Page 213 - Arabiab Studies (IV)

The Omani Manuscript Collection at Muscat 203
some fortified buildings in Sufoar from the Julanda for the state’s
defensive needs.
(ii) from the Bayan al-shai* that the Imam Julanda b. Mas‘ud
made an ‘Islamic’ treaty with the inhabitants of Soqotra. But the
real significance of tracing the original citations lies in the fact that
in every single case the information was recorded in the context of
a discussion about some fiqh principle. So when we read how the
Imam Julanda b. Mas‘ud executed his rebellious kinsmen, this
occurs in the course of a discussion on how an Imam’s obligations
override all personal considerations: so, even though the Imam
tried to resign rather than carry out this painful duty, he was not
able to do so for that would have been reneging the imamah.
Furthermore as a result of forcing the Imam to execute members of
his own clan the IbatJIs created a feud with the *a$abiyyat
al-Julanda which, by tribal law, could never be settled except by
blood. So we understand the ruthlessness by which the war
between the two was waged and why the Ibadls themselves
resorted to conduct offending their own canon. This point is
clearly brought out by seeing the complete letter of A. ’1-Hawari to
the Ha<JramIs (J.M. 6 iii). Every single incident the Hadramls
question concerns the acts of the Iba<jls against the Julanda and
their tribal supporters who continue to cause trouble down to the
time of their final suppression in Muhanna’s Imamate, that is some
half century after the Iba<JI state was properly established. It is for
this reason that A. al-Hawari finishes his letter, having answered as
honestly as he can what really happened, with a lengthy discussion
on what is the right course of conduct for waging war against other
Muslims. So there is no new information in all this but rather a
fresh interpretation, arising from seeing information chopped up
chronologically by al-Saliml in the Tubfah, reassembled in its
original context and continuity.

IV. SOCIO-ECONOMIC HISTORY
Yet if there is little new to be found about political history in these
manuscripts this certainly is not the case for the socio-economic
history of the early Imamate.
One of the particularly interesting features about the new IbadI
state was the way it developed a land organization which was to
endure right through to the present century. For the present writer
there is something particularly fascinating to have stated from
information collected in the field, ‘The job of grazing the village’s
livestock is normally entrusted to a shepherd (ra*i) who receives a \
fixed payment per head per month ... ’, and then to find a ruling of
almost exactly one thousand years earlier by A. '1-Hawari to the