religion and politics - Salomon, for love of the prophet Flashcards
(39 cards)
1
Q
what does he look at
A
- looks at the everyday life of living under an Islamic state - of which little has been previously written - it takes as its interlocutors Sudanese working within the conditions of possibility provided by the state and its Islamist project - one of the first books to delve into the making of the modern Islamic state - describes a classic example of ‘religion making from above’ arising from several attempts to rid Sudan of the Mahdist regime
2
Q
intro - islam in sudan and western misunderstanding
A
• Islam in Sudan became ‘a normative framework that far exceeded the state, one that individuals inhabited regardless of their positions on the particular government in question’ 4/5
West misunderstands/does not know the ‘the kind of political culture that the Islamic State enabled’ – regime has ‘made Islam the primary source of political legitimacy’ 5 –
3
Q
intro - how political system is lived
A
• Where previous anthropological literature has separated the State and the public sphere, Salomon by looking at how this political system is lived (hence ethnography best method), views them somewhat in unity 6
4
Q
intro - why are public sphere and state often separated
A
- Reasons why State and public sphere (if we take to represent religion) are usually separated: Public sphere is seen as ‘a site of free deliberation’ and is ‘celebrated’ whilst the State is presented much more negatively – this is not specific to Sudan and has been used in the study of other countries also 6/7
- There is a uniqueness to the Islamic public sphere – exploring this can help to dishevel/recalibrate western anthropological perspectives (orientalism link) 7
- In countries like Sudan, reason is not secular or ‘private’ in the public sphere as it is in the Jacobian European frameworks, rather it is ‘practical’ and ‘sanctified by religious tradition’ 8
- Echoes with Foucault’s theory of bio-politics – supports the extension of State power into the public sphere
5
Q
intro - why Sudan is a good example
A
- Salomon says that Sudan is a good example of the merging – ‘the government came to power through a coup, the regime explicitly muddied the boundary between state and society in order to make itself seem less foreign’ whereas the ‘many civil societies’ still see the state as separate ‘in order to maintain comfortable distance from the regime’ 11/12
- Also rejects the definition of the public sphere as a site of freedom and deliberation (and thus as separate from the State) – ‘They are spaces that rely on (and reproduce) both traditional and state authority as much as they challenge them’ 12
- Wanted to create a place where the people are motivated to follow the political order by their love for the Prophet/because of their piety 13
- LANGUAGE: ‘the language of political discourse had irreversibly become an Islamic one’ 14
6
Q
intro - difficulty of study
A
- Study was difficult to conduct because of the blurred boundaries between state and public
- E.G. al-Burai (Sufi leader) – represented the people but also the State 17
- Long history of conflict since achieved independence in 1956
7
Q
1 - history - Britain
A
- British attempts to colonise Sudan (from 1898) and to secularise the state were ultimately unsuccessful 31
- British realised couldn’t separate religion from the state and so set about ‘molding and reforming religion’ as part of their ‘governing strategy’ 32 – used it as a vital tool
- Sought to establish a kind of ‘Islamic Orthodoxy’ that they perceived would be ‘civilised’ 33
- British rejecting Mahdism (political movement from 1981) and favoured ‘a new type of Sunni orthodoxy’ (35) – destroyed Mahdi’s tomb, banned their clothing, prayer meetings, prayer book etc. 35/6 among other tactics
- British did not seek to privatise religion but to form ‘new sorts of religious publics’ 37
- Feared private religions because they were difficult to monitor and so threatened the power of the state 37
- British surprised by experience of Islam in Sudan – seen in C.P. Browne’s writings 39
8
Q
1 - what did GB need and how did they do this
A
- The British needed a form of Islam that could be its ‘partner’ in colonialism – one that was disciplined and did not have an unfamiliar spirituality that might stand in opposition to their ‘civilizing project of colonialism’ 40
- To do this they used Egyptian scholars from al-Azhar University in Cairo 42 – felt that educated individuals would work better with their ‘rational principles’ 42/3
- ‘A unified body, made up of Azhar graduates, would, they hoped, be able to enforce the distinction they wanted to uphold between orthodoxy and heterodoxy, fanaticism and religion.’ 43
9
Q
1 - British control of courts and prevention of revival
A
- British changed Sharia courts and underwent a campaign of Mosque reconstruction 45
- Could not locate an Orthodox Islam so attempted to create one 46
- Promoted flexible interpretations of the Qu’aran to prevent ijtihad (untraditional) revival? 47
10
Q
1 - al-bashir rally
A
- December 2013, Qarri, north of Khartoum & east of Nile, Sudanese President Umar al-Bashir held a rally – spoke about the revival of the Islamic state and the importance of this – majority of non-Muslims had relocated to South Sudan and so North should focus on Islamic path 49-52
- Like the British, al-Bashir attempted to shape Sudan using religion – it is a place where ‘religious identity would be central to national belonging’ (52) (NATION AND POLITICS INTERTWINED)
- British attempts at colonisation/implementing new religious/political regimes have influenced Sudan’s political formation now and how it interacts with religion (if we can even view them as separate!) 54/5
11
Q
2 - focus from 2005
A
- From 2005, looks at how capitalism functioned in Sudan and how Islam interacted with multiculturalism 59/60
- Involvement of SPLM and recognition of ‘political identity of religious minorities as integral to the identity of the state’ 59
12
Q
2 - government of nation salvation
A
- Government of National Salvation tried to save the nation as it was collapsing
- NIF paralleled with British colonial attempts 62 – ‘both focused on “civilizational” reform’ 62
- Hasan al-Turabi behind salvation reform 63
- Salomon looks at relationship between movement and society it wanted to ‘reform’ 63
- ‘The Civilization Project was concerned with knowledge and the arts, religion and the body, language and literature, alongside politics and economics’ 64 rather than simply being ‘an effort at political or social reform’ 64
- Although emphasised importance of minority religions, sought to secularise these so that they did not threaten the Islamic public sphere
- Wanted to privatise these minority religions so that Islam remained the public one 66
13
Q
2 - main three aims of civilisation project
A
- 1) ‘reform Sudanese political practice in a different direction from that taken by previous Islamic political experiments in Sudan’, 2) ‘moral reform of individual citizens’, and 3) ‘reform the structure and focus of religious life and institutions in Sudan’ (see how on this page and para too) 69
- ‘This, today, remains ‘the foundation of Muslim piety in the country’ 69
- NIF ‘revitalis[ed]… sharia as a system of state law and its extension into domains from which it previously had been excluded’ 70
14
Q
2 - most successful parts of NIF
A
- ‘‘Qurʾan study groups were funded and encouraged in workplaces, television and radio took on the goal of daʿwa (proselytization), grants were given to women who wanted to start “prayer upon the Prophet” groups, and the educational curriculum at the national level took on a distinctly Islamic tone.’ 73
- They also created an ‘Islam-orientated media by dominating content on television, radio, and newspapers and while it imposed Public Order and Security of Society Laws and established a special police to administer them (to enforce, for example, the separation of the sexes at social events and modest dress for women), it also turned to religious organizations to do the legwork of social, moral, and political reform’ 75
15
Q
3 - process of islamisation
A
• This process of ‘the Islamization of academic and intellectual culture’ took place through a number of different means such as ‘the establishment of think tanks, journals, fora, and even new universities, of print and televised media, of public space through mosque construction, dress codes and billboards, and of the workplace through Islamic associations and opportunities for Islamic learning’ 97
16
Q
3 - knowledge
A
- Wanted to change the ‘epistemological foundations of public culture’ through the ‘Islamization of knowledge’ allowing that this epistemological enlightenment aimed to move away from the secularisation of knowledge imposed by the Western colonisation 98
- This included knowledge of science 100 – West had ‘de-moralised’ science – wanted to make the western understanding of science harmonious with Islam 104
- Ethnographic detail: early 1990s established the Administration for the Fundamentalization of Knowledge 101
17
Q
3 - how did they effect islamisation of knowledge
A
- Changed education system to fit this Islamization of knowledge 102
- Proposed by al-Turabi? (Sudanese politician) – saw his ideas as ‘revolutionary’ but this making of knowledge available to the public sphere had already been occurring in Muslim world 105 but Sudan was a uniquely big project 105
- Power of state needed to do this 106
- Suggested that ‘since God and the Prophet have already acted in revealing divine knowledge, agency in attaining this knowledge is placed primarily in the hands of the Muslim individual’ 106 HENCE FOCUS ON INDIVIDUAL MORALITY
- Raised questions about the nature of Islamic knowledge – what is it? 106 and how does it relate to Islamic authority? 107
18
Q
3 - why did the state oppose the Sufi movement
A
• Reason why state opposed Sufi movement: Sufi’s promoted an epistemology that ‘relies on the notion of restricted knowledge…and a spiritual elite…that has exclusive access to it’ (STILL RELATED TO POLITICS BUT NOT IN THE SAME WAY AS REGIME SALOMON HAS PREDOMINANTLY LOOKED AT) e.g. Hasab al-Rasul’s theory of knowledge 110-112
19
Q
5 - al burai
A
- In the 1990s in Sudan, ‘to engage in Islam was to engage the state’ – the pious Muslim could not ‘[escape] the state’ 162 – even in remote areas
- Figure al-Burai demonstrates this – people made pilgrimages to him (see example of night pilgrimage) and he was a figure representing spiritual worship: serves as an example that ‘Islamic organizations could not avoid the state’ for ‘he was at once an agent of the state’s Islamization process and an alternative fount of religious (and political) authority’ (use quotes from story) 159-163
20
Q
5 - al turabi
A
• al-Turabi’s views suggest a necessary relationship between Islam and politics:
o critical of Sufi movement – their focus on “private” ritual acts’ as distracting from ‘issues of national concern’ – the politics of the public sphere 167
o ‘The political categories of relevance to the NIF, as represented by al- Turabi, look quite familiar to the contemporary political scientist— state, society, citizens, majorities, minorities— though al- Turabi came to argue that such categories need to be filled with Islamic content if politics is to serve moral ends rather than material progress alone.’ 167
21
Q
5 - hagiography
A
- Literary works such as the genre of hagiography are important in Sudan for opening up spaces for political critique e.g. the hagiography of al-Burai which explores the pilgrimages to him etc 168
- Interesting example given in hagiography following the meeting between al-Burai and al-Turabi: al-Turabi is unable to complete his political duties unless he completes his basic duties as a Muslim such as the ritual prayer. He becomes unable to complete the ritual prayer because every time he goes to pray he involuntary urinates on himself and is therefore unclean (and the prayer cannot be completed unless one is ritually pure). AT has to ask AB for forgiveness for insulting him so that he can complete the prayer and carry out his political duties (AB forgives him and he is cured quickly)
22
Q
5 - transformation of al-bura’i by al-turabi
A
- ‘in this tale, al- Turabi turned a political- economic request made by al- Buraʿi into a matter of ritual concern by questioning whether al- Bura‘i had attained the requisite state of religiosity to make his political criticism viable.’ 171
- Suggests that we shouldn’t just look at the government to understand ??? bc AB ‘represents a mode of Islamic politics that refuses to be confined by the framework of the nation-state and the questions that emerge out of the political traditions that underlie it’ 172
23
Q
5 - how we should understand relationship between politics and religion
A
- To understand relationship between politics and religion in Sudan should use the hermeneutical approach proposed by Chakrabarty in the social sciences 174
- We do not necessarily have incorrect knowledge, but it is certainly ‘incomplete’ 177
- Chakrabarty raised the question of how we can understand Islamic politics without making it about us in the West 179
24
Q
5 - Salafi movement
A
- Salafi movement – Ansar al-Sunna’s model (EXPLICITELY RELATES TO DA’WA MOVEMENT IN POLITICS OF PIETY) 181/2
- Salafi movement (opposed to Sufi movement) poses biggest threat to the state 181/2
- ‘their politics spoke in a different language altogether, one that emerged directly out of their piety and that refused to be normalized by the mechanisms of a state that used religion as a means of shaping citizens’ 183
- Piety is ‘the object of political contestation itself, under the belief that establishing God’s sovereignty on earth depends on humans embracing His commands correctly’ 183
- Ansar al-Sunna’s Salafi lessons tend not to focus on the state but on ‘such things as personal comportment and ritual practice’ 184
- In the Salafi movement, political work must be in line with the works of the Prophet Muhammad in Mecca 184 (as in da’wa movement in Egypt?)
25
5 - Example of why ethnography needs to look at the public sphere and not just the government officials or policies
• two conferences held in Khartoum on 4th of July 2007; government conference held during day, lavish details, celebrity audience, held in 5* hotel, speech by Umma al-Bashir (president) proposed that religion was simply ‘epiphenomenal’ to the conflict in Sudan as to ‘downplay’ the issue of how Muslims and non-Muslims could live side by side in Sudan (SUGGESTS BC RELIGION IS INTEGRAL TO STATE OR POLITICS MEE) 189/190
26
5 - salafi conference
* Salafi conference held at night (symbolic of what is present in media/western perception and what is not?) in derelict location outside, attended by Muslim Sudanese public, Salafi Shaykhs suggested that in order for Muslims and non-Muslims to live together in Sudan should look for a ‘notion of religious tolerance…derived from the life of the Prophet’ (not the model proposed by the government which they argue was never made ‘explicit’ in AB’s speech) 190 – sought a positive relationship between Muslim public and minority groups 190
* Requires a rethinking of categories in West and in current Sudanese government (according to Salafi’s)
* Me: point here is not that the Salafi opposition to the government suggests that religion and politics are different but rather that there is contestation in Sudan about how the government should deploy this necessary relationship between politics and piety – it is not a matter of the government wishing to abolish this
* Make general link to Said and Chakrabarty
27
summary of focus
- useful for the follow themes: politics, secularisation (sec. thesis is not applicable to Sudan), mass media
- does the treatment of Sudan come from religion or elsewhere?
- violence in Sudan = not accepted. Focus on criticism of authoritarian aspects of Sudan’s Islamic State.
- society’s response is to try and do better
- freedom of discussion – limited. We assume from a Western perspective that this must mean that it is totalitarian
- Look at impact of population growth and urbanisation
28
history pre-britain
o Many parts were Muslim sultanates
o Egypt conquest under Mohammed Ali – Khartoum established in 1830 as the new capital – up to the Upper Nile and equatorial provinces by 1870
o Run along the lines of the ‘modernising’ Ottoman empire at that time
o Egypt sought to control Sudan’s religion, and subordinate the Muslim elites
o Violent resistance from conservative Islam – led to the defeat of the British in 1885 – but joint British- Egyptian rule from 1899-1955
29
history - independence
o Sudanese ‘Mahdists’ remained influential and instrumental in Sudan’s nationalistic and independence aims
o Independence came with significant tensions between conservative Arab Islam and secular pluralistic approach to nationhood in the Christian and traditional religions of the South, leading to the partition of Sudan in 2011
o Secular groups seeking a separation of state and religion have failed to control Sudan – succession of military governments
30
our assumptions re. book and general thesis
o Sudan has treated many brutally – but as students of religion we need strong to question whether this can be attributed to religion, and in particular to Islam – an assumption that many would automatically make, particularly when ‘Islamic State’ is mentioned
- Media reports of Sudan are of extreme violence, harsh Sharia punishments, mistreatment of women, and many other atrocities
- Salomon is critical of authoritarian and despotic aspects of Sudan’s Islamic state – but there is much more to it than this
- Salomon’s interest is in how the peculiar version of Islamic State in Sudan actually allows many, thought of as disenfranchised, to participate in the activities of the State
- Sudan lacks a central authority like Egypt’s al-Azhar, giving leadership to Islamic thought
- The study shows that Islamic politics in Sudan are not a response to secularism or Western ideals, but the product of a long ‘conversation in Islamic thought’ over 20 or more years
31
our western assumptions re. democracy
- We tend to assume that the State is somehow set against and opposed to the public sphere
o In Sudan we need to see them as intimately connected with political and social everyday life
o Salomon seeks to challenge the notion that the public sphere is a place to critique the State, and critical voices are not understood to be part of the state
o The reflection is that our notions of public sphere draw on western notions of democracy
¥ Assume that the public sphere must be unconstrainted
¥ Freed discussion must not be restricted in any way
¥ Any such restriction must be totalitarian
¥ Hence the public sphere must be outside the State
¥ But it is more complicated than this – even in the west!!!! (where is the boundary, and how does it function here in the UK??)
o Sudan has been brutal and repressive – but Sudanese people are seeking to move on and build a better society for themselves – which has Islam at its heart
32
important factors
o Harsh experiences led to urbanisation – Khartoum has grown massively
o Urbanisation brought religious change
¥ Sufi organisations had been agents of religious change resisting centralised approaches
¥ In the new Khartoum individuals could have enormous influence
o Massive urbanisation could undermine the development of an Islamic state
¥ Pressure for wider representation diminishing the influence of the capital
¥ Especially in non-Muslims
¥ Arab identity was diminishing – Khartoum was beginning to be
¥ understood as a symbol of unity, not an Arab homeland
¥ Arab and African culture were mingling
¥ City life could undermine Islamic values, with its distraction from deep contemplation
33
resistance of islamic values
- The regime, however, resisted the brutal imposition of Islamic values (which had been the historical trend)
o Law and education had been the instruments of promoting Islamic values
o In the new Khartoum artistic approaches would be more important – including government sponsored poetry!
34
radi al-kawthar
- Radio al-Kawthar (the name of a river in paradise, and literally meaning ‘abundance’) started in 2005
o Radio had already become a very important means of communication – generally pop radio themes, with contemporary songs, and casual conversation – the things that traditional leaders would fear might distract
o al-Kawthar promoted Sufi madīḥ praise poetry • Seeking to promote love for the Prophet (a genre transformed for the radio)
o Radio became an inspiration to piety and Islamic values rather than a threat
35
al-kawthar
- sought ‘the glorification of the Prophet’
- through madīḥ songs
- Very successful, especially among urban youth – funding was increased
o Content of poems etc. maintained
o Genre had to modulate to fit the demands of the younger generations
o Urban youth = more difficutl to persuade
o Used slogans etc. for marketing
o Allowed them to fashion widespread Islamic values
- The goal was a national goal (at least in the North) but the means was quite an innovation in the political arena
36
aim for al-kawthar
- it sought to make ‘Sudan the Country that Prays upon the Prophet the Most’ – a slogan that appeared on billboards all over the capital
- ‘the sonic density of urban space, with the constant drone of traffic and crowds, was embraced not as a void into which piety might disappear, but rather as a potential workshop in which a new urban Muslim could be produced.’
- Teaching did not achieve the transformation that this no-discursive means did
37
approach of al-kawthar
- The approach
o Allowed the regime to fashion an Islamic state
o Became a means through which the public place for Islam could be debated
o Allowed the expression of Islamic piety when the national agenda was in a secular direction
38
ʿAbd al-Rahim Hajj Ahmad - interview with key producer of cassettes in Sufi order
o He understood the key elements of the traditional approach, and the challenge of engaging people who are in their cars or in a bus, or a café. Traditionally participants sought to be completed satisfied through their listening to the madīḥ, and the encounter with the Shaykh (Sufi teacher)
o Although these elements are important in the tradition, they are unattainable in the context in which they sought to use them
o Physical engagement was especially important in the tradition, and a ‘distracted body’ was an additional impediment to engaging
o Styles of musical accompaniment were also crucial – without them ‘the love of the Prophet would also disappear’, and the modern approach sought to use popular music styles
39
al ghazali on cal to prayer
o When you hear the call to prayer given by the Muezzin, let yourself feel the terror of the summons on Resurrection Day. . . . So review your heart now: if you find it full of joy and happiness, eager to respond with alacrity, you can expect the Summons to bring you good news and salvation on the Day of Judgment. (al-Ghazali 1983: 44)
