Several scholars have recognized the importance of seventh-century women as participants in and transmitters of the early history of Islam. At least one historian has traced the conscious effort by medieval male scholars to rewrite the lives of prominent seventh-century women to accord with their ideal of the Muslim woman. One area that scholars have not explored is the ways male religious authorities in the ninth and tenth centuries attempted to limit women’s association with al-mushaf, the Qur’anic codex. Hafsa bint ‘Umar ibn al-Khattab (d. 665), wife of the Prophet and daughter of the second caliph, played an important role in the collection and codification of the first written Qur’an, but by the eleventh century Hafsa’s name had been completely eliminated from accounts of this significant part of Islamic history. This paper will demonstrate that male writers consistently diminished Hafsa’s role in the project and that this was part of a larger pattern of severing women from the written scripture. Malik ibn Anas (d. 796) refers to the mushaf only seven times in his Muwatta’ yet two of those references concern women. Ibn Hanbal’s (d. 855) Musnad includes several reports associating women with the Qur’anic codex, two of which relate incidences of women reading the Qur’an without male guidance. With the exception of one hadith, none of the accounts of women possessing or reading the Qur’an are repeated after the ninth century. Abu Ubayd’s (d. 838) Fada’il al-Qur’an and al-Bukhari’s (d. 870) Sahih both include detailed accounts of Hafsa’s role in preserving the first Qur’an. In his Tafsir, al-Tabari (d. 923) alters Hafsa’s role and in al-Askari’s (d. 1010) account, Hafsa does not appear at all. The late ninth and tenth-century accounts of the collection and codification of the Qur’an illustrate a conscious rewriting of Hafsa’s role in those projects. Moreover, it appears that as the written Qur’an became more prominent in society, the connection of Hafsa and other women to the Book was deliberately diminished by male scholars, thereby eliminating yet another option for Muslim women; the written word of God is the domain of men, and women have no business participating in that sphere. The life of Hafsa as written and rewritten by successive male scholars provides a prism for examining the deteriorating position of women in the early centuries of Islam.

There is a renewed interest in the Umayyads: the dynasty (Hawting); elite life (Fowden, Asad Ahmed Dis. 2007); traditionists (Judd, Anthony, Mikkati in MESA 2012); memory (Borrut); mawali (Crone); tribal politics (Wellhausen and Ulrich Dis. 2008); Hadith and isnad (Juynboll); and social transformation (Khalek). The rise of the Hadith movement during the late Umayyad period is still poorly understood especially the connection between the Sahaba, the Successors and the pious generation of the early second century (e.g. Zuhri, Sikhtiyani). The connection between the early "aristocratic" generation and the later mawali or the ordinary teachers' generation is in my opinion very problematic because the transmission of divine knowledge between an exclusivist early aristocracy and their servants is not a relationship between equals. The case of early women transmitters of Hadith could present a "crack" in the system of isnad composed of pious men whose social standing is usually ignored in favore for their piety as a measure of trustworthiness. A'isha bint Talha ibn Ubaydullah is the daughter of a prominent companion and the granddaughter of the Caliph Abu Bakr. She married Mus'ab ibn al-Zubayr who also married Sukayna bint al-Husayn ibn 'Ali. Both ladies were famed for their beauty and literary interests. A'isha was a Hadith transmitter and had access to Muhammad's wife A'ish, her aunt. Her son was a prominent scholars and three of her nephews transmitted Hadith on her authority. The famous Hijazi poet Umar ibn Abi Rai'a composed poetry describing her beauty and character. She was then a public figure. This paper aims at investigating the role of this Umayyad aristocrat in transmitting tradition and the connection between her social status, her public character, and the types of topics she transmitted. Why would a women like her transmit tradition? Moreover, her isnads include three generations of the early Muslim elite (her aunt, herself, her nephews) before starting to include ordinary transmitters (commoners). How was such a transformation possible? What can we infer from this case about Hadith transmission in the first century from a social perspective rather than from a pious perspective.

This paper proposes a new understanding of the Qur’anic term “umma” through a thematic analysis of four exegetical works from the early Islamic period and the modern period. Umma commonly refers to a Muslim community in Islamic literature; nonetheless the first umma established in Medina in early Islamic history was pluralistic in nature. Conducting a thematic analysis on the Meccan verses of the Quran revealed that the Qur’anic usage of the term umma in various contexts does not signify a closed ritualistic community. The umma signifies an active concept necessitating a defined goal by active participants rather than a passive term defining a community with shared religion, ethnicity or culture. The analysis showed that the umma represents a “purposeful community” united through a common goal and book, which basically represents their mutual rights and obligations and defines their covenant to share a life. At the core of the concept of the umma is choice and responsibility. That what is given does not determine membership in an umma, instead what is chosen is key. Hence, the concept of the umma is grounded in the concept of the Book (al-Kit?b) and not of religion (al-D?n). Such is why the concept of the covenant is critical for the umma, because different individuals belong and adhere to an umma by either upholding a covenant with God to follow a specific divine revelation or by making a covenant with a leader and other people to establish a particular way of life. The Quranic notion of the umma challenges the common understanding of the umma as a static salvific community. In a socio-political context, the Medinan verses introduce the Qur’anic vision of a shared umma that is multi-religious and pluralistic in its make up, but unified in its goal and orientation. The unified umma seeks to settle their differences through a common book that outlines mutual rights and obligations of its different members, thereby establishing justice for the whole umma. That inclusive umma does not eliminate religious diversity but acknowledges the human right to choose his/her religion. Such findings have important ramifications for contemporary debates about questions of communal identity and community involvement in political governance in the modern world. This paper explores the Islamic theological foundation for establishing a civil society in a globalized setting. This research also contributes to a better assessment of recent uprisings, “the Arab Spring”, spreading across the Middle East.