« Le Massacre des Banu Qurayza » : différence entre les versions

 

{{QualityScore|Lead=4|Structure=4|Content=4|Language=4|References=4}}[[File:Banu qurayza massacre.jpg|175px|right|thumb|''Détail d'une peinture miniature : Le Prophète, Ali, et ses compagnons lors du massacre des prisonniers de la tribu Juive des Banu Qurayza, illustration d'un texte du XIXe siècle de Muhammad Rafi Bazil.]]Selon les sources islamiques traditionnelles, en 627 après J.-C., à la suite de la [[Bataille de la Tranchée]] et de la trahison des Musulmans par la tribu juive des Banu Qurayza, les Musulmans, sous le commandement militaire direct du prophète [[Muhammad]], ont assiégé le camp des Banu Qurayza. Après un siège d'environ 2 semaines, selon les sources, les Juifs des Banu Qurayza se sont rendus et ont confié leur sort à un intermédiaire de confiance des Musulmans de la tribu des 'Aws, Sa'd ibn Mu'adh. Cependant, Sa'd ibn Mu'adh, affirmant suivre la loi de la Torah elle-même, a conseillé à Muhammad de massacrer les hommes de la tribu et de vendre les femmes et les enfants comme esclaves. Muhammad a suivi ce conseil et, par conséquent, entre 400 et 900 prisonniers de la tribu, incluant des enfants montrant des signes de puberté, ont été abattus, beaucoup devant leur famille, et le reste de la tribu a été vendu en esclavage. L'événement est bien attesté dans la tradition historique islamique et a servi de base à de multiples décisions tout au long de l'histoire concernant le traitement des non-Musulmans capturés par les forces militaires Musulmanes.

Les hadiths de Bukhari témoignent des incidents décrits par Ishaq. Bukhari confirme que ce sont les anges qui ont décrété que la guerre soit menée contre les Banu Qurayza.{{Quote| {{Bukhari|4|52|68}}|Rapporté par Aicha : Quand le Messager d’Allah (ﷺ) est revenu le jour (de la bataille) d’Al-Khandaq (c.-à-d. la Tranchée), il déposa ses armes et prit un bain. Alors Gabriel, dont la tête était couverte de poussière, est venu à lui en disant : "Tu as déposé tes armes ! Par Allah, je n’ai pas encore déposé mes armes." Le Messager d’Allah (ﷺ) a dit : "Où (aller maintenant) ?" Gabriel a dit : "Par-là," en pointant vers la tribu des Banu Qurayza. Alors le Messager d’Allah (ﷺ) est parti vers eux.}}De même, il confirme que c'est Sa'd qui les a condamnés à leur destin.{{Quote| {{Bukhari|5|58|148}}|Rapporté par Abu Saʿid al-Khudri : "Certaines personnes (c.-à-d. les Juifs des Banu Qurayza) ont décidé d’accepter le verdict de Sa'd ibn Mu'adh alors le Prophète fit qu’on aille le chercher (ﷺ)  (c.-à-d. Sa'd ibn Mu'adh). Il est venu monté sur un âne, et quand il s’est approché de la mosquée, le Prophète (ﷺ) a dit : Levez-vous pour le meilleur parmi vous, ou a dit, levez-vous pour votre chef. Puis le Prophète (ﷺ) a dit : "Ô Sa’d ! Ces gens ont accepté de recevoir ton verdict. Sa’d a dit : Je juge que leurs guerriers doivent être tués et que leurs enfants et leurs femmes doivent être pris comme captifs. Le Prophète a dit : Tu as rendu un jugement similaire au Jugement d’Allah (ou le jugement du Roi)."}}D'ailleurs, Bukhari mentionne que même si ibn Sa'd a été appelé à rendre un jugement équitable aux Banu Qurayza en tant qu'ancien allié, en réalité, il est décédé des suites de blessures subies lors de la Bataille du Fossé, souhaitant la mort aux infidèles.{{Quote| {{Bukhari|5|59|448}}|Aicha a rapporté : "Sa’d a été blessé le jour de la Tranchée par un homme de la tribu des Quraysh, nommé Hibban ibn al-Arqah qui l'a frappé avec une flèche. Le Prophète (ﷺ) a dressé une tente pour Sa’d dans la Mosquée pour qu'il puisse être à proximité du Prophète (ﷺ) pour des visites. Lorsque le Prophète (ﷺ) est revenu de la Bataille de la Tranchée et a déposé ses armes et s'est lavé, Gabriel est venu à lui en secouant la poussière de sa tête et a dit : « As-tu déposé tes armes ? » Le Prophète (ﷺ) a répondu : « Par Allah, je ne les ai pas déposées. Sors vers eux (pour les attaquer). » Le Prophète (ﷺ) a demandé : « Où ? » Gabriel a pointé vers les Banu Qurayza. Ainsi, le Messager d'Allah (ﷺ) est allé vers eux (c’-à-d assiéger les Banu Qurayza). Ils se sont ensuite rendus au jugement du Prophète (ﷺ), mais il les a dirigés vers Sa’d pour donner son verdict à leur sujet. Sa’d a dit : « Je juge que leurs guerriers soient tués, leurs femmes et leurs enfants pris comme captifs, et leurs biens distribués. » Hisham a rapporté : « Mon père m'a informé qu'Aicha a dit que Sad a dit : ‘’Ô Allah ! Tu sais qu'il n'y a rien de plus cher pour moi que de combattre dans Ta cause contre ceux qui ont mécrus en Ton Prophète et l'ont expulsé de La Mecque. Ô Allah ! Je pense que Tu as mis fin au combat entre nous et eux (c'est-à-dire, les infidèles Quraysh). Et s'il reste encore un combat avec les Quraysh (infidèles), alors garde-moi en vie jusqu'à ce que je les combatte pour Ton intérêt. Mais si Tu as mis fin à la guerre, alors laisse cette blessure éclater et causer ma mort.’’ Ainsi, le sang a jailli de la blessure. Il y avait une tente dans la Mosquée appartenant aux Banu Ghifar qui ont été surpris par le sang qui coulait vers eux. Ils ont dit : « Ô gens de la tente ! Qu'est-ce que cette chose qui vient de votre côté ? » Voilà que le sang coulait abondamment de la blessure de Sa’d. Sa’d est alors mort à cause de cela."}}Bukhari also mentions the fate of the Banu Qurayza, carried out in accordance with Sa'd's judgement:{{Quote|{{bukhari|5|59|362}}, See Also: {{muslim|19|4364}}|Narrated Abd-Allah ibn Umar: Banu Nadir and Banu Qurayza fought (against the Prophet violating their peace treaty), so the Prophet exiled Bani An-Nadir and allowed Bani Quraiza to remain at their places (in Medina) taking nothing from them till they fought against the Prophet again). He then killed their men and distributed their women, children and property among the Muslims, but some of them came to the Prophet and he granted them safety, and they embraced Islam. He exiled all the Jews from Medina. They were the Jews of Banu Qaynuqa, the tribe of Abdullah bin Salam and the Jews of Bani Haritha and all the other Jews of Medina. }}Sunan Abi Dawud tells us exactly how it was determined, whether a male youth would be spared, based on whether he had had reached puberty or not:{{Quote| {{Abudawud|38|4390}}| Narrated Atiyyah al-Qurazi:

 

 

I was among the captives of Banu Qurayza. They (the Companions) examined us, and those who had begun to grow hair (pubes) were killed, and those who had not were not killed. I was among those who had not grown hair.}}

==Modern Views and Perspectives==

<center><youtube>UZE1N56fswY</youtube></center>In the clip above Muslim scholar Yasir Qadhi, well respected for his degrees from the Islamic University of Medina as well as from Yale, makes the argument that Muhammad was dealing with treachery and he had taken the maximum punitive actions against it. Qadhi argues that the prophet was justified in every step and showed as much restraint as necessary, being motivated purely by concerns on statecraft and practicality, not by malice. As he says, it is possible to accuse the prophet of being "harsh" but not of acting with malice towards the Banu Qurayzahor the Jews in general, as this would not be "academically valid."

 

Ibn Ishaq makes the same point:{{Quote| Ibn Ishaq: 683 | Then Abu Sufyan said: “O Quraish, we are not in a permanent camp; the horses and camels are dying; the Banu Qurayza have broken their word to us and we have heard disquieting reports of them. You can see the violence of the wind which leaves us neither cooking-pots, or fire, nor tents to count on. Be off, for I am going” }}Yasir Qadhi states that the punishment was "harsh" and yet it is sometimes necessary to be harsh. Yaqeen institute scholar Abu Amina Elias (Justin Parrott) makes the cases that killing the "fighting men" prisoners of the Banu Qurayzahwas an "act of self-defense" on the part of the Muslim community and cites Deuteronomy 20:12-14 to justify the actions of the Muslims, agreeing with ibn Ishaq that Sa'd was judging the Jews by their own law. He also claims that the prophet only sent his men their with arms to "defend themselves" and that the women and children of the Banu Qurayzahwere taken "into captivity" for their protection since all of their men folk had bee slaughtered <ref>"Did the Prophet commit genocide against Jews?" Faith in Allah There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is his messenger https://abuaminaelias.com/prophet-genocide-banu-qurayza/  April 8, 2013</ref>. Karen Armstrong, in her book A Short History of Islam, likewise claims  "The struggle did not indicate any hostility towards Jews in general, but only towards the three rebel tribes. The Quran continued to revere Jewish prophets and to urge Muslims to respect the People of the Book."<ref>Islam:A Short History Karen Armstrong Modern Library 2002</ref>

 

 

Banu Qurayza replied: "O Abul Qasim (Muhammad), you are not a barbarous person" }}In mocking them as apes, Muhammad is here echoing the Qur'an, which claims that (some) Jews were turned into apes for violating the sabbath (Qur'an 50:60).

Jewish anti-jihad scholar Andrew Bostrom points out that Muhammad took one of the most beautiful Jewish women of the Banu Qurayza, Rayhanah, as his wife and that the Muslims benefited handsomely from the destruction of this tribe, so self-defense was clearly not the only concern. <ref>"Muhammad, the Qurayza Massacre, and PBS" Andrew Bostom The Legacy of Jihad 10 June 2012, Archived https://www.webcitation.org/query?url=http://www.andrewbostom.org/loj//content/view/38/27/&date=2012-06-10</ref>. Abu Amina Elias's view that the Muslims took such women and children as Rayhana captive simply for their protection also cannot be true, as ibn Ishaq recounts that some of them were taken to the far-off region of the Najd to be sold for weapons and horses. Yasir Qadhi himself points out that the Banu Qurayzahwere offered freedom to live on were they to accept Islam, and according to the sira only their hard, petulant hearts which rejected Muhammad despite knowing he was a prophet of the Lord prevented them from allowing themselves to be saved by conversion to Islam. So clearly, at least in the eyes of the sirah, their Jewish religion did, in fact, have something to do with the pitilessness with which Muhammad dealt with them, going against Qadhi's point that the prophet acted without malice or religious animus according to the sources we have. Bukhari also mentions that the prophet commanded his men to abuse the Banu Qurayzahwith poetry, which was in ancient Arab times one of the premier ways of promoting enmity with an enemy (Muhammad ordered poets who did this to him to be killed):{{Quote| {{Bukhari|5|59|449}}|Narrated Al-Bara: "On the day of Qurayza’s (besiege), Allah's Apostle said to Hassan bin Thabit, 'Abuse them (with your poems), and Gabriel is with you" }}

==Problems with the Traditional Narrative==

The narrative of the Banu Qurayzahis an accepted part of Islamic law, and multiple Islamic jurists have cited it, including when ruling that certain populations of Jews and other non-believers be massacred. As such there is no question amongst orthodox Muslims that it happened <ref>"Extended Interview: The legacy of Islamic Antisemetism" Andrew Bostom andrewbostom.org  13 June 2008</ref>. Yet the historiography of the subject is not without its own problems.

Within the Islamic tradition, ibn Ishaq was frequently criticized for giving too much weight to Jewish stories and being biased in general in his retellings of certain events. Malik ibn Anas accusses ibn Ishaq of being a "liar" for listening to "Jewish stories" <ref>"New Light on the Story of Banu Qurayza and the Jews of Medina", W.N Arafat 2001 p. 100-107</ref>.

Modern scholarship has cast much more serious doubts on the scholarship of Islamic scholars working in the 8th century (2nd Islamic century) such as ibn Ishaq. As Fred Donner points out, one of the earliest documents we have from the nascent proto-Islamic movement is the ''Constitution of Medina''  صحيفة مدينة also known as the Ummah Document or صحيفة الأمة. This remarkable document, preserved by the Islamic historian [[Al-Tabari]], lays out a compact for the "believers" of Medina, an "ummah" or national community that includes the Jews as "believers" on the same level as the Arab believers. Fred Donner believes this document actually points to an early, occulted history of Islam in which Arab monotheists joined with Jews into one "ummah" under the command of Muhammad. Troublingly for the historical narrative, this document makes mention of many different Jewish tribes, but the main 3 tribes of the sira, the Banu Qurayza, the Banu Qaynuqaa', and the Banu Nadir are conspicuously absent. It is in fact the absence of these tribes which convinces scholars that the document must be very old despite being preserved only in the 9th-century works of Tabari, since a younger document would presumably would have been changed to agree with the established historical narrative. Donner mentions that many early 7th century mosques do not include the qibla facing towards Mecca, and concludes that this story of the massacre of the Banu Qurayzahmay have been invented or embellished in order to explain a much later break between the Jewish and Muslim communities <ref>Muhammad and the Believers: At the Orgins of Islam, Fred Donner, Harvard University Press 2010, p. 72-73</ref>.

Patricia Cronner and Michael Cook in their groundbreaking work ''Hagarism'' likewise report on an Armenian historian writing in the 7th century known as pseudo-Sabeous. This historian imputes the Arab invasions to a confederation of Jews and Arabs led by Muhammad himself, contradicting the Islamic narrative that Muhammad died before the invasion of Palestine and the Middle East. Pseudo-Sebeos likewise imputes to the Arabs and Jews a shared monotheism and brotherhood through their ancestry to Abraham and his wife Hagar <ref>Hagarism: Making of the Islamic World, Patricia Crone and Michael Cook, Cambridge University Press 1977, p. 6-8</ref>. If this account is to be believed, there could not have been any great massacre of the Jews by Muhammad as we has working with them when he invaded Palestine. Stephen Shoemaker in his work ''The Death of a Prophet'' adds further evidence to thesis of Crone and Cook, marshaling evidence from a wide variety of sources, almost all of which predate the first Islamic sources, that Muhammad himself was actually the leader of the believers when they entered Palestine and he died only after its conquest. In particular he calls attention to a Jewish apocalypse from the 7th century, the Secrets of Rabbi ben Shim'on, which seems to paint Muhammad as the redeemer of the Jews from the oppression of the Romans in the Holy Land. If this is to be believed, and this source predates every Islamic source we have, the massacre of the Banu Qurayzahcould not have taken place, since Muhammad, the leader of the invasion of Palestine, was seen as a savior of the Jewish people <ref>The Death of a Prophet, Stephen Shoemaker, University of Pennsylvania Press 2012, p. 27-33</ref>. This would seem to indicate that the break between the Muslims and the Jews took place after his death, and would indicate that stories such as the massacre of the Banu Qurayzahwere fabricated in order to "back date" the break with the Jews to the prophet's own lifetime.

==See Also==

==External Links==

*[http://www.answering-islam.org/Muhammad/Jews/BQurayza/index.html What really happened to the Banu] ''- Collection of articles from Answering Islam''

==References==