This Noble House. Arnold E. Franklin

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СКАЧАТЬ nesiʾim who lived during those five centuries; rather, it merely represents a lower boundary, the actual number being certainly several times greater. Factoring in hints that daughters of nesiʾim were occasionally viewed as members of the biblical lineage as well, the Jewish community’s overall exposure to members of the royal line becomes all the more considerable.

      While there is no reliable data from earlier periods to compare with our tally, indirect evidence that the Davidic line had indeed undergone an expansion can be deduced again from critically considering the extant genealogical records of medieval nesiʾim. As noted above, those genealogies converge at Bustanay. The ancestor lists themselves, then, convey the image of a Davidic lineage that begins to divide into collateral descent lines only in the early Islamic period; only at that point does the genealogical record as a whole appear to acknowledge the existence of multiple dynasts in a single generation. And the further we move from Bustanay, the more ramified and numerous the lineage becomes. We need not ascribe an undue measure of accuracy to these genealogical sources in order to discern in this spread the echo of a progressive increase over time in the number of individuals laying claim to what was regarded as a legitimate Davidic pedigree. The variability that enters into the lineage after the time of Bustanay would thus point not only to more vigorous efforts to record Davidic ancestry, but to a growth in the overall number of recognized dynasts as well.

      Comparisons with the Family of Muḥammad

      The changes noted above in the organization, localization, and self-presentation of the Davidic line resemble in certain respects transformations that occurred among the ʿAlids about a century earlier. By the late tenth century members of the ʿAlid dynasty had spread to towns across the Islamic East, where they succeeded in converting popular respect for their noble lineage into a variety of forms of status at the local level.⁸⁸

      The affinities between the two lines were also evident to medievals. Jews and Muslims alike began to conceive of the exilarchal dynasty as a Jewish equivalent to the family of the Prophet. In the introduction we observed the way both Benjamin of Tudela and Petaḥya of Regensburg suggestively paired the families of King David and Muḥammad in their enthusiastic descriptions of Jewish power in Baghdad. An equation of the two families is also evident in the specific honorifics that Jews began to use when referring to members of the Davidic line. The letter mentioned above that was addressed to the thirteenth-century nasi Solomon ben Jesse is illustrative. In the opening lines of the missive, the writer, following epistolary custom, lavishes praise on his addressee in the midst of which he describes Solomon in rhyming prose as “the sharīf of the Jewish nation, and the sayyid of the Davidic faction [sharīf al-milla al-yahūdiyya wa-sayyid al-tāʾifa al-dāwūdiyya].”⁸⁹ The combination of the terms sharīf and sayyid—each a common designation for members of the family of Muḥammad—unmistakably casts the House of David as the Jewish counterpart to the ahl albayt.⁹⁰ A similar characterization of the Davidic family occurs in yet another letter addressed to the same Solomon ben Jesse, this one by a man named Peraḥya. The writer apologizes for not paying a visit to Solomon on the occasion of his pilgrimage to Jerusalem, explaining that he was prevented from doing so because of the unexpected arrival in town of the nasi Josiah—quite possibly referring to a brother of Solomon with the same name. Peraḥya’s letter includes the wish that God might bring joy to the Jewish people “through the merit of his [Solomon’s] noble family [baytatihi al-sharīfa],” once again drawing on language most frequently used in connection with the family of Muḥammad.⁹¹ The tendency to think of the Davidic line as a family of Jewish ashrāf is also suggested by Abraham al-Raḥbī, who refers to the subject of his genealogical list as “his noble … presence [al-ḥaḍra al-sharīfa]” and to the nasi’s family as “this noble house [hadha al-bayt al-sharīf].”⁹² The complementary notion of the Davidic dynasty as a family of sāda appears in medieval sources as well. Several letters addressed to Solomon ben Jesse refer to his “exalted … sayyidi court,” and the members of his family are described as “the sāda [who are] the nesiʾim.”⁹³ While the terms sharīf and sayyid could also be used as generic titles of respect—sayyidunā (“my master”) is in fact a common form of address in Geniza letters—it is hard to avoid the conclusion that when used in conjunction with one another and in reference to a nasi such terms carried an added resonance implying a comparison with the family of Muḥammad.

      The impact of Islamic categories—in particular those pertaining to the ahl al-bayt—on the way Jews perceived the Davidic line is no less evident in the characterization of the Davidic family as a pure and prophetic family. Abraham al-Raḥbī invokes both of these notions as well, when, in lauding his subject, he refers to the latter’s “prophetic, Davidic” ancestry and describes his own affection for the “pure and unsullied [al-ṭāhir al-zakkī] house.”⁹⁴ The purity of the Davidic line is also a central theme of the Bustanay story, where, however, the idea is roundly contested. The narrative’s insistence that Bustanay irreparably sullied the purity of the royal line should perhaps be read against the background of a growing tendency to view members of the Davidic family in precisely the terms suggested by al-Raḥbī.⁹⁵ The conception of the Davidic line as a prophetic family is invoked by the author of the Geniza letter discussed above, who writes of his happiness at learning that his addressee had met with Nafīs the elder, someone he refers to as “a branch of the prophetic, Davidic family.”⁹⁶

      And the same idea can also be found in a fragmentary text missing both its beginning and end, which has been described by its editor as “verses of praise” in honor of the exilarch Ḥisday ben David (fl. early twelfth century).⁹⁷ Made up of a series of scriptural passages celebrating the Davidic family followed by a string of encomia to Ḥisday in particular, the text appears to be a panegyric introduction to a sermon given by the exilarch, for connecting the two parts is the formula “Hear what he explains, and heed what he says,” a declaration that a number of medieval sources depict as the formal opening to addresses by important communal officials.⁹⁸ Ḥisday is eulogized in some fairly predictable ways; the text refers to him as, for instance, “the crown of our heads,” “our king,” and “our nasi.” But it also employs a less-than-obvious formulation when at one point it describes him as “the diadem of the nesiʾim and the offspring of prophets.”

      In the Islamic tradition David is, of course, a prophet. But when medieval Jews referred to the Davidic dynasty as a “prophetic family,” more was involved than simply the recasting of the Jewish David in an Islamic mold. That, to be sure, is part of the story; but the real point of reference was undoubtedly Muḥammad, whose descendants constitute the prophetic family par excellence in Muslim society. The Jews’ characterization of the Davidic line as prophetic thus entailed a double transposition: reassigning David a role that matched his status in the Islamic tradition, but thereby ultimately setting up an equivalence between his family and that of the Prophet Muḥammad.

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