The Umm al-Kitāb (Arabic: أمّ الکتاب, lit. 'Mother of the Book') is a syncretic Shi'i work originating in the ghulāt milieus of 8th-century Kufa (Iraq). It was later transplanted to Syria by the 10th-century Nusayris, whose final redaction of the work was preserved in a Persian translation produced by the Nizari Isma'ilis of Central Asia.[1] The work only survives in Persian.[2] It contains no notable elements of Isma'ili doctrine,[3] but given the fact that Isma'ili authors starting from the 10th century were influenced by early ghulāt ideas such as those found in the Umm al-Kitāb,[4] and especially given the influence of these ideas on later Tayyibi Isma'ilism,[5] some Isma'ilis do regard the work as one of the most important works in their tradition.[1]
The work presents itself as a revelation of secret knowledge by the Shi'i Imam Muhammad al-Baqir (677–732) to his disciple Jabir ibn Yazid al-Ju'fi (died c. 745–750).[6] Its doctrinal contents correspond to a large degree to what 9th/10th-century heresiographers ascribed to various ghulāt sects,[6] with a particular resemblance to the ideas of the Mukhammisa.[1] It contains a lengthy exposition of the typical ghulāt myth of the pre-existent shadows (Arabic: aẓilla) who created the world by their fall from grace, as is also found in the Kitāb al-Haft wa-l-aẓilla attributed to al-Mufaddal ibn Umar al-Ju'fi (died before 799).[6]
The work must have been multicultural in language, since it includes Arabic, Persian and Aramaic terms. Orthodox and heterodox Jewish, Zoroastrian, Manichaean and Mandaean motifs appear. The tone and style of the work hint that the authors of the work were probably of middle class origin, with some distance to other Muslim groups, like the politically active Shiites and those advocating asceticism.[7]
The treatise offers an esoteric hermeneutics concerning cosmology, the nature of man, and worship within a Qur'anic context.[8]
The book may be an attempt to reconcile dualistic cosmologies, as found among the pre-Islamic Persians, with Islamic monotheism. Several principles of evil, such as the Persian figure Ahriman, are said to be merely a later incarnation of ʿAzāzīl, a fallen angel in Islamic tradition who in turn owes his existence to God.[9]