Al Nahda Fall 2022.pptx

ARA 102 AL-NAHḌA: MODERN ARAB AWAKENING    What is meant by al-nahda? What are the possible factors that contributed to the emergence of alnahda movement? How was Napoleon received in Egypt and Beyond? How was Europe perceived? Al-Nahda (introduction)    Al-Nahda may refer to both time perio...

ARA 102 AL-NAHḌA: MODERN ARAB AWAKENING    What is meant by al-nahda? What are the possible factors that contributed to the emergence of alnahda movement? How was Napoleon received in Egypt and Beyond? How was Europe perceived? Al-Nahda (introduction)    Al-Nahda may refer to both time period and to the movement that emerged in the late 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. The time era roughly between the 13th and the 18th century is described as al-inḥiṭāṭ (the Age of Decline) Al-Nahda is seen as connected to the cultural shock brought on by Napoleon's invasion of Egypt in 1798 The French invasion and occupation of Egypt  ‘Abd al-Raḥmān al-Jabartī’s (17541825) ʿAjāʾib al-āthār fī al-tarājum wa-lakhbār or simply, Al-Jabarti’s History of Egypt  The French army was accompanied by about one hundred and fifty scientists with expertise in the fields ranging from chemistry, astronomy to philosophy, poetry Why was France interested in occupying Egypt? One scholar writes: “Having an exciting and fascinating past and profitable location beside the Mediterranean coast, Egypt was the dream of France, [which thought] that Egypt might be used as a tool to threaten the interests of the British trade and to cut the overland route in order that Britain could not reach India. The French also thought that conquering Egypt would lead to the control of Syria and Jerusalem as well.” John Ray, The Rosetta Stone and the Rebirth of Ancient Egypt (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), 25. The nahḍa precursors    What can you find out about Muhammad Ali Pasha? Khedive Ismāʿīl Rifaʿa Rafiʿ al-Ṭahṭāwī     His background His approach to modernisation His legacy How does history view him? The nahḍa precursors Muḥammad ʿAlī       Both Muḥammad ʿAlī and his grandson Khedive Ismāʿīl were extremely instrumental to the nahḍa in Egypt. Muḥammad ʿAlī ruled Egypt for 43 years (1805 to 1848) He was an army general of Albanian descent in the Ottoman army sent to Egypt to help drive out the French and restore law and order. He is generally considered the architect of modern Arab and Islamic cultural revival in Egypt. He re-directed the course of governance in Egypt from a pan-Turkish to a pan-Arab approach. Politically, although he fought the French, under his rule they were still very influential in Egypt. The nahḍa precursors:  Muḥammad ʿAlī achievements    Education  introduced the French system of education through his series of educational missions (al-baʿtha) Education  started the importation of European teachers, mainly French and Italians, into Egypt to teach and train the Egyptian youths in the schools and higher institutions of learning he had established across Egypt. Translation  commissioned the translation of many Western texts into Arabic, which were then studied at the newly established schools and institutions. The nahḍa precursors:  Muḥammad ʿAlī achievements  Press  He is credited with the introduction to the Arab world of a full-scale printing press that published a wide range of materials. That was the Būlāq Press, in 1822 which helped launch masses-oriented Egyptian journalism. This led to the appearance of daily newspapers, like the official Egyptian government gazette, al-Waqāʾiʿ al-Maṣriyya, which first appeared in 1828, and al-Ahrām, which was founded in 1875 and now is one of the oldest surviving Arabic daily newspapers. Journalism in Syria and Lebanon then followed. The nahḍa precursors  Khedive Ismāʿīl    He ruled Egypt for 16 years (1863 and 1879). He took the trend of modernization of Egypt further. His goal was to make Egypt look like—if not part of—Europe. “My country is no longer in Africa; we are now part of Europe. It is, therefore, natural for us to abandon our former ways and to adopt a new system adapted to our social conditions”. The nahḍa precursors: Stage  Khedive Ismāʿīl  He established many of Egypt’s national institutions that boosted his development plans including, most especially: Dār al-kutub (the National Library) Dār al-awprā (the Cairo Opera House) Dār al-ʿulūm (which is a teacher training college) The first girls’ school (1873) The re-opening of al-Ṭahṭāwī’s Madrasat al-alsun (School of Languages) in 1868. The nahḍa precursors: the intellectuals Rifaʿa Rafiʿ al-Ṭahṭāwī      He is an Egyptian scholar and one of the greatest intellectual leaders of the nahḍa. A graduate of and scholar at al-Azhar, al-Ṭahṭāwī was sent in the first set of the education mission sent by Muḥammad ʿAlī to study in France. Taking France as a role model, he wrote several works to express his ideas about reforming Egypt. He also translated several French works into Arabic. as the founder and first director of the School of Languages (Al-Alsun) from 1835 onward, he supervised many translation projects that took place in that school. The nahḍa precursors: the intellectuals Rifaʿa Rafiʿ al-Ṭahṭāwī    His most famous book is Takhlīṣ al-ibrīz fī talkhīṣ Bārīz, which provides an unprecedented account of an Egyptian’s impressions of French and European societies and civilizations in comparison with his homeland’s society and civilization. He wrote about the set-up of the city of Paris, its inhabitants, streets, and houses, and also he discusses the status and position of men and women in that society, emphasizing the special love which the French people have for reading, literature, and the arts. For example he writes: “It is recognized that the French people are outstanding among the European nations in their great attachment to arts and sciences. They are the greatest in literature and civilization.”  His descriptions of nineteenth-century French society and civilization are very accurate. The Muslim reformists  Most prominent figures:  The Persian scholar Jamāl al-Dīn al-Afghānī (18381897) The Egyptian scholar Muḥammad ʿAbduh (18491905)    They were leaders of the Islamic religious reform in the 19th century. Both sought to modernize Islam and interpret its precepts in line with modern Western discourses and analytical paradigms. The Muslim reformists Jamāl al-Dīn al-Afghānī    He is an Islamic ideologist and reformist who was one of the founders of Islamic Modernism in the 19th century. He was less interested in minor differences between schools of Islamic jurisprudence, and more interested in organizing a united Islamic front against the West. He believed that Islam and Shari’a were compatible with rationality. The Muslim reformists Muḥammad ʿAbduh     He wrote several works to instigate intellectual debates about Islamic reform in the modern period. He co-edited a journal with al-Afghānī called alʿUrwat al-wuthqā (The Firmest Bond), which was published between while both of them were in exile in France. Some of the topics he discussed was a comparative survey of the Christian and Islamic civilizations with regards to the doctrines stipulated in their respective scriptures. For example, he writes: The Muslim reformists Muḥammad ʿAbduh “Christianity was based on reconciliation and forbearance in all things. It brought with it the removal of retaliation, the rejection of involvement in rule and authority, and the neglect of the world and its vanity. It preached submission to every authority ruling its devotees, ‘rendering to Caesar that which is Caesar’s’, and the avoidance of personal, racial, and even religious quarrels […]. The religion of Islam (on the other hand) is based on the quest for victory, influence, conquest and power; and the rejection of every law conflicting with its own legal code (sharīʿa); on the removal of every authority where the ruler is not committed to carrying out the laws of Islam […].” Muḥammad ʿAbduh  He explains how modern-day Muslims and Christians are not the embodiments of the teachings of their respective faiths.  He argues that the Christians, from the time of the crusade wars to the present, have become world powers, while the Muslims have become the passive observers and and the victimized other in a world a large part of which they once controlled for centuries. Social and political reform and Arab nationalism  Social reform:    Women’s rights and freedom: debated across the country and in the wider Arab world, as shown in the many poems, plays, and fictional texts produced around that time and afterwards. Qāsim Amīn (d. 1908) wrote two important and famous books on the subject: Taḥrīr al-marʾa (Women’s Liberation) and al-Marʾa al-jadīda (The New Woman). His reform ideas contained in these books were met with opposition from some conservative Islamic religious groups, but well accepted by most western-educated and progressive Egyptians. Many women from across the region—such as ͑Āʾisha Taymūr and May Ziyāda also participated in the women’s rights struggle and the overall nahḍa movement through their writings as well as their social and political activism. Social and political reform and Arab nationalism  Political reform:     Saʿd Zaghlūl struggle against the British. The real event that spurred political and nationalistic activism in the country was the ʿUrābī revolution of the 1870s and 1880s in protest against the despotism of the Muḥammad ʿAlī dynasty. The struggle against British imperialism began in 1882 when the British deposed Khedive Ismāʿīl. Egypt gained independence from Britain in 1922 and, thereafter, a monarchical system of government, in continuation of the Muḥammad ʿAlī dynasty, was restored.