[In the following essay, Dozy concentrates on Ibn Hazm's romantic imagination, noting his relationship to Caliph ‘Abd-er-Rahman V and the latter's anti-Christian views.]

The historian of a calamitous epoch, and of a people rent and agonised by civil wars, sometimes longs to avert his gaze from the strife of factions and its attendant bloodshed, in order to soothe the imagination for a while in the realms of fancy, amidst ideals of innocence and peace. Let us therefore linger for a brief space over the poems with which pure and ingenuous love inspired the youthful ‘Abd-er-Rahmân V and his Vizier Ibn Hazm. Their verses exhale a perfume of youth, artlessness, and joy; the allurement of their pure accents is irresistible in the midst of universal devastation—the song of a nightingale heard amidst a tempest.

When scarcely past his childhood, ‘Abd-er-Rahmân had passionately loved his cousin Habîba,¹ daughter of the Khalif Sulaimân. But his sighs were vain. Sulaimân's widow opposed the marriage and gave the youthful suitor to understand that he must bide his time. His wounded pride and thwarted longings thereupon found vent in the following verses:

Endless are the pretexts for refusal, and against them my pride revolts! In their blindness her family would force her to reject me; but can the moon be refused to the sun? How can Habîba's mother, who knoweth my worth, frown upon me as a son-in-law?

For I love her—that fair and innocent daughter of the house of ’Abd Shams, who liveth secluded in her parents' palace. I have sworn to be her slave for life, and my heart shall be her dowry.

As a hawk swoopeth upon a dove which spreadeth her wings, so dart I when I behold her, that dove of the ‘Abd Shams—I who am sprung from the same noble stock.

How fair is my beloved! Her hands in their whiteness flout the radiance of the Pleiades, and the sheen of her bosom is the envy of the dawn.

How long a fast hast thou imposed upon my love, oh, my beloved! When wilt thou suffer me to break it?

It is beneath thy roof that I seek the remedy for all my ills—over that roof, may Allah shower his blessings! It is there that my aching heart would find solace; it is there that the fire which consumes me would be quenched!

If thou rejectest me, my cousin, thou wilt reject—I swear it—a lover who is thy equal by birth, and whose eyes are dimmed by the ardour with which thou inspirest him!

But I despair not of winning her one day, and thus shall I attain the height of my glory; for I can wield the lance when the black horses are red with blood. I render honour to the stranger within my gates; I load with benefits the wretched who appeal to my generosity. Which of her kinsfolk excelleth me in desert? Who is my equal in renown? Mine are the qualities needful to please her—youth, courtesy, tenderness and eloquence.

We know nothing of Habîba's sentiments towards her wooer, for Arab writers have left but a shadowy outline of this fair and flitting apparition, whom the imagination would fain picture more definitely. She appears, however, not to have been insensible to ‘Abd-er-Rahmân's homage. Meeting him one day, she lowered her eyes before the prince's ardent gaze, and in blushing confusion forgot to return his salute. ‘Abd-er-Rahmân, misinterpreting her modest timidity as coldness, composed these verses on the occasion:

Greeting to her who deigneth not a word to me! Greeting to the lovely gazelle whose glances are arrows piercing my heart! Never, alas! doth she send me her image to soothe the tumult of my dreams! Knowest thou not—thou whose name is so sweet to utter—that I love thee unspeakably, and that I would be to thee the most faithful lover in the world?

‘Abd-er-Rahmân, however, does not seem to have won Habîba's hand. He was, indeed, as a rule unfortunate in his amours. It is true that another damsel was not unkind to him, but she broke her plighted troth, as these lines witness:

Ah! weary are the hours since thou preferredst my rival! O graceful gazelle—breaker of vows and faithless one—hast thou forgotten the nights when we lay alone among the roses? One shawl covered us; as pearls on a necklace we lay; entwined like the branches of trees, we twain were but one, while the golden stars glittered above us in the blue vault of heaven!

The youthful ‘Abd-er-Rahmân had a friend like him in character and disposition: this was ‘Alî Ibn Hazm, his Prime Minister. Ibn Hazm's ancestors, who lived in the province of Niebla, had been Christians until his great-grandfather, Hazm, embraced Islamism; but, ashamed of his origin, and wishing to conceal it, Hazm denied his ancestry. ‘Alî's father, Ahmad (who had been Vizier under Almanzor), had set him the example; alleging his descent from a Persian freedman of Yazîd, brother of the first Omayyad Khalif, Mu‘âwiya, he expressed profound contempt for the religion of his ancestors.²

“Human Superstition,” remarks Ibn Hazm in his Book of Religions and Sects,³ “need never excite our astonishment. The most numerous and civilized nations are thralls to it. Take, for example, the Christians. So great is their multitude that God alone can number them; and they can boast of illustrious philosophers and sagacious princes. Nevertheless, they believe that one is three and three are one; that one of the three is the father, another the son, and the third a spirit—that the father is the son, and that he is not the son—that a man is God, and that he is not God—that the Messiah is in all respects God, and yet that he is not the same as God—that he has existed from all eternity, and yet was created. A sect of theirs, known as the Jacobites⁴—numbered by hundreds of thousands—even believe that the Creator was scourged, buffeted, crucified and slain, and that for three whole days the Universe was without a ruler!”

These sarcasms, be it observed, are not those of a sceptic, but of a zealous Moslem. In religion Ibn Hazm followed the doctrines of the Zâhirites,⁵ a sect which clung firmly to the letter of the sacred text, and branded decision by mere analogy—that is, the employment of human reason in interpreting the canon—as an invention of the Evil One. In politics, Ibn Hazm was a supporter of the legitimate dynasty—of which he had become a client by virtue of his false pedigree—and the Omayyads had no more faithful, devoted, and zealous follower. When their cause seemed irrevocably lost, when ‘Alî Ibn Hammûd occupied the throne, and even Khairân, chief of the Slavs, had submitted to him, Ibn Hazm had been one of those whose courage did not fail. Surrounded by enemies and spies, he nevertheless continued to intrigue and conspire, for, being an enthusiast, in his eyes prudence was cowardice. Khairân discovered his proceedings, and after throwing him into prison for several months to expiate his unseasonable zeal, he procured his exile. Ibn Hazm thereupon sought the hospitality of the Governor of Aznalcazar, not far from Seville, and was there when the news came that the Omayyad ‘Abd-er-Rahmân IV had been proclaimed Khalif at Valencia. Ibn Hazm immediately embarked to tender his services, and fought valiantly in the battle which Mortadha lost through the treachery of his pretended friends; then, falling into the hands of the victorious Berbers, he did not regain his liberty for some time.

Ibn Hazm was ultimately to be hailed as the most learned man of his age, and the most fertile writer that Spain ever produced.⁶ But in his earlier days he was pre-eminently a poet, and one of the most graceful poets of Moslem Spain. He was still of an age blessed with illusions, for he was only eight years older than his young sovereign. He too had had his romance—a simple one, indeed, but he has recorded it so frankly, so artlessly, yet with so much charm, that we cannot resist reproducing the narrative. (Here and there we have omitted certain strained metaphors, embellishments, and spangles, which in the eyes of an Arab give inimitable literary grace, but which to the more sober Western taste are barely tolerable.)

“In my father's palace there lived a damsel who had been brought up under its roof. At the age of sixteen she was peerless among women for beauty, intelligence, modesty, and gentleness. Jesting and flattery wearied her, and her words were few. While none dared to woo her, her loveliness overcame every heart: though proud, and chary of her favours, she was more alluring than the most refined coquette. Sedate and caring little for frivolous amusements, she touched the lute to perfection.

“I was very young in those days, and all my thoughts were of her. Sometimes I heard her speak, but always when others were by, and for two years I sought an opportunity of conversing alone with her. One day an entertainment, of a kind frequent in the palaces of the great, was given at our house, and to it the ladies of our family, and of our clients and chief dependants were invited. After spending a part of the day within the palace, the ladies proceeded to a belvedere affording a glorious prospect of Cordova and its suburbs, and placed themselves where the trees of the garden did not obstruct the view. I joined them, and drew near to the embrasure at which she stood; but when she saw me at her side she tripped gracefully to another niche. I followed her; she again eluded me. She well knew my sentiments towards her, for women have more skill in divining love felt for them than the Bedawy travelling by night has in marking his track; fortunately the other ladies suspected nothing, for they were too much occupied in seeking the fairest prospects to pay attention to me. The company then descended into the gardens, and those who were privileged by age and position begged the idol of my heart to sing somewhat. Taking up her lute, and attuning it with a modesty which, in my eyes, redoubled her charms, she thereupon sang these verses by ‘Abbâs, son of Ahnaf:⁷

‘I have no thoughts save for my sun—the willowy and lissom maiden whom I saw vanish behind the dark walls of the palace. Is she human or a shade? She is more than woman; but if she hath all the beauty, she hath none of the malignity of a jinni. Her countenance is a pearl; her form, a narcissus; her breath, perfume—she is an emanation of pure light. Clad in an amber robe, walking with inconceivable lightness, she might tread on things the most fragile, and break them not!’

“While she sang this, it was not the cords of the lute, but my heart-strings, that she struck with the plectrum. Never hath that exquisite day faded from my memory; it will linger therein on my deathbed. But since that day I never heard that sweet voice again.

“In my rhymes I said:

‘Blame her not if she avoideth thee: she deserveth not thy reproaches. She is fair as a gazelle, or as the moon; but the gazelle is timid, and no mortal may attain to the moon. … Thou deprivest me of hearing thy sweet voice, and thou wilt not suffer mine eyes to drink in thy beauty. Absorbed in devotions, thy thoughts are fixed on God; thou hast none for mortal man. How happy that ‘Abbâs whose verses thou singest! And yet if that great poet heard thee, he would be sad, he would envy thee as his vanquisher, for thy lips imbue his words with a pathos beyond his art!’

“Three days after Mahdî had been declared Khalif, we quitted our new palace in the suburb of Zâhira, on the east of Cordova, and returned to our former abode in the western suburb, Balât-Moghith, but for reasons I need not dilate upon, the damsel did not accompany us. On the accession of Hishâm II we fell under the displeasure of those then in power; they extorted immense sums from us, and cast us into prison, and on regaining our liberty we were obliged to go into hiding. Civil war followed. There were none who did not suffer from it, but our family more than all. My father died on Saturday, June 21, 1012, and we were left in evil plight. One day when I was attending the funeral of a kinsman, I recognised the maiden among the mourners. Good reason had I for sorrow on that day! Misfortune threatened me on all sides, and yet, as my eyes fell on her, the present with all its woes seemed to roll away as though by enchantment: she recalled the past—the fading memories of halcyon days, of dawning love—and for a little space youth and happiness seemed to return. But, alas, for how brief a moment! Then the grim realities of the present flowed in upon my soul, and my sorrow, heightened by the pangs of hopeless love, grew more bitter. I composed these verses on the occasion:

‘She laments a dead man, whom all respected; but he that still liveth hath more need of her tears. Strange! She weepeth for one who died an easy natural death, and she hath no pity for him whom she tortureth in despair!’

“Not long afterwards, when the Berbers had seized the Capital, a decree of exile was issued against us, and we quitted Cordova in July, 1013. Five years passed by without my seeing the damsel. At length, on my return to Cordova in February, 1018, I went to lodge with one of my kinsfolk, and there I beheld her. But so greatly was she changed that I scarce recognised her, and I had to be assured that it was she. The flower that I had erstwhile gazed upon in ecstasy, and that all would have plucked if respect had not restrained them, was now withered. Nurtured under our roof in luxury, she had been suddenly cast out to seek her bread with bitter toil. Alas! women are tender blossoms; as soon as they are neglected they fade: their beauty cannot endure, as can the comeliness of a man, the burning sun, the scorching blast, the inclemency of the seasons, or bare neglect. And yet, being what she was, she would still have made me the happiest of all men had she vouchsafed to me one tender word; but she remained as cold and indifferent to me as of yore. Little by little this coldness began to detach me from her; the loss of her beauty did the rest. I never reproached her—and I do not reproach her now. I have no right to do so. Of what can I complain? I might have complained if she had coquetted with me; but she never gave me a gleam of hope, or promised me aught.”

In the foregoing narrative there are evidences of a delicacy of sentiment unusual among Arabs, who prefer graces that allure, eyes that anticipate, the sigh that encourages. Ibn Hazm's love-dream is doubtless not devoid of a sensuous element—for his regrets are alleviated when their object is changed for the worse—but it comprises also spiritual attraction, chivalrous esteem and enthusiasm, and it charms by a calm, modest beauty, full of tender dignity. But it must be borne in mind that this writer—the chastest, and, we had almost said, the most Christian of Moslem poets—was not an Arab of pure blood. Great-grandson of a Spanish Christian, he had not entirely lost the modes of thought and feeling characteristic of his ancestors. In vain did such orientalized Spaniards repudiate their descent—in vain did they invoke, not Christ but Mohammed, and assail their former co-religionists with sarcasms—in their innermost nature there lingered a delicate and spiritual element which was not Arabian.

Notes

1. “The beloved.”

2. See Nicholson, Lit. Hist. of the Arabs (1907), pp. 426 sq.

3. Kitâbu ’l-Milal wa-’l-Nihal.

4. See p. 536 n.

5. “Literalists.”

6. See Nicholson, op. cit., p. 426.

7. See C. Huart, Arabic Literature (1903), p. 78.