In this excerptfromQuḍāt Qurṭuba, Khushanī describes another instance in which the judge Jukhāmir b. ʿUthmān al-Shaʿbānī was ridiculed by a poet, in this case Ibn al-Shamir (d. after 206/822). The judge had cards on which the names of the litigants were written; these would be read out to call the litigants to court. Ibn al-Shamir inserted among these cards one bearing the names of Yūnus b. Matī (Jonas) and al-Masīḥ b. Maryam (Jesus). The judge did not grasp what was going on and had them summoned, prompting strongly worded mocking verses from the poet. In her chapter in Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, MaribelFierro uses this anecdote to show that judges and scholars were ridiculed, mocked, and satirized, especially by poets, sometimes leading to punishment of the poet by the mocked judge.
This source is part of the Online Companion to the book Justice and Leadership in Early Islamic Courts, ed. Intisar A. Rabb and Abigail Krasner Balbale(ILSP/HUP 2017)—a collection of primary sources and other material used in and related to the book.