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Int. J. Middle East Stud. 34 (2002), 465494. Printed in the
United States of AmericaDOI: 10.1017.S0020743802003033
Basheer M. Nafi
A B U A L - T H A N A A L - A L U S I : A N A L I M ,O T TO M A
N M U F T I , A N D E X E G E T EO F T H E Q U RA N
Abu al-Thana Shihab al-Din al-Alusi (180254) was one of the most
prominentulama of mid-19th century Baghdad. In an era in which the
Ottoman drive for modern-ization and centralization was changing
the fabric of society and undermining thepower and influence of the
ulama class in large parts of the sultanate, al-Alusi wasemerging
as a powerful local alim, in terms of both his status as a scholar
and hisinfluence as a public figure. By the time of his death, the
Alusis were becomingfirmly established as a recognized ulama
family, members of which would continueto play important roles in
the intellectual and political life of Iraq and the Arab Mash-riq.
The grand Alusi, as Abu al-Thana al-Alusi was known, however, was,
and stillis, a controversial Muslim scholar whose intellectual
genealogy and leanings seem tobe difficult to categorize and too
contradictory to pin down. Nothing illustrates theproblematic of
defining al-Alusis intellectual and theological attitudes better,
perhaps,than the way in which his two sons diverged. Whereas Numan
Khayr al-Din al-Alusi(183699) became one of the most influential
Salafi ulama in the late 19th century,his brother, Abdullah, was
known as an alim with strong Sufi tendencies. MahmudShukri al-Alusi
(18571924), the son of Abdullah, however, emerged as a
highlyregarded member of the growing Salafi circles of the major
Arab urban centers in thebeginning of the 20th century.
The purpose of this article is to present a brief study of the
life of Abu al-Thanaal-Alusi, to probe the intellectual
underpinnings of his major work of tafsr (exegesisof the Quran) and
to try to define the position he occupied in the evolution of
modernsalafiyya in the Arab-speaking part of the Muslim world. As a
school of thought,salafiyya has been commonly identified with the
late 19th- and early-20th-centuryIslamic reformist ulama in the
Middle East and North Africa, who tended to empha-size their
relatedness to the intellectual legacy of Ahmad Taqi al-Din ibn
Taymiyya(12921357) and his disciples.1 David D. Commins, tracing
the intellectual genealogyof the late-19th- and early-20th-century
salafiyya, remarked that Ibn Taymiyyacame to hold the status of the
intellectual ancestor of Salafism. Religious reformers in
Syria,Iraq, Yemen, and India accorded him the greatest respect,
avidly sought his works, and strove
Basheer M. Nafi teaches Islamic History at the Muslim College,
London, and Birkbeck College, Universityof London, London W5 3RP,
United Kingdom; e-mail: [email protected].
2002 Cambridge University Press 0020-7438/02 $9.50
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466 Basheer M. Nafito have them published. Ibn Taymiyyas
position on ijtihad, emulation, reason and revelation,and myriad
other issues provided elaborate arguments, which the Salafis
appropriated.2
Described in the writings of modern Arab Salafi scholars as a
Salafi and defenderof salafiyya, al-Alusi seems also to have been
claimed as one of the intellectualancestors of modern salafiyya.
Did al-Alusi really relate to and use the ideas of IbnTaymiyya? And
if he did, to what extent, under which influences, and in which
con-text did he do so?
Ibn Taymiyya, in his response to the Ashari and Mutazili
theologies, his objectionto the excesses of tasawwuf and
pantheistic Sufism of wadat al-wujud (existentialmonism), and his
defense of Sunnism against non-Sunni Islamic sects, sought to
up-hold the tenets of what he saw as orthodox Islam.3 In contrast
to the Ashari andMutazili invocation of Greek philosophical
concepts and analytical tools, Ibn Tay-miyya called for the return
to and direct understanding of the primary Islamic texts,the Quran
and hadith. This call implied a denunciation of madhhabi and
sectariandivisions, as well as a mandate for continuous ijtihad.
Although a wide range ofIbn Taymiyyas ideas had been in circulation
within Hanbali circles, he was thefirst to advance these ideas in a
systematic and elaborate fashion. For Ibn Taymiyya,pristine Islam
is the Islam as was projected and practiced by the salaf of the
umma.The term salaf (ancestors; predecessors), as he used it,
indicated the first threegenerations of Muslims: companions of the
Prophet, their followers, and disciples ofthe followers.4 Yet by
ascribing particular theological views to those generations
ofMuslims, Ibn Taymiyya laid the groundwork for his early students
and followers, suchas Ibn al-Qayim, Ibn Abd al-Hadi, al-Dhahabi,
and Ibn Kathir, to employ the termsalaf not only in its strict
linguistic and generational sense, but also as a school ofthought.5
Ibn Taymiyyas position would thus be described as the Salafi way,
Salafidoctrine, and Salafi belief. Although Ashari theology and
taawwuf would domi-nate the Sunni cultural milieu during the
following period, the late 17th and 18thcenturies witnessed a
rising interest in Ibn Taymiyyas works. Not only Muhammadibn Abd
al-Wahhab (170392) but also other eminent ulama, including Ibrahim
al-Kurani (161689), Shah Wali-Allah Dihlawi (170362), Muhammad
Murtada al-Zabidi (173291), and Muhammad ibn Ali al-Shawkani
(17601834), were all, invarying degrees, interested in Ibn
Taymiyyas intellectual legacy.6 Behind this revivedinterest was the
re-emergence of Ibn Taymiyyas ideas as a major source of
inspirationfor those ulama who developed critical views of
AshariSufi dominance and soughtto challenge the Ashari theology and
reform Sufi beliefs and practices.
Because of Ibn Taymiyyas well-known opposition to taawwuf (an
aspect of histhought that was vigorously pursued by Ibn Abd
al-Wahhab), it seems inconceivablefor Sufi ulama to subscribe to
his teachings. However, the cases of al-Kurani, Dihlawi,and
al-Zabidi, all of whom were ulama with profound Sufi affiliations,
suggest the possi-bility of overlapping attitudes, where both a
Sufi-reformist vision and Salafi-inspiredbeliefs could coexist.
Even Ibn Taymiyyas attitudes toward taawwuf were complex
anddiscriminatory, where only Sufi believers in wahdat al-wujud
were condemned outright.7One of the aims of this study is to show
that al-Alusi, in spite of his acute awareness ofthe Wahhabi
movement (and perhaps because of this awareness), was more in
accordwith al-Kurani, Dihlawi, and al-Zabidi than with Ibn Abd
al-Wahhab.
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 467
The other terms that invite clarification for their connection
with this studys projec-tion of the intellectual development of
al-Alusi are orthodox and traditional. I. Gold-ziher, defining the
difference between Ashari theology and Hanbali theology as
ex-pressed particularly by Ibn Taymiyya, employed the terms new
orthodoxy and oldorthodoxy. For Goldziher, Ibn Taymiyya represented
the old orthodoxy because ofhis advocacy of the theological
teachings of the early Islamic generations, the salaf.In a detailed
discussion of these views of the Hanbali school, George Makdisi
rejectedGoldzihers concepts of dual orthodoxies, implying that
Sunni orthodoxy is moreinclusive. The only orthodoxy certified in
Islam by the consensus of the community,Makdisi wrote, is the Sunni
orthodoxy, represented since the third/ninth century bythe four
schools of Sunni law: Hanafite, Malikite, Shafiite, and Hanbalite.
There isno other orthodoxy recognized by the majority of Muslims.8
But whether the Hanbaliand Ibn Taymiyyas position was more
representative of the Sunni orthodoxy than theAsharis is an area
into which Makdisi did not venture. From Makdisis
standpoint,Hanbali and Ibn Taymiyyas theological views are
traditional for being inspired bythe Quran and the sunna, whereas
the Ashari kalam was a theology of rationalistinspiration. Given
that this study deals with the cultural theological environment
ofthe 19th century rather than the period of Ibn Taymiyya, and
considering the domi-nance of Ashari theology in the intervening
period, traditional Islam is used hereto denote the Ashari
perspective of Islam. Tradition is therefore employed in itsbroad
social-scientific sense,9 rather than to indicate relatedness to
the Prophetic tradi-tions. By contrast, orthodox refers to early
Islamic theological views as they wereelaborated by Ibn
Taymiyya.
In his study of the history of political ideologies, Quentin
Skinner has approachedthe agents acts, political choices, and ideas
as subjects of examination, explored fromwithin and as part of
their broader socio-political context.10 Although ideas
coulddictate, constrain, and typify actions, actions on occasion
require legitimating in termsof conventional cultural regimes, thus
inviting modification, alteration, or concealingof a set of ideas.
In other words, acts and ideas should be seen as
interchangeablesignposts for interpreting historical ideologies.
This, however, does not mean thatideas are treated here as a simple
or direct outcome of their social base. First, for onecan
understand the significance of al-Alusis intellectual development
and the rele-vance of salafiyya only by also considering the
intellectual context (the normative andthe subversive, the
conventional, and the unorthodox cultural patterns). And second,for
the interaction of cultural and structural constraints through the
human agency isboundin Durkheims wordsto engender new dimensions of
reality, rarely in apredetermined fashion.
T H E M A K I N G O F A N A L I M
Abu al-Thana Shihab al-Din Mahmud ibn Abdullah al-Husayni
al-Alusi was born inBaghdad to a family of Muslim scholars,
claiming a sharifian descent, whose surnameis derived from Alus, a
village south of Anat on the upper Euphrates.11 The Alusis,who were
originally residents of Baghdad, moved to Alus in the 17th century,
led bytheir ancestor Ismail. It is believed that Ismail, an alim of
high standing and once a
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468 Basheer M. Nafi
mufti of Baghdad, was allocated the land of several villages and
river islands in theAnat region by the Ottoman authorities.12 The
rise of the ulama as a main force amongthe urban notables (the
ayan) in major cities was a common feature of the OttomanMiddle
East at the time. In Baghdad, the ulamas position was further
strengthened asa result of the continuous struggle between the
Ottomans and successive rulers of Iran,from the Safavids onward,
over the control of Iraq. Around 175657, Mahmud
al-Alusi,grandfather of Abu al-Thana al-Alusi, returned to Baghdad.
It is not clear why Mahmudal-Alusi decided to bring his branch of
the family back to Baghdad after almost acentury of residing in the
Anat region. But because neither Abu al-Thana al-Alusi norhis
descendants would make reference to land possession in Alus, it
seems that thefamilyor, at least, Mahmuds branch of ithad lost the
right to its land holdings.13Private land ownership had not yet
been established in the Ottoman domain, and thetransfer of rights
to land or land taxes from one notable to another was not rare.
Abdullah al-Alusi (d. 1830), son of Mahmud and the father of Abu
al-Thana, wasalso an alim, trained in the Hanafi school of fiqh. He
was perhaps one of the firstAlusis to embrace the Hanafi madhhab
(school of fiqh), for the family is widelybelieved to have been of
Shafii background. The attraction of official posts in theOttoman
ulama hierarchy, which was exclusively a Hanafi institution,
encouragedmany Arab ulama families to subscribe to the Hanafi
school of fiqh in order to im-prove their sons chances in the
competition for position and wealth.14 Given the statusof the
Alusis as new arrivals in Baghdad, such a move was even more
appealing ifthey were to re-establish their roots in the learned
community and the citys ayancircles. Indeed, Abdullah al-Alusi
would soon rise to become a teacher at the Mulk-hana school and
would then be appointed to the prestigious school of Ali Pasha,
aposition that was usually offered to the most prominent of all
teachers in Baghdad.15
Although not entirely stable under the semi-autonomous rule of
the Mamluks, Bagh-dad of the early 19th century was quietly
emerging as a center of Sunni learning. Boththe Ottoman authorities
and the local Mamluk rulers were still deeply apprehensiveof
Persian interests in Iraq and commonly suspected the loyalty of the
Iraqi Shiis andtheir ulama. By supporting the Sunni circles of
learning, the Ottomans and the Mam-luks hoped to create a
counterbalance to the powerful Shii centers of Najaf and Kar-bala.
The Mamluks, in addition, never commanded the required legitimacy
to justifytheir semi-independence from the Ottoman central
government; support of the localpopulations, therefore, was vital
for maintaining their status. In a society whose out-look was
shaped by religion, this support could be garnered only by the
local ulama,spokesmen of the people. The flourishing of Sunni
learning in the city was by andlarge associated with a group of
Arab and Arabized Kurdish notable families, includ-ing the
Haydaris, the Jabburis, the Suwaydis, the Rawis, the Shawwafs, and
the Alusis,who had been ulama-producing families for several
generations.16 Baghdad was alsoa crossroads and a resting place for
Indian and Central Asian ulama moving from eastto west or north to
south. In this flourishing and evolving environment of
Islamiclearning, concentrated in a wide range of ulama circles held
at various schools andmosques, Abu al-Thana was to receive his
education.
Abu al-Thana al-Alusi was one of three sons born to Abdullah
al-Alusi, all ofwhom rose to prominence in the Sufi and ulama
circles of Baghdad. To prepare hisson for a scholarly career,
Abdullah paid great attention to the education of Abu al-
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 469
Thana from an early age. Before reaching age seven, Abu al-Thana
was taught vari-ous disciplines of the Arabic language and was
introduced to the primary texts ofHanafi and Shafii fiqh by his
father and Mulla Husayn al-Jabburi, the young Alusisfirst two
teachers.17 The combination of Shafii and Hanafi education was a
strongindication of Abdullah al-Alusis desire to preserve the
tradition of Shafii fiqh in thefamily, although he was certainly
aware that his sons career would prosper onlythrough the Hanafi
school. At age ten, Abu al-Thana al-Alusi finalized the first
stageof his learning and was given permission by al-Jabburi to seek
other teachers. Subse-quently, Abu al-Thana al-Alusi joined the
circle of his cousin Ali ibn Ahmad al-Alusito receive instruction
in Ashari theology, while seeking to study additional texts offiqh
with other ulama, including Mulla Muhammad al-Shawwaf, his son Abd
al-Aziz,Mulla Darwish ibn Arab, and Sayyid Amin ibn Ali al-Hilli.
Among his many teach-ers, however, Ala al-Din al-Musilli, Ali
al-Suwaydi, and Khalid al-Naqshbandi seemto have been the most
influential in shaping his outlook as an alim.
Al-Musilli, whom Abu al-Thana al-Alusi joined at age thirteen,
was a distinguishedalim but a demanding teacher with a difficult
personality, a reputation that left himwith only a small number of
students. Through his father, Salah al-Din Yusuf, and hisother
teacher, Isa al-Halabi, al-Musilli is connected to the Yemeni
scholars of hadith,Muhammad ibn Ala al-Din and Abd al-Khaliq
al-Mizjaji, as well as to the Dama-scene scholar of hadith Abd
al-Rahman al-Kuzbari (the grand Kuzbari, d. 177172).18Both chains
of knowledge indicate not only the powerful credentials of
al-Musilli butalso the strong ties that connected the ulama of
Baghdad with the wider circles ofknowledge in the Arab Mashriq
during the 18th and 19th centuries. Al-Musillis idio-syncratic
lifestyle and aversion to circles of power led him to reject a gift
presentedto him by the renowned Mamluk official Dawud Pasha when he
was still a dafterdar(director of finance) of vilayet Baghdad. Like
other ambitious Mamluks before him,Dawud Pasha was apparently
trying to pave his way toward capturing the governor-ship of
Baghdad by canvassing the citys prominent ulama. Once he achieved
his goalin January 1817, Dawud Pasha ordered Shaykh Ala al-Din to
be exiled to the city ofMosul. Although the exile order was later
rescinded on the intercession of other ulamaand notables, Dawud
Pasha continued to mistreat and harass al-Musilli until his deathin
1817, a few months after the rise of Dawud Pasha to power.19 This
incident, whileconforming with the ascetic image of Ala al-Din
al-Musilli, reveals other aspects ofthe relationship between men of
the sword and men of knowledge in early-19th-century Baghdad, which
was not always equitable or smooth.
The bulk of al-Alusis basic education in fiqh and theology was
the outcome of hisjoining the circle of Shaykh Ala al-Din
al-Musilli, in whose companionship he spentmore time than with any
other of his teachers. But though he would always be proudto extol
the memory of al-Musilli, at a later stage of his life, al-Alusi
seemed to feelthe need to augment his scholarly credentials with
further ijazas (licenses) from othereminent ulama of his time.
These he obtained from the Maliki faqih Shaykh Yahyaal-Marwazi
al-Amadi of Baghdad, Shaykh Abd al-Latif ibn Ali Fath-Allah of
Beirut,and the Damascene scholar of hadith Shaykh Muhammad
al-Kuzbari.20 There is noevidence, however, that these ijazas were
granted after a period of companionship;they were, rather, a kind
of approval ijazas. Sometime in the 16th and 17th centuries,the
ijaza, which had originated earlier in Islamic history to denote a
personal form of
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470 Basheer M. Nafi
the transmission of knowledge from teacher to student after a
considerable period ofcompanionship, began to degenerate to express
mere approval of existing knowledge,as well. The differentiation
between the two types of ijaza is in some cases necessaryto
delineate the educational background of Ottoman ulama, for the
approval ijazacould be obtain by correspondence or after only a
brief encounter and did not entaila period of companionship.
Shaykh Ali al-Suwaydi (17491821), al-Alusis second most
influential teacher,was a different kind of alim altogether. His
father, Muhammad Said, and his uncleAbd al-Rahman were both
scholars of hadith who received ijazas from or establishedcontacts
with the great 18th-century scholars of hadith and reformist ulama
of Cairoand Madina, such as Muhammad Murtada al-Zabidi, Muhammad
Hayat al-Sindi, andAbdullah ibn Salim al-Basri.21 Emerging as a
main scholar of hadith and history, al-Suwaydi was deeply immersed
in public and state affairs. By becoming a close adviserto Suleiman
the Young (al-Saghir), the wali of Baghdad from 1807 to 1810 and
repre-senting him in the inspection of the Basra customs services,
al-Suwaydi crossed theline between the realm of knowledge and the
realm of power, a move that wouldeventually lead to his demise.22
By encouraging Suleiman the Young to bid for greaterindependence
from Istanbul, al-Suwaydi was to contribute to the final
destruction ofthe highly ambitious wali. Yet the controversy
surrounding al-Suwaydis career arosenot only from his association
with Suleiman the Youngs short-lived drive for indepen-dence, but
also from widely circulated allegations of his WahhabiSalafi
beliefs. Abual-Thana al-Alusi is perhaps the only source we have
that denies such allegations,pointing in support of his argument to
his teachers book, al-Iqd al-Thamin, in whichal-Suwaydi adhered to
the standard methodology of the traditional ulama institutionrather
than the WahhabiSalafi approach.23 Al-Alusi, however, does not
indicatewhether al-Iqd al-Thamin was written before or after the
allegations of Wahhabismbegan to surface against his teacher. In
addition, while denying the Wahhabi leaningsof al-Suwaydi, al-Alusi
made clear assertions of his teachers Salafi beliefs, drawingin
essence a critical line between salafiyya and wahhabiyya.
The Wahhabi question (and consequently the allegations) is, of
course, a seriousone. Since the beginning of the rise of the
WahhabiSaudi movement in Najd in thelate 18th century, Iraqi
territories were repeatedly attacked by the WahhabiSaudiforces.24
Although the Ottoman Egyptian army of Muhammad Ali Pasha finally
elimi-nated the WahhabiSaudi danger in 1818, the ideological debate
about the Islamicnature of Wahhabi teachings was still simmering.
Whether in Istanbul, seat of theOttoman government, or in circles
of Islamic learning throughout the empire, theWahhabi movement was
from the beginning seen as both an ideological and a
politicalchallenge. While the Ottoman authorities were busy dealing
with the political andsecurity threats emanating from the
SaudiWahhabi expansion and domination of theholy cities of the
Hijaz, they encouraged loyal ulama to respond to the Wahhabitheses.
As they spoke in the name of Islam, the Wahhabis had to be
de-legitimized byscholars of Islam. In Iraq, therefore, accusations
of Wahhabi tendencies were a veryserious matter indeed.
Lines of communication between the Najdi heartland of the
wahhabiyya and theIraqi urban centers had been always open, not
only for bedouin raids but also for themovement of people, trade,
and ideas.25 Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab himself was
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 471
a student in Basra before embarking on his enterprise of Islamic
reform.26 Husayn ibnGhannam, the early Wahhabi historian and
student of Ibn Abd al-Wahhab, recordeda letter that his teacher had
sent to the Baghdadi alim Shaykh Abd al-Rahman al-Suwaydi (172186)
in response to the latters inquiry about the reality of the
newmovements teachings.27 Although Ibn Ghannam made no record of
the text of al-Suwaydis inquiring letter, Ibn Abd al-Wahhabs
response was written in a characteris-tically mild and welcoming
tone, an indication of the positive impression that al-Suwaydis
letter had left on him. It is also evident that the theological and
intellectualdebate between successors of Ibn Abd al-Wahhab and the
Iraqi ulama continued afterthe death of the Wahhabi movements
founder.28 Although Shaykh Abd al-Rahmanal-Suwaydi died more than a
quarter-century before the death of his nephew ShaykhAli
al-Suwaydi, the Iraqi ulamaor, at least, a section of them,
especially in Baghdadand Basrawere perhaps the first group of ulama
to become aware of the Wahhabiteachings and goals. It is even
tempting to assume that repeated wars and confronta-tions between
the Ottoman authorities in Baghdad and the WahhabiSaudi forcescould
not preclude the attraction of a few Baghdadi ulama to the puritan
ideal of theWahhabi movement.
In his biography of Abd al-Aziz al-Shawi (d. 1803), Uthman ibn
Sanad, the Iraqichronicler of the late Mamluk period, reported that
al-Shawi embraced Wahhabi teach-ings after spending a time in Najd
in an investigatory mission undertaken in 1801 onbehalf of Sulayman
Pasha (the elder; r. 17801802), the wali of Baghdad.29 Abd al-Aziz,
an alim and accomplished man of letters, belonged to the
ShawiUbaydi clan,one of the most notable and powerful Arab Sunni
tribes of Iraq in the 18th and early19th centuries. It was against
reports of contacts between the Ubaydis and the Wah-habis that the
Mamluk governor of Baghdad, Ali Pasha (who should be
distinguishedfrom the later Ottoman governor Ali Pasha), launched
an attack on the Ubaydis,which culminated in the killing of the two
brothers Abd al-Aziz and Muhammad al-Shawi in 1803.30 If Shaykh Ali
al-Suwaydi did indeed have Wahhabi leanings, thenhe was certainly
not an exceptional case.
Mamluk rule of Iraq contributed to the development of a
localized sense of identityfor the people of Baghdad and its
environs, where a precarious alliance of interestsexisted among the
Mamluk class, the city notables, and the ulama.31 It was not
surpris-ing, therefore, that the citys inhabitants, led by the
ulama, sided with Dawud Pasha(r. 181731), the last Mamluk governor
of Baghdad, against forces of the centralOttoman government, which
encircled the city in the early summer of 1831 with theaim of
destroying Mamluk rule. Shaykh Ali al-Suwaydi, whose support of
Suleimanthe Youngs political ambitions was acknowledged by Abu
al-Thana al-Alusi, sharedwith the wali a vision of political
independence from Ottoman control at a time thatIstanbul seemed to
have relinquished its responsibility toward the protection and
de-fense of Iraq. The bond that connected the alim and the wali
evokedat least, to theenemies of boththe WahhabiSaudi alliance. If
that was the motivation of Ali al-Suwaydi, his vision was
undoubtedly not shared by many in Baghdad; nor was itinformed of
the real balance of power in the Ottoman sultanate or of the
capabilitiesof the Iraqi Mamluk class, a position that resulted in
the final destruction of SuleimanPasha the Young and the demise of
al-Suwaydi.
By denying Ali al-Suwaydis Wahhabi attitudes, al-Alusi was
defending not only
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472 Basheer M. Nafi
the reputation of his teacher against what was still regarded as
a terrible accusation;he was also protecting himself from
implications of similar measure. Recording hisviews of his teacher,
as will be shown, in a turbulent time of his career and of
hisrelations with the Ottoman authorities, al-Alusi was careful not
to raise any kind ofdoubt about his own loyalty to the sultanate.
Al-Alusi, however, could not concealthe whole truth, and that is
why, while denying the Wahhabi attitudes of al-Suwaydi,he still
confirms his adherence to salafiyya. A few decades later, when the
Arab Salafiulama where becoming more confident of their position,
al-Suwaydis salafiyya andhis defense of Ibn Taymiyya, the main
source of inspiration for both the Wahhabis ofNajd and the modern
Salafis of the Arab urban centers, was celebrated by a Dama-scene
alim of the same school, as well as by Numan al-Alusi, son of Abu
al-Thana.32But Abu al-Thana al-Alusis attempt to draw a line
between wahhabiyya and salafiyyashould not be seen as a mere
defense technique employed for political expediency.Throughout the
19th and early 20th centuries, almost none of the non-Najdi
ulama,influenced by the Wahhabi reformist movement, could totally
agree with its teachingsor blindly accept all of its methods and
policies. Salafiyya without the spilling ofMuslim blood and free of
the Wahhabis extreme theological position would be thedominant
feature of the Islamic reformist circles of Baghdad, Cairo, and
Damascus.
The third main figure in the education of Abu al-Thana al-Alusi
was Abu al-Baha Diya al-Din Khalid al-Shahrazuri, known as Mawlana
Khalid al-Naqshbandi(17761826).33 Born in Qaradagh in the district
of Shahrazur in Kurdistan and edu-cated in the traditional ulama
circles of Sulaymaniyya, Mawlana Khalid was introducedto the
NaqshbandiyyaMujadidiyya twarqa in Delhi by successors of Shah
Wali-AllahDihlawi, led by his son Shah Abd al-Aziz (17461823).
Mawlana Khalid played aninstrumental role in spreading the
Naqshbandiyya twarqa in Kurdistan, Istanbul, and theArab Mashriq
during the early part of the 19th centuryso much so that the
twarqasline initiated by him would become known as the
NaqshbandiyyaKhalidiyya.
There is no dispute in the Naqshbandi writings about the
significance of the Indianjourney in the making of Mawlana Khalid
and his perception of his mission in life.The important aspect of
his initiation into the Naqshbandiyya is the revivalist phaseinto
which the twarqa was passing during the 17th and 18th centuries. In
a characteris-tic shift in the development of taawwuf, Sufi
revivalists extended the scope of thetwarqa from catering to
personal piety and world denial to assuming responsibility forthe
revival and well-being of society. The Naqshbandiyyas path with
which MawlanaKhalid was connected was first defined by the austere
and orthodox vision of AhmadSirhindi (15641624) in response to the
syncretic theology of Akbar, the Mughalemperor of India, and the
antinomianism of popular Sufism.34 With Shah Wali-AllahDihlawi
(170362), NaqshbandiyyaMujaddidiyya (as it came to be known after
Sir-hindi) would be projected from within a more complex structure
of ideas, in whichthe Indian revivalist shared central themes with
his contemporary Muhammad ibnAbd al-Wahhab, emanating from their
common admiration of Ibn Taymiyya.35 Buteven if he held Salafi
attitudes, Shah Wali-Allah was not a Wahhabi; nor was heconscious
of the Wahhabi movement. In Shah Wali-Allahs system of thought,
thecore Sufi doctrine of wahdat al-wujud was accommodated, and the
reformist emphasison the supremacy of the primary texts, the Quran
and hadith, was upheld. By empha-
-
Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 473
sizing the role of the primary texts in reconstructing the faith
and the community,Shah Wali-Allah called for ijtihad.36 The legacy
of Wali-Allah dominated the culturalenvironment of the Delhi school
in the early 19th century, into which Mawlana Khalidwas initiated
during his Indian sojourn.
Tasawwuf, however, is a way, not a tightly defined ideology, and
the points ofemphasis of a given Sufi tariqa would thus repeatedly
be redefined at the hands ofcharismatic figures, who appeared at
different stages in the development of the tariqa.Khalid
al-Naqshbandi was one of these figures. Although some reports
attributed tohim claims of intercession on behalf of the sick,
there is general agreement that Maw-lana Khalid, like the
revivalists of Delhi, sought to bring the tariqa into line with
thehigh tradition of religion by imploring his followers to observe
commands of thesharia and adhere to the Quran and the sunna.37
Theologically, howeverand despitethe widening debate about the
Wahhabi movement and evidence of his familiaritywith works of Ibn
Qayim al-Jawziyya, the faithful student of Ibn
TaymiyyaKhalidal-Naqshbandi was an Ashari. His commitment to
traditional Islamic scholarship isfurther shown in his faithfulness
to the Shafii madhhab.38 Until the last stage of hiscareer, he
taught works by the eminent Shafiis Ahmad ibn Hajar al-Haytami,
Muham-mad ibn Ahmad (al-Khatib) al-Shirbini, and Muhammad ibn Ahmad
al-Ramli,39 all ofwhom were Ottoman Egyptian non-Salafi scholars
with deep roots in the traditionalulama institution.
Mawlana Khalid began disseminating teachings of the
NaqshbandiyyaMujaddi-diyya twarqa, as he saw it, immediately after
his return to Sulaymaniyya in 1811. Oninstructions from his mentor
Abd al-Aziz Dihlawi, he made his first visit to Baghdadshortly
after his arrival in Sulaymaniyya.40 Two years later, plotting by
the local circlesof ulama at Sulaymaniyya forced him to move again
to Baghdad. Although he waspersuaded to return to Sulaymaniyya by
Mahmud al-Baban, the local ruler, his teach-ing career there
finally ended in 1820. Mawlana Khalid left his hometown first
forBaghdad, where he stayed for a few months; then he moved to
Damascus, where hespent the rest of his life.41 But contrary to the
trends of social consciousness andpolitical involvement that
characterized the careers of Ahmad Sirhindi and the
Delhirevivalists, Mawlana Khalid, especially during the Syrian
years, showed strong aver-sions to political circles and people of
authority.42 This position may have been agenuine reflection of his
understanding of what the Naqshbandiyya twarqa was about;it could
also be interpreted in light of the troubling circumstances that
surroundedhis relations with the rulers of Sulaymaniyya or the
religious-political tension thataccompanied the dissolution of the
Ottoman janissary corps and the Bektashi twarqaconnected with them.
The influence of Mawlana Khalid, in other words, stemmedfrom a
message of reconciliation between Sufism and the sharia, advocated
by apowerful and charismatic personality, rather than a radical
departure from traditionalIslamic culture and Ashari theology.
Abu al-Thana al-Alusi, still younger than twenty years of age,
met Mawlana Khalidin Baghdad during one of the eminent Sufis
sojourns to the city. Like many otherBaghdad ulama, the young
al-Alusi was initiated into the Naqshbandiyya twarqa byMawlana
Khalid; with him he also read a text of Islamic theology,43 a
strong indicationof Khalids reputation as both a Sufi leader and a
scholar. Two decades later, when
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474 Basheer M. Nafi
al-Alusi wrote about his teachers and his impressions of them,
he would underscoreMawlana Khalids adherence to the way of Quran
and the sunna. Although al-Alusidid not become a senior member of
the twarqa or a main contributor to the dissemina-tion of its
teachings, his attachment to the Naqshbandiyya facilitated his
entry to thesenior echelons of ulama circles at a time that the
Naqshbandiyya was being estab-lished rapidly in Iraq, Syria, and
elsewhere as the twarqa of the ulama class and oflearned
circles.
This highly diversified educational background makes the task of
identifying thereal orientations of Abu al-Thana al-Alusi even more
difficult. It was perhaps a rareoccurrence for an Ottoman alim in
the early decades of the 19th century to receivehis education at
the hands of three prominent and influential scholars who were
asdifferent as the traditionalist al-Musilli, the Salafi
al-Suwaydi, and the Sufi revivalistKhalid al-Naqshbandi. It is not
that al-Alusi consciously chose such a complex patternof education;
rather, the period in which he lived and functioned created this
complex-ity, as the long-held alliance between taawwuf and circles
of traditional Islam beganto crack, allowing various currents of
reformist Islam to rise to the surface. Like anyerudite traditional
Muslim alim of the time, al-Alusi acquired broad learning of
theAshari-Maturidi theology; Hanafi, Shafii, and Maliki schools of
fiqh; al-Bukhari andMuslim hadith collections, the two major
sources of hadith for Sunni ulama; Arabiclinguistic sciences, and
Greek logic, as well as the founding texts of taawwuf andethics,
such as al-Ghazalis Ihya Ulum al-Din, al-Ansari al-Harawis Manazil
al-Sairin, and Ibn Arabis al-Futuhat al-Makkiyya. Yet two
significant elements areclearly visible in the ijazas he granted
later in his life to his students and companions.The first is his
imploring of those who would receive his ijazas not to seek
knowledgein sources of logic, philosophy, or extreme Sufism, unless
it was vitally necessary;the second is his underlining of the
reformist ulama in the chains of knowledge thathe belonged tonot
only Ali al-Suwaydi and Khalid al-Naqshbandi, but also 18th-century
reformists such as the Damascenes Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulsi and
Ismail al-Ajluni, and the prominent figure of the Madinan circle,
Ibrahim ibn Hasan al-Kurani.44By projecting such an image, al-Alusi
attempted to qualify his traditionalist back-ground, the formal
education expected and accepted in the Ottoman cultural
environ-ment, through a moderate reformist genealogy that would not
invite the enmity of hiscontemporaries, especially among official
ulama and Sufis.
R I S E A N D FA L L O F A B U A L - T H A N A A L - A L U S
I
Until the end of Mamluk power and the restoration of central
Ottoman rule in 1831,al-Alusi held some teaching posts in several
mosques and schools but no officialposition. Although none of these
appointments was regarded as of major importance,for a young alim
in his twenties to reach the rank of teacher was in itself a
majorachievement. This recognition, however, would soon take
al-Alusi into the first crisisin his relationship with the Ottoman
administration of vilayet Baghdad. Once thetriumphant Ottoman
forces entered the city in September 1831, al-Alusi was markedas a
supporter of the defeated Mamluk wali Dawud Pasha and was thus
accused oftaking part in organizing resistance to the Ottoman
forces during the long siege of
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 475
Baghdad, which preceded the surrender of the Mamluks.45 Because
the re-establish-ment of central Ottoman rule was accompanied by
indiscriminate and summary killingof the Mamluks and their
supporters, al-Alusi went into hiding. Only intervention bythe new
mufti of the city, Shaykh Abd al-Ghani al-Jamil (17801863),46 would
savehim.
Al-Jamil was appointed to the muftiship of Baghdad immediately
after Ali Pasha,the victorious Ottoman commander, was confirmed by
Istanbul as the new wali. Be-fore leading the Ottoman expedition to
Baghdad, Ali Pasha was a governor of Aleppo,where he came to know
al-Jamil, the Baghdadi alim who was by then living in Syria.A
bureaucrat of the old regime, Ali Pasha was fully aware of the
importance of thewalimufti relationship for maintaining security
and stability; hence, one of his firstacts as a wali was to recall
his friend Shaykh Abd al-Ghani al-Jamil to take controlof the
muftiship of Baghdad. Al-Alusi, searching for protection and the
normalizationof his life, took refuge in the muftis house. Shortly
afterward, using his special rela-tionship with the wali, al-Jamil
not only secured the pardoning of al-Alusi but alsohis appointment
as the amn al-fatwa (first aide to the mufti).47 Al-Alusi was
furthergranted a teaching position at the Qadiriyya school of the
al-Gaylani mosque, a valu-able teaching post with a regular income.
The speedy recovery of al-Alusis fortunewas a strong indication of
how close he became to the new mufti and how appreciativethe mufti
was of his young aides abilities. But al-Alusis troubles with the
governmentwere not over. In May 1832, only a few months after the
inauguration of the newadministration, the mufti instigated a
popular rebellion against the wali, in whichal-Alusi, out of either
real conviction or mere loyalty to al-Jamil, became
deeplyinvolved.
The origin of the rebellion was certainly not political, for it
began as a reaction tothe killing of a Mamluk woman, who had taken
refuge at the muftis house, by thewalis aides. But the mass
rallying of the people of Baghdad to the muftis causeturned the
issue into a political matter, illustrating the precariousness of
the new order.Abd al-Aziz Nawwar, the eminent Egyptian historian
writing during the heyday ofArab nationalism, painted al-Jamils
rebellion in Arabist colors.48 Nawwar argued thatthe rebellion was
staged in support of Muhammad Ali and the Egyptian armys ad-vance
into Syria, reflecting the Iraqis wish for independence. Nawwar
presented nohard historical evidence to support his case. The
people of Baghdad were certainlymore sympathetic to the Mamluks and
did support Dawud Pasha against the Ottomangovernment forces, but
available sources do not mention any positive responses inBaghdad
toward the attempt of the wali of Egypt to expand his domain into
Syria,which was still in its initial stage. Muhammad Ali himself
made no proclamation tothe effect that his Syrian campaign was
launched to unite the Arab Mashriq and realizeits independence;
even if such a perception was to develop, communications were
notyet so effective as to create supportive public opinion in
Baghdad. The siding of al-Alusi, and the majority of Baghdadis,
with the Mamluks against the Ottoman expedi-tion in 1831 cannot be
attributed to the existence of Arab nationalist feelings amongthe
Iraqis of the early 19th century. The Mamluks were no different
from the newOttoman rulers in terms of their non-Arab ethnic
origins; nor did they promote anArabist vision, which was not yet
in existence, at any rate. It was most likely the
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476 Basheer M. Nafi
identification of the Mamluks with local forces and the strong
perception of theirbelonging to the city that led to the Baghdadis
to side with Dawud Pasha against whatappeared to be an invasion by
an external army.
In fact, Abd al-Ghani al-Jamil was an old friend of Ali Pashas,
and nothing in hisprevious career hinted at the existence of
secessionist political ambitions. Al-Jamilwas a mufti with a
powerful character who believed that his position entitled him
toprovide protection to an innocent Mamluk woman; when the sanctity
of his home wasbreached, he reacted in the best tradition of the
city of Baghdad. Responding to thesituation, the wali did not
hesitate to employ swift and harsh measures, includingdestruction
of the muftis residence, to suppress the uprising and restore
normality.Abd al-Ghani al-Jamil fled the city, and al-Alusi again
went into hiding.49 On thisoccasion, it was his Naqshbandi
associates who came to al-Alusis rescue, pleading tothe wali on his
behalf. Although his life was saved and he was allowed to keep
histeaching post at the Qadiriyya school, he lost his job at the
muftis office, and hismovement and activities were restricted for
the next year and half. As for Abd al-Ghani al-Jamil, a year after
the incident, he was allowed to return to Baghdad, butthe walis
offers of land grants and other enticements failed to appease the
proud alimor diminish his resentment. Until his death, al-Jamil
made no attempt to hide hiscondemnation of Ottoman rule, and some
of his recorded poetry reflects visible anti-Turk sentiments.50
One night in January 1835, Ali Pasha arrived at the Abd al-Qadir
al-Gaylanimosque to attend the usual religious congregation of the
holy month of Ramadan.Either by mere chance or out of
premeditation, al-Alusi delivered the sermon of thenight, which
deeply impressed the wali.51 This story, relayed by almost all of
the Iraqiannalists of the 19th century, is the standard explanation
for the second turn of fortunethat propelled the career of Abu
al-Thana al-Alusi from the days of fear and exclusionto the highest
position any local alim could reach in the Ottoman ulama hierarchy.
Itis believed that Ali Pasha, touched by the speech, invited
al-Alusi to a private meetingthat proved to be the beginning of a
deep and long-lasting friendship between the two.Sometime later, an
insignificant theological disagreement between the wali and
thestanding mufti, Muhammad Said al-Tabaqjali, precipitated the
dismissal of the latterand the appointment of al-Alusi in his
stead.
There is, of course, an element of legend in this story, in
which the power of theword is made to overwhelm the worldly powera
celebration of the righteousnessand the godly derived wisdom of the
men of knowledge. The truth had perhaps amore mundane dimension.
Ali Pasha, a ruthless official, highly generous man, andinefficient
administrator, was a typical Ottoman governor who not only held
strongreligious feelings but also understood the power of religion
and its vital role in theprocess of governing. He was granted the
vilayet of Baghdad as a reward for hissuccess in ending Mamluk
rule, but the restoration of central authority meant that thewalis
fate lay no longer with the local game of power but with the
Sublime Porte inIstanbul. To prove his ability to maintain peace in
this turbulent region of the empireand meet the financial demands
made of him by the central government, he definitelyneeded the
support of an active, trustworthy, and effective mufti who could
secure theloyalty of the ulama institution and command respect from
the population. Because
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 477
he did not feel comfortable enough with the mufti al-Tabaqjali,
Ali Pasha tried toreconcile with his old friend Abd al-Ghani
al-Jamil. When he failed in this attempt,he turned to the younger,
but not less illustrious or effective, al-Alusi. Al-Alusi
himselfdid not deny that there was yet another element to the
story.
The 1830s were testing times for Istanbul, during which the
Ottoman sultanatefaced the unstoppable incursion of Muhammad Alis
forces into Syria, European mili-tary and economic encroachments,
and uncertainty in the modernization project. Con-sequently, the
sultanate had a desperate need to reassert its legitimacy. After
his intro-duction to the wali, al-Alusi was encouraged by Ali Pasha
to comment on a bookdealing with Muslims duty to obey their ruler.
The book, al-Burhan fi Itaat al-Sultan,was originally written by a
former shaykh al-Islam, Abd al-Wahhab Effendi YasiniZadah.52
Al-Alusi added, to the short, original text a detailed and
diversified commen-tary on the legitimacy of the Ottoman sultanate
and the Quranic duty of all Muslimsto obey the sultan, and a
refutation of Shiiimamate political theory. He is also be-lieved to
have written a letter to Muhammad ibn Awn, the sharif of Mecca,
warninghim against siding with Muhammad Ali and declaring the wali
of Egypt a disobedi-ent aggressor, asserting that fighting him
would be equivalent to a jihad.53 Despitethe Salafi influences of
Shaykh Ali al-Suwaydi and the initial tumultuous episodes inhis
relations with the Ottoman authorities, there is certainly no
ground to doubt al-Alusis loyalty to the Ottoman sultanate or his
belief in the legitimacy of its rule. Itis, however, hard to
imagine that writing a treatise on Muslims obedience to thesultan
or issuing a fatwa against the wali of Egypt had been on his agenda
before hisrapprochement with Ali Pasha. By and large, obedience to
the sultan was a genreof Ottoman writings that flourished in
circles of Turkish ulama belonging to the offi-cial religious
hierarchy, especially those associated with the center of the
empire, andwas rarely treated by Arab or provincial, non-official
ulama. By identifying with thesultanates political Islamic goals,
he was resorting to the ulama class the best traditionof
compromise, reconciling himself with the new realities of power in
Baghdad.
Soon after al-Alusi wrote the commentary and gained the
muftiship of Baghdad,the wali obtained for him the honorary title
of teacher of the Asitana from thegovernment in Istanbul and
granted him the guardianship of the Marjan waqf, one ofthe most
rewarding endowments in the city. This addition to the income to
which hewas entitled from his other teaching posts totally
transformed al-Alusis life, materiallyand otherwise. He bought a
large new house, where he would receive and entertainincreasing
numbers of disciples, students, and fellow men of letters. A large
collectionof poems written in his praise by al-Alusis
contemporaries gives a clear indication ofthe influence and central
position he occupied in the cultural life of Baghdad duringthe
1830s and 1840s.54 Finally, by making peace with the Ottoman
authorities, heseemed to have realized his ambitionsand the
ambitions of his ancestors. The emi-nence and prestige that
al-Alusi acquired did not, however, come without a price. Al-Alusis
contribution to the heated debate that engulfed the Ottoman realm
over thelegitimacy of Muhammad Ali and his challenge to the state
made him effectively anofficial spokesman of the vilayet of Baghdad
and a recognized figure in Istanbul. Ina highly bureaucratized
state, even records of the local muftis were kept by the
shaykhal-Islam (the mufti of Istanbul and head of the religious
hierarchy). As long as al-
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478 Basheer M. Nafi
Alusi maintained his close relationship with the Ottoman
authorities in Baghdad, thisrecognition worked in his favor, but
once he fell out with the wali, it turned againsthim.
The affair of the Iranian questions, which also occurred during
the governorshipof Ali Pasha, shows how closely al-Alusi became
identified with the state. Al-Alusisinvolvement in this matter
developed out of a list of questions covering theological,legal,
and other issues of an Islamic nature that the Ottoman authorities
in Baghdadreceived from a group of Iranian Shii ulama. It is
certainly not clear whether the listof questions was meant to be
official and thus required an official response, or whetherit was
merely another episode in the long-drawn-out polemics between the
Sunni andthe Shii establishments of the two countries. Either way,
the OttomanPersian conflictwas not only geopolitical in nature. It
also concerned some of the holiest Shii shrines,as well as a large
Shii population, under Ottoman rule. This meant that the
Iranianquestions had serious implications for the legitimacy of the
Ottoman state and itscontrol of Iraq. According to al-Alusi and his
disciples, none of the ulama to whomthe questions were passed dared
to answer them until he volunteered to write thedefinitive
response.55 Al-Alusis effort was rewarded with a medal from the
sultan, arare honor to be bestowed on a local alim. A few years
after assuming the muftishipof Baghdad, al-Alusi seems to have
become so powerful a figure and so essential forthe walis scheme of
things that when, in 1837, Ali Pasha succeeded in suppressingthe
autonomous rulers of the emirate of al-Muhammara, on the eastern
bank of Shattal-Arab, it was to the mufti that he first told the
news of his victory in a formalletter.56
This symbiotic relationship between the mufti and the wali came
to an end in 1842,when Ali Pasha was dismissed from the
governorship of Baghdad and replaced withMuhammad Najib Pasha. The
new wali was not an admirer of the mufti; nor did hewelcome his
self-confidence or the aura of social influence and power that
surroundedhis position. A son of a prominent family from Istanbul
and a bureaucrat from the oldguard who saw in the Tanzimat (Ottoman
state-sponsored modernization) a mere proj-ect of authoritarianism
and the imposition of conformity, Najib Pasha sought to under-mine
al-Alusis position and diminish his status. The proud mufti, now
with an estab-lished scholarly reputation and a long record of
loyalty to the state, was not easyprey. As relations between the
two deteriorated, Najib Pasha made sure that al-Alusiscredentials
in Istanbul were wiped out and that he was dismissed at the most
conve-nient and opportune time.
Sometime in 1847, al-Alusi received an invitation from the
shaykh al-Islam to at-tend an imperial party in Istanbul,
celebrating the circumcision of Sultan Abd al-Majids sons. Although
the mufti was willing to accept the invitation, the wali orderedhim
to write an apology to the shaykh al-Islam and warned him of severe
conse-quences if he left the city of Baghdad, perhaps fearing that
al-Alusis travel to Istanbulwould consolidate his position.
According to al-Alusi, the letter of apology he wrotewas passed to
Najib Pasha, to be sent to Istanbul through official channels.
Instead,the wali dispatched the letter via the French consulates
mail, implying the existenceof suspicious relations between the
mufti and the French.57 As OttomanFrench rela-tions were at a low
point because of earlier French support of Muhammad Ali Pashaand
the rising influence of Britain in Istanbul, the letter, and the
way in which it was
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 479
delivered, had a drastic impact on the shaykh al-Islams view of
his mufti in Baghdad.Whether al-Alusi, who was certainly aware of
Najib Pashas strained relations withthe French consulate, really
did make approaches to the French in Baghdad hoping towin their
backing against the wali, or whether Najib Pasha concocted the
whole epi-sode, is not clear. What is clear, however, is that
al-Alusi, in the account of his latertrip to Istanbul and his long
meetings with the shaykh al-Islam, never reported theraising of
this issue or defending himself against the accusations of Najib
Pasha.58Although more than three years separated his travel to
Istanbul from the confrontationwith Najib Pasha, the absence of the
French connection issue from his long ex-changes with the shaykh
al-Islam should pose some questions as to the reality of al-Alusis
denial of Najib Pashas allegations.
In the summer of the same year, Najib Pasha faced the first
local challenge to hisrule in Baghdad. An angry demonstration began
in the popular quarter of Bab al-Shaykh, and the demonstrators
marched to the summer residence of the wali in protestagainst Najib
Pashas decision to increase taxes levied from the asnaf (artisans).
Be-cause Baghdad was just coming out of a plague epidemic, the
increase in taxationwas certainly an unwise decision and was bound
to spark a popular reaction. Butrather than face his own
responsibility for the situation, Najib Pasha accused the muftiand
his friend and student Sayyid Muhammad Amin al-Waiz, the preacher
of the Abdal-Qadir al-Gaylani mosque, of instigating the protest.59
Al-Waiz and one of his broth-ers were exiled to the southern Iraqi
city of Basra, and al-Alusi was dismissed fromthe muftiship. Najib
Pasha, for his injudicious management of the vilayets affairs,lost
his job in the summer of 1849.60 No investigation was conducted to
determine themuftis responsibility for the events of the summer of
1847, and the removal of NajibPasha from the governorship of
Baghdad could not be linked to the dismissal of al-Alusi, who by
then had no defenders in Istanbul to take up his case. And because
allprovincial muftis belonged to the religious hierarchy of the
sultanate, the dismissal ofal-Alusi was approved by the shaykh
al-Islam. For al-Alusi, the consequences of los-ing the muftiship
of Baghdad were heavyat least, financiallybecause he was notonly
deprived of his salary as a mufti but was also stripped of the
Marjan waqf, amajor source of his income. Almost nothing is known
of his attempts to mend hisrelations with the government during the
rule of Najib Pashas successor, Abd al-Karim Nadir Pasha (184951),
or of his trying to recover his lost income. But inMarch 1851, as a
result of severe deterioration in his financial situation,
al-Alusiembarked on his famous overland travel to Istanbul (a
detailed account of which heleft in three books), seeking a redress
of his case and compensation for his services.61
In Istanbul, where he seems to have been given dignified
hospitality and where hestayed until mid-1852, al-Alusi presented
his complaint to Shaykh al-Islam AhmadArif Hikmat (17851858), with
whom he seemed to have mended fences,62 and tothe famous modernist
Grand Vizier Mustafa Rashid Pasha. Although there is no evi-dence
that al-Alusi had been awarded the Marjan waqf for life by Ali
Pasha or thatthe waqf by then had been passed to his successor in
the muftiship of Baghdad, heapparently hoped to restore his control
of it. However, the ruling of the OttomanSupreme Judicial Council,
to whose jurisdiction al-Alusis case was finally referred,granted
him a yearly stipend equivalent to half of the Marjan waqfs
revenue. He wasalso offered the judgeship of the outlying Turkish
city of Erzurum, on the assumption
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480 Basheer M. Nafi
that he would receive the salary but deputize whomever he wished
to do the job. Lessthan two years after his return to Baghdad,
during which time he struggled againstdeteriorating health to
finalize his last works, al-Alusi died on 20 August 1854, per-haps
as unpleased with his times as he had been when he began his
career.
The fall of al-Alusi from the muftiship of Baghdad and the
deterioration in hisrelations with the Ottoman authorities in the
city was a major event in his life. Under-standing this eventits
causes and its impactcould shed further light on a criticalperiod
in the history of Ottoman Iraq and on the making of a prominent
alim who isstill an elusive figure. It has been suggested that
al-Alusis crisis may have been dueto the gradual eclipse of the
role of the religious establishment in the tanzimat era,and the
Ottoman reformists attempts to decimate the ulamas material base
throughthe confiscation and diversion of pious foundations.63 A
similar explanation had beenmade earlier by Abd al-Aziz Nawwar, who
went even further by asserting that al-Alusi held strong Arabist
and anti-Turkish sentiments that were crucial elements indeepening
the enmity between him and Najib Pasha.64 Although both proposals
seemlogical, they cannot easily be sustained by hard historical
evidence.
The Ottoman Tanzimat was launched in 1839 by Rashid Pasha and
his coterie,which created the impression that the appointment of
Muhammad Najib Pasha to thegovernorship of vilayet Baghdad two
years later was meant to implement measuresof modernization in the
unruly province. Seen in totality, the Tanzimat made a
consid-erable leap toward the transformation of the Ottoman state
and society, leading to thecentralization of administration and
undermining the historical autonomy of old socialorganization. By
introducing new channels of representation, uniform curricula
andmodern schools, and legal codes and modern judicial systems, and
by attempting tocreate a professional, modern military free of Sufi
and religious influences, the Tanzi-mat weakened the ulamas
position and their role in holding the societal nexus andspeaking
on behalf of the community.65 The Ottoman modernist statesmen were
alsohighly interested in maximizing state revenues, for the
industrialization of the empireand for other purposes, and saw in
the privatization of land and the states re-acquisi-tion of major
religious endowments one way to generate the necessary funds for
theirproject.66 Yet, the modernization vision of the Tanzimat was
not born fully fledged;rather, it was largely experimental and took
more than three decades to unfold. Itsimplementation was equally
piecemeal and regionally uncoordinated.
In Iraq, the Tanzimat had no tangible impact until the beginning
of Midhat Pashasrule (186972)67; only minor and highly tentative
steps were taken in the 1850s, sev-eral years after the removal of
al-Alusi. One of the main promises of the first Tanzimatdeclaration
in 1839 was the abolishment of the centuries-old iltizam system,
but evenNajib Pasha was appointed to the governorship of Baghdad on
the basis of the iltizamcontract of the old regime.68 Although the
first administrative council for the provinceof Baghdad came into
being in March 1851,69 the municipality of Baghdad was
notestablished until 1868,70 while modern educational and judicial
systems were intro-duced by Midhat Pasha only the following year.71
There is no doubt that the statesattempts to control the public
waqf began with Sultan Mahmud II in the late 1820s;however, these
attempts did not take real form in Baghdad or possess the power
oflaw until the issuing of the regulations for awqaf administration
in the provinces in1863.72 In fact, the Marjan waqf survived until
the late 19th century, when Numan
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 481
Khayr al-Din al-Alusi succeeded in a visit to Istanbul in
reacquiring it at the order ofSultan Abdulhamid II.73
This picture of slow and uncertain effort at bringing the
Tanzimat vision to mid-19th-century Baghdad suggests no direct link
between the program of modernizationand the crisis of al-Alusi. The
ruthless reassertion of government authority in the cityof Karbala
by Najib Pasha in December 1842; the war against the
SaudiWahhabimovement; the destruction of Mamluk rule in Baghdad;
and the termination of theJalalis autonomy in Mosul in 1834 and of
the amirs of al-Muhammara three yearslater were no doubt
manifestations of Ottoman attempts to re-establish the
territorialintegrity of the empire. But while al-Alusis relations
with the Ottoman centralizedregime survived until the end of the
1840s, the Baghdad of Najib Pasha was stilllargely a city of the
pre-modern times, ruled by an authoritarian wali who, though
heseems to have been a good administrator, was described by Ahmad
Lutfi, the lateOttoman official historian, as an oppressive wali, a
reactionary whose rule resultedin no benefits for the state or the
people of Iraq.74
Najib Pashas intolerance of the power and influence of the mufti
was combinedwith a desire to eclipse symbols of his predecessors
long rule, of which al-Alusi wasthe most prominent, and stamp his
own imprints on affairs of the vilayet. In addition,Najib Pasha was
a Qadiri Sufi at a time in which relations between the al-Alusis
andthe Gaylanis, whose head was traditionally the naqib al-ashraf
and leader of the Qadi-riyya twarqa in Baghdad, were characterized
by antagonism and hostility.75 In contrastto Ali Pasha, Najib Pasha
was closely attached to the naqib al-ashraf, Sayyid Ali al-Gaylani,
affirming his commitment to the Qadiriyya by organizing the large
waqf ofthe Abd al-Qadir al-Gaylani mosque for the benefit of the
al-Gaylani family. Untilthe spectacular success of Mawlana Khalid
in spreading the Naqshbandiyya twarqa inBaghdad, with which
al-Alusi was identified, the Qadiriyya was the most powerfulSufi
brotherhood in the city and among the Iraqi Sunnis at large. The
Naqshbandiyyatwarqa represented a threat to the traditional
dominance of the Qadiriyya, and thoseamong the Naqshbandi ulama who
expressed Salafi attitudes and criticized populartaawwuf were the
most threatening. Not surprisingly, it was not only al-Alusi
whosuffered from the alliance of the wali with the Gaylanis but
also his friend, student,and fellow Salafi, Sayyid Amin al-Waiz,
preacher of the very mosque of Abd al-Qadir al-Gaylani.
Hence, to explain al-Alusis crisis in terms of his Arab
nationalist attitudes is toreverse the order of things, for it was
most likely the outcome of al-Alusis downfallthat led to nourishing
his Arabist tendencies. And it was here that the Tanzimat playeda
crucial, though indirect, role. As has already been argued, Abu
al-Thana al-Alusiof the early 1830s was certainly not an Arabist in
the nationalist sense of the term,and his loyalty to the Ottoman
sultanate during the following years should not be indoubt. But his
profoundand, one might say, arrogantbelief in his abilities
andscholarly qualifications, contrasted with the abrupt manner of
his dismissal, engen-dered in him a strong feeling of resentment.
Al-Alusis resentment was first directedat his own opponents and
enemies in the religious circles of Baghdad, together withthe wali.
Later, as he was forced to make the arduous journey to Istanbul,
the objectsof his resentment multiplied. In the pre-Tanzimat world,
his problem would have beenresolved in Baghdad, where the power of
the word and personal relations still mat-
-
482 Basheer M. Nafi
tered. The centralized regime of the Tanzimat, which reasserted
the position of Istan-bul, made the quest for justice a difficult
task for a provincial alim and underlined theremoteness of the
ruler from the ruled.76 From the perspective of the Baghdadi
alim,Istanbul of the mid-19th century appeared both physically and
culturally remote. Re-flecting his belief in the power of the word,
which verged on the point of obsession,77he took with him a copy of
his recently completed exegesis of the Quran, the ultimateword that
any alim could achieve, to pave his way into the higher circles of
thestate. But the new men in Istanbul belonged to a world that was
not his, and the newcodes of law, according to which his case was
decided, were abstract and devoid ofpersonal values and
appreciation of the word.
Resentment and marginalization, reinforced by a heightened
belief in his own self,gave rise to a sense of difference,
alienation, and rediscovered identity. If the Ottomansultanate was
about Islam and the guarding of the faith, it was the Arab ulama
(andhimself in the first place), not their privileged Turkish
counterparts, who understoodthe original text and who were better
equipped to dive into the oceans of its intricacy.Throughout the
account of his travel to Istanbul, al-Alusi would highlight the
igno-rance of the Turkish ulama he encountered and the
worthlessness of their ijazas andchains of authority as compared
with the ijazas of the Arab ulama, placing elements oflanguage and
ethnicity at the heart of his assessment.78 Even the deservedly
admirableerudition of the shaykh al-Islam was attributed to his
long association with Arabulama. Although al-Alusi gradually warmed
to the shaykh al-Islam and came to writea flattering biography of
him, he could never portray him in terms as affectionate
andprecious as those he used to describe his own students and
disciples in Baghdad. InIstanbul, though still identifying himself
as a Naqshbandi, al-Alusi mocked shaykhsof the popular taawwuf who
enjoyed the comfort of the capitals madrasas and khani-qahs and
occupied the center of its religious life, while implicitly and
explicitly under-scoring the pervasive corruption of the state and
the divisive nature of its mens inter-relationships. When he was
invited, with genuine insistence, to stay in Istanbul, hecould
hardly hide the feeling that it was to Baghdad that he belonged. It
is here, inthe last few years of al-Alusis life and in the last of
his writings, that Arabist expres-sions would become visibleand
here, too, that one may find some answers to thereality of his
theological convictions.
E X E G E T I S T O F T H E Q U R A N
In the introduction to his exegesis of the Quran, Ruh al-Maani
fi Tafsir al-Quran al-Azim wal-Sab al-Mathani,79 al-Alusi outlined
the methodology he intended to followin projecting his
understanding of the Quranic text. He first mentioned the basic
toolsnecessary for the interpreter of the Quran, including
knowledge of the Arabic lan-guage, the occasions on which various
verses were revealed, the correctly transmittedsayings of the
Prophet and his companions related to the meaning of Quranic
verses,and the science of Quranic readingstools beyond which a
Salafi interpreter wouldrarely venture. Al-Alusi then moved to
uphold the traditionalist method of interpreta-tion by rai (the
interpreters independent, informed opinion) and accept the
validityof Sufi interpretation. When he delved into the old debate
about the nature of theQuranic text, he rejected the Mutazili
doctrine of the Quran as the creation of God
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 483
and advocated the HanbaliAshari view of the Quran as the word of
God, supportinghis position, nevertheless, with arguments derived
mainly from Ashari sources.80 Thedifference here is critical, for
only the Hanbali argument is deemed valid by propo-nents of the
Salafi theology, despite the HanbaliAshari agreement on the
principle.In fact, al-Alusis complex and broadly scoped
introduction to his magnum opus sendssignals that are as mixed and
intricate as his own life. Later Arab students of modernsalafiyya
saw in Ruh al-Maani a tafsir that upheld the principles of
salafiyya,81 whileMuhammad Husayn al-Dhahabi, the late shaykh
al-Azhar, in his comprehensive studyof the history and schools of
tafsir, placed al-Alusis work under the category of tafsrby rai.82
And although Muhammad Bahjat al-Athari, the Iraqi Salafi scholar,
acceptedthat Ruh al-Maani was a tafsir based on three approachesthe
Salafi, the Sufi, andthe theologians raihe raised some doubts about
the clarity of its Salafi content.83
The rai, Salafi, and Sufi interpretative approaches constituted
the three majorschools of Quranic tafsr until the mid-19th
century.84 Tafsr by rai, which flourishedin Ashari and other Muslim
theological circles, implies a greater role for reason
inunderstanding the Quranic text. In reality, yielding to the
conservative currents thatdominated Sunni Islam during the middle
Islamic period, tafsr by rai turned into animitative exercise in
which theological opinions of the Ashari school were reproducedin a
more dogmatic and largely convoluted manner. One of the main
pursuits of tradi-tionalist Islamic circles, rai (or theological
dogma) gradually became an aim in itself,eclipsing the Quranic text
in relation to which the whole tafsr discourse is legiti-mated.
Indeed, in most of tafsr-by-rai works, the Quranic text was
employed as avehicle to advocate previously conceived theological
opinions. It was against thisdevelopment that Ibn Taymiyya and his
students, such as Ibn Kathir, reacted by re-establishing tafsr on
the primacy of the text, avoiding the distractive theological
treat-ment of the Quran and adhering to the lucid and directly
formulated Salafi conceptsof the nature of the Quran, the
attributes of God, and mans responsibility for hisacts. Al-Alusis
ambition, it seems, was to achieve the unprecedented not only
bycombining Salafi and Ashari theological methodologies but also by
incorporating theSufi approach of searching for the hidden,
intrinsic meaning.
Ruh al-Maani is a massive project that took al-Alusi more than
fifteen years tocomplete, concluding in February 1851, only one
month before he embarked on hisdesperate journey to Istanbul.85 The
writing of a substantial part of al-Alusis work,therefore, was the
product of his heyday in office as the official Hanafi mufti
ofBaghdad, a period during which al-Alusi was enjoying a close
relationship with thewali and was keen to display a firm commitment
to the sultanates political and ideo-logical goals. Of the
thirty-volume work, the last third was most likely written afterhis
dismissal in 1847. This assumption is validated by the gradual but
fundamentalchange in the discursive underpinnings of Ruh al-Maani.
Overall, al-Alusis work isundoubtedly an unsuccessful undertaking
to compile a comprehensive Quranic tafsrthat integrates the Sufi,
rai, and Salafi approaches to the text. However, the spirit
andemphasis in which the last few volumes were written are
different from those of theearlier parts of the work. In the first
parts of his tafsr, al-Alusi was rather a closetSalafi walking a
tight path between his own convictions and the demands of
hisofficial position; toward the final volumes the Salafi alim in
him would become freerand more visible. Al-Alusi opened his work by
declaring himself a re-born Hanafi,
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484 Basheer M. Nafi
renouncing his Shafii background and defending Ashari theology
and the validity ofthe Sufi interpretation.86 Arguing in support of
tafsr by rai, he wrote:Those who believe that tafsr by rai is not
permissible refer to a Prophetic hadith, relayed byAbu Dawud,
al-Tirmidhi, and al-Nisai, which says, He who spoke of the Quran
with his ownopinion, even if he was correct, is mistaken. Another
hadith, relayed by Abu Dawud, states,He who spoke of the Quran
without knowledge, is to be seated in the hellfire. Both
[hadiths]furnish no evidence [to uphold the case of opponents of
rai]. Firstly for the doubts about theauthenticity of the first
hadith . . . as for the second hadith, it carries two meanings:
first, hewho attempts to interpret the problematic [ambiguous]
verses of the Quran without [proper]knowledge is to be subjected to
the wrath of God; the second meaning is that he who expressedan
opinion about the Quran while he knew that the right view lays
elsewhere is to anticipatethe punishment of God. Secondly, for the
evidence supporting the permissibility of rai andijtihad in the
Quran are numerous.87
Neither rai nor ijtihad is used casually or in general terms
here, because al-Alusisspecific projection of rai is illustrated by
numerous other instances, including hispraise of al-Razi, the last
of the great Asharis, whose Quranic tafsr was the embodi-ment of
theological rai and philosophy,88 and his approving incorporation
of IbnArabis mystical venture into the employment of numbers and
letters in understandingthe text and the universe and his
unorthodox re-interpretation of the Quranic story ofMoses and
Pharaoh as the story of mans struggle against his own evil self and
theseductions of this world. Further, in an unjustified contextual
diversion, al-Alusilaunched a rhetorical attack on Ibn Taymiyya,
Ibn al-Qayim, and other eminent Han-bali scholars of the middle
Islamic period.89 In other words, the early parts of Ruh al-Maani
reflect a defined position, intent, on the part of al-Alusi to
identify with tradi-tionalist Islamic circles of the Ottoman
religious hierarchy where the Hanafi schoolof fiqh and Ashari
theology were the norm. Yet even here, al-Alusis discourse couldnot
conceal his inner struggle and tension. For instance, he made sure
that his accep-tance of Sufi methodology should not be understood
as an acceptance of extremetaawwuf (batw iniyya), where symbolic
interpretation of Islamic tenets led to the denialof sharia and its
obligations.90 And once he established his Ashari credentials, he
thenreturned to affirm his commitment to the late doctrine of Abu
al-Hasan al-Ashari asexpressed in his book al-Ibana,91 in which
al-Ashari reconciled himself with Hanbaliand Salafi theology.
Realizing how far he had gone in diluting his Salafi
orientation,al-Alusi carefully and elusively sought to qualify the
Ashari and Sufi dimensions ofhis work. He would thus write:
You should also be informed that many people regarded the
attributes [of God], such as Hisascendance [to the throne], hand,
foot, descent to the lower heaven, laugh, wonder and the likes,as
unexplainable issues. The Salafis doctrine, and al-Ashari, God
bless his soul, is among theirnotables, states in his al-Ibana that
although they are all affirmed attributes they lay beyond[the
capacity of] reason; we are required to believe in them but not to
conceive of God in termsof mans attribute, in order not to put
reason in opposition to reason.92
Gradually, however, al-Alusis Salafi commitments would become
more forceful,and he seemed to begin giving up on his ambition, or
his expedient pursuit, to recon-cile the irreconcilable. While in
the first parts of his work al-Alusi incorporated Sufiopinions into
the mainstream of his tafsr, in later parts he placed them in a
separate
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 485
section at the end of each chapter,93 implying their
unrelatedness and foreignness. Inthe last two volumes of Ruh
al-Maani, his discourse became almost completely freeof Sufi
references. After launching an apologetic attempt to disociate the
two greatSufis, Ibn Arabi and Abd al-Qadir al-Gaylani, from the
widely circulated anti-ortho-dox Sufi notion of elevating saints to
a status higher than that of the Prophets,94 hewould become
unequivocally assertive in his rejection of Ibn Arabis and other
Sufiopinions that rested on the belief in wahdat al-wujud and
dismiss hadiths of Sufiorigins in favor of the orthodox views of
the scholars of hadith.95 Free of the politicaland ideological
constraints of office, al-Alusi would no longer fear identifying
withthe major figures of the Salafi school of thought. Ibn
al-Qayims concept of thesoul, as suggested in his book on the
subject, was upheld against the views of eventhe grandest of all
Asharis, Abu Hamid al-Ghazali,96 while the usual Salafi
descriptionof Ibn Taymiyya as Shaykh al-Islam would first be
mentioned with a degree ofreservation, then used freely and
unreservedly.97 Added to the fundamental differences,in form as
well as in substance, between Ruh al-Maani and al-Razis Mafatih
al-Ghayb, al-Alusis specific responses to many of al-Razis views
make the case ofthose who identified al-Alusis work with that of
al-Razi unsustainable.98 But nothingcould illustrate al-Alusis
profound commitment to the Salafi perspective of Islambetter than
his discussion of the principal theological issues, which defined
the con-tours of salafiyya in the first place.
Beyond the displays of linguistic dexterity, beyond the
distractive insertions of Suficommentary, and beyond the not always
vitally required references to wide-rangingsources and opinions of
Islamic heritage, al-Alusis Ruh al-Maani is a powerful de-fense of
Salafi theological doctrine at a time that traditionalist Ashari
theology wasstill dominant. For al-Alusi, attributes of God are His
and should neither be allegori-cally re-interpreted nor understood
in this-worldly terms, for His transcendence defiesthe wildest
imagination of man. Gods power is infinite; His will is absolute,
and Heis the creator of all things. But God also created in man the
faculty of choice thatmakes his responsibility for his acts
undisputable.99 It was here in the irrepressibleSalafi
determination to delineate mans position and limits that one of the
main ele-ments of salafiyyas inevitable confrontation with
traditional Islam and tasawwuf lay.Al-Alusi (as any Sunni alim was
expected to do) spared no occasion to attack theMutazilis and
ridicule their views; yet his concept of man and free will, like
that ofIbn Taymiyya before him, was closer to the Mutazili doctrine
than to that of theAsharis. In fact, one of the sharpest arguments
that al-Alusi formulated was his refuta-tion of the Ashari notion
of kasb (acquisition) and its dogmatic denial of causation
innatural phenomena.100 His disociation from Ashari theological
doctrine culminated inhis recognition of the Salafi position that
Gods acts and injunctions can be rational-ized (talil). In this he
not only declared his disagreement with one of the fundamentalsof
Ashari theology; he also advanced his view as an extension of the
view of Ibn al-Qayim, the most eminent of all of Ibn Taymiyyas
students. The Ashari doctrine, al-Alusi pointed out,states that
Gods acts are not to be linked to the purposes [of God] . . . the
Salafis, like Ibn al-Qayim and others, stressed that acts of God
could be rationally explained. . . . [In fact], rational-ization
[of Gods acts] exists in more than ten thousand Quranic references
and hadiths, anyattempt to re-interpret them all in a different
light is a deviation from fairness.101
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486 Basheer M. Nafi
Al-Alusis rupture with the Ashari schoolas well as with its
vehicle, traditionalistIslamwas further expressed by his assertion
that the four fiqhi madhhabs of SunniIslam reflected neither an
eternal nor an obligatory order, and that the fulfillment offaith
can be achieved from within as well as from without the madhhabi
system.102 Inthis he was no longer a Hanafi, or even a Shafii, in
the literal sense; he was becominga Salafi.
The ideal that is invoked by al-Alusi is that of the early
centuries of the Islamicventure, the ideal that was embodied (or
believed by Ibn Taymiyya and his followersto have been embodied) in
companions of the Prophet, their followers, and disciplesof the
followers. By fusing their ideas with the glorious period of Islam,
later Salafisin the Arab-speaking regions of the Ottoman Empire
equipped their intellectual enter-prise with a political dimension
and laid the foundations for turning salafiyya into anoppositional
force to the Ottoman status quo. Only the Saudi state, which was
seenas the guardian of salafiyya, received their approval. There is
no evidence to suggestthat al-Alusis embrace of this powerful
rationalist and austere worldview was a re-sponse to the impact of
modernization and the Western challenge, for al-Alusis worldwas
still a world on the eve of modernity, to use Abraham Marcuss
term.103 In thepre-modern mode, demarcations between the
conventional and the subversive weredistinctively marked; after
struggling for a long time to blur these demarcations, al-Alusi
stepped to the side of the subversive. The implications of Salafi
theology forthe next generation of Arab ulama were certainly
evident. Salafiyya, as Commins hasproposed, offered the only
Islamic route for the ulama class to free themselves fromthe
shackles of the past and construct an Islamic discourse that was
both relevant tomodern times and able to withstand the blowing
winds of change.
C O N C L U S I O N
The emergence of the WahhabiSaudi movement, carrying the banners
of the Salafidoctrine, as a violent and secessionist insurrection
in the late 18th and early 19thcenturies created a historical
anomaly that has complicated our understanding of themodern history
of the Salafi school of thought. Violence and secession related
moreto the tribal and political ambitions of the WahhabiSaudi
alliance than to inherentcharacteristics of salafiyya or the
dynamics of its recovery from the dominance oftasawwuf and Ashari
theology that occasioned the long period of decline. In otherwords,
the development of modern salafiyya in the late 19th century, as
representedby Muhammad Abduh, Numan Khayr al-Din al-Alusi, Rashid
Rida, and many others,was in fact the outcome of a slow, long, and
convoluted process. Al-Alusi was one ofa series of transitional
figures in this process. He was transitional in the sense that
hecould never formulate his Salafi views in a full-fledged and
exclusive manner, orpresent a coherent case for his choice. His
Salafi discourse was largely embedded inand intertwined with other
discourses. It is true that, as he grew older, he becamemore
explicit in expressing a Salafi viewpoint, but one has the
impression that he wasno longer prepared to make a stand, and his
writings were instead meant to be atestimony to posterity and to
fulfill his search for self-emancipation. Yet one shouldin no way
doubt the strength of his Salafi convictions, not only because they
repre-sented his last words, but also because he was an alim with
versatile erudition, an
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Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 487
alim who knew Islamic traditions and the mannerism of these
traditions. His choicewas, therefore, an informed and deliberate
choice, though he was not always able tomake it appear as such.
Al-Alusi was also the product of a deeply established Sunni
belief in the ultimateprecedence of communal unity and stability
over inner dissent and conflict, regardlessof the side on which
righteousness might lie. A main reason behind al-Alusis
earliersuppression of his Salafi attitudes was certainly the
hostile reaction elicited by theviolent expansion of the
WahhabiSaudi movement in the Arabian Peninsula. But hewas also a
believer in the Ottoman sultanate and its well-being. Only the
experienceof his fall from the muftiship, his deep sense of
injustice, and the suddenness withwhich the Ottoman centralization
confronted him and deepened his grievances wouldshake this belief
and arouse his Arabist feelings. His career, nevertheless,
equallyreflected the tense game of power that shaped the
relationship between the ulamaclass and the Ottoman rulers, even
before the impact of the modernization programbegan to be felt. One
of the main features of the readjustment of local ulama in theArab
urban centers to Ottoman rule was their attainment of the post of
mufti in the18th century and their success in preserving it within
their domain.104 Though a testi-mony to the resilience of the ulama
class, this major achievement conversely exposeda significant
section of the local ulama to the bearings of power and its
constantlychanging climate. A career in the Ottoman religious
hierarchy therefore would hingenot only on piety and erudition but
also on influence and access to men of power.
Al-Alusi had a blueprint neither for his career nor for his
exegesis of the Quranwhen he set out to write it. A monumental
project by any standard, Ruh al-Maani,like its author, was also
subject to the unpredictability of the ulamastate relationshipand
should thus raise some vital questions about the validity of
reading the genre oftafsir without considering its socio-political
context. It is evident that al-Alusi wasinfluenced by Salafi ideas
much earlier in his life, but it was not until his politicaland
social outlook was disrupted that his Salafi attitudes would be
clearly expressed.In this sense, salafiyya provided a vehicle for
the ulamatic oppositional discourse inthe late Ottoman period. The
object of this opposition was both the circles of powerand the
ruling forces and the locally entrenched Sufi twarqas and popular
taawwuf.Al-Alusis disenchantment with taawwuf was grounded,
perhaps, not only in Salafitheological beliefs but also in the
competition for social and political interests. In arevealing
outburst in a later part of Ruh al-Maani, al-Alusi launches a
ferocious attackon the Sufis who give their loyalty to the
oppressors, and even to those who have norelationship to religion,
and support them by falsehood and injustice.105 Although
thisoutburst alludes to the role played by some Baghdadi Sufi
shaykhs in al-Alusis down-fall, it also signifies the beginning of
the Salafi ulamas confrontation with the Sufistate alliance. The
connivance of Sufi tariqas with the state, and the rising power
ofthe state in determining who among the ulama would be granted
position and influ-ence and who would be deprived, would set the
scene for the emergence of modernsalafiyya and its oppositional
discourse.
It is much easier perhaps to pinpoint the fundamental
theological differences thatseparate salafiyya from taawwuf; in
reality, al-Alusi, like many other reformist ulamain the 18th and
19th centuries, was equally an alim whose education was imbued
withSufi culture. Except in the case of Ibn Abd al-Wahhab, who, as
Albert Hourani has
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488 Basheer M. Nafi
pointed out,106 took Ibn Taymiyyas teachings to extreme,
reformists of the 18th and19th centuries had to negotiate their way
in a Sufi-dominated environment to whichthey belonged and of which
they were critical at the same time. In this respect, al-Alusi was
no different from Shah Wali-Allah, whose belief in wahdat al-wujud
didnot stop him from writing a treatise on the virtues of Ibn
Taymiyya and embracing arange of his ideas. Assuming that Sufi and
Salafi attitudes were always mutuallyexclusive is to assume that
cultural artifacts can be frozen in history. Al-Alusi was noIbn Abd
al-Wahhab, of course, but neither could he be regarded as a
traditional Sufiand Ashari alim. Nor was his case of overlapping
attitudes the end of the evolutionof Salafi theology, for Salafi
themes and ideas would continue to be appropriated,negotiated, and
developed. By the end of the 19th century, the salafiyya of
MuhammadAbduh and Rashid Rida, as well as other reformist ulama in
Damascus, Baghdad, andelsewhere in the Muslim world, would acquire
a new dimension by responding toWestern cultural challenges.
N O T E S
Authors note: I am deeply grateful to Y. Michot, I. Abu Rabi, S.
Taji-Farouki, M. Badawi, the editorof IJMES, and the anonymous
IJMES reviewers for reading and commenting on an earlier version of
thisarticle.
1Muhammad Rashid Rida, al-Wahhabiyyun wal-Hijaz (Cairo: Matbaat
al-Manar, 192526); idem, al-Manar wal-Azhar (Cairo: Matbaat
al-Manar, A.H. 1353); Numan Khayr al-Din al-Alusi, Jala
al-Aynayinfi-Muhakamat al-Ahmadayn (Cairo: Matbaat al-Madani,
1981); Husayn ibn Ghannam, Tarikh Najd, ed.Nasir al-Din al-Asad
(Beirut: Dar al-Shuruq, 1985), esp. 36382.
2David D. Commins, Islamic Reform: Politics and Social Change in
Late Ottoman Syria (New York:Oxford University Press, 1990), 25.
See also H. A. R. Gibb, Modern Trends in Islam (Chicago:
ChicagoUniversity Press, 1947), 3435; Albert Hourani, Arabic
Thought in the Liberal Age: 17981939 (London:Oxford University
Press, 1962), 37, 92, 148, 222, 22526, 231, 233, 344. Cf. John L.
Esposito, ed., TheOxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), s.v. Salafi-yah (Emad
Eldin Shahin), 3:46369.
3For elaborate discussion of the life and works of Ibn Taymiyya,
see Henri Laoust, Essai sur le doctrinessociales et politiques de
Taki-d-Din ibn Taimiya (Cairo: Institut Francais dArcheologie,
1939); MuhammadAbu Zahra, Ibn Taymiyya: Haiyatuh wa Asruh, Arauh wa
Fiqhuh (Cairo: Dar al-Fikr al-Arabi, 1991).
4Abu Zahra, Ibn Taymiyya, 18485.5On Ibn Taymiyyas students
perceptions of him and his vision of Islam, see Muhammad ibn Abd
al-
Hadi, al-Uqud al-Durriyya min Manaqib Shaykh al-Islam Ahmad ibn
Taymiyya, ed. M. A. al-Fiqi (Cairo:Matbaat Hijazi, 1938), 7172,
8788, 117; Mari ibn Yusuf al-Karmi, al-Kawakib al-Durriyya fi
Manaqibal-Mujtahid Ibn Taymiyya, ed. N. Khalaf (Beirut: Dar
al-Gharb al-Islami, 1986), 63, 102103, 11720,125; Abu al-Fida ibn
Kathir, al-Bidaya wal-Nihaya (Beirut: Maktabat al-Maarif, 1967),
13:225, 241, 303,333, 341, 344, 14:13540; Muhammad ibn Ahmad
al-Dhahabi, Tadhkirat al-Huffaz (Beirut: Dar Ihiya al-Turath, n.
d.), 4:1469; Muhammad ibn Qayim al-Jawziyya, Alam al-Mwaqiin an Rab
al-Alamin (Cairo:Dar al-Hadith, n. d.), 1:328; Ahmad ibn Hajar
al-Asqalani, al-Durar al-Kamina fi Ayan al-Maa al-Thamina, ed. M.
Jad al-Haq (Cairo: Umm al-Qura lil-Tibaa, n. d.), 1:15470; Muhammad
ibn Nasir al-Din al-Dimashqi, al-Rad al-Wafir ala man Zaam bi-An
man Samma Ibn Taymiyya Shaykh al-Islam Kafir,ed. Zuhayr al-Shawish
(Beirut: al-Maktab al-Islami, 1991).
6On Ibrahim al-Kuranis defense of Ibn Taymiyya, see al-Alusi
(Numan), Jala al-Aynayin, 29, 55. OnMuhammad Murtada al-Zabidis
view of Taymiyya, see his Ithaf al-Sada al-Muttaqin bi-Sharh Asrar
IhiyaUlum al-Din, ed. R. Abd al-Hadi (Beirut: Dar Ihiya al-Turath
al-Arabi, 1995), 1:28, 40, 170, 176, 180,183, 400, 449, 455; ibid.,
2:106, 177; ibid., 3:90, 99, 131, 48182; ibid., 4:416, 531, 53739;
ibid., 5:322,379, 369, 420. On Shah Wali-Allah al-Dihlawis views,
see J. M. S. Baljon, Religion and Thought of ShahWali Allah Dehlawi
(Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1986), 148, 200201. On Muhammad ibn Ali
al-Shawkanis view,
-
Abu al-Thana al-Alusi 489
see his al-Badr al-Tali bi-Mahasin man Bad al-Qarn al-Sabi
(Cairo: Matbaat al-Saada, A.H. 1348), 1:6372.
7I am indebted to John O. Voll for suggesting the overlapping of
Sufi and Salafi attitudes within Islamicreformist circles of the
18th century. See, for example, John O. Voll, Hadith Scholars and
Tariqas: AnUlama Group in the 18th Century Haramayn and Their
Impact in the Islamic World, Journal of Asianand African Studies 15
(1980): 26473; idem, Muhammad Hayya al-Sindi and Muhammad ibn Abd
al-Wahhab: An Analysis of an Intellectual Group in Eighteenth
Century Madina, Bulletin of the School ofOriental and African
Studies 38 (1974): 3239; idem, Linking Groups in the Networks of
Eighteenth-Century Revivalist Scholars: The Mizjaji Family in
Yemen, in Eighteenth-Century Renewal and Reformin Islam, ed. N.
Levtzion and J. Voll (New York: Syracuse University Press, 1987),
6992. The counter-argument has been made by Ahmad Dallal, The
Origins and Objectives