“Umm al-Banin’s pregnancy had, it would appear, distracted my attention from other matters, with the result that this Sufi shaykh knew more about world affairs than I did. But for the fact that I am forced to wander my way along the corridors of power, I would be extremely happy with the ways things are. I asked the shaykh why he was so involved in current events.
“That may be,” he replied, “because I was born and grew up in Rigraga close by the sea, a region much affected by sudden changes in weather. The port is always full of ships except when the winter storms blow up. I can still picture scenes of the way the sea used to get roiled by the wind. Even the poor there separate into different groups and sects. In summary, some of them take Sufism to imply a complete denial of worldly things and mortification of the senses, while others choose to see it as represented by the generous hand of God Himself, standing alongside His servants, their necks outstretched to achieve the precious values of beauty, truth, and justice. God willing, I see myself as belonging to the latter group, not the former. Then doesn’t religion involve rituals and behavior: some time for one, some time for the other? My day is spent on both aspects until I manage to encounter the visage of my Lord, the Generous and Mighty.”
“Wonderfully said, Abu ‘Abdallah. May you be blessed.”
“Now tell me about the matter you’re concerned about.”
“It’s about my brother-in-law who is somewhat deranged.”
“Yes, in both the Maghrib and here I’ve seen patients in yet worse states than that of your brother-in-law. Here’s the conclusion I’ve come to: such mental problems will never be cured by resorting to violence, isolation, or cauterization. You have to let the patient tell the story and reveal the agonies he is suffering. Once that is done, you need to nurse the condition with tender, caring words so that you can track down the thread that is tying the various biles and fumes together into a noxious mixture. Understanding is what’s needed, that and nothing more. With God’s aid that’s the path to a cure.”
I was anxious to make quite sure I understood what he meant. “What is to be done then, Abu ‘Abdallah?” I asked.
“He shouldn’t be either in your house or in the hospital. Instead he should come here to my convent. Along with my other students I can teach him to fear God and seek His protection in his personal struggles. As for the one who fears the station of His Lord and denies the soul its fancies, Paradise is the refuge—the Lord of Mankind has spoken truly.”
“My own hope in God Almighty and in you is great. But suppose the young man keeps on causing trouble and doesn’t repent?”
“In that case, I’ll recommend that you send him for a while to the Qalandariya Mosque outside Bab al-Nasr.”
I was well aware that the adherents to that particular sect belonged to the Malamatiya movement, a group that considers itself liberated from all conventions regarding conduct and conversation and licensed to indulge in activities forbidden by both religion and custom. All of which made people shun and censure them. However, for the time being I refrained from questioning the shaykh’s reference to them, preferring at this stage to show my delight at the offer he had made. I stood up and showered his head with kisses, while he asked God’s forgiveness for such expressions and kissed my shoulder in turn.
The sun was barely over the horizon before I had removed Sa‘d from the hospital on the terms stipulated by the director and left him in the care of the Moroccan shaykh — may God prolong his life. I also made Sa‘d very happy by carrying out all the promises I had made.
I performed the evening prayer in the al-Azhar Mosque, then returned joyfully to my wife. She had been worried by my absence. Once she had calmed down somewhat, I decided to tell her everything about her brother. She was delighted to hear what I had done and blessed me for it, while I drew her close to me and felt her enlarged belly.
As I lay down to go to sleep, I felt a severe pain in my joints which affected my back. This time it was so bad that I was not able to hide it from Umm al-Banin, so I told her, all the while cursing the scars and wounds of political life. “We’ll cure it with cups!” she shouted. She laid me on my stomach and brought out a small box from under the bed. Opening it she took out some cups, moistened them with kohl, filled them with translucent wax which she lit with a match, and put them on the places that ached. The warmth felt very good, and I asked for more until I felt very relaxed. While she was rubbing my back with aloewood oil, I must have fallen into a deep sleep, ever grateful to my wife.
On the tenth day of Muharram, ‘Ashura’ Day, I thought about accompanying my wife on visits to some Shi‘i monuments. I asked her to choose between the shrines of Zayn al-‘Abidin, Sayyida Nafisa, and Umm Kulthum. “In each one of them,” I told her, “the government expects people to weep over the slaying or exclusion of members of the holy family, but the scent of musk is what lingers there the longest.”
But Umm al-Banin — how sensible and calm she is — decided not to take me up on the suggestion for fear of exhausting herself or even bringing on labor unexpectedly when she was far away from the midwife.
“‘Abd al-Rahman,” she went on, “have you forgotten perhaps that I’m in my seventh month? My heart tells me that my daughter is going to be a seven-monther just like me.”
“A girl you say? Who told you that?”
“Her gentle movements and the midwife’s probings. What do you say we name her al-Batul, like my late mother?”
I hugged her to me and kissed her on the forehead. Not being a successor of those pre-Islamic people who regarded the birth of a daughter as a bad sign, I repeated to myself the words of the noble prophetic hadith: “Do not show your dislike for girls. They are precious companions.”
“We’re going to be happy with our baby,” I said, “whether it’s a boy or girl. We’ll name this seven-monther whatever you like — thanks be to God who knows the world of the unseen!”
We ate breakfast. I decided to stay at home for a few days so as to be near Umm al-Banin when she was about to give birth and also close to my books and papers.
I now secluded myself in my library and started prioritizing my readings. I wanted to get things organized in my mind so that I could continue writing the chapter on the Mamluks for The Book on the Lessons of History and also my autobiography, Information on Ibn Khaldun and His Travels East and West. Research on the Mamluks, these erstwhile slaves who go on to become rulers, took up all my time. I even started using two authors at once, but only on points where they both agreed, all the while struggling to deduce significant ideas from the wealth of information and data about events. But no one should get the impression that my reason for working this way was to fill up time or because I felt the onset of old age. To the contrary, there were two major reasons. One of them is generaclass="underline" namely that future generations should be able to profit from another cycle in the long heritage of historical lessons. The other is more personal, and I must admit it here so as to avoid any ambiguity: I have this tendency to adjust my understanding of events to my own sense of self-preservation, as a kind of protective shield against an entirely futile end, be it slow or swift. It is something that never fails to hurl me headlong into the grinder of caprices and the arena of clashing swords. As a result, I either find myself banished and sent into the wilderness of exile, or else I’m cut into two pieces and my shoulders are dislocated. Here is the way I put it:
Whenever politics becomes a craft used for deceitful purposes and an instrument for wreaking havoc and death, religious scholars should remove themselves from the scene to the maximum extent possible. That is what I have deduced from my own experiences in the Maghrib, and, ever since my arrival in Egypt as a refugee, I have detected the very same forces at work. Furthermore, I can say that the long arm of the Mamluk regime of this region has no rivals when it comes to the fierce support of both allies and mercenaries — something I term ‘solidarity of convenience and clientage.’ Once launched and enhanced, that phenomenon can easily rival other types of group solidarity in inciting one group to behave aggressively toward others and inflicting patterns of murder and sequestration. Religious scholars, even those who turn to the mystical path or resort to the apparently secure shade of neutrality and discretion, cannot avoid involvement in this crushing and destructive pattern of group identity, unless, that is, they are to go crazy or lose their minds entirely. When dealing with the ruler, the religious scholar has no alternative but to be either with him or against him. Any third way is a lost cause. This is what I have come to realize since I came to Egypt. It’s for that reason that I let the atabeg, Altunbugha al-Jubani, enroll me as a member of al-Zahir Barquq’s retinue so that this Mamluk sultan would include me within the framework of his general protection and supply me with salary and food. Whenever he throws his fits of kingly anger, I am reminded of the fact that I am totally indebted to him for my daily bread and the very fact that I’m alive. God is my witness that, while I may be a part of this enforced indemnity, I have done my level best to remain as aloof and cautious as I can. I have kept my glowing encomia to a minimum and, to the extent possible, I have steered clear of politics and not indulged in all its ‘alarums and excursions.’