Joshua the Prophet

Joshua the Prophet (Yūsha‛ Nabī), The tomb and mausoleum within the Takht-e Fulād* cemetery.

It is located in the cemetery’s eastern and oldest section known as Lesān al-arḍ*, adjacent to a mosque of the same name.¹ This mausoleum, which is likely the earliest structure of the cemetery,² is ascribed to Joshua son of Nun, of the tribe of Ephraim, a descendant of the Prophet Joseph, and the appointed successor of the Prophet Moses. Joshua is regarded as a pivotal figure in Judaism. At the beginning of his life, he was called Hoshea “savior”,³ but later Moses changed his name to Joshua (Hebrew: Yehoshua), meaning “Yahweh saves.”⁴ Joshua was forty-four years old at the time of the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt.⁵ According to the Torah when Moses ascended Mount Sinai to receive the tablets, Joshua accompanied him part of the way. Also, the sixth book of the Old Testament is named after him. The Book of Joshua (ketāb-e yūsha‛) opens with the commission appointing him as Moses’ successor and leader of the Israelites, and concludes with an account of his death and burial; it records major episodes, including the miracle of the “sun standing still” during the battle against the Amorites,⁶ the Israelites’ numerous victories under Joshua’s leadership in the conquest of Canaan,⁷ and the apportionment of that land among the twelve tribes of Israel.⁸ Joshua led the Israelites for fourteen years,⁹ transforming their pastoral and nomadic way of life into one based on urban settlement and agriculture, and bringing an end to the dispersal of the tribes.¹⁰ At the conclusion of the Book of Joshua, his death at the age of 110 is recorded, along with his burial in his hereditary estate near Timnat Serah in the hill country of Ephraim, northeast of Jerusalem.¹¹

With regard to the life of Joshua son of Nun and the specialized sources on the subject, the presence of Joshua in Iran—particularly in Isfahan—cannot be deemed plausible in view of the time and place of his prophetic mission,  and the period of exile and migration of the Jews* to Isfahan.¹² In addition, other tombs attributed to Joshua exist, including in northern Palestine, at Beit Hanoun, and in northern Lebanon;¹³ yet it is certain that the followers of Judaism were among the earliest inhabitants of Isfahan, and historical sources narrate their migration to the city around 586 BCE, that is, after the conquest of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar.¹⁴ Thus, given the early presence of Jews in Isfahan, the existence of tombs ascribed to revered figures and religious personalities of Judaism, bearing the same names as their prophets, is both likely and unsurprising. Reports also attest to visits by Jews to this mausoleum .¹⁵

The precise date of construction of the mausoleum of Joshua the Prophet is unknown. Nevertheless, it is certain that this mausoleum stands in the oldest section of the cemetery, namely Lesān al-arḍ, and scholars such as Eugenio Galdieri* and ʿAbbās Beheshtīyān* have attributed its origins to the Buyid* period. During the Seljuq* era the structure was faced with brickwork, and in the Safavid* period it was renovated and restored. On its southern side, mud-brick walls dating from the Buyid era are still preserved.¹⁶ Murtaḍā Fereshte-nezhād, by examining photographs from 1973/1352., undertook a reconstruction of the Lesān al-arḍ complex. According to his account, Lesān al-arḍ covers an area of about 50,000 square meters, of which approximately 12,000 square meters belonged to a historic mosque. On its northern side were the remains of a covered prayer hall (shabestān), porticoes, and small vaulted halls, apparently from the Safavid period; on its southern side stood the remains of a tall brick prayer niche with massive piers, probably dating to the Buyid era. To the east of the prayer niche were two domed mud-brick chambers: the smaller one, adjacent to the prayer niche, was the mausoleum of Joshua, while the larger one, with a shorter dome, belonged to the Navvāb family, a notable household from the late Qajar period.¹⁷ The interior of the mausoleum of Joshua was heptagonal in shape, with decorative niches.¹⁸ According to Humāyī*,¹⁹ the mausoleum also contained a small wooden grille, and local people visited the site venerating it as the resting place of one of the prophets of the Israelites, regarding it as a place for intercession and votive offerings.

The mausoleum of Joshua and the surrounding structures remained intact until November 1982/Ābān 1361. In that year, owing to the haste in preparing sufficient space for the burial of 370 martyrs of Operation Muḥarram during the Iran–Iraq War, this shrine and the monuments dating from the Daylamite period were demolished. In 1986/1365, through the efforts of Sheikh ʿAbbās-Ali Adīb*, a jurist and literary scholar, a simple grave was constructed in the form of a marble tombstone set upon a platform. At first, the tombstone mistakenly bore the name of Isaiah* the Prophet, but some years later its upper section was repaired and inscribed instead with the name of Joshua the Prophet.²⁰ Nevertheless, according to the inscriptional text, as transmitted on behalf of Kh^wānsārī*²¹ in his rawḍāt al-jannāt fī aḥwāl al-‛ulamāʾ wa al-sādāt, the structure was attributed to Isaiah the Prophet, thus producing a textual discrepancy.²² At present, a metal enclosure 1.5 meters high surrounds the platform, and visitation is possible only from behind this fence.

/Yasaman Ghani/

Bibliography

In addition to the Bible, Old Testament.

Abū Nu‛aym Eṣbahānī. ketāb dhekr akhbār Eṣbahān. Edited by Sven Dedering. Leiden: Brill, 1931–1934.

Aharoni, Yohanan,“Joshua”, in Encyclopaedia Judaica, vol. 10, Jerusalem: Keter Publishing House Jerusalem, 1978.

Beheshtīyān, ‛Abbās. bakhshī az ganjīne-ye āthār-e mellī. Isfahan: Anjuman-e Āthār-e Mellī, 1964/1343.

Ebn Faqīh. ketāb al-buldān. Edited by Yūsef Hādī. Beirut: ‛Ālam al-Kutub, 1996/1416.

Faqīh Mīrzāʾī, Gīlān; Mukhleṣī, Muhammad-Ali; and Ḥabībī, Zahrā. Takht-e Fulād: yādmān-e tārīkhī-ye Isfahan. Tehran: Sāzmān-e Mīrāsth-e Farhangī va Gardeshgarī, 2005/1384.

Fereshte-nezhād, Murtaḍā. s.v. “lesān al-arḍ.” In Dāneshnāme-ye Takht-e Fulād-e Isfahan, vol. 4, ed. Aṣghar Muntaẓer al-Qāʾem. Isfahan: Sāzmān-e Farhangī-Tārīkhī-ye Shahrdārī, 2015/1394.

Hawkes, James. qāmūs-e ketāb-e muqaddas. Tehran: Āsāṭīr, 2004/1383.

Humāyī, Jalāl al-Dīn. tārīkh-e Isfahan: valune abnīye va ‛emārāt, faṣl-e takāyā va maqāber. Edited by Māhduḵt-Bānū Humāyī. Tehran: Humāyī, 2002/1381.

Kh^wānsārī, Muhammad-Bāqer b. Zayn al-‛Ābedīn. rawḍāt al-jannāt fī aḥwāl al-‛ulamāʾ wa al-sādāt. Edited by Asadullāh Esmā‛īlīyān. Qum: Esmā‛īlīyān, 2011–2013/1390–1392.

Levy, Ḥabīb. tārīkh-e yahūd-e Iran. Tehran: Ketābfurūshī-ye Burūkhīm, 1955–1960/1334–1339.

Muntaẓer al-Qāʾem, Aṣghar. s.v. “Yūsha‛ Nabī.” In Dāneshnāme-ye Takht-e Fulād-e Isfahan, vol. 4. Isfahan: Sāzmān-e Farhangī Tafrīḥī-ye Shahrdārī, 2015/1394.

Rāmīn-Nezhād, Rāmīn. mazār-e payāmbarān. Mashhad: Bunyād-e Pajūheshhā-ye Eslāmī, 2008/1387.

1. For further information see: lesān al-arḍ.[↩]
2. Humāyī, p. 485.[↩]
3. Book of Numbers 8:13.[↩]
4. Book of Numbers 16:13.[↩]
5. Hawkes, p. 970.[↩]
6. Book of Exodus 24:13.[↩]
7. Book of Joshua 10:12–13.[↩]
8. Book of Joshua 14:1–5.[↩]
9. Book of Joshua 18:1–10, 23:1–14.[↩]
10. Levy, vol. 1, pp. 41–42.[↩]
11. Book of Joshua 24:29–30.[↩]
12. For further information, see: “Joshua”, s.v.  Aharoni.[↩]
13. Rāmīn-Nezhād, pp. 92, 96.[↩]
14. For example, see: Ebn Faqīh, p. 530; Abū Nu‛aym Eṣbahānī, vol. 1, p. 16.[↩]
15. Faqīh Mīrzāʾī et al., vol. 1, p. 132.[↩]
16. Ibid.; Beheshtīyān, pp. 74–75.[↩]
17. Fereshte-nezhād, s.v. “lesān al-arḍ.”[↩]
18. Faqīh Mīrzāʾī et al., vol. 1, p. 132; Humāyī, p. 485.[↩]
19. Humāyī, p. 485.[↩]
20. Muntaẓer al-Qāʾem, s.v. “Yūsha‛ Nabī”; see also: image of the tombstone.[↩]
21. For further information see: Kh^wānsārī, vol. 1, p. 19.[↩]
22. The inscription engraved on the tombstone reads as follows: “In the name of God, the Exalted. This is the resting place of Joshua the Prophet, peace be upon him. The scholar Kh^wānsārī—may God’s mercy be upon him—in his rawḍāt al-jannāt fī aḥwāl al-‛ulamāʾ wa al-sādāt affirms this claim. Among the evidence he cites is the mosque of Lesān al-arḍ, which lies to the east of his shrine, known as Takht-e Fulād, near the grave of al-Fāḍel al-Hendī, may God’s mercy be upon him. To the south of that mosque there is a tomb reputed to be the resting place of the Prophet Isaiah, peace be upon him, who was sent to a community of Jews inhabiting that town. It is also widely reported among the townspeople that the name Lesān al-arḍ “the Tongue of the Earth” derives from the belief that this land spoke with Imam Hasan al-Mujtabā,  during his stay in Isfahan with the Muslim troop when the Muslims conquered that place. Likewise, Muḥaddeth al-Qummī relates a similar account in his tatemmat al-muntahā (muntaha al-āmāl)… Through the efforts of the board of trustees of the lesān al-arḍ Mosque, dated 11 Ābān 1365./Sunday, 28 Ṣafar al-Muẓaffar 1407.”

    Besmehī T‛ʿālā, hādhā marqad Yūsha‛ al-nabī ‛alayhe al-salām, wa yadullu ‛alā hādhā al-qawl al-muḥaqqeq al-Kh^wānsārī reḍwān Allāh Ta‛ālā ‛alayhe fī Rawḍāt al-jannāt fī aḥwāl al-ʿulamāʾ wa al-sādāt. Men jumlat dhāleka masjed Lesān al-arḍ alladhī huwa fī mashreq mazārehā al-ma‛rūf be-Takht-e Fulād, qarīban men qabre al-Fāḍel al-Hendī raḥemahu Allāh. Wa fī qeblate dhāleka al-masjed, ṣūrat qabr eshtahara kawnuhā marqad Sha‛eyā [Asha‛īyāʾ] al-nabī ‛alayhe al-salām, al-mab‛ūth elā ṭāʾifat al-yahūd alladhīna sakanu telka al-baladah. Wa mena al-mushtahar ‛alā afwāh ahl al-balad fī wajh tasmīyat dhāleka be-lesān al-arḍ annahu takallamahu ma‛a al-Imam al-Ḥasan al-Mujtabā ‛alayhe al-salām ayyām nuzūlehī be-Eṣfahān ma‛a‛ʿaskar al-eslām wa fatḥ ahl al-eslām dhāleka al-maqām. Wa hakadhā qāla al-Muḥaddeth al-Qummī raḥmata Allāh Ta‛ālā ‛alayhe fī tatemmat al-muntahā methla hādhā … be-sa‛y wa eḥtemām heyʾat umnāʾ masjed Lesān al-arḍ muvarakhe 11/8/1365 muṭābeq ei-yekshanbe 28 Ṣafar al-Muẓaffar 1407.  [↩]