Bensalem Himmich - The Polymath

Faced with such a situation, the only stratagem I use — and in spite of everything I continue to rely exclusively on reason — is to stay at home and stick to my books and writing. If I have to go out, it is only for some really pressing reason or else to visit my college or the houses of God.

Exhaustion! It creeps its way into my body and joints without license or permission. It moves ever forward, sure of its advance, enveloped in the ruthless onward march of time and the headlong clash of days. It falls into two separate categories: the first arises from the sight of endlessly repeated dross; the symptoms of the second reveal themselves in people who delve into the deeper levels behind events and the causes of change in a quest for hidden pearls and useful lessons. I wonder, have I now reached the culmination of both types at once?

I wrote that paragraph in the margin of one of the stack of papers that I filled over the past year and a half about the history of Mamluk Egypt. One evening at the beginning of the year 797 I was on the point of confessing to my dear wife that I felt really tired, but then I changed my mind and made an effort to look alert and happy. I was anxious to seem (to the extent possible) just as youthful and fond of life as my wife was. As I wrote on a piece of paper at the time, “I have no right to object to my wife’s joie de vivre . She’s well aware that my hair has turned gray, but it’s not right to make her aware of the extent to which my veins and joints are showing signs of the wear and tear of old age. Dear God, if You have planned for me to die at this particular stage, then I beg You to make it quick.”

My feelings of exhaustion during this particular year may well have been intensified by the fact that so many of my colleagues and members of the government died. Some of them were actually killed, including al-Jubani, al-Nasiri, and Mintash, all in Syria. Others fell ill and died, such as Shaykh al-Rikraki, and Chief Judge Ibn Abi al-Baqa’, the Shafi‘i. Still others died unexpectedly, such as some of the brigade commanders and Yahya from Sudan, the servant at the Hammam al-Sufiyya. There were many others as well.

“God grant them a just reward; every soul gets to taste death; verily to God do we belong and to Him do we return.” I kept having to repeat these phrases of condolence to family and friends of the deceased.

“The last time I saw Shaykh al-Rikraki, Umm al-Batul,” I told my wife, “I asked him as usual how Sa‘d was. He told me that, now that he was living with the Malamatiya community, his moods were more normal. He then advised me to hope for the best and not ask too many questions.”

I devoted several paragraphs to the circumstances surrounding the killing of Altunbugha al-Jubani. I included a sympathetic obituary as an acknowledgment of the kind role he had played in bringing about a rapprochement between the sultan and myself and of the fact that he had stood by me in hard times. I closed the passage with this sentence: “All I have seen in him is good, so I beg God to accord him the same.” Nor was I content merely to write such things. I went in search of one of his sons, knowing that he lived close to the Elephant Lake. My purpose was to offer my condolences and discover the whereabouts of his father’s tomb in Damascus. After exhaustive investigations I was able to track him down at the al-Khayyam tavern on the banks of the Nile, quite close to al-Luq, the quarter of lay-abouts and riff-raff. It was only after I had disguised myself as an Egyptian and made sure the room was dark enough that I ventured inside. Sitting down beside al-Jubani’s son at a low table, I introduced myself and explained the reason for my visit. Even though he was clearly drunk, he managed to express his gratitude and respect.

“You ask me, sir, about my father’s burial place,” he went on. “I have no idea exactly where they buried him. I wasn’t able to attend the funeral ceremonies; I don’t even know if there were any. There was always a huge chasm between my father and me even when he was still alive. As for now, well.. ”

He yelled to the waiter to bring over a carafe of wine and a cup of coffee.

“The permitted and forbidden: they’re both available here, so, if you’ll excuse me, I invite you to take your pick. Revered pilgrim, I cannot stand reproach and criticism, having received more than my due of both from my late father. In many ways, man has decisions made for him. Was it my choice to be Altunbugha al-Jubani’s son, and thus be banned from politics and made to consort with ordinary folk? Did fate offer me counsel in polishing up the kinks in my career or dealing with the various trials life has thrown at me? I’ve had to make my way through life as best I can, like some fleeting shadow or passing cloud. In the world to come may God be forgetful and forgiving.”

The young man sitting next to me had clearly been wronged. Gingerly taking the cup of coffee, I listened attentively to what he had to say.

“In the political arena, sir, the very worst disaster to affect a man is to die before other people.”

I pushed my turban back from my forehead. “Who is there,” I asked, “who doesn’t die before others?”

“By ‘other people’ I mean enemies and those who oppose one’s ideas and initiatives. I have no doubt that my father felt that his death was one such ignominious defeat.”

I started fidgeting as a way of showing that I was about to leave the tavern, but the young man begged me to stay.

“Can’t you stay here with a son of the people?” he asked. “What I’ve just told you is merely ephemeral nonsense. But what is more important then anything else is about to appear before our very eyes. Please stay with me for a while so you can watch and listen.”

As long as the possibility of anonymity was still there, I had little choice. Furthermore the wine had not yet reduced him to incoherence.

There was suddenly a total silence in the tavern, even though it was packed with customers and filled with pipe smoke. The silence was broken by a singer behind a curtain whose nightingale voice was accompanied by the strings of a lute. The words of the song were Persian, from the Ruba‘iyat of ‘Umar al-Khayyam. My companion leaned over and told me that he was Persian on his late mother’s side. Sipping his wine and sucking on his pipe, he kept swaying from side to side as the music inspired him.

For sure, I told myself, this invisible woman’s lovely voice merits a place in the haven of passion, amid cascades of flowing delight. In such a sound resides the very definition of the ideal of sweet-tempered refinement. It has an enormous power to attract the spirit of the listener to life and the pursuit of beauty; of that there can be no doubt. The voice is warm and lush, dispensing beauty all around it. One can swear an oath that the owner of that voice is a paragon of beauty and an authority. In addition to those thoughts and in spite of my normal piety and Maliki beliefs, I allowed myself to be inspired by the passions of the moment in this space that seemed like some secret nocturnal garden. In my mind I pictured the singer’s body in all its painting, white-hot nakedness. I could envision the very breath of her, the breath of youth, a captivating breath, one that had only to come into contact with wilting bodies in order to restore them. The soul that it entered was purged of all accumulated dross and misery. . I allowed myself to chase after ever-regenerating fantasies. All my efforts at dispelling them, curses aimed at the duplicity of the devil and other temptations, were completely in vain.

My companion kept closing his eyes or staring fixedly into the void, mouthing blissful sighs at the sound of the singer’s voice as she borrowed shapes and colors from the vocabulary of passion and tenderness. At this point the singer stopped for a while to recover her breath, and the lute played a solo.