hanif

The term {{transliteration|ar|ḥanīf}} comes from the Arabic root {{transliteration|ar|DIN|ḥ-n-f}} meaning "to incline, to decline"Lane, 1893 or "to turn or bend sideways"{{cite book |last1=Wehr |first1=Hans |title=Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic |page=210 |url=https://archive.org/details/HansWehrEnglishArabicDctionarySearchableFormat/page/n223 |access-date=28 October 2019}} from the Syriac root of the different meaning “to deceive, to turn pagan, to lead into paganism”. The Syriac word refers to pagans and deceivers.{{Cite web |title=The Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon |url=https://cal.huc.edu/oneentry.php?lemma=xnp%20V&cits=all |access-date=2023-12-06 |website=cal.huc.edu}}{{Cite web |title=The Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon |url=https://cal.huc.edu/oneentry.php?lemma=xnp+N&cits=all |access-date=2023-12-06 |website=cal.huc.edu}}J. Payne Smith (Mrs. Margoliouth), A Compendious Syriac Dictionary (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1903) p. 149 [from sedra.bethmardutho.org, tagged by Aron M. Tillema, accessed on Dec. 06, 2023]. The Arabic is defined as "true believer, orthodox; one who scorns the false creeds surrounding him/her and profess the true religion" by The Arabic-English Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic.

According to Francis Edward Peters, in verse {{cite quran|3|67|style=nosup|expand=no}} of the Quran it has been translated as "upright person" and outside the Quran as "to incline towards a right state or tendency".{{sfn|Peters|1994|pp=122–124}} According to W. Montgomery Watt, it appears to have been used earlier by Jews and Christians in reference to "pagans" and applied to followers of an old Hellenized Syrian and Arabian religion and used to taunt early Muslims.{{sfn|Watt|1974|pp=117–119}}

Michael Cook states "its exact sense is obscure" but the Quran "uses it in contexts suggestive of a pristine monotheism, which it tends to contrast with (latter-day) Judaism and Christianity". In the Quran {{transliteration|ar|ḥanīf}} is associated "strongly with Abraham, but never with Moses or Jesus".{{cite book |last1=Cook |first1=Michael |title=Muhammad |date=1983 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=0192876058 |page=39}} The unique association of ḥanīf with Abraham underscores his foundational role in the development of monotheistic faith and his exemplary status in the Islamic tradition.

Oxford Islamic Studies online defines {{transliteration|ar|ḥanīf}} as "one who is utterly upright in all of his or her affairs, as exemplified by the model of Abraham"; and that prior to the arrival of Islam "the term was used [...] to designate pious people who accepted monotheism but did not join the Jewish or Christian communities."{{cite web |title=Hanif |url=http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t125/e800 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180602131703/http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t125/e800 |url-status=dead |archive-date=June 2, 2018 |website=Oxford Islamic Studies Online |access-date=28 October 2019}}

Others translate {{transliteration|ar|DIN|Hanīfiyyah}} as the law of Ibrahim; the verb {{transliteration|ar|DIN|taḥannafa}} as "to turn away from [idolatry]". Others maintain that the {{transliteration|ar|ḥanīf}} followed the "religion of Ibrahim, the {{transliteration|ar|hanif}}, the Muslim[.]"{{sfn|Watt|1974|pp=117–119}} It has been theorized by Watt that the verbal term Islam, arising from the participle form of Muslim (meaning "surrendered to God"), may have only arisen as an identifying descriptor for the religion in the late Medinan period.{{sfn|Watt|1974|pp=117–119}}

According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, "there is no evidence that a true {{transliteration|ar|ḥanīf}} cult existed in pre-Islamic Arabia."{{cite web |title=Hanif |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/hanif |access-date=23 February 2020 |website=britannica.com}}{{Additional citation needed|date=December 2024}}

A Greek source from the 5th century CE, The Ecclesiastical History of Sozomen, speaks of how "Abraham had bequeathed a monotheist religion" to the Arabs, who are described being descended "from Ishmael and Hagar" and adhering to certain practices of the Jews, such as shunning pork consumption.Ibn Rawandi, "Origins of Islam", 2000: p.112

Sozomen, a 5th-century Roman lawyer and historian of the Christian Church, is thought to have been a native of Gaza CityCrone, Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam, 1987: p.190-91 and a native speaker of Arabic{{Cn|date=October 2024}} Therefore, according to Ibn Rawandi, he provides a "reliable source" that Arabs—at least in northwest Arabia—were familiar with the idea there were pre-Islamic "Abrahamic monotheists ({{transliteration|ar|ḥanīf}}) [...] whether this was true of Arabs throughout the [Arabian] peninsula it is impossible to say."

Yehuda Nevo, a revisionist Islamic historian which has called into question several aspects of the traditional islamic narrative, interprets the Hanif movement as part of a broader pre-Islamic monotheistic trend in Arabia that eventually morphed into what he names Mohammadian Islam following the Islamic conquests.https://archive.org/details/yehuda-d.-nevo-judith-koren-crossroads-to-islam-the-origins-of-the-arab-religion/mode/2up page 199

{{more citations needed section|date=November 2011}}

According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, "some of Muḥammad's relatives, contemporaries, and early supporters were called {{transliteration|ar|hanifs}}" – examples including Waraqah ibn Nawfal, "a cousin of the Prophet’s first wife, Khadija bint Khuwaylid, and Umayyah ibn Abī aṣ-Ṣalt, "an early 7th-century Arab poet".

According to the website "In the Name of Allah", the term {{transliteration|ar|ḥanīf}} is used "twelve times in the Quran", but Abraham/Ibrahim is "the only person to have been explicitly identified with the term." He is mentioned "in reference to" {{transliteration|ar|ḥanīf}} eight times in the Quran.{{cite web |title=hanif |url=http://inthenameofallah.org/Hanif.html |website=In the Name of Allah |access-date=28 October 2019}}

Among those who are thought to have been {{transliteration|ar|DIN|ḥunafā'}} are:{{citation needed|date=October 2019}}

• All the prophets and messengers after Abraham according to Islamic tradition
• Muhammad
• Old Najranites
• Seven Sleepers
• Sa'id bin Zayd
• Khaled bin Sinan
• Hashim ibn Abd Manaf
• Umayya ibn Abi as-Salt

The four friends in Mecca from ibn Ishaq's account:

• Zayd ibn Amr: rejected both Judaism and Christianity{{sfn|Peters|1994|pp=122–124}}
• Waraqah ibn Nawfal: was a Nestorian priest and patrilineal third cousin to Muhammad. He died before Muhammad declared his Prophethood.{{sfn|Peters|1994|pp=122–124}}
• Uthman ibn al-Huwayrith: travelled to the Byzantine Empire and converted to Christianity{{sfn|Peters|1994|pp=122–124}}
• Ubayd-Allah ibn Jahsh: early Muslim convert who emigrated to the Kingdom of Aksum.{{sfn|Peters|1994|pp=122–124}}

{{transliteration|ar|Ḥanīf}} opponents of Islam from Ibn Isḥāq's account:

• Abū 'Amar 'Abd Amr ibn Sayfī: a leader of the tribe of Banu Aws at Medina and builder of the "Mosque of the Schism" mentioned in the Quranic verse {{cite quran|9|107|style=ref|expand=no}} and later allied with the Quraysh then moved to Ta'if and onto Syria after subsequent early Muslim conquests.{{sfn|Peters|1994|pp=122–124}}
• Abu Qays ibn al-Aslaṭ{{sfn|Peters|1994|pp=122–124}}

• Banu Khuza'a
• Noahidism, similar concept with Judaism
• Abrahamites
• Monotheism in pre-Islamic Arabia
• Perennial Philosophy
• People of the Book
• Prisca theologia, equivalent concept in esoteric Christianity
• Rahmanism
• Urmonotheismus

{{reflist}}

• {{Cite book |last1=Ambros |first1=Arne A |last2=Procháczka |first2=Stephan |year=2004 |title=A Concise Dictionary of Koranic Arabic |publisher=Reichert }}
• {{cite book |last1=Crone |first1=Patricia |title=Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam |year=1987 |publisher=Princeton University Press |url=http://www.almuslih.org/Library/Crone,%20P%20-%20Meccan%20Trade%20and%20the%20Rise%20of%20Islam.pdf |ref=PCMTatRoI1987 |access-date=2020-02-23 |archive-date=2016-05-28 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160528221729/http://almuslih.org/Library/Crone,%20P%20-%20Meccan%20Trade%20and%20the%20Rise%20of%20Islam.pdf |url-status=dead }}
• {{Cite book |last=Hawting |first=G. R. |author-link=G. R. Hawting |year=1999 |title=The Idea of Idolatry and the Emergence of Islam: From Polemic to History |publisher=Cambridge University Press }}
• {{cite book |editor1-last=Ibn Warraq |title=The Quest for the Historical Muhammad |date=2000 |publisher=Prometheus |pages=89–124 |chapter=2. Origins of Islam: A Critical Look at the Sources |ref=IROoI2000}}
• {{Cite book |last=Kaltner |first=John |year=1999 |title=Ishmael Instructs Isaac: An Introduction to the Qu'ran for Bible Readers |publisher=Liturgical Press |isbn=0-8146-5882-2 }}
• {{Cite book |editor-last=Köchler |editor-first=Hans |editor-link=Hans Köchler |year=1982 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zMuipwd5MTEC |title=Concept of Monotheism in Islam & Christianity |publisher=International Progress Organization |isbn=3-7003-0339-4 }}
• {{Cite book |last=Peters |first=F. E. |author-link=Francis Edward Peters |year=1994 |title=Muhammad and the Origins of Islam |publisher=SUNY Press |isbn=0-7914-1875-8 |url=https://archive.org/details/muhammadorigins00pete }}
• {{Cite book |last=Watt |first=William Montgomery |author-link=William Montgomery Watt |year=1974 |title=Muhammad: prophet and statesman |publisher=Oxford University Press US |isbn=0-19-881078-4 |url=https://archive.org/details/muhammadprophets00watt }}

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Category:Quranic words and phrases