Naziritism and the Qur'ān?by Mikhayah ben David

בשם יהוה הרחמן הרחם/بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

To discuss the notion of Naziritism in the Qur'ān we must first assume that the reader has some cursory knowledge of the Nadr Nazīr, the Torah's oath of Naziritism. Two complete tractates of the Talmūd are dedicated to Nazīrūt. These collections indicate that by the Second Temple Era there were several different manifestations of the practice, which were deeper than the surface reading of Bamidbar (Numbers) 6.1-21. The Talmudic tractates explain that some Nazirites were life-long Nazirites, some abstained rom fruits that could be made alcoholic as we see in the Chumash, some abstained only for as little as one lunar cycle and then had to return to the sacrificial system. Those who broke their oath - ending it early - or those otherwise returning to being non-Nazirites, would thereby offer a "sin offering"; as it was only permitted to eat meat sacrificed at the Temple. Nazirites could shave their hair periodically, and did so on particular occasions. This was even so for life-long Nazirites who would typically, but not always, shave their head once a year, even while maintaining their Naziritic oath.

A detailed discussion about the expressions of Naziritism in the Second Temple Era and Talmud is beyond the scope of this study. We are here interested in a peculiar Qur'ānic word and Islāmic traditions relating to Muḥammad which seem to parallel the Nazirite oath. We might expect, at first, that if the Qur'ān said "Nazirite" it would write it directly parallel to the Torah, as نزير. This term does not appear in the Qur'ān, yet a term that is only slightly different reoccurs and is an important title used for Muḥammad throughout. In examining this word, we must bear in mind that there is not today, nor has there ever been, an Arabic etymological dictionary. The Qur'ān was the first book penned in the Arabic language, and with the standardizing of it, from the up to 6 dialect-variants attested to in ḥadīth literature, we see the true birth of the fuṣḥā al-turāth Arabic language as we know it.

Thus, exploring the Aramaeo-Arabic and Hebrew etymology of the Qur'ān, we might look at another common Qur'ānic term which there is no doubt derives from Hebrew usage. We see that the Hebrew זכר is directly related to the Arabic ذكر rather than to زكر. There are thus etymological occasions where the Hebrew ז does not transfer into an Arabic ز but into an Arabic ذ; a letter which does not exist in Hebrew. Therefore, just as זכר is to ذكر, we can conclude a likelihood that the Qur'ānic نذير is the Biblical נזיר; spelled in this manner rather than نزير.

Corroborating this notion of Naziritism in the Qur'ān, and the historical Sunnah of Muḥammad, we read some of the most blunt evidence from third party sources. Pre-dating the earliest Islāmic manuscripts on record, following the recovery of Edessa by Heraclius in 628 we have an unexpected account from Bishop Sebeos. The account traces to the 660s CE (the final account is in 661). Therein, Sebeos says that the Jews of the Levant "set out into the desert and came to Arabia, among the Children of Ishmael" upon the exile. The Diaspora Jews "sought their help, and explained to them that they were kinsmen according to the Bible." Although the Ishmaelites "were ready to accept this close kinship," the Jews "could not convince the mass of the people because their cults were different." Sebeos tells us that it was "at that time there was an Ishmaelite called Mahmet, a merchant... [who] presented himself to them as though at God's command, as a preacher, as the way of truth... he was very well-informed and very well-acquainted with the story of Moses." (Sebeos, Histoire, 94-6)

Most peculiar, and relevant to the linguistic discussion of Naziritism in the Qur'ān, is that Sebeos adds that "Mahmet forbade them to eat the flesh of any dead animal [or] to drink wine." (Ibid) These are particular facets of the Nazirite oath. The methodology of Higher-Criticism argues for the authenticity of this account due to its dissimilarity from either Christian or Muslim accounts of Muḥammad. That is, its historicity is more likely, because it is dissimilar from what we should expect a Christian source to say about Muḥammad.

There is further evidence in what later Islāmic traditions would preserve remnants of. For instance, in Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim it is reported that Muḥammad grew his hair so long that it "hung over his shoulders and earlobes". (Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim Book 30 Number 5773) Ṣaḥīḥ Bukhārī also supports this. (Ṣaḥīḥ Al-Bukhārī Volume 7 Book 72 Number 788). Numerous other accounts attest to Muḥammad periodically shaving his head completely (Ṣaḥīḥ Bukhārī Volume 3, Book 28, Number 34, et al; other sources correlate Muḥammad's followers sacrificing with the shaving of their heads: e.g. Volume 3, Book 28, Number 36; 39; 41; 42; 43; 44 and numerous similar examples). These evidences then make the etymological argument, for the Qur'ānic description of a نذير as a נזיר, even stronger.

Related to this is a discussion, also beyond the scope of this particular article, on the etymology of the Arabic laḥam, which is clearly derived from the Semitic lechem, a term which specifically means "bread" in Hebrew (as in Bethlehem: בית לחם/بيت لحم), but is otherwise a general Semitic term for food. That Muḥammad could be interpreted by later authors, writing centuries after him, as having eaten لحم, is a likely forgetting of the etymology from the Hebrew לחם.

It would seem that Shaykh Muhammad Raheem Bawa Muhaiyaddeen was right about the diet of this man whom Rabbī Natanyel ibn Al-Fayyūmī (ca. 1090-1165), the leader of the Jews of Yemen, described as prophet to the nations...