Page:Muhammad and the Jews According to Ibn Ishaq.pdf/3

Spoerl / The Levantine Review Volume 2 Number 1 (Spring 2013) Ishaq, who died in Baghdad roughly in 767 CE (or 151 AH). Ibn Ishaq’s sira is passed down to us in an abridged and annotated recension by a later scholar, Ibn Hisham (d. c. 833 CE), although it is possible to undo some of Ibn Hisham’s abridgement since other historians such as al-­Tabari quote large portions of the earlier unabridged version in their writings. Ibn Ishaq’s biography forms the basis of virtually all later biographies of Muhammad in the Islamic tradition. It is, in F. E. Peters’ words, “the classical and canonical biography of Muhammad.” There is a wide variety of opinion among scholars of early Islam as to whether Ibn Ishaq’s sira is reliable. I will abstain altogether from taking a position in this debate and focus entirely on the contents of the book, since its impact on the Islamic tradition is indisputable even if its historical accuracy is not. ISSN: 2164-­6678