Noah adaptations p07: Islamic Texts

This is part 5 of a series investigating adaptations of the "Noah" story.

Click on images to enlarge.Left: Illustration from Ishaq b. Ibrahim al-Nayshaburi's Qisas al-Anbiya (Tales of the Prophets, C.16th). Right: Hafiz-I Abru's  image from "Majma al tawarikh" (World Histories, 1425).

In the last two parts of this series on adaptations of Noah, I looked at Jewish variations of the flood story following the writing of Genesis. Now I want to turn to how Islamic writers tell the story from the Qur'an onwards. Firstly to be clear. I am very much a newcomer to these texts, so I speak in ignorance giving first impressions and notes rather than some of my more citable work here. Don't let any footnotes convince you otherwise! Secondly, Because I am ignorant of Islam this is not an exhaustive examination of the most important/relevant texts, it's simply a selection of some ancient texts that talk about Noah (who is called Nuh in Islam which I'll use from here on in).

The Qur'an

In contrast to the Torah where the story of Nuh only occurs in Genesis, in genealogies and two passing mentions (Is 54:9 & Ezek 14:14-20), Nuh is mentioned in (by my count) 27 of the 114 suras. Many of these references are similar to the Isaiah and Ezekiel ones – just a passing verse –  and none are as long as the Genesis one. Instead they are more varied in length. There's even a sura named after him, sura 71 Nuh. Unsurprisingly, sura 71 is the longest discussion of Nuh, but there are also fairly long sections in 7:59-64; 11:25-49; 23:23-32; 26:105-122; 29:14-22; 54:9-22 with sura 11 being the most familiar account.

Not only is the story more widely distributed but it's also quite different. Perhaps the most notable thing is that here Nuh's life more closely corresponds to that of the prophet Muhammed.(1) There is far more emphasis on Nuh as a preacher – something almost entirely absent in the Jewish texts, but which has emerged a little in Christian ones. Here the majority of references to Nuh are about him preaching and his preaching being rejected until he starts again. 

In a not dissimilar vein, the parts of the Torah version after the flood where Noah sacrifices animals and where he plants a vineyard and gets drunk and naked are downplayed. I think some discussion of the latter comes up in later texts, but not much about sacrificing animals (which was one of the original points in the Mesopotamian accounts & P/Genesis.

There are two notable additions though. The first is a tragic one. In the Bible it is only Noah's wife, three sons and their wives who are saved form the flood. In the Qur'an it is those who believe Nuh's message who are saved. While this seems to include a few non-family members, Noah has an extra son who dies having decided to try and survive the flood by going to higher ground instead of getting on the boat (11:41-46).

The second is far more minor, but connects to my environmental theme. Having spent the early part career helping decontaminate sites polluted with tar, I'm struck by the fact that in the Bible Noah waterproofs his ark with pitch (Gen 6:14), whereas in the Quran Nuh uses palm-fibre (54:13).

History of al-Tabarī

Formally known as Ta'rikh al-rusul wa'l-mulūk (The History of Kings and Prophets) this was completed by Abū Ja'far Muhammad in 915 CE. William M. Brinner, whose English translation is at archive.org, claimed it was "by common consent the most important universal history produced in the world of Islam" (vii). Given he was writing over 50 years ago in 1971 I think we're entitled to question quite how true that is (I'm sceptical about who was and wasn't included in his idea of "common consent").

Details of Nuh's story are fairly minor: al-Tabarī is far more concerned with detailing the descendants of Nuh's sons, where they ended up geographically, and which nations they became (as well as occasionally giving details of their ethnicities. The animals, the flood itself and the ark don't get a look in. Even the story of Noah sleeping while "his genitals were exposed" leaves out his drunkenness (11). So this is a really interesting example of how far an adaptation can be stretched in a certain direction while still recognisably belonging to the corpus.

Al-Tha'labī's Lives of the Prophets

These tales of the prophets were written down by Abu Ishaq Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Tha'labi sometime before his death in 1036 CE. It's one of many Lives of the Prophets type works, and it's anglicised Arabic name is Ara'is Al-Majalis Fl Qisas Al-Anbiya. Archive.org holds a 2002 translation of it by William M. Brinner. Brinner describes it as "Except for the work of Tabarī, this is the longest and most diverse collection of tales of the lives of the prophets" noting that is also contains "a number of extraneous tales having little or nothing to do with prophets" (xxiv).

The Nuh story (p.92 onwards in Brinner's translation) shows plenty of elaboration from the Qurannic account 400 years earlier. For one things Noah is now regularly enduring quite savage beatings for his preaching. The bit that really stood comes a little later when Nuh is commanded to build an ark. Initially he does not even know what an ark is. Then as asks where the water will come from. Finally we're told 'Noah continued: "Lord, and where is the wood?" God said: "Plant trees." And he planted teak.' (94) I've hear it was palm trees from later accounts, but that could be just down to translation. Also here Nuh is back to using pitch again to waterproof his vessel (95), but then the author does refer the reader to "the People of the Book" when it comes to  some of the technical details (94). 

I recently watched a cartoon version of this story which included a couple of details that are found here. One of which is the idea of Nuh planting the trees first, the other of which is that the flood begins by coming out of the (family) oven, meaning Nuh's wife is the one to tell him the flood has started.

There's also a whole host of stories about the animals boarding the ark. The devil manages to sneak on with the donkey (96). The snake and the scorpion are only allowed on after they promise not to harm anyone who mentions Nuh (96-7). The story records Noah as worrying about the carnivores eating the others only for him to be reassured that they will be reconciled (97) and the lion was struck with a fever which "caused him to be busied with himself rather than (with) the domesticated animals" (97). Lastly Al-Tha'labī quotes Jesus telling stories about how pigs were produced from elephants, and cats from lions in order to solve problems of too much dung and too many rats (100). There's also a mention of Og (king of the giants) surviving the flood as it only went up to his knees (100).

Majlisi’s Stories of the Prophets

Allamah Muhammad Baqir Majlisi (the Allamah means "the second") was a Shi'i Islamic writer in the 17th century whose many works included Hayat al-Qulub (literally Life of the Hearts). He died in 1699CE. Volume I of the translation of Hayat al-Qulub contains a section on Noah and Syed Athar Husain S. H. Rizvi's translation can be read here. It shows things having moved on significantly in the 650 years since Al-Tha'labī. For example, it starts with lengthy discussions about his original name before he became Nuh because he wept and mourned so much. 

The Nuh material is divided into two parts. The first is more of an account of key moments in his life. The second part is "Proclamation of Nuh" which is more of a commentary on key parts in the Qur'an.

In the first part, the story of Nuh's nakedness takes a new twist. Now it is no longer the result of his drinking but because "a strong wind blew and uncovered him". Later though the tradition of Nuh growing grapes re-emerges. But here Nuh's greatest adversary is not his people (as in the Qur'an) nor Ham (nor the wind), but Satan who is constantly pestering him leaving Nuh to make appeals to Gabriel.

There are some interesting touches from an environmental perspective. Firstly there's no mention of the animals whatsoever. Secondly we're also told "that when Nuh came down from the Ark, he planted the trees that he had brought with him" similar to some of the earlier Jewish stories such as Genesis Rabbah. 

In the Proclamation section we again get the story that Nuh planted the trees and this time it is palm trees he plants. Nuh's persecution intensifies, having stones thrown at him, being knocked unconscious for three days at a time and being knocked unconscious. 

This text also has the clearest arc in terms of Noah's attitude to the townspeople, though this is there from the start. First he preaches, then he is abused and keeps getting sent back until Nuh finally curses them, is sent back once more and then "prayed for divine punishment" which was heeded.

There's also a bit of whimsical aetiology with a story about the goat disobeying Nuh has he struggles to get the animals on board and as a result of being "thrashed" "its tail came away and the private parts were exposed". Conversely, the lamb behaved so "Nuh patted its back and tail; therefore its tail grew long and covered its private parts". Al-Tha'labī's animal stories are repeated.

Another sustainability angle, that links to Aronofsky's 2014 film is this description of Nuh "His dress was woolen, whereas prior to him, the dress of Idris was made of deer skin. Nuh lived in the mountains. His staple diet consisted of grass." Finally the writer notes different traditions about Nuh's wives. One discusses his wife Amoora herself being persecuted and proving faithful. Another says that Nuh had two wives Rabia and Haikel, the former was "an infidel" and "perished in the storm". I'm aware of another tradition that links the unsaved wife to the unsaved child (Canaan) and this is possibly linked to Sura 66:10 in the Qur'an where we're told that her and Lot's wife "were false to their husbands".

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(1) For more on this see Guillaume Dye and Gabriel Reynolds Le Coran des Historiens, vol 2b, (Paris, Le Cerf, 2019). pp1837-8. Thanks to @Rurouni_Phoenix from Twitter (but also convener of Reddit's r/academicquran) for this observation.

Refs:
Brinner, William M. (1971) The History of al-Tabarī (Ta'rikh al-rusul wa'l-mulūk). Vol II: Prophets and Patriarchs (New York: State University of New York Press)

Brinner, William M. (2002) Ara'is al-majalis fi qisas al-anbiya' or 'Lives of the Prophets' as recounted by Abu Ishaq Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Tha'labi   (Leiden, Boston and Cologne:E.J. Brill)

S.H. Rizvi, Sayyid Athar Husayn (Publication date not stated)   Hayat al-Qulub Hayat al-Qulub Vol. I: Stories of the Prophets by Muhammad Baqir Majlisi. Available online: https://www.al-islam.org/hayat-al-qulub-vol-1-stories-prophets-muhammad-baqir-majlisi/account-nuh

The Tale of the Ark (1909)

The earliest film about Noah and the flood is The Tale of the Ark (1909) by British animation pioneer Arthur Melbourne Cooper. It's currently available for free on BFIPlayer, in the UK at least, and seems to also have been circulated under the title Noah's Ark. I don't know much about Cooper, but he apparently learnt some of his skills from the legendary British cinema pioneer Birt Acres and while I'd love to get into all of that, I simply don't have the time at the moment. So I'll restrict myself to a few passing observations about the film itself.

The film begins with a young girl playing with a toy Noah's Ark, who soon tires and settles herself down for a nap. there's a cut, and the next shot is of the ark now resting on water, by grass. This is a charming framing device, which both contextualises this as a children's film (or at least one suitable for/aimed at children), while also putting it outside the scope of historical scrutiny. Years later another black and white film that featured Noah, The Green Pastures (1936) would employ a similar framing device.

The rest of the film is stop-motion animation. Plot-wise things are fairly straightforward. Noah opens the doors, the animals bring themselves on board, the rains comes forming a flood, then the water recedes and the animals disembark, but there are a number of nice touches here. Firstly while most of the animals file onto the ark fairly uniformly, the elephants provide a certain level of comedy, spinning and rolling about and heading off in different directions. This shows a level of advancement, of Cooper going beyond basic execution of a smoothly executed piece of animation, to include humour and give his characters personality.

Secondly I was struck by the way the waters gradually recede after the flood. I don't know whether the water was gradually drained off camera, or if it was gradually filled and the footage reversed, but again it perhaps could have been done with simple cuts but this seemed a superior approach.

Finally, Cooper again uses the elephants to lighten the tone and highlight his dexterity as an animator. When Noah and the animals disembark Noah lowers the ramp, but it's not placed quite right, at least, not for one of the elephants who uses their trunk to adjust it before going down. Again the fussiness / sense of  exasperatedly having to show Noah how to do it right is quite a complex thing to convey with animated figures.

For those wanting to read more about this film, David Shepherd wrote a paper on it for the Journal of Religion and Film back in 2016 called "Noah's Beasts  Were the Stars": Arthur Melbourne Cooper Noah’s Ark (1909)'.