ISLAMIC LITERATURE

Although Europeans during the Middle Ages benefited from Islamic treatises on medicine, geography, mathematics, astronomy, and philosophy, they did not become acquainted with the original literary creations of the Muslim world. Even today, the rich heritage of Islamic literature is hardly known in the West, except for a few examples such as the Koran, the holy book of Islam; the `Thousand and One Nights' , or `Arabian Nights'; the `Rubáiyát' of Omar Khayyám; and the 20th-century works of Khalil Gibran. This unfamiliarity is due in part to the fact that almost all of this literature was written in languages that often were quite difficult to translate, in part because they used an alphabet in Semitic script. (See also ` Arabian Nights '; Gibran ; Koran ; Omar Khayyám .)

Literary Types

The difficulty of translation applied especially to Islamic poetry, which for centuries used traditional, rigid, and distinctive forms in a highly stylized way. Prose, in the Western sense of novels, short stories, and dramas, was not known in the Islamic world until the modern period. What prose writing there was also used specific forms, and often it, like poetry, was rhymed. This emphasis on form and style dominated Islamic literature until the early 19th century, frequently to the detriment of content.

Classical Arabic poetry was built on the principle of the monorhyme, and the single rhyme was employed throughout a poem, whether it was long or short. Within the rhyming pattern, there were 16 basic meters in five groupings, but the poet was not allowed to change the meter in the course of a poem.

The chief literary types, all poetic forms developed according to traditional rules, were the qasida, the ghazel, the qitah, the masnavi, and the roba`i. In prose, the chief genre was the maqamah.

The Range of Islamic Literature

The Muslim empire was enormous in size; it included a great diversity of peoples, many of whom had preserved ancient cultures and languages. For a long period, Arabic became the literary language for many regions of the empire; but as time passed, local influences reasserted themselves and native languages once again came into use. This was particularly true in Persia, where the Arabic alphabet was adapted to the Persian language.

By the 11th century, northwestern India and the region that is now Pakistan had become a center of Islamic literature in the Persian language. Persian remained the language of Muslim India until the 1830s, when it was succeeded by Urdu, which had borrowed heavily from Persian sources in its early period during the 18th century.

Central Asia became part of the Muslim empire after 711. With cultural centers at Samarkand, Bukhara, and Fergana, it was a hub of Islamic literature and scholarship, much of it in the Arabic language, until the Russian invasions of the late 19th century. A great deal of the literature of this region was also written in the Turkic languages; and in later centuries, when the Seljuq and Ottoman Turks conquered much of the Islamic empire, their languages displaced Arabic in some areas. After the 14th century, for example, an elaborate classical Turkish literature developed that was heavily influenced by Persian styles and vocabulary.

In Spain, at the western end of the empire, the Muslims created a highly sophisticated culture that reached its apex in the 10th century and continued to flourish until the Muslims were driven from the country at the end of the 15th century. It was through Spain that so many of the major Arabic works in philosophy and the sciences made their way into medieval Europe.

Periods of Islamic Literature

Three successive caliphates ruled the Islamic empire: the Patriarchal (632-661), the Umayyad (661-750), and the `Abbasid (750-1258). In 1258 the Ottoman Turks invaded and sacked Baghdad, the capital, and murdered the caliph, thus ending Islamic rule in the eastern section of the empire. A weak ` Abbasid caliphate survived in Egypt until 1517, while in Spain and the western part of North Africa separate dynasties continued to rule until the 15th century. (See also Caliphate .)

The religious zeal of the early Muslims did inspire the beginning of two significant works, collections that were not completed until later centuries. The most important was the hadith, the record of the sayings and deeds of Muhammad. The sudden death of the spiritual and political leader took the Islamic community by surprise, and within a few decades it was deemed necessary to preserve all of Muhammad's words and actions since they were believed to have been inspired. By the 9th century, the hadith had been solidified into a body of material to which no new traditions were added. Today the hadith is revered as a major source of religious law and moral guidance, second only to the Koran.

Another collection that was begun at the same time consists of the sayings of `Ali, Muhammad's son-in-law and the fourth caliph, whose followers later established a major division in Islam, Shi`ah. Finally compiled in the 10th century, the collection is called `The Road of Eloquence'. It is a masterpiece of Arabic prose that has inspired numerous commentaries and imitations in other languages.

The Umayyad Caliphate

The Islamic civil wars and the rise of sectarian rivalries contributed to the emergence of a poetry that became a favorite vehicle for expression of the divergent points of view. The three greatest poets of the Umayyad period were all polemicists who used their verses to support political factions.

Al-Akhtal, though a Christian, was a strenuous supporter of the policies of the first Umayyad, Mu'awiyah I. Jarir and Tammam ibn Ghalib Abu Firas (al-Farazdaq) were active at the courts of the Umayyad caliphs and their governors and were ardent supporters of the regime. The two were enemies, however, and they delighted rival tribesmen with their stinging satires against each other. The work of these two poets has furnished historians with a rich vein of material on the social and political climate of Islam during the early 8th century. They used the traditional qasida form with great effect, incorporating a wealth of vocabulary and imagination.

A remarkable poet from Mecca, `Umar ibn Abi Rabi`ah, contributed to the development of the ghazel as a love poem. His poems sing of amorous adventures with the ladies who came to Mecca on pilgrimage. Using the same literary form, one of the last Umayyads, al-Walid ibn Yazid, gained a greater reputation as a poet than as a warrior. His poetry excelled in frivolous love verses and in odes praising the virtues of wine.

In Medina the vogue was highly idealized love poetry akin to the chivalric romances of medieval Europe. Supposedly invented by Jamil, this genre sings of lovers who become martyrs, dying in their total surrender to the force of true love.

The `Abbasid Caliphate

In contrast to the brief 90-year period of the Umayyads, the `Abbasid caliphate endured for more than five centuries. It was during the `Abbasid rule, with its capital at Baghdad, that the golden age of Islamic literature began. In Iraq (ancient Mesopotamia) all the cultural currents of the ancient Near East came together, and members of the Muslim community --centered at the court of the caliphs--began to adapt and rework elements from all the earlier cultures.

The major poets of the ` Abbasid period were Abu Nuwas, Ibn al-Mu`tazz, Ibn Da'ud, al-Mutanabbi, and al-Ma`arri. The greatest of these was Abu Nuwas, who had an incomparable command of language and imagery. His witty, cynical verses and delightful drinking songs scandalized the orthodox Muslims, however. One of his lines, said to have been his motto, was: "Accumulate as many sins as you can."

Al-Mu`tazz, in his `Book of the Novel and the Strange', laid down literary rules governing the use of metaphors, similes, and verbal puns (see Figures of Speech ). His concept of poetry involved the richest embellishment of verses by all kinds of figures of speech and rhetorical devices. In time, his advice produced poetry in which the content was overpowered by style and verbiage.

The theme of the lover who would rather die than achieve union with his beloved became central to ghazel poetry in the 10th century. An early exponent was Ibn Da'ud, a theologian, in his anthology `Book of the Flower'. Although used in a completely secular way at first, the theme was later taken over as a major concept in religious mystic poetry. It soon became commonplace in Persian, Turkish, and Urdu poetry as well. Its influence was even felt in Spain, where another theologian, Ibn Hazm, drew upon personal experiences to compose his `The Ring of the Dove', a prose work on pure love that is interspersed with poetry.

Al-Mutanabbi, one of the greatest Arab poets, was in the mainstream of classical qasida poets, but his work surpassed that of his predecessors in imagination. His compositions were noted for their exaggeration, sound effects, and formal perfection.

The verses of al-Ma`arri, the blind Syrian poet, continue to appeal to young Arab readers today. Yet their vocabulary is so difficult, and meanings so compressed in his double rhymes, that even his contemporaries had to ask him to interpret them. His outlook is deeply pessimistic and skeptical, running counter to the heroic idealism of his time. He taunted the privileged classes of his day and expressed a strong contempt for hypocrisy, injustice, and superstition. Pious Muslims supposedly were offended by his `Paragraphs and Periods' because they felt it to be a parody of the holy Koran. His `Epistle of Pardon', which describes a visit to the world of the afterlife, also contains sarcastic criticism of Arabic literature.

During the reign of the `Abbasid empire, literary prose also began to develop. Writers were consumed by an insatiable curiosity for all kinds of knowledge, a curiosity that led them to compile and translate scholarly and philosophical works from other cultures.

Ibn al-Muqaffa` translated the fables of Bidpai, an Indian sage, into Arabic. These stories provided Islamic culture with a seemingly inexhaustible fund of tales and parables from the animal world, comparable in some respects to the fables of Aesop and La Fontaine (see Fable ). He also introduced into Arabic the Persian `Book of Kings', a type of pre-Islamic mythology that sophisticated Muslims preferred to the rather meager accounts of the Arab pagan past. His translations of writings on ethics and the conduct of government are the prototype of the "Mirror for Princes" literature that flourished during the late Middle Ages in both Iran and the West.

In response to the growing interest in life outside the Islamic world, al-Jahiz of Basra wrote treatises on many subjects. The `Elegance of Expression and Clarity of Exposition' dealt with literary style and the effective use of language. His `Book of Misers' is a collection of stories about the avaricious. Although an intellectual free spirit, al-Jahiz supported government policy by writing "Exploits of the Turks," an essay on the military qualities of Turkish soldiers, upon whose strength the government depended. His `Book of Animals' has little to do with zoology, but it is a mine of information on Arab proverbs, superstitions, and traditions.

One of the most vigorous prose stylists was Abu Hayyan at-Tawhidi. His book denouncing the weaknesses of two of the caliph' s viziers (governors) for their literary ambitions highlights his brilliance and eloquence.

The rhetorical style of rhymed prose found its best expression in the maqamah, which was invented by al-Hamadhani. The master of this form was al-Hariri of Basra, whose 50 maqamahs are closer to the Western notion of the short story than anything else in classical Islamic literature.

Spain and North Africa

Despite its remoteness from the `Abbasid center at Baghdad, Spain experienced a parallel flowering of literature during its Muslim period, one that flourished under its own Umayyad caliphate. The culture of the Western land contains some of the greatest names in Islamic literature.

Prominent in the field of philosophy were Avicenna and Averroës. The outstanding work of Avicenna in philosophy, science, and medicine was highly regarded in the rest of Europe. Averroës, court physician of the Berber kings at Marrakech in Morocco, was the Arab commentator on Aristotle whose work helped form medieval Christian theology in Europe. Among his most notable writings was an attack on the Islamic mystic al- Ghazali, whose `The Incoherence of the Philosophers' elicited from Averroës `The Incoherence of the Incoherence'. Al-Ghazali, however, has a well-deserved reputation as the most influential of the mystic writers; his chief work is `The Revival of the Religious Sciences'. (See also Averroës ; Avicenna .)

Another prominent mystic, Ibn al-`Arabi, was educated in the Spanish tradition but wrote poetry and prose that shaped large parts of Islamic thought for centuries afterward. His chief work was `The Meccan Revelations'. He also wrote a volume of love poems entitled `The Interpreter of Desires', in which wisdom was the object of his quest.

Arab scholars from North Africa made substantial contributions to geography after the 9th century. The geographer al-Idrisi produced a world map, together with detailed descriptions, in his `The Delight of Him Who Wishes to Traverse the Regions of the World' (see Idrisi, al- ).

Perhaps the greatest world traveler of his time was Ibn Battutah, a native of North Africa who explored the Far East, India, and the region of the Niger in Africa (see Ibn Battutah ). In all, it is estimated that he traveled about 75,000 miles (120,000 kilometers) and visited nearly every Muslim country. His `Rihlah' (Travels), written in about 1353, is filled with information about the cultural state of the Muslim world of his time.

The Tunisian Ibn Khaldun was one of the great social scientists of all time (see Ibn Khaldun ). His masterpiece, the `Muqaddimah' (Introduction), is filled with brilliant observations on the writing of history, economics, politics, and education. It has long been regarded as one of the finest philosophies of history ever written.

The Persian Influence

During the `Abbasid period a great Persian literature emerged, some of it in Arabic. Of the large number of Persian authors in this period, the most significant were Firdawsi, Awhad ad-Din `Ali (known as Anvari), al-Biruni, Omar Khayyám, Jalal ad-Din ar-Rumi, Sa`di, and Amir Khosrow.

In the early era of Persian Islamic literature, the greatest achievement was that of Firdawsi (Abu ol-Qasem Mansur) (see Firdawsi ). He compiled all the inherited tales and legends of the Persian kings into one great national epic, the `Shah-nameh'. Completed in the early 11th century, it contains nearly 60,000 verses in short rhyming couplets.

Anvari was the most accomplished writer of panegyrics, or formal eulogies, using the qasida form of poetry. His `Tears of Khorasan' mourns the passing glory of the Seljuk Turks. He was not only well versed in Arabic and Persian literature but was skilled in logic, geometry, astronomy, astrology, music, natural science, and philosophy. In addition to excelling in the art of the qasida, he used the ghazel, roba`i, qitah, and masnavi with great skill.

Al-Biruni, one of the most learned men of his time, was conversant with Hebrew, Turkish, Sanskrit, Persian, and Syriac in addition to Arabic. His most famous works were `Chronology of Ancient Nations', `Elements of Astrology', `A History of India', and `The Mas`udi Canon', a major work on astronomy.

Another scientist and mathematician, Omar Khayyám, became famous in the West for his `Rubáiyát' (see Omar Khayyám ). This work is a volume of quatrains that was freely translated into English by Edward FitzGerald and published in 1859. Each quatrain is an independent poem, but is related to the others by the recurrence of common themes. There is some question whether Omar actually wrote all the poetry attributed to him, since his contemporaries took no notice of his verses. The most famous of his quatrains is:

A book of verses underneath the bough

A jug of wine, a loaf of bread--and thou

Beside me singing in the wilderness

Oh, wilderness were paradise enow!

Amir Khosrow was one of India's most significant Persian-language poets. He wrote panegyrics of seven successive kings of Delhi. His `Khamseh' (Pentology), written in emulation of a work of the same name by another Persian author, is a group of five long idylls in the masnavi style about general themes in Islamic literature.

By the time of Amir Khosrows death in 1325, the `Abbasid caliphate had been gone for nearly 75 years. The golden age of Islamic literature was passing. Regional literatures were beginning to take its place in Persia, Central Asia, India, and North Africa.