Iranshahr
, who worshipped him as a great god in his own right.
Mihran
A Parthian aristocratic dynasty.
Minim
A Hebrew word that the rabbis applied to heretics; sometimes used as shorthand for “Christians.”
Monophysite
An insulting term that Chalcedonians applied to their opponents in the Christian Church who held that the divine and human natures of Christ had been so interfused as to constitute a
mone physis
—Greek for “single nature.”
Mowbed
A Zoroastrian priest.
Muhajirun
An Arab word meaning “those who go on a
hijra
”—therefore, “emigrants.” In the early years of the Arab Empire, religiously motivated conquerors seem to have used it in preference to “Muslims” as a self-designation.
Mushrikun
“Those who are guilty of
shirk
”: the opponents of the Prophet in the Qur’an.
Nazoreans
A sect of Christians, like the Ebionites, who claimed descent from the original Jewish Church.
Nestorians
A word applied by their opponents to those Christians who believed that the two natures of Christ, the divine and the human, had existed distinct within his earthly body. Nestorius, a Bishop of Constantinople, was condemned for heresy in the first half of the fifth century.
Ohrmazd
The supreme God of Truth and Light in Zoroastrianism.
Orthodox
From the Greek words for “correct belief.”
Palladium
The image of the goddess Pallas Athena supposedly taken from Troy to Rome, and from Rome to Constantinople.
Parthians
An Iranian people who lived mainly in the north of Iran. The dynasty overthrown by the Sasanians was Parthian, but so were other aristocratic dynasties that flourished well into the Islamic period.
Qibla
The direction of prayer. In mosques, it is generally indicated by a niche in a wall called a
mihrab
.
Quraysh
The tribe into which, according to Muslim tradition, Muhammad was born.
Rashidun
“Rightly guided.” An adjective used, from the third Muslim century (ninth century AD) onwards, to describe the first four Caliphs: Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman and Ali.
Sabaeans
A mysterious people who are mentioned in the Qur’an alongside Jews and Christians as one of the three “Peoples of the Book.” The most widely supported theory is that they were Manichaeans.
Sahabah
The personal associates and followers of Muhammad—literally, his “companions.”
Shahanshah
The title of the Sasanian kings: “King of Kings.”
Shekhinah
A Hebrew word that refers to God’s dwelling place on earth.
Shi’a
An Arab word—literally “party”—that came to be applied to the followers of Ali and his descendants.
Shirk
Associating gods or other supernatural beings with the One True God—in Islam, the ultimate crime.
Shirkat
Arabic for “partnership.”
Sira
An Arab word—literally “exemplary behaviour”—used for a biography of Muhammad.
Stylites
Christian hermits who spent lengthy periods of time—often years—on top of pillars.
Sunna
An Arab word meaning “custom” or “achievement.” In Islam, it refers to the collection of
hadith
s that constitutes the body of sacred law.
Syriac
Prior to its replacement by Arabic, the most widely spoken common language in the Middle East.
Tafsir
A commentary on the Qur’an.
Talmud
The written record of rabbinical learning, composed in Palestine and Mesopotamia during late antiquity.
Tanakh
Hebrew for the body of scriptures known by Christians as the “Old Testament.”
Theotokos
A Greek title—meaning “the one who gives birth to God”—bestowed by many, although not all, eastern Christians on the Virgin Mary.
Torah
From the Hebrew for “instruction,” the shorthand term for the sacred law of the Jews.
Ulama
Muslim scholars and lawyers.
Umayyads
The first dynasty to rule the Caliphate.
Umma
A word used in the Qur’an to mean “community” or “people.”
Yeshiva
A rabbinical school. The most famous
yeshiva
s were in Sura and Pumpedita, in Mesopotamia, and Tiberias, in Galilee.
Zuhhad
Muslim ascetics.
Notes
1 Known Unknowns
1
From a letter of Simeon of Beth Arsham, discovered and quoted by Shahid (1971), p. 47.
2
Ibid., p. 57.
3
Chronicon ad Annum Christi 1234 Pertinens
: 1.237.
4
From a poem written in the Hijaz, the region of Arabia where Mecca is situated: quoted by Hoyland (2001), p. 69.
5
Theophylact Simocatta: 4.2.2.
6
Eusebius:
History of the Church
, 1.4.10.
7
Eusebius:
Life of Constantine
, 1.6.
8
Ibn Hisham, p. 629
9
Ibid., p. 105.
10
Qur’an: 96.1–5.
11
Ibn Hisham, p. 106.
12
Qur’an: 6.102.
13
Ibid.: 15.94. Or perhaps “Do what you have been commanded to do.”
14
Qur’an: 1.1.
15
Ibid.: 33.40.
16
Ibn Hisham, p. 155.
17
The “Quraysh” are often referred to in English simply as “Quraysh,” without a definite article, reflecting the Arabic, which never refers to them as “al-Quraysh.”
18
Qur’an: 89.20.
19
Ibid.: 42.42–3.
20
Ibn Hisham, p. 303.
21
Waqidi:
Kitab al-Maghazi
, quoted by Hawting (1999), p. 69.
22
Ibn Hisham, p. 555.
23
From a West Syrian Christian text which records a disputation between a monk and “a man of the Arabs.” Although the monk—hardly surprisingly, considering its authorship—ends up decisively winning the argument, the suggestion that God’s approval of Islam had manifested itself in the sheer scale of the Arab conquests was a difficult one for Christians to rebut. The date of the text is unknown, but Hoyland, who quotes it (1997, p. 467), suggests that it is unlikely to be earlier than the mid-eighth century.
24
Al-Jahiz, quoted by Robinson, p. 88.
25
Qur’an: 33.21.
26
Ibn Qutayba, p. 217.
27
Al-Adab al-Mufrad al-Bukhari
6.112.