The Case of the Empty Inbox

Muhammad ‘Abduh and Egyptian Islamic Reform

Note: I was offered the opportunity to present a paper at the Middle Eastern and North African Studies Undergraduate Conference at the University of Arizona, but have had numerous cases of the flu since December and the worst case yet hit the day before the conference. As such, I cancelled my presentation, to my immense regret and disappointment, but have decided to post a much briefer version here. Thank you for reading.

Contemporary western discourse on Islam often impose a liberal-conservative, moderate-extremist dichotomy on the Muslim world, ignoring local, idiosyncratic contexts. For instance, such discourse labels the Muslim Brotherhood as a conservative organization, and the Egyptian theologian Muhammad ‘Abduh as a liberal counterexample. The measuring stick western media use, however, is how willing Muslims are to accommodate western influence. ‘Abduh is often seen as sympathetic to western influence, but his political and religious goals were effectively those of the Muslim Brotherhood–to bring the community of believers back to a more authentic practice of Islam because the community has strayed and allowed unlawful innovation.

Muhammad ‘Abduh

The youngest child of a rural farmer, ‘Abduh was born in 1849 in a village called Mahallat Nasr, on the Egyptian Nile Delta, into a middle-class family. Egypt was under a series of economic reforms first initiated by Muhammad Ali, a military leader who wanted to industrialize Egypt like Europe. His economic reforms benefited peasants, including ‘Abduh’s father, and those benefits allowed ‘Abduh to leave his rural home to become an Islamic scholar, or ‘alim. ‘Abduh showed much potential; he reportedly memorized the Qur’an at the age of ten. At thirteen, he went to study at the Ahmadi Mosque at Tanta, and later the University of al-Azhar in Cairo. However, ‘Abduh’s experience with the traditional education system was disappointing. The outdated practice of having students memorize centuries-old commentaries on the Qur’an and Hadith frustrated him to the point that he ran away from school multiple times, returning only when his father forced him back.

In addition to his formal education, ‘Abduh received an informal education with his uncle Shaykh Darwish, whom he visited when he was not in school. Darwish had a profound influence on ‘Abduh. He was a Sufi mystic familiar with several North African Sufi Brotherhoods, such as the Sanusiyya and the Tajiniyya, which emphasized an important concept in Islamic discourse, ijtihad, or independent reasoning. Ijtihad allows scholars to rely upon their own reasoning to answer questions. It departs from the method employed at al-Azhar at the time, called taqlid, or reliance upon set precedence, which requires scholars to defer to previously established commentaries, most of which came from the medieval period. While not opposites, ijtihad and taqlid differ greatly from one another, but ‘Abduh learned both simultaneously.

‘Abduh’s two educations coincided. While he continued to tolerate the outdated methods at al-Azhar, he learned from his Sufi uncle who taught mysticism, asceticism, and individual reasoning. These two educations showed ‘Abduh two extremes, the dilapidated structure of Islamic learning in a weakened Egypt trying to imitate Europe, and the informal, thoughtful, and intimate education of Sufi Brotherhoods.

Painting of the Suez Canal

Meanwhile, Egypt fell into an economic crisis. The Khedive, Isma’il Pasha, turned to European investors to help with the expensive construction of the Suez Canal. These investors, mostly British and French, took an increasingly demanding role in all of Egypt’s economic affairs after the Canal’s 1869 opening. The British exerted more and more control over the Egyptian state, at a time when European powers imposed colonial administration over much of the Islamic world. Many Muslim scholars turned their attention to the threat of Europeanization (taghrib). These scholars traveled, wrote, and publicly spoke about religious reform against colonial authority. One well-established scholar, Jamal al-Din al-Afghani, met ‘Abduh while he was still a student at al-Azhar. In their meeting, they discussed Qur’anic exegesis and theology, and ‘Abduh became one of al-Afghani’s most devoted students.

As the political situation in Egypt worsened, ‘Abduh turned to the press and became politically active. Eventually becoming the chief editor of the Egyptian Official Gazette (Al-Waqai al-Misriya), ‘Abduh published numerous articles critical of what he saw as the most damaging facet of Egypt and the Islamic world: unchecked deference to authority. Taqlid and Europeanization were equally dangerous; ‘Abduh criticized the local ‘ulema for their “obsolete and rambling” denouncements of rubbing alcohol while the British exerted control over Egypt’s finances. Both parties, he argued, were responsible for Egypt’s problems.

The Battle of Tel-El-Kebir, 1882, leading to the British defeat of the Urabis

‘Abduh and al-Afghani were part of a nationalist movement in Egypt in the 1870s, which culminated in a militant revolt against the British authorities in 1879. Led by Ahmed Urabi, the revolt briefly established a new government in Egypt. ‘Abduh criticized the revolt but nevertheless offered his support through the press in the hopes that all Egyptians would unite under a movement to throw off British control. The Urabi Government, however, ended in 1882 when the British invaded, installed a colonial regime, and exiled of the revolt’s supporters, including ‘Abduh.

Jamal al-Din al-Afghani

While in exile, ‘Abduh and al-Afghani worked together, mostly in Paris, publishing articles on Islamic reform and European rhetoric that painted Islam as backwards by the standards of post-Enlightenment liberalism. Their writing emphasized criticism, but not blind dismissal, of European influence. He applied ijtihad to European as well as Islamic ideas. For example, a broad-based European education was useful, but the British authority on the grounds of racial and historical superiority was useless and inaccurate.

After his return to Egypt, ‘Abduh was named Grand Mufti of Egypt by the colonial administrators, and he used the opportunity to reform al-Azhar. He expanded the curriculum, adding western subjects such as political science, history, geography, and mathematics. At the same time, he overturned the outdated, taqlid-based system and instead required students to pass tests on their knowledge of both religious and secular subjects. Not only did ‘Abduh hope to produce morally upstanding students, but he also wanted intellectually sophisticated students with an understanding of economics, politics, military science, math, and natural sciences.

If previous generations would have had such education, Egypt might not have fallen into debt. A moral nation-state would not have felt the need to compete with Europe or would not have wanted such an expensive opening of the Suez Canal. An educated Egypt would have had a sufficient background to combat European rhetoric and influence.

‘Abduh once wrote that “life takes precedence over religion in Islam,” meaning that Islam is meant to improve the quality of life for all its subjects. An Islamic Egypt did not entail imitating the precedence of medieval societies, nor did it mean modernizing Islam to fit contemporary standards. Instead, it meant meeting contemporary challenges and constructing a modern nation-state as devoted, thoughtful, well-reasoned Muslims who continually developed along with the ebb and flow of a globalized world while retaining their identity, faith, and authenticity.

2015 Cairo International Book Fair

‘Abduh was named person of the year at the 2015 Cairo International Book Fair for his reformist discourse. His conceptualization of orthodoxy was a counterexample to numerous forces in his time, the outdated methods of his fellow ‘ulema, khedives trying to compete with the West, and European powers carving the Muslim world into colonies and protectorates. That the Cairo Book Fair would name ‘Abduh their person of the year shows a belief in the continued relevance of his theology. He defied the imperialist rhetoric imposed upon the Muslim world; he still defies the liberal-conservative dichotomy western forces use today to justify forced assimilation of Islamic societies with the West. ‘Abduh was instead one voice in the diverse scholarly discourse of Islam, a diversity that western media ignore and powerful forces like the Saudi regime and terrorist organizations want to crush.

As such, allowing ‘Abduh to exist in his own context, a reformer trying to implement a more authentic Islam, is an exercise in understanding the intellectual diversity of the Muslim world as a whole, an understanding that over one billion people cannot be reduced to a largely fictional duality.

The Snow, the Writer, the Time

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Campus Snow Day

Yesterday started so safely. It was overcast and raining, but the roads were clear. By 11:00 AM, though, the city of Flagstaff was covered in snow and slush. Ponds sprouted in road dips and parking lots became marshes. Northern Arizona University cancelled all classes after 2:00 PM, after everybody was already on campus and desperate to get home. Students, faculty, and staff were told to leave before it got worse.

Com Building

I opted to stay on campus and not wait in the snow swamps amid dozens of tense drivers. I chose not to risk driving down Milton or Butler to get home, not wanting to wait ninety minutes because some inevitably bad drivers congested traffic after skiing their cars into each other. Instead, I found a warm corner on campus and set up shop with everything I needed: my computer, hot chocolate, a lengthy playlist of folk music, and a window giving me an unmitigated view of the snowfall.

Cline and Tree

I not-so-secretly harbor an obsession with snow. It’s often a subject in my writing. I’ve written many poems about snow alone, how it feels against my skin and glows under streetlamps. I’ve set numerous short stories in a mountain town in December, a Russian field in January, a Montanan cabin in February, or Flagstaff in March. Snow delights me immeasurably, and imposes an opportunity to sit back and do what I have so little time to even contemplate. When it snows so monstrously, I refuse to let the cold and darkness drag me down. Instead, I accept them as unexpected gifts. I don’t think sitting in front of a cold window improves my writing, but it often gives me direction and motivation. Yesterday, it forced isolation upon me, and isolation prompts writing. I’m grateful for being ushered indoors sometimes. Otherwise, I might never begin sewing the words together.

-jk

Flash Fiction: Train Tracks

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I’m attempting to do forty creative things (stories, poems, music, art, photography) for Lent. Here is one of them, a short short story.

The chainlink fence delicately rattles. There is nothing in the distance, but the rattling persists like a stick dragged through broken glass. Then, in the distance, we hear it, the horn calling from the right. It’s coming. The fence shakes violently. At last, it spills into view, the bright lights on the front forming a trio of eyes glaring at us as we scurry up the gravel slope to the tracks. The train soars closer.
The all-consuming noise enthralls us. We dig in our backpacks for the ritual sacrifices: an action figure, a light bulb, a marble chess piece, and a platoon of plastic army men. We assemble them facing the train, the unstoppable bringer of death. We line them up on the bright steel tracks, then scramble back down the hill to watch the storm, the explosion, the apocalypse. The train blares its horn once more as we shiver in delight at our violation of the rules. We have been rebelling like this ever since we first discovered how easy it is to get away with it.
Moments before impact, one of us asks whose action figure we used. For a moment nobody speaks, but soon we realize it does not belong to any of us but to one of our old brothers. We look at one another, then take the hill once again, prepared to ambush the rumbling tracks like soldiers emerging from their trench. Amidst one last blast from the horn, an air raid siren before the bombs fall, we stop two feet in front of the train as it eviscerates the entire army we set up. It crumbles the chess piece, it pops the light bulb, it mows down the platoon of army men, and flattens the action figure. We do not turn our attention away, even after the last traces of our sacrifice have vanished. We stand and watch wheel after wheel glide past us where the toys had been.
After the train passes, we stand sullenly around the hallowed battlefield. An atomic bomb has just been dropped. A tornado has just hit. There is not a trace of the army men. We find some glass fragments from the light bulb and a single arm of the action figure. We pick it up and stare at it in horror. Just one severed red arm gnarled at the shoulder. What more can we say? We bury it and begin working on a good lie.

-jk

Photo and story copyrighted work of Keene Short, 2015.

In Search of the Perfect Beer Milkshake

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“If a man ordered a beer milk shake, he thought, he’d better do it in a town where he wasn’t known. But then, a man with a beard, ordering a beer milk shake in a town where he wasn’t known–they might call the police.” -John Steinbeck in Cannery Row.

My favorite author, John Steinbeck, is known for his epic novels about the lives of the working poor like The Grapes of Wrath. While I love his longer works, the Steinbeck novel that has had the most influence on me is Cannery Row, more a collection of interconnected stories than a novel. I first discovered it four years ago, and I have reread it every fall to rediscover the magic of Steinbeck’s Cannery Row in Montery, California, which he calls “a poem, a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light, a tone, a habit, a nostalgia, a dream.”

In one story, the main character Doc remembers somebody commenting that he loves beer so much, “someday [he’ll] go in and order a beer milk shake.” Because he is safely out of town, he takes the bet and orders one, providing the following recipe: “Put in some milk, and add half a bottle of beer. Give me the other half in a glass–no sugar in the milk shake.” Because Doc is one of my favorite literary characters, I attempted to make a beer milkshake following Doc’s specifications.

It turned out dreadfully, so I worked on changing the recipe. Because several restaurants have already experimented with beer milkshakes, one can probably find several recipes online, but here, I offer my own.

1 bottle of beer (preferably a flavorful ale or stout)

3 scoops vanilla ice cream

1/4 cup milk

1 tablespoon sugar

2-3 icecubes

Combine all ingredients in a blender and serve fresh and cold.

I tested numerous variations of the beer milkshake. With dark beers, I tried adding chocolate sauce. With ales, I tried using only ice cream and beer, nothing else. I don’t know what Steinbeck was thinking when he wrote about Doc’s excursions into the world of beer milkshakes; he wrote that “it wasn’t so bad–it just tasted like stale beer and milk.” I may have taken Steinbeck fandom to an extreme, but his work is dear to my heart. For now, I’m content to read my favorite writer, take his jokes too seriously, and remember his reflections on the world:

Cannery Row’s “inhabitants are, as the man once said, ‘whores, pimps, gamblers, and sons of bitches,’ by which he meant Everybody. Had the man looked through another peephole he might have said, ‘Saints and angels and martyrs and holy men,’ and he would have meant the same thing.”

World War One: The Unpopular Prequel to World War Two

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World War One Books This semester I’m taking a senior seminar on World War One, for many different reasons: it’s an important event that changed the shape of the world in the twentieth century, I want to know more about it, it’s the hundredth anniversary. I’m also frequently disappointed by how often popular media ignore World War One.

European military history appears in popular arts on a regular basis. We have numerous video games, movies, and documentaries about World War Two. The History Channel has a long list of Hitler-fetish programs (Hitler and the Occult, Hitler’s Henchmen, Hitler’s Women), and in the U.S., WWII movies often come out on or near Christmas Day (Schindler’s List, Valkyrie, and most recently Unbroken, because there’s no better way to celebrate Christmas than by watching portrayals of crimes against humanity). I was excited this past summer when the History Channel announced a six-hour special on both World Wars, but was disappointed when it ignored much of World War One in favor of yet another biography of Hitler; I jokingly called the series Hitler: Origins. Complete with historical inaccuracies, it was effectively a Hollywood trilogy.

Nevertheless, there are some very good portrayals of history in popular media, such as the documentaries of Ken Burns and the BBC series Foyle’s War. These and others pay close attention to detail and often avoid simplifying history. The problem with so many popular depictions is that they present a simple Good Guy/Bad Guy narrative, to the point that World War Two is often reduced to a standard action movie format: bad guys do bad things to good people, good guys intervene, and there’s a happy ending. On the other hand, World War One resists this narrative completely: morally ambiguous empires kept promises to invade each other, millions died without significant progress, and nobody was happy about how it ended.

Popular arts can be useful if treated with the proper attention, and understanding World War One, I think, is sometimes more important than understanding its wildly popular sequel. The problem is that history never translates easily into narrative. It’s not a study of plot and characters, it’s a study of variable circumstance and decision-making without foresight, which can be messy, scary, and uncomfortable. It almost never works out the way we expect or want. Nevertheless, I long for better popular depictions of history. If the History Channel and Hollywood will not grant this wish, then I’ll simply have to do my part as a writer and contribute better, more accurate stories to the canon.

-jk

Where Has All the Introspection Gone?

The 1914 Christmas Truce

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December 24, 1914

Memorial for the 1914 Christmas Truce in Flanders, Belgium, where soldiers may have played soccer.

Memorial for the Truce in Flanders, Belgium, where soldiers may have played soccer.

“About five o’clock on Christmas Eve the Germans started lighting up Christmas trees in their trenches. We took no notice of them until they began to sing. Then we began to cheer them and to talk to one another as we are only about 80 yards apart.” -Rifleman C. Ernest Furneaux, British Rifle Brigade, January 4, 1915.

Along the Western Front in France and Belgium, soldiers waited in their trenches on Christmas Eve. British troops enjoyed puddings and cigarettes from home. Across the fields, sometimes only yards apart, German troops decorated small Christmas trees with candles. Both sides had started singing carols, and could hear their sworn enemies singing familiar tunes. French and British soldiers peered out of their trenches and saw hundreds of lights across the fields when curiosity took hold of them. Despite the language barriers and the months-long war, soldiers crawled out of their trenches, walked into the open air, traded gifts, and sang together. Some even played soccer, with a reported German victory of 3-2. They drank, sang, and celebrated Christmas on the battlefield. Later, many soldiers wrote about these events in letters to their friends and families.

“At dawn the Germans displayed a placard over the trenches, on which was written Happy Christmas, and then leaving their trenches unarmed they advanced towards us singing and shouting ‘comrades!’ No one fired.” -Unknown Belgian soldier, January 4, 1915.

The Great War began in August, 1914, and was expected to end before Christmas. By December, it was clear the war would drag on. Soldiers found themselves in appalling conditions. Sanitation was poor, food was scarce, and enemy gunfire was frequent. So, far away from home, threatened with death and disease, cold, hungry, and probably confused, many German, French, and British soldiers decided to stop fighting.

“The British burst into a song with a carol, to which we replied with ‘Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht.’ It was a very moving moment, hated and embittered enemies singing carols around the Christmas tree. All my life I will never forget that sight.” -Josef Wendl, German soldier, January 1915.

In some places, the Truce lasted until Christmas morning. In others, it lasted until New Year’s Day. Soldiers shared whatever food and drink they had, took the opportunity to bury their own dead, and befriended the men they were expected to kill. Some even joined together in a Christmas Mass on the battlefield. Suddenly, the Germans were no longer monsters trying to dismantle civilization; suddenly the French and British were not the greatest threat Europe had ever known.

“Friend and foe stood side by side, bare-headed, watching the tall, grave figure of the padre outlined against the frosty landscape as he blessed the poor broken bodies at his feet. Then with more formal salutes we turned and made our way back to our respective ruts.” -Unknown British soldier, January 15, 1915.

The ceasefire was spontaneous, informal, and technically illegal. Soldiers were forbidden from fraternizing with the enemy, which was relatively easy when trenches were so close, and such interactions sparked sympathy. Though common then, such fraternization is rare today.

In contemporary wars, it is easier to dehumanize the enemy because there are broader cultural differences. American troops during the Korean and Vietnam wars were told they alone prevented the spread of communism, and those Americans who celebrate Christmas now find it difficult to share that holiday with the mostly Sunni Muslim communities of Iraq and Afghanistan. Propaganda dehumanized communists as the negation of American values and contemporary media frequently call Muslim societies the antithesis of western culture.

“Further, they agreed that if by any mischance a single shot were fired, it was not to be taken as an act of war, and an apology would be accepted; also that firing would not be opened without due warning on both sides.” -Unknown Irish soldier, January 2, 1915.

But dehumanization is only a process of denial. No matter how well we deny it, everybody in the crosshairs is a human being. They all have families; they are all lost and confused and angry and shaken. It’s easy to deny the humanity of an Iraqi or a Korean whose language and culture we do not understand. But just like all Americans, they work like us; they make music like us; they bleed and yearn and gasp for one last breath like us.

The trenches were hell on Earth. Nevertheless, people chose to celebrate Christmas in hell. They chose to recognize their mutual humanity and stop their mechanized slaughter. We can learn from the Truce that peace is actually quite simple. All we have to do is realize that, no matter who we’re fighting, all we really want is good food, good music, and good company. If we all stopped listening to the propaganda and acknowledged how much we long for home, maybe we can stop the nonsensical industry of warfare. It may sound preposterous, but the letters prove that such an act, however brief, has a historical precedence. Who’s to say it can’t happen again?

Joyeux Noël.

Schöne Weihnachten.

Happy Christmas.

Nothing Gets Past Hercule Poirot

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One of the most influential fictional detectives, Hercule Poirot, achieved a unique fame during his literary life. Created by Agatha Christie, he appeared in thirty-three novels, numerous more short stories, and upon his death became the only fictional character whose obituary was published in The New York Times. Although his creator despised him as a character, Poirot’s fans loved him. Recently, Poirot died a second time with the final portrayal by David Suchet, who played the Belgian detective in an adaptation of every story Christie wrote about him, ending a lengthy career with his final story, Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case.

Poirot may not be the most famous fictional detective. He has not entered popular culture the way Sherlock Holmes has; Christie, unlike Arthur Conan Doyle, did not choose to bring him back from his death, making his demise far more permanent than Holmes’s. But he is one of the most important detectives in the genre, relying on his “little grey cells” and watching the world with a meticulous eye. Perpetually calculating, though always a gentleman, he is far from the theatrically awkward, over-the-top socially inept kind of detective so common today, ranging from Batman to Dexter Morgan. Instead, Poirot falls into the believably quirky set of detectives, Miss Marple, Inspector Morse, Nero Wolfe, and Colombo. He is self-assured, confident, slightly neurotic, easily discomforted, and obsessive. His fans love him for many of the same reasons Christie hated him.

For many Poirot fans including myself, it is impossible to think of the detective without also thinking of Suchet’s portrayal. When I read Christie’s novels and stories, I hear Suchet’s light, Belgian accent, his distinct articulation, and his intonation whenever Poirot speaks. I picture Suchet with a curled mustache, cautious eyes, and fine suit when I read Poirot’s descriptions. Like many Poirot fans, I watched Suchet’s final performance with great difficulty because I knew it was his last act. But his adaptation is so fine-tuned after decades of practice, watching Poirot wither away in a wheelchair and struggle to solve an impossible case made me cringe. I know it was only an adaptation, but I would like to think that Suchet would have made Christie admire her Belgian detective, even though she loathed him by the end.

Bringing Poirot to life was Suchet’s magnum opus as an actor, or so I thought. Now I know the importance of bringing a character to death, to place him in the grave with dignity, to do justice to his final breaths and make audiences lament their loss. Suchet prompted such a lament.

-jk

Election Day Eve Special Post: Elections in History