Al-Mutanabbi

The Poet of Sultans and Sufis

Margaret Larkin

• Publisher: Oneworld Academic
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9781780742069
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Asian Religions

This exhaustive and yet enthralling study considers the life and work of al-Mutanabbi (915-965), often regarded as the greatest of the classical Arab poets. A revolutionary at heart and often imprisoned or forced into exile throughout his tumultuous life, al-Mutanabbi wrote both controversial satires and when employed by one of his many patrons, laudatory panegyrics. Employing an ornate style and use of the ode, al-Mutanabbi was one of the first to successfully move away from the traditionally rigid form of Arabic verse, the 'qasida'.

OUT OF ARABIA

ARABIAN ORIGINS

For classical Arabic poetry, everything goes back to the desert. The earliest examples of Arabic poetry date from the late fifth or early sixth century, a little over a hundred years before the advent of Islam, though their formalized and sophisticated nature bespeaks a long history of earlier development. Orally transmitted and publicly performed compositions, this pre-Islamic poetry served, as the well-known expression goes, as “the register of the Arabs.” The poets and their audiences were members of a tribal elite: rich, probably semi-sedentary, and politically and militarily dominant. The poetry constituted not only the record of tribal feuds and alliances, but also the vehicle for constructing a favorable public image for the poet’s tribe and for reinforcing shared social and moral values. The importance of the poet in pre-Islamic tribal life is vividly described by Ibn Rashiq (1000–1063 or 1071 CE):

Whenever a poet emerged in an Arab tribe, the other tribes would come and congratulate them. They would prepare food and the women would get together to play the lute, as they do at weddings, and the men and boys would announce the good news to one another. For a poet meant protection of their honor and defense of their reputations, memorializing of their glorious deeds and singing of their praises.

(al-‘Umda, vol. 1, 65)

POETIC FORMS – THE ODE

While the monothematic “occasional” poem was more abundant in pre-Islamic Arabia, the most prestigious form of poetry was the polythematic qasidah, or ode, the structure of which has remained more or less constant up to the present day. These poems consisted of monorhymed verses, usually thirty to about one hundred, divided into two half-lines or hemistichs, and employed any one of some sixteen quantitative Arabic meters throughout the composition.

More striking even than the regularity of its structure was the predictable stock of subjects treated in the pre-Islamic ode. Most often an ode would start with the scene of the poet stopping, sometimes with his companions – conceived to refer either to people or to the poet’s sword and mount – at the site of his beloved’s abandoned campsite. Features of the physical environment, such as traces like tattoos in the sands, evoked the memory of the woman who had once camped there with her tribe and the experience of loss occasioned by the tribe’s departure. The lost beloved was then usually described in great detail. These amatory preludes and following paeans to the beautiful women are the only love poetry that we have from the pre-Islamic period. The poet-lover moved from the mood of loss and nostalgia evoked by this elegiac preface to a detailed description of his camel or horse, sometimes accompanied by descriptions of desert animals such as the oryx and the wild ass, and a depiction of an arduous desert journey. The mount, described as possessing consummate stamina, loyalty, and beauty, was often presented as a kind of alter ego for the wounded poet-lover, who recaptured his sense of strength and manhood through an extended and detailed homage to his animal. This process of recuperation came to fruition in the final movement of the poem, a series of verses in which the poet boasted the merits of his tribe and his named ancestors. The tribe was described as possessing all the qualities deemed praiseworthy in pre-Islamic nomadic society. It would be lauded for its unfailing generosity, its prowess and bravery in battle, and its sense of communal responsibility that demanded it provide protection to weaker tribes and individuals such as orphans and widows who sought support and protection. Poems composed in honor of the Ghassanid and Lakhmid kings, who ruled the Byzantine and Sassanian buffer states, concluded with a panegyric to the patron, and it is this poetry that most closely resembles the court poetry that was to dominate during later periods.

Recited publicly among groups of different tribes at caravan gathering sites, these compositions served as both an important vehicle for reinforcing the shared values and customs that held Bedouin society together and a potent form of propaganda and publicity for the various tribes. Poetry – in its content and performance context – constituted a communal voice, and the poet was little more than a representative, albeit a heroic one, of his tribe. Competition among the poets was keen, and, in keeping with the communal nature of the art, poets frequently borrowed from the compositions of others. This emphasis on intertextuality has remained one of the hallmarks of Arabic poetry, and we will discuss later how this inclination manifested itself in connection with the poetry of al-Mutanabbi.

INVECTIVE AND ELEGY

In addition to the boasting about the merits of specific tribes and their renowned members that was a standard feature of the polythematic ode, these compositions often included insults to members of enemy or rival tribes. Such verses, which also occurred as (usually) short compositions separate from the ode, generally consisted of a collection of coarse insults about not only the subject, but also the female members of his family. The public recitation and repetition of these poems was a key part of their functioning, since their purpose was to spoil the reputation and besmirch the honor of their target.

Poems of lament for the dead were also prevalent during the pre-Islamic period. Derived from women’s rhymed prose wailing for members of their family, these compositions were somewhat less rigidly conventional than the ode. Among their frequently occurring features was that of the poet addressing her eyes and encouraging them to find relief in tears. The focus of the poem was praise of the deceased for his adherence to tribally sanctioned values such as bravery, generosity, and forbearance, followed by pronouncements about fate and the inevitability of death. The heart of the pre-Islamic social and moral code was belief in fate and its vehicle, time – or “the days” or “the night” – as the unseen, unfathomable arbiter of life, death, and everything in between in the desert environment.

Very little of the complete corpus of pre-Islamic and early Islamic Arabic poetry has come down to us. Any narrative we can produce about this poetry therefore necessarily involves filling in the blanks as best we can on the basis of what we do know. There are certain questions we will probably never be able to answer: for example, was there a body of poetry of a more popular nature than the prestigious ode form – perhaps poems composed in rajaz, the simplest of the sixteen recognized Arabic meters, such as the songs of the camel drivers? We simply do not have enough information to answer such questions fully. Though it is difficult to determine with any certainty how much of the corpus of pre-Islamic poetry was composed by the more sedentary members of Arab society – or indeed by over-zealous forgers during later periods – the essential ethos of nomadic life, its precariousness and its changeability, is nonetheless reflected in the themes and motifs of the surviving poetry.

POETS ON THE FRINGE

Not every poet of the pre-Islamic period was tribally enfranchised, and a body of compositions by sa‘alik or “outlaw” poets (poets who had in some way fallen out with their tribe either because of their disillusionment with it or its disapproval and subsequent rejection of them) has also survived. For these poets, the tribal value system and communal ideals provided the overarching social and moral paradigm that they either rebelled against or defended from what they deemed the lax attention of tribal leaders. Some poets, such as Ta‘abbata Sharran, who probably lived during the first half of the sixth century, manifested a primitive individuality that distinguished their compositions from the main corpus of tribal poetry. These poems presented the image of a “man’s man” tough enough to go it alone and face the elements of nature, finding companionship in the wild animals of the desert rather than his tribal comrades. The figure of rugged manliness they portrayed found impassioned reprise in many of the compositions of al-Mutanabbi, who obviously saw a kindred spirit in the world-weary tough guy that Ta‘abbata Sharran described:

I do not say when a friendship has been cut off

“Woe to me,” out of longing and compassion

No! my weeping – if I am brought to weeping –

is for a man skilled in acquiring praise, who is always ahead,

Bare of flesh on the shins, the sinews of his arms standing out,

often venturing out on nights that are inky black and pouring with rain.

Such is the sort of man I care for and want [at my side].

He is the one to whom I turn for help when I seek help –

shockheaded and hoarse.

(Jones, 1992, vol.1, 213–215)

ISLAM’S EFFECT ON POETRY

In its emphasis on the uniqueness of the Qur’an and the nature of Muhammad’s message, the Qur’anic text repeatedly denies any relationship to poetry. Even though the new religion did not encourage poetry, the advent of Islam in the early seventh century provided an inadvertent spur to the field. Despite the ambivalence toward poetry expressed in the Qur’an and hadith (the sayings of the Prophet Muhammad), poetry was viewed as a treasure trove of information about the Arabic of the sacred text, and the fields of philology and lexicography blossomed. The text of the Qur’an emphasized the Arabness of the event of revelation and the kindness God had shown in revealing the sacred text in “clear Arabic” language. The need for linguistic information inspired the diligent collection and recording of poetry that, prior to Islam, had been preserved exclusively in the memory of professional transmitters attached to individual poets and conveyed orally. Islamic religious identity was thus very much Arab – Arab because the Qur’an had been revealed to an Arabian prophet, and Arab because the sacred text was in the Arabic language.

The connection between the word of God and the Arabic language persists today in the Muslim belief that although translations are acceptable to facilitate understanding among diverse groups of Muslim believers, only the Arabic text is the actual word of God. The notion, derived from specific verses of the Qur’an, that the text of the Qur’an is itself stylistically inimitable added to the emphasis on the language and, in part, shaped Arab attitudes toward rhetorical excellence in general. Thus, in the centuries immediately following the advent of Islam, pre-Islamic poetry increased greatly in prestige and became seen as the unquestioned model of excellent poetry. In later centuries astute critics, such as Ibn Qutaybah (828–889 CE) in his Kitab al-Shi‘r wa’l-shu‘ara’, rebelled against this notion that the more ancient the poetry, the better it necessarily was, but the overall thrust of conviction weighed in the direction of looking to the past.

After the death of Muhammad, Islam did not immediately expand beyond the confines of the Arabian peninsula. Leadership of the community remained in the hands of the close associates and successors of the prophet, who were themselves products of the same Arabian culture. Tribal affiliations and loyalties remained the well-spring of society. The new religion created a new bond that brought diverse tribes together in a community whose ties superseded the old tribal system, but old alliances and ancient animosities did not evaporate overnight. Indeed, the stature and circulation of pre-Islamic poetry, which exalted the tribal system with its loyalties and entrenched values, contributed to their perpetuation.

CENTRALIZATION UNDER THE UMAYYADS

After the establishment of the Umayyad dynasty (661 CE) – the first Muslim empire after the death of the prophet – things started to change for the young community. Muhammad left no instructions regarding the leadership of the Muslims after his death, so his succession became a thorny and divisive issue. Though even their leadership was not accepted without question, the first four, so-called “rightly guided,” caliphs had the distinction of a personal relationship with the prophet to justify their authority. The Umayyad dynasty, initiated by the governor of Syria, Mu’awiyah, ushered in a distancing from the Arabian environment in which the religion had arisen. This was manifested physically by the transfer of the capital from Madina to Damascus, while Madina remained the center of religious scholarly activity. Meanwhile, Mecca, the birthplace of the prophet and the site of Muslim pilgrimage, was awash in new-found wealth and luxury.

For the first time, under the Umayyads,Arab tribes had to submit to the authority of a central imperial government. Wars of expansion into the former lands of the Byzantine empire in Syria and Iraq yielded spoils, and the mechanism of their distribution, in the form of money, became a bone of contention between the various provinces and the central government in Damascus. Arab Muslims involved in the campaigns of expansion came in contact not only with other Muslims from diverse tribes in the garrison towns established in conquered territories, but also with indigenous communities with their own religious and cultural traditions. The Arab tribal tradition of offering protection to tribes or individuals who became “clients” of powerful tribes continued with non-Arab converts in the conquered territories. This enhanced familiarity facilitated cultural assimilation, and the complacency of an ethnically homogeneous society was gradually disappearing. At the same time, the young community of believers was still sorting out what it meant to be a Muslim and what kind of organization the community should have now that its founder and prophet was no longer among them. The factionalism that challenged the community was as often religious and political in nature as it was tribal.

Despite – or perhaps partly because of – this general opening up of Arabian tribal society and the many social, political, and economic transformations it was undergoing, Arab poets in the century following the death of Muhammad clung to essentially the same poetic conventions as had prevailed in pre-Islamic Arabia, especially where the polythematic ode was concerned. There were developments toward a more straightforward and simple language in the occasional, monothematic poem, and both the love poem and the wine-song blossomed at this time. The major change that took place in the ode was in its performance context. With the exception of panegyric poems in honor of the pre-Islamic kings of Hira (the Arab buffer state bordering western Mesopotamia), pre-Islamic odes were generally performance pieces in which praise was reserved for the poet’s tribe or outstanding individual members of the tribe. Now for the first time praise poetry was composed and performed in honor of kingly rulers who paid for the good press that these compositions provided. As in the pre-Islamic period, poetry served as propaganda; the big difference was that the publicity now often served the purpose of bolstering the image of the central Muslim authority and legitimizing the caliph and his evolving Muslim world-view. Traditional tribal values were being re-cast in religious and political terms befitting the new Islamic communal realities, including their tensions and controversies.

DIVERSITY UNDER THE ‘ABBASIDS

This trend became even more pronounced during the ‘Abbasid era, the first two centuries of which (early eighth to the early tenth century) represent the heyday of Arabic letters, including poetry. This dynasty, which claimed legitimacy on the basis of descent from al-‘Abbas ibn ‘Abd al-Muttalib, the uncle of the prophet Muhammad, capitalized on a widespread frustration with the Umayyad rulers. Accusations of authoritarianism, nepotism, and lack of piety had undermined Umayyad rule and united Arabs and non-Arabs in the goal of ousting them. The challenge of shaping a unified Muslim polity from the diverse communities that were included in the now far-flung Muslim empire was beyond Umayyad moral and political abilities. By now, the majority of Muslims were non-Arab and urban, the desert and its tribal ethos little more than a distant memory. Under the ‘Abbasids, the old Arab families that had spearheaded the Muslim military drive for expansion no longer received the preferential treatment they had enjoyed under the Umayyads, and the many Arabized Persians and others who had converted to Islam were more integrated in ‘Abbasid life. The social and political structure of ‘Abbasid government was centralized around the caliph and an extensive bureaucracy that was essentially run by Persians and Aramaeans. With the establishment of the capital at Baghdad in 762 CE, the Muslim community not only gained a grand imperial court but also a vibrant cultural center, in which virtually all fields of scholarship and art were sponsored. The golden days of ‘Abbasid patronage reached their height under Harun al-Rashid (r. 786–809 CE), whose era boasted some of the most outstanding poets of the time, including Abu Nuwas (ca. 755–813 CE) and Abu ’l-‘Atahiyah (748–826 CE).

In the multi-cultural environment of the ‘Abbasid caliphate, where many of the outstanding poets were of Persian origin, the poet’s stock-in-trade was his ability to produce compelling panegyric poems that served to legitimize and aggrandize the caliph and his officials or whoever was wealthy enough to engage the poet’s services. Despite the powerful claim of genealogical ties to the prophet, the ‘Abbasid caliphate, which had been brought to power by the Persians of Khurasan, needed to present itself to the Muslim public as a faithful adherent to ancient Arab tribal values. Some of the grander odes of this period, produced by poets such as AbuTammam (ca. 805–845 CE), portray the ‘Abbasid caliph as possessing traditional Arab heroic qualities, such as generosity and bravery, and also attributes associated with Sassanian and ancient Near Eastern models of kingship. In these mythologizing descriptions, the caliph was often depicted as having power over the natural world, so complete was his appointment from God. Where fate had been the explanation for everything in the pre-Islamic poetic universe, Islam now took over that role. In that sense,‘Abbasid panegyric poetry in honor of caliphs was not just publicity for the individual ruler, but also an expression and public reinforcement of a shared Islamic world view, and...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title page
• Copyright page
• Dedication page
• Contents
• Preface
• 1 OUT OF ARABIA
• 2 GROWING PAINS
• 3 GLORY DAYS IN ALEPPO
• 4 PARADISE LOST
• 5 CONTEMPORARY CRITICS
• 6 THE HIGHEST FORM OF PRAISE
• Conclusion
• Suggestions for further reading
• Index