Reviews 181

among commentators, to competing oral traditions eventually reduced to writing, to (at least)
one ancient Quran manuscript that retains evidence of manipulation. This book unpacks that
complex and fascinating process of ensuring that Muhammad was indeed the father of none
of his menand the quest to discover it.
I am convinced of the thrust of Powers argument and deeply impressed by his scholarship.
There remain two questions that to my mind would benefit from further consideration. The
first is the issue of the finality of prophethood and its association with prophetic genealogy.
One of the core theological premises of Islam is that Muhammad is the last prophet. This
provides Islam with authority and allows it not only to correct or even supersede prior religions
but also to anticipate and preempt the assertions of future religions that might claim the same
status in relation to it. So there can be no more prophets after Muhammad. But what about
other Abrahamic genealogies? Lack of heirs might end the Ishmaelite Abrahamic genealogy
through Muhammad, but Arabs from the clan of Hashim or the larger tribe of Quraysh could
also trace their genealogy to Abraham. Could there not be a hidden prophetic spark in any
of these waiting to emerge when the time is right? And what about the Israelites who trace
their lineage to the Patriarch? Jews carried on, and according to some traditions, continued to
expect a prophet from their own people at least through the 6th and 7th centuries C.E.
The second question relates to the transition from theoretical

kalla to kal ala. According
to my understanding of Powers position, the original term disappeared entirely from Arabic
and was replaced by kanna, though kalla is common in virtually all other Semitic languages.
It is difficult to imagine the natural though inconsistent linguistic move from the L to N
phoneme affecting every single dialect of Arabic to such an extent that the original

kalla
dropped out entirely from Arabic, as is the case today. If

kalla occurred originally in the
Quran, it must have been known in 7th-century Arabia. How could it disappear entirely from
the language only a few generations later? Alternatively, if the phonemic shift had occurred
generations earlier so that the word kalla was unknown in 7th-century Arabic, how could it
occur in the Quran?
Powers forensic ability is outstanding and the encyclopedic nature of his research pro-
foundly impressive. He demonstrates remarkable control over a broad range of material, lines
up the evidence, suggests multiple explanations, and then draws out what he sees is the
necessary conclusion. This is an extremely important book, a must read for all seriously
engaged in Quran scholarship, Islamic studies, and the history of the Middle East.
JONATHAN A. C. BROWN, Hadith: Muhammads Legacy in the Medieval and Modern World,
Foundations of Islam (London: Oneworld Publications, 2009). Pp. 320. $90.00 cloth,
$29.95 paper.
REVIEWED BY AHMED EL SHAMSY, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations,
University of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.; e-mail: elshamsy@uchicago.edu
doi:10.1017/S0020743811001425
With several books marketed as introductions to hadith already available, one might ask
whether there is need for another such work. Existing introductions include translations of
classical texts, such as Eerik Dickinsons translation of Ibn al-Salahs handbook An Intro-
duction to the Science of the Hadith (Reading: Garnet, 2006), as well as modernized pres-
entations, such as Muhammad Zubair Siddiqis Hadith Literature (Cambridge: Islamic Texts
Society, 1993) and Mohammad Hashim Kamalis A Textbook for Hadith Studies (Markfield:
Islamic Foundation, 2005). These largely track the classical Muslim curriculum, which intro-
duces novice students to the field by familiarizing them with its terminology, protocols of
182 Int. J. Middle East Stud. 44 (2012)
transmission, and standards for transmitters. What the literature has been missing, however, is
a more panoramic survey of the field of hadith that elucidates not only its theoretical ideals
but also the ways in which these ideals have been pragmatically translated into practice as
well as the historical and continuing significance of hadith for Muslim civilization.
The reason for the lacuna lies in the unwieldiness of the subject matter. Whereas the Quran
is a single work that is generally considered to originate in the lifetime of Muhammad, hadith
are dispersed in myriad collections and their authenticity has been the subject of perennial
debates. As a result, not unlike herbivores, hadith scholars must gather and digest vast amounts
of material in order to function. For Western-trained academics, this inevitably means that
they will never be able to claim a command over hadith literature comparable to that of their
classically trained Muslim counterparts, who have spent decades memorizing hadith, charting
mental maps of their transmitters, and acquainting themselves with transmitter biographies.
At least partly in compensation for this disadvantage, Western studies of hadith have tended
to dispense with the densely layered classical scholarship and to analyze hadith reports in
isolation, primarily concerned with the question of their authenticity.
Jonathan Browns new book on hadith goes beyond such a piecemeal approach. It is the
first introduction that properly deserves the epithet thanks to the breadth of its coverage and
the confidence with which the author moves between an internalist account of hadith scholars
efforts to grapple with their tradition and Western scholarship on the subject. The book is
framed as a quest narrative, which subtly suggests to the reader the immensity of the topic
and the pressing need for further research on it and implicitly criticizes the ease with which
previous authors have touted allegedly certain conclusions.
The first chapter of the book discusses the role of Muhammad and the reports regarding
his life, as well as some basic terminology. Chapter 2 provides a concise but remarkably
comprehensive account of the collection and transmission of hadith throughout Islamic history.
It explains methods of oral and written transmission and traces the development of the various
genres of hadith scholarship.
In Chapter 3, Brown gives an engaging account of the process by which Muslim scholars
evaluated hadith reports and of the changing assumptions that have underpinned this activity.
The chapter, which is based on Browns groundbreaking articles on the subject, shows that the
process of evaluation was neither methodologically rigid (Brown fruitfully compares it to the
work of a reporter seeking to verify a story) nor historically unchanging, as he demonstrates
by identifying periods of greater and lesser rigor.
The bulk of hadith scholarship has been done by Sunni Muslims; accordingly, Brown
generally treats the Sunni position as the default one. Commendably, however, he does not
neglect the extensive tradition of hadith scholarship in Shiism, dedicating Chapter 4 to a
discussion of the historical genesis of both Imami and Zaydi hadith works. His coverage
of the latter is particularly fortunate, since this small but significant group has been all but
ignored in modern scholarship.
Chapters 5 to 7 discuss the role of hadith in law, theology, and Sufism, respectively.
Although these chapters are relatively short (perhaps even too short), they establish that the
discourses of hadith, law, and theology overlapped extensively and gave rise to two rival
systems of hadith categorization: one promoted by hadith scholars, the other by theologians.
Many of the debates regarding hadith in the realms of law and theology are rooted in these
partly incommensurable systems of categorization and their differing epistemological rami-
fications. Sufism, in contrast, possesses an independent fount of authority in its experiential
dimension and in the charismatic figure of the shaykh. This enables it to avoid to some extent
the rigorous formalistic methods of hadith assessment applied in the other fields.
Chapter 8 leaves the internalist account of hadith in the Muslim scholarly tradition and turns
to Western debates on the authenticity of hadith. In an insightful introductory section, Brown
Reviews 183
summarizes the history of Western epistemological approaches to history in general and the
Bible in particular, which have significantly informed the study of hadith. For the sake of
clarity, he categorizes Western approaches to hadith into four roughly diachronic stages, which
he labels the Orientalist Approach, the Philo-Islamic Apology, the Revisionist Approach, and
the Western Revaluation. His subsequent discussion of these approaches is the clearest and
most even-handed account written on the subject yet.
The ninth and final chapter tackles the role of hadith in Muslim debates about modernity and
authenticitya daunting topic, since hadith occupy the central ground in these debates. Brown
identifies four dominant positions, namely, those of modernists, modernist Salafis, traditionalist
Salafis, and late Sunni traditionalists. His wide-ranging discussion of these positions is not
(and does not claim to be) comprehensive, but it provides a helpful sketch of major trends
and thinkers as well as their interconnections and avenues of influence.
The success or failure of an introductory work such as Browns can be assessed in terms
of two potential uses. First, does it serve as a reliable and useful guide for novices to the
subject area? Second, by synthesizing and portraying a whole area of study, can it give new
impulses and generate new avenues of inquiry for subsequent scholarship?
As an introduction for beginners, Browns book is both erudite and highly readable. Brown
has a knack for recounting memorable anecdotes that consistently remind the reader that the
hadith tradition is no monolith of faceless avatars but rather a collection of often idiosyncrat-
ically brilliant individuals. Such anecdotes complement analytical sections that contextualize
developments in the field of hadith and situate them within wider historical currents affecting
the Muslim world. Most important, the text manages to explain why, over such a long period
of time, some of the greatest scholars of Islam have dedicated themselves to this field and,
by extension, why the reader should care about it.
As for the second function, the book does a great service to Western hadith scholarship
by providing a holistic picture of the Muslim hadith discourse as an intellectual activity. This
portrayal balances the predominant but one-sided tendency to analyze chains of transmission as
a disembodied subject matter and to ignore those who selected and assembled these chains
the great hadith critics. Brown thus challenges us to see medieval Muslim hadith collectors
not simply as a variety of native informers but rather as critical scholars in their own right:
separated from us by time and epistemological assumptions but possessed of expertise and
insights that we disregard at our own peril.
Jonathan Browns remarkably learned, engaging, and wide-ranging book will certainly find
favor with students of all levels, but it is also accessible to educated lay readers and offers a
fruitful read for specialists. More than a decade ago in the pages of this journal (31: 27576),
Daniel Brown (no relation) concluded a review of John Burtons An Introduction to the Hadith
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1994) with the words, A book worthy of the title
remains to be written. Now it has.
SUSAN A. SPECTORSKY, Women in Classical Islamic Law: A Survey of the Sources, Themes
in Islamic Studies (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2009). Pp. 236. $142.00 cloth, $67.00 paper.
REVIEWED BY JUDITH E. TUCKER, Department of History, Georgetown University, Washington,
D.C.; e-mail: tuckerje@georgetown.edu
doi:10.1017/S0020743811001437
In an important new contribution to the fields of Islamic law and gender studies, Susan Spec-
torsky reviews the work of the early Muslim jurists in order to acquaint us with their process
for defining key legal rules and doctrines concerning women, the sources and methods they