputation that I have been able to find is recorded in the editors' introduction to Rijal al-Sayyid Bahr al- Ulum al-ma ruf bi'l-Fawa id al-rijaliyya ("The Biographies of Great Men, Known as 'Notes on Famous Men,' of Bahr al- Ulum"), written by the sayyid Muhammad Mahdi ibn Murtada Tabataba i Burujirdi (1155-1212 A.H./A.D. 1742--97).(8) The account given there and thus the text on which this study is based describes at some length (pp. 50-66) a munazara, a "debate," that occurred between Bahr al- Ulum and a group of Jews. According to the editors, the Sayyid took pleasure in learned religious debates and had engaged in them previously several times with fellow Muslims during his seven-year stay in Mashhad (1772-79), and also in Mecca, during his three year hajj visit (1779-81). It was in Mashhad, in Khurasan, that he bested the philosopher Mirza Muhammad Mahdi al-Isfahani al-Khurasani, who then bestowed upon Sayyid Muhammad Mahdi the laqab "Bahr al- Ulum" by which he came to be popularly known.(9) The contents of these intra-Muslim debates are not discussed in this introduction beyond the general mention that they dealt with the differences between the madhahib, i.e., the various schools of Muslim law. However, perhaps because of the rarity of debates between Shi is and Jews, the same introduction presents a full account of the Sayyid's encounter with a group of Jews. Moreover, after the narrative of the debate itself, the editors inform us that the exchange was famous enough to be noted by at least two other fairly recent Shi i authorities, namely Sayyid Mahmud Tabataba i, in al-Mawahib al-saniyya ("The Sublime Gifts"),(10) and Sayyid Muhammad Baqir al-Khwansari, in Rawdat al-janna fi ahwal al- ulama wa'l-sadat ("The Gardens of Paradise Regarding the Status of Learned Men and Sayyids").(11) The former claims explicitly that many Jews converted as a result of this encounter. Both authors appear merely to be repeating a claim made by an earlier source, the Muntaha al-maqal ("The Conclusion of the Speech") by Shaykh Abu Ali Muhammad b. Isma il al-Karbala i (d. 1216 A.H. [1800-1801]), who was a student of Bahr al Ulum. Shaykh Abu Ali's citation appears to be the earliest reference to the debate. He may have witnessed the event himself or had access to a contemporaneous account of it.(12) Several later sources, basing themselves on this report, repeat the claim.(13) The editors also maintain that the text of the debate itself has been carefully preserved although they do not specify the manner of its recording, the name(s) of the transmitter(s), or its present location. They appear to imply that their account is based on a full text of the debate.(14) In fact three sources refer explicitly to the existence of an original account. In the sentence following the quotation recorded in the Rijal, al-Khwansari mentions that "the elucidation of this event is found in an orderly book among the collected works of the man mentioned above."(15) Mirza Muhammad Ali ("Mu allim Habibabadi"), in addition to referring to the conversion of some Jews in Dhu'l-Kifl (he is the only one among these sources to mention the location)(16) and basing himself on al-Khwansari's claim, numbers the account of the debate (amplified by details provided by some unnamed students of Bahr al- Ulum who had witnessed it), as the eighth written work that can be attributed to the Sayyid.(17) Mirza Muhammad Tunuqabuni also refers to a risala, or treatise, about "refuting (radd) the Jews."(18) Until this account actually surfaces, however (and, if it exists, it is probably still in manuscript), the editors' record of this encounter is the only one available to us.

The Shi i, or rather Muslim, bias of the account, which highlights Bahr al- Ulum's acumen and erudition, is readily apparent and what, if anything, in the account may be distorted or suppressed is, in the absence of other (especially Jewish) records of the event, a moot question. Despite the account's apparent grounding in fact, a number of its features cast doubt on whether the munazara actually took place in the manner related. Certain of its hortatory features suggest the possibility that the kernel of the actual event may have been subordinate to its aims, namely the extolling of Bahr al- Ulum's educational and proselytizing efforts. Furthermore, the vague identity of the Jewish protagonists suggests the possibility that the account, even in the form available to us, was not intended to represent a real incident but simply signaled to some readership that, had such a debate taken place, these would have been the arguments presented. But it would appear likely that the instruction derived from the munazara was directed primarily at Shi is.

THE DEBATERS AND THEIR TIMES

The present account of the munazara provides practically no information about the identity of the Jewish participants in the debate, whose surnames are not given and who are referred to by the rather generic Jewish names of "Da ud" and " Ezra" (Uzayr). If they were real individuals, we may only guess that they were learned leaders of the local Jewish community.(19)

By contrast the Shi i theologian, known to his contemporaries and to future generations of learned Shi is simply as "Bahr al- Ulum," was a major and prolific mujtahid of the usuli branch of Shi ism.(20) His biography has been well preserved.(21) In brief, he was born in Karbala in 1155/1742 where he studied under two famous theologians, Shaykh Yusuf al-Bahrani (d. 1186--1772) and Vahid Bihbihani (1118-1207/1706-92). He moved to Najaf in 1169/1755 and succeeded Bihbihani as a leading mujtahid upon the latter's death. Many miraculous stories are told about Bahr al- Ulum, including the popular claim of communication with the Hidden (Twelfth) Imam.(22) Bahr al Ulum, in turn, was the teacher of several famous students, such as Kashifu'l Ghita (d. 1812)(23) and Shaykh Ahmad Ahsa i (d. 1826),(24) to name only two, and he was the sire of a family that produced several famous ulama up to the present.

By the time of Bahr al- Ulum, the usuli branch of Shi ism had come to prevail over the akhbari in Iran and the Shi i regions of Iraq(25) During most of his lifetime, Iran was under the rule of the Zand dynasty (1750-94); a change of dynasties occurred with the accession of the first Qajar Shah, Agha Muhammad (1794-97). Despite his family ties to Iran and to his ancestral town of Burujird,(26) Bahr al- Ulum was actually an Ottoman subject. The two "thresholds" (ataba), the shrines of Najaf and Karbala, were only briefly under Iranian protection during the reign of Shah Abbas I (1571-1629) when he conquered Baghdad in 1624. They remained under his control until 1638, when Shah Safi I (1629-42) lost them again to the Ottomans.(27) Nevertheless, Iranian threats to these parts of the Ottoman realm continued to make the Porte nervous.(28) Despite Sunni dominion, the primarily Shi i population of Najaf, Karbala, and their surroundings, retained strong ties with Iran. It is therefore not surprising to find a certain fluidity across these borders that neither the Ottomans nor the Iranians controlled too strictly. Thus students kept going back and forth to study with reputable ulama and these, in turn, paid visits to their families on either side of the border.

During Bahr al- Ulum's lifetime approximately twelve Mamluk and Turkish pashas ruled Iraq (1750-1831). The welfare of Ottoman Jewry, already on the decline in the sixteenth century, continued...