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    The History of the Khalifas (The History of the Muslims I)

    TRANSCRIPT OF THE INTRODUCTION

    !"#$%&'$%()*+$%(),#

    -.&/$%&'0&/1,23456*2-0&/7$%'-.68'-1

    -9$%&:';9"?@96?,AB5A+9$%?69CDAllah is not shy of the truth (S!rat al-Ahzab 50:52)

    $EAF:59894GAHI;JDK9+L09M9(9N?$%?692O-9$%?*9P?Q;PR;S;#:$%T:*9(9N?There are ten starting points for every science:

    its definition, its subject and then its fruit

    -9K9U?&;';-93A"?89VW-9$%?P9$QAX?-9$

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    The decision of the ruler puts an end to disagreement.

    Proceeding to the definition of our topic necessarily means that we define the several terms we use, which inturn requires a proper investigation of their meanings. Indeed, there would be no harm in trying to definewhat we mean by the term definition itself, or at least to explore what that process is.

    From the verb definire set bounds to.

    And thus it has almost exactly the same meaning as the Arabic term hadd. Almost any subject is potentiallyboundless, and every thing can link to an infinity of other matters, so that in order to proceed it is vital toset limits to our subject matter.

    Thus, in our course, we will not consider the history of kings and sultans who did not claim to be khal"fassuch as Salah ad-Din al-Ayyubi nor people such as Y!suf ibn Tashfin the leader of the Murabitunmovement, nor those who claimed to be khal"fas but whose claims are rejected for various reasons, such asthe Fatimids whose heretical shiism precludes their being accepted as legitimate.

    Origin: late Middle English (also as a verb), via Latin from Greek historia finding out, inquiry, narrative,

    history, from hist$rlearned, wise man.

    In order to further clarify the meaning of history, it is useful to examine its functions. Besides functioningas inquiry about the historical past and present, history also functions as narrative. In relation to thesubject, the history of the khal"fas, the following functions are important to underline:

    Deals with the historical question of what happened. This is the basic function of history astransmission of reports either orally or literally, within various social spheres such as science, politics,literature and other cultural transactions. The transmission of reports provides the content for thefollowing functions of history.

    Deals with the historical question of when it happened. This is fundamentally the task of

    chronologically arranging and thereby knowing what happened when and where and who wasinvolved, which characterises the scientific approach to historiography. We can categorise under thisheading all kinds of factual information, which, like the dating of events, are vital before one can evenbegin to investigate the meaning of events.

    Deals with the historical question of how and to whom it happened. Once the facts are established, thena narrative becomes established that explains events and produces identity. Since all human activity isfundamentally historical, the narratives provides a self-defining memory that shapes the identities ofindividuals, groups, communities, societies and epochs. Depending on needs, usages and users, thefunction of the narratives can be either explanatory, legitimising or mobilising.

    Deals with the historical question of why events happened. Relates to the root meaning of the wordhistory as inquiry and knowledge. One aspect of it is that in order to make sense of the plethora ofhistorical data we often need to recognise the importance of instances, by which we mean whatGoethe referred to when he said, one instance is often worth a thousand. We are not surprised eitherthat this is the Quranic method. The Qur#n contains three divisions: taw%!d, a%k#m and qa&a&, orstories. These instances functions as a source of knowledge not only about the instances themselves,but about similar phenomena wherever and whenever they might occur.

    -"i&,^V">YPF!*\l/K40Jm$hH>d&n5+I4Fo8&'5+$%*ef[YVKB$

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    The word derives from khalafa which means to come after, or succeed and also to stand in place of orsubstitute. Khal!f is either the intensive of kh#lif one who comes after, who succeeds thus khal!fmeaning succeeding or coming after, or it means the same as makhl'f one after whom another onecomes, one who is succeeded. The khal"fa is also known as the Im#m and the Am"r al-Mumin"n.

    The Khal"fas are therefore defined as successors of the previous khal"fa and are themselves succeededby a subsequent one. Since Adam and D#w!d are those prophets who have been named as khal"fas ofAllah, and since such an expression is not properly used of anyone other than a prophet, then the

    khal"fas succeed the Messenger of Allah @.

    Throughout the course, the broadest possible definition will be applied and all khal"fas succeeding anotherwill be examined, rather than excluding some due to various deficiencies in relation to the Shar"a.

    o4r$%&'j\4%/u-9$EAt?o94r9Z9!Ov9%A&?*9e9wf[AY9VA$EA3D/x940JWKA/y

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    Juzayy wrote before the epoch of the Mongol slaughter and the appearance of the Osmanl.

    It is wrongly thought that kingship is forbidden. The Messenger of Allah @ was offered the choicebetween being a prophet who was a king or a prophet who was a slave, and chose the latter. Allahwould not have offered him something that is %ar#m. Ibn Khaldun shows that where kingship fails toembody the d!n and to uphold justice it becomes ordinary tyrannical kingship, but that where akhal"fa uses his royal authority to bring about the d!n, and to establish justice among his subjects,then he is a khal"fa.

    The science of governance and power politics. Also rule or governance as contrasted with Divineshar!a. A decision based on public interest. The Osmanlis knew it as ZA094>9V literally shepherding.

    The group feeling of a people that can be a dynamic force in history.

    The Messenger of Allah @ said, He is not one of us who calls for a&abiyya, he is not one of us whofights for a&abiyya and he is not one of us who diesfor a&abiyya.1

    A&abiyya is defined by the Messenger of Allah @, in a hadith narrated by Al-Bayhaq" in As-Sunan

    from W#thilah, as, that you aid your people in wrongdoing. Where it denotes the natural force ofkinship that binds a polity together, it is a key term in the work of Ibn Khald!n. Many peoplemisunderstand his position. Rather than calling to the forbidden a&abiyya in which people supporttheir race or tribe or nation in wrongdoing, Ibn Khald!n identifies how the natural forces of kinshipoperate, and moreover, how they work along with the dynamics of the d!n in creating Muslimpolities, which he illustrates copiously with examples from history.

    In order to examine the functions of the khal"fa, we have to delineate in what roles the Messenger ofAllah @ could be inherited and succeeded. He @ was:

    The absolutely obedient slave and worshipper of his Lord.

    i.e. who received revelation. There are no more prophets after him @, but the Qur#n itself isenduring revelation. So the Muslim still receives revelation if Allah grants that to him and he isopen to it.

    Who conveyed (tabl!gh) the message. There are no more messengers, but it is a duty on the Muslimsto convey the message to mankind, and this duty falls particularly on the shoulders of the lite ofthe Muslims among whom are the khal"fas.

    a. i.e. the leader of the Muslims who led them

    b. and led them in&al#h

    a. who took their zak#t andb. who purified them

    %9s92?59+:y%&:';09&9/y%?*;?5AlA,+9$EAt?!9\99KA,A#?Z91;PI,#"$hH>`\$haI,47$%s&P!4*4Fo4%'$!+084.-o,J:>({#5+G3$%Y^(-$%|3Po4%'$!+x(>-5s4jJ.-o4r$%"2H:>4hi|aI4N$h5P$%#yuzakkihim i.e. make them pure-hearted by means of"m#n, as Ibn Abb#s said. Some said, Purifythem of the filth of kufr and wrong actions as Ibn Jurayj and Muq#til said. As-Suddi said, He takesthe zakat of their wealth. (Al-Qur%ub")

    Or, as it is stated more explicitly:

    i;|?5A+?$h95?P9w%AA#?.929o9Vzj;9D(;{;#?-9j;9ID,A#!A94-9.9JD09&9,?A#?

    1 Ab! D#w!d, kit#b al-adab, b#b fil-a&abiyyah, No. 5121.

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    Take zakat from their wealth to cleanse and and pray for them. Your prayers bring relief to them.Allah is All-Hearing, All-Knowing. (S!rat at-Tawbah 9:103)

    The word tazkiya, in the sense of purification, is the alternative word for tasawwuf with some of theHanbalis.

    i.e. the judge between people in their worldly affairs and the one responsible for the %ud'd.

    K9)?Y;#!9,?l9;#!A*94}$h939r9y%&:';So judge between them by what Allah has sent down. (S!rat al-M#idah 5:48)

    who, in his capacity of commanding the good and forbidding the wrong, checked the weights andmeasures and the practices of the traders in the market.

    who responded to their queries about matters of the d!n:

    >9"?4h9%;P39v909+...They ask you about(Many ayats in a number of surahs, starting with S!rat al-Baqarah 2:189)

    a. who commanded and whom we are ordered to obey

    o;J?$h9A,\;P$y%&:'9-9y%(:1;Pr9Say: Obey Allah and the Messenger(S!rah 'l Imr#n 3:32)

    b. commanded the right and forbade the wrong

    y%:|A>+9>9@:8A\;PF9y%(:1;Pr9y%l:8A/:y

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    the civil strife with Mu#wiya.

    The beginning of the codification of Arabic grammar begun by Abil-Aswad ad-Duali at hiscommand and under his supervision.

    His khal"fa was his son al-&asan who was khal"fa for six months and who negotiated the cession of theoffice to Mu#wiya ibn Ab"Sufy#n. Al-&asan then retired to Madina. It is attributed to him that he thentook up the task oftarbiya. The Messenger of Allah @ said about him:

    -o2I4FZ1Pr$%&'@o4ru$EAF:$!?lAB{9|9$19,D2W-9%9\9J:$%&:'9$h9F?>;~?&A9!A'A!9,?+9KA9@9,?+A09A,*9@9,?+A5A+?$%?*;"?&A*A,+9.)#m$hi(x'$%8d4ZHI@4$%~&!4oPr$%l8B.&/$%&'0&,'-1%&6"+!+0&B...)3/243(.(3-0+$h!B!Y(N(.

    This son of mine is a noble chief, and it is likely that Allah will reconcile two great parties of theMuslims by means of him.

    Al-&asan pledged allegiance to him in Rabi al-Awwal in 41AH, which was known as the Year of theJamaah, leading to twenty years of undivided unity. Ibn Khaldun and others include Muawiya amongal-Khulaf# ar-R#shid'n, whereas others erroneously think of him as the start of the rule of BaniUmayya even though they had had their first khal"fa in Sayyiduna Uthm#n.

    During their time the jihad continued and there was great expansion of the dawla in both the East and theWest. The number of people who were Muslims during this time were only a couple of percent of the totalpopulation.

    The epoch was greatly tested with many insurrections particularly by groups of Khawarij and proto-Shia.

    The second fitna began during the khil#fa of Yaz"d ibn Mu#wiya, and comprises the killing of al-&usaynin Kerbala, the atrocities of al-&arra in Madina, the siege of Makka, and ended with the death ofAbdull#h ibn az-Zubayr who had proclaimed himself khal"fa in Makka in opposition to the Umayyads.Al-&ajj#j defeated and killed Abdull#h during the khil#fa of Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan.

    Instituted the first mintings of Dinars and Dirhams according to the standard of Umar ibn al-Khattab.

    Made Arabic the official language of government.Under him, al-&ajj#j.

    The last of Bani Umayya. He was killed in Rabi of 132AH. The Umayyads lasted for 90 years, 11 monthsand 17 days.

    The Opening of al-Andalus to Islam in 92AH at the hands of *#riq ibn Ziy#d the mawl# of M!s# ibnNu+ayr the governor of Ifriqiyya.

    During their time the miracle of the spread of Islam itself among the population occurred, all the seeds forwhich had been planted previously.

    The loss of Andalus, North Africa and Egypt, so that never again was the khil#fa united.

    Abd ar-Ra(m#n ibn Mu#wiya ibn Hish#m establishes the amirate of Bani Umayya in Andalus in 138AH.

    The mi%nah (inquisition) during which the ascendant Mutazilah used the force of the dawla to haveulam#andfuqah#interrogated as to their belief in the tenets of the Mutazilah creed. The mi%nah wasended by al-Mutawakkil.

    It was during this period that the fuqah#consolidated the madhhabs of fiqh, and the ulam#of kalamformed the intellectual schools ofaq!dah.

    Later Abbasid rule saw the decline of their power and the reduction of the khal!fa himself to the figure of akind of pope, completely passive and ceremonial, a prisoner in the hands of the Turkish troops, without

    any substantive power. It also saw the abandonment of jihad.

    Abd ar-Ra(m#n ibn Mu(ammad ibn Abdull#h assumes the title of Am"r al-Mumin"n and Khal"fa inAndalus in 316AH/929CE and rules for fifty years. The dynasty lasts a century.

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    Al-Muta+im was the last of them. He was killed in Baghdad in 656. The number of their khal"fas werethirty-seven, and they reigned for 524 years.

    The Mongols swept away the remnants of Abbasid power, arguably leaving a clean new slate for theOsmanl.

    The Osmanl revived the waging of jihad. What is less well known is that they undertook the tarbiya that is

    the very core of the prophetic message, through the various institutions offutuwwa.

    Osman al-Ghazi became the ruler in 687AH under the Seljuqs and it is from his reign that we date theOsmanl and it is after him they are named.

    The third Osmanl Khn Murd (726AH/1362CE-791AH/1389CE) Hudvendigr, refers to his capitalEdirne (Adrianopolis) as drul khilfat. Prof. Maksudoglu considers this the correct date for thebeginning of the Osmanl khil#fa and not 1517CE.

    Mehmed II (1432/1481): Opened Constantinople to Islam in 805/1453.

    Sulaiman al-Kanuni (6 November 1494CE 5/6/7 September 1566CE): promulgated his Kanun lawalongside shar"a. He took jihad right up to the gates of Vienna in 1529 CE.

    Ma(m!d II (20 July 1789CE 1255AH/1839CE), the Reformer, laboured to modernise the army and the

    bureaucracy and all of Osmanl society. The Tanzimat (1839-1876CE) was the continuation of thereforms which resulted in the First Constitution.

    The first ever codification ofshar!a law 1869-76. It was made law in 1877.

    We could say that in the colonial era and amid the collapse of the khil #fa and other power centres, thedominant culture ate the umma and is now suffering indigestion. We can also say that in recentcenturies, the Muslims ate modernity and are now suffering indigestion.

    The great issue is the nature of technology, which is not necessarily the same thing as machines, and its

    impact on our age.

    The most significant of all technology is the technologisation of money and commerce, which alsodrives the speed and impact of all other technology.

    Another aspect relating to technology that appeared around the fall of the khil#fa was thetechnologisation of governance. The greatest impact upon the Muslims after the covert one of financeand banking has been in the infatuation with foreign models of the national state, initially autocraticand authoritarian ones. It later evolved into an engagement with the model of representativedemocracy. Contrary to the critique that says that colonial powers imposed modern finance andautocracy on the Muslims, it rather represented the Muslims own aspirations and their firstengagement with modernity.

    Ones knowledge of history becomes a part of ones narrative as an individual and as a society and thatcontributes to the formation of identity. There are two primal types of narrative: open and closed.

    The closed narrative works by excluding material that does not fit. It initially seems to be an act ofdefinition, i.e. placing bounds on the subject, but the difference is that the bounds are arbitrary or dueto a hidden prejudice or passion, a hawa. This restriction can bring a certain power but in the end it isself-defeating since it excludes matters that really ought to be considered.

    A closed narrative is one which fails to take into account the point of view of others. In extremis it isthe narrative of the psychopath.

    An example of a closed narrative is the the dominant scientific narrative that, despite claims of beingopen, in fact is a closed narrative that dismisses a great deal without proper open examination andthat starts from premises that are not actually scientific. Nevertheless, its apparent openness, even ifonly a claim, is very attractive and has given it genuine power, particularly because it is wed to actual

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    political and military power and the very considerable wealth of modern finance. The root of thispsychopathic condition has its clearest manifestation today in the practice of usury. It is the act oftaking increase from ones brother in his hour of need thus transforming him into the other, and inProf. Benjamin Nelsons inimitable phrase transforms a society of tribal brotherhood into one ofuniversal otherhood.

    Another example of an apparently closed narrative is to be found in many parts of the Muslim world. Itis clearly a failed narrative. It is determined either to emulate the narrative of the psychopathic

    dominant order because what is important is to be dominant and everything else is subsumed underthat imperative or to define itself in opposition to that order. Thus in the first instance, thecontemporary Muslim world has no other wish than to absorb what it can from its psychopathicopponent, even if those are not the values of Islam, and thus come to dominate him. It is this societythat the Muslim world today wishes to emulate, to swap one closed dysfunctional and defeatednarrative for another victorious but psychopathic narrative. In the second instance, rejectionistssimply define themselves as whatever is opposite to the dominant order.

    This is actually a closed narrative based on a ressentiment, a psychological condition defined as asense of hostility directed at that which one identifies as the cause of one's frustration, that is, anassignment of blame for one's frustration. The sense of weakness or inferiority and perhaps jealousy inthe face of the "cause" generates a rejecting/justifying value system, or morality, which attacks ordenies the perceived source of one's frustration. The ego creates an enemy in order to insulate itself

    from culpability.

    The open narrative is riskier since it has to allow for material that appears not to fit and for argumentsthat seem to contradict but in the end it is more stable because it deals with everything before it.

    The very nature of Islam is of an open narrative. The Noble Book speaks of all the prophets andmessengers, whether explicitly or implicitly, those we know and those we dont insisting on theuniversality of the message, and it tells universal stories of man throughout time, of every culture. Thisis different from the modernists who say that we are friends of the People of the Book. It is differentfrom saying that we think their d!n is acceptable. But it is permitted to them to live under ourgovernance when we govern and it is permitted to us to live under their governance where they governunder certain conditions.

    Intrinsically our narrative is an open one.Our aq!dah was not established by a church but by the open discussion and indeed controversy of thepeople of knowledge. Similarly, our fiqh was not established by diktat but by the very fundamentaldifferences of the Companions themselves and the later generations, their differing understandings ofthe Sunnah and subsequent ijtihads. The four madhhabs enshrine those differences that have stood thetest of time. Indeed, the Qur#n itself contains an open argument with disbelievers, the People of theBook and others, and calls on them to bring a trenchant criticism of the revelation and to provide prooffor their position. The Islamic narrative is intrinsically an open one and only suffers if it is closed.

    History and the narrative to which it gives rise brings about clarity in the identity and a historicalorientation which is a fundamental necessity of psychological health.

    The fruit of its study is the understanding of the khal"fas and thus of what it is to be a khal"fa.

    Since this knowledge is intimately connected to the very nature of the second half of the shahada, it has highmerit.

    Khil#fa is, according to the Ashari school but not the Maturidi, comprised under aq!da. Others categorise itunder fiqh.

    Although there are many illustrious names who have written on the history of the khal"fas, there is only onewhom we could look on as the founder of this discipline that we are talking about: Ibn Khaldun. He alone

    looked back over history, during the very first interregnum of khal"fal power, and, looking with the eye of theshar!a and the eye of accurate observation and understanding of power, delineated an understanding thatlacked fantastic elements and yet was true to the revelation.

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    History of the Khal"fas (tarikh al-khulafa orsiyar al-khulafa).

    The Tarikh of at-Tabari. Secondary sources include as-Suyutis Tarikh al-khulafa, an eclectic assembly of reports,and Ibn Katheers al-Bidaya wan-Nihaya.

    Its sources are the Muqaddima of Ibn Khaldun and his Kitab al-Ibar, and other vital works such as The DefenceAgainst Disaster of Qadi Ab! Bakr ibn al-Arabi, works which seek to understand what happened, how ithappened and why it happened. For Osmanl history, there is the work of Halil Inalik and Prof. MehmetMaksudoglu.

    Knowledge of the history of the khal"fas is far" kif#ya a communal obligation because that without which acommunal obligation cannot be discharged becomes itself a communal obligation. Since the khil#fa is acommunal obligation, then this knowledge becomes obligatory for the restoration of it in two ways: itcomprises knowledge of the strengths of the khal"fas and also the weaknesses that lead and led to defeat.

    The transmission of reports establishing what actually took place.

    The chronological arrangement of what happened thereby understanding the context and the relationbetween events.

    The biographical understanding of the people involved in the events.

    The construction of meaningful and coherent narratives.

    The critical examination of the reasons and consequences of the dynamics of historical change in a waythat will enable one to understand other events and their circumstances.

    -$%8\]!4%8\]$I@^/-5+GZ_$%`*,X)4a$%M(K4and some people content themselves with a part of it

    but whoever knows them all gains pre-eminence.

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    ABOUT THE COURSE

    Covers the political and biographical history of the khalifas from al-Khulaf# ar-R#shid'n to the sultans ofthe Osmanli caliphate in order to to provide an understanding of political changes throughout the history of thecaliphates, with particular reference to the importance of the leading figures. Although focusing on bio-politicalhistory, the course also covers the political, social, military, economic, ideological and sectarian changes duringthe different caliphates. The aim is to analyse the changes and historical events leading up to the present day

    situation and relating the history of the caliphs to the interregnum that faces the contemporary umma. Thecourse will also present an overview of the history writing of Islam in relation to the different caliphs andcaliphates, which furthermore provides the necessary perspectives and theories needed for understandinghistorical events.

    The students will have tutorials with the teachers and an exam is required to completethe course as a part of the degrees. The student essays will be the main exam of the course and the essays ofparticular distinction will also be published in the online Faculty Library. However, all courses and classes areopen for participation with or without completing the written essay.

    The course is available as a part of the degree in History of the Muslims.

    Abdalhaqq Bewley, Aisha Bewley, Abdassamad Clarke, Uthman Ibrahim Morrison, Mufti Abu Layth,

    Asadullah Yate.

    READING LIST FOR THE COURSE

    REQUIRED READING:

    Bewley, Aisha 2002. Muawiya: The Restorer of Muslim Faith. Dar al-Taqwa, London.

    Ibn al-Arabi, Abu Bakr 1995. Defence Against Disaster. Trans. Aisha Bewley. Madinah Press, Granada.

    Inalcik, Hilal 1973. History of the Ottoman Empire: Classical Age / 1300-1600. Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London.

    Maksudoglu, Mehmet 2011. Osmanl History and Institutions. Ensar Kitab, Istanbul.www.ensarkitap.com/prddet.php?pid=731485

    as-Sufi, Shaykh Abdalqadir 1996. The Return of the Khalifate. Madinah Press, Granada.

    as-Suyuti, Jalaluddin 1995. History of the Khalifas Who Took the Right Way. Trans. Abdassamad Clarke. Ta-HaPublishers, London.

    RECOMMENDED READING:

    Ibn Khaldun.Tarikh[Kitab al-Ibar]. Ed. Nasr al-Hurini. Cairo, 1868.

    as-Suyuti, Jalaluddin 1881.History of the caliphs. archive.org/details/cu31924023164654

    as-Sufi, Shaykh Abdalqadir 2006. Sultaniyya. Madinah Press, Cape Town.as-Sufi, Shaykh Abdalqadir, The Fatwa on Sovereignty.

    Ibn Sad, The Men of Madina Vol.I & II, Ta-Ha Publishers Ltd., London. Translated by Aisha Bewley.[Particularly valuable for her historical introductions.]

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    SCHEDULE OF CLASSES

    Class 1 (1/9) - Introduction - Abdassamad Clarke

    Class 2 (8/9) - Khulafa Rashidun I - Abdassamad Clarke

    Class 3 (15/9) - Khulafa Rashidun II - Abdassamad Clarke

    Ancillary Class: The History and Historiography of Banu Umayya Abdalhakim Andersson

    Class 4 (22/9) - Banu Umayya I - Aisha Bewley

    Class 5 (29/9) - Banu Umayya II - Aisha Bewley

    Class 6 (6/10) - Banu Abbas I - Abdassamad Clarke

    Class 7 (13/10) - Banu Abbas II - Aisha Bewley

    Class 8 (20/10) - The Caliphate of al-Andalus - Mufti Abu Layth

    No classes (27/10) Eid al-Adha

    Class 9 (3/11) - The Caliphate of al-Andalus - Mufti Abu Layth

    Class 10 (10/11) - The Osmanli Caliphate - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 11 (17/11) - The Osmanli Caliphate - Asadullah Yate

    Class 12 (24/11) - Conclusion - Shaykh Abdalhaqq Bewley (10th Muharram 1434)

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    The Politics of Power (Politics of Power I)

    TRANSCRIPT

    FORMAL INTRODUCTION TO THE POLITICS OF POWER

    The formal introduction to the subject is a matter of adab which is both useful and commendable. Its elements are10 as follows:

    1. DefinitionAn examination of the roots of power and governance in modern society with reference to the legacy of theFrench Revolution and the insights of Ibn Khaldun regarding the cyclical nature of societal development.

    2. SubjectThe impact and historical legacy of the French Revolution as they relate to the forms of authority and power inthe modern age. Also the post-revolutionary shift in the sphere of power from politics to economics andtechnology.

    3. Its FruitThe recovery of historical memory and knowledge of precedents which are the foundation for awareness andunderstanding of the current political, economic and philosophical climate, avoiding the repetition of errors andmaking well informed predictions.

    4. Its meritIt has a high merit due to its importance as the foundation for strategic behaviour in the present political andeconomic environment.

    5. Its relationship to other sciencesIt is related to the sciences of history, politics, economics, philosophy, jurisprudence and other social sciences.

    6. Its founder

    a) The history of the French Revolution has been studied by numerous scholars within academia since the time ofits occurrence.b) Politics of power is an ancient discipline, ofter derived from the greeks and the works of Aristotle and Platoamong others. Has appeared throughout history under different names and been treated within variousdisciplines.

    7. Its nameThe Politics of Power

    8. Its sources and referencesa) Primary sources include contemporary accounts and records.b) Secondary historical, academic and literary materials.

    c) The Time of the Bedouin (2006) by Ian Dallas gathers the above from an unprecedented perspective incorporatinga unique synthesis of unusual Muslim and non-Muslim references.

    9. The judgement of the Shar!ah on it is:It is a collective obligation - fard kifaya - due to its necessity in our times for the achievement of that which is fardwhich is the establishment of the deen in its entirety.

    10.The topics it coversa) Historical development during and after the French Revolution:

    Political governance. Revolution and terror. Societal power and authority. Economics. Individual and social transactions. Ideological and philosophical changes. Technology.

    b) The contemporary situation concerning power:

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    Revolution in our times. The collapse of politics. The power shift from politics to economics. The impact of technology. Narratives and ideology in the post-revolutionary society. The formation of a new nomos.

    THE POLITICS OF POWER: AN OVERVIEW

    Our legions are brimful, our cause is ripe.

    The enemy increaseth every day;

    We, at the height, are ready to decline.

    There is a tide in the affairs of men

    Which, when taken at the flood, leads on to good fortune:

    Omitted, all the voyage of their life

    Is bound in shallows and in miseries.

    [Julius Caesar]

    The purpose of this lecture is threefold. Firstly, it is my intention to give an ample overview of the 12 week courseentitled The Politics of Power I: The Time of the Bedouin which is scheduled to be taught here in Norwich beginning in

    September and which will also be made accessible online. Therefore, if I succeed in striking the right balance, mypresentation will do enough to whet the appetites of those of you who derive satisfaction from applying theirintellects to matters of a historical, philosophical and political nature. Secondly, I hope to convey just enough ofthe syllabus to provide you with an irresistible and tantalising glimpse of the potential for new ways ofunderstanding the political predicament of the modern human being and the key role to be played by sincere,knowledgeable and active people, free of the dialectical frustrations of left vs right, extreme vs moderate,progressive vs conservative, modern vs mediaeval, salafi vs sufi, political vs religious, etc, etc. My third aim is toensure that those of you who may be new to this material are adequately equipped to participate meaningfully inthis afternoons Symposium.

    It is appropriate that we should begin with the title. It is taken from the seminal book whose full title is The Timeof the Bedouin: on the politics of powerwhich was written in 2006 by the leading contemporary Muslim thinker and

    intellectual Ian Dallas, better known to the Muslim world as Shaykh Dr Abdalqadir as-Sufi, head of theDarqawiyya-Shadhiliyya-Qadiriyya Tariqa (sufic order) and founder of the Murabitun World Movement. You willall instantly have noticed that the title of the September course reverses the order of the principal elements ofthe books title. The reversal of these terms is significant here because it quite literally reflects the order ofpriority which, according to the Dallas thesis which it is the purpose of this lecture to summarise, requires us firstto examine and seek to comprehend how, authority, kinship, conflict, opportunity, political philosophy,individual will, human genius, character, property and wealth have combined historically to give rise to thepresent-day life transaction, which we hear described variously as late capitalism, consumerism, post-modernism, globalism, the age of technology, the information age and the age of the media; but perhaps all of thisis best captured in the term advanced western democracy. It is imperative that we understand where we are andhow we arrived here before attempting to set out on a new departure. The study of these matters belongs to therealm of the politics of power.

    The phenomenon of the Bedouin is also an expression of the politics of power. However, it comes second becauseon the historical cycle brilliantly described in the 14th century by the great Andalusian thinker, diplomat andhigh ranking Maliki Qadi Ibn Khaldun, the re-emergence of the people who embody the politically transformativecharacteristic he defines as Asabiyya, is yet to happen. This is not to say that the advent of the Bedouin has notoccurred before, indeed throughout history it has happened repeatedly. Being himself of Berber origin, he wasmore than aware of what would have been for him the relatively recent history surrounding the dramatic riseand decline of first the Murabitun (1040-1147) to be followed by the Muwahhidun (1121-1269); and no doubt IbnKhalduns own lifelong involvement with the constantly shifting power politics of his own day and his directwitnessing of the Timurid ascendancy, which included a series of diplomatic encounters with Emperor Timurhimself, provided him with motivation and determination enough to apply his considerable intellectual acumenand powers of observation to the matter of societal change. The translators introduction to the Princeton editionof the Muqaddimah comes close to capturing the nature of his particular genius:

    "the Muqaddimah itself clearly shows that Ibn Khaldun had neither the desire nor the equipment to makeoriginal contributions of note to any of the established disciplines. He was endowed with that rarer gift, a deepinsight into the essentials of the accumulated knowledge of his time, and he possessed the ability to express this

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    gift clearly and forcefully. This gift helped to place his new science upon firm foundations." [Translator's intro.p. xli]

    In similar fashion and with no less brilliance, Dr Dallas achieves an extraordinary synthesis between a totallyrevealing analysis of the complex vicissitudes and driving personalities of the French Revolution as the key tounderstanding the birth of modernity (as well as its fate), a penetrating exposition of the 20th centurys leadingpolitico-philosophical exponents of modernitys own lucid apprehension of its predicament, and his reading of

    the Khaldunian thesis as it can only be read by another similarly endowed with that rare gift:

    a deep insight into the essentials of the accumulated knowledge of his time [possessing] the ability toexpress this gift clearly and forcefully. [ibid.]

    What this enables us to realise is that a confident grasp of the historical, philosophical, political and technologicalenframing which has given rise to the present we inhabit is what will provide us going forward, with thecapacity in political terms to distinguish friend from enemy, gain from loss, power from impotence, wealth frompoverty, freedom from entrapment, safety from peril and victory from defeat; and most importantly, it willenable us to recognise (as we will see later) where we stand on the Khaldunian cycle of political renewal anddegeneration, to identify the true moment and to seize the given opportunity.

    Looked at from this perspective, a telling example of the failure to apply the high calibre of analytical

    discrimination I have just described may be found, by and large, in those modern movements whose political aimis the Islamic nation state. Unfortunately, this concept is little short of being an oxymoron. The modern nationstate, of which the so-called Islamic state appears to be nothing more than a superficially islamised counterfeit,has grown out of a determined experiment in rational structuralism requiring the destruction of the naturalorder of legitimate personal rule within a societal context predicated upon the customary dynamics of family,clan and tribe. This has given rise over the last two centuries to the various parliamentary models of governmentby representative democracy that appear to dominate the modern world.

    It was the complete failure of these structuralist systems to ensure freedom from oppression, moral certitude andsocial justice, that generated the conditions for the anomie and nihilism so clearly signalled by the great Russianwriter Fyodor Dostoyevsky who sounded the alarm in novels such as Crime and Punishment, The Devils and TheBrothers Karamazov; and somewhat later, of course, we also have Conrads stark portrayal of the early anarchists inThe Secret Agent. The impulse to nihilism reawakened at the heart of western societies in the nineteenth century inthe form of violent anarchism, is the precursor and template for the terrorist outrages and the extreme tyrannyof the anti-terrorist reactions of todays democratic governments, that have defined the opening to the twenty-first century. I say reawakened because we are witnessing the same dance of death between revolutionary andcounter-revolutionary impulses that animated the otherwise incomprehensible Terrorof the French Revolution.

    The unfolding of the politics of power within the rationale of democratic systems has now led us to the pointwhere the terrorist group and the terrorist state have become interdependent, they mirror one another inmethod and modus operandi, while the liberty of the individual citizen is everywhere circumscribed and subjectto progressive erosion. We need look no further back than this week for the latest example of this convergence ofmodalities, as in the run-up to elections the US government proclaimed another valuable victory over theIslamist terror threat posed by a deadly underwear bomber, who turned out to be a CIA operative. Thedescription carried in the Los Angeles Times (8 May 2012) is evidence, if any more were needed, that false flag

    events can no longer be dismissed as mere conspiracy theory:

    Saudi Arabias intelligence agency, working closely with the CIA, used an informant to pose as a would-besuicide bomber. His job was to convince the Al Qaeda franchise in Yemen to give him a new kind of non-metallicbomb that the militants were designing to easily pass through airport security But the double agent insteadarranged to deliver the explosive device to U.S. and other intelligence authorities waiting in another country,officials said Tuesday. The agent is now safely outside Yemen and is being debriefed.

    It is undeniable that humanity in general is struggling under a widespread regime of social and economicinjustice. The Muslims have a pressing motivation to induce political change derived from the necessity that theShari'ah should be uppermost in the affairs of the world in order that mankind as a whole should have the propermeans to carry out our duty as guardians of the weak and the poor and custodians of the earths naturalresources. However, because our ulama and people of intellectual endeavour (with very few honourable

    exceptions) have so far failed, at least in recent times, to give the sciences relating to the politics of power theattention due to them by that very same Shariah as fard kifaya (a collective obligation), we are in no position tointerpret the lessons of modern world history or to properly observe the modalities of social, political andeconomic change as an important source of obligatory knowledge.

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    As long as this is the case, attempts to impinge upon the dominant system in any significant way will continue tomeet with frustration and failure; indeed, they are likely to strengthen it. Hence, the sad irony, or indeed, thegreat tragedy, is that it is into the very nihilism generated by the historical failings of modernity that Islamicmovements, political leaders and all manner of activists have blundered half-blindly and ill equipped, unawarethat by allowing themselves to be cast as the opponents of democracy, far from being the catalysts for positivechange they imagine themselves to be, their political role in fact, according to the thesis of Carl Schmitt, is that of

    the necessary other, the enemy required by the state to sustain its own unity. In this light, the Islamic nation stateis no more a reflection of authentic political understanding than is Islamic vodka or for that matter, Islamicbanking.

    THE ROOTS OF THE MODERN STATE

    Let us now turn directly to the pages ofThe Time of the Bedouin (henceforth ToB) as we trace the power matrix thathas produced the modern state. It is relevant to mention at this point that in his approach to unlocking theevents of the French Revolution, in order to avoid the hitherto dominant Marxist paradigm, Dr Dallas reliesprincipally on the classical multidisciplinary approach recovered by Franois Furetfounder the Centre de RecherchePolitiques Raymond Aron (CRPRA) whose luminaries include Patrice Gueniffey and Mona Ozouf.

    Central to the thesis put forward in ToB is the concept of the Great Interregnum. This represents the long interimperiod between the destruction of the Ancien Rgime and the time which is now near at hand, given theappearance of its recognised precursors, for the emergence of a new nomos (a new ordering of society) predicatedupon the cyclical movement of history elaborated by Ibn Khaldun:

    The revolution in 1789 had overthrown the sovereignty invested in the absolute monarchy, and then withoutchanging its content set up that same absolutism in the hands of elected representation, but they did not merelyremove the King of the Ancien Rgime, with him went the ancient society of orders and bodies that hadsurrounded the King and were, in fact, the institutions which set limits and constraints on royal absolutism Intheir place the Revolution had set up a society of individuals, juridically equal but at the same time nakedlyexposed to the direct action of the State. [ToB pp. 18-19]

    The other key date opening the Great Interregnum was 1909, when the forces of the uprising of the city ofIstanbul, led by the Rebel, Mustafa Riza, later named Ataturk, in defiance of his own oath of allegiance, stormedthe Palace and dethroned Sultan Abdalhamid Khan II, to the cries of Libert, Fraternit, galit. The Sultanatewas not formally abolished until 1922. [ToB p. 266]

    The common assumption derived from the collusive accounts of apologist historians, is that the Revolution was amovement for political liberation and that the Terror, the genocidal frenzy of revolutionary State bloodletting,was a necessary and justifiable price to be paid for the progress of modernity and its promise of democraticfreedom. However, the contradiction which cannot be easily ignored manifests in the form of the draconianmeasures passed by the Legislative Assembly in the name of public safety and the defence of the Revolution,which of course, must be one and the same:

    Thus it is clear that the path to the Terror was not an anarchic road of increasing panic, disorder and fury butrather a carefully planned and legislated path, which once the political paradox had been accepted as reasonable,

    took the populace and the government into the zone of Terror as practice. [ToB

    p. 57]Bearing in mind my earlier description of the ground proper to the study of the politics of power, we cannot fallinto the error of assuming that these outcomes are simply the deterministic workings of the machinery of astructuralist leviathan. We must also take account of what we might call the essential bio-political catalysts - thehuman beings without whom there is no decision or active will to power:

    The structuralist State which was the machine of Jacobinism, was in its turn the product of Saint-Just andRobespierre. The masses neither wanted nor recognised Jacobinism for what it was, but these two men placed allFrance under its orders, so that with both of them beheaded and the Terror over, the monstrous and inhumanmachine lay waiting for a new driver, Napoleon, this time a genius who made of it the foundations of thatarchetypal State on which all subsequent States were to be based. [ToB pp. 83-4]

    POST-MODERNISM AND PRESENTISM

    As far as this section of our overview goes it remains for us to examine briefly the course of the final transfer ofpolitical power through the ownership, control and creation of wealth within the evolution of the modern state,

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    from the aristocracy and via the bourgeoisie, into the arena of banking and usury finance. For this we must firstreturn to the question of public ignorance as to the past and the collusion of state schooling, academia, the mediaand technology to prepare us mentally and emotionally for the passive reception of convenient, reassuring oroutright misleading narratives and the predictably mistaken assumptions that flow from them, which then forthe vast majority remain unchallenged and unquestioned. Direct light is cast on these matters in observationsregarding the post-modern interplay of what has been called presentism and political correctness made in a 2004article by Dr Dallas writing as Shaykh Dr Abdalqadir as-Sufi where he cites the penetrating thesis of the respected

    revisionist historian J.C.D. Clark. This is certainly worth quoting at length:

    What then is the doctrine that has to be used to persuade people that the move from monarchy to republic wasevolutionary and inevitable, and did not really represent a move from personal rule to inhuman systemsgovernment? What is necessary to make people conform to democratic government when it has already provedthe instrument of genocidal and total war across the whole world? How do we keep people from noticing thatmoney devalues in their pockets and that a decreasing number, now already reduced to hundreds, hold the greaterpart of all the worlds wealth? The philosophy goes under different names, and a host of books have been writtenpropagating it, many by influential in-back members of the U.S. Administration, and many by financiersthemselves. This iceberg of thought heading for the Titanic of liberal society, in that small portion forced toappear above the surface, goes by the name of post-modernism and presentism, and has an operative policing ofthe masses called Political Correctness. As Professor Jonathan Clark says, A de-historicized mental universemust also be an atheistic one [. . .] The self is not born free in the sense of timeless. Personal identity isestablished largely by history, by the persistence within an individual of a set of experiences and learned ways ofreacting. To lose ones memory is not emancipation but a serious mental disorder, for without memory we cannotfunction as ourselves. If a society loses its history it has the same effect on a larger scale: [. . .] that society couldnot have only a disembodied existence. It would have lost all those many things which made it itself.

    Further:

    Professor Clark gives this bleak vision of the social effect of post-modernism: By claiming to emancipate thepresent from the past, presentism promises to abolish the future also, for the future cannot look essentiallydifferent from that which we now have. The world ceases to be a narrative of suffering and achievement, andbecomes a timeless cultural shopping mall. Generations cease to relate to each other, since the termination ofdevelopment makes currently dominant values seem normative. Past generations cease to relate to futuregenerations, since past generations did not shop in the same mall. Future generations will raise no problems ofdifference or continuity, since, it is presumed, they will continue to shop there. [Hukum on Englands Future]

    It has taken a world banking crisis of historical proportions in 2008 and the almost total collapse of theinternational banking system to bring the iniquities and the inequities of the usurious financial system to theimmediate attention of the 99.9% of the population who had hitherto been content to remain dormant,indifferent or blissfully ignorant of the nature of the system and the political realities of the money power(referred to as the Sect by Proudhon). When in 2008 the Dean, Hajj Abdassamad, and I addressed an open letter tothe Archbishops of Canterbury and York in response to their published remarks rather timidly implicating thegreed of the international banking fraternity in the current crisis, it was not merely that we wished to availourselves of an opportunity to publicly reiterate our habitual warnings regarding the banking system, we wereresponding to the fact that, finally, an establishment voice was attempting to speak up and we wished to supplythem the proper means to do so.

    It was suddenly clear for all to see, though understandably still hard for most to believe, that almost all of themoney in circulation is provided not by the State but by the banks which through a combination of fractionalreserve banking and credit manipulation are allowed to create money out of nothing. As the financial crisis hascontinued and the fates of Ireland, Greece, Spain, Portugal and the Euro hang in the balance, it has also becomeclear that the sovereignty of nation states and the autonomy of elected governments are little more thanelaborate fictions designed to conceal the hitherto hidden power of the bankers whose continued operationsdemand countless billions in bailouts and quantitative easing; who threaten governments with credit ratingreductions; who replace elected leaders with technocratic place men whose brief it is to ensure that the interestsof the banks are prioritised ahead of the national population and the terms of austerity measures strictly adheredto so that the servicing of debts owed to unelected and nameless banking oligarchs takes precedence over theprovision of health, education and welfare services to the electorate.

    A detailed phenomenological survey of the ascendancy of the financial oligarchy from the end of the French

    Revolution to the end of the Second World War is far beyond the scope of this limited presentation. However, thefollowing two passages from the Time of the Bedouin provide a sufficient overview of the evolutionary process bywhich the money power positioned itself to acquire ultimate dominion over the assembly politics bequeathed tomodernity by the Jacobin event:

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    Passage 1:The dynamic of wealth systems, active and evolutionary, must be seen in relation to social systems, passive anddevolutionary. The first stage of the affair is the direct result of the French Revolution. The immediate effect ofthis bloody upheaval was the rupture of the old society (Ancien Rgime) and the re-stratification caused byparliamentism (lawyer class). The shattering of the Aristocratic system did not, however, leave a void. The Terrorand the new financial order both removed a system of inherited wealth and emptied the chateaux. The motor ofthe Revolution was still running. Napoleons Empire created, as it were, a new aristocracy The rule had gone

    from the monarch to the Assembly (the politico-legalists) and the money had gone from the Clergy to theSect. [ToB p. 200]

    Passage 2If, as now seems convincing, Ernst Noltes view of one European Civil War stretching from 1914 to 1945, ineffect a Second Thirty Years War, is accepted, then it provides a perfect time-frame within which the Sect couldeffectively take control of the political system that had not only failed but somnambulistically allowed that war totake place. By the end of that century the social landscape was able to reveal that power had passed to a new classopenly in command. The Sect had started in its archetypal Rothchild pattern from 1815 to 1915. From the KoreanWar to the Iraqi and Afghan invasions can be observed and recorded the new burgeoning-in-wealth anddecreasing-in-membership of a ruthless and globe destroying lite before whom the world may well tremble,although it scarcely knows their names. [ibid. p. 205]

    A NEW NOMOS

    it must be confirmed that while dynasties collapse and die, by that same active principle they come intobeing. This is a fundamental element of men in leadership. It is that realistic recognition that the electoralstructuralist system, Revolution, or its synonym democracy, tries to eliminate. It is this illusion of the permanenceof the State that lies at the core of the Great Interregnum, the perpetual Revolution. [ToB p. 256]

    The word nomos is of Greek origin and carries the basic meaning oflaw. However, its use in the sphere of politicalphilosophy, especially as used by the influential legal theorist Carl Schmitt, comprises the idea of a recognisableorder or way which governs the dispensation of justice manifest in society. A new nomos therefore, is the physicalmanifestation of a new societal order. The Dallas thesis maintains that the end of the Great Interregnum has nowarrived but warns that the opportunity it presents can only be grasped by a capacity for comprehension that isindependent of the processes that produced it and the analytical parameters imposed by it. In order to achieve

    this independence of approach and manner of thinking free of the dialectical method imposed upon philosophyin the 20th century, he identifies four modern intellectuals whose outstanding genius in their respective fieldsheld them above the imposition: The theoretical physicist Werner Heisenberg (1901-1976); the philosopherMartin Heidegger (1889-1976); Carl Schmitt (1888-1985); and perhaps most significantly with respect to the wayforward Ernst Jnger (1895-1998) whose visionary identification of the essential existence form, the Gestalt, of themodern individual living under technique, made his genius the thread that unified them all.

    Dr Dallas therefore proposes that the approach to the advent of the new nomos should be led by the combinedindications of the ancient mastery of Ibn Khaldun and the modern mastery of Jnger and synthesises theuntrammelled life force of the Bedouin of Asabiyya with Jngers response to the nihilism of modernity; thesovereign individual marked out by a particular quality of resistance whom he names the Waldgnger. Once more,it is beyond the scope of this paper to offer a detailed account of the stages on the natural cycle of societies from

    peak to decay as described by Ibn Khaldun, nor is it possible to do complete justice to the vision of Jnger withrespect to the particular features of the Waldgngerbut I trust that it will suffice as a foretaste of what is to comein September if I now bring this overview to a close with the following passage from the Time of the Bedouin:

    Asabiyya, normally kinship is here used to mark as distinctive the bond, the life and death unifying bond of abrotherhood without blood ties [the translator] calls it esprit de corps, but it is much more than that, for it has in italso a moral evaluation as in the term Futuwwa, chivalry or nobility of character. Asabiyya unites men to find thepower to act and transform and command. If its motor power is high, its brotherhood is raised higher. If thebinding factor (religio - to bind together) is there, that is Divine religion, it is, that being its highest possibility,assured a triumph. [ToB p.276]

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    ABOUT THE COURSE

    Content: Covers the historical events and legacy of the French Revolution, with particular focus on the troubledpost-French Revolution era that has shaped the modern world - East and West. The course is based on the seminalstudy by the leading Muslim intellectual Ian Dallas, presented in the book The Time of the Bedouin (2006), whichlays the foundation for the aims and perspectives of the course.

    The aim is to present the necessary historical perspectives for understanding the ideological, economical andsocio-political changes resulting from the revolution, in relation to the contemporary state of the world. Thecourse will furthermore provide particular references to the scholars and thinkers that are not only crucial forthe understanding of the past, but also for re-shaping the future, such as Ibn Khaldun and the later Carl Schmitt,Ernst Jnger, Martin Heidegger and Giorgio Agamben, among others.

    Tutorial and examination: The students will have tutorials with the teachers and an exam is required tocomplete the course as a part of the degrees. The student essays will be the main exam of the course and theessays of particular distinction will also be published in the online Faculty Library. However, all courses andclasses are open for participation with or without completing the written essay.

    Degree: The course is available as a part of the degree in Politics of Power.

    Teachers: Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison.

    READING LIST FOR THE COURSE

    RECOMMENDED READING:

    Clark, J.C.D.Our Shadowed Present: Modernism, Postmodernism and History. London: Atlantic Books, 2003

    Conrad, JosephThe Secret Agent. Wordsworth Editions Ltd, 1993

    Dallas, Ian (Shaykh Abdalqadir as-Sufi)The Time of the Bedouin: On the Politics of Power. Cape Town: Budgate Press, 2006.Hukum on England's Future. www.shaykhabdalqadir.com/content/articles/Art015_19052004.html

    Dostoyevsky, FyodorCrime and Punishment(trans. David McDuff) Penguin Classics, 1996.The Devils (trans. David Magarshack) Penguin Classics, 1954.The Brothers Karamazov (trans. David McDuff) Penguin Classics, 2003.

    Furet, FranoisInterpreting the French Revolution. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981

    Gueniffey, PatriceLa Politique de la Terreur. Gallimard, 2003

    Heidegger, MartinThe Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays. New York: Harper & Row, 1977

    Ibn Khaldun, The Muqaddimah.

    Jnger, ErnstEumeswil. (trans. Joachim Neugroschel) Marsilio, 1993

    Ozouf, Mona (edit.)A Critical Dictionary of the French Revolution. (trans. Arthur Goldhammer) Belknap Press, 1989

    Orr A. and Clarke A. (ed.)Banking: The Root Cause of the Injustices of Our Time. Diwan Press Ltd, 2009

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    Schmitt, CarlThe Concept of the Political. (trans. George Schwab) Rutgers University Press, 1927

    Shakespeare, WilliamJulius Caesar. London: Arden Shakespeare, 2006

    SCHEDULE OF CLASSESClass 1 (1/9) - Introduction - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 2 (8/9) - The European context - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 3 (15/9) - The French Revolution I: The history - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 4 (22/9) - The Revolution II: Biographical survey - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 5 (29/9) - The French Revolution III: Template for modernity - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 6 (6/10) - The French Revolution IV: The Legacy - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 7 (13/10) - Democracy and the (post-)national state - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 8 (20/10) -The narrative of revolution - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    No classes (27/10) Eid al-Adha

    Class 9 (3/11) - From the state to the market - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 10 (10/11) -Colour Revolutionaries and the Arab Spring - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 11 (17/11) - The Interim - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison

    Class 12 (24/11) - Conclusion - Uthman Ibrahim-Morrison