In the land of our backwash (2/3)*
	Nadia Yassine, 11-10-2006 The Mark of Pharaoh We can only truly understand the cause of our current decline if we go further back in our history. We will only find ourselves if we admit that the accursed mark of Pharaoh has inevitably corrupted the entire system. So long as power was in the service of the Message, we made great strides in our history. When the process was reversed when despots began to use the Message for personal ends, deviations began. The germs of our deviance were already astir in the days of Mu‘āwiya. They were already lived in the sumptuous palaces of Hārūn ar-Rashīd; they were coiling in the folds of his gold-embroidered caftans and circulating in the magical corridors of his well-supplied harem. There is, alas, not the slightest trace of that in the official accounts of the history set down in the inner circles by hands at worst filled with dinars, at best trembling with fear, naturally in complete support of the regime’s line. Without entirely subscribing to the thinking of the contemporary Moroccan author Abdellah Laroui, we may acknowledge to his credit that he has well defined the role of the chronicler. No historian existed in our cultural heritage, at least until Ibn Khaldūn. The chronicler, according to Laroui, reports a flat image of the facts: The attitude of the chronicler towards the events is always the same. And it is from these akhbār, these pieces of news, that a synthesis is almost mechanically effected, according to the whims of a patron, in a dynastic history, a biographical collection, the history of a generation or a nation or a cultural era, or again a local, tribal or family history, or finally a geographical index. We have here a virtually perfect illustration of what is humorously called the “cut and paste” method. It is true that when you read history in the records of the great chroniclers like Tabarī, for instance, you feel a certain annoyance before this monotonous delivery of accounts that are not linked by any main theme or historical framework. Fragmented chronicles for a fragmented history! We thus inherit an accumulation of impersonal accounts of unequal importance yet presented on the same scale of value. In the same detached style, for instance, we are informed that Sukayna, daughter of Hussayn, had very beautiful hair and that her father’s head was slit by Yazid Ibn Mu‘āwiya. Such unflappability, as we might call it, in the face of events produces an uninteresting and impersonal history, wanting in the power of events. So flat and blurred are its accounts that the fleeting periods of time it attempts to capture seem easily interchangeable. Laroui expresses the sensation this way: In the notes of many erudite studies, Baladuri, Yāqūt, Ibn Khalliqan, Ibn Hajar, Suyūtī and so on are put together as though no necessity justified such an association, as if all these chroniclers were of equal distance with regard to their subject. Not even chronology is taken into account; Ibn Hajar is often quoted before Tabarī . . . to such extent that history appears, no matter the level of synthesis, like the mere accumulation of accounts of singular events. All these facts -fear, corruption, the disorganized mind of the chroniclers- recommend that the perception we have of our history ought to be gathered around a methodical analysis that is likely to give us a meaning, stimulating thus in ourselves a need to find our way back again. The best way to regain the summit is to know the paths of descent. A methodical repositioning that places power at the center of history will enable us to understand our past and present suffering. It will certainly be to our advantage to see again more seriously what our Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) said in this regard: “The knots of islam will come undone one by one. Each time one comes apart, people will cling to the other: the first knot to be untied will be power; the last will be the prayer.” This statement has the advantage of being clear as to the decisive role of power in an Islamic system. Power is the major junction. When its nature is changed or usurped, it rends apart the social fabric at all the vital levels. “Rending apart” befits the metaphor used by the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him), who alludes to the knots that hold the dress. Islam is a dress for the umma, which is compared in another hadīth to a body. The Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) says: “In their affinity, mutual love and solidarity, the faithful may be compared to a body that reacts with fever and insomnia when one of its members is suffering.” This sacred solidarity is one of the last knots to be severely tested by the domino effect produced by corrupted power. The system of inequalities engendered by despotic regimes eventually lacerates the body of the umma. To our spiritual impoverishment, occasioned by our progressive estrangement from the altruistic and humanistic teachings recommended by islam, is added our material indigence. Both work to compromise the sense of community. In the state of decline of our history, the elite currently in power aggravate our illnesses by individualism and practice the policy of après moi le déluge! If we wish to save the body -let alone its tattered dress - from disappearing, from being dissolved in the corrosive acid of heedlessness to God, of nonsense and blind imitation, indeed, from a final holocaust altogether, it is urgent that we revise, understand, and react! The Impossible Example Ali Lwazir explains that among the other factors that enabled despotism to establish its authority and subjugate people throughout all these centuries is an excessive idealization of the epoch of the Rightly Guided Caliphs. In a section entitled “The Impossible Example,” he writes: The first representations of the Rightly Guided Caliphs endowed them with consciences freed from worldly burdens that soared in the air, surpassing in practice all the standards established for managing power. Thus the achievements of that period were transformed into models radiant with light that hovers over reality, inaccessible and intangible. Rendering them unique created the feeling that it was impossible to relive their example, thus sustaining a reality beyond attainable standards. We can readily understand how such representations created a mentality that regarded the era of the Rightly Guided Caliphs as an ideal that cannot be reproduced, an inaccessible model. It was logical, then, to seek a model that was accessible. The alternative within reach was obviously the system of the Umayyads and the other forms of power that followed. Our love of the Companions of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) led us to regard them as infallible supermen whose faith and practice of justice cannot be imitated. We are inclined to see in each of their decisions a sacred action, a divine inspiration that is inaccessible to ordinary mortals. Loving and revering the holy Companions of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) is admittedly part of our faith; yet to regard their deeds and gestures as sacred -to the extent of forgetting that they are human - has done a great disservice to the progress we ought to have made. Such idealizing runs counter to the teaching of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him). It has contributed to encouraging tyrants and normalizing a political reality which acknowledges the rule of one over everyone else. Accepting what does not conform to the Prophet’s teaching has legitimized the aberrations of “the power of the individual.” The Ummayads were keen to exploit this argument. They hastened to pose an “accessible form” against the “impossible model” of the fi rst holy caliphs. As no one could govern with the virtues of the Rightly Guided Caliphs, any prince could rule with the means of power at hand, namely violence and guile. The weakness inherent in this representation of things is appreciable. The first error is that the role of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) in our judgment is not given the importance it merits. His advent as Messenger, and his presence within the community his Message perpetuates are the sole, the first and the last credit it has. As a consequence, no Companion nor any other member of the umma may aspire to saintliness except to the extent that he remains close to the home of mercy, the teaching of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him). The other consequence, related to the fact that the spiritual power of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) does not end with his death, is that each member of his umma is capable of attaining spiritual purity so long as he wholeheartedly and sincerely observes his path. It is even evident that the absence of physical contact with our beloved Prophet favors privileged relationships. That is attested by the hadīth that announces the coming one day of the Brothers of the Messenger, those who would believe in him without having met him. Moreover, the idyllic view of the era of the Rightly Guided Caliphs owes to a misinterpretation of the nature of the society created and desired by the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him). His teaching includes a legacy of a spirit of group solidarity. The spiritual heritage he left to his Companions is a shared heritage, a force that can be effective only to the extent that unity takes precedence over disunity. At the level of government - and particularly here - the caliphate is in no way to be the expression of individualism but rather one of a communitarian choice animated by a communitarian conscience. A Revealing Barometer The gravity of our political deviations can be measured by several indices. The status of women bears eloquent testimony to the deviation of the nature of power and its repercussions on the social aspect of our life as Muslims. The status of women is traditionally recognized as a powerful barometer of the decadence or civility of civilizations. As an identifiable point of the reference, the period of the Abbasids stands more prominently in our diverted and manipulated memory than that of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him). The reign of Hārūn ar-Rashīd fl atters our feeling of membership and fi res up our collective imagination. Evocation of this epoch is always associated with the Thousand and One Nights. It is synonymous with splendor, jewels, and especially with beautiful slaves and palace intrigue. In the curricula of Muslim countries the reign of this sovereign is unanimously presented as the zenith of Islam. This approach to our Muslim past is doubly misleading: (1) we gauge the history of islam by purely material values while relegating spiritual values to a dark corner and regarding the spiritual quest as a matter of vocation or eccentricity; (2) and wenormalize our intellectual and emotional relationships with a system whose nature and legitimacy ought to be called into question. This myth further undermines our moth-eaten memory. To cite but one example of the numerous repercussions of this official view ingrained in our Muslim subconscious, we will touch on the status of women, thus opting for an indirect approach so as to broach a subject that concerns an entire umma in which the first victim of its decline is woman. In the history of declining civilizations, women are always the scapegoat. Our Muslim societies are no exception to this rule. It will be to our advantage to develop our history heuristically; to do so we must consider the upheavals experienced by women in the land of Islam as being intimately dependent on the conception of power and its involution from shūrā to autocracy. The Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) came to rescue the Arab woman from the limbo of history so as to make her a full and responsible human being, ready to assume the heavy responsibility incumbent upon those who make sense of life. The system that came to replace shūrā made it its duty to erase the outlines of a nascent society wherein the woman is man’s equal in “the ordering of Good and the pursuit of Evil.” It encouraged an enslaving mentality that considers woman a common if beautiful commodity of speculation. The goodwill of the princes who usurped power as from Mu‘āwiya went against the Qur’ānic teachings that recommend the progressive abolition of slavery. The mark of Pharaoh in this domain is most profound, as the first victim of this degeneration from the top is surely woman. The jāhiliya that the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) came to remedy was characterized by a state of deep ignorance and perdition of the godless. Ignorance as such -both of sense and of essence- has always had as a corollary social violence and the law of the strongest. Islam came to create a new balance and to promote new values by censuring despotism, whether political or chauvinistic in practice. The link between these two expressions of ignorance is so strong that it engenders a perfectly clear dynamic of cause and effect; the liberation of woman from the yoke of tradition can be considered only in the sense of a global struggle that aims to eradicate archaic and authoritarian political systems. It is easy to subscribe to this argument once we examine the historical relationship between the deterioration of the status of the Muslim woman and that of power. But let us fi rst examine the pre-Islamic period. We note at first that, with few exceptions, all the peoples of the earth had adopted the same attitude with regard to woman, an attitude of distrust and suspicion, attraction and repulsion similar to the attitude toward the dark forces of nature. These sentiments were expressed in different ways, but the watchword was always the reification of the woman. For the Arabs of the jāhiliya, this reification was a bit less abject than that of the Romans or the Greeks. Yet it was no less cruel. They were so jealous of their women, whom they regarded as properties, that they would not hesitate to bury them alive. The newborn girl child was at the mercy of the paterfamilias, who held the power of life and death over her. Among certain tribes, he sometimes even buried her for fear of dishonor, should he deem that necessary, without the least reproach or worry- quite the opposite. Many settled and rich tribes who could do without the woman’s social work used to bury her symbolically when they did not inter her physically. The practice of khidr was widespread in Arabia. khidr is the word that describes the bearing and the house of the woman who never goes out of her household. The example of Khadija (God bless her), a free and independent woman, the first spouse of the Prophet and the first support to his cause, was not commonplace in the Qurayshi nobility to which she belonged. It is certainly not by pure coincidence, however, that she was elected by God to be on the path of the future Messenger (grace and peace be upon him). Non-believers might call this a coincidence, an accident not representative of the image of the woman advocated by islam. A predestination, we would reply, that serves as proof that the woman that islam wishes is far from being the thing of “caliphs” and men, but an active actor in the progress of history. It is equally revealing that the Muslim community of that time declared the year of the death of Khadija (God bless her) a “Year of Sadness.” This was uncom mon in a society that Omar (God bless him) recognized as deeply misogynist: “Before islam,” he said, “we used to attach little importance to women.” The same Omar who before his conversion to islam buried his daughter, the same Omar who admitted the chauvinistic nature of his society and from whom women used to hide behind the back of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him), is the Omar who during his mandate appointed a woman to head the fi nancial administration of a large city. This change is the result of the education the community received from the Prophet. Successfully and progressively, the Messenger of islam rescued men from the prison of their vices, their habits, their ill-fated customs. Left to their own devices, their natural instincts would have engendered and unleashed destructive forces in governing a society where the weakest had no place, and where the law of the strongest was the sole valid rule. The weakest could only submit or escape an unenviable lot by means of tortuous paths of hatred, treachery, ill-will, and guile. Jahiliya also describes a society where distrust and violence are exacerbated by want and need, a society where men live by submitting women to their physical might, where tribe crushes tribe, where man fi ghts man, where barbarity prevails. Muhammad (grace and peace be upon him) came to guide the Companions and the Muslims with the might of love, to free them from the vicious circle of violence and self-centeredness. Yet he behaved towards them with the care of the teacher who is concerned about making progress without brutal ruptures or traumatic shock-treatment. As our Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) was fully aware that the Arabs were captious regarding the status of women, his gentleness was even more in evidence in that highly sensitive area than elsewhere. By ordering the Companions to allow women to go to the mosque, he posed a veritable moral dilemma for the Muslims. The concern to obey the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) and his teaching prompted a dynamic of woman’s liberation and promotion from the state of a thing to that of an active citizen. When we consider that the mosque was the very heart of the nascent community- the locus of meeting and social life as well as its place of worship-we realize the scope of this apparently trivial commendation. The Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) was inviting women to enter, by the main gate, into a social field hitherto exclusively reserved for men. Before this, women did not exist in this fi eld, since social life frequently consisted of waging war and engaging in trade - which amounted to the same thing, considering the state of insecurity endured by the desert caravans, where raids were common. The Message of Peace with God and with the Other made woman a partner of man in this society of growing confi dence. Instigating the presence of women in the mosque was first of all proof of their equality before God, Who received them in His House the same way as men. Women were not only securing public space and times that had been exclusively male preroga-tives; they were also entering the sacred space as God’s guests. What further annoyed certain Companions about these three acquisitions was no doubt the fact that the dawn and night prayers (Fajr and ‘Ishā’ ) were performed at times where it was unthinkable to allow women out in a society particularly touchy in matters of honor. The community then lived in constant transformation; it was becoming accustomed to obeying the counsels of the Prophet as matters of Islamic Law, since He says nothing that does not come from God. Liberated, Responsible Women The Message fashioned a generation of women among whom Aisha (God bless her) is the symbol par excellence, a generation of responsible and free women. Islam educated magnifi cent women who knew their rights as well as their obligations, and who perfectly understood their roles in establishing that society of confidence. With admirable force, they took hold of God’s gift to them of their humanity, at last recognized, and their dignity. We thus had such figureheads as Um Haram. This great lady of Islam, were we to cite her alone, did not content herself with entering the public arena as a full believer responsible, just like any other Muslim, man or woman, for the life of the community. She even requested the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) to beseech God so that she might die with a group to whom he predicted martyrdom in distant lands. The Messenger (grace and peace be upon him) found it natural to answer her request. Dozens of examples of female disciples of the Prophet can be mentioned. It is also interesting to note that if Paradise was expressly promised by God’s Envoy (grace and peace be upon him) to ten men of his entourage, it was promised to twenty women. If we know what such promise represents in the eyes of a society that defi nes itself above all as being turned towards the Ultimate Life, the status of the woman takes all the more signifi cance. Aisha, this personification of islam par excellence, left (and will eternally leave) an indelible mark on our memory. If the Companions vowed her particular respect, it was no doubt because the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) vouchsafed her singular love. Yet that was not the sole reason for their admiration. Aisha had exceptional personality and intelligence. With legendary precociousness she had been initiated by her father into the Arab genealogy and was ranked among the scholars of Arabic language and literature. A great number of hadīths were memorized and transmitted by her to the Companions, who readily came to consult her about the most delicate theological questions. Since the family is a determining factor in the development of personality, we understand how privileged Aisha’s relationship with her parents was. Her birth within one of the rare Muslim families completely supportive of islam enabled her to grow up in an atmosphere where woman was no longer the plaything of the sexist and chauvinistic man. Abu Bakr, her venerated father (God bless him), was reputed for his gentle nature, very close to the fi tra, and for his absolute confi dence in the first statements of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him). Surely he was as- Siddīq- a kind of superlative that may be translated “extremely confident.” Indeed, he was the Companion par excellence, recognized as such in the Qur’ān account of his accompanying the Messenger during his fl ight from Mecca. Assiddîk, confident in the teachings of Muhammad (grace and peace be upon him), unhesitatingly repudiated forever the typically Arab view of the daughter as a curse. The love he had for his daughter Aisha was touching. It is reported that one day, as Aisha kept him company, he spoke of ‘Omar bnu al-Khatāb, saying, “There is no one on earth I love more than Omar.” As Aisha had doubtless gestured disapproval, he corrected himself exclaiming, “What have I said?” Keen as was her wont, Aisha hastened to repeat his statement. He quickly corrected himself to prove the love he felt for her. “I meant to say, more agreeable to me than Omar, my children, closest to my heart.” This kindness of a father for his daughter is striking proof of saintliness in an Arabia of rough and steely ways often fatal to women. Abu Bakr was the worthy disciple of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) who used to manifest in public his great love for his daughters, notably Fatima (God bless her). He would stand up to offer her his seat, approach her all smiles, and kiss her on the hand or forehead. In those days the Prophet was inaugurating a new era for woman, the era of the Message that denounces the inequitable practices suffered by the oppressed of the system, be they slaves or women. We are told in the Qur’ān: When news is brought to one of them, of (the birth of ) a female child, his face darkens, and he is fi lled with inward grief! With shame does he hide himself from his people, because of the bad news he has had! Shall he retain it on (sufferance and) contempt, or bury it in the dust? Ah! what an evil (choice) they decide on! Another verse, mentioning the Day of the Last Judgment, says: When the female (infant), buried alive, is questioned for what crime she was killed . . . (Then) shall each soul know what it has put forward. Thus owing to the Qur’ān and the practical teaching of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him) in his sunna, the community gradually developed a new concept of the role of woman by regarding her as the equal of man in the sight of God and His Messenger (grace and peace be upon him). The specifi city of her status distinguished her only to the extent that her function in the family and society assigns to her duties that differ from those of the man; this in no way presupposes a difference in essence or dignity. The momentum initiated by the women of the Prophet’s lifetime would continue into the advent of the Caliphate. History portrays levelheaded, kindhearted women taking over from the generation of the sahābiyāt (female com panions). Among second-generation women, tābi‘iyāt,21 stand countless women of out stand ing personality competing with men in the realm of knowledge and active par ticipants in the life of the community. The history of the Muslims is studded with the luminous names of women who in their wake left generations of women to come a glimmer of hope and evident proof of the esteem islam has for them: Aisha bint Talha, Fātima bint Sirīn, Sukayna bint al-Hussayn, Rābi‘a al ‘Adawiya, and many others. These perfect women took active part in the life of their community; they have made their mark on the history of the liberation of woman initiated by the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him), a liberation that reconciled her with God, her faith and her role as builder of the future. ------------------------------------------------------------------ * From the Book "Full Sails Ahead" (available online at www.jspublishing.net). ------------------------------------------------------ 7. Abdellah Laroui, Islam et histoire [Islam and history], Éd. Bibliothèque Albin Michel in Idées 1999, p. 42. 8. Laroui (1999), p. 42. 9. Hadith reported by Imam Ahmad and Tabarani as related by Abu Umāma Bahili. 10. Hadith reported by Bukhārī and Muslim as related by Numan bnu Bashîr. 11. Lwazīr (2000), p. 29. 12. I write this knowing of the circulation in the Islamic countries of ready-made ideas concerning putting the woman under guardianship and her eternal status as minor. The polemic surrounding the topic is volatile; the problem cannot be discussed in depth in a single work. Women live among the interstices of a particular history that is made of breaks and lapses. During an unstable course of events against which the jurisprudential schools struggled they have lost their rights—but this is not the subject of this book. I shall defer a study of the complicated issue of the woman in islam until, God willing, I can devote a prospective book exclusively to it. 13. L’ordonnance du Bien et le pourchas du Mal, in Jacques Berque’s phrase, renders the divine order addressed to the Muslims to “order Good and combat Evil.” 14. Jahiliya is the state of ignorance and, inevitably, of violence that characterizes impious societies. It is commonly translated as “the pre-Islamic period.” 15. Qays, a bashful lover of the pre-Islamic era, was for life refused by his tribe permission to marry his lady friend for having dared to mention her in his poems. 16. Qur’ān: S. LIII. 3. 17. Arabic distinguishes between male (sahâbi) and female (sahâbiya) Companion or disciple of the Prophet (grace and peace be upon him). 18. Akhbâr Omar (1989). 19. Qur’ān: S. XVI. 58. 20. Qur’ān: S. LXXXI. 8–9, 14. 21. Tabiî and tabiya refer respectively to the man and woman belonging to the second generation of islam.