University of Life: A Review of
The Days by Taha Hussein, pt. 3
July 31, 2006
A Season of Migration to the North offers an odd contrast to the work of Taha Hussein. In that novel Tayyeb Salih tells the story of a young man from the Sudan who comes to London and gets lost in the difficult mirrors of cultural identity. He takes up serial relationships with western women and finally kills his English wife. If there is any lesson to be drawn from this novel, it is about the need for people to stay rooted and at home.. not to strive outwards. Taha Hussein tells a different story about cultural exchange in the third part of his autobiography.. in fact, I am not sure this story could even be told today: it is a success story.. a young man who succeeds at the Sorbonne and marries a French woman.. then looks back at his life with satisfaction.
At the start it is important to think about the meaning of a "university." Literally, the word seems to imply unity.. and historically I would guess that a community of scholars was expected to come to a unified view of the world. For Hussein, however, the university is his ticket to a diverse world. He complains about al-Azhar:
It was a life of unrelieved repetition, with never a new thing, from the time the study year began until it was over. After the dawn prayer came the study of Tauhid, the doctrine of the divine unity; then fiqh, or jurisprudence... [246]
So literally this course of study at al-Azhar was marked by the study of "unity." Then he mentions the great change:
It was in the midst of all this that the name of the "university" was first mentioned. I had not heard this word before and, initially, a peculiar sense of strangeness possessed me. [246]
The title of this third section of his autobiography is given as "A Passage to France." But that overemphasizes the place of France, per se, in the scheme of the book. France is simply another step in this broadening of horizons. After success at the new Egyptian University he winds up at the Sorbonne, where he again succeeds.
During his time in France he marries a French woman. He meets her in an unusual way: as a blind student (who rejects Braille) he needs to employ a full-time reader, who he happens to fall in love with. He gives the following portrait of their life after they were engaged:
I was so happy with my fiancee and with myself. The gladness was unalloyed, with no trace of misgiving, or anger or contradiction. Here were a youth and girl in the first days of their engagement, filling most of the day with study, Latin in the morning, reading the French translation of Ibn Khaldun's Al-Muaqaddimah in the forenoon and then, after a break at the table for lunch, Greek and Roman history. [358]
That sounds ideal. The only odd thing is that his wife, in reading all this, must be learning it too.. yet there is never a sense that she is in school or a candidate for a higher degree. Maybe that was not possible (this was during World War I). Still, the vision of a lovely voice and a union based on common endeavor is beautiful. Later, as Hussein takes up Greek history, she helps to explain the geography:
She had taken a piece of paper and shaped it to conform to the natural contours of Greece. Her aim was to illustrate the mountains and the plains, where narrow and where extensive, and the surrounding coasts. She did this in relief on the same paper. Then she took my hand and guided it over the paper... [391]
His love is also a part of the "university".. defined not so much as a single place, but as an aproach to the world.
Reading Hussein's descriptions of "that lovely voice" I kept thinking of my own love. Although I am the one that reads to her, we share that same partnership in the university of life.. For Hussein this love tempered the spirit of the great but bitter Arabic poet Abu l' 'Ala al-Mu'arri:
and here was this voice, chasing from within me all the thoughts of darkness, pessimism and despair that Abu l' 'Ala had ever planted there... [328]
It was just last week that the Washington Post had an article about Woody Allen, and about his unabated pessimism.. even after all these years. I reflected on how that point of view once seemed so attractive.. but now it almost takes effort for me to remember why. The only reason is the wonderful new geography that my lovely wifi has opened up for me.
And so, you see, the autobiography has a wonderful ending.. a note of confidence in the ability of a boy who grew up in the countryside of Egypt to succeed not only at al-Azhar, but at the highest reaches of western intellectual endeavor.. and confidence in the ability of an Egyptian to marry and love a French woman. It is a message of cultural acceptance and personal fulfillment that we somehow don't expect from a serious artist.. but there it is.
A Synagogue in Old Cairo
July 30, 2006
Throughout the Middle East there are remnants of Jewish communities. Jewish cemeteries and old neighborhoods from Morocco to Syria can be visited by anyone who has the inclination. The living communities in these places have disappeared.. or are confined to a few scattered (and often old) individuals. The communities as a whole have migrated to Israel..
Like other Middle Eastern countries, Egypt has its traces from the Jewish past. Those traces happen to be difficult to photograph right now.. Shaar Hashamaim in downtown Cairo is off limits to photography from the street (I was stopped several years back attempting to take a picture). Ben Ezra in old Cairo can be photographed on the outside, but the inside has prominent cards forbidding photography. That has presented a problem for this blogger, who likes to rely on photographs to drive the text along.
At the end of his Khitat al-Maqrizi, having described in detail the urban topography of Islamic Cairo, comes round to Jews and Christians. The Jews are treated first (probably because they are the more ancient group, and al-Maqrizi tends to order things chronologically). The various synagogues in Cairo make up the first chapter.. except they are not called "synagogues", but "churches" (kinâis). Al-Maqrizi refers to the theologian Ibn Taymiyya to explain the word: "Kinisah is a Hebrew word, its meaning in Arabic being 'a place in which people gather for prayer.'" Which is true: a synagogue was known as a beit knesset, or "House of Assembly." And you can see how knesset could turn into kinisah in Arabic. Today the word kinisah is used exclusively for Christian churches.. but for al-Maqrizi it was appropriate for either Christian or Jewish places of worship.
Al-Maqrizi devotes a few lines to describing the Ben Ezra synagogue in old Cairo:
The Jews venerate this place of worship (kinisah), which is located in the quarter of al-Musasa in old Cairo. They claim that it was restored during the Caliphate of the Commander of the Faithful 'Umar ibn Khutab. Its setting is on what is known as the street al-Karamah. It was built in the year 325 of Alexander, which is prior to the religion of Islam by about 621 years. The Jews claim that this place of worship was a place of council for the Prophet Ilyas. [2:471]
Ilyas is the prophet Elijah.. although I cannot say how he gets down to Egypt. A little further reading would probably answer that question. But it is interesting that this is reported as a Jewish claim, and so we have a hint about the way Jews, as a minority group, were creating a landscape connected to their own stories.
Al-Maqrizi recognizes the legitimacy of Jewish claims about the age of their place of worship. The place of worship was "renovated" during the time of 'Umar ibn Khutab (the second Caliph). Its existence is then tied back from Islam 621 years, and forward from Alexander 325 years.. which puts us at 1 AD. The present setting of the synagogue tends to support this kind of dating, since directly behind the synagogue is an old wall that was part of the Roman fort that was once here:
Although the synagogue that now stands on the site was constructed at the end of the 19th century, there can be no doubt that the site itself, and Jewish worship here, goes far back in time.
In the process of restoring/rebuilding the synagogue they stumbled onto a cache of papers from the 9th to 13th centuries. Since Jews did not just throw away a piece of paper with the name of God written on it, they deposited them in a storage place.. known as a geniza. In the late 19th century (at the same time as the renovation of the synagogue) the importance of the documents in this collection was recognized and they were fanned out to several research libraries. For an example of what is to be found in this collection go to this Cambridge University site (there are some beautiful samples of the documents on this site).
I naturally wanted to know where this storage place was. I asked the man who worked in the small Hebrew library, and he pointed to a locked door underneath the library. Obviously the building itself is rather recent, but I had to believe that the geniza must have been under there:
Looking through what al-Maqrizi had to say about Jews in Egypt I decided that my next translation project from the Khitat might well be these 15 or so pages. Their interest deriving from what they say about a minority group creating a meaningful world for itself here in Egypt. The Geniza documents also provide an interesting check by which I may be able to see what is missing in al-Maqrizi's account. Just another way to enter and get to know these narrow streets:
Build a Mosque and They Will Come:
The Mosque of Sultan al-Zahir Baybars (1266-69)
July 28, 2006
The mosque of Sultan al-Zahir Baybars is large. It was not built along a narrow busy street, but laid out square in an open space. Even now it forms a kind of natural midan, or square, around which traffic flows. The mosque was the first large mosque constructed by the ascendant Bahri Mamluks, and it sticks out alone to the north of old Cairo. An article by John Alden Williams entitled "Urbanization and Monument Construction in Mamluk Cairo" (Muqarnas 2 (1984), pgs. 33-45) tries to answer why this mosque was built in the first place:
All this meant that the city was being pulled to develop toward the southeast. Baybars I briefly arrested this trend by developing an area to the north of Fatimid Cairo... The suburb around the great congregational mosque and a palace he built before 1270 was also called Hussayniyya. The creation of a new royal quarters or suburbs was always a highly lucrative affair for Muslim monarchs: the land was bought cheap and sold dear, and new royal markets brought in high revenues as merchants and notables moved to the desirable new area. [35]
This makes mosque building sound something like building a freeway in California. Once a freeway is planned, property that had been in the boonies is suddenly valuable.. and all kinds of opportunities present themselves for people willing to get in on the ground floor of a new development. Muslim rulers did not build freeways, they built new royal mosques.. and the people came.
As it turns out, this area was not a success in the long run:
The growth of the southern area checked development in Husayniyya, and after the Black Death (1347-49) the northern suburb seems to have been deserted, and by 1403 abandoned. [36]
That explains why on a map of the medieval monuments of Cairo, this mosque stands almost by itself in the north. It was the seed of a new district which in the long run went to ruin.
The mosque itself is today not in great shape. The central courtyard is overgrown with tall grass:
And as one walks over to the qiblah side of the mosque, there are rows of columns standing in a ruined state, their roof having long disappeared:
After being in so many mosques which are at some stage of restoration, it was fascinating to see what happens when a mosque simply "goes natural" and is left to fend for itself. When I look through the books of drawings and photographs on medieval mosques, I am often struck by how dilapidated they once looked. This mosque is probably a pretty good indication of the state of many medieval mosques as they limped into the modern period. Some found renewal with Ottoman patrons.. but others simply disintegrated year after year.
The mosque of Sultan al-Zahir Baybars is still in use. A portion of it has a covering and has been turned into a somewhat makeshift place of worship. As I walked around I was surprised to see what looked like a cabin:
I looked behind it, and it was not very wide.. but when I walked in front of that door, three men suddenly popped up and donned their gelabiyyas to greet the visitor. Evidently, then, this is the living quarter for the men in charge of the upkeep of the mosque.
The guy on the left was blind, the guy on the right wanted me to sit down and read the Qur'an with them. I obliged for a few minutes, and showed that I could read it (although obviously not like a professional). They were impressed and I felt like I had won my spurs. They were also just trying to keep me busy and occupied so I would feel the need to tip them. But they got around to showing me the prayer niche.. which was oddly absent from the place of worship.
The prayer niche was in the ruined area of the mosque.. and is now bare of any ornament. Note also the water marks on the bricks.. which looks to me like water leeching.. something that will slowly destroy this building.
This area in front of the prayer niche was once quite brilliant. Doris Behrens-Abouseif notes a distinguishing feature:
the space ...instead of being roofed with a ceiling like the rest of the mosque, or covered by a small one-bay dome as in earlier mosques, was covered with a dome as large as that of Imam Shafi'a... The dome of Baybars, made of wood, disappeared long ago. Baybars ordered the dome to be built and decorated with the wood and marble he brought as trophies from the citadel of Yaffa, captured from the Crusaders. The dome thus commemorated Baybar's victory and the triumph of Islam. [94]
But all that is gone, and the sun falls freely on this ground.
The outside of the mosque is marked by three monumental portals, decorated with medallions and other designs over the entrance. One important model for this ornamented style is the al-Aqmar mosque (which seems like the model for everything).
This mosque also features the first occurrence of the ablaq, or striped, style:
Another notable feature of this mosque is the use of ablaq masonry, striped courses of light and dark stone, at one of the entrances. According to Creswell, this is the earliest extant example of ablaq, which becomes typical in later Cairene architecture. [94]
The entrance she is referring to is pictured above.. where one can make out the use of stripes on the lower levels.
It is a curious mosque.. one that attracts few visitors.. and since it does not appear to be on anyone's restoration agenda, who knows what its future will be.
Conversion to the New Middle East
July 27, 2006
On Tuesday our Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice was in Israel meeting with Ehud Olmert, and made the following statement:
"It is time for a new Middle East," she said. "It is time to say to those that don't want a different kind of Middle East that we will prevail. They will not."
It is a short statement, but provides ample opportunity for commentary.
What would a "new Middle East" look like? Listening to these people in control of our foreign policy, you might think that there is some kind of necessary destruction or creative chaos that will allow for something new to take birth. We can think of this as the "Phoenix from the flames" theory of Middle East policy. The hope appears to be that after a series of destructive encounters with superior force, Muslims will realize they have been stupid and start living according to western principles.
But why go to a classical reference like the Phoenix? This policy is also underlain by a widely held religious view of the crisis of conversion. The change that happens inside a sinner at conversion is sudden; a new man steps into the place of the old man:
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! [2 Corinthians 5.17]
The new life is found by shedding the old life. Cognitively that seems to be parallel with the solution to the Middle East: the status quo ante cannot be accepted, we have to work for a new world.
If you doubt my application of this religious concept to American foreign policy, just look at the way these ideas are developed in an on-line sermon by John Schmidt:
...God works to contain the effects of our rebellion. Things could be worse and yet God is at work in the world to make sure that as bad as things get they won't get so bad that everything is destroyed. And we see that happening again and again in the Scriptures, as well as in the history that we have seen since. And then finally, God is actually at work in this story to provide the ultimate solution. This is what we call redemption: God's rescue of humanity... The part where God restores creation to all that it was originally created to be, the promise that was given to Adam and Eve comes back to humanity, all the potential for creation comes out again in a new heaven and a new earth. Everything is torn down and remade. It's Extreme Makeover...
That could easily be turned into an official political statement from our current administration, just change God into America, sinful humanity to the Muslim world, redemption to peace with Israel, and the new heavens and new earth to the new Middle East. It all starts to look familiar, doesn't it?
I am not saying that leaders are crafting policy around the Bible. No, I am saying that these religious principles and concepts are ingrained in our minds. Certain solutions to real world problems appear sensible.. almost obvious.. since they are accepted as true elsewhere. You can look at this as a master metaphor: NEW CREATION FROM DESTRUCTION OF OLD. The application of that principle can turn up in the oddest of places.
Foreign policy is an odd place. No matter what your view of individual change, human society is manifestly not something that arises as a "new creation." Societies change incrementally. The new Middle East will not come about by a sudden conversion, but through small changes.. through nurturing the liberal and moderate aspects that are to be found in this part of the world.
That is what is so wrong with our policy with respect to Israel's war in Lebanon: if there existed a root for liberalism and democracy in the Middle East.. it was in Beirut and Lebanon. The obvious policy for a country that professes to want a democratic and liberal Middle East is to encourage and defend with all our resources such places and possibilities. It seems a point of view that has its own biblical precedents. The following is a description of the Servant of the Lord and his establishment of righteousness:
A bruised reed he will not break,
and a smoldering wick he will not snuff out.
In faithfulness he will bring forth justice... [Isa. 42.3]
But this is not all that needs to be said about Rice's statement. It is easy to read that statement and believe that she knows what she is talking about:
"It is time to say to those that don't want a different kind of Middle East that we will prevail. They will not."
Is she serious? Hezbollah and al-Qaeda have not exactly traded on the status quo ante. Those are two organizations with vastly different goals, but they are certainly doing their best to bring about a different kind of Middle East. And just who is at least nominally supporting us in the Middle East? It is Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. We certainly owe something to these countries for their support, but I am not sure how they fit into the forces working to make a "new Middle East." To the people of the Middle East, we are very much a staunch ally of the "old Middle East."
But this is all to complicate what was in essence a religious statement by Condoleeza Rice—meant to be accepted and not questioned. Silly me.
Measuring a River:
The Nilometer on Rawda
July 26, 2006
Egypt is dependent on the Nile to an extent that is difficult to communicate. I have been in Cairo for close to three months, and I have not felt a single drop of rain. The closest I come to the experience of rain is when walking underneath someone's drippy A/C. The empty deserts on either side of the Nile valley offer a portrait of Egypt without the Nile. Throughout Egypt's history.. at least until the construction of the High Dam in Aswan, which regularized this natural process.. the year revolved around the annual Nile inundation, which crested in September. A low inundation.. or too high of an inundation.. meant failure of crops. The tax rates were historically aligned with the inundation level: low water level = low taxes. This economic management of the Nile and the Egyptian economy made necessary the use of some kind of measuring system, and thus the importance of the Nilometer on the island of Rawda.
Egyptians knew that the Nile had been measured far back into their history. Al-Maqrizi cites Ibn 'Abd al-Hakam, the earliest historian of Egypt whose work survived to our own time:
The first person who measured the Nile in Egypt was Joseph, upon him peace, who founded a gauge at Memphis. Then the old woman Daluka, daughter of Zabawahi, originator of the "Wall of the Old Woman", founded a gauge at Esna (although it was small of measure) and one also at Akhmim. 'Abd al-Aziz ibn Marwan founded a gauge at Helwan (although small). Usama ibn Zayd al-Tunukhi also set up a gauge on the island, which was the largest of the gauges. [1:57]
The original measurement is thus traced back to a biblical prophet: Joseph. But finally we reach the gauge built by Tanukhi, which was constructed on the island.. which here means Rawda. William Popper in his study on the Nilometer identifies this as taking place in 715 AD. Popper also clarifies that what we now know as the Nilometer is largely the result of the construction ordered by the Caliph Mutawakkil around 860 AD.
The Andalusian traveler Ibn Jubayr gives a description of the Nilometer from the year 1183 AD:
Beside this mosque is the Nilometer, which measures the Nile's increase at the time of its yearly flooding. The beginning is expected in the month of June, the maximum in August, and the ending in the beginning of October. This measuring instrument is a is a white octagonal column of marble set in a place which confines the water as it flows into it. It is divided into twenty-two cubits, subdivided into twenty-four parts called 'fingers'. [Broadhurst translation, 47]
This can be better understood with a look at a picture:
You can see how the pole itself is divided into cubits, which in turn are divided into 24 spans (count them!). Within the arch is an inlet so that the water running outside can flow into the well and therefore be weasured. Three such inlets are present along the vertical wall of the well.
While everything about the well itself appears to be quite old.. the structure that lies over the well is much more recent.. Ottoman or later. From the outside you see an unusual pointed dome.. to my eyes reminiscent of the top of a pointed Ottoman minaret:
Looking out from the other side of this structure, you find the broad expanse of the Nile. To the right is Giza, and straight ahead is yet another island.. this reachable only by boat and devoted largely to agriculture:
Looking at that other island I have wondered if the island of Rawda once looked just like that.. a couple places of development, but mostly green with agriculture. When I looked through the French illustrations to the Description de l'Egypte I found a drawing of Rawda:
What a romantic island.. ruins, pastoral fields, and the pyramids in the distance. That was 200 years ago. Along the island of Rawda you will find no scene like this. For the most part Rawda looks just like the rest of Cairo:
Myself at the Tomb of Sadat
June 26, 2006
Revising a Mosque:
The Blue Mosque (1347)
July 25, 2006
One of the enjoyable aspects of heading into Cairo with my driver Harby is the way my trips always end up different than I had imagined them. In the case of last Friday we ended up driving down Bab al-Wazir Street, taking a route to the Zuweila Gate which I had never seen. At one point we came to an old mosque which had its door open, and Harby told me to go see the Blue Mosque. Its more official name is the Mosque of Amir Aqsunqur, built in 1347, but in a way it deserves a new name since it was so extensively revised.
In 1654 the Ottoman official Ibrahim Agha added his own vision to the mosque. As Doris Behrens-Abouseif comments, this was hardly unusual:
In the Ottoman period, many sponsors of religious foundations restored old mosques that had fallen into decay or built upon their foundations and walls, rather than building new ones. Such mosques then acquired the name of the restorer, and this mosque, after restoration, was sometimes called the mosque of Ibrahim Agha. [116]
That seems an eminently practical solution to the reality of Cairo at that time: lots of old mosques, lots of decaying walls. So the Ottomans simply made it their business (often, but not always) to spend their resources updating and revising the mosques that were out there.
In this case, the mosque does not seem to be merely repaired, but to actually be a new mosque. Ibrahim Agha was even buried inside the mosque, in a closed room that is beautifully lined with Iznak tiling. The prior Mamluk prince who originally built the mosque is also buried nearby.. but you would hardly stop to look at his final resting place.. it is crumbling. The main show here and elsewhere is in the beautiful re-visioning.
Most spectacularly, the entire qiblah wall of the mosque (which is extensive) is covered with Iznak tiles. The first picture (above) is a detail from this wall. It is not hard to see why the mosque was nicknamed the "Blue Mosque." This is the most extensive use of tiling that I have yet seen in Cairo, although Behrens-Abouseif notes:
The Cairo craftsmen were not quite familiar with the art of tile paneling, and the tiles are inexpertly applied to the walls. [116]
This inexpertise may be part of the reason the mosque has suffered a lot of damage in earthquakes. There are portions of the wall where the tiling has obviously fallen down.
This mention of earthquakes brings up another variety of revising:
Also noticeable in this mosque is the modern attempt at stabilizing and restoring the structure. There are steel braces everywhere. I imagine that at some point in the future this mosque, like others, will get a complete facelift and be tidied up for tourists (although there were several on the day I visited.. throwing the lone custodian into a bit of confusion):
In some ways these modern repairs are a further revision, and the mosque takes on yet another layer of history. I wonder if in a thousand years such repairs, aimed perhaps at preparing a touristy version of Islamic Cairo, will seem similar to the Ottoman practice of repairing and revising mosques. From that distant vantage what will be obvious is how decisively changes were made to conform to contemporary expectations.. to what people wanted the Islamic past to be.
One element I have not talked about enough in these blogs is how they look from the street. Here is a street view of the blue mosque and its minaret. The mosques of Cairo (except the earliest) were not laid out in the open, where people could walk around and see all four sides. They stood on narrow streets and were designed to be seen by those passing by.
The street orientation was also often at odds with the necessity of having the prayer niche face Mecca, which meant that the square court inside the mosque was often at an odd angle with the street itself. Looking down from the minaret of the Blue Mosque you can see the strange angle clearly:
To the right is the courtyard of the mosque, while to the left is the street itself. The angles have nothing to do with each other. A big part of mosque design (in Cairo) is how to finesse this difference between street layout and the obligatory wall facing Mecca. The entrances are designed so that almost insensibly the visitor is reoriented from the street to the central court of the mosque.
I end with another detail of the Iznak tiles because these are some of my favorite artistic products from the Middle East.. and I want it known that if I were ever to collect something from the Middle East besides books.. it might well be Turkish tiles.
The Old Road to the Pyramids
July 24, 2006
If you were living in medieval Cairo and wanted to visit the pyramids, how would you get there? It was naturally not a matter of waving at a taxi. The road would also not involve a freeway, a modern concrete cridge across the Nile, or a long trip through the urban expanse that is modern Cairo and Giza. So what would the trip be like? We have an exact description of the route passed down to us by al-Idrisi:
From the city of Cairo, possessor of radiant palaces, if one chose to depart from the Zuweila Gate—which is a gate marvelous of description, eloquent description falling short of describing the mastery of its construction and quitting in haste the attempt, it being the fatique of the vision of the viewer. One who was seen the gate cites as an example for one who has not seen it the following lines of the al-Nili, the skilled poet:
"Oh sober one, If you laid eyes on the Zuweila Gate
Then you would know the measure of its site in construction.
It is a gate that surrounds itself with a galaxy,
dresses its hair, and winds Saturn around its head.
If the Pharaoh could have seen it he would have
built nothing imposing nor commissioned the two lofty heads."
One should follow along the street, which is the extensive Qasaba, until he leaves from the Suweiqa Gate and passes by Halalya and the Street of Aleppo. Then he leaves from the New Gate and walks through the Garden of 'Abbas, known today as the Garden of the sword of Islam, commanding a view of the Elephant Pond. Then comes the mosque of Ibn Tulun, which will be on his right. He turns on his left side so that he can visit the three shrines, which are the shrine of Muhammad the younger, Sukayna, and Ruqqaya. Then he arrives at the shrine of Sayyida Nafisa (daughter of Hasan, son of Zayd, son of Hasan) in a neighborhood known anciently in the books of Khitat as Darb al-Siba', where she had her house. The Imam Shafi'a... directed, when death attended him, that his funeral procession carry him to her house [and grave] so that prayer might give testimony for him and her blessing come to him. Prayer at her grave is an antidote tested through fulfillment. There appeared for her sake after her death miracles... Likewise the shrine of Sayyid ['Ali Zayn al-'Abdeen], who is quite close to the shrine of Sayyida Nafisa, to the right of one who visits her.
Al-Idrisi describes a number of sites which are still present.. A picture of Zuweila Gate heads this blog—the starting point for the road to the pyramids. The shrines for Sayyidas Nafisa and Ruqqaya, along with Sayyid 'Ali Zayn al-'Abdeen, continue to be major shrines that attract Muslims in Cairo. The mosque of Ibn Tulun still stands. But although some of these sites remain, the connectivity of the medieval city is gone. What gave these sites a pull on the imagination is that they lay on a specific well-traveled route. The city was bound together by sacred sites.. which had stories attached to them, and even a vast literature (note the reference to "books of Khitat").
Lost, of course, are well-known sites such as the "Ponds" around which wealthy palaces and homes were built. One would also look in vain for traces of medieval gardens or parks.. although these were clearly an important part of the city experience. To get a visual conception of this road, we can look at a schematic map of medieval Cairo:
Al-Idrisi is simply following that major road marked in black. You can see Elephant Pond to the right of the road, and then the mosque of Ibn Tulun again to the right. The cemetery falls a little to the left of the road. So what we have is a highly exact description of what a pious Muslim would encounter and value as he makes his way along the road.
If I continued with the translation, we would eventually make our way to the mosque of 'Amr ibn al-'Aas in Fustat, and then we would cross the Nile on a bridge made of boats tied together. What is encountered on the other side of the Nile I think I will leave for another blog.
There is one unanswered question from this description: why is al-Idrisi, in a book dedicated to the pyramids, spending a few pages describing a road that passes sites having nothing to do with the pyramids? I think it goes along with the general stragegy employed by al-Idrisi throughout this work. He is laboring at all costs to bring the pyramids inside the Islamic tradition, and he does this in a couple of ways: by pointing out every important Muslim or prophet who has had a connection to the pyramids.. and here he does it by associating the pyramids with the great thoroughfare of Cairo. By setting the pyramids as the end point of this road, he is tacitly asserting the place of the pyramids among the other sacred sites of Cairo.
Repairing the Sphinx:
Preservation, pt. 6
July 23, 2006
When people visit the Pyramids and the Sphinx they like to imagine what they were once like—back when everything was new. In Mark Lehner's The Complete Pyramids there is a computer generated view of what the Giza plateau looked like originally:
There you can see the pyramids with their casings still intact and their nice limestone causeways leading down to the valley. You can also see the Sphinx in the middle, to the side of the valley temple of the Pyramid of Khafre. This it seems to me is the ideal vision that most people are trying to get.. and which guidebooks help to construct. I call this philosophy "Originalism."
The problem with Originalism is that things stay original for a very short period of time. Even within ancient Egypt the meaning of the pyramids and the Sphinx was eclipsed. The most dramatic example of this is found in the stela set up by the 18th Dynasty king Thutmose IV, dated to 1401 BC. The narrative of the stela begins with high praise for himself:
Now then his majesty appeared as king as a beautiful youth who was well developed and had completed eighteen years upon his thighs in strength. He was one who knew all the words of Mont; he had no equal in the field of battle. He was one who knew horses; there was not his like in this numerous army. [41, Ancient Egyptian Literature, vol. 2, trans. Miriam Lichtheim]
I am going to skip some of the self-praise.. but soon the topic of horses brings round some interesting information:
He raised horses that were unequalled. They did not tire when he held the reins: they did not drip sweat in the gallop. He would yoke them with the harness at Memphis and would stop at the resting place of Harmakhis. [42]
This needs a little commentary. Memphis was the ancient capital of Egypt, and was located on the west side of the Nile, near Saqqara. Thutmose IV is thus claiming to have started there and to have ridden hard until he got to the "resting place of Harmakhis." This was the Sphinx, Harmakhis being a version of Horus. Thutmose IV continues:
He would spend time there leading them around an observing the excellence of the resting place of kings Khufu and Khafra, the justified. His heart desired to make their names live. [42]
The two large pyramids at Giza are today known by the names of their builders: Khufu and Khafre. Even 1,100 years after their deaths, their names were not forgotten and were indelibly connected to the two largest pyramids. But the site had obviously become abandoned at this point.. a place for riding horses across the empty sand.
The narrative continues, and the youth becomes a king:
Then his majesty remembered the place where he had enjoyed himself, in the vicinity of the pyramids and of Harmakhis. One ordered to make a resting-place there and to place a stela of limestone in it... [42]
At the end we find that the narrative is the story of the stela, and how it came to rest between the paws of the Sphinx itself. (You can see the stela which contains this narrative in the first picture, on the bottom right corner.)
So far as I have discovered, this represents one of the earliest direct examples of preservation. The motive? It seems that he had rested with his horses in this spot during his youth, and promised to himself that he would make the names of these ancient kings live. It seems refreshingly human.
Not only did he set up a stela, but there is also evidence that he made direct repairs on the Sphinx. The attention of the visitor today is naturally drawn to the face, but the body is a fascinating mixture of stone reparations. Here is the tail:
The original Sphinx was carved from natural rock, so anything that is constructed or shaped from stone blocks represents a later repair. As you gaze at the Sphinx, you start to notice many different sizes and types of blocks.. indicating a number of different periods in which repairs were made. The smaller blocks are generally modern, but the larger blocks in the middle of the photo date to the repairs made by Thutmose IV around 1400 BC—the same time as the stela was erected. Mark Lehner provides a picture that color codes the different periods of repair (the peach colored stones being the old ones):
What is original from the Sphinx is everything above the line of reconstruction.. that is, the weathered old stone that once served as the back of the Sphinx. My guess is that this also pretty much represents the line at which the Sphinx was buried in the sand:
The lesson here is that Originalism does not get us very far with the Sphinx. Early on it was reinterpreted as Harmakhis.. when it was neglected and partially covered.. and this reinterpretation as a friendly and protective god turned out to be a cause of its restoration. The restoration also resulted from the personal experience of Thutmose IV, resting his horses and gazing at the bygone splendors of Egypt. In fact, that story of a future king being affected by his proximity to these ruins is one of the most captivating personal images to come out of ancient Egypt.. much more colorful than anything we know about the origins of the Sphinx. Preservation can thus be seen as deeply connected to the spirit of mis- or re-interpretation.. and the continuing preservation of a monument often has more to do with later personal stories than with any original knowledge.
One wishes we could ask the Sphinx: "What were the best days?" And I wonder if it would not prefer the days when a king took refuge in its shade as it lay forgotten, to the crowds of tourists that traipse in front of it now.
Friday Odds and Ends
July 21, 2006
Today is Friday, the first day of the weekend in Egypt and in many parts of the Middle East. I generally stay home and wait for the sermons to start sounding over loud speakers at 1 pm. But today was a day of exploration with my driver Harby, and I got to learn something about the way that Friday works here.
One of the sites that has eluded me is the shrine for Umm Kalthum.. one of the Sayyidas whose cults began back in the Fatimid times. I asked Harby about this shrine, and he knew exactly where Umm Kalthum was buried. We headed to the cemetery I expected (Qarafa).. and wound our way down a small street lined with walled and free-standing tombs:
Until we came to the tomb of Um Kalthum. Harby proudly pointed out the writing over the door.. yes, I could see: Umm Kalthum. This was not what I expected, but it was still interesting. This was the tomb of the famous Egyptian singer Umm Kalthum, who died in 1975.
Inside was an octagonal rug, headed by a fancy couch and then flanked by some more ordinary chairs. People come here to pay their respects to the singer. I was also shown a book where visitors had written their Arabic tributes to Umm Kalthum. Unfortunately none of us had a pen, so I did not add my own Arabic note. Off on one side of the tomb was a small indenture where the singer was buried:
That book is an open Qur'an.
We were not the only ones out visiting tombs. Friday is the day when Egyptians head out to visit tombs. The social pattern is to drink tea, eat bread, read the Qur'an, and generally socialize at the place where the person is buried. And you can see from the furniture set up (first picture, above) that the tomb is set up for exactly that kind of visitation. While driving to the tomb we passed numerous flower sellers on the side of the small streets.. attracting the business of people heading to the tomb of a loved one.
Connected to the Qarafa cemetery is a large Friday market. This is the big market day for traditional Egyptians.. although if you shop at Western-style stores, it is a day on which you will find many of the stores closed. We drove through parts of this market, and I saw pretty much everything needed in a house, from bathroom fixtures to drapes to closets to shoes.. The vendors ranged from large store-style booths to individuals sitting cross-legged on the ground with a small store of goods lying for-sale in front of them.. From an overpass I could look down and watch the people in the market:
We followed this view of the Friday market with some serious wandering. We made a run at the Shrine of al-Juyushi, sitting conspicuous atop the Muqattam Hills.. and I got close enough to see it pretty well:
This was as close as I could get, however, as a guard shortly hereafter let us know we could not take pictures. (It seems the army has some kind of base up here.) That was unfortunate because this is a very old shrine, built in 1085 AD. Its original purpose is unknown.. and in fact one scholar believes that it was a watchtower designed to look like a mosque (see Behrens-Abouseif 66). So perhaps this prominent position has always encouraged military applications.
We then visited a couple of mosques near Bab Zuweila.. which I think will be better covered in another blog. After those Harby took me to the mosque of Ali Zeyn al-Abdeen, which is a modern mosque, but which will be for the next couple of nights the setting for a mulid.. a large and festive street party centering around a mosque and the birthday of a saint.
These mulids are pretty thrilling events.. there is perhaps no better introduction to Cairo popular culture.. real Cairo popular culture.. than one of these fairs. During my visit today you could see the outlines for what will happen at night.
All those bulbs will be lit and blinking. The street will also be filled with people. The row of "rides" (below) will be dispersed on the street, and kids and their parents will pay a small fee to get on them.
Walking toward the mosque I was surrounded by kids and people wanting to say something.. but having Harby nearby made the navigation easier. Inside the courtyard I came across this small group singing together (below).. something that there will be much more of in the mulid itself.. which is filled with music. Note the women singing with the men.
The more "traditional" and "popular" Islamic religion becomes.. the more comfortable it is to navigate. This is not the world in which Islamic fundamentalism thrives. These are very poor people who probably could not care less about the global issues that incense the fundamentalists. These people are just looking to get by, and I have always found a warm welcome among them. The following are a few of the people who came up to me at the mosque.. and at their instigation I took a picture of them:
You may notice two black spots on the forehead of the guy in the black Gelabya. That is a prayer callous, and is pretty common to see on men in Egypt. It is a badge of piety since it confirms that he prays often enough to develop actual calluses.
At the center of the mulid celebration is the shrine marking the burial or memorial for a saint. This is the kind of reverence that fundamentalists would love to stamp out.. but that would be a shame, as it is a driving force for a popular religious culture. It is no mystery why fundamentalism thrives (so far as I have seen) in the sterile middle class and wealthy suburbs.. outside the jostle and tumble of the popular and poor neighborhoods.
[That girl in a white shirt to the left of this photo is the same girl who is making a strange face in front of those people who are singing. She watching where I pointed the camera and trying to angle herself into my shot.]
What the Fuck Are We Doing?, or
Weep for Lebanon
July 20, 2006
If democracy and a liberal society are part of our Middle East plan, then why are we silent as Lebanon is destroyed? There are not too many places in the Middle East where these values have taken root, but the country whose infrastructure is being degraded, and which has about half a million internal refugees, is one place where they have flourished. Don't take my word for it, read what our president George W. Bush had to say about Lebanon just a few months ago:
'PRESIDENT BUSH: Well, we just had a really interesting discussion. I told the Prime Minister that the United States strongly supports a free and independent and sovereign Lebanon. We took great joy in seeing the Cedar Revolution. We understand that the hundreds of thousands of people who took to the street to express their desire to be free required courage, and we support the desire of the people to have a government responsive to their needs and a government that is free, truly free . . .
We talked about the great tradition of Lebanon to serve as a model of entrepreneurship and prosperity. Beirut is one of the great international cities, and I'm convinced that if Lebanon is truly free and independent and democratic, that Beirut will once again regain her place as a center of financial and culture and the arts.
There's no question in my mind that Lebanon can serve as a great example for what is possible in the broader Middle East; that out of the tough times the country has been through will rise a state that shows that it's possible for people of religious difference to live side-by-side in peace; to show that it's possible for people to put aside past histories to live together in a way that the people want, which is, therefore, to be peace and hope and opportunity.
And so, Mr. Prime Minister, we're really glad you're here. I want to thank you for the wonderful visit we've had, and welcome you here to the White House.[quotation from Juan Cole, his emphases]
That is a pretty rosy view of a country which is having full scale war waged against it.
Maybe it is hard for Americans to have a clear idea about the differences that exist between countries here in the Middle East.. it all starts looking like some sand-swept Iraqi landscape in the mind's eye. But that is not so.. and those who have visited the beautiful sea-board country of Lebanon will be the most deeply saddened by the turn of events over the past ten or so days.
I dug up a letter I wrote about my own experience in Lebanon almost exactly four years ago. The following is a slightly edited extract:
Happy as my experience was at the ruins, my best story came from the bus ride down to Tyre. I sat talking with this soldier named Danny for most of the hour and a half trip. He was in the middle of his year of service, and was on his way for a stint in the south. He was very young and spoke little English.. something not too common. But he loved rap music, and was part of what he called an Arabic rap group. The more bewildering sections of our talk came when he tried to describe songs by Tupac or Eminem. Then I got a further surprise as I had to talk about favorite alcoholic drinks with this young Muslim. Do I like vodka? Do I like Mexican beer? He knew a little more than me on this score. And he is an example of how much more liberal the Lebanese are than others in the Middle East.
About half way down the road to Tyre.. a road which followed the Mediterranean coastline closely.. a beautiful girl and her mother got on the bus and sat in the row ahead of us. This guy asked me, in a voice that was a little loud, how I liked the girls in Lebanon.. nodding ahead of us at this new arrival. I coughed that they were indeed nice looking. A little time passes and this girl, to give her mother a little more space, comes to the back row and sits at the window, next to me. Soon Danny has to get out to catch his connection to some base or other, and I am left next to this girl, alone. I stayed quiet for a while.. I was a little unnerved by the presence of the mother directly in front of me.. but when we got close to Tyre, I started asking the girl some questions. She was a Muslim from Sidon, going to Tyre to buy clothes with her mom. Before I knew it she was smiling and we were talking! She spoke no English, but loved America... This may seem like no big deal, but after Cairo it was like a breath of fresh air to be simply talking to a girl with no worries. To take the cake, when her mother decided to move to the back row she pointedly sat on the other side of me so that I and her daughter could continue to talk. When we got to Tyre we looked a little bewildered so they walked us to the start of the monuments, and the girl turned and said goodbye, leaving with a kind smile. I wanted to invite them to lunch or something, but I let them walk away. I thought maybe we would pass in Tyre, or maybe we would take the same bus home.. but neither happened.
Given their residence in the south of Lebanon, it is almost certain that this girl and her mother are today refugees. Yet look at her excitement to be talking with an American! What are we doing standing by and giving approval to the actions of Israel, when those actions are making us the enemy for millions of people.
But terrorism trumps everything? And the wise John Bolton, our ambassador to the United Nations, refers to Hezbollah in this way: "We unequivocally condemn the kidnapping by Hizballah, a terrorist organization, of two Israeli soldiers and call for their immediate and unconditional release" [quote source here]. I have no trouble unequivocally condemning the actions of Hezbollah, but it strikes me that the phrase "terrorist organization" is a little blunt. It calls to mind Bin Laden and the chaos sown by Zarqawi in Iraq. But no American in Lebanon as of two weeks ago had anything to fear from Hezbollah. I myself have walked through its strongholds, in the south and in the Bekaa Valley.. their yellow flags flying from the power poles.. but encountered nothing overtly hostile. That is not a defense of Hezbollah, which is a vicious enemy of Israel, but it is a warning that the American public is repeatedly presented with these words that muddy and blur the situation.. Lebanon is not Iraq, and Hezbollah is not al-Qaeda.
What is the goal here? Maybe there is a big picture that leaders have planned out.. but then I thought the same thing during the buildup and aftermath of the Iraq War, and I am now tempted to believe that there is no bigger picture, and that we (and Israel) are simply sowing lasting hatred toward ourselves.
Much ballyhooed has been the lack of outright condemnation from the main Sunni states (Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia).. but whatever the official response of these states, the battle for the hearts and minds of individuals is being won by the other side. The following is a cartoon that ran today in the Al-Ahram Weekly:
It is the face of Hassan Nasrallah, the head of Hezbollah. The caption under this cartoon read:
I illustrated Hassan Nasrallah as an outstanding hero, one who dared strike terror in the heart of Israel. He bombed Haifa. His Hizbullah have emerged as a widely-respected and hugely popular resistance movement throughout the Arab and Islamic worlds. His eyes are those of an eagle [nasr, with the letter "sin" means eagle], ready to prance on its prey. His mouth is round and frank—always ready to speak the truth.
Now there is much to roll one's eyes at in responses such as this.. and one dearly wishes that people in the Middle East could simply build up their world instead of lionizing (or eaglizing) those that wreck things.. but that is not my point: my point is what is our goal? And how is this wholesale destruction of a beautiful country, with beautiful citizens, benefiting our cause?
Al-Azhar without Theology: A Review of The Days by Taha Hussein, pt. 2
July 19, 2006
The second part of Taha Hussein's autobiography centers around the years in which he was connected to the great religious institution of al-Azhar in Islamic Cairo. It would be difficult for a person to recount so many years at Azhar and have less to say about religious matters. This is what we get instead:
An immense number of shoes used to be stolen at the Azhar, and innumerable were the notices posted on the walls round the court announcing the loss of a pair of shoes and calling upon the person who had got hold of them to return them to their owner at such and such a place, or in such and such a section, with the promise of a reward and threats of expulsion to anyone who kept them unlawfully. [207]
For anyone who goes to mosques and knows about leaving his shoes in the little wooden cubby-holes, this is enough to strike fear into the heart. I make sure I cast frequent glances back at my shoes. It is immensely amusing that Azhar.. the serious-minded religious institution.. suffered from shoe stealing.
But that's not all; here is another passage:
In front of him was a shop which played an important part in his life; it belonged to El-Hagg Firuz, who supplied the neighborhood with most of the necessities of life. In the morning he sold boiled beans, prepared in the usual variety of ways. But El-Hagg Firuz used to boast the special virtues of his beans—and raise their prices accordingly. He had plain beans, beans in fat, beans in butter, beans in every kind of oil... [109]
If one is looking for a description of what it felt like to be a student at Azhar.. the types of foods that students ate or the rooms that they lived in.. then this is a marvelous book. I daresay that is not what most religious folk will want from an account of life at Azhar.
The characters surrounding Taha Hussein also come in for lively description. There is the older student who has been at Azhar for years and years but never finishing (like a grad student hanging around an institution). There is the sweets seller living down the hall. There are the ridiculous professors who can't stand being questioned, and threaten one with a shoe. Taha Hussein lovingly portays this group of people clustered around the Azhar. In fact, these characters.. wastrels or clowns or peasants or sheikhs.. seem to finally become the reason for the book:
In all probability the experience of life and of human character which he gained there at first hand were at least as beneficial to him as the progress he made at the Azhar in grammar and logic, law and theology. [170]
Hussein provides a dreary list of the Azharite textbooks he had to get through, but these take second place to the education in people and personalities which Hussein acquired.
For a guy who periodically thinks about writing down his memories from Bible College, this book appeared to be a model. I would love to capture that little world where I spent three years on a flat prairie! And this is the spirit with which I would like to go about that task: to concentrate on the characters and the sounds.. not to talk about the abstruse theological points that actually filled our time in classes. Hussein is the master of the fond critique.
This emphasis on the texture of his experience and the characters that surrounded him should not lead one to think that Hussein was without intellectual curiosity. At his arrival at Azhar he was elated:
He felt the conviction of being in his own country, amongst his own people, and lost all sense of isolation, all sadness. His soul blossomed forth, and with every fibre of his being he yearned to discover... well, what? Something he was a stranger to, though he loved it and felt irresistibly drawn towards it—knowledge. [115]
The problem is that this love of knowledge leads him away from the stuffy rote lessons of the Azhar.. and toward a world in which he is more at home.. a world in which he will pass the rest of his life. That world can be summarized in one word: literature.
In describing his conversion from the turban to the tarboush.. that is, from the religious path to the secular path.. Hussein gives one of the most eloquent summaries of the value of literature, describing the life of the teacher who first opened up to him the study of literature:
Sheikh Marsafy was not merely a teacher, but a man of the broadest culture. In conversation or lectures at the Azhar he assumed all the gravity of a learned sheikh; but when he was alone with his intimate friends he lived the life of a humanist, conversing with perfect freedom on any subject under the sun and quoting the poetry and prose, yes, and the lives, of the ancients, to prove that they had been as free and unconstrained as he was and talked of everyone and everything with the same unhesitating candour as himself. [218]
That is a paragraph which will win Hussein a place in the honor role of Old Roads. Further, it hits close to home as I too had to learn to make the switch between theology and literature.. and to follow the intellectual path of a humanist.. free to converse about everything.. rather than a partisan.. even a partisan for God.
Multi-tasking Structures:
The Mosque/Khanqah/Mausoleum/
Madrasa/Sabil of Sultan Qaytbay (1472)
July 18, 2006
An odd feature of Islamic architecture in Cairo is the tendency for buildings to take on more and more tasks. Structures that in their earliest manifestations stand separately are finally bundled together into one mega-religious complex. It is as if someone realized that there is a lot more spiritual bang for the buck if you just do everything at the same time.
This kind of combinatoriness (a word I believe my wife coined) is especially a mark of the Circassian Mamluk Period (1382-1517). Doris Behrens-Abouseif comments:
At the end of the fourteenth century, which corresponds to the beginning of the Circassian Mamluk period, a change had taken place in the function of religious institutions, the origins of which had already started under the Bahri Mamluks. This was the drawing together of various institutions into the multi-functional religious complex. The madrasa-jami' combination has already been mentioned in connection with Sultan Hasan. Under... Barquq, the complex included a khanqah as well, thus forming a madrasa-khanqah-jami'. Later the functions of both the madrasa and the khanqah were reduced, so that every Friday mosque is called a madrasa, even without a teaching curriculum, and they all... had Sufi rites, though the Sufis no longer had to live in them. The khanqah had lost its monastic character. [19]
This makes it sound as if a large part of the structural combinatoriness was a watering-down of the various individual functions. If khanqahs and madrasas were losing their distinctiveness, then their connection into a single structure would be relatively simple.
The religious complex of Sultan Qaytbay (built in the generation following the death of al-Maqrizi) is an example of this combinatoriness:
This is the main entrance to the religious complex of Qaytbay. The portal is striking with its striped style, and to the left is the barred grill representing a sabil from which water was dispensed. Above the sabil is the traditional Kuttab where young students were instructed in the Qur'an. We have already seen the sabil-kuttab as a stand-alone structure, but now it is artfully set next to the entrance to a major religious complex. What is new about this building is not any one design feature, but the way old parts are put together.
This time I got to walk into the sabil and see what it was like. The marble floor has a small opening from which water could be drawn up from the cistern. And from here the water could be dispensed to those who came to the iron grill.
The portal leads to the splendid mosque interior. The basic form is recognizable: a central court surrounded on four sides by an arch.. the qiblah side (above) being the most extensive and ornate of the sides. What is different is that the court is not open, but given a wooden ceiling and painted wooden lantern (see first picture, above).
The interior of the mosque is beautiful, as this detail shows. It is also laden with tacky modern lamps, lime-green prayers rugs, and all the other kitschy adornments that come with a mosque in a poor neighborhood. This is the interesting challenge of almost every visit to a medieval Islamic site.. one must see the mosque for what it is and try not to blame it for a bad lamp.
On the wall hung a picture of the Haram in Mecca:
This is one of those images that every visitor to a mosque must become familiar with.. identify instantly. It is an image of the geographical heart of Islam.. where every Muslim longs to visit. Photos and representations of all sorts, big or small, glossy or sun-dulled.. they are everywhere. Christian churches may have their iconography of Mary and the risen Christ.. but an image of Mecca is as close to an iconic image as Islam comes.
Through a door in the mosque and a short passage one comes to the mausoleum, lined with stained glass windows. It is here that Qaytbay himself was buried:
But the interior of the mausoleum pales when compared to the mastery of the dome itself.. which features an intricate stone pattern:
That is a dome that shows up often in illustrated books on Islamic art and architecture. Behrens-Abouseif has a discussion of the difficulty of working an abstract pattern onto a curving shape. A number of attempts went into finding a solution to this difficulty—attempts to which this dome represents a culmination:
The dome on the mausoleum attached to Qaytbay's mosque in the cemetery shows that the designer for the first time reversed these principles. Instead of basing the pattern on the principle of a star applied on a decreasing, or triangular, base to apex surface, the star was designed for a circular surface, the center of which is the apex of the dome. Of course, unlike a flat circular area, the dome surface has irregularities. In this case they met with the star pattern not near the apex, but nearer to the base of the dome, where the lines resulting from the central star at the apex have to be logically continued. Thus, the design of Qaytbay's dome is made from a bird's eye view... [23]
I won't even try to unpack all that. But it gives a sense of the hidden difficulty in designing a dome that stands so perfectly. It was not a matter of just making a lot of criss-crossing lines that met in stars, but the curves of the dome itself have to be considered.
Behrens-Abouseif continues:
This is perhaps the most beautiful carved stone dome in Cairo, and it seems to have discouraged any imitations. Afterwards, masons were content with repetitive geometric or floral patterns, such as those seen on the domes of... [24]
This dome also serves as a fitting conclusion to this look at a multi-tasking religious complex. The place for creativity has shifted from large scale generic changes, to the work of integrating multiple old forms into a single structure. Along with that effort came the perfection of earlier forms.. such as the beautiful solution to the question of the design of a dome.
Cairo's City of the Dead
July 17, 2006
A "City of the Dead" is a hard idea to get one's head around. It can be explained most simply by the fact that what once were large cemeteries have now become neighborhoods.. and thus literally these cemeteries are cities, complete with apartments and shops. The funerary monuments that form the background to the neighborhood range from small to monumental. In the above picture you can see two towering Mamluk era mausoleums.. while in other cases the grave is marked by only a small marker:
There are two major medieval cemeteries in Cairo. The first is to the south of the modern city, and the other to the west. The cemetery to the south is the home for the mausoleum to the Imam al-Shafi'a, and was the oldest of Cairo's cemeteries (lying outside Fustat). By the time of the Mamluks, after the city center had established itself further to the north, the burial zone of choice ranged to the west of the city, filling a slice of land to the north of the citadel. Below is a picture of this cemetery as the French saw it around 1800 when Napoleon invaded (and set the artists of the Description d' l'Egypte at work):
That is a wall of the citadel on the right, and down below you can see the band of mausoleums and funerary structures that makes up what is now called the "Northern Cemetery." Anyone who knows Cairo, however, will be somewhat shocked to see all that empty space.. but here the cemetery appears as it must have in the centuries before 1800, as a ghost-like place sitting isolated outside the city proper.
Ghostly maybe, but that does not mean this area would have been devoid of residents. In fact a number of large Khanqahs were constructed in this area during the 14th and 15th centuries. The picture above is a photo of the entrance passageway for the Khanqah of Sultan Barquq (1382). Like the other Khanqahs, this one too would have housed Sufis, and younger students would have come for the Kuttab. So this cannot be imagined even in the early days as a cemetery in the way that we like to imagine them, but as a realm of the dead which inevitably included the living.
The book The Fellahin of Upper Egypt by Winifred Blackman provides an interesting description of popular Egyptian funerary customs:
One day a week—in some parts of Egypt on Thursday, in others on Friday—the villagers pay a visit to the graves of their relations and friends. The ceremony is called et-Tala', meaning the coming forth or going up. Many of the cemeteries are situated in the lower desert, and this name may have been given because the people always spoke of 'going up' to and 'descending' from the desert... A number of fukaha [scholars] were always present on these occasions, as it was their business to recite various passages from the Koran by the gravesides, for which purpose they are hired by the visitors. Some of the women brought with them large baskets full of bread-rings, and with these they rewarded the fukaha for their recitations, which are believed to be of great benefit to the dead. [117-18]
This is an account of village life in upper Egypt.. but it is not hard to reason from this to the value that a large endowed mausoleum would have for earlier Mamluk rulers. It was a way ensure Qur'an recitations and other beneficial actions at the site of his grave. From the popularity of visiting the dead we can also understand why these zones for the dead outside Cairo could never be really empty.. but were always cities: the visitation of these sites was such a regular feature of life that a service industry was demanded.. and that in turn meant residents.
The size for the mausoelums varies greatly. In the foreground above is the "Tomb of the Seven Maidens" from the mid-15th century, while in the background is the "Tomb of al-Rifa'i" from the 16th century. In both cases these are relatively small structures standing by themselves. They have a dome with a single chamber underneath. This would have been the place that mourning and Qur'an recitations took place. The majority of these small monuments are literally mouldering away, the trash collecting along their walls:
Obviously the "seven maidens" are not getting a lot of visits these days..
Along with these smaller monuments come the really monumental structures. The Khanqah of Barquq is an example of just how large these buildings could get.
At either end of the qiblah side of the structure are two domes, underneath which are the graves of the members of the family of Barquq.. it seemed to be the women who were buried on the right side and the men on the left. The tomb of Barquq himself is below, covered with dust:
Barquq's mausoleum is better preserved than that of the "seven maidens".. but I don't think he is getting much more in the way of prayers. Why do humans always seem to think that they will be remembered for so long? In its own way these Islamic mausoleums can be viewed with the same level of irony as we approach the ancient Egyptian monuments for the dead.. with their monumental statues falling head first into the dirt. In this case we have ornate marble lined interiors covered with dust..
Up above is a splendid dome, and these domes give the voice a splendid echo.. I imagine it would be perfect for reading the Qur'an. Although I cannot say just what historically made the connection between burial and a dome.. but as you drive through the outskirts of Cairo and see the ornate domes, you can know that each one of them marks a tomb.
The dual stone domes in the Khanqah of Sultan Barquq are the largest stone domes in Cairo (that of Imam Shafi'a being wooden):
The Unexpected Consequences of a Story:
Preservation, pt. 5
July 15, 2006
One of the most popular medieval traditions concerning the pyramids at Giza is that of a supposed challenge from their builder, inscribed on the surface of the pyramid. Here is the version provided by Mas'udi in the 10th century:
...the following is written: “We constructed these pyramids, so whoever is thought to be our equal in sovereignty, attainment of power, and perfection in strength, let him destroy these pyramids and efface its inscriptions. Although to destroy is easier than to construct, and taking apart is easier than to put together." It is related that one of the Muslim kings began to destroy a few of them, but then the land tax was not sufficient for their tearing down.
Interestingly, al-Masudi intimates that a Muslim ruler had made an attempt at destroying the pyramids, but failed. Since the inscription itself is obviously apocryphal, it is tempting to think that maybe this failure led to the popularity of this tradition: the pyramids as standing challenges for rulers who come later.
Early in the 12th century, Abu al-Salt al-Andalusi provided a fuller version of the story:
[The Copts] assert that the builder of the pyramids was Surid, who did so on account of a vision he saw. The contents of this vision was that harm would come down from the sky, and that this harm would be a great flood. They say he built the two pyramids in the time of six months and covered them with a colored silk brocade. He wrote upon the pyramids: “We built them in six months. Tell whoever comes after us to destroy them in 600 years—yet to destroy is easier than to construct. We clothed them with colored silk, but let him clothe them in mats—yet mats are of less value than silk.”
This marks a conflation of the original tradition with the tradition concerning Surid, the supposed builder of the pyramids. In its earliest versions the challenge is simply written on the pyramid, and not tied to a specific king.. but now it has been brought into the orbit of a specific (although fictional) king.
This story was clearly in the air.. and now things get serious. At the death of Salah al-Din in 1193, his son Uthman took over as Ayyubid Sultan in Egypt. It was under this ruler that the most sustained attack against a pyramid took place:
Malik Aziz ‘Uthman ibn Salah al-Din Yusaf ibn Ayyub when he possessed sovereignty for himself following his father, ignorant ones among his friends enticed him to destroy these pyramids. He began with the small red pyramid and sent out to it excavators and stone workers, along with a group composed of the princes of his country and great ones of his kingdom. He ordered them to destroy this pyramid.
This is the account given by 'Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi early in the 13th century.. just a few years after the death of Uthman. Mysterious in his account, though, is just how his friends could "entice" him to destroy the pyramids. I can see friends enticing a king to, say, make a land grab or to raise taxes.. but to destroy the pyramids? One tries hard to imagine that conversation: "Uthman, why don't you spend millions and tear down the pyramids! Just for fun!" But I think we have to recall the popular tradition about the written challenge on the pyramids.. directed at later rulers. Suddenly an effort to destroy the pyramids becomes easier to understand. Their destruction would be a declaration of a later king's greatness. And for the son of Salah al-Din some such public declaration may have been important.
So he set about destroying the "red pyramid." None of the pyramids at Giza are today known as the red pyramid.. but in fact the smaller pyramid of Menkaure was once mostly covered in the reddish tinted Aswan granite. You can still see the lower portions of this covering:
Covered with those granite blocks, it could indeed be called the "red pyramid." These granite blocks, however, are present only on the lowest portions of it, which would have been covered with sand and debris (and thus spared).
Notice in the above photo the litter of blocks in front of the pyramid. It seems like a war zone.. and in some ways it was a war—aimed at a pyramid. 'Abd al-Latif gives a vivid description of what happened after Uthman was enticed:
So [his men] pitched camp nearby and the men and laborers gathered. They economized with respect to their expenses and occupied themselves for 8 months, with horses and with their own effort, destroying each day, after strain and exertion and the expending of great pains, one or two stones. People above would dislodge a stone with wedges; the people below would pull it with cables and ropes. When the stone fell, a great crash was heard from far away, to the point that mountains trembled and the earth shook, and the stone plunged into the sand... When their stay lengthened, their support dwindled, their fatigue multiplied, and their determination became feeble, they desisted, pained that they did not accomplish their desire, but had rather disfigured the pyramid and made plain their inability and failure. That was in the year 1196/7 AD.
Looking at the jumble of stones lying at the base of this pyramd, one can almost imagine the scene.. rocks falling, etc.. And there can be no doubt that they disfigured the pyramid: note the blunt scar on its face:
In the end, the joke is on Uthman. He has supported a large contingent of men for eight months, and they have hardly touched the smallest (!) of the three main pyramids at Giza. 'Abd al-Latif notes trenchantly:
One looking at the stones of this pyramid would think that it had been wholly destroyed. Then one gazing at the pyramid would think that nothing of it had been destroyed, rather that some of its side had fallen away.
All that work and the pyramid still looks whole! And visitors today would hardly realize that a war had been waged against it.. although seeing the piled up stones they should probably suspect that something was up.
We learn a couple of interesting points here. First, the pyramids were understood as a statement of power long past. Contemporary rulers could not tear them down, let alone build something like a pyramid. Second, and most important for our theme of preservation.. we see how important a story can be. The stories that are generated by a culture can have unintended consequences on physical structures. In this case a brash king appears to have seen in the story a chance to prove himself.. and to take advantage of the cultural meaning of the pyramids. Thankfully, he ended up being the perfect example of failure.. but let us never underestimate the power of a simple story, nor the damage it can do.
Medieval Appreciation for the Pyramids:
pt. 2
July 14, 2006
The picture is from a Coptic church nestled up against the Muqattam Hills of Cairo. Scores of biblical scenes have been carved into the wall, but this one caught me eye. The scene is of the Holy Family as they make their way through Egypt. The New Testament spends only a verse or two mentioning that they spent time in Egypt to escape Herod's persecution, but Coptic literature took that hint and ran with it until today there is even a lengthy and well-mapped itinerary for their time in Egypt.
The placement of the pyramids in the background is important.. the three classic pyramids of Giza (although here each the same size). These pyramids were useful to the artist because they definitively make the setting Egyptian.. But their presence also constitutes an unspoken argument for preservation. That argument goes something like this: the sites and places that formed the background of the visit of the Holy Family should be preserved.. or are at least worthy of a high level of respect. After viewing representations such as this a Copt can look at the pyramids and think: I am looking at the same structure that Mary and Joseph looked upon.
In his book on the pyramids al-Idrisi spends several sections recounting the important people who have visited the pyramids. One section begins with the heading: "Mention of Who Paid a Visit Here from among the Prophets..." Al-Idrisi continues after that heading with a list:
Idris [Enoch], Abraham the Friend of God, Jacob, Joseph the trusty... Moses the mouthpiece of God, his brother Harun, and his youth Joshua son of Nun... and Jeremiah... All of these that we have mentioned in the way of prophets, peace be upon them, their laudable feet trod the wide river bed of the pyramids and their far-ranging glances wandered in hope of them. The city of the king at that time in Egypt was Minf [Memphis]. Everyone who arrived there from the regions of the Levant did not continue on except after passing the pyramids and crossing over to them.
As for Moses, upon him be peace, his brother Harun, and his youth Joshua son of Nun, Minf was the nest which they outgrew, and from which, fleeing the Pharaoh with all the tribes of the sons of Israel, they departed. And all the histories testify to Abraham's seeking of refuge to Egypt after his exit from Haran, and to the story of him with the king of Egypt Tawtis... They testify also to the arrival of Jacob there, and Joseph and his brothers, about which the Qur'an testifies in its place. As for Idris [Enoch], it is said that he was the king of Egypt in long past times, and that he was the erector of the pyramids, their builder, and the one who deposited the secrets of wisdom in them. People among the oldest of historians insist that his body is in one of the pyramids, and because of the veracity of that, the Sabaeans make pilgrimage to them... [20-21]
None of these sketches (except the one Idris at the end) actually place the characters at the pyramids, but the argument is that since the capital of Pharaonic Egypt was Minf, close to the location of the pyramids, each of these figures must have been knowledgeable of them.. and looked longingly at them in the distance.
After this section al-Idrisi goes on to provide another section about the companions of the prophet who stayed in Egypt.. arguing that before the Muslim armies split up, some going to Alexandria and others south, they camped near the pyramids. The following chapter recounts the Caliphs and famous persons who in Islamic times have spent time at the pyramids.. the Caliph al-Ma'mun being the posterboy for pyramid visitation.
So what is the point in all this time spent by al-Idrisi recounting who has been to the pyramids? It is part of a strategy for justifying the value of the pyramids.. sort of an extended textual version of the picture at the head of this blog. For every important personage that has camped in the shape of the pyramids, they gain that much more importance and justification. A Muslim could look over at the pyramids and imagine the far-gazing glances of those who came before.
By the way, before all the build-up in and around Cairo the pyramids were much easier to see.. The following is a picture I found in the Description de l'Egypte, showing how easily the pyramids could be seen from Fustat (actually the island of Rawdah):
Those Muslims sitting under the tree could be thinking about how those pyramids formed the background for so many different stories, from biblical figures to historical Muslim rulers. In being mentally transformed into the background for so many events, the pyramids start to take on some of that same importance. This kind of popularized association lays the groundwork for a culture of preservation.
Visiting the Women:
Shrines to Three Sayiddas
July 12, 2006
Perhaps because I am missing my own dear sayyida (Emily returned to the US early Monday morning), I went to visit some shrines dedicated to sayyidas. In the Fatimid period (969-1171 AD) a number of shrines were constructed or restored—a high percentage dedicated to women.
An article by Caroline Williams ("The Cult of 'Alid Saints in the Fatimid Monuments of Cairo" Muqarnas 2 (1984), 39-57) manages to historicize these shrines. The Fatimids, recall, were the ones who established Cairo proper, a square kilometer dominated by their private palaces. Fatimid religious practices were initially exclusive, and shrines for the dead established within the palaces themselves.. i.e. they were not meant to be visited by the population at large. The Fatimids suffered a series of crises beginning at the end of the 11th century and continuing into the 12th, and it was during this time.. when they were no longer dealing from a position of strength.. that the leaders involved themselves in the construction of shrines. These shrines are united in their dedication to members of the 'Alid family (loyalty to 'Ali being the principal definition for Shi'a Islam). The Fatimids traced their lineage back to 'Ali, and they seem to have tried to stengthen their claims to legitimacy by encouraging the religious cult related to early 'Alid residents of the Fustat/Cairo. It is as if a dynasty from Sweden took over the United States, and looked for earlier branches of their family that had migrated to the United States a few centuries earlier.. in order to venerate them, and creating by that means the impression of their longevity. These shrines, then, were part of a political program.
That program is lost today.. but the shrines remain. Often the shrines have been reconstructed or rehoused.. so they are not always the most historic of buildings.. but their origins go back to the Fatimid period, about 900 years ago.
1. Sayidda Nafisa
Sayyida Nafisa was four steps removed from 'Ali and migrated from the Hijaz in Arabia to the Arab capital of Fustat in Egypt. Her grave appears to have been revered from early on: "She was buried in her house in a grave reportedly dug by her own hands. Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Khallikan says: 'The spot on which her house stood is now occupied be her mausoleum... This tomb has a great reputation, experience having shown that prayers said near it are answered'" (40). So the movement was from private house burial to the development of a shrine at that same place. Even before the Fatimids arrive on the scene these early saints were revered in a popular cult..
The mosque that now houses the shrine to Sayyida Nafisa is a manifestly modern building. The decorations and style being obviously of recent construction. Walking through the mosque proper one is hard pressed to distinguish it from others. There is the usual sleepfest:
Past this open area is a hallway featuring multiple pious pictures and texts. The dominant image is of the mosques in Mecca and Medina. Other framed hangings contain the 99 names of God or sections from the Qur'an. Below is the hall and then a detail of the kinds of pictures that line the wall:
At the end of the hall comes the shrine itself, bathed in the usual greenish fluorescent lights. The shrine is surrounded by a silver cover, and it is here that people give a show of veneration. Inside the metal cover is a tomb whose head is decked out in what looks like a wedding dress, and draped with silk. My favorite part of the picture below is the dangling bottle of Windex on the left, which, yes, I am sure is an important part of running a shrine like this.. with all the touching and kissing that is liable to smear windows.
2. Sayyida Ruqayya
Sayyida Ruqayya was a daughter of 'Ali and buried in Damascus. It is therefore strange that a shrine would be constructed for her in Cairo, but it appears to have been inspired by a dream. There is no reason, of course, to doubt the dream, but there is good reason to think that the Fatimids at this point in the early 12th century were more than happy to make use of it to mark more firmly their own waning legitimacy.
Once again the shrine itself is located within a silver casing, which visitors will kiss or rub in a show of veneration. The actual building that houses the shrine is from the 12th century.. and its diminutive size gives a sense of how the other shrines (which have been enlarged in recent centuries) would probably have looked in their Fatimid context. We are talking about a small domed building:
Behind the shrine itself is an original stucco prayer niche. It was hard to get a good picture of the niche because the metal shrine is now so imposing.. again a clue to the much more diminutive original setting. The prayer niche is quite striking (note again the dim green atmosphere):
3. Sayyida Zaynab
Who was Sayyida Zaynab? Caroline Williams in a footnote writes: "Most people in Cairo today believe that the Zaynab honored here is the sister of al-Husayn who survived the massacre at Karbala, even though she died and is buried in Medina" (58). This Zaynab was actually a more obscure figure, the niece of the above mentioned Sayyida Nafisa (44). Again, an early 'Alid resident of Cairo around whom their gradually developed a cult.. which was then encouraged by the Fatimids through building and restoration projects.
My only previous visit to this mosque came during a night visit to a Mulid.. which is a carnival-like celebration of a saint. It is generally an annual celebration. The Mulid at Sayyida Zaynab is quite large.. and I will testify that it is deafeningly loud and crowded with people, from the young to the sick. At the heart of the mosque is the shrine dedicated to Sayyida Zaynab. This was by far the most crowded of the three Sayyidas I visited today:
These are all men; the women are once again behind a wooden screen.. You can see the men rubbing the silver shrine cover.. and making signs of veneration. Along the wall are men sitting and praying or reading the Qur'an. The covering itself is beautiful, covered with silver and worked into marvelous patterns:
To sum up, then, we have seen how the original system of shrines was encouraged by the Fatimids, who were looking to take advantage of popular devotion to saints to build loyalty to their reign. But as the pictures above show, this original context is long past.. and the Sayyidas are now a part of popular Cairo religiosity. These shrines outgrew their context.. but the popular devotion to them continued and new contexts evolved. Today these shrines are a part of popular Sunni religious devotion.
But let's return to that original context briefly and ask the question: why all these women?? Williams has a speculative answer to that question:
The preponderance of female saints might be due also to their general appeal to the women of Fustat whose chief social and religious outlet was in the visitation of the dead in the Qarafa [Cemetery], and through whose sentiments their male kin might also be attracted to the dynasty. All these points indicate either an atmosphere of religious fervor for the saints or official manipulation to create such an atmosphere or, probably, both. [54]
These shrines are the living testimony of a failing dynasty whose final pitch was to stoke the religious emotions of its subjects.. and identify itself with those emotions.
Sayyid Harby
In conclusion I would like to mention my driver for the day: Harby. I am currently convinced that he is the coolest cat in Cairo. He knows all the local places, the dates for the mulids, and details of popular devotion. He seems to know people everywhere he goes.. which he explained to me is because he comes from a large family (9 kids). I also think he attends a lot of the popular religious festivals.. and knows people by means of that as well. His taxi haunt is out in front of Coptic Cairo.. that is where I first met him, and where I will be meeting him at least a couple more times.
Housing a Head:
The Mosque of Vizier Salih Tala'i (1160)
July 11, 2006
With my visit to the mosque of the Vizier Salih Tala'i I complete my round of the Fatimid mosques of Cairo. This one was originally constructed to house the head of al-Husayn—the grandson of the prophet Muhammad and son of Ali. This is the Husayn who is mourned by Shi'as every year on the day called Ashura. The images of Shi'as striking and bloodying themselves are part of the annual mourning for Husayn, who was killed at the battle of Karbala in 680 AD. The Fatimids were Shi'as, and sought to bring the head of Husayn to their own capital city. The story is told by Maqrizi:
This mosque is among those constructed in the time of the Fatimids. It is outside The Zuweila Gate. Ibn 'Abd al-Zahir said: Salih Tala'i ibn Razik, when he feared for an attack by the Crusaders against the shrine of Imam Husayn, God be satisfied with him, since it was in the city of Askalon [i.e. in the Levant], determined to transfer it. He had built this mosque to bury the head in it, but when he finished it the Caliph would not allow that, and said: "It will not be anywhere except inside the palaces. The caliph built the shrine which is there now, and buried the head inside it. [2:293]
So the mosque was part of an aborted plan to create a house for the head of Husayn. The Caliph apparently decided that this particular head was too important for a vizier's mosque.. and gave it a special place within his own palaces. Today the head is still in the same place. The palaces are gone, but a mosque was put up to house the shrine.. and so far as I know this is the only mosque in Cairo which tourists are not allowed to enter..
It is worth noting that there are many claimants to the head of Husayn in the Muslim world. The Encyclopedia of Islam lists the following: 1) Najaf (in Iraq), 2) outside Kufa (Iraq), 3) Karbala (Iraq), 4) Medina (Arabia), 5) somewhere in Damascus, 6) al-Rakka (Syria), and 7) in Cairo at the mosque of Husayn. So if you want to pay your respects you have some choices to make.
The exterior is hardly covered with decorations, but various medallions and designs adorn the walls.. making them lively to look at.. much more so than on an early mosque such as that of ibn Tulun. It is tempting to call Fatimid mosques the most aesthetically pleasing of Cairo's mosques. The goal is not to dazzle, but to present a well-ordered space dotted with designs.
Evident here is a detail that is often no longer visible: the presence of places for shops beneath the mosque. These are a feature one reads about often in descriptions such as those by Maqrizi. When a Sultan or any wealthy person built a mosque or other religious structure, he set aside properties whose profits were dedicated to the upkeep of said structure. Many mosques were even built with places for shops underneath the mosque itself.. at the original ground level. I associate these kinds of dedicated properties much more with the Mamluk system, and it is possible that these were built and added later in the history of the mosque (which was extensively restored after the 1303 earthquake). But nevertheless, they are clearly present:
The interior of the mosque has been rebuilt, but there are places where the restorers have left original stucco designs:
This mosque has a square open courtyard surrounded on all four sides by an arcade with columns. The qiblah side of the mosque is "thicker", in that it has a succession of columned rows, ending in the prayer niche pointing the way to Mecca.
It was again interesting to notice the make-shift addition of a women's prayer area. I still can't decide if this is an advance or not on past practices.. But no woman is going to distract a man from behind that partition!
The mosque itself is situated right in front of the Zuweila Gate, which is unique for its twin minarets.. markers for the mosque of Sultan Mu'ayyad, located right behind the gate (the subject of a future blog). The minarets give this gate a memorable front:
This stone gate was added a good bit after the mosque of Salih Tala'i, but it was built up in the same place as the earlier Fatimid gate. In fact to the right of this gate one can glimpse some of the ruins of the old Fatimid brick wall.. which would have overlooked this mosque:
And if you ever want a sheesha pipe, you might consider coming down to the Zuweila Gate..
Medieval Appreciation for the Pyramids:
pt. 1
July 10/11, 2006
My project this summer centers on a chapter about the pyramids in the mammoth Khitat by al-Maqrizi. In the process of working through a translation and introduction to this chapter, I came across a very different medieval work on the pyramids, commonly referred to as the Anwar, and written by al-Idrisi (d. 1251 AD). This short work was not nearly as popular as al-Maqrizi's Khitat. The oldest surviving manuscript comes from the 17th century library of an Ottoman philologist who was himself working on a book about the pyramids. Al-Idrisi sets down some interesting arguments for the importance of the pyramids.. specifically, he answers the nagging question: why care about monuments that are foreign to your own tradition? It is a question that lies at the heart of preservation.. I plan on devoting a few blogs to an examination of al-Idrisi's arguments on this point.
The following is a report given by al-Idrisi:
Myself and a man among the eminent westerners in Egypt, came together at a sitting of Zakaria al-Biyasi aimed at the gathering of his precious pearls in the craft of medicine and the science of education. We had on that day settled down at a place from the Book of Cones and Their Forming, and we paid attention to the commentary of the man on the origin of their shape. There occurred in what we were going over from our study a mention of the forming of fiery bodies as translunar masses (?), so we compelled him to a discussion of the traditions of the pyramids. We closed our talk finally in a discussion about the secrets of the pyramids. We broke up our study with a maxim about the beautiful blossoms of reports about them.
The eminent fellow who had come to us from the Maghreb, a newcomer arriving amongst us, said: Seeking knowledge of wisdom and right conduct I used to frequent the house of a learned man from among the learned men of my country, and he stoked the notion of a determination for the Hajj in my heart. So I said goodbye and traveled the various stages, famished all the while. I did not intend anything but the Hajj and the visitation [to Medina]. When I had spent my stop with the customs and details which people commonly go on about, it was enough. I hastened to return and get back to my land. When I arrived in the country and got down from my camel, I set forth right away...
I attended a sitting of the Skeikh al-Fadil al-Hakim, seeking benefit from him and education. He met me with welcome and honor and awe. Then he said: "Tell me about the pyramids of Egypt and what you saw of them!" and he produced a [blank] page for what I might relate about them in the way of reports. I said to him: "Teacher, I don't have any sort of observation of them which I could relate or convey to you as a true tradition. So he responded: "Base in his zeal for seeking knowledge and wisdom is the one who does not turn from his determination [for the hajj] to see the likes of the pyramids when he is staying nearby, and whose desire is not agitated—that is, his desire to observe what he is able of concealed wonders. What could have stood between you and reports about the pyramids, and a testimony for me about what you witnessed of them? Only the gallop of your mount or the shoving off of a boat! It is appropriate for every mean person to be zealous to not be among the people of blind copying of the precious jewels of wisdom. So do not return to me after this day for the reading of books about wisdom and correct manners!"
So I traveled right away to Egypt, for toward no goal did I shoot from the bow of my desire, except to see the pyramids.
The basic setting is in a scholarly "sitting" (majlis) in Egypt, and one guy who is from somewhere in North Africa tells a story of his Hajj, taken on the cheap, in which he neglected to see the pyramids. The result was a tongue lashing from his teacher back home. This generally conforms to what we find in Arabic travel narratives. Both Ibn Jubayr and Ibn Battuta are sure to mention the pyramids and other ancient Egyptian ruins. It seems that these monuments were on every pilgrim's "must see" list. At the same time, it is striking that the above tale does not represent any kind of "popular view" with respect to the pyramids.. the tale involves a reading group that seems to be dedicated to somewhat abstruse knowledge.. not exactly the "traditionalist club."
The marrow of the report is contained in the exchange between the sheikh and the hapless pilgrim. That poor pilgrim, having completed the Hajj "famished", returns with joy, only to have the first question be: "What did you think of the pyramids?" That would be deflating. But the words of the sheikh, while a little hard, are the important part of the report. They allow us to glimpse that the pyramids had an independent importance among certain quarters of the Islamic world.
That importance seems to be summed up by the word "wonder." The idea of "wonders of the world" goes back to Classical times, and continues strong in the Islamic period. But it is clear from this story that "wonders of the world" is not simply an abstract category, but refers to sites that are apt to produce a strong desire to observe them on the part of human beings. A "wonder" is not a passive site, but powerful in its own right. A traveler who gallops past or shoves off without witnessing it is shown to be devoid of a sharp human feeling. It is possible that the invention of photography has cheapened the sense that a site carries with it this force of wonder. We no longer feel to the same extent that sites carry with them the power of "wonder." But at least through the Medieval periods monuments still possessed this force. I we look for an explanation as to why people found importance in monuments from the past, then it is to an exegesis of the word "wonder" that we must turn.
The Passion of Superman
July 8, 2006
I've had enough of Jesusification in movies. How many times could they hammer home the point that Superman is like Jesus? He has a miraculous birth. He comes to do good for human beings. He dies only to be resurrected.. making his resurrection flight against the background of a brilliant sunrise. Lois Lane writes an article at the end on "why the world needs Superman." At the end Superman reassures her that he will always be present. There is also the scene in which Superman ascends above the earth and is overwhelmed with the cries for help.. you must read the passage about Jesus weeping over Jerusalem to follow the import there. I wonder if they got Gerson to help with the screenplay? It is as if Hollywood has decided that "values voters" and Mel Gibson fans must be catered to whenever possible.. and that just reminds me why mainstream cinema is so uninteresting. Cut it out!
From another point of view it may say something about America's view of Jesus that he is a figure so easily assimilated to superhero plot-lines.
No matter how bad these superhero films are, they carry some cultural interest with them. There is the oddity of a distrust of technology and skill. Of course the film entrusts itself entirely to special affects.. so that is not what I mean. Within the movie Lex Luthor is a brilliant (though evil) man who is out to harness new technology. Superman on the other hand is the "natural".. straight out of the heartland of America.. true blue.. born with his powers.
In many of the other superhero films that I have seen, there is a similar breakdown among the characters: techno-savvy and artificial bad guy.. naturally powerful good guy. But who are we in America? Are we not the people who trust more than anyone else in the power of technology to meet our needs? On the eve of war don't magazines feature layouts explaining the artificial technological boosts with which our soldiers are equipped? Don't we rely on scientists and researchers to make our lives easier? Yet if you watch our superhero films you would think that all hard-working techno-savvy thinkers are bad guys, and that good guys are naturals.. From the vantage point of a few centuries that will be curious indeed. There is something in our superheroes that is foreign to our own character.. as if we were longing for something.
Happy Birthday Emily!!
July 7, 2006
This is my chance to give a sappy tribute to Emily on her 29th birthd