Mahajjah

History

Local Muslim tradition holds that Muhammad had sat on or leaned against a stone at Mahajjah and that the stone would ease the pain of childbirth. The 13th-century Syrian geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi dismissed the local claim, asserting that Muhammad had not traveled beyond Bosra, a town lying further south of Mahajjah. The late 12th-early 13th-century Persian traveler Ali al-Harawi noted that Mahajjah was one of the ziyarat of the Hauran plain, a site of local Muslim pilgrimage.

Al-Hamawi visited the town during Ayyubid rule, in the 1220s, noting that Mahajjah was "One of the villages of the Hauran" and that local tradition held that "seventy prophets" were buried in the town's Friday mosque. Yusuf al-Muhajji (1287-1338), a native of Mahajjah, became the Chief Qadi of the Shafi'i school of Sunni Islam in 1332, during Mamluk rule. He was dismissed from his post in 1334 and imprisoned, a move that angered the Shafi'is.

In 1596, Mahajjah appeared in the Ottoman tax registers as Muhajja and was part of the nahiya of Bani Kilab in the Hauran Sanjak. It had an entirely Muslim population consisting of 40 households and 24 bachelors. The villagers paid a fixed tax-rate of 40% on wheat, barley, summer crops, goats and beehives; a total of 28,100 akçe. All of the revenue went to a waqf (= an Islamic charitable institution).

In 1838, it was noted to be north of ash-Shaykh Miskin, with a population of Sunni Muslims and Catholics.

Religious buildings

• Al-Miqdad ibn al-Aswad al-Kindi Mosque
• Al-Farooq Mosque
• Uthman ibn Affan Mosque
• Ali ibn Abi Talib Mosque
• Abu Bakr Mosque

References

Bibliography

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References

2. [https://web.archive.org/web/20160305082831/http://cbssyr.sy/new%20web%20site/General_census/census_2004/NH/TAB12-12-2004.htm General Census of Population and Housing 2004] {{webarchive. link. (2013-01-12 . [[Central Bureau of Statistics (Syria)). Syria Central Bureau of Statistics]] (CBS). Daraa Governorate. {{in lang. ar
3. Batatu, 1997, p. [https://books.google.com/books?id=Mbr-ZfU_uCoC&pg=PA51 51]
4. Rodinson, 1980, p. 382.
5. Le Strange, 1890, p. [https://archive.org/stream/palestineundermo00lestuoft#page/509/mode/1up 509].
6. Asikainen, 2007, p. 335.
7. Hakluyt Society, 1958, p. 137. Translation of ''Travels of Ibn Battuta, A.D. 1325-1354''.
8. Hütteroth and Abdulfattah, 1977, p. 210
9. [[Eli Smith. Smith]], in Robinson and Smith, 1841, vol 3, 2nd appendix, p. [https://archive.org/stream/biblicalresearch03robiuoft#page/151/mode/1up 151]