Origin of the
name of Sabaʾiyya
Groups of rebellious Muslim militants marched from Iraq and Egypt, and
invaded Al Madinah
(the city of the prophet
PBUH) and killed the Caliph Uthmaan. The Muslims
(Arabs at that
time) called those invaders by the name of (Sabaʾiyya).
a. Why they
were called Sabaʾiyya according to narrators?
The later narrators who wrote about
Sabaʾiyya were ignorant of the meaning
of
the name (Sabaʾiyya), because its ancient Arabic verb (saba')
has died and is no longer used by later Arabs. The narrators
wrongly
thought that those who invaded Al Madinah and killed the Caliph were
called Sabaʾiyya, because they followed a leader called (Ibn
saba').
So,
in order to explain the name (Sabaʾiyya), the narrators have now
invented
a man called (Ibn saba'). But The
narrators actually did nothing except explaining "the meaning of water"
by the same word "water". We still don’t know the meaning of the Arabic
root "saba'" that made the name Sabaʾiyya or ibn saba'.
b. another
opinion
Sabaic Dictionary (English-French-Arabic),
by AFL Beeston, MA Ghul, page 122:
Arabs at the time of Caliph Uthmaan called
those groups of militants
(who came from outside of AL Madinah and killed Caliph Uthmaan)
by the name
Sabaʾiyya,
because they invaded
Madinah. The verb (saba')
was a very common and popular ancient Arabic verb used before Islam by
the Arabic tongue of Himyar (Yemen). Himyarite ancient pre-Islamic
inscriptions are filled with this verb (saba').
This ancient Arabic verb (saba') means (to
invade, to march to, to travel, ...). So,
because those outside groups
invaded
Al
Madinah and marched toward it to do an act, they were called
Sabaʾiyya (Invaders)
by those Arabs who exsited during the Caliph Uthmaan's time.
Sabaʾiyya is from the Arabic verb (saba'=
to invade).
But that ancient Arabic verb (saba')
didn’t survive long after Islam, and later Arabs
(few decades after
Uthmaan's death) were no longer using it
(that’s why we don’t
find it recorded as a verb in early Arabic dictionaries). But the name of those invaders
(Sabaʾiyya), even its meaning is lost, was still remembered by people and
didn’t disappear.
This is like the names
of many places which we still remember, but we can't explain the meanings
of those names.
Note: only the verb
saba' is gone, but some words derived from it like "masba'"
(road), or "suba't" (long travel) still
exist in early Arab dictionaries, and their meaning is the same as used
by the pre Islamic Himyarite inscriptions.
How did the
name (Ibn Saba) appear?
[The Arabs say:
son
of a thing), and (father of a thing), if he is belonging to that
thing, and is bound to it/ Sharh Diwan Abi al-Tayyib al-Mutanabbi: Mujiz
Ahmad - Abul 'Ala' Al-Ma'arri]. What Al-Ma'arri said also said by many
Arabic language scholars.
[العرب يقولون:
فلان (ابن كذا) وأبو كذا إذا كان من أهله،
وملازماً له/ معجز أحمد - المعري]
To repeat what Al-Ma'arri said above in
another way, this means that old Arabs will call you
(son of that thing) if you belong to that thing
or linked to it, and they don’t mean by that thing your human
father. For example, you will be called (son of war) if you are always
engaging in wars, you will be called (son of sport) if you are always
engaging in sports or (son of sadness) if you are always sad, and so on.
The most famous example is mentioned in
Quran which is the name (Ibn assabeel) or
(Ibn As-Sabil): وَآتِ ذَا الْقُرْبَى حَقَّهُ
وَالْمِسْكِينَ وَابْنَ السَّبِيلِ (26)
الإسراء
Wa aati zal qurbaa haqqahoo walmiskeena
wabnas sabeeli
Ibn as-sabīl means (son of the road) or (wanderer,
traveler, wayfarer).
And the most famous man who is called son of
his situation was the Jewish name (Yusha ibn Nun)
or (Joshua). The servant of Moses (ibn nun)
or (son of Nun) which means (son of fish),
was called like that because he forgot the nun or fish, as Quran told
about him:
{فَإِنِّي نَسِيتُ الْحُوتَ (63)} [الكهف], (fa-innee naseetu alhoota)
Surah Al-Kahf [18:63], meaning: (I forgot
the fish).
The word (alhoota) in the verse
(al-hoot) or (hoot) in Arabic means fish. And Jewish word (nun) means
fish. Nun is also an Arabic word mentioned in Quran
Surah 21. Al-Anbiyaa, Ayah 87 [Watha annooni],
this is the name of the prophet
Yunus (Zun-nun) or (Dhun Nun), because he was swallowed by a (hoot) or (nun).
Another example is the famous scholar "Ibn
Hajar" or (son of stone), named for the quality of his mind, And
strength of his opinion. There are hundreds of Arabic examples of such
names, but the translation to English will be tedious and not obvious.
Ibn Saba'
got his name in the same manner like above
examples. He is linked to his deed or act from verb (Saba')
which means (to invade, to march to).
That’s because his group invaded or marched in war toward Al Madinah.
Meaning of
the name (Ibn Saba)
The term "Sabaʾiyya " means "invaders". The
people described the (Sabaʾiyya) (by what they did) and attributed them
to what they did. And what they did is that they
invaded (dead Arabic verb:
Saba')
Al Madinah. Verb (Saba') in the Arabic Himyarite tongue meaning (invade,
march to, attack, travel, ...). Sabaʾiyya are named after their act
(verb
Saba'),
like another name
Khawarij or Kharijites (because of
their act from the Arabic verb (kharaja)
which meant (come out against the Caliph, revolt against him). Or
like name Muʿtazila or Muʿtazilites
(al-muʿtazilah) from verb (iʿtazala) which means "to separate (oneself);
to withdraw from". Or like name Rafidah (Rafida, ar-Rāfiḍa, Raāfiḍa)
meaning "rejectors", "rejectionists", "those who reject" or "those who
refuse". The word is derived from the Arabic verb (rafada) means "to
reject". Or like name (Shia, Shīʿah), from
Shīʻatu ʻAlī, "followers of Ali") from verb (shayʻa) means (to follow or
help, support). Or like the name Sahaba (aṣ-ṣaḥābah ) from
verb (sahaba)
means to "accompany", "keep company with", "associate with" (the
prophet). And so on.
After the old Arabs called that group
Sabaʾiyya from their act (verb Saba'),
then the later narrators wanted to represent the Sabaʾiyya by one man
(leader), and through the way of calling someone as
(son of his doing/
son of his act), they derived from the name of the (Sabaʾiyya) the name
of (Ibn Saba') meaning (son of
Saba') or (son of invasion) or invader.
Is there only
one man named Ibn Saba?
Sabaʾiyya
are real historical group
(they are the invaders
of AL Madinah during the
caliphate of Uthmaan, also they are any other later group who invade,
raise the sword and go against the authorities).
Sabaʾiyya name, as we
mentioned, is linguistically from the Himyarite verb (Saba')
which means (to invade). The famous Arabic name (ibn Saba') or (son of
Saba') does not actually mean a specific unique individual
(I.e.
only one man, like their leader) as the narrators are claiming.
The name
(ibn Saba') can represents
anyone who invaded AL Madinah. But the
narrators for the sake of simplification, represented the invaders
(Sabaʾiyya) by only one specific person which they named him (Ibn Saba') or (son of
Saba'), and they made him the leader of
Sabaʾiyya
(as they also
represented the
Kharijites by the person of
"Dhul-Khuwaisarah" or "Dhu Ath-Thudayyah").
Or because the narators
wanted to make the devil (Satan, jinn) appear in the image of one man
(Ibn Saba). Narrators did the same
thing before as they made the devil appear as a (Najdi sheikh)
in Dār al-Nadwa in Mecca (during the conspiracy of Quraysh chiefs to kill
the prophet). Narrators also made the leader of the kharjites "Dhu
Ath-Thudayyah" from the jinn ("Dhu Ath-Thudayyah" was killed in battle by
Ali).
As we mentioned earlier that Sabaʾiyya are
actually many people from different places
(few thousands of men who
invaded Al Madinah and killed Uthmaan), therefore the narrators can NOT
quote or know what many different men of those invaders said or did. So,
they simplified that huge task by making
Sabaʾiyya talk and act as one single man (ibn
Saba).
So, if any invader of Sabaʾiyya said something its ibn
Saba who said it, or if one invader of
Sabaʾiyya did something its ibn
Saba who did it. Ibn
Saba' is like the sum or spirit or symbol of those invaders (Sabaʾiyya).
Why the
narrators named the Sabaʾiyya after Ibn
Saba?
Because this habit or method is always
followed by the ancient narrators. Here are few examples:
(1) Some narrators invented a man which they named
Sufsta (sophista),
and then they claimed that the name sophism was derived from the name of that man Sufsta.
But we know that Greek word sophism, is
derived from sophía, “wisdom, learning” not from the name of a man.
(2) Some narrators invented from the name of
Islamic Sufism a man named
Sufah and attributed Sufism to him.
(3) Some narrators invented from the name of the Qur'anic word (alssabieen)
or Sabians, a man whom they named him
sabi,
and then they said that the Sabians are named after him.
(4) Some narrators invented the Arabic name
Tufail
(specific individual) from
Tufailywn
(people who enter feasts without being invited), then they attributed
Tufailywn to him.
(5)
Some narrators invented from the name of the
Nabat of Iraq (original inhabitants of Iraq before Islamic
conquest), a man whom they named Nabat
(they made him live during the time of king Solomon), and then they
attributed Nabat people to him.
(6) Some narrators even invented from the
Ulooj
(enemies of Islam who engage in battles with muslims like romans or
crusaders) a father which they called
Aljan,
and then attributed the Ulooj to that father.
In the same way, the narrators invented from
the name of the Sabaʾiyya a man or (Satan
appeared as human) and they called him ibn Sabaʾ
(the son of Sabaʾ), then they said that
the Sabaʾiyya got their name from that man
whose name is (ibn Sabaʾ).
This is the same way that the people of
genealogy (Ansab, as in Arabic) use. Ansab
scholars who were usually ignorant of the origin of the name of
any people (for example, why the people of Persia were called by that
name), they usually answer that (the people of Persia were called by that
name because their father's name was Persia). It's Like they explained
the "meaning of water" after effort by the same word "water". They also
said in the same way (like the Bible before) that the people of Greece
are called after their father Greece (Yawan, yunan), the Arabs named
after their father Ya'rub, Yemenites named after their father Yemen, and
Hadramites named after their father Hadramawt, Omanites named after their
father Oman, China named after their father or king China, and almost
every people got their name from an earlier man with the same name of his
people.
This is the way of ancient narrators
(Jews, Arabs, Romans, …) , they attribute the group
(people, sect, party,
family, ..) to an earlier man
(father, king,..) which they get his name from the name of
that group.
For example, if
Australians were known at the time of ancient narrators they will say
that Australians were called as such because an earlier man called
Australia.
In
this same rotation of explaining names, the ancient Arab narrators
actually derived from the name of the Sabaʾiyya
the name (Ibn Sabaʾ). They reversed the
situation and said that Sabaʾiyya got
their name from their leader (Ibn Saba), While the truth is just the
opposite.
Why Ibn Saba
became a Yemenite?
After the killing of the Caliph Uthmaan,
and after few decades when the verb "Sabaʾ"
(which means to invade) died, the later narrators misunderstood the
meaning of the name "Ibn
Sabaʾ"
(who then
became one specific unique person= the leader of
Sabaʾiyya). The only obvious simple explanation the narrators can
find is this: he is called "Ibn
Sabaʾ"
because he is from the land of Sabaʾ
(Yemen).
Why (ibn
Saba') was called (ibn al-Sawdāʾ)?
The early people called (ibn Saba') as (ibn
al-Sawdāʾ). The later narrators
understood (ibn al-Sawdāʾ) as (son of black
woman). But early people didn’t mean that, and they did not intend
to defame "Ibn Sabaʾ" with the black skin of his mother by calling him
(ibn al-Sawdāʾ). But actually they meant to disgrace the
blackness of his evil heart, liver and work. The Arabs call the enemy as
"dailam" which is close to "
zalam=darkness"
because of his evil
(his
black and dark deeds as seen by the eyes of his victims), and they call
the enemy a " black liver". Arabs attribute the blackness to the devil,
evil, grief, death, war, hostility, ugliness, injustice, and any bad
thing.
This Qur'anic verse is enough to show that
word "black" is used in such cases:
Surah An-Nahl
– Verse 58:
وإِذَا بُشّـِرَ أَحَدُهُم بِالاُنثَي ظَلَّ وَجْهُهُ
مُسْوَدّاً
Wa izaa bushshira ahaduhum bil unsaa zalla
wajhuhoo muswaddan
58. “And when one of them is given the news
of having a daughter his face becomes black”/[and
if someone preached to the female face was
blackened].
And this is used in all languages like the
phrase (black heart) or (dark ages of Europe) or (the unguided lives in
darkness) or (dark moments or days) or (his face darkened with anger).
In the same way, they
link the enemy with blackness. They said about (ibn Muljam) who killed
Ali that his face blackened and burned. And (ibn Saba')
blackened because
he said bad words against the Companions and he made war. And
blackened "Dhul-Khuwaisarah" and "Dhu Ath-Thudayyah"). And
blackened the faces of
the enemies of the Companions. And
blackened the face of
Nāṣibi (enemy or hater of Ali) in
the eyes of Shiite.
As they called who
invaded (verb: Saba') Al Madinah by the name ibn
Saba', and called who fought (verb: haraba) the Caliph by the name
ibn harb
(son of war, which is also the title of ibn sab'), in the
same way they also called the man of black
(Arabic: aswad, swdaa)
words
and deeds by the name "ibn al-Sawdāʾ" or
(son of blackness).
It has nothing to do with the
mother of "ibn al-Sawdāʾ" as the later narrators misunderstood and said
that his mother was a black woman from Ethiopia.
Hamed Al Awlaki