Oran Fatwa

The Oran fatwa was a ''responsum'' fatwa, or an Islamic legal opinion, issued in 1502 to address the crisis that occurred when Muslims in the Crown of Castile (in Spain) were forced to convert to Christianity in 15001502. The fatwa sets out detailed relaxations of the sharia (Islamic law) requirements, allowing the Muslims to conform outwardly to Christianity and perform acts that are ordinarily forbidden in Islamic law, when necessary to survive. It includes relaxed instructions for fulfilling the ritual prayers, the ritual charity, and the ritual ablution, and recommendations when obliged to violate Islamic law, such as worshipping as Christians, committing blasphemy, and consuming pork and wine.

The fatwa enjoyed wide currency among Muslims and Moriscos (Muslims nominally converted to Christianity and their descendants) in Spain, and one of the surviving aljamiado translations was dated at 1564, 60years after the original fatwa. The fatwa has been described as the "key theological document" to understand the practice of Spanish Muslims following the Reconquista up to the expulsion of the Moriscos. The author of the fatwa (''mufti'') was Ahmad ibn Abi Jum'ah, a North African scholar of Islamic law of the Maliki school. The fatwa was termed the "Oran fatwa" by modern scholars, due to the word "Al-Wahrani" ("of Oran") that appears in the text as part of the author's name.

The influence of the fatwa was limited to Spain. Outside the Iberian Peninsula, the predominant opinion upheld the requirements of Islamic law and required Muslims to emigrate, or even choose martyrdom, when the orthodox observance of the religion became impossible.

Background

Islam has been present in Spain since the Umayyad conquest of Hispania in the eighth century. At the beginning of the twelfth century, the Muslim population in the Iberian Peninsula — called "Al-Andalus" by the Muslims — was estimated to number up to 5.5 million, among whom were Arabs, Berbers and indigenous converts. In the next few centuries, as the Christians pushed from the north in a process called ''reconquista'', the Muslim population declined. At the end of the fifteenth century, the ''reconquista'' culminated in the fall of Granada, and the total number of Muslims in Spain was estimated to be between 500,000 and 600,000 out of the total Spanish population of 7 to 8 million. Approximately half of the Muslims lived in the former Emirate of Granada, the last independent Muslim state in Spain, which had been annexed to the Crown of Castile. About 20,000 Muslims lived in other territories of Castile, and most of the remainder lived in the territories of the Crown of Aragon.

Prior to the completion of the ''reconquista'', the defeated Muslims were generally given freedom of religion as terms of their surrender. For example, the Treaty of Granada, which governed the surrender of the emirate, guaranteed a set of rights to the conquered Muslims, including religious tolerance and fair treatment, in return for their capitulation. The increasing occurrences of forced conversion triggered a series of Muslim rebellions in Granada (1499–1501). The rebellions were suppressed, and afterwards the Muslims in Granada were no longer given the rights that had been provided to them by the Treaty of Granada. They were given the choice to remain and accept baptism, to reject baptism and be enslaved or killed, or to be exiled. The option of exile was often not feasible in practice because of the difficulty in uprooting one's family and making the journey to Muslim lands in North Africa, the inability to pay the fee required by the authorities for safe passage, and the general tendency by the authorities to discourage and hinder such an exodus.

Some Muslims, especially those living near the southern coast, took the option of exile, but for most, publicly converting to Christianity while secretly continuing to believe and practise Islam was the only available option for surviving as Muslims. The population converted ''en masse'', and by 1501 the entire Muslim population of Granada was nominally converted to Christianity. The apparent success of Granada's forced conversions triggered a series of edicts and proclamations in 1501 and 1502 which effectively put the Muslims elsewhere in Castile to the same fate. These new converts, along with their descendants, were known by Spanish sources as the Moriscos. As well as having to accept Christianity and abandon the Islamic faith and rituals, they were also pressured to conform to Christian ways, including by attending church, sending their children to be instructed in the Christian doctrine, and partaking of food and beverages forbidden by Islamic law.

Previous Islamic legal opinions

Prior to the Oran fatwa, the predominant position of Islamic scholars had been that a Muslim could not stay in a country where rulers made proper religious observance impossible. Therefore, a Muslim's obligation was to leave, when they were able to do so. Even before the systematic forcible conversion, religious leaders had argued that Muslims in Christian territory would be subject to direct and indirect pressure, and preached emigration as a way to protect the religion from erosion. Notably, the contemporary North African scholar Ahmad al-Wansharisi, who was considered the leading authority on the subject of Muslims in Spain, wrote in 1491 that emigrating from Christian to Muslim lands was compulsory in almost all circumstances. Further, Al-Wansharisi urged severe punishment for the Muslims who remained and predicted that they would temporarily dwell in hell in the afterlife.

Authorship

The surviving translations of the fatwa give the name of the author in various slightly different forms. All of them are thought to be derived from the Arabic name Ahmad ibn Abi Jum'ah al-Maghrawi al-Wahrani, with some adding the name 'Ubaydallah, which might be a pious formula meaning "the little servant of God". The author's nisba — the part of his name that indicates place of origin — ''al-Wahrani'' ("of Oran") refers to the city of Oran ( ar, وهران,''Wahran'') in modern-day Algeria, then part of the Zayyanid kingdom of Tlemcen. Thus, the author is often referred to as "the ''Mufti'' of Oran" and the document is called "the Oran fatwa", even though there appeared to be no indication that the fatwa was issued in Oran or that the author resided or had an official authority in Oran. Devin Stewart, an academic specialist in Islamic studies, identified the author as Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ibn Abi Jum'ah al-Maghrawi al-Wahrani (b.unknownd.1511 in Fez), a Maliki jurist who had studied in Oran and Tlemcen and probably issued the fatwa in Fez while a professor of Islamic law there.

Al-Wahrani drafted the fatwa in response to a request of legal opinion, in other words, as a ''responsum'', to Muslim petitioners who wished to learn if they could continue to live in Christian Spain. The recipient of the fatwa is not named. The commonly accepted date of the composition of the fatwa is 1Rajab 910AH, as this was the date that appears in most of the surviving manuscripts. This day in the Islamic calendar corresponds to around 8December 1504. One manuscript added "3May 1563" in addition to 1Rajab 910, which would have been a date conversion error, but both Stewart and the historian L. P. Harvey have suggested that the 1563 date might have been the time of the translation. One other manuscript gives "Rajab909", which was probably a copying error.

Content

The opening of the fatwa displayed sympathy to the Muslims of Spain, who kept their religious faith despite the suffering and risk that this posed them. The ''mufti'' (author of the fatwa) exhorted that they continue to adhere to the religion of Islam and instruct it to their children when the latter reached maturity.

The fatwa reaffirmed the obligation of Spanish Muslims to perform the ritual prayers (''salat''), the ritual charity (''zakat''), and the ritual ablution (''ghusl''), even if they could not be performed in the correct form. It described the obligation of the ritual prayersnormally performed by standing, bowing, prostrating, and sitting in a prescribed sequenceeven if done only by making slight movements. The fatwa also allowed the omission of the prayersnormally performed an obligatory five times a day at prescribed timeswhen they were prevented from doing so, and instructed them to make up the missed prayers at night instead. It also provided instructions for performing the ritual dry ablution (''tayammum'') when ritually pure water was not available, to replace the ritual ablution (''wudu'') that is ordinarily required before performing the ''salat''. When ''tayammum'' was not possible, even making slight pointing motions with hands or face toward clean earth, stone, or tree was acceptable.

The fatwa also maintained the Islamic obligation to give the ritual charity (''zakat'')normally calculated and distributed in a specific manner prescribed by the sharia (Islamic law)even if this could only be done by showing generosity to a beggar. It affirmed the obligation of the ritual ablution (''ghusl''), "even though by plunging into the sea".

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