Al-qadi_The Term Khalifa

The Term "Khalīfa" in Early Exegetical LiteratureAuthor(s): Wadād Al-QāḍīSource: Die Welt des Islams, New Series, Bd. 28, Nr. 1/4 (1988), pp. 392-411Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1571186 .

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Die Welt des Islams XXVIII (1988)

THE TERM "KHALIFA" IN EARLY EXEGETICAL LITERATURE

BY

WADAD AL-QADI

Yale New Haven

The meaning of the term "khalifa" has been studied by several modern scholars for almost a century now.' This is quite under- standable in view of the importance of this term in Islamic history, institutions, political theory, law and theology. Most of these scholars noted that the term occurs in various forms in the Qur'an, and some of them, notably Rudi Paret and W. Montgomery Watt,2 made this occurrence the starting point of their research. This, in

turn, led them to study the Muslim exegetical literature about "khalifa'"-now already much over a millennium old. The results of their investigations were more often than not complementary rather than contradictory. But this was not unexpected. After all,

See I. Goldziher, Muhammedanische Studien, II, pp. 52-66, Halle, 1890; idem, "Du sens propre des expressions Ombre de Dieu, Khalife de Dieu pour designer les chefs dans l'Islam," Revue de l'Histoire des Religions 35 (1897) esp. 137-40; D. S. Margoliouth, "The Sense of The Titel Khalffah," in A Volume of Oriental Studies Presented to E. G. Brown, ed. E. T. Arnold and R. A. Nicholson, Cambridge, 1922, pp. 322-28; E. Tyan, Institutions du droit public musulman, vol. 1: Le califat, Paris, 1956; A. Abel, "Le khalife, presence sacree," SI 7 (1957) 29-45; W. Montgomery Watt, Islamic Political Thought, Edinburgh, 1968; H. A. R. Gibb, "The Heritage of Islam in the Modern World, (I)," IJMES 1 (1970) 3-18; R. Paret, "Significa- tion coranique de haltfa et d'autres derives de la racine halafa," SI 31 (1970) 211- 17; W. M. Watt, "God's Caliph: Qur'anic Interpretation and Umayyad Claims," in Iran and Islam, in Memory of The Late Vladimir Minorsky, ed. C. E. Bosworth, Edinburgh, 1971, pp. 565-74; R. Paret, "Halifat Allah-Vicarius Dei: Ein differenzierender Vergleich,'" in Melanges d'Islamologie, Volume dedie a la memoire de Armand Abel, ed. P. Salmon, Leiden, 1974, pp. 224-32; A. K. S. Lambton, "Khalifa, (In Political Theory)" in EP, IV, Leiden, 1978, pp. 947-50; P. Crone and M. Hinds, God's Caliph, Cambridge, 1986; H. CAtwan, al-Umawiyyun wa l- khildfa, Amman, 1986. Several more general works on early Islamic history discuss the question briefly.

2 Paret in "Signification," and Watt in "God's Caliph."



THE TERM ,,KHALIFA

if the aims of scholars differ, what they see in the same material is

likely to be different too. Paret, in his capacity as a Qur'an translator, hoped to come to some kind of "neutral" but

"homogenous" understanding of what the term meant in the

Qur'an in its various forms (nominal as well as verbal) and he con-

sequently did not spell out his "supporting authorities" from the medieval period. Watt, as a historian on the other hand, wanted to exhaust all the possibilities of the meaning of the term in the

Qur'an, in order to see how these possibilities compared with the

Umayyad Caliphs' claim that they were "khulafa3 Allah"-God's

caliphs. This led him not only to conduct a thorough philological examination of the root kh.l.f. in Arabic but also to study and cite the major exegetical authorities on the subject from the first until the tenth Hijri centuries.

In the present paper my aim is still different. I am not concerned with a "neutral", "homogenous" or "exhaustive" understanding of the meaning of the term "khalifa" as it appears in the Qur)an. My purpose is "exegetically historical" and for that reason it is confined to the earliest era of Islam, not ranging beyond the

Umayyad period. What I would like to determine is the following: How did the early Muslim exegetes, living under the Umayyads, understand the QurPanic term "khalifa" in their own time and

place, when they were governed by caliphs who, in one way or the

other, and at different points in their rule, not only declared themselves as God's khalrfas but also cited at leas one Qur'anic khalzfa-verse in support of their declarations?3 Did they also make the connection between the political reality and the Divine Word?

And, if so, how? Or did they not? And, again, if so, why? It is

hoped that such a study might shed light on how a small but signifi- cant sector of Islamic society intellectually functioned during the

Umayyad period, a period about which we know little definite in character.

Once defined, my aim confined the material to be examined, since the period in question is one in which the literary output in

general was limited and only very few of the exegetical works

3 The subject has been thoroughly discussed by Crone and Hinds in God's Caliph (see n. 1).

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WADAD AL-QADI

known from it cover the whole Qur'an. Moreover, the state of our

original sources does not render the work of the researcher any easier. There are some contemporary early works related to ex-

egesis which have been lost.4 There are three early, strictly ex-

egetical works which are still in manuscript form5 and, for the mo-

ment, only one of them is available to me, namely the Tafsir of

Muqatil b. Sulayman (d. 150/767).6 On the other hand, during the

past two decades three early exegetical works appeared in print: Tafshr Mujdhid (21/641-103/721),7 Tafsir Sufydn al-Thawrz (95/713- 161/777),8 in addition to the first volume of Muqatil's Tafstr.9 To these can be added the sayings of the early exegetes which have been preserved in later exegetical literature, most of which is

already in print. But, again, quite a few of these early exegetes were not reported to have commented on the verses which deal with the term "khalifa" in its various forms in the Qur'an. Finally, because of my precise purpose, I cannot use the statements of the later, more well-known Qur'an commentators, as Watt did. The very last

authority I can cite is Sufyan al-Thawrl, who lived for 37 years of his life under the Umayyads and died at the age of 66 under the Ab- basids. Hence the sayings of Watt's authorities, namely those of

Suyuti (d. 911/1505), Tabarl (d. 310/922), Zamakhsharl (d. 538/1143) and Baydawi(d. 685/1226)-in Watt's order-,'0 are irrelevant for my work and can even be destructive for its purpose, as will be shown below."l The reason for this is clear. All these "standard" commentators lived and wrote mainly after the formation of the Sunni creed; the earliest among them, Tabarn, par-

4 Examples of those are Qatada's and Zuhri's books with the title al-Ndsikh wa

l-mansukh, and Zuhri's Kitab al-tanzil; see F. Sezgin, GAS 1, 20 (Leiden, 1967). 5 These are the tafslrs of CAta) b. Abl Muslim Maysara al-Khurasanl (Sezgin,

op. cit., 1, 33), MaCmar b. Rashid (ibid., 99) and Muqatil b. Sulayman (ibid., 36-7).

6 Ms. Bursa, H. Celebi 27. I am indebted to Gerhard B6wering, Professor of Islamic Studies at Yale University, for gaining access to this manuscript.

7 Ed. CAbd al-Rahman al-Tahir b. Muhammad al-Surati, 2 vols., Beirut, n.d. 8 Rampur, 1385/1965. 9 Ed. CAbdallah Mahmud Shihata, Cairo, 1969; Muqatil's al-Ashbah wa l-naza-'ir

Ji l-Quradn al-karim (Cairo, 1395/1975) and Tafsir khamsmi'at aya (Cairo, n.d.) do not have anything on the term "khallfa."

10 In "God's Caliph," 566. " See n. 17 below.

394



THE TERM ,,KHALIFA

ticipated himself in this process of its final formation. What I wish to investigate appears far earlier, at a time when each commentator was still struggling independently to understand the meanings of the revealed text and when the Islamic state was slowly taking shape.

Paradoxically enough, it is Tabari's Commentary, or Tafs-r,12 which is our main source for the study of the sayings of the early exegetes. For TabarT has recorded in his monumental work not on-

ly his own exegetical comments but also those of most of the ex-

egetical authorities before him, right from the start of the

"discipline" among the Muslims. It is to him that we owe the

preservation of material which otherwise could have been lost forever. Furthermore, modern research has shown that TabarT was both copious and exact in reproducing the sayings of the early commentators he chose to cite; the recently published Tafsir of Mujahid shows this point quite clearly.

Using Tabari as main source, however, is not without hazards, and particularly so when the topic under investigation is a crucial one for Tabarl, such as the term "khalifa" in the Qur)an. This is evident immediately in the material Tabarl brings forth by way of

commentary on the very first verse in which the term occurs in the

Qurafn, in sura 2:30. The verse is the first in a series narrating the

story of Adam's creation and the ensuing events. The text reads:

(And when your Lord said to the angels, "I am making on earth a khalffa," they said, "Will You make on it one (or: those) who will act corruptly and shed blood on it, whereas we glorify You with Your praise and hallow You?" He said, "I know that which you do not know.")

In Tabarl's lengthy commentary on this verse,'3 one encounters four major problems. The first consists of Tabaris "dogmatic" position on the politico-historical level. From the beginning Tabari states clearly that there is a direct relation between the Qur'anic term "khalifa" and the historical reality of the caliphate: the Muslim Caliph is called "khalifa" along the lines of the word in

12 For the Qur'anic verses until sura 12 (Yusuf): 18, my references are to the edition of Mahmuid Muhammad Shakir, 15 vols., Cairo, 1954-1960; hereafter, they are to the Cairo print, 30 vols., third ed., 1954-1968.

13 1, 439-80 (Shakir).

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WADAD AL-QADI

this verse.14 This is based on a philological examination which, from my point of view, represents the second problem in Tabari's material: his dogmatism on the philological level. Tabari begins by examining the meaning of the root kh.l.f. and states that it is "to succeed," without indicating that this is just one of many possible meanings. Furthermore, he outrightly rejects the interpretation of an early scholar, Ibn Ishaq (d. 151/768), who suggested that the root kh.l.f., in the context of the same Qur'anic verse, means "to inhabit and to cultivate."15 Once Tabari dispenses with this second

meaning (which would not have fitted his "historical" vision), he returns to the original meaning and asks a necessarily "consequen- tial" question: So whom did this "khalifa" succeed?16 And he con- tinues to ask questions in this manner until the end of the commen-

tary on this verse. This is the third problem: The questions asked follow a "Tabari assumption:" They make the very "presentation" of his material suspect. The fourth problem, however, is the most serious one. Tabarl indeed reproduces the sayings of the early exegetes, but he also "explains" almost each one of them after

stating them. However, an examination of his wording shows that this "explanation" often is in fact an "interpretation" rather than an "explication." In some cases, especially where Tabari almost "twists" the saying to fit his initial understanding of the term "khalifa,"17 this can be tremendously misleading for the researcher.

14 "Hence al-sultdn al-aczam was called 'khalifa,' for he succeeded the one before him...." (Tafsir, 1, 449. This was copied by Ibn Kathir in his Tafsir, 1, 70 (4 vols., Beirut, 1401/1981-1402/1982.)

15 Tafszr, 1, 449-50.

16 Ibid., 450. 17

Perhaps the best example is Tabari's "explanation" of the commentary of Ibn 'Abbas, Ibn Mas'ud and others on sura 2:30. Their commentary is: "God said, (I am making on earth a khalifa); they said, 'Our Lord, what about this khalffa?' He said, 'He will have a progeny who will act corruptly on earth, envy and kill each other.' " This simple commentary "means" the following according to Tabarl, "The interpretation of the verse... (is): I am making on earth a substitute (?) of Me (khalifatan minni) who would replace me (yakhlufuni) in acting as an arbiter (f- l-hukmi) among my creatures. And this "khalifa" is Adam and whoever acts like him by obeying God and acting justly among His creatures. As for corruption and unlawful bloodshed, (they come) from (people) other than His "khulafa"' and other than Adam and whoever acts like him among God's wor- shippers...." (Ibid., 451-52. This was copied by Ibn Kathir in his Tafsir, 1, 70.)

396



THE TERM ,,KHALIFA" 397

In order to avoide the problems mentioned above, one should dismiss the initial relation between the Qur'anic term "khalifa" and the historical reality of the caliphate. One must also be open about various possibilities of the meaning of the root kh.l.f., and hence "khalifa," should any of the early exegetes be prone towards one or more of them. In addition, one should ignore Tabarl's "se-

quential" presentation, be prepared to ask new questions, set aside Tabarl's "explanations" of the sayings of the early exegetes and

study the texts-and solely the texts-of those exegetes. With these precepts in mind, I would first like to make some

preliminary observations. The term "khalifa" occurs in the Qurnan twice in the singular

and seven times in the plural, four of them in the form "khala'if" and three in the form "khulafa'." In all of these instances, it is to be noted, the term has one or more of three contextual characteristics: the word is connected in the various verses with some form of the verb jacala (to make); with the word al-ard (the earth) or the

prepositional phrase jf l-ard (on earth); and sometimes with the ex-

pression min bacd (thereafter). As for the verb "khalafa," it occurs in various moods and tenses of forms 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8 and 10, together with some nominal derivatives of forms 1, 2, 4, 6 and 10. These last verbal and nominal forms have many meanings, not all of which are related to the word "khalifa" and hence are not all relevant to our topic. Those of them which are, not surprisingly, are the same forms which are connected in their corresponding verses with one or more of the three characteristics mentioned

above, and they are limited to forms 1 and 10, "khalafa" and "istakhlafa." These verses, together with the khalifa-verses, con- stitute the core of the material to be examined in this paper.

In spite of the variety of methods the early exegetes used, it is

possible to discern five main meanings18 they thought the word "khalifa" and related words possessed. They are:

It is quite clear, I believe, that Tabari added major dimensions to the commentary of Ibn 'Abbas and Ibn Mas'ud when "explaining" it, dimensions which are not in their original, simple saying.

18 I am setting aside a "sixth" meaning because it is irrelevant to the discus- sion, namely "to copulate from behind;" see Tafszr Mujdhid, 1, 387; Tabari, Taf- sir, 16, 99; Ibn Kathlr, Tafsir, 3, 128.



WADAD AL-QADI

1. "To succeed, to follow, to come after another." This is one of the very basic meanings of the root kh.l.f., and thus many ex-

egetes followed it. One of them is Ibn CAbbas (d. 68/687), the well- known Hijazi authority in exegesis. In commenting on sura 43:60, where the text reads: (And if We were to will it, We would make of you angels on earthyakhlufuna), Ibn CAbbas said, "It means: one

(or: some) succeeding the other(s) (yakhlufu bacduhum bacdan)," ac-

cording to a transmission by Tabar; Ibn Kathir added, "as one

(or: some) of you succeed each other."19 The Basran exegete, Qatada (d. 118/736), used almost the same words in commenting on the same verse: "If God willed, He would make on earth angels that succeed each other (yakhlufu ba.duhum bacdan).20 The purport of

Qatad'as commentary on sura 35:39 is similar. Commenting on (It is He who made you (pl.) khaldaifon earth), Qatada said, "A nation

(umma) after a nation, and a generation (qarn) after a generation. 21

This meaning might also be the meaning to which the famous Basran authority, al-Hasan al-Basri (d. 110/728), in the recension of Ibn Sabit (d. 118/736), endorsed when he said that the term "khalifa" in the Adam verse means "the children of Adam,"22 or "human beings" (al-nds),23 in the sense that one of them follows the other.24 In this respect, this interpretation is not dissimilar to what has been reported by the Kufan exegete, al-Suddi (d. 128/745), on the authority of Ibn CAbbas, Ibn MusCid (d. 34/654) and other

Companions of the Prophet, with regard to the same verse: what is meant by "khalifa" is that "he will have progeny (dhurriyya) which will act corruptly on earth, envy each other and kill each other. "25

19 Tabari, Tafszr, 25, 89; also, slightly less precise, Ibn Kathir, Tafstr, 4, 132. 20 Tabari, Tafszr, 25, 89; also Ibn Kathir, 4, 132. 21 Tabarl, Tafszr, 22, 143. 22 Tabarn, Tafs?r, 1, 451; see also Ibn Kathir, Tafszr, 1, 70. 23 Tabarl, Tafsir, 1, 463. 24 It is along those lines that one should understand the interpretation of al-

RabTc b. Anas (d. 139/756) of the Adam verse. He said, "God created the angels on Wednesday, the jinn on Thursday and Adam on Friday...." (Tabari, Tafsfr, 1, 450-1 (Shakir); idem, Ta'rfkh al-rusul wa l-muluk, I, 84 (ed. M. J. de Goeje and others, Leiden, 1879-1901); Ibn Kathir, Tafs?r, 1, 70-1.)

25 See n. 17 above;-cf. also al-Hakim al-Naysaburi, al-Mustadrak, 1, 261 (4 vols., Riyad, [1968]); Shawkani, Fath al-qadir, 1, 63 (5 vols., Cairo, second ed., 1383/1964.)

398



THE TERM ,,KHALIFA"

2. "To replace, to substitute, to take the place of another, mainly in a temporary or supposed manner, to deputize for." This mean-

ing is another major meaning of the root kh. I.f. and hence many ex-

egetes employed it. Commenting on sura 43:60, which reads: (And if We were to will it, We would make of you angels on earth

yakhlufuina), the Khurasani then Iraqi exegete, Muqatil b.

Sulayman, said, "(yakhlufuna) [means]: in your place (makdnakum); they would thus be replacements of you (fa-kdnui khalafan minkum)."26 Suddi said according to one recenion: What is meant is "as replacements of you (khalafan minkum)"27 or, according to a second recension, "replacing you on it [i.e. the earth] (yakhlufiinakumfiha)' .2 This last saying can be translated as "being your deputies in it," because there is no indication that the people who are being replaced ("you") are necessarily dead by then: they are just not "on it", the earth.

This idea is clearer in two other cases. The first is the commen-

tary of the Meccan exegete Ibn Jurayj (d. 150/767) on sura 7:142, where Moses says to his brother Aaron just before he went to the Mount: (ukhlufni among my people.) Ibn Jurayj said, "When

[Moses] wanted to meet his Lord, he istakhlafa Aaron over his people."29 The fact that Ibn Jurayj used the same root in explaining the Qur'anic "ukhlufni," makes his words rather vague. In spite of this, I believe it is quite safe to assume that the meaning "to

deputize for me," or "temporarily replace me" is understood here. The second case concerns Muqatil b. Sulayman's commentary

on sira 2:30. His reference, though mythical, is given a philological guise. God created the angels and the jinn before He created the devils and men, i.e. Adam. He made the jinn the inhabitants of the earth and the angels the inhabitants of the heavens. The jinn fell into discord and jealousy, and they started killing each other, whereupon God sent to them a host of the inhabitants of the lower

heaven, headed by Iblis, and so they descended to the earth. There

they were not required to do as many acts of worship as required in heaven, and thus they desired to stay on earth. It is then that

26 Muqatil, Tafszr, p. 459 (Ms. Bursa). 27 Tabari, Tafszr, 25, 90. 28 Ibn Kathir, Tafs?r, 4, 132. 29 Tabari, Tafsir, 13, 88 (Shakir).

399



WADAD AL-QADI

God revealed to them: I am going to make a "khalifa" other than

you (siwdkum), and I am going to raise you back to heaven.30 Man, then, was going to replace the angels on earth, but the angels were

going to continue to exist elsewhere in the heavens. Man in this sense is the deputy of the angels: he replaces and succeeds them in- sofar as he acts on earth like them when they were living on it before him. Ibn CAbbas' isrdailiyydt-based interpretation of the same verse, in the recension of the famous Khurasani exegete, al-Dahhak b. Muzahim (d. 105/723), follows the same lines.31

3. It is clear at this point that there is a strong connection between the first two meanings of kh. l.f. since that the second mean-

ing "to replace" almost always incorporates in it the first meaning "to succeed". After all, hardly any replacement takes place without the one replacing being also a successor of the one replaced. And this is the starting point for the third meaning, which can be phrased as: "To substitute, to replace, to take the place of another, but

normally after this other is gone (destroyed, dead, etc.), thereby succeeding him." This meaning is a combination of meanings 1 and 2, except that it tends to stipulate that the party succeeded or

replaced does not exist any longer. Like the first two meanings, it has its roots in the language. The exegetes' use of it was extensive for two reasons.

The first reason is that there are many sections in the Qur'an which deal with "salvation history" and in which a certain motif recurs: God installs a people on earth (Noah's, Hud's, Salih's). They go astray and refuse to heed the words of the messengers sent to them. God consequently destroys them and replaces them with other people to succeed them. These substitutes and successors are their khald'if or khulafd'. The people they succeed and replace are

gone. Thus, in sura 7:69, we read: (...and remember how He made

you khulafda AFTER Noah's folk, and gave you growth of

stature...). And in sura 7:74, the prophet Salih tells his people: (And remember how He made you khulafda AFTER CAd and gave you station on earth...). The pattern was thus set by the Divine text

itself, and some exegetes reiterated this pattern frequently, feeling 30 Muqatil, Tafszr, 1, 29. 31 Tabari, Tafszr, 1, 450 (Shakir); idem, Ta'rfkh, I, 81, 84; Ibn Kathir, Tafsir,

1, 70.

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THE TERM ,,KHALIFA

that they were merely obliged to insert a word or two here and there.32 Suddi was clearer in indicating this meaning. Commenting on the Noah verse mentioned above (7:69), he said, "[It means:] ... He did away with Noah's folk and He istakhlafakum after them." 33

There is one instance, however, which requires special attention in that the evidence for it is not obvious. It is the saying of CUmar b. Muhammad b. Zayd (d. shortly after 145/762) with regard to sura 2:30-the Adam verse. His comment on this verse is vague. It reads: "[God says]: I want to create on earth a creature and make on it a "khalifa"; but there was not then for God any creatures except the angels; as for the earth, there were no creatures on it. "34 Tabarl was uncertain about the interpretation of this saying.35 But, regardless of that, it appears to me that Ibn Zayd's words fall into this third

meaning. The man is obviously puzzled by the Qur'anic statement. To him, apparently, a "khalifa" is someone who (1) succeeds someone else, and (2) replaces him in his same capacity in the very same place of performance: Whether (3), the one replaced or succeeded is defunct or not, is not clear from his statement but seems to be insinuated. Hence the problem: How is it that God says to the angels that he is going to make a "khalifa" on earth when (1) there is no one on earth to be succeeded in the first place (the angels being in heaven); and (2) how can this "khalifa" replace someone who does not exist where he is going to be; and (3) how is this whole

thing going to work, knowing that the angels not only existed but will also continue to exist? If my interpretation is right, then Ibn

Zayd subscribed implicitly to this third meaning of "khalifa." The second reason for which this interpretation gained ground in

early exegesis is that there are words in the Qur'an from roots other

32 This is a method which was particularly used by Muqatil b. Sulayman; see his Tafszr, 1, 410; and pp. 164, 167, 210, 215, 342, 401 and 417 of the Bursa Ms.

33 Tabari, Tafsfr, 12, 505. 34 Tabari, Tafsir, 1, 451; Ibn Kathir, Tafszr, 1, 70. 35 Tabari said, "This saying makes room for what has been reported on the

authority of al-Hasan [al-Basri, that 'khalifa' is a reference to the children of Adam, not to Adam himself); but it also allows that, what Ibn Zayd intended was that God told the angels that He was making a 'khalifa' in the earth of Him, one who would judge in it with His judgement among His creatures"; Tabari, Tafszr, 1, 451.

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WADAD AL-QADI

than kh.l.f. which convey the same meaning, sometimes in con- structions similar to its own, and some other times, moreover, with one of its occurrences being coupled with this parallel word, and with one exegete going as far as to quote the other construction in

support of his particular interpretation. This can be seen clearly in the cases of three verbs: adhhaba, istabdala, and waritha. In sura 6:33, we find the words istakhlafa and adhhaba side by side thus: (...and if He wills, He can remove you (yudhhibkum) and yastakhlif after you what He wills, just as He raised you from the seed of other folk.) And there are three other verses in the Qur'an where the verb adhhaba is used with the same meaning and in the same construc-

tion, as Rudi Paret has already noted.36 As noted by Paret too,37 the verb istabdala also occurs twice in the

Qur an in the third meaning of kh.l.f. One must add that it is

employed in the same manner of thought: If you turn away, God will replace you with another people, or: He will chastise you with a painful chastisement. In sura 7:129, Moses says to his people: (...Perchance your Lord will destroy your enemy and He will

yastakhlifakum on earth, so that He may see how you behave.) After

commenting on this verse in the vein of the third meaning, Muqatil b. Sulayman cited by way of further proof the text of two other verses (28: 5-6) in which the verb waritha occurs in the same sense as

istakhlafa in the above mentioned example. He said, "Moses said this to them in accordance with what God said in "al-Qasas" [i.e., sura 28]: (And We desired to show favor unto those who were op- pressed on earth, and to make them examples and to make them the inheritors (al-wdrithzn))-until the end of the two verses. God did that to them: He destroyed their enemy and istakhlafahum on earth. '"38

4. With the fourth meaning, one comes to new grounds. It is "to inhabit, to cultivate" (sakana, Camara). At first sight this meaning looks strange and somehow unexpected. However, when one ex- amines many of the occurrences of the verbs sakana and Camara in the Qur>an, one finds that they are used in a quite similar way to

36 In "Signification," 214. 37 Ibid. 38 Muqatil, Tafszr, p. 167 (Ms. Bursa).

402



THE TERM ,,KHALIFA" 403

that of verbs like istabdala, adhhaba and waritha-hence, istakhlafa or to make a people khald3if or khulafda of a past nation. In suira 14:13-

14, the nonbelievers tell their prophets to drop their teaching, whereupon God reveals to his messengers (We will surely destroy the evildoers, and We will surely make you inhabit the earth after them (wa-lanuskinannakumu l-arda min bacdihim). Similarly, in sura

30:9, God asks a rhetorical question: (Have they not journeyed in the earth and beheld how the end of those before them was? They were stronger than themselves in might, and they ploughed up the earth and cultivated it more than themselves [wa-?amarihd akthara mimmd Camaruzhd] and yet their end was evil, for they did not believe what God's messengers taught them).

The earliest exegete to have mentioned this meaning and to be followed by others in this respect is the well-known Meccan ex-

egete, Mujahid b. Jabr, a student of Ibn cAbbas' but an independent mind himself. This meaning appears in its purest form in Mu-

jahid's commentary on 57:7: (And spend (pl.) from that which He had made you mustakhlafina in it...). Two independent reports state that Mujahid said: "(mustakhlafina) [means]: muCammirzna fi-hf bi 1-

rizq,"39 which can be roughly translated as "cultivating it by means of the fortunes [God has granted you]." This interpretation agrees with Muqatil b. Sulayman's commentary on the same verse:

"(mustakhlafina fi-hi) [means]: from your possessions (amwdlikum) which God has given to you."40

But, as happened with meaning 3 vis-a-vis the two basic mean-

ings 1 and 2 of the root kh. l.f., this fourth meaning too came to have extra layers of "to replace" and "to succeed." Hence, when Mu-

jahid said that the interpretation of (And if We were to will it We would have made of you angels yakhlufuna) (43:60) is: "cultivating the earth instead of you (yacmuruna l-arda badalan minkum), "41 he was

adding the meaning "to replace" to the original meaning "to cultivate." Ibn Zayd went even further and added still more the

meaning "to succeed," thereby ending up with a cluster of three

meanings. This is clear in his commentary on sura 6:165, where God says that it is He who made the people the khulafda of the earth.

39 Tafsfr Mujdhid, 2, 656; Tabarl, Tafstr, 27, 218. 40 Muqatil, Tafsir, p. 503 (Ms. Bursa). 41 Tafstr Mujahid, 2, 583; Tabari, Tafszr, 25, 89; Ibn Kathir, TafsFr, 4, 132.



WADAD AL-QADI

Ibn Zayd said, "It means: He made you cultivate it (1), generation after generation and nation after nation (2) and successors after

predecessors (khalafan baCda salafin) (3)." 42 The same tri-cluster is at the basis of Ibn Ishaq's interpretation of sura 7:69; (khulafdaa min baCdi qawmi Nuhin,) means according to him: "the inhabitants of the earth after the people of Noah."43 And it was Ibn Ishaq's inter-

pretation of the Adam verse (2:30) along those lines which Tabari

outrightly rejected, as was mentioned above.44 Furthermore, Ibn

Ishaq gave almost a "definition" of Camara, connected with suc-

ceeding and replacing, when he said, commenting on sura 7:74:

(And remember when He made you khulafda after CAd...), "When God destroyed 'Ad and its affair was over, Thamuid came to cultivate the earth after them, and they were ustukhlifui therein; they dwelt and spread in it, then they became recalcitrant towards God. "45

5. The last meaning which the early exegetes had for kh. .f. is "to

govern, to rule, to be king." It was mentioned by two exegetes on-

ly. The first one is Suddi, who said, commenting on sura 38:26, where God says to David: (O David, We have made you a khalzfa on earth, so judge (fa hkum) justly between people...) "[It means]: He made him king (mallakahu) on earth."46 (It is to be noted that Suddi was the only early exegete to offer an interpretation of the word "khalifa" in this verse.) And the second one is our latest

authority, Sufyan al-Thawri. His commentary concerns sura 24:55: (God has promised those of you who believe and do

righteous deeds that he will surely la-yastakhlifannahum on earth, as He istakhlafa those who were before them, and that he will surely establish for them their religion which he has approved for them ....) Identifying those meant by the verse, Sufyan said, "They are the people in charge (or: the governors-al-wuldt).'47

This last meaning brings us back to the main question with which we began this paper: Did the early exegetes living under the

42 Ibn Kathlr, Tafsfr, 2, 199. 43 Tabari, Tafszr, 12, 505. 44 See p. 7 above, and n. 15. 45 Tabari, Tafszr, 12, 528. 46 Tabari, Tafszr, 23, 151. 47 Tafstr Sufyan al-Thawrz, p. 185.

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THE TERM ,,KHALIFA

Umayyads make the connection between the Qur'anic term "khalifa" and the actual reality of the caliphate, by which the

caliphs considered themselves God's khulafda? The above exposition shows that this connection was indeed

made but not before the end of the Umayyad period or the early decades of Abbasid rule, for it was only Sufyan al-Thawri who subscribed to the last meaning of kh.l.f., and Sufyan died almost

thirty years after the Abbasids had taken over political power. That

Suddi, who died in 128/745 towards the end of Umayyad times, subscribed to this meaning is not of any political significance for two reasons. The first is that he used this meaning only in the David verse, while in all other verses he accepted the other, more basic meanings of kh.l.f. The second is that, when he said that

"khalffa" in the David verse meant "mallakahujfil-ard, " he was just repeating what the Qur'an itself literally said about David elsewhere. Thus we read in sura 2:251 that God gave David kingship (al-mulk) and wisdom; and in 38:20 we find: (And We strengthened his kingdom (mulkahu) and gave him wisdom and speech decisive).

But Sufyan is one exegete, and a late one for that matter, and he had only one statement to say about the subject. What about the rest of the exegetes, the earlier ones, and the many sayings they had about their understanding of the Qur'anic term "khalifa?" A

thorough examination of the above given material shows the follow-

ing conclusions: 1. Many of the early exegetes were, paradoxically, either puzzled

by the Qur'anic term "khallfa" in the singular and did not know how to handle it, or they took it so much for granted that they did not comment on it. This made them quite often gloss over the word and concentrate on other words or expressions in the verses in which it occurs. When they did indeed stop to comment on some other form of it (the plural forms, the verbs), they sometimes ex-

plained that form with another word stemming from the same root, kh.l.f., thereby making their statements rather ambiguous and in need of reinterpretation. At other times, they simply depended on the context of the term, and would sometimes seek help in under-

standing it from other occurrences of it or its synonyms in the

Qur'an. One of them, Ibn Zayd, simply stated his incapability of

finding something conclusive in the Qurdanic text of the Adam verse.

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WADAD AL-QADI

2. The main resort of the exegetes for understanding was either isrd'liyydt material or philology. Both sources remained in use

during the entire period under investigation, albeit with a great dif- ference in frequency of reference. The isrdazliyydt, which came up very early with Ibn CAbbas, as is well-known, proved handy and relevant particularly because the first occurrence of the term is connected with the story of the creation of man, and there the isrdazliyydt material was extensive anyway. All the other instances-which means: the vast majority of them-were based on philological grounds. But, since the root kh. .f. is a very rich root and has a large number of meanings, the exegetes were faced with a veritable

challenge. 3. As a result, the early exegetes subscribed to different meanings

of the root kh. I.f., and hence reached different conclusions. Indeed, some of them subscribed to more than one meaning of the root and resorted to different meanings in different contexts. The two mean-

ings which seem to have dominated the scene were "to succeed" and "to replace." These two meanings being very close to one another, the most dominant meaning was a compound one made up of both of them: "to replace in some form of succession." This

meaning is connected with the fact that the verb khalafa is seman-

tically related to the adverb khalfa (after), be that in place or in time. Since this meaning fitted most of the Qur>anic "khalifa" instances, it was heavily relied upon by the early exegetes. But then they had to face a serious problem with regard to the Adam verse, 2:30: so whom was Adam to replace and/or succeed?

Their problem was further complicated by the fact that, neither in this nor in any other "khalifa"-verse, singular as well as plural, is the term phrased in construct, with an iddfa, which would indicate of whom a certain person or group is a "khalifa." For sura 2:30, their choices were limited: either this "khalifa" succeeded and replaced some other creature(s) on earth, or he was a "khalifa" of God. The first choice was selected by those who relied on

isrda)liyydt material: Adam was the successor/replacement of the jinn or the angels. But this proved to be only partially convincing. Anyway, the very question of whether one should take up isrdailiyydt as a basis for understanding the Qur'an was a controversial issue. As for the second choice, that a "khalifa" is God's "khalifa," it is note-

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THE TERM ,,KHALIFA

worthy that nobody endorsed it at all, unlike the late exegetes like Tabari. As such, many of the early exegetes ended up with a "no comment" on the "khalifa" part of this verse. Perhaps their attitude was further supported by another problem the verse presented, namely that this "khalifa" is "identified" as one who would act

corruptly and shed blood. How can this creature be God's "khalifa" then? Furthermore, how can he be Adam, the first of God's prophets? Well, whereas the second problem was circumvented in a way which is syntactically unsound,48 the first problem could not, at least for the exegetes living under the Umayyads. Other ways had to be opened.

4. The main way found by the early exegetes was to adopt other

meanings for kh.l.f. which would fit the various occurrences of the term in the Qur'an. This was further strengthened by the fact that the meaning "to substitute successively" tells nothing specific about man, the first creature to be identified as "khalifa" in the

Qur'an. In other words: What is clear in all the Qur'anic occurrences is that "khalifa" is necessarily connected with man-and with his existence on earth. But what is it that makes man specifically distinguishable from other creatures on earth to the point of being designated as "khalifa?" More explicitly: What is man's

distinguishing function as a "khalifa" on earth? For this question there came two suggestions: "to cultivate", and "to rule." Since the first suggestion dates from the middle Umayyad period and the second from the late Umayyad one (or possibly from early Abbasid

times), it can be well argued that these two chronologically suc- cessive meanings were the result of social change, with the ever in-

creasing urbanization and complexity of Islamic societies. This

proposition can be even further defended on the basis that the adherents to these two meanings essentially came from complex metropolises such as Basra and Kufa. But this is not enough by way of explanation, nor is the proposition universally tenable. Besides, these adherents had a serious problem. Their foundations were

philologically unsound, for there is nothing in the language to suggest

48 This is the interpretation of al-Hasan al-Basri: "khalifa" in sura 2:30 means the children of Adam, not Adam himself; see Tabari, Tafs-r, 1, 451 (Shakir). Tabari noted the intention of al-Hasan and pointed out to its implausibility from a syntac- tical angle (ibid., 452-3).

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WADAD AL-QADI

that kh.l.f. meant "to cultivate" or "to rule." The basis of their conclusions was mainly contextual. This is why those who subscribed to the meaning "to inhabit, to cultivate" often had to compound this meaning with one or both of the basic, philologically sound

meanings: to succeed and to replace. Perhaps this is also why the

meaning "to rule, to govern" did not have any success. After all it is solely derived indirectly from the word fa'hkum which appears in the David verse, and even there this word is not necessarily syntactically connected with the term "khallfa".49

5. But the exegetes had to face a further problem, particularly with regard to the two verses in which the term "khalifa" occurs in this particular singular form. In the Adam verse and in the David verse, there was an important question: Who is meant by the term "khalifa" strictly speaking? The David verse poses no problem; it is only David. But this itself has consequences. If we understand "khalifa" to mean "king" only in this verse, as was suggested by Suddi, then the equation "khalifa = king" does not apply except to David on the basis of the Qur'an. The Adam verse is more problematic. I have already pointed out the two problems of "succession" and "bloodshed vs. prophethood." But there is more. The verse does not mention explicitly that the "khalifa" in it is Adam, but this is inferred from the following verse, and almost all of the exegetes accepted this identification. But Adam can mean either the person of Adam specifically or man in general. Depen- ding on the context, all the exegetes who had anything to say on the

subject tended to accept the second identification. The net result of this was that another equation came about: "khalifa = man" in the

Qur'an. Consequently: all men are created as khalifas.

Although this was not spelled out by any of the commentators on this particular verse, it did come out in Qatada's commentary on sura 10:14, in which the speech is directed to Muhammad's followers. The verse reads: (Then We made you khaldaif on earth after them so that We may see how you behave.) Qatada narrated in his commentary a report on the authority of CUmar b. al-

Khattab, in which CUmar said, "Our Lord spoke the truth; He did not make us "khulafa"' except in order to see how [we carry on

49 See Paret, "Signification," 215.

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THE TERM ,KHALIFA

with] our deeds. Thus, show (pl.) God the goodness of your deeds

by night and day, in secret and in public."50 According to his saying, CUmar considered all the Muslims to be khulafd' according to the Qur'anic text. And there is no way by which we can interpret the saying to mean that only caliphs, such as CUmar, are considered

khulafd). 6. This report was recorded by Tabari. What is interesting is that

immediately after it Tabari brought forth another report in which CUmar again is the main figure, but it has a clear purport. The word "khulafa)" in the verse is a reference to the caliphs: CUmar

figures in it in his capacity as caliph.51 Now, this report is certainly a forgery: It is enshrouded in the dream motif; it is based on

foretelling the future; its isndd is strange,52 etc. But this is not the

problem. The problem is the following: Why did Tabarl feel almost

obliged to bring it up in the first place? The answer is, as far as I can judge, simple. He wanted to have at least one early authority identify the Qur)anic "khalifa" with the political "caliph," as he himself believed. Finding no one hand done so (except for the David verse, but it is too specific and cannot serve the purpose), he made room in his book for this report. He further placed it im-

mediately after the previous one, the one which is representative of the early exegetes' stance on the subject, thereby coming to a seem-

ing balance between the two positions. But this does not change things. The early exegetes in the Umayyad period did not equate the Qur)anic "khalifa" with the head of the Islamic state. When

Sufyan al-Thawri came close to doing so, the state was about to leave the hands of the Umayyads, or indeed it had already gone away from them forever. Besides, it has to be noted that Sufyan did not say that the Qur'anic "khulafa)" are the caliphs. He merely said, "the governors/ the people in charge"-a very general word/expression which has a rather wide variety of meanings. It has to be kept in mind too that Sufyan had Shili leanings. As such,

50 Tabarl, Tafszr, 15, 38-9 (Shakir). 51 Tabari, Tafsir, 15, 39 (Shakir). It was copied by Ibn Kathir in his Tafszr, 2,

409. Ibn Kathir, however, did not reproduce the previous report. 52 There is a different version of the report in Ibn Sa'd, Kitab al-tabaqat al-kabir,

3/1, 239 (9 vols., ed. E. Sachau, Leiden, 1904-1940), where the isndd is a more plausible one; but the report remains unconvincing.

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WADAD AL-QADI

he could not have had the Umayyad caliphs (certainly not their

governors!) in mind, and his life history leaves no room for doubt that he did not have the Abbasid caliphs in mind either.53

7. Is this conclusion an absolutely definitive one? Yes, but only in as far as our available sources can tell us. It is, on the other hand, not so definitive in the sense that some contemporary material has been lost. In addition, an examination of the isndds of the individual

reports of this material, together with the exegetical works that have come down to us, shows that all of them are of Iraqi, Khurasani or Hijazi provenance. In other words, they come from areas which are either centers of opposition to the Umayyads (Iraq and Khurasan) or from the area which still viewed the Umayyads with a great deal of suspicion, to say the least (jHijaz). The question is, therefore: Would things not look different if we were to have had at our

disposal reports from Syria, the center of pro-Umayyad sentiment?

Again, it is to be noted that some of the exegetes whose sayings were reported on this subject were either positively against the

Umayyads or had fallen out of favor with them.54 Would the pic- ture change if the two books of Zuhri (d. 124/741), (a staunch defender of the Umayyad cause), namely his al-Ndsikh wa l-mansuikh and Kitdb al-tanzzl,55 were to have come down to us?

8. Within the limits of what we know of early exegetical literature, then, there was no move on the part of the exegetes to find any Qur'anic basis for the Umayyad caliphs to justify their

"rights" as they claimed, a claim made by Walid II in 125/742 for the first time in Umayyad history, in the testament in which he ap- pointed his two sons as his consecutive successors to the caliphate.56 When the early exegeters were not opposed to the state, they were

53 Sufyan died in hiding from the Abbasid Caliph al-Mahdi; see Ibn Khallikan, Wafayat al-aSydn, 2, 390-1, ed. I. CAbbas, Beirut, 1970.

54 Al-RablC b. Anas, for example, fled from al-Hajjaj and left Basra to Merv

(Sezgin, GAS, 1, 34); Mujahid was recalled from Mecca to Iraq by al-Hajjaj, following the defeat of Ibn al-Ash'ath, and he was kept in prison until the death of al-Hajjaj (Tabarl, Ta'r?kh, II, 1262); al-Hasan al-Basri had to go into hiding from al-Hajjaj until the latter's death after he had criticized him for founding the city of Wasit (H. Ritter, "Hasan al-Basri," in EP, III, 247b).

55 See above, n. 4. 56 Walid's testament is preserved in TabarT's Ta'rzkh, II, 1756 ff.; an English

translation of it is given in Crone and Hinds, op. cit., 118-26.

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THE TERM ,,KHALIFA 411

simply, as it appears, not interested in the issue. This they could afford. They were not dependent on the state for their livelihood, and the earlier history of the Umayyads had taught them that they would be normally left alone if they did not rise in arms against the rulers. This same Walld, however, did not only cite and paraphrase Qur'anic verses to assert his and the earlier caliphs' rights. He used the Adam verse to say that the title "khalifa" for the Umayyads was indeed "khallfat Allah" and thus he himself was posing as a

Qur'anic exegete. But this had no effect on the exegesis scholars:

they were one group among several who were "piety-minded," people who wanted sincerely to understand the meanings of the revealed text and to arrive, through that, to a clearer Islamic "sense of identity"-regardless of what the state thought or claimed. As

such, and as I mentioned earlier, only the exegetes who resorted to

isrdaFliyyat material insinuated that "khalifa" in the Adam verse was the "khalifa," or successor/replacement of the angels or the jinn. The rest of the exegetes simply did not indicate whom this "khalifa" was supposed to succeed, and certainly none of them used the ex-

pression "khalifat Allah." Does this mean that they did that intentionally in order not to be

of any assistance for the Umayyads in their claims? This is a very likely possibility. There may be another possibility, however. The

expression "khalifat Allah" was too well established by their time to be in any need for being spelled out. And when it was adopted as a caliphal title, possibly even before the Umayyads, it was so done not necessarily on the basis of the Qur'an, for in the text all men are "khulafad" and are identified as such by God. If so, then, the Qur'an exegetes had no cause to explicate issues which were not

strictly related to the Qur'anic text. But it is still too early to pass any final judgement. We have to find out much more about the

origin of the caliphate in its earliest days.



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Al-qadi_The Term Khalifa