Bensalem Himmich - The Polymath

This is my statement about the absolute requirement that one look closely at the particulars of the regime currently in power, something that, as a matter of personal incentive, involves a consideration of my own future in the light of all this political turmoil.

The information that I have collected and the conclusion I have drawn from it lead me to state that for people who find themselves with their heads in the noose of this Mamluk regime, daily life is in the hands of a totally unpredictable demon. Anyone who has lived through circumstances in which banishment and execution have become basic features of justice and law will know precisely what I mean. Not even chess players, professional diviners, and zir aficionados are safe. Disasters can strike when you least expect it, and punishment and mercy alternate with each other like night and day. You can be clobbered at random, and then you’re pardoned without warning. The entire situation is controlled by whim; say that and you’ve got it. As you stumble on your way among blind people with their sticks and a thick knot of binding ropes, your task is to manage your life and see your path ahead as best you can. All the while you are hoping and praying that your own star is somehow in the ascendant and misfortune is currently preoccupied somewhere else.

I have written quite a bit to describe the visible side of the history of the two Mamluk dynasties, the Bahri and the Burji. As usual, I’ve focused on the sultans, their appointments, depositions, raids, and conquests; on disasters and murders too, all interspersed with revolts and insurrections. Steering my way between the actual course of events and the murky area of suppositions, I have managed, through a lucky chance, to focus on a tangible element relevant to al-Zahir Barquq, one that has served me well when things have become especially trying. This particular sultan has tended to use mercy as a display of his power, and only to resort to violence in measured ways and after due deliberation. Unlike the tiger sultans, you’ll only find him shedding blood when it is absolutely necessary. When he has won a victory, he tends to give back to his vanquished rivals their positions, salaries, and estates and only to impose a minimum degree of prison time or official reprimand. That’s how he behaved, for example, with Baraka, his first partner in government who launched a revolt against him. He thought it was enough punishment to imprison him in Alexandria, where someone assassinated him without permission. It was the same with al-Nasiri, his deputy in Aleppo and the most dangerous of his rivals from the Yalbughwiya.

I have tried to understand the secret behind this particular aspect of his personality, and can only assume that it lies in the period before he became sultan. He is a manumitted slave from abroad who has lived a life of indigence and deprivation; he has known corruption, perversion, and imprisonment. Furthermore, he was one of the Mamluks involved in the murder of Sultan al-Muzaffar Hajji and his replacement by our noble sultan. Here’s what I wrote about their brutal revolution in Travels East and West :

They unleashed on the Egyptian people a series of outrages the like of which had never been seen since the establishment of the dynasty. Seizures, abductions, beating on doors of houses and baths so as to fool around with women, unleashing all conceivable kinds of debauchery and lust at every turn. Everyone was in a panic. The entire matter was taken to the sultan, and there was much praying and beseeching to God Almighty. The senior figures involved in the revolt held a meeting with the sultan and negotiated a cessation of their attacks. He ordered them to leave, then set his army and retinue on them with orders to capture them by force. Within what seemed like the twinkling of an eye they were all taken prisoner; the jails were full of them. They were fettered and paraded round the city as an example. Most of them were disemboweled, but the rest were either exiled or imprisoned in distant parts. Then they released Barquq, who took over things, and Baraka al-Jubani, Altunbugha al-Jubani, and Jarkas al-Khalili.

Forgetfulness is the bane of all scholarship. It is thus essential that the person currently occupying the ruler’s throne in Egypt be reminded of the past. That way, his image will be enhanced and the possibilities for the future will become that much clearer.

This Barquq, manumitted slave that he is, carries with him a criminal record that is chock full of vile and disgusting deeds. He is the champion abductor and rapist of women, even within the sanctuaries of home and baths!

This Barquq the Circassian has been imprisoned, chained, and paraded through streets and markets!

Like any major brigand or highwayman, his life has been spent gambling with death. Scoffing at dangers and disasters, he has always managed to escape through some miracle. It’s as if he is not just one person, but many, as the term ‘Circassian’ suggests.

So then, he has emerged from the very pits of evil, from the ranks of foreign slaves, from the fraternity devoted to violence and rapine, to become Barquq, the sultan of Egypt today, one who is always ready to forgive and who shows both common sense and moderation in his mode of governing and the way he treats his defeated foes. It is almost as though he is trying to use such behavior as a way of cleaning the slate of his past crimes and his undesirable origins, all in the hope of dispatching to the Creator a stream of apologetic letters seeking His forgiveness. This is how I embellished the account in my Book of the Lessons of History , although I gave a more economical version in Travels East and West :

Thereafter Barquq took it upon himself to run the government, using threats, bribes, and familiarity as means of solving issues in its various subdivisions. He would make a point of balancing revenues with expenditures and putting clamps on the proclivities of Qala’un’s descendants in spending money on luxuries and indulging in grossly excessive habits until the stage was reached when expenditures were almost under control. As a result, the ruling class could not maintain its lifestyle. Barquq observed all this and looked for other ways to put an end to government wastage and reform corruption. This cause became his primary pretext for occupying the throne and using the title of sultan, in that the descendants of Qala’un had been so corrupted by luxury and had had such a negative effect on the regime, that the entire thing had degenerated into sheer vice and everyone involved seemed content with the situation. That is why he assumed the throne on the nineteenth of Ramadan in 784, taking the title al-Zahir.

I hid myself away until the end of Muharram. I kept studying and writing, checking and mulling things over, and making notes as I did so. At the same time, I made sure to take good care of my wife and listen from time to time to the sound of the baby moving around in her womb. Two days before the end of the month — a Thursday morning, in fact — I was concentrating on my writing when I heard Umm al-Banin scream for the first time, followed by other prayers for God’s aid. Those screams, I told myself, are a harbinger of my family’s future, and I rushed downstairs to her side, overcome with joy. I immediately sent Sha‘ban to bring the midwife. Umm al-Banin was flat on the bed with labor well advanced; she was sweating and groaning as she clasped the sheets and pillow for all she was worth. I sat down beside her and held her hand so she would know I was there. I wiped her forehead with a cloth dampened with rosewater, saying, “O God who brings us out of all perils and agonies, grant her an easy delivery and keep her safe from the risk and shocks of labor. Grant, O Lord, that the baby may move safe and sound from the darkness of the womb to the light of life itself. O God, make things easy rather than difficult; release the child from the womb unharmed; and give us the bounty of Your blessings and boundless good health. O Merciful and Compassionate One!”