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Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal – Vol. 9, No. 5

Publication Date: May 25, 2022

DOI:10.14738/assrj.95.12280. Shamsuddin, S. M. (2022). Narration of Pre-Islamic Poetry and its Sources. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 9(5). 60-

70.

Services for Science and Education – United Kingdom

Narration of Pre-Islamic Poetry and its Sources

Salahuddin Mohd. Shamsuddin / Prof. Dr.

Faculty of Arabic Language

Islamic University Sultan Sharif Ali, Brunei Darussalam

ABSTRACT

There is no doubt that the Arabs were illiterate, and they did not depend on the

writing, but rather on the oral narrations since the pre-Islamic era. Oral narration

in the pre-Islamic era was a technical school in which the young or novice poets

learn the principles of poetry, just as the artisans today learn the principles of the

craft and the rules of the profession. The junior remains attached to his teacher,

carrying out his directions and corrections, and sticking to him as a beneficiary to

be able to say and stand out in it, and whoever wanted to learn poetry or be a poet

had to commit one of the great poets who was known and recognized for his status,

in order to memorize, narrate and excel so that he can get the benefit and

proficiency both. The series of narration of pre-Islamic poetry was not interrupted

until the era of codification. However, the Orientalist Lyle confirms that who refer

to (Muʻallaqāt): Pendants, for example, find that each has its own distinct

personality, which proves that it belongs to its owner. Aim of this article is to shed

light on that the Pre-Islamic poetry has reached us through the oral narrations, and

to respond to those orientalists who doubt the authenticity of those narrations and

the narrators who transmitted them until they were codified in the era of

codification. In this study, we used the descriptive and historical approach, which is

always useful in studying such heretical texts.

Keywords: Oral Narrations to the Arabs - Pre-Islamic Poetry - Sources of Pre-Islamic

Poetry.

NARRATIONS OF PRE-ISLAMIC POETRY AND THEIR NARRATORS

Muşṭafā Sādiq al-Rāfiʻi writes at the end of the first part of his book "History of Arab Literature":

“Arabs were an illiterate nation, they did not read except what was transcended by the nature,

and they did not write except the meanings that they were taught by the nature, so they took

those meanings by the feeling and wrote with the tongue on the board of their memory, so every

Arab was on the extent of his awareness and memorization as a book, or a part of a book, and

each tribe was thus like a chronological record in counting the news and antiquities. He also

says: “The Arabs, by their nature, were the most powerful and perfect people in their

memorizing, and the writing was unnatural in their social system, therefore, the patience and

endurance arose in them. So, every Arab, by the nature, was a narrator of himself and his

people’s affairs. When they were guided to the poetry and expanded on it, they associated it

with the finest psychological meanings, until the poet began to be considered the tongue of his

people. He defends them, and their lineages, and winks at their enemies, and in this he was

unique in the narration in a historical sense, as he became as he was narrating for the history,

unlike the other elders of the tribe, the people of its lineages, and those who were responsible

for its glory. There are people who refer to this particular knowledge, not to the general

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Shamsuddin, S. M. (2022). Narration of Pre-Islamic Poetry and its Sources. Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal, 9(5). 60-70.

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/assrj.95.12280

narration, and that is as we see the origin of the historical meaning in the scientific narration

among the Arabs, and it was proven by what was done by the work of the narrators themselves,

in their taking the poetry as a pillar of the narration, citing it on the news and many other

information that has no witness. When poetry attained that status, the need for someone who

devote himself to narrating the feats and faults, and telling their news about the Arabs’ glory in

a manner of investigation and absorption, as the case is in the scientific situations. Thus, a class

of genealogists arose, and they were the narrators of the pre-Islamic era and its scholars, and

thus the narration was distinguished in its scientific sense. [1]

Poetry and poet in the pre-Islamic era had a great status, because it was and still is the only

window to the entire pre-Islamic life and its secrets and mysteries, and for this reason scholars

and researchers turned to it in their study and research, in order to get acquainted with the pre- Islamic life in an honest way.

The Arabs knew the writing in the pre-Islamic era, and used it for some of their purposes, but

the writing was not common, it was represented by a few numbers in the cities, and less than a

few in the desert. Therefore, the Arabs did not use the writing to write down their poems. If

they had written that, we would have found from the narrators who mentioned that he quoted

from a paper had been written in the pre-Islamic era. The oral narration was the tool by which

pre-Islamic poetry was transmitted among the narrators and the preservers and was

transmitted through it from generation to generation until the era of codification.

In the pre-Islamic era, poets themselves played a huge and important role in the field of

narration, until they made the narration and poetry memorization a school where the novice

poets learned the art of poetry, and whoever wanted to learn the poetry or who wanted to be a

poet, had to commit a great poet known to them, whose status was recognized. It was necessary

for him to memorize, narrate, and excel, so that the benefit and the proficiency both can be

achieved.

Every generation of narrator poets or poet narrators, teaches another generation the origins of

this art so that the process of communication can be continued among the generations. [2]

The narration in the pre-Islamic era was like this form, but the narration of pre-Islamic poetry

was reduced and stopped after the rise of Islam, because of the principles and values that it

carries that contradict the values and principles of the Islamic religion.

On the other hand, the Arabs were distracted from the narration by their preoccupation with

the conquests, as we see in the words of ̔Umar b. Khaṭṭāb: Poetry was the knowledge of a people

who had no knowledge more soundly than it. Then Islam came, and the Arabs were preoccupied

with it, and were preoccupied with jihad and the conquest of Persia and the Romans, and they

turned away from poetry and its narration. When Islam increased and the conquests came and

the Arabs were assured of the lands, they returned to the narration of poetry, but they did not

go to a written diwan or a written book, so they threw that, and some of the Arabs perished by

the death or murder, so they memorized the least of that, and most of it was gone. [3]

Then the narration continued its way in the Islamic era, and no barrier was set up and no

obstacle was obstructed in its way, as Muḥammad the Messenger used to enjoying some poetry,