1996/10/01 by John Nawas · 1 citation
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Archaeology and Historical Studies #Historical and Linguistic Studies #Islamic Studies and History #Opposition (politics) #Chose #Empirical research #Positive economics #Sociology #Political science #Classics #History #Law #Philosophy #Epistemology #Economics
paper · doi:10.2307/605440
openalex publication_date 1996/10/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/23
Exhaustive biographical information from numerous chronicles has been found for twenty-eight of the forty-four men, known by name, who were interrogated on order of al-Ma mun in the mihna. Comparable information was obtained for fifty-six randomly selected men used as a control group. The findings indicate that al-Ma mun chose to focus on the interrogees, first, on account of their greater intellectual eminence and social influence and, second, to make of them an example to all traditionists, with the aim of censoring the hadith enterprise. This interpretation supports the hypothesis which explains the mihna as a design on the part of al-Ma mun to secure for the caliphal institution full control over religious matters. An alternative hypothesis which explains the mihna as an attempt by the caliph to quell opposition is cast into further doubt, in that there was no predominance of (Arab-) Khurasanians within the ranks of the opposition, as this hypothesis states.