THE COMING OF THE `ABBASIDS
The rule of the `Umayyads had been a period of tyrannical oppression
on the part of the Arab rulers upon their non-Arab subjects and
especially upon the _mawali_ or converts drawn from the native
population of the conquered provinces who not only were not admitted
to equality, as was the professed principle of the religion of Islam,
but were treated simply as serfs. This was in no sense due to religious
persecution, for it was the converts who were the most aggrieved, nor
was it due to a racial antipathy as between a Semitic and an Aryan
people, nor yet to anything that could be described as a “national”
feeling on the part of the Persians and other conquered races, but
simply a species of “class” feeling due to the contempt felt by the
Arabs for those whom they had conquered and hatred on the part of
the conquered towards their arrogant masters, a hatred intensified
by disgust at their misgovernment and ignorance of the traditions of
civilization. There were other causes also which helped to intensify
this feeling of hatred especially in the case of the Persians. Amongst
these was a semi-religious feeling, even amongst those who had become
converts to Islam. It had been the old usage of the Persians to regard
the Sasanid kings, the descendants of the legendary _kayani_ dynasty
of heroes who had first established a settled community in Persia,
as _bagh_ not quite perhaps what we should understand as “gods,” but
rather as incarnations of deity, the divine spirit passing on by
transmigration from one ruler to another, and so they ascribed to the
king miraculous powers and worshipped him as the shrine of a divine
presence. At the Muslim conquest the Sasanid kings had not only ceased
to rule, but the dynasty had become extinct. Many of the Persians who,
in spite of adopting Islam, still clung to their old ideas, were quite
ready to treat the Khalif with the same adoration as their kings, but
felt a distinct distaste for the theory of the Khalifate according to
which the Khalif was no more than a chieftain elected in the democratic
fashion of the desert tribes, a thing which seemed to them like
reversion to primitive barbarism. Our own experience in dealing with
oriental races has shown us that there is a great deal which must be
taken seriously in ideas of this kind. Of course those who had been
subjects of the Roman Empire had no inclination towards deifying their
rulers, unless perhaps some who had been only recently incorporated
from more oriental elements: but those who had been under Persian rule
craved a deified prince. In A.H. 141-142 this took the form of an
attempt to deify the Khalif by a fanatical sect of Persian origin known
as the Rawandiyya which broke out into open revolt when the Khalif
refused to be treated as a god and cast their leaders into prison:
the members of the sect, and many other of their fellow-countrymen,
considered that a Khalif was no valid sovereign who refused to be
recognised as a deity. From the second century of the Hijra down to
modern times there has been a continuous stream of pseudo-prophets
who have claimed to be gods, or successful leaders who have been
deified by their followers. The latest of these appears in the earlier
phases of the Babi movement, A.D. 1844-1852, though the doctrines of
re-incarnation and of the presence of the divine spirit in the leader
seem to be less emphasized in present day Babism, at least in this
country and America.
The most prevalent form of these ideas occurs in the essentially
Persian movement known as the _Shi`a_ or “schismatics.” These are
divided into two types, both alike holding that the succession of the
Prophet is confined to the hereditary descendants of `Ali the cousin
and son-in-law of the Prophet to whom alone was given the divine right
of the _Imamate_ or leadership. The two types differ in the meaning
of this Imamate, the one group contenting itself with maintaining
that `Ali and his descendants have a divine authority whereby the
Imams are the only legitimate rulers of Islam and its infallible
guides; of this moderate type of Shi`a is the religion of Morocco
and the form prevalent about San´a in South Arabia. The other group
presses the claim that the Imam is the incarnation of a divine spirit,
sometimes asserting that it was only by fraud that the prophet Muhammad
interposed and acted as spokesman for the divine Imam `Ali. Of this
type is the Shi`a which forms the state religion of modern Persia,
spreading westwards into Mesopotamia and eastwards into India. The
commonest belief, prevalent in the modern Shi`a, is that there were
twelve Imams of whom `Ali was the first, and Muhammad al-Muntazar,
who succeeded at the death of his father the eleventh Imam al-Hasan
al-Askari in 260 A.H. (= A.D. 873) was the last. Soon after his
accession Muhammad Al-Muntazar “vanished” at Samárrá, the town which
served as the `Abbasid capital from A.H. 222 to 279. The mosque at
Samárrá is said to cover an underground vault into which he disappeared
and from which he will emerge again to resume his office when the
propitious time has arrived, and the place whence he is to issue forth
is one of the sacred spots visited by Shi`ite pilgrims. Meanwhile
the Shahs and princes are ruling the faithful only as deputies of
the concealed Imam. The disappearance of Muhammad al-Muntazar took
place more than a century after the fall of the `Umayyads but we have
anticipated in order to show the general tendency of the Shi`ite ideas
which were prevalent even in `Umayyad times, especially in Northern
Persia, and did much to promote the revolt against the secularised
`Umayyad rule.
A curious importance also is attached to the date. The disaffection
of the _mawali_ came to a head towards the end of the first century of
the Muslim era. There was a general belief that the completion of the
century would see the end of existing conditions, just as in Western
Europe the year 1000 A.D. was expected to mark the dawn of a new world.
Dissatisfaction was at its height, especially in Khurasan, and the
disaffected for the most part rallied round the `Alids.
The `Alid claims which did so much to overthrow the `Umayyad dynasty
and indirectly led to the bringing forward of the Persian element by
which the transmission of Hellenistic culture was most furthered, are
best understood by the help of a genealogical table.
al-Hanafiya + (1) `Ali + Fatima
| _____|___________
Muhammad (2) Hasan (3) Husayn
| |
Abu Hashim (4) `Ali Zayn
____________________________________
| |
Zayd (5) Muhammad al-Bakir
|
(6) Ja`far as-Sadiq
________________|______
| |
Isma`il (7) Musa al-Qazam
| |
Muhammad (8) `Ali ar-Rida
|
(9) Muham. al-Jawad
|
(10) `Ali al-Hadi
|
(11) Hasan al-Askari
|
(12) Muham. al-Muntazar
`Ali had two wives, (i) al-Hanafiya, by whom he had a son Muhammad,
and (ii) Fatima, the daughter of the Prophet Muhammad, by whom he had
two sons, Hasan and Husayn. All the `Alid party believed that `Ali
should have succeeded the Prophet by divine right and regarded the
first three Khalifs as usurpers. Already under the third Khalif Uthman
the dissatisfied _mawla_ element had begun to look to `Ali as their
champion, and he in the true spirit of early Islam supported their
claim to the rights of brotherhood as fellow Muslims. This partisanship
received its extreme expression in the preaching of the Jewish convert
`Abdu b. Saba, who declared the divine right of `Ali to the Khalifate
as early as A.H. 32. `Ali himself apparently did not take so pronounced
a view, but certainly regarded himself as in some degree injured by
his exclusion. In 35 `Ali was appointed Khalif and Ibn Saba then
declared that he was not only Khalif by divine right, but that a divine
spirit had passed from the Prophet to him, so that he was raised to a
supernatural level. This theory `Ali himself repudiated. When he was
assassinated in 40 `Abdu declared that his martyred soul had passed to
heaven and would in due course descend to earth again: his spirit was
in the clouds, his voice was heard in the thunder, the lightning was
his rod.
The Umayyad party led by Mu`awiya never submitted to `Ali, although
they did not question the legitimacy of his appointment. At his death
Mu`awiya became the fifth Khalif, but had to face the claims of
al-Hasan, `Ali’s son. Al-Hasan made terms with Mu`awiya and died in 49,
poisoned, it was commonly stated. The other son, al-Husayn, tried to
enforce his claim, but met a tragic death at Kerbela. After al-Husayn’s
death some of the `Alid partisans recognised Muhammad the son of `Ali
and al-Hanafiya as the fourth Imam; he, it is true, disowned these
supporters, but that was a detail to which they paid no attention. His
supporters were known as Kaysanites, and owed their origin to Kaysan,
a freedman of `Ali, who formed a society for the purpose of avenging
the deaths of al-Hasan and al-Husayn. When this Muhammad died in 81
his followers divided into two sections, some accepting the fact of
his death, others supposing that he had simply passed into concealment
to appear again in due course. This idea of a “concealed” Imam was a
heritage from the older religious theories of Persia and recurs again
and again in Shi`a history. The important point is that both sections
of this party continued to exist all through the `Umayyad period,
steadily refusing to recognise the official Khalifa as more than
usurpers, and looking forward to the day when they could avenge the
martyrdom of `Ali and his sons.
We need not linger over the family of al-Hasan and his descendants.
They were involved in `Alid risings at Madina, and after the
suppression of one of these in 169, long after the fall of the
`Umayyads, Idris the great-grandson of al-Hasan escaped to the far West
and established a “moderate” Shi`ite Dynasty in what is now Morocco, so
that the subsequent history of that house concerns the history of the
West.
Most of the Shi`ites regard the third Imam, al-Husayn as being
succeeded by his son `Ali Zayn. Al-Husayn, like al-Hasan, was not
only the son of `Ali, but also of the Prophet’s daughter, Fatima. In
al-Husayn’s case moreover there was another heritage which ultimately
proved more important than descent from either `Ali or Fatima: he
was generally supposed to have married the daughter of the last of
the Persian kings, the “mother of the Imams,” and this traditional
marriage with the Persian princess,--its historical evidence is
very dubious--has been regarded by the Persian Shi`ites as the most
important factor in the Imamate, although this, of course, has nothing
whatever to do with the religion of Islam. That so great weight could
be attached to such a consideration serves to show how really foreign
and non-Muslim a thing the Shi`a is. `Ali Zayn had two sons, Zayd and
Muhammad al-Bakir. Of these Zayd was a pupil of Wasil b. `Ata and
associated with the Mu`tazilite movement: he is generally regarded as
a rationalist. Indeed, as we shall now see frequently, the heretical
Shi`ite party was very generally mixed up with free thought and
frequently shows adherence to Greek philosophy: it seems as though its
inspiring spirit was hostility towards orthodox Islam, and a readiness
to ally itself with anything which tended to criticize unfavourably
the orthodox doctrines. Zayd had a body of followers who established
themselves in North Persia where they held their own for some time, and
a branch of their party still exists in South Arabia, still suspected
of rationalist proclivities. Most of the Shi`ites, however, recognised
Muhammad al-Bakir as the fifth Imam, and Ja`far as-Sadiq as the sixth.
This latter also was a devoted follower of the “new learning,” that
is to say, of Hellenistic philosophy, and is generally regarded as
the founder, or at least the chief exponent, of what are known as
_batinite_ views, that is to say the allegorical interpretation of the
Qur´an, so that revelation is made to mean, not the literal statement,
but an inner meaning, and this inner meaning generally shows a strong
influence of Hellenistic philosophy. It is only the divinely directed
Imam who can expound the true meaning of the Qur´an which remains a
sealed book to the uninitiated. Ja`far was, it would appear, the first
of the `Alids who openly asserted that he was a divine incarnation as
well as an inspired teacher: his predecessors had done no more than
acquiesce in such claims when made by their followers, and very often
had repudiated them.
Abu Hashim, the son of Muhammad b. al-Hanafiya, died in 98 A.H.
poisoned, it was generally believed, by the Khalif Sulayman, and
bequeathed his rights to Muhammad b. `Ali b. `Abdullah, a descendant of
the house of Hashim, to which the Prophet and `Ali had belonged, the
rival clan of the Quraysh tribe opposed to the clan of the `Umayyads.
Abu Hashim assumed that the Imamate was his to be passed on to whom he
saw fit, a view of the Imamate which was not accepted by the stricter
Shi`ites who were legitimists, but the partisans of Abu Hashim do not
seem to have been extremists in spite of their Kaysanite origin. In
99 the Khalifate passed to Umar II. the one `Umayyad who showed `Alid
sympathies, putting an end to the public cursing of `Ali which had
formed part of the public ritual in the mosques of Damascus since the
days of Mu`awiya and who represented a type of personal piety to which
the `Umayyad Khalifs had hitherto been strangers. His brief reign of
less than three years did not, however, remove the evils of tyranny and
misgovernment, and he was followed by other rulers more in conformity
with the old bad type.
About the time of Umar’s death a deputation of Shi`ites waited upon
Muhammad b. `Ali the Hashimite, a man of noted piety and the one
who had now become, as legatee of Abu Hashim the son of Muhammad b.
al-Hanafiya, the recognised head of an important wing of the Shi`ites,
and swore to support him in an endeavour to obtain the Khalifate “that
God may quicken justice and destroy oppression” (Dinwari: _Akhbaru
t-Tiwal_. ed. Guirgass, Leiden. p. 334): and Muhammad had answered that
“this is the season of what we hope and desire, because one hundred
years of the calendar are completed.” (id.)
The supporters of the family of Muhammad b. al-Hanafiya, who had
now transferred their allegiance to Muhammad b. `Ali, were extremely
important, not so much by reason of their numbers as by their excellent
organisation. They had developed a regular system of missionaries
(_da`i_, plur. _du`at_) who travelled under the guise of merchants
and confined their teaching to private instructions and informal
intercourse, a method which has become the standard type of Muslim
missionary propaganda. By Abu Hashim’s death and legacy Muhammad b.
`Ali found this very fully organised missionary work at his service,
and its emissaries were fully confident that his acceptance of the
overtures of the Shi`ite deputation meant that he stood as the champion
of Shi`ite claims. The stricter Shi`ites who followed the house of
al-Husayn did not admit the claims of Muhammad b. al-Hanafiya or his
descendants, but they supported Muhammad b. `Ali’s efforts under the
impression that he was a Shi`ite champion.
The propaganda in favour of Muhammad b. `Ali is sometimes referred
to as `Abbasid because he was descended from al-`Abbas, one of the
three sons of `Abdu l-Muttalib, and so brother of Abu Talib the father
of the Imam `Ali and of `Abdullah who was grandfather of the Prophet
Muhammad. At the time, however, the missionaries claimed rather to be
the supporters of the Hashimites, a term which was ambiguous, perhaps
intentionally so. It was afterwards explained as referring to the
house of Hashim which was the rival clan of the Quraysh opposed to
the `Umayyads and that to which the Prophet, and `Ali, and al-`Abbas
belonged: but in the minds of many of the Shi`ites it was taken to mean
the followers of Abu Hashim, the grandson of Al-Hanafiya.
Muhammad b. `Ali died in 126 A.H. leaving three sons, Ibrahim, Abu
l-Abbas, and Abu Ja`far, the first of these being recognised as his
successor. About the same time Abu Muslim, who became governor of
Khurasan in 129 comes into prominence. It is dubious whether he was an
Arab or a native of `Iraq (cf. Masudi. vi. 59), indeed, the claim was
made that he was a descendant of Gandarz, one of the ancient kings of
Persia (id.) Now Khurasan was the area most disaffected towards the
`Umayyads, and there the Hashimite missionaries had been most active
and successful. Abu Muslim threw himself into this work heartily and
began gathering together an armed body of men who before long numbered
200,000. Information and warning was sent to the Khalif Marwan II. but
was ignored: indeed the court at Damascus took no notice until 130.
Abu Muslim at length openly raised the black standard as the signal of
revolt against the `Umayyads whose official colour was white. Then all
the Khalif did was to seize Muhammad b. `Ali’s son Ibrahim and put him
to death. The other two sons escaped and fled to Kufa where they were
sheltered and concealed by some Shi`ites, the second son Abu l-`Abbas,
known to history as _as-Saffah_ “the butcher” being recognised as the
Hashimite leader.
Abu Muslim’s success was rapid and complete, and in 132 the `Umayyad
dynasty was overthrown and partly exterminated, and so “the butcher”
became the first of the `Abbasid Khalifs, so called as being of the
family of al-`Abbas the son of `Abdu l-Muttalib.
As soon as the Khalif Abu l-`Abbas was seated on the throne his chief
aim was to secure the establishment of his dynasty by getting rid of
all possible rivals, and it was the vigour he showed in doing this
which earned for him the title of “the Butcher.” First of all he hunted
down and slew all the representatives he could find of the `Umayyad
family. One of these escaped, `Abdu r-Rahman, and went to Africa where
he endeavoured to form a body of supporters without success, and then
crossed over to Spain where in 138 he established himself at Cordova,
and there he and his descendants ruled until 422 A.H. These Spanish
`Umayyads claimed to be legitimist rulers, but never assumed the divine
claims of the `Alid section.
Abu Muslim, who had done most to establish the `Umayyad dynasty, next
provoked the Khalif’s jealousy, probably with good cause for he was
indignant to find that “the Butcher” was no sooner on the throne than
he entirely discarded the Shi`ites who had helped to place him there,
and so within the first year of the `Abbasid rule Abu Muslim was put to
death.
The fall of the `Umayyads brought an end to the tyranny of the
Arab minority, as it now was, and placed the preponderance for a clear
century (A.H. 132-232) in Persian hands. The government was remodelled
on Persian lines, and to Persian influence was due the institution
of the _wazir_ or responsible minister at the head of the executive.
The title is probably identical with the Old Persian _vi-chir_ or
“overseer” (thus Darmesteter: _Etudes Iraniennes_ i. p. 58. note 3.);
before this the chief minister was simply clerk (_kàtib_) or adviser
(_mushir_) and was simply one of the Khalif’s attendants who was
employed to conduct correspondence, or to give advice when occasion
required. In 135 the noble Persian family of Barmecides began to supply
_wazirs_, and these controlled the policy of the Khalifate until
189. From the time of al-Mansur (A.H. 136-158) onwards the Persians
began to assert their pre-eminence and a party was formed known as
the _Shu`ubiyya_ or “anti-Arab party” of those who held, not only
that the alien converts were equal to the Arabs, but that the Arabs
were a half savage and inferior race in all respects, contrasting
unfavourably with the Persians, Syrians, and Copts. This party produced
considerable mass of controversial literature in which free course was
given to the general dislike felt towards the Arabs and which reveals
the intensity of the contempt and hatred felt towards these parvenus.
The Arabs had boasted of their racial descent and had devoted much
attention to the keeping of their genealogies, at least in the century
immediately preceding the rise of Islam; as they had then only just
commenced to count descent in the father’s line these genealogies were
purely fictitious in so far as they dealt with pre-Islamic ancestors.
The Arabs were in fact a parvenu people only just emerging out of
barbarism (cf. Lammens: _Le berceau de l’islam._ p. 117). But the
Persians, no less careful about genealogical records, to which their
caste system had caused them to pay considerable attention, boasted
authentic genealogies of much greater antiquity. In literature, in
science, in Muslim canon law, in theology, and even in the scientific
treatment of Arabic grammar, the Persians very rapidly surpassed the
Arabs, so that we must be careful always to refer to Arabic philosophy,
Arabic science, etc., in the history of Muslim culture, rather than
to Arab philosophy, etc., remembering that, though expressed in the
Arabic language, the common medium of all the Muslim world, only in a
very few cases was it the work of Arabs: for the most part the Arabic
philosophers and scientists, historians, grammarians, theologians,
and jurists were Persians, Turks, or Berbers by birth, though using
the Arabic language. The fall of the `Umayyads and the replacing
of the Arabs by the Persians commences the golden age of Arabic
literature and scholarship. The older Arabic literature, that namely
which was written by Arabs as yet untouched by external influences,
consists entirely of poetry, the work of professional bards who sing
of desert life and warfare, lament over the deserted camping grounds,
boast of their tribe, and abuse their enemies. It forms a distinct
class of poetic composition, which has developed its own literary
standards, and attained a high standard of excellence in its way. In
many respects this older Arab poetry makes a special appeal to us,
it shows an observation of nature which is very striking, it has an
undercurrent of melancholy which seems an echo of the desert, and an
emotional side which seems convincing in its reality. At the same time
it has very distinct limitations in its range of interest and subject
matter. Undoubtedly a careful study of this early Arab poetry is a
necessary preparation for a proper appreciation of the literary forms
of Arabic and of its oldest vocabulary and syntax, and of recent years
much attention has been given to it. But this older Arabic poetry,
apparently a native production, but possibly influenced in pre-Islamic
times by some external contacts as yet undefined, comes to an end soon
after the fall of the `Umayyads, save in Spain, where, under the exiled
and fugitive remnant of the `Umayyad dynasty, the production of such
poetry survived. But this type of poetry is really outside our present
enquiry, save to note that it was a Persian scholar, Hammad b. Sabur
ar-Rawiya (d. circ. 156-159) who collected and edited the seven ancient
Arabic poems known as the _Mu`allaqat_ or “suspended,” i.e., the catena
or series, and thus set what may be called the classical standard of
the ancient poetry and vocabulary. At the accession of the Abbasids the
old Arab type passes away and the intellectual guidance of the Muslim
community passes into the hands of the Persians.