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 Ibn
Khaldoun
From:
La Revue Phénicienne
Les Arabes d’après leurs plus grands écrivains
The
Man
Although it is often said that he preferred study to public office,
Ibn Khaldoun had a strong tendency to concern himself with political
matters, which he was inclined to do on account of his wide learning
and sound judgment.
So it is that his life was intimately bound up with the political
history of the Arabs of Tunis, Fez, Spain, Syria and Egypt toward
the middle of the fourteenth century. The destiny of Ibn Khaldoun
was affected by all the swings of fortune of the different forces
in conflict with one another.
He came from the Kinda tribe in Hadramout. His ancestor Khaled,
who came with an army into Spain in the third century of the Hegira,
had given his name to the family Beni Khaldoun settled in Carmona,
then in Seville, and finally in Tunis, where Ibn Khaldoun was born
on 27th May, 1332.
After finishing his studies, he entered service with the Hafsid
sultan Abu Ishac Ibrahim, but had to seek refuge in Ceuta after
the defeat of the latter. When his protector had managed to settle
his affairs, Ibn Khaldoun was recalled, but had hardly begun to
enjoy the favor of the court when he was flung into prison on the
pretext of treason, for his friendship with the Emir of Bougie did
not have his patron’s approval. Once free again thanks to a change
in authority, he won the friendship of Sultan Abu Abdallah Ibn el-Ahmar,
who after seizing the kingdom of Grenada from his brother Ismaïl
charged Ibn Khaldoun with a mission in Castile to conclude peace
with the ruler Don Pedro. There the jealous intrigues of his compatriots
obliged him to return to Abu Abdallah Mohammed, his fellow-prisoner
in Fez, who had just entered into possession of Bougie and who reserved
him the office of Grand Chamberlain and regent of the kingdom. This
good fortune could last no longer than the peace. The prince of
Constantine having beaten Abdallah Mohammed, Ibn Khaldoun handed
over the keys to the conqueror, without however managing to obtain
his trust. He was soon obliged to seek refuge with Abdel Aziz, who
had driven Abu Hamdu out of Tlemcen. On the death of Abdel Aziz
Ibn Khaldoun attached himself to Abul-Abbas and Abder-Rahman, who
had divided the government between them. Suspect of being inclined
towards the first of these joint rulers, he was imprisoned by the
second. Then having managed to flee to Spain, he was grandly received
by Ibn al-Ahmar at Grenada; but he soon fell into disgrace and returned
to Tlemcen just in time to find Abu Hamdu back on the throne. Charged
with the mission of rallying the Bedouins to the party of Abu Hamdu,
he spent four years in the castle of a minor princeling at Kalaat
Ibn Salama, where he composed his celebrated Prolegomena and his
great work on the history of the Berbers.
But the misfortunes of Ibn Khaldoun had not come to an end yet.
So long as there were Arab princes disputing power – as there always
will be – Ibn Khaldoun suffered the most unexpected reversals of
fortune.
His former co-disciple and friend Ibn Arafa, now Mufti of Tunis,
having represented him as a dangerous individual, on the pretext
of a pilgrimage to Mecca Ibn Khaldoun went off to Cairo. There the
students crowded round his house and implored him to stay in Egypt
to be their teacher. Ibn Khaldoun agreed and the sultan Barkok,
despite his unwillingness, appointed him chief Malekite judge and
agreed to release him from his high office only after his family,
whom he had recalled from Tunis, perished in a shipwreck. He was
still suffering from stress after this new misfortune when he was
obliged to take up his function as judge again, one which he exercised
until the year 1400 under Barkok’s successor Malika Nassir Foraj.
This prince threw him into prison and then released him, finally
taking him with him to Syria in his celebrated campaign against
Timur Leng. This expedition having degenerated into a disastrous
retreat, Ibn Khaldoun secretly left Damascus and presented himself
to the Tartar victor, who gave him back his post as judge in Cairo,
a post which he lost and regained several times, until his death
on 20th March, 1406.
This brief survey of the life of Ibn Khaldoun is only the summary
of one page of the history of the Arabs in Mediterranean Africa.
The annals of their conquests are always complicated by the endless
and most disconcerting story of disorder, intrigue, party struggles,
disputes for power, intestine wars and the greatest social disorganization
imaginable.
The
Writer
Ibn Khaldoun left us the Kitab el’bar, of which two manuscripts,
unfortunately incomplete, have recently been discovered at Constantinople
and at Constantine.
This work is divided into three parts:
1- The Prolegomena, translated into French by Mac
Guckin de Slane in Notices et Extraits des manuscrits (Bibliothèque
impériale) after Quatemère (Etienne) had published
the Arabic text in the same collection.
2- History of the Arabs and Neighboring Peoples,
History of the Berbers and Muslim Dynasties of North Africa, published
and translated into French by Slane at Algiers.
3- History of the Aglabites and the Arabs of Sicily,
published and translated by Noël de Vergers.
Ibn Khaldoun is considered one of the greatest historians of Arab
literature, because with an exceptional independence of mind and
sure clarity of judgment he was able to formulate a whole admirable
philosophy of the history of his country.
In the Prolegomena, he began by laying down rules of historical
criticism and the principles of writing history on the basis of
facts and of examples. His work in any case is called The Book of
Examples. He opens by clearly defining people as either nomadic
or sedentary. He describes the formation of towns, their influence
on civilization, the origin of all authority, the foundation of
empires and the cause of their decadence.
The documentation of his recital, joined to a powerful faculty of
generalization, gives his work a solidity and breadth which provoke
the admiration of impartial scholars of East and West.
However, his translators reproach him for the excessive abstraction
of his style, but this is due rather to the genius of Arabic writing
than to any fault of the author.
Speaking of the main considerations which are the subject of the
Prolegomena, Huart says textually: “All that is laid open in an
original and lively style by a man full of ideas, who repeats himself
the better to explain and who continually interrupts an argument
to provide historical proof for this theories. Everywhere one finds
a firm and sagacious spirit. I know of no book more worthy to be
studied by anyone wishing to understand the history of the Muslim
empires.”
PAGES
chosen from the Prolegomena of Ibn Khaldoun, edition of Bibliothèque
impériale. All texts of Ibn Khaldoun are placed between inverted
commas.
“A tribe which has lived in base condition and servitude is incapable
of founding an empire.”
“Base condition
and servitude crush the energy and esprit de corps of a tribe. This
state of degradation indicates that in it this sprit does not even
exist any more. Unable to rise from its low state, it (the tribe)
no longer has the courage to defend itself; this is all the more
reason why it should be unable to resist or to attack its enemies.
Notice the cowardice shown by the Israelites when the holy prophet
Moses called them to the conquest of Syria and proclaimed to them
that the Lord had ordained in advance the success of their arms;
they replied to him: ‘The people who inhabit this land are giants
and we will not go in until they come out.’
“They meant: ‘Until God makes them come out by showing his power
and without our being obliged to do anything for it; that will be
one of your great miracles, O Moses.’ The more he entreated with
them, the more they remained obstinately disobedient; ‘Go off,’
they said to him, ‘You and your God, and fight (for us.)’ To express
themselves in such a way, these people must have felt their own
weakness and realized that they were quite incapable of attacking
an enemy or resisting him. This is what the passage in the Koran
gives us to understand, as well as the traditional explanations
that the commentators have collected. This cowardice was the result
of the servile life that the people had been living for centuries;
they had remained long enough under Egyptian domination to completely
lose all spirit of solidarity. Further, they did not sincerely believe
in their religion; when Moses announced to the Jews that Syria should
be theirs, as well as the kingdom of the Amalekites, whose capital
was called Jericho, and that this people would be delivered to them
as prey according to the order of God; they recoiled before the
enemy, being interiorly convinced that after having passed their
lives in a state of humiliation they would be unable to attack an
enemy. They even dared to make fun of the words of their prophet
and to resist his orders; so God punished them by making them wander,
that is to say that he made them remain forty years in the desert
between Egypt and Syria. During this time it was impossible for
them to withdraw into a town or to remain in any inhabited place,
because they had on one side the Amalekites in Syria and on the
other the Copts of Egypt, and they were, in their own words, unable
to fight. The verses which we have just quoted have an application
that is easily understood; the punishment of wandering was meant
to eliminate the entire population that had been brought out of
the oppression and humiliation imposed on them in the land of Egypt,
a population without energy that was resigned to degradation and
that had lost all feeling for independence. To replace this generation
another was needed that had been raised in the desert, that had
never been submitted to humiliation and that knew nothing of domination
by a foreign nation and of the power of despotism. Through this
disposition of Providence, a new corporate spirit was born among
the Israelites, one which led them to attack and to conquer. All
this makes clear that to make one generation disappear, to be replaced
by another, it needs a period of at least forty years.”
“The people who are least
civilized make the most extensive conquests.”
“We have already
said that semi-savage nations have everything needed to conquer
and dominate. These peoples manage to make others submit because
they are strong enough to make war against them, while others consider
them as ferocious beasts. Such were the Arabs, the Zenata, and those
who live the same kind of life, the Kurds, Turcomans and veiled
tribes (Almoravids) of the great Sanhadjian family. Not having territory
where they can live enjoying plenty, races without much civilization
have nothing to make them cling to their native soil; so any country,
any region seems just as good to them. Not satisfied with being
lords where they are and dominating their neighbors, they cross
the limits of their territory and invade distant countries, subjugating
their inhabitants. The reader has only to recall to mind the anecdote
of the Caliph Omar.
“As soon as he had been proclaimed chief of the Muslims, he stood
up and harangued the assembly, urging true believers to undertake
the conquest of Iraq.
“‘The Hejaz,’ said he, ‘is not a place for habitation; it is suitable
only for pasturing flocks, without which it would be impossible
to live. Go on, you others, you who were the last to have emigrated
from Mecca, would you stay so far away from what God has promised
you? So cross the earth, God has declared in his Book that it will
be your inheritance. He has said: “I will do such as to raise your
religion above all others, and this despite the unbelievers...”’”
“The Arabs can establish
their domination only in countries of plains.”
“The natural ferocity
of the Arabs has made of them a nation of looters and brigands.
Every time they can seize booty without running into danger or having
to fight, they never hesitate to take it and return as quickly as
possible to that part of the desert where they are pasturing their
flocks.”
“They never march against
an enemy to fight him openly, unless the good of their own defense
obliges them. If during their expeditions they come up against fortified
places or localities difficult to approach, they turn away toward
flat countryside. Civilized peoples remain sheltered from insults
in the rugged mountains and defy the destructive spirit which animates
the Arabs.
“In truth, the latter do not dare to attack them there; they would
have to climb steep hills, to venture into almost impenetrable ways
and to expose themselves to the greatest dangers. It is quite otherwise
in the plains; if they (the inhabitants) have no soldiers to guard
them and if the government shows weakness, they become a prey to
the Arabs for what they enjoyed. The nomads renew their incursions,
and as they can cover the whole wide area very easily, they give
themselves over to pillage and acts of devastation, until the inhabitants
resign themselves to accepting the nomads as masters. Possession
of these unfortunate countries then passes from one tribe to another;
everything is disorganized and civilization completely disappears.
God alone has power over his creatures.”
“Every country conquered
by the Arabs is soon ruined.”
“The habits and customs
of nomad life have made of the Arabs a rough and ferocious people.
The coarseness of their customs has become for them second nature,
a state which they accept, because it assures for them freedom and
independence. Such a disposition is opposed to the progress of civilization.
To go from one place to another, to scour the deserts, that has
been their principal occupation since the most ancient times. As
much as sedentary life favors the progress of civilization, so much
nomadic life is contrary to it.”
“If the Arabs
need stones to support their cooking-pots, they pull down buildings
in order to procure them; if they need pieces of wood to make the
pegs or the supports for their tents, they tear off the roofs of
houses to get them. By the very nature of their life, they are hostile
to any sort of edifice or to constructing edifices, which is the
first step toward civilization. Such are the Arabs in general, and
we may add that by their natural disposition they are always ready
to take by force the goods of others, to seek riches with weapons
in their hands, and to plunder without limit and without holding
back. Every time that their eyes fall on a fine flock, on a piece
of furniture, or any form of utensil, they take it by force. If
by conquering a province or by founding a dynasty they are in a
condition to satisfy their greed, they make a mockery of all the
regulations that serve to protect the property and the riches of
the inhabitants. Under their domination all is ruined, On craftsmen
and artisans they impose forced labor for which they see no reason
to offer compensation. Now the practice of the arts and crafts is
the true source of riches, as we shall show later. If the normal
professions come up against obstacles and are no longer profitable,
people lose all hope of profit and give up working; the established
order is upset and civilization declines. Let us add that the Arabs
neglect all the duties of government; they make no effort to stop
crime; they take no care of public safety, and their only concern
is to extract money from their subjects either by violence or by
harassment. Provided that they attain this end, nothing else worries
them. Bringing order to public administration, providing for the
well-being of the subject peoples, stopping malefactors, all these
are occupations to which they give no thought. So it is that the
subjects of an Arab tribe remain more or less without any government,
and such a state of affairs destroys both the population of a country
and its prosperity.
“We should add that the nomads are greedy for power and one can
find hardly one of them who would agree to hand over authority to
another. An Arab will hand over command neither to his father, nor
to his brother, nor to the head of his family. If he should by chance
consent, he will be doing it unwillingly and only out of regard
for what is fitting; so it is that among the Arabs one finds many
chiefs and individuals given some little authority.”
“Consider all the countries
that the Arabs have conquered since earliest times. Civilization
has disappeared there and so has the population. The very soil seems
to have changed its nature. In the Yemen, all the centers of population
have been abandoned, some major towns only excepted. In Arab Iraq
it is the same; all the beautiful crops with which the Persians
covered it have ceased to exist. In our times Syria has been ruined.
Ifrikia and the Maghreb are still suffering from the devastation
caused by the Arabs. In the fifth century of the Hegira the Beni
Halal and the Soleim burst in and for three centuries and a half
they continued to exploit the country, so devastation and solitude
still reign. Before this invasion, all the region from the country
of the black Africans to the Mediterranean was fully inhabited,
and the ruins of towns and villages are there to confirm this. God
is the heir of the land and of everything it bears, and he is the
best of heirs.”
“As a general principle,
the Arabs are incapable of founding an empire, unless they have
received a more or less strong religious character from some prophet
or saint”
“Of all peoples, the
Arabs are the least inclined to accept subordination. Leading an
almost savage life, they acquire a coarseness of manners, a pride,
an arrogance and a spirit of jealousy that turns them against all
authority.”
“Of all peoples, the
Arabs are the least capable of governing a kingdom.”
“The Arabs are
more accustomed to nomad life than other peoples are, penetrating
deeper into the desert, and, being accustomed to misery and to suffering
privation, they easily do without cereals and the other products
of cultivated countries. Independent and ferocious, they rely only
on themselves and accept subordination only with difficulty. If
their chief needs their services, it is almost always to use their
spirit of solidarity against an enemy.
“In a kingdom things follow a different course; the king or sultan
has to employer force or restraint in order to maintain good order
in the state. Further, as we have already said, the Arabs are naturally
inclined to plunder other men, something which is their chief concern.
As for the care that must be taken to maintain good government and
order, they do not let it bother them.
“When they conquer a people, they think only of enriching themselves
and stripping the conquered, never trying to give them a good administration.
“Also, under the domination of the Arabs, misdemeanors go on increasing;
devastation extends everywhere and the inhabitants, left to themselves
so as to say, attack and plunder each other; the prosperity of the
country, being no longer sustainable, soon declines and vanishes.
This is what always happens with peoples left to themselves. All
the causes we have indicated makes the Arab spirit ill-suited for
giving the attention needed by the administration of a state.”
These short
extracts from the Prolegomena prove once again not only the astonishing
frankness of Ibn Khaldoun but also the surprising application of
his judgments and their unchanging solidity when faced with the
succession of empires and recommencements of history.
Sanchoniathon
Translation from the French: K.J. Mortimer
Contact: editorial@onefineart.com
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