RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIESPATTERNS OF PIETY
Muslims brought this form of communal and private worship with
them to Iraq. Worship led by the governor or his representative in the
congregational masjid at noon on Fridays was an expression of obe-
dience, devotion, and submission to God, a public act announcing
one's membership in the community, and an act of political allegiance
to the leaders of the community. But Muslims in Iraq also performed
private devotions, especially prostrations combined with nocturnal
vigils and the recitation of the Qur'an, which were partly a contin-
uation of the early practices of overly pious people at Makka and
partly an adaptation of local practices in Iraq, most probably from
Christians.
Some of the best descriptions of Christian devotional piety in Iraq
in the later seventh century are provided by Isaac of Nineveh. He
advised that one "honor the works of vigils, then thou wilt find con-
solation in thyself. Be constantly occupied with recitations in solitude,
then thou wilt be drawn towards ecstasy at all times."59 He declared
that the correct posture of the truly pious should be either to be
prostrate day and night on one's face before the cross or to kneel with
hands spread out or stretched towards heaven while facing the cross.
He summarized the exercises of piety as "the work of hunger, of
reciting, waking during the night, according to everyone's strength;
frequent prostrations, several times in the day and often during the
night."60 Such constant communion with God made one similar to
Him and gave one power over nature.^61
Similar forms of piety appeared among Muslims in the century after
the conquest. It is said that when Masruq ibn al-Ajda' of Kufa per-
formed the pilgrimage (Ar.lJajj), he only slept prostrated on his face.^62
AI-Aswad ibn Yazld (d. 694), also of Kufa, would recite the Qur'an
at night during the month-long fast of Rama<;ian, completing it every
two nights, while he slept between worship at sunset and evening.^63
The testimony of the mawlii a'nd tiibit Abu-'Aliyya (d. 709) at Basra
reveals the existence of such practices among mawiilt, while it also
shows how the authority of the Companions was exerted in such
matters. As Abu 1-'Aliyya described the situation:
59 Isaac Of Nineveh, "Mystic Treatises," p. 31.
60 Ibid., pp. 40, 88.
61 Ibid., p. 103.
62 Ibn Sa'd. Tabaqat, VI, 52.
63 Ibid., VI, 49.