Urwa ibn al-Zubayr
Some of his literary correspondences with the Umayyad caliphs Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan (r. 685–705) and al-Walid I (r. 705–715) have also been reported in historical works.
Some hold that most of the traditions reported on his authority did indeed originate with him and the core of the information contained therein is genuine, although they have been modified and colored by later transmitters to some extent.
After Uthman's assassination, he accompanied his father, brother, and his aunt A'isha to the southern Iraqi town of Basra, where the three elders fought against the fourth caliph Ali (r. 656–661).
[2] In the Second Fitna (680–692), his elder brother Abd Allah established his counter-caliphate in opposition to the Umayyads, and Urwa supported him.
[11] In 706, he was appointed to the newly established ten-member council of fuqaha (jurists) by the then governor of Medina, Umar ibn Abd al-Aziz.
[15] The sources describe Urwa as a person with upright character who avoided discord and lived a pious life.
According to a report by his son Hisham (d. 763/764), Urwa destroyed them on the day of the Battle of al-Harra (August 683),[b] when the army of the second Umayyad caliph Yazid I (r. 680–683) stormed Medina to quell the rebellion there.
The scholars of the early period of Islam would write books for private use, destroying them before their deaths out of fear that they might fall into others' hands and compete with the Qur'an.
[c][24] Urwa narrated a number of hadiths (traditions about the sayings and deeds attributed to Muhammad as well as early Muslims) which are transmitted through his son Hisham and his student Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri (d.
[26] The hadiths cover all events of significance on early Islam, but his reports concerning the life of Muhammad are of central importance.
[27] He also narrated short reports on the Rashidun period such as the Ridda wars, campaigns in Syria, the claims of Abbas, Fatima, and Muhammad's wives to his inheritance, battles of the Yarmuk, Qadisiyya, and of the Camel, and Umar's journey to Jerusalem.
[29] In addition to historical data, he transmitted hadiths on legal issues concerning laws (such as those on property, marriage, divorce, the status of women and slaves) and rituals, such as ablution, prayer, and pilgrimage.
Many of his transmitted hadiths give explanations for various Qur'anic passages and provide historical background to their origin.
[30] In the traditional Muslim hadith criticism, Urwa is considered a trustworthy transmitter and is praised for his piety and depth of his knowledge.
[35][36] The letters have not survived in the documentary form nor has their exact wording been preserved, due to the process of oral transmission.
Nine letters in total have been reported through three different chains of transmission from Hisham, al-Zuhri, and Abu al-Zinad, a mawla (freedman) of the family of Caliph Uthman.
[34] The letters contain accounts of the Meccan persecution, hijra to Abyssinia (Ethiopian Empire) and Medina, the battles of Badr and Hunayn, treaty of al-Hudaybiya, conquest of Mecca, and calumniation of A'isha.
[26] Analyzing the al-Hudaybiya traditions attributed to Urwa, Goerke concluded that his version is the oldest of all, and has been redacted over the long transmission process.
[45] Professor Stephen Shoemaker has contested the conclusions of Goerke and Schoeler, arguing that only for a few elements of these traditions can a secure connection with Urwa be established, with a majority of them going back to al-Zuhri at most.
[37] Similarly, Watt considered the letter concerning the hijra genuine, even though it has anti-Umayyad bias due to the history of Zubayrid-Umayyad hostility.
They are consistent with the image of the Umayyads and Zubayrids that emerges from other sources, are lacking any hagiographic and miraculous stories, and fit well in the context of Umayyad-Zubayrid reconciliation.
[49] Based on the accounts that are narrated on his authority in the works of Ibn Ishaq and others, the Arabist Alfred Guillaume calls him the "founder of Islamic history".
[d][53][39] The Islamicist Fred Donner states that since the later sources attribute written books to Urwa and no earlier authorities, it seems to imply that he was the first to systematically collect and write down individual traditions.
[54] To professor Abd al-Aziz Duri, Urwa laid the foundation of historical study among the Muslims that was then taken up by later generations.
