Ma‘mar ibn Rāshid, The Expeditions: An Early Biography of Muḥammad. Edited and translated by Sean W. Anthony. Foreword by M. A. S. Abdel Haleem. New York: New York University Press, 2014. Pp 372. $35.

The Expeditions is one of the earliest biographies of the Prophet Muḥammad.

The author, Maʿmar ibn Rāshid (96–153/714–770), was a prominent Persian scholar from Basra in southern Iraq, who came to be revered for his learning of prophetic traditions, Islamic law, and the interpretation of the Qurʾan.

His scholarly journey began thanks to his nomadic profession, which included extensive travel trading wares for the Azd (Arabian) tribe and his dealings with the court of the Umayyad caliphs, he became acquainted with—and ultimately the pupil of—Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri (d. 124 H/742 AD), regarded as one of the greatest Muslim scholars of his generation.

This fascinating foundational seminal work contains stories handed down by Maʿmar to his student, ʿAbd al-Razzāq of Sanaa, relating Muḥammad’s early life and prophetic career as well as the adventures and tribulations of his earliest followers during their conquest of the Near East.

Ma’mar was a contemporary of Ibn Ishaq (d 151/768), the author of Al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah (Biography of the Prophet). However, M A S Abdel Haleem in his Foreword reminds us that the above two works are not the earliest writings on the Prophet’s life. (p xi)

“In his discussion of the genres of maghazi and sirah, the Ottoman literary historian Hajji Khalifah (d. 1067/1657) reports that Ibn Ishaq compiled his work from preexisting materials, and goes on to identify ‘Urwah ibn al-Zubayr (d. 93/711-12) as the earliest to gather material on the topic. Thus, both Ma’mar ibn Rashid and Ibn Ishaq must have taken their information from written sources as well as authenticated oral reports collected by ‘Urwah and others.” (p xi)

The major contributions of Ma’mar and Ibn Ishaq were to gather the material from different sources together in one place.

The Arabic text is based on a lone surviving manuscript and offers significant revisions to earlier editions. Annotations on the text’s transmission and variants in later works are included.

A comprehensive annotation section provides cultural, religious, and historical contexts for the events and individuals described within this updated translation, presenting the original manuscript in contemporary English.

The translation of The Expedition by Sean W. Anthony has been done well and is very easy to read. He emphasises the importance of “readability” in his introduction. While detailing how he took into account the different transmissions (riwāyat) of Ma’mar ibn Rāshid’s work, Anthony reconstructs the different manuscripts to marginalise errors and offer a translation that demonstrates fluidity to the reader.

The text, Anthony says, contains “humour, adventure, tragedy, and all the ingredients of great stories,” including the famous incidents at Badr, Uud, Khaybar, and Ḥunayn as well as the tales of Muslims who migrated to Abyssinia and the three who remained behind.

Anthony also includes a timeline of historical events in Prophet Muhammad’s life, which is especially valuable since the original text is not in chronological order. Additionally, the glossary provides brief details about personalities and locations that serve as background information.

He is to be applauded for translating such important work on the history of the Prophet, which gives an insight into both the life of the Prophet and the rise of the Islamic Empire. The other important feature of the book is that it is a bilingual Arabic-English edition.

Ahmed J Versi