The Gibeonite Gambit

Ḥarrānians, Karaites, and Khaybarī Jews on the Margins of

Medieval Islamic Society
Fred Astren

Abstract
Embedded in the literature of Muslims, Christians, and Jews are historicized narratives that purport
to rationalize and contextualize the place of minority and sectarian groups in medieval Islamic
society. Among these are those that, at first reading, tell the story of an intentional fictionalizing of
history on the part of a minority group with the intent to deceive Muslim authorities and thereby gain
advantage. A prototype for this narrative strategy is observed in the Book of Joshua, wherein the
“pagan” Gibeonites employ a ruse to secure recognition and protection from the conquering
monotheistic Israelites, who had been commanded by God to exterminate pagans. Three case
studies (on the Sabians of Ḥarrān, Karaite Jews, and Khaybarī Jews) reveal that similar stories in
medieval Islam are often the result of co-production, a phenomenon which constitutes a kind of
cultural negotiation between the dominant culture and a sub-culture; between rulers and subject
peoples, between Muslims and non-Muslims, and even between competing subaltern groups.
Reshaped narratives about the caliph al-Ma‘mūn, the Prophet Muḥammad, or other key figures
offered narrativized permission for the dominant Muslim religion and culture to tolerate the existence
of groups whose theologies or practices challenged Muslim assumptions of collectivity, and
correspondingly, might or might not be otherwise deemed unacceptable. These narratives also
provided subalterns a kind of myth of origin for their place in Islamic society. What is at stake in
these complex interweavings of memory, history, and literary construction are the rights and duties
of the subordinate groups.