SOURCE: "Insights from the Uthmaniyya of Al-Jahiz into the Religious Policy of Al-Ma'mun," in The Muslim World, Vol. LXIX, No. 1, January, 1979, pp. 8-17.

[In the following essay, Zahniser explores the relationship between al-Jahiz 's writings and the views of the caliph al-Ma'mun. Zahniser argues that Uthmaniyya both reflected and influenced al-Ma 'mun 's policy.]

One of the most interesting periods in Islamic history is that of the caliphate of Abdallah b. Harun al-Rashid, called al-Mamun (198/813-218/833). Not only was it charac terized by great cultural advancement, greater sympathy for the aspirations of non-Arab Muslims, and a championing of the superiority of the fourth caliph, Ali b. Abi Talib; but also of Mutazilite orthodoxy and the persecution of a traditionalism represented by Ahmad b. Hanbal (164/780-241/851).

Crucial to an understanding of al-Mamun and his reign is the question of his relation to the supporters and champions of the claims of the Prophet's cousin and son-in-law Ali (d. 40/661). While our oldest sources, al-Tabari (244/839-310/923) and al-Yaqubi (d. 284/897), give no evidence as to what led al-Mamun to champion the cause of the Shia,¹ the traditional Sunni sources present the view that this was due to the strong influence of his entourage in general and his vizier, al-Fadl b. Sahl, in particular,² and the most reliable Shiite sources attribute to the caliph himself the formulation and execution of his pro-Alid measures. As a matter of fact, these same sources consider his naming of the eighth imam, Ali al-Rida (148/765-203/818), as his heir apparent (wali al-ahd) a betrayal of true Shiite principles and seek to exonerate their imam from responsibility for this compromise by claiming that he was forced to accept his role as the successor to al-Mamun by the caliph himself.³ Gabrieli holds that al-Mamun's motivation for taking up the cause of the Alids was a combination of personal veneration for the descendents of Ali and a desire to repair the wrongs which the Alids suffered at the hands of the Abbasids and others.⁴ Sourdel rejects Gabrieli's explanation, believing the caliph was motivated by the Mutazilite conviction regarding the nature of the imamate itself, and a desire to unite the numerous dissident elements existing at the time under his authority.⁵

Sourdel suggests that the writings of Amr b. Bahr al-Jahiz (160/776-255/869), in some sense at least an apologist for al-Mamun, provide an indication of the point of view which al-Mamun championed.⁶ The purpose of this essay is to show that al-Jahiz' most extensive treatise on the imamate, his Uthmaniyya, was written for the information of al-Mamun himself, and to suggest what insight this may give us into the nature of the caliph's religious policy.

In his classic work, Al-Bayan wa 'l-Tabyin, this same author records that he wrote a number of books on the subject of the imamate for the caliph al-Mamun. These books pleased the caliph very much and gave al-Jahiz the start he needed for his brilliant career. The passage runs as follows:

After having ordered al-Yazidi to look through the books which I had written on the imamate and to convey to him his opinion about their contents, and after having read them himself…[al-Mamun] sent for me [and] said to me, "Someone whose intelligence we respect and whose information can be trusted informed me that these books were well composed and of great usefulness. I said to him, 'Maybe the description will prove superior to firsthand contact.' But when I looked them over I found that on inspection they were better than the description of them. So I examined the books more closely and found that my pleasure with them had been as greatly increased by a second reading as it had been by the first…This is a book which does not require the presence of its author or other supporters to defend its contentions. It combines depth of meaning with fullness of treatment. It has excellent diction and smoothness of style. It is a book for the marketplace or the palace, for the common man or the specialist."⁷

Since these books could not have been presented to the caliph any later than 202/817-818, the year of death of al-Yazidi,⁸ they were brought to the attention of al-Mamun in a crucial period for his religious policy. In Ramadan of 201 (March 817) he designated Ali al-Rida heir apparent. Sometime prior to the month of Shaban in the year 202 (February 818) al-Mamun left Merv for Baghdad, and on the second of that month al-Fadl b. Sahl was killed. Early in the following year (203/818) Ali al-Rida died. When al-Mamun finally entered Baghdad on the fifteenth of Safar, 204 (August 11, 819) he had changed the colors under which he rallied from the green standard of the family of Ali to the Abbasid black. Therefore, if we knew what books were among those which al-Jahiz presented to the caliph we might know a little more about what went into the formulation of that policy.

Since the Uthmaniyya is clearly the most complete of all the extant works on the imamate from the pen of al-Jahiz (280 pages in the Cairo edition of 1955), it would seem reasonable to consider it to have been among these books. Taha al-Hajiri, the only scholar who has dealt with the question of the occasion for which the Uthmaniyya⁹ was written, however, concludes that it could not have been written during the caliphate of al-Mamun. "Al-Jahiz," writes al-Hajiri "(although he claims to be speaking for the Uthmaniyya) proceeds to nullify the virtues of Ali one by one, practically eliminating them all."¹⁰ Al-Hajiri feels that al-Jahiz was too judicious to have offered such a book to al-Mamun, who was of the Alid persuasion and surrounded by a strong entourage convinced of the superiority of Ali." A more reasonable date according to al-Hajiri, would be sometime during the caliphate of al-Mutawakkil (233/847-247/861) when the dynastic policy was directed against the Aiids.

It cannot be denied that the Uthmaniyya presents a systematic argument against the claim that Ali was the most virtuous of the Companions of the Prophet. Indeed, in al-Jahiz' time the designation "Uthmani" was equated with objection to the superior virtue of Ali¹² and, thus, to his claims to have been the immediate successor of the Prophet. The book deals with two main subjects: the contention that Abu Bakr "was the most virtuous individual in the Islamic community and the most worthy of the imamate" (p. 3) and the view of the Uthmaniyya on the nature of the caliphate and how the imam ought to be selected. Since the Uthmaniyya maintain that God made clear that the most virtuous in the Community should be its leader (p. 277), the first of these subjects is clearly the most crucial. The argument in the Uthmaniyya, therefore, demands for its success the subordination of the virtue of Ali to that of Abu Bakr. Al-Jahiz sets about this task by attacking first the superiority of Ali's conversion to Islam, concluding that he was not the first male convert (pp. 3-4), and that, even if he were, the conversions of even Zayd and Khabbab, to say nothing of Abu Bakr, would have been superior to his (pp. 22-27). Since, in the critical period when the nascent Muslim community was experiencing persecution in Mecca, he, as a youth, was safe both because of the protection granted by his family and because no adult warrior could derive any honor from challenging him, al-Jahiz assures his reader that Ali could then have had no share at all in the heroic virtue of those who suffered in this period (pp. 27-39). Even the virtue said to be Ali's as a result of his heroism as a warrior in battle is denied by our author who suggests that since many motives may bring a warrior into the thick of battle, only one of which is true courage, Ali could very well have been driven by some baser motive (pp. 45-50). On the other hand, al-Jahiz contends, Abu Bakr served as a trusted military adviser to the Prophet and was in greater danger than Ali, since his capture or death would have been a greater boon to the enemy than that of Ali (pp. 50-66). Indeed, the latter's heroism is considerably lessened by the fact that the Prophet had promised him that he would live to fight Talha and al-Zubayr (p. 49). After a lengthy discussion of the Alid evidence for dissent at the time of the pledge of allegiance to Abu Bakr, al-Jahiz argues that if such dissent were proof against Abu Bakr it could also be used against Ali, since his caliphate upset the entire world (pp. 195-196)! The Conquests did not end until Ali was in power; the great schisms did not commence until he was in control (pp. 185-186)!

On the other hand, there is convincing evidence, both external and internal, that the Uthmaniyya could not possibly have been written during the caliphate of al-Mutawakkil, and probably was written during that of al-Mamun.

The fact that the book was answered by al-Iskafi¹³ who died in 240/854 provides a date after which the Uthmaniyya could not have been written. Although this date would still allow seven years in the reign of al-Mutawakkil during which the book could have been written, the probability that it was written during these years is considerably lessened by the testimony of Ibn Abi'l-Hadid that the refutation of al-Iskafi was written when he was a young man.¹⁴ If we knew al-Iskafi's age at death we could be more certain of this point. Other evidence, however, contributes to the conclusion offered here. Al-Jahiz mentions in the introduction to his Hayawan a Qawl al-Uthmaniyya which is certainly this Uthmaniyya.¹⁵ Furthermore, al-Jahiz states in the Uthmaniyya that he will inform his reader "about the point of view of the Abbasiyya…after finishing with that of the Uthmaniyya" (p. 187). This must be the treatise Kitab al-Abbasiyya mentioned also in the introduction to the Hayawan.¹⁶ Since the Hayawan was addressed to Muhammad al-Zayyat who died in Rabi 1, 233/November, 847, to have been written in the reign of al-Mutawakkil Mutawakkil both the Abbasiyya and the Uthmaniyya would have to have been completed within the four-month period between the accession of al-Mutawakkil (Dhu 'l-Hijja, 232/August, 847) and the death of al-Zayyat. Futhermore, al-Jahiz was evidently in very poor health during this period.¹⁷

There is a decidedly Mutazilite stamp upon this treatise. It is as through the author expects his reader to accept the categories of reason and dogma championed by this movement. Al-Jahiz accepts unequivocally the position that prophets made errors (pp. 91-92), evidences a strong dislike for taqlid (pp. 7, 10, 17), appeals repeatedly to the mean between extremes in deciding questions of historical accuracy (e.g., pp. 5, 7), and discusses what is possible that God should do and what is not possible, viewed of course from the Mutazilite conviction that God's acts be consistent with his unity and justice (pp. 8, 255). His critical theory concerning the use and value of prophetic tradition (hadith) and other historical data for proof is clearly Mutazilite (e.g., p. 116).¹⁸ Under these circumstances al-Mutawakkil could not conceivably have been the intended reader of the treatise, since his opposition to the Mutazilites was nearly as strong as his opposition to the supporters of Ali.

There are also indications in the Uthmaniyya that it is part of a series of books on the subject. The reference to the Abbasiyya has already been mentioned. In this passage the reader is addressed in the singular. In another passage al-Jahiz apparently refers to his Kitab Wujub al-Imama,¹⁹ or at least a book of similar contents. Notice the context of this reference.

If it were not for the fact that those whom the Prophet left as leaders in Medina during the various raids were included in… all the sira literature, I would have included them in my book which I wrote for you (sg.)…in which I refuted those who belittle the value of the imamate.…Except for this book, my books do not reflect my own point of view; rather, I let the book explain itself (p. 187).

At the end of al-Jahiz' closing statement about the book, a passage in which his reader is addressed in the singular, he says, "Now we are beginning the Kitab al-Masail.…" (p. 280).²⁰

In the light of this evidence it seems safe to conclude that the Uthmaniyya was written during the caliphate of al-Mamun. The burden of proof would now seem to fall upon those who wish to show that it was not among those books on the imamate which al-Yazidi brought to the attention of al-Mamun. Why should a treatise on the point of view of the Uthmaniyya have been left out of a series of books describing the views of various sects on the imamate? In what other period would it have been safer to give views critical of Ali? Although al-Mamun's political and official championing of the Alid cause ended with his entry into Baghdad, his personal proclivity for that view continued, as witnessed to by his decree in Rabi 1 212/June, 827 that the Quran was created and that Ali b. Abi Talib was the most virtuous Muslim after the Prophet himself.²¹

What then may we offer as the significance of the conclusion that the Uthmaniyya was among the books read by al-Mamun during the period when he was formulating his religious policy?

The most obvious is that sound criticism of Ali and his supporters was not out of the question at the court of al-Mamun.

It is true that al-Jahiz softens the blow of his criticism of Ali by suggesting that he is reflecting the views of the Uthmaniyya and not his own personal views. As we have seen, he says only one of the books which he has written on this sensitive subject represents his own point of view. It is clear, however, from a reading of the Uthmaniyya that this is more of an ideal than a reality.²² That his readers could have concluded this is clear from the refutation of al-Iskafi, and al-Jahiz' reaction to that refutation, mentioned above. Al-Masudi in his discussion of the Uthmaniyya implies that al-Jahiz expresses his own views in it.²³Jahiz Al-Jahiz, himself, in the introduction to his Hayawan shows that his effort was not completely successful: "Why do you criticize the views expressed in the Uthmaniyya as though they were my own but do not criticize me for my views when I am representing the position of the Shia?"²⁴

That al-Jahiz does recognize the impact that he is making is clear from his attempts to cushion the blows he is inflicting upon Ali and his supporters. "There is," he says, "a lot that could be said here against Ali; but to engage in that would be to do something we disdain" (pp. 185-186). In another context he writes: "We don't mean by all this to remove credit from Ali for what he underwent [in battle], just as we would not diminish what others like him have done…" (p. 48).²⁵ Nevertheless, what al-Jahiz seeks to show in this book is that, while Ali was an excellent and virtuous Companion of the Prophet, Abu Bakr was more virtuous and thus deserved to be the first imam. To do this he had to refute many claims of the Shia, both "Rafidite and Zaydite" (p. 279). Al-Mamun was not convinced. Throughout his caliphate he held to the position of the superiority of Ali. Nevertheless, to argue the claims of Abu Bakr was evidently not sufficiently risky to prevent al-Jahiz at the start of his career from presenting the Uthmaniyya to the caliph.

If we assume that al-Jahiz wrote the Uthmaniyya with al-Mamun in mind as a reader, we can also learn something from the book about the caliph himself.

We have already shown that its reader is sympathetic to the basic views of the Mutazilite rationalists, a fact which is in agreement with what we know of al-Mamun's sympathies. There is further the assumption in the work that the imam ought to be an accomplished scholar and the person of highest merit in the Muslim community. Al-Jahiz answers the question, "How can the superior individual who is worthy of being made caliph be recognized?" He writes:

A person cannot be the most knowledgeable individual about religious and secular matters without being heard of, since he only becomes knowledgeable by frequenting the company of the ulama and sitting long hours with the fuqaha studying at length the books [sic] of God and the books of men, and by scholarly debate (p. 266).

Further, both the nature of man, which impels him to reveal the things discovered by him which have escaped others, and religion, which requires him to benefit the community of believers with the knowledge and skill which he has gained, assure that his superior stature will be recognized by the community of the faithful (p. 267). This is in agreement with what we know about the personal qualities of al-Mamun²⁶ and may suggest that his choice of Ali al-Rida may have resulted at least in part from his respect for his spiritual and scholarly attainments. Indeed, al-Mamun was the first Abbasid to take the title of imam, a designation which implies more of the qualities attributed to the office by al-Jahiz than had been associated by the Abbasids with the designation khalifa²⁷

The Uthmaniyya warns its reader against allowing his natural biases to stand in the way of evaluating objectively the arguments of the treatise. Al-Jahiz writes:

Because sects like individuals have different "personalities" (suwar), and just as some personalities are more compatible with your (sg.) basic nature than others… so a given sect may have a "personality" more in harmony with the emotions, desires, and spirits of men than another. Therefore beware of the appeal to your desires and compatibility of spirit! It is more difficult to detect than the invisible.…This is true even if the meaning and point of view are presented plainly and openly; how much more true when the proponent embellishes and decorates his argument with sweet words and well-turned, elegant phrases (p. 279).

Evidently al-Mamun was a man who was supportive of learning with a recognized bias against the position which al-Jahiz was taking. Nevertheless, not only was the climate in his entourage such that criticism of the superiority of Ali was permitted, but, within the context of an appreciation for his own secular and religious superiority, the caliph could even be reminded of his bias and still commend his critic for the excellence of his work. Al-Jahiz' younger contemporary, al-Iskafi, a Mutazilite who, as has been mentioned above, wrote a refutation of the Uthmaniyya in which he argued for Ali's right to have become the immediate successor of the Prophet, argued from the same premise as al-Jahiz, viz., that the caliph must be the most virtuous member of the Muslim community; he simply favored Ali over Abu Bakr. He does not, however, identify himself with the Shiites of the Imamite persuasion.²⁸ Al-Iskafi, then, probably represents the position which al-Mamun, himself, adopted. However, al-Jahiz was never penalized nor placed in disfavor for having taken a contradictory position.²⁹

This evidence contributes to the conclusion that the crucial concern of al-Ma'mun's religious policy was not to champion Shiism over against Sunnism (if, indeed, it is even proper to use such terms to designate movements current in the time of al-Mamun), or non-Arabs over against Arabs, but, rather, to champion a point of view which might best be identified politically as absolutist and theologically as Mutazilite. This was the view of the elite court bureaucrats or udaba, of which the author of the Uthmaniyya was a prime example. The opposition which al-Mamun sought to combat—led by the ulama dedicated to the Sharia and supported by the general populace of Baghdad—can be broadly designated traditionalist.³⁰ In this light it makes sense that al-Jahiz, although disagreeing with the caliph on the matter of who of the two, Abu Bakr and Ali, was the most deserving of the imamate, was considered an ally in this struggle rather than an opponent.

The caliph hoped that by selecting Ali al-Rida as his successor he was following a policy like the one advocated by both al-Jahiz and al-Iskafi, namely, that the imam should be a man of scholarly achievement and personal piety.³¹ In addition, he hoped that this move would serve to bring to his aid those who were sympathetic to the cause of Ali. He was to discover, however, that this plan did not work. Indeed, the Imamite Shiites either disowned Ali al-Rida for cooperating with al-Mamun's efforts, or claimed that he was forced to comply with them. As mentioned earlier, al-Mamun, after the deaths of his vizier al-Fadl b. Sahl and Ali himself, and upon entering Baghdad, abandoned green as a color to rally behind for the black of the Abbasids. However, political realities forced him to make this policy, since he was to make known his own preference for Ali on more than one future occasion.

Notes

¹ Francesco Gabrieli, Al-Mamun e gli Alidi, Morgenländische Texte und Forschungen …, II Bd., Hft. 1 (Leipzig, 1929), p. 32.

² Sidqi Hamdi, "The pro-Alid Policy of Mamun," Bull. Coll. Arts Sci. Baghdad, I (1956), 96.

³Ibid. 101.

⁴ Gabrieli, Al-Mamun, p. 34.

⁵ Dominique Sourdel, "La politique religieuse du calife Abbaside al-Mamun," REI, XXX (1962), 47.

⁶ Dominique Sourdel, "The Abbasid Caliphate," in The Cambridge History of Islam, Vol. I: The Central Islamic Lands, ed. P. M. Holt, Ann K. S. Lambton, and Bernard Lewis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970), p. 121.

⁷ Amr b. Bahr al-Jahiz, Al-Bayan wa 'l-Tabyin, ed. Hasan al-Sandubi, 3 vols., Maktabat al-Jahiz, 2 (Cairo, 1926-27), III, 374.

⁸ Taha al-Hajiri, Al-Jahiz: hayatu-hu wa atharu-hu, Maktabat al-Dirasat al-Adabiyya, 28 (Cairo, 1969), p. 181.

⁹ Amr b. Bahr al-Jahiz, Al-Uthmaniyya, ed. Abd al-Salam Muhammad Harun, Maktabat al-Jahiz, 3 (Cairo, 1955). The numbers in parentheses in this essay refer to the pages in this edition of the text.

¹⁰ Al-Hajiri, Al-Jahiz, p. 187.

¹¹Ibid.

¹² Amr b. Bahr al-Jahiz, Al-Hayawan, ed. Abd al-Salam Muhammad Harun, 7 vols., Maktabat al-Jahiz, 1 (Cairo, 1938-45), VII, 7.

¹³ Muhammad b. Abd Allah al-Iskafi, Al-Radd ala Kitab al-Uthmaniyya. Only portions of this book are extant. These portions have been preserved in the Shark Nahj al-Balagha of Ibn Abi 'l-Hadid (ed. Hasan Tamim, 5 vols. [Beirut, 1963], IV, 219-69). Harun published these portions after the text of the Uthmaniyya in his edition referred to above (pp. 282-343).

¹⁴ "Al-Jahiz entered the quarter of the booksellers of Baghdad and said, 'Who is this common youth who I have heard has dared to refute my book?'" Ibn Abi ΊHadid, Shark Nahj, V, 96.

¹⁵ Al-Jahiz, Hayawan, I, 11. See also Charles Pellat, "Gahiziana III, essai d'inventaire de l'œuvre Gahiziene," Arabica, 111(1965), 178.

¹⁶ Al-Jahiz, Hayawan, I, 12; Pellat, "Gahiziana III," Arabica, III (1965), 156.

¹⁷ Charles Pellat, The Life and Works of Jahiz, trans. D. M. Hawke, The Islamic World Series (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969), p. 7.

¹⁸ See Mathias Zahniser, "The Uthmaniyyah of al-Jahiz: An Analysis of Content Method and Sources" (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Johns Hopkins University, 1973), Ch. IV.

¹⁹ Pellat, "Gahiziana III," Arabica, III (1965), 161.

²⁰ Zahniser, "The Uthmaniyyah of al-Jahiz," pp. 12ff.

²¹ Muhammad b. Jarir al-Tabari, Tarikh al-Rusul wa 'l-Muluk, ed. Muhammad Abu Fadl Ibrahim, Dhakhair al-Arab, 30, 10 vols. (Cairo, 1937-1962), VII, 619 (= 111, 1099). See also Ahmad b. Abi Tahir Tayfur, Baghdad fi Tarikh al-Khilafa al-Abbasiyya (Baghdad, 1968), p. 9.

²² For details on this from the Uthmaniyya, see Zahniser, "The Uthmaniyyah of al-Jahiz," pp. 18 ff.

²³ Ali b. al-Husayn al-Masudi, Les Prairies D'Or, trans, and ed. C. Barbier de Meynard, 10 vols. (Paris, 1871), VI, 56f.

²⁴ Al-Jahiz, Hayawan, I, 11.

²⁵ See also Uthmaniyya, pp. 87, 89, 93, and 153 for similar defenses of Ali.

²⁶ Al-Rifai points out al-Mamun's personal proficiency in the Islamic disciplines (Ahmad Farid al-Rifai, Asr al-Mamun, 2nd ed., 2 vols. (Cairo, 1927), I, 215. This is clearly shown by an anecdote in Ibn Abi Tahir Tayfur, Baghdad, pp. 30 and 31.

²⁷ Sourdel, "La Politique," REI, XXX (1962), 37.

²⁸ See also Ibn Abi 'l-Hadid, Shark Nahj, I, 782, where al-Iskafi is mentioned as the most sincerely convinced and the most effective exponent of the Baghdadi school of Mutazilites who opted for the superiority of Ali.

²⁹ Sourdel ("La Politique," REI, XXX (1962), 38, 39) shows that al-Mamun took exactly the position which al-Jahiz refutes in his Uthmaniyya.

³⁰ Recent analyses of the religious policy of al-Mamun have in various ways pointed to the conclusion offered in this essay. George Makdisi ("Remarks on Traditionalism in Islamic Religious History," in The Conflict of Traditionalism and Modernism in the Muslim Middle East, ed. Carl Leiden [Austin, Texas: Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, 1965], p. 81) identifies the two broad factions as Rationalist and Traditionalist. Sourdel ("La Politique," REI, XXX [1962] sees al-Mamun's view as combining those of the philosophers, Mutazilites and Shiites of the Zaydi variety. W. Montgomery Watt came to conclusions very similar to those of Sourdel, exploring even further the similarities between the policies of al-Mamun and the features of the Zaydi views of his time. Watt designates the two factions identified by Makdisi as autocratic and constitutionalist (The Formative Period of Islamic Thought [Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1973], pp. 175-179). Marshall G. S. Hodgson (The Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilisation, 3 vols. [Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1974], I, 473-81) maintains that, while al-Mamun did not limit his own policy to any one of the several solutions to the problem of enduring Islamic government, its central features were most like the Mutazilite convictions of the adibs (udaba) or court bureaucrats like al-Jahiz. The Traditionalist opposition he calls Shari ulama, some of which were of the jamai-sunni variety and some of which were Twelver Shiis.

³¹ Sourdel, "The Abbasid Caliphate," Cambridge Hist, of Islam, Vol. I, p. 121.