Chapter One: Holy Women in Context
Hagiographers certainly embellished Mary and Fatima’s roles in Christianity and Shi`ite Islam for rhetorical purpose. Throughout sacred texts these women perform various miracles such as healing the (pious) sick and punishing the (heretical) evildoers with righteous anger. Historians, on the other hand, have struggled to locate Mary and Fatima chronologically, in their sociopolitical contexts. Although their historical personae might be forever shrouded in sacred memory, scholars can identify some of the pivotal moments in theological debates and dynastic lineages when Mary’s and Fatima’s veneration proliferated most fervently.
Late antique Christian theologians, for example, invoked the Virgin Mary as an image of orthodoxy; Mary’s body displayed the church’s purity and incorruptibility. Battling theologians, arguing most ardently over Christ’s nature, articulated their ideas by describing Mary’s nature. Early medieval dynasties depended on the same didactic technique. Families such as the Merovingians aligned themselves with the Blessed Virgin and orthodox Christianity against their barbarian counterparts (who adhered mostly to Arian Christianity; i.e., those Christians who denied that Jesus was cosubstantial with the Father).
In a similar fashion, the evolving shi`at `Ali (party of `Ali) came to define themselves through their connection with Fatima. While all Muslims esteemed Fatima as the Prophet’s daughter, she uniquely symbolized the reverence for and status of the Prophet’s family among the early Shi`a. Shi`ite theologians developed a distinctive notion of authority that they believed passed from the Prophet to `Ali and his descendants (the Imams) through Fatima. Fatima’s maternity became increasingly important as Shi`i scholars defined her miraculous, pure, and intercessory capacities to strengthen a definition of power imbued with spiritual significance and unique to `Ali’s patriline and Fatima’s matriline. As Fatima’s descendants became more privileged, various Shi`ite groupings emerged, sometimes arguing over the Imams’ true identity and then forging separate dynastic claims.
The historical personae of both Mary and Fatima thus may be hidden within layers of hagiographic formulas and sacred memory, but the socio political contexts from which they emerge can be reconstructed to some degree. Hagiographers and theologians, Christians and Shi`ites, retold and reformulated the women’s lives to reflect and refine emerging notions of sanctity, community, and dynastic authority. Mary and Fatima, shaped and reshaped through time, demonstrate the importance of women in constructing a sense of historical anamnesis and identity.
Mary, the Church, and the Merovingians
Mary’s greatest contribution to Christian theology is perhaps that she literally conferred flesh upon Jesus, the Christ. Yet early Christian sects considered this seemingly basic point the most controversial; many groups argued over the exact nature of Jesus well into the fourth and fifth centuries. Gnostic groups questioned whether Divinity could be encapsulated in flesh; Arian Christians suggested Jesus was created in time and thus was unlike God the Father. Only by the fifth century did an emerging Christian orthodoxy firmly claim that Christ, fully divine and equal to the Father, bore a human body composed of flesh and blood that suffered and died at Calvary. Theologians made such assertions by designating Mary Theotokos, or God-bearer, to prove Christ’s unique composition.
Nestorian Christians quickly countered this claim and forced the church to finally, and very distinctly, define the God-Man’s nature and birth.
The church confirmed Mary as Theotokos at the Council of Ephesus in 431 CE (although the title had appeared throughout theological discourse since the time of Origen, d. 254 CE). The council acted after a heated dispute developed between two important church leaders. Nestorius, patriarch of Constantinople, considered the title Theotokos an infringement on the God-Man’s divinity.
The appellation, he feared, implied that the deity required a natural birth, a mundane gestation; to suggest that Mary contained God within her womb bordered on paganism. Cyril, bishop of Alexandria, insisted that Mary as Theotokos verified the unity of Christ. The Marian appellation showed clearly, he believed, that Christ was God and Man simultaneously. At the hastily convened council, church leaders sanctioned Cyril’s position, condemned Nestorius, and presented Mary’s new title to a boisterous crowd.
The Council of Ephesus generated Marian devotion almost as a byproduct of Christological explanation. Popular piety had already revealed a vibrant Marian devotion evidenced in prolific tales of her infancy and childhood, yet theologians also harnessed the image and popularity of Mary in their emerging orthodoxy regarding both Christ and his church. Mary functioned as a proof text for Christ’s unique nature as well as a metaphor for the church itself. Both Mary and the ecclesia evoke the image of a spotless, pure virgin and a fecund mother producing Christian offspring.
Church officials’ use of Mary to craft a Christian orthodoxy corresponded with the Roman Empire’s political transformation. During the fifth and sixth centuries, Germanic kingdoms replaced the (once) more ecumenical Roman administration with local kings, bishops, and priests who wielded substantial local power. Holy men, in particular, served as theologians as well as political figures because the church easily appropriated local vestiges of Roman authority.
Theological resolutions and even political might came to reside more in the church than traditional political offices. These church officials appeared particularly powerful as they defended their communities not against external, foreign enemies but against the internal abominations of heresy.
By the late fifth and early sixth century, for example, the Gallo-Roman population no longer feared barbarian onslaughts, ethnic contamination,
or usurpation by Germanic overlords; in fact, Gregory of Tours considered most freemen of Gaul as Franks, even if they descended from the indigenous Gallo-Roman population.
If they felt secure in some ways, however, they were not free from perceived threats of spiritual contamination. Church leaders viewed Arianism and Judaism as threats to Christian theology and life itself. The general Frankish population of Gaul identified their barbaric enemies not only in terms of ethnic or linguistic otherness but also as threats to Catholic orthodoxy.
It is important to remember, too, that theological orthodoxy was not considered part of an elite culture accessible only to a literate scholarly class.
Theologians and laypersons alike debated many issues. While it would be difficult to find a sixth-century theologian of Augustine’s or Ambrose’s caliber, Christian orthodoxy was nonetheless felt and lived in every social stratum partly by way of the cult of saints, devotions promoted by the clergy and taken up avidly by the laity. Ideas about orthodoxy were not located primarily in theological treatises or formulaic accounts of Trinitarian disputes. They were found in complex diatribes against heresy, which, in turn, were embedded in a variety of popular devotions, many of which centered on the figure of Mary.
Orthodox Christianity, unlike its heretical counterparts, necessitated the union of humanity and divinity in the God-Man, Jesus. Judaism denied Jesus as the Messiah, and Arianism questioned the full divinity of Christ, thinking him a creature and therefore not on the order of the Creator. Both refused the Christian claim that in Jesus the human and divine were united in one person and thus denied that the vast chasm between God and humanity could be bridged.
Orthodox (or “right”) Christianity, in contrast, maintained that Christ could and did breach the abyss separating heaven and earth. Christ was not only a divine person capable of uniting humanity and divinity within himself; he afforded a model for others to follow. Accordingly, saints, by imitating Christ, could themselves transcend the human condition after death by taking on immortality in an eternal paradise. The power of the Jesus story and those of the saints animated the landscape of medieval Gaul. In the experiences of ordinary people, the divine touched their lives every day, every moment, through miraculous healings, exorcisms, and intercession.
Catholic orthodoxy and its prolific hagiography confirmed miraculous displays of divine power and effectively denounced Arianism and Judaism.
Such imagery was not unexpected as Merovingian (and later Carolingian) historians assimilated their past to a biblical framework and renamed themselves the “new Israel.”
Gregory of Tours recognized the Frankish struggle to establish its kingdom and spread Christianity as one ordained by God.
The Franks’ eventual triumph was simply a matter of divine providence as they banished heresy (i.e., Arianism instead of the Israelites’ Canaanite enemies) and preached orthodox Catholicism. In his Ten Books of Histories, Gregory recasts Merovingian kings in the guise of Old Testament heroes. As Frankish warriors struggled against Goths and unruly offspring, they became new Davids braving the Philistine threat.
Within the Merovingians’ early alignment with Israel, Mary takes on the role of Eve’s righteous counterpart. Extant Merovingian missals (books describing the liturgy of the mass), for example, emphasize perfected Christianity as compared to imperfect Judaism.
The Bobbio Missal and the Missale Gothicum rely on temple ritual language to demonstrate the superiority of Christ, the sacrificial lamb, who completes the Old Covenant and initiates the New. In this system of salvation, the missals juxtapose the sinful Eve to the redemptive Mary while also affirming Mary’s perpetual virginity.
Mary’s obedience to God’s will and miraculous parturition provide the mode of Christ’s birth, proof of his unique nature, and the foundation of Merovingian orthodoxy.
Merovingian devotion to Mary is manifest in a number of other ways. First, Frankish Christians celebrated at least two masses dedicated to Mary, one being the Feast of the Assumption, during the liturgical calendar.
This feast recognized Mary’s bodily assumption into heaven without physical death, a theological point that became official doctrine only in 1950. Second, Merovingian holy men gained prestige through the procurement and possession of Mary’s relics. As the Franks accepted Mary’s bodily ascension, these relics probably related to her clothing or physical remains such as hair or breast milk.
The cult of relics in general signified the church’s power on earth; miracles, exorcisms, and divine displays ratified God’s presence and provided a framework for Frankish communities to make sense of their world.
Merovingian royalty and aristocrats certainly understood the importance of relics as symbols of both authority and heavenly mandate. By the sixth century, aristocratic families also sought prominent bishoprics throughout Gaul. Local authority, now centralized in the church offices instead of senatorial clout or ancestral prestige, provided a substantial source of sociopolitical ascendency.
The ownership or even the discovery of saintly relics only added to aristocratic fame in the competition for episcopal title.
Saint cults and relics also enhanced royal authority in Gaul. The two Merovingian queens Brunhild and Balthild consolidated their position at court not only by supervising the appointment of bishops but also by managing local saint cults.
Brunhild sponsored Saint Martin’s local clique, and Balthild procured several different saints’ relics for her monasteries.
Merovingian kings and queens rendered themselves conduits of heavenly power by (ideally) appointing bishops sympathetic to their royal agendas and proving themselves appointees of the saints. These early medieval saint cults, in comparison with those of the later period, remained mostly localized and regional while at the same time the belief and rituals surrounding the living dead provided a kind of unity. Gregory of Tours could discuss northern Gaul’s practices and saint figures with a sense of familiarity because of his experiences in central and southern Gaul. Some cults transcended local boundaries and proliferated through all the Gallic provinces. Relics of Saint Martin of Tours, for example, spread throughout Gaul and attracted cultic practices from many towns (this, of course, required some clever stories about his travels and adventures to account for how his relics ended up in so many different areas).
Gregory of Tours also suggests that most Franks adored other common saintly figures identified in the Scriptures, such as Peter, John the Baptist, and Paul. He even boasts of Marian relics, although he is vague in identifying exactly what type of relics he owned. Gregory is usually noted as the first Western hagiographer to describe Mary’s corporal assumption into heaven just before her death, so it is doubtful that he would refer to her dead body parts as he might refer to John the Baptist’s head or Saint Denis’s arm.
He does describe, however, the miracles performed by her relics both in Jerusalem and in Gaul.
When Gregory begins his discussion of various Marian miracles, he includes Saint Mary’s church in Jerusalem as a place-relic. He explains that the emperor Constantine had commissioned the edifice, but the building required supernatural facilitation. According to Gregory, the architects and workmen proved unable to move the massive columns intended for the church’s support. Mary, as a sublime engineer, appeared to the architect in a dream and explained how he should construct appropriate pulleys and scaffolding to aid in the job. The next day the architect followed Mary’s instructions. He summoned three boys from a nearby school (instead of the grown men previously employed), and they raised the columns without incident.
Gregory establishes Jerusalem as one of the first focal points of Marian piety.
Gregory then explains how many Marian relics found their way into Gaul. In one narrative, Johannes, a pious pilgrim, traveled to Jerusalem to be healed of his leprosy. While in the Holy Land he received the Virgin’s relics and then proceeded home via Rome. On his journey highwaymen ambushed him and stole his money and reliquary. After they beat Johannes, they discovered that the reliquary contained nothing of value (such as gold) and tossed it into a fi re. Johannes later retrieved the relics, miraculously preserved in their linen cloth, and advanced safely to Gaul where the relics continue to work miracles.
Gregory himself boasted of owning Marian relics and carrying them in a gold cross (around his neck) along with relics of Saint Martin and the holy apostles. These relics, in fact, once saved a poor man’s house from burning. Gregory explained, “Lifting the cross from my chest I held it up against the fi re; soon, in the presence of the holy relics the entire fi re stopped so [suddenly], as if there had been no blaze.”
While the poor man’s family had been unable to quench the flames that would consume his home, the simple presence of the bishop’s relics brought relief.
Gregory’s attestation to the presence and power of Marian relics not only boosts his own authority, but also the authority of Gaul as a locus of religious piety. He introduces Marian miracles at Jerusalem and then follows the transmission of her relics to his own land. In this way, Gregory is transforming Gaul into a biblical Jerusalem, comparing Mary’s miracles and cures in the Holy Land to her current residence in Gaul.
Instead of traveling to Jerusalem on a holy pilgrimage, the pious could simply tour Mary’s relics at Clermont. Gregory proclaims Gaul as a spiritual center equal to Jerusalem and the Holy Land, operating freely from the constraints of Rome.
Gregory, like his late antique and Merovingian counterparts, transformed the Virgin Mary - a woman barely mentioned in the Christian canon - into a champion of orthodoxy and even prestige. Patristic authors constructed their evolving Mariology to bolster the church’s evolving Christology. Merovingian theologians, bishops, and kings relied on the saints, including Mary, to warrant their expanding spiritual (and political) authority.
Fatima, the Holy Family, and Shi`ite Dynasties
Just as Christianity transformed the Virgin Mary, Shi`ite hagiographers and theologians transformed Fatima into a symbol of orthodoxy and dynastic mandate. Fatima’s authorization of the Imamate enables the designation of those within the shi`at `Ali and the other. As with the Virgin Mary also, exposing the exact historical persona of the Prophet’s daughter proves elusive. Shi`a date their emergence to the moment of Muhammad’s death (632) when some of the community allied themselves with Abu Bakr instead of the Prophet’s chosen successor and son-in-law, `Ali, Fatima’s husband.
Historically, `Ali’s party certainly emerged at a specific moment, usually identified as 656, when `Ali became the fourth caliph. This precipitated the first civil war in the Islamic community as `Ali defended himself against his predecessor `Uthman’s kin and those who generally rejected his election. Yet those who endorsed `Ali as the community’s leader, and subsequently distinguished Fatima as the mother of the Shi`ite Imams, hardly composed a monolithic group.
The earliest shi`at `Ali were certainly political; that is, they supported `Ali as the community’s leader. After the death of `Ali and his son Husayn, however, the party began to assume religious implications. A member of the Kharijites, an early `Alid (pro-`Ali) sect, assassinated `Ali in 661 because the group disagreed with his arbitration with those who opposed him.
After `Ali’s death, Mu`awiya (`Uthman’s kinsman) declared himself caliph and ushered in the Umayyad caliphate. `Alids turned first to his son Hasan for leadership; Hasan refused to rebel against Mu`awiya’s forces and instead retired from public life.
After Hasan’s death in 669, `Ali’s supporters (and the Umayyad’s opponents) turned to `Ali’s second son, Husayn, for guidance. Husayn finally decided to make a public bid for power against Mu`awiya’s successor-son, Yazid, after hearing rumors of tyranny and receiving pledges of support.
In 680 pious Muslims in Kufa (present-day Iraq) appealed to Husayn to lead their community against the caliph Yazid. Husayn agreed after thousands of Kufans professed their loyalty; he set out from Mecca to meet them. Before he arrived the caliph tamed any threat of revolt through terror tactics and bribery. When Husayn and his party (numbering seventy-two armed men plus women and children, including his own family) reached the plain of Karbala outside Kufa, they met a detachment assembled by `Ubaydullah ibn Ziyad, the commander sent by the caliph.
On the tenth day of Muharram, 680 CE, after several days of siege in desert terrain, Husayn and his companions fell to the Umayyad forces. Husayn was decapitated and his head returned to Kufa where `Ubaydullah publicly struck the lips of the Prophet’s own grandson. Husayn’s martyrdom became a central point in Shi`ite theology representing suffering, penance, and redemption: Shi`ites continue to re-create the martyrdom at annual ta`ziya ceremonies, demonstrate repentance for deserting Husayn, and finally gain redemption through symbolic participation in Husayn’s sufferings.
After Husayn’s death, leadership of the shi`at `Ali became much more complex. `Alids disagreed over who inherited the Prophet’s son-in-law’s position of authority and exactly what type of authority was involved. The Shi`a then began to craft their own kind of orthodoxy wherein Fatima’s maternity proved particularly important. In the midst of a blatant patrilineal system of descent, Shi`ite theologians uniquely transformed Fatima’s motherhood into the corner stone of the Imamate, the system of Shi`ite authority. The Shi`ites argued, over time, that Fatima transcends the importance of her mother, Khadija (the Prophet’s first wife); Maryam, the mother of Jesus (or `Isa); and `A’isha, the Prophet’s beloved wife. They effectively placed Fatima in a singular position as the mother of the Imams.
Unfortunately it is almost impossible to discover the exact historical evolution of such traditions and theologies. Some historians date Fatima traditions and the importance of her bloodline to the earliest community, apparent during the Prophet’s own lifetime (d. 632). A second group situates Fatima’s popularity and evolving Shi`ite identity in the period surrounding the `Abbasid revolution (750) and subsequent consolidation of `Abbasid authority that usurped the Umayyad caliphate.
A third group of historians describes the proliferation of Fatima traditions as slowly evolving throughout the first several centuries of Islam as a rejoinder to extremist (ghuluww) doctrine.
The first theory, favored by most pious Shi`ite Muslims, accepts traditions that limit the ahl al-bayt to Fatima’s children (which, in turn, emphasizes Fatima’s unique status) and that allegedly date to the Prophet’s own lifetime and certainly to the time of Husayn’s martyrdom (i.e., seventh century).
One such tradition defined Muhammad, `Ali, Fatima, Hasan, and Husayn as the specific “people of the cloak,” or ahl al-kisa´.
According to the “cloak” hadith, Muhammad met a group of Christians at Narjan, a town located on the Yemeni trade route, and attempted to convert them. After some debate, the Christians agreed that Jesus foretold the Paraclete, or Comforter, whose son would succeed him. They agreed that since Muhammad had no son he could not be the fulfillment of such a prophecy. The Christians also consulted a collection of prophetic traditions titled al-Jami`, which referred to one of Adam’s visions wherein he encountered one bright light surrounded by four smaller lights. God revealed to Adam that these were his five beloved descendants.
Although the Christians rejected Muhammad at Narjan, they were nonetheless intrigued by his message and later sent a delegation of scholars to Medina to question the Prophet further and engage in mubahala (mutual cursing).
When Muhammad arrived, he had `Ali, Fatima, Hasan, and Husayn with him wrapped in a cloak. The Christians identified the family with the prophetic chapter of al-Jami` and quickly withdrew from the contest.
Various Shi`ite traditions directly relate the people of the cloak to the ahl al-bayt and say that Muhammad repeated the Qur’anic verse 33.33 as he wrapped the holy family in his mantle: “Allah only wishes to remove all abomination from you, members of the family, and to make you pure and spotless.” This asserts the (eventual) Shi`ite notion of the Imams’ infallibility and ultimate ritual purity.
The traditions attesting to the holy family’s supremacy encountered some resistance. A set of countertraditions, usually transmitted by prominent Umayyads, erupted that placed others under the cloak with Fatima’s family such as the Prophet’s servant, Wathila b. al-Asqa`, and wife, Umm Salama.
These traditions denying the exclusivity of the ahl al-bayt allegedly predate the `Abbasid revolution and at the least recognize the controversy surrounding the meaning of the ahl al-bayt. This challenges, then, the second theory of Fatima tradition that places her sublime status (as well as her family’s) as only an `Alid rejoinder to `Abbasid denigrations.
This second theory, favored by most historians, emphasizes the propaganda potential of Fatima imagery when employed by sectarian leaders. The early `Abbasid movement, so this argument holds, merged forces with the Hashimiyyah, a Shi`ite sect originating with Mukhtar ibn Abu `Ubayd al-Thaqafi (d. c. 686) as it prepared to usurp the ruling Umayyad dynasty. Mukhtar had arrived in Kufa around 680, just after Husayn’s tragic martyrdom under Caliph Yazid. Mukhtar, acting as a prophet of sorts, proclaimed Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya, Imam `Ali’s third son by a woman of the Hanifa tribe (and not Fatima) as the Mahdi (anointed one). As Mahdi, Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya would restore peace and order to the Kufan community and relieve Umayyad oppression. After both Mukhtar and Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya died, a group of supporters called the Kaysaniyya continued their adoration by proclaiming that the Mahdi had entered occultation (ghayba), a type of hiding or sublime stasis, instead of truly dying.
The Kaysaniyya was not a monolithic sect. After Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya entered occultation, the group split into separate branches. One of these branches, the Hashimiyya, taught that Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya did indeed die after relegating his authority and divine knowledge to his son, Abu Hashim. The `Abbasids later asserted that Abu Hashim conferred his Imamate on Muhammad ibn `Ali (the greatgrandson of al-`Abbas, the Prophet’s uncle) and, thereby, the descendants of al-`Abbas (with no bloodline through Fatima). The `Abbasids identified themselves with the Hashimiyya and, by association, the “party of `Ali” because `Ali was Abu Hashim’s grandfather through the Hanafite woman. The `Abbasids advanced their revolution by harnessing the discontent of the early shi`at `Ali against the ruling Umayyad dynasty.
After the `Abbasids firmly established their own caliphate, however, their propaganda machine disassociated themselves from the Hashimiyya and the `Alids (and also persecuted the Shi`a who refused to recognize their authority). By al-Mansur’s caliphate (c. 754-775), the `Abbasids stressed their relation to Muhammad’s uncle al-`Abbas instead of their connection to `Ali and the Banu Hashim. They argued that Allah favored the male relative, in this case the paternal uncle, over inheritance through a female (implying, of course, Muhammad’s daughter, Fatima). Court clerks circulated Mansur’s declarations against the `Alids:
As for your assertion that you are direct descendants of the Prophet, God has already declared in His Book, “Muhammad was not the father of any of your men” (33.30); but even though you be descended from the Prophet’s daughter, which is indeed a close kinship, this still does not give you the right of inheritance.
`Ali and Fatima’s family, according to the `Abbasids, held no esteemed position among the community.
The `Abbasids also questioned the very meaning of the ahl al-bayt and its association with `Ali and Fatima’s progeny. Caliph Mahdi (d. 785), Mansur’s son, circulated various hadith and poetic verses promulgating a distinctively anti-Shi`a interpretation of the people of the cloak.
According to these traditions, the people of the cloak instead included Muhammad’s uncle `Abbas and his descendants:
The Prophet came to `Abbas and his sons and said: “Come nearer to me.” They all pushed against each other. He then wrapped them in his robe and said: “O, Allah, this is my uncle and the brother of my father, these are my family; shelter them from the fi re in the same manner that I shelter them with my robe.”
This understanding of the ahl al-bayt promoted the house of `Abbas while challenging the notion of the infallible Imamate as well as Fatima’s unique status.
The `Alids responded to these `Abbasid claims, first, by pointing out that `Abbas was only Muhammad’s half uncle and that Abu Talib, `Ali’s father, was Muhammad’s full uncle. `Ali’s relationship as the Prophet’s cousin therefore outweighed any claims of `Abbas.
Second, the `Alids punctuated their direct descent through Fatima. A proliferation of traditions proclaiming the predestined status of Fatima and the ahl al-bayt ensued.
Historians then might view Fatima hagiographies as the `Alids’ political rejoinder to `Abbasid claims of ascendancy.
A third group of historians consider Fatima traditions and the ahl al-bayt’s glorification as a response to extremist theologies (or ghulat sects) within the Shi`a instead of an overtly political move.
Many `Alid scholars advertised mystical traditions that promoted divinely inspired reason (`aql) instead of logical rationality, the esoteric (batin) above the exoteric (zahir), and cosmogonic links between the Imams and humanity.
Shi`ite theology that evolved during the ninth and tenth centuries represents a process of mitigating, negotiating, and eventually integrating some of these mystical views.
The emerging orthodox traditions, for example, define the Imams as the divine light (nur) and Fatima as the Confluence of the Two Lights (majma` al-nurayn; i.e., her husband’s and her father’s light). Fatima resides as the nexus between Muhammad (exoteric knowledge) and `Ali (esoteric knowledge), where the sublime meets the human. In a sense Fatima manages to bridge the great chasm between Allah and humanity just as the Christian saints and Mary do; she exists as part of Allah’s light (divine nur), yet she is the attending mother, flesh and blood, beckoning her extended (and spiritual) family to her care. Fatima traditions display Shi`ite scholars’ careful incorporation of esoteric cosmology in an evolving, rational theology. These traditions directly deny some of the ghulat ’s more extreme assertions that the Imams themselves (such as the sixth Imam, Ja`far al-Sadiq) were incarnations of Divinity.
Whatever the genesis of Fatima traditions, whether in political discourse or in esoteric theology, Fatima remains a signal throughout for the orthodox (right) community. Sometimes that might be interpreted as the `Alid claims against the `Abbasids, as the Banu Hashim against the Umayyads, and perhaps even the Shi`ite theologians against extremist sects. From a more general perspective, Fatima always symbolizes Shi`ism against the other. Beginning in the late ninth century (and the solidification of an Imami orthodoxy, or rightness), Fatima’s image provided a powerful proof for theologians as well as future dynastic leaders.
As Shi`ite theologians eventually came to recognize `Ali and Fatima as the Imamate’s progenitors and bestowed spiritual potencies on the Imams themselves, they disagreed as to the Imam’s designation process. These disagreements continue to distinguish Shi`ite sects today: many Shi`a recognize five initial Imams (Zaydis); some, seven (Isma`ilis); and others, the majority of the Shi`ite world, twelve (Ithna-`Ashariyya, or Twelvers). The different groups accepted different descendants of `Ali and Fatima as Imams. According to Twelver Shi`ite traditions, the fifth and sixth Imams (Muhammad al-Baqir [d. 731] and Ja`far al-Sadiq [d.765]) addressed the problem by carefully articulating the theory of nass, the process by which the current Imam designates his son (the Prophet’s bloodline) and bestows on him `ilm (authoritative knowledge). The problem lies, however, in which son the community recognizes as having received nass.
By the mid-tenth century, most of these Shi`ite groups had control of substantial geographic regions. The Buyid dynasty (Twelvers) controlled much of Iraq and Iran, although they allowed the `Abbasid caliph to reign as a figurehead; the Isma`ilis established the Fatimid dynasty in North Africa and founded Cairo; and the Zaydis controlled areas of northern Iran and Yemen.
By the tenth century there is a true flowering of Fatima traditions in Shi`ite theological texts. As Buyids came into power, they had to articulate what distinguished them from their Isma`ili competitors. Zaydi Shi`ites explained their unique view of the Imamate: the Imam must be descended from `Ali and Fatima, but he must also make a public claim for power and oppose illegitimate rulers. As Shi`ite dynasties seized leadership throughout the Middle East, Shi`ite identity became increasingly distinct from Sunni Islam.
Fatima proved important to theologians of all these Shi`ite groupings because she gave birth to the Imams; through this Mother, the Imamate’s authority flowed from husband/ `Ali and father/Muhammad.
For the majority of Shi`ite Muslims (Twelvers), that authority ended with the twelfth Imam’s great occultation in 941 CE. Until his return at the end of time, Shi`ite clerics and theologians speak in his stead, drawing on the traditions of the ahl al-bayt and the Imams for guidance.
Mary and Fatima, as they appear in late antique and early medieval sources, must be placed in the historical contexts from which they emerge. Theological disputes, dynastic authority, and shifting lines of community certainly affected the interpretive tradition that perpetuated their legacies. Whether through the writings of patriarchs or bishops, Twelvers or Isma`ilis, Mary’s and Fatima’s lives helped to shape historical memory and communal identity. Their stories are told most fully not only in theological tracts and historical chronicles but also in hagiography. Hagiographers fully defined Mary’s and Fatima’s status in their respective communities by assessing their miraculous and intercessory powers. Comparative hagiography provides a glimpse at the various and contrasting ways these male authors refashioned their holy women to fit their rhetorical strategies.
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Author: Mary F. Thurlkill
