Prologue: Imperial Rule and Islamic Awakening
When Napoleon and his “expedition” entered Egypt for the first time in 1798 it marked the beginning of a series of European incursions – namely by the British and French Empires – to subjugate the Arabic-Islamic World of North Africa and the Levant in the following decades. Morocco in 1844, Algeria in 1848, Tunisia in 1881, Sudan in 1899 and again Egypt in 1882 were subdued under French -British colonial rule. This development culminated in the final defeat of the Ottoman Empire in 1918 and the partition of its former provinces among the European Powers. The step only confirmed the Europeans in their approach to the Orient that viewed the newly founded territorial entities only as useful battleground with regard to prevailing their own interests there. (cf. Schulze 1994: 28) This view was widespread amongst Europeans and endorsed by intellectuals who represented the Orient as minor and backward, irrational and erratic, dangerous and carnal. (see as a showcase Renan 1883) On the economic level it goes without saying that the Arabic -Islamic Dominions were, of course, a very useful source for the European powers. The keen competition for resources was highlighted by plunder, robbery and violent military acts against the indigenous populations who were unwilling to embrace the European invaders as saviors or spearheads of civilization.
Under these circumstances it was just a matter of time until Arabic -Islamic resistance would be triggered. Finally, in the last decades of the 19 th century Islamic scholars and intellectuals, led by Mohammed ʻAbduh and Jamāl ad-Dīn al-Afghānī felt that the occupation was much more than a military defeat and loss of political control. (cf. Hourani 1962) They identified degradation on a cultural and identity level which was a much more difficult challenge to cope with. This gap between “the West and the Islamic World” needed to be fixed quickly. They claimed that the Arab-Muslim world´s distance from Islam and its principles caused its backwardness. Hence, they postulated the return to “true Islam” best represented in the Quran and prophet Muhammad´s and his disciple´s way of life (Sunna). This return though, was not intended to create an archaic form of society without considering contemporary societal developments and paths. In fact, scholars like Muhammad ʻAbduh claimed that they wanted to integrate Islam into modernity but with its own cultural expression. Thus, their call to “true Islam” was aiming at reinterpreting the foundations of belief critically: So as to prove that the Quran´s message is foremost “spiritual, metaphysical and moral”, they wanted to put it in its historical context. (cf. Murtaza 2012: 39)
It was into this political, social and historic context Hassan al -Bannā, founder of the Society of the Muslim Brotherhood, was born in 1906. He was to become the charismatic leader of the first Islamic mass movement of the 20 th century, pious preacher, political activist and religious reformer.
The Setting: Hassan al-Bannā in Cairo – or: Modern Times
When Bannā first moved to Cairo in the 1920s to study at the Dār al- ʻUlūm – Egypt’s first teacher-training school – he was downright shocked by what he witnessed there. The moral squalidness – as he put it – was an unmistakable sign of demise of the Islamic societies in general. New ideas were evolving everywhere in the Arabic world: Nationalism, secularism, liberalism and socialism were contesting more traditional views of statehood and society. Especially Egypt, as the Arabic world´s cradle of culture, was affected by these developments and influences in the 1920s which amounted to a culture-war between traditionalists and modern thinkers, liberals. Freedom of expression and freedom to choose one´s own religion stood in the middle of that struggle which was fought in newspapers, clubs, periodicals and universities. (cf. Mitchell 1993 [1969]: pp. 1-7)
At the same time colonialism and industrialization generated socio-economic upheaval in the Egyptian society which led to the exodus of the rural population to the urban centres. There, they settled at the outskirts trying to make a precarious living through hard labor or retail trade always on the edge to bitter poverty. These people, simple, modest and conservative were soon to become the Muslim Brotherhood´s mass-base.
Eventually Hassan al-Bannā was one of them, born and raised 90 KM north -west off of Cairo to a local Imām and watchmaker, he had a perfect grasp of people´s needs. He started his classical religious education at age eight, when he began memorizing the Quran and learning the traditions of Prophet Muhammad ( Ḥadīṯ). As a teen he also joined and founded different Sufi-Brotherhoods which adhered to very rigid ethical codices aiming at “the preservation of Islamic morality, and to resist the work of the Christian missionaries”. (cf. ibid. p. 3) At age 21 he became full member of the Ḥasafīyya-Sufi Order. His puritanism stems exactly from this environment represented in sexual abstinence, refusal of any worldly pleasures and the ritualized worship of god through the practice of Ḏikr, i.e. the continuous repetition of God´s name.
Unlike his intellectual predecessors ʻAbduh and Afghānī he was not willing to concede positive characteristics to European civilization. To the contrary, his advocacy of puritanism was strongly linked with a harsh rejection of all western influences which would lead to “decadence, political disunity and aberration” (Al-Banna 2006: p. 42) from true belief, something that he already saw in progress. Thus he identified the European West with “greed, carnal lust, usury and unconditional materialism” (ibid.) prone to infect the Arabic-Islamic World and resulting in its utter weakness and inability to fight the West on so different levels such as the military, art, politics and morals.
Hence, fighting the British presence on Egyptian soil became an imperative in Bannā´s thinking. He participated in the 1919 uprising against the occupation by publishing nationalist articles in which he also attacked the “corrupt national elites”. He began travelling the country, preaching in mosques and coffeehouses “institutes of the people” (Mitchell 1993 [1969]: p. 5), gathering students and workers around him in pursuit of his foremost aim: To re-establish Islam and Islamic ethics and morals in the Egyptian society.
His success was based on his modesty and simple mode of expression. This helped him to establish a popular Islam that was very close to the rural poor´s and newly urbanized underclasses understanding of religion. In the end, this fostered the Muslim Brother´s expansion as organization in the early 1930s vehemently.
Ideological Elements: Daʻwa, Islamic Nationalism, Welfare and Opposition
It is no coincidence that the Brotherhood was eventually founded in 1928 in the city of Ismāʽiliyyā at the shores of the Suez Canal, where hard labor at the docks produced a discontent class of workers who compared their miserable situation to that of the omnipresent colonial oppressors, who were residing in luxurious compounds, and who were asserting their economic interests with force of arms if necessary. British occupation troops throughout the city, were arresting, beating and shooting striking workers. Given all this, Bann ā, who worked as a teacher in the port town since 1927, had no problems to find people who would support him in spreading Islam and fighting the British. He convinced his audience again and again that an Islamic Awakening was inescapable in order to free the
Islamic fatherland from all foreign domination […] and that a free Islamic state may arise in this free fatherland, acting according to the precepts of Islam, applying its social regulations, proclaiming its sound principles, and broadcasting its sage mission to all mankind. (Al-Banna 2006: p. 47)
By saying this, Bannā opposed Egyptian nationalism represented by the secular and liberal forces who aspired for a republican system. Instead, he wanted to implement Islam as holistic system (Niẓām) which encompasses all areas of life. However, Bannā did not refuse nationalism per se, only in its secular and democratic form. Hence, he established a perspective, which tried to integrate and pass nationalism off as genuinely Islamic. This was a natural thing, was the new ideology on the rise and very popular among the secular and intellectual classes of Egypt. So he rather tried to use the new ideology for his own ends by adapting it to his idea of Islam: Not the people was the collective he addressed, but the Islamic Community – Ummah -, which constitutes the “house of Islam” (Dār al-Islām) across countries and continents. This connection between nationalism and Islam as a way of life or system which transcends conventional borders was expressed in an ideal-typical manner by Bannā:
When a nation assumes Islam in its worship, but emulates non-Muslims in its other matters, its Islam is weak […] Islam is worship and creed, homeland and citizenship, religion and state, idea and work as well as Koran and sword. (Al-Banna [b] n.y.)
With this kind of interpretation he invokes classical Islamic thinking put in a modern dress. Remarkably enough, today´s Muslim Brother hood still follows the same path of pretending that modern phenomena are an inherent part of Islam. A good example is the attempt of their political arm “ Freedom and Justice Party” (FJP) in their 2011 Party-Platform to equalize the Islamic concept of Šūrā with modern-style democracy simply by putting the latter in brackets behind the Arabic word. A very plump attempt, by the way:
Šūrā is democracy´s actual character. It is the path on which the interests of the nation and its people are realized […]. We have to embrace Šūrā (democracy), especially in the political arena. [1. Parts of the English version of the FJP-Party-Platform (2011) can be found under the following link (last retrieved: January 09, 2014). However, for my translations I relied on the original Arabic version which has been available under the FJP´s Arabic website www.hurryh.com, but in January 2014 was not reachable, presumably due to the Brotherhood´s prohibition.]
Accommodation and Adaptation to political and ideological challenges instead of ideological stubbornness stayed a characteristic of the Brotherhood throughout the decades. This is due to Bannā´s method and understanding of the Daʽwa- concept, i.e. mission. The Brotherhood´s Daʽwa aims at forming a unity out of the believer’s community, a Jamāʽa, which strives for the same goal. The emphasis in this concept is placed on individual catharsis through faith, not violence. In this context, elements of welfare, which account for a big portion of the Brotherhood´s fieldwork, can be seen as material contribution to their effort s of implementing the Daʽwa. This approach is deeply rooted in the Brotherhood´s sense of mission : They embody a “holistic system” (cf. Al-Banna [b]) – according to their understanding of Islam – and thus are able to offer people answers for every life-aspect, be it politics, economy or culture. This put them into direct ideological confrontation and opposition to (pan)arabic nationalist forces with their front man Nasser, Egyptian President and leader of Arabic Unity from 1952-1970. In the end, he prohibited the Brotherhood in 1954 as political organization, imprisoned its leadership and prosecuted its members and supporters. This state lasted throughout the following decades in which they thus focused their work on welfare issues. It was only after long -term President Hosni Mubarak´s ousting in 2011 that the Muslim Brotherhood could organize and articulate its views without any restrictions.
Part II of the article “2011 and After: Social Protest, Power Bargaining and Political Failure” will be available soon.
References:
- Al-Banna, Hassan: Majmu´at al-Rasa´il al-Shahid Hassan al-Banna [Six tracts of Hassan al- Banna. A Selection from the Majmu´at al-Rasail al-Schahid Hassan al-Banna], Cairo 2006, I.I.F.S.O
- Al-Banna, Hassan (b): Islam al-Ikhwan al-Muslimin [The Islam of the Muslim Brotherhood], Cairo, no year mentioned, no page-count: http://www.ikhwanwiki.com.
- Hourani, Albert: Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798-1939, London et al.: Oxford University Press, 1962.
- Mitchell, Richard P.: The Society of the Muslim Brothers. New York/Oxford: Oxfor d University Press, 1993 [1969]
- Murtaza, Muhammad Sameer: Islamische Philosophie und die Gegenwartsprobleme der Muslime. Reflexionen zu dem Philosophen Jamal al-Din al-Afghani [Islamic Philosophy and Contemporary Problems of Muslims. Reflections on the Philosopher Jamal al-Din al-Afghani], Berlin/Tübingen: Verlag Hans Schiler, 2012
- Schulze, Reinhard: Geschichte der islamischen Welt im 20. Jahrhundert [History of the Islamic World in the 20th Century], München [Munich]: Beck 1994
