The Enlightened of God.
By Pieter Smoor, Amsterdam
During the last 25 years a number of editions have appeared of the
Diwäns of the Fätimid poets which have substantially increased our
knowledge of their work. Before this time a critic such as Muhammad
Kämil Husayn could express the belief (1950) that the Diwän of Zäfir
al-Haddäd, a blacksmith and self-taught poet from Alexandria, was
lost.' But since 1969 we possess this formerly-lost Diwän in a critical
edition by Husayn Na§§är.^ And even before then, in 1957, a critical
edition of Tamim ibn al-Mu'izz's Diwän had already made its appear¬
ance in print.*
Thanks to this modem tradition of critical editions, we now possess
two complete Diwäns of two poets whose lives were spent in Fätimid
Egypt, namely Tamim, a contemporary ofthe Caliphs al-Mu'izz and al-
'Aziz, and roughly 150 years later, ^äfir al-Haddäd, contemporary of al-
Ämir and al-Häfiz.
Other poets now in print, who did not always live in Egypt, are Ibn
Häni' al-Andalusi,* who lived during the beginning of the Fätimid
dynasty, and Ibn Qaläqis* and 'Umära al-Yamani later*.
' Muhammad Kämil Husayn, Fi adab Mi^r al-Fdtimiyya, Cairo 1950,
p. 138: "Wa-'ayna Diwänu . . . wa-Diwänu Zäfir al-Ifaddäd . .
^ Diwän Zäfir al-Haddäd ibn al-Iskandariyya, tähqiq Husayn Nassär, Cairo
1969, Zäfir died 529 H.
' Diwän Tamim ibn al-Mu'izz li-Din Allah al-Fätimi, ed. Muhammad Basan
AL-A'?AMi, Cairo 1957, 2nd printing Beirut 1970. Tamim died 375 H.
* The best though incomplete edition is Tabyin al-ma'äni fi sharh diwän Ibn Häni' al-Andalusi al-Maghribi, ed. Zähid "Al!, Cairo 1352 H. Another edition is
Diwän Ibn Häni' al-Andalusi, Där Sädir, Beirut 1964. Ibn Häni' died ca. 362/
973.
^ Diwän Ibn Qaläqis, ed. KhalIl Muträn, Cairo 1323/1905. There seems to
be an edition Kuwayt which however was not available to me. Ibn Qaläqis died
567/1172.
" For text and translation of 'Umära's prose and poetry see Hartwig
Derenbourg, 'Oumära du Yemen sa vie et son oeuvre, 2 vols in Pablicatians de
Wine, Love and Praise for the Fätimid Imäms 91
Finally, we should mention two poets who were more interested in
nature, wine and love than they were in the singing of praises. Con¬
sequently, the work of al-Sharif al-'Aqili' and Ibn Waki' al-Tinnisi* is
rather less interesting for our purposes.
Mueh ofthe poetry written during the Fäfimid period has disappeared
due to the enmity of their Sunni successors. The orthodox Ayyübids
could not approve of the extreme teachings of the Godly Light which
were the legacy of the Fätimid imäms. This quite apart from the fact
that the Ayyübids were naturally hostile to Fätimid claims of descen¬
dance from the Ahl al-Bayt, claims which they felt were wholly vain and
wholly groundless. In this regard a noteworthy statement is that made
by the well-known al-'Imäd al-Isbahäni. In his Kharidat al-qa^r wa-jari-
dai al-'asr he has the following to say about Zäfir al-Haddäd, whose
poetry he otherwise thought highly of:
"I say that ^äfir had received a clear portion of excellence. His poetry
shows that his adab (literary talent) was abundantly present. His verses
are subtle and pure. How perfect he would be were he not a singer of
the Egyptian's praises, God forgive him for it!"* "The Egyptian" is, of
course, an allusion to the Fätimid Caliph. This anti-Fätimid attitude in
later writers who were Surmis is one ofthe reasons why our information
about Fätimid poetry is so scarce and the anthologies of Fätimid poetry
that have come down to us so slender. Sunni (or Twelver Shi'ite) histo¬
rians such as Yäqüt, Ibn Khallikän and al-Kutubi have very little to tell
us about the Fätimid poets who lived before them for this reason.
At the present time I wish to confine myself to the poetry of praise
written during the Fäfimid period in Egypt, with special attention being
paid to Tamim b. al-Mu'izz. I shall cite certain passages, principally
from the work of this poet, in order to illustrate my points.
Tamim is interesting because he himself was a member ofthe Fäfimid
family. Although he was never made Caliph, as eldest son ofthe Caliph
al-Mu'izz he was certainly well-acquainted with the esoteric teachings
ofthe Fätimids. And, as the Caliph's son, he could go quite far in singing
his own praises, as in the fakhr theme,
I'ecole des langues orientales Vivantes, IVe s6rie — X and XI (partie francaise), Paris 1897, 1904. 'Umärah died 569/1174.
' Al-Sharif al-'Aqih, died ca. 450 H.
» Ibn Waki' al-Tinnisi, died 393 H.
° Al-'Imäd al-Isfahäni al-kätib: Kharidat al-qa^r wa-jaridat al-'a^r qism
shu'arä' Mi^r, eds. A^mad Amim, Shawqi Payi and IpsAN 'Abbas, Cairo
1951), vol. II, p. 3: 'Aqülu Zäfir biha??ihi mina 'l-fadli ?äfir . . . wamä akmalahu lawla annahu min muddäJ}i 'l-Mi^ri wa 'l-Lahu lahu ghäfir ..."
lS-^' '^^^ tSyt L?-^' ...11
(25) "I am the sword that slashes in twain, the cloud of hospitable
welcome."
(Tamim, p. 174)'"
Actually, Tamim's sword probably never saw much service. When, for
example, in 363 the Qarmatis attacked Egypt in order to overthrow the
Fätimids, Tamim took no part in the defense. His younger brother, 'Abd
AUäh, was amir of the Fäfimid army." Nor do we hear anything of
Tamim's military exploits in the Syrian action which came later. Inso¬
far as this sort of things is concemed, Tamim rather closely seems to
resemble that ostentatious braggart, al-Mutanabbi.
On the other hand, Tamim's extreme pride with respect to his Fäfimid
antecedents is more justified:
^"^1 i\ jUii y} w
/Jjlj Jijii]) iXJlj cy}
(28) "I am the son of noble lords who held their noses high, I am the
son of the beaming stars.
(29) I am the son of the Revelation and Wisdom, of the Qur'än (al-
Furqän) and of the (Godly) Admonition. "
(Tamim, p. 174)
Although he himself was never an "Imam-Caliph", he nevertheless
claimed to have inherited their Godly Enlightenment. Indeed, the
Imäms were considered to be symbolizations ofthe verses ofthe Qur'än,
as emanations of the Godhead. And so Tamim, with his pretentious
sword and tme lineage, is able to claim power over life and death. Laco¬
nically, he boasts,
>U ui jJ^ j;l J\ Ü
^ ^Wi li (jojj ü
The words between brackets, "(Tamim, p. . . .)", are intended henceforth to refer to the page or pages ofthe Diwän Tamim, edition Beirut 1970. The lines
quoted are from the poem on rhyme al-nahri.
" See al-Muntaqä min Akhbär Mi^r li Ibn Muyassar intaqähu Taqi al-Din
Ahmad b. 'Ali al-Maqrizi, ed. Ayman Fu'äd Sayyid, IFAO du Caire 1981,
p. 165.
Wine, Love and Praise for the Fätimid Imäms 93
(33) "I sow the tear, I break the back.
(34) I break the bone again, I set it too."
(Tamim, p. 175)
In reahty, Tamim's power was confined to his own palace and gardens,
"al-Ma'shüq", and his palaces which fronted on the waters ofthe "Bir¬
kat al-5abash" (the Ethiopian Pond). His expeditions usually did not
extend further than the park "al-Mukhtär" and the Christian convent,
"Dayr al-Qusayr", where good wine was always to be had.'^
Self-praise is not the only theme ofthis poem. In order to increase its
interest for the reader, Tamim included an introduction consisting of
love-poetiy. In this grÄozaZ-preface, he describes how he passed a pleas¬
ant time during a communal walk at night between the park "al-Mukh¬
tär" and "the Bridge". He is very much taken by his sweetheart and
wishes he had imprinted a 'love-souvenir' in the sweetheart's neck! At
this point in the poem, Tamim switches over (takhallu?) to fakhr: the
neck of the loved one bears no such mark, but the hand of Destiny will.
First Tamim addresses his sweetheart, before going on to say a few
things in his own favour:
(18) "If it were not for the fact that I feared your body would flow
away — so subtle is your body!
(19) I would have left the marks of my passion in your neck:
(20) Just as my benificient dew will preserve my name tattooed on the
hand of Destiny!"
For these gardens or rather palace gardens, see Diwän Tamim (Beirut
1970), in the "Muqaddimatu 'l-muhaqqiqin li 'l-fab'ah al-ülä", pp. yä', käf See
also AuMAD 'Abd al-Magid Haridi, Index des Hifaf, UL P- 353, s.v. "al-
Ma'shüq (bustän al-amir Tamim)"; op. cit.. Ill, p. 42, s.v. "Birkat al-Habash" ; op.
cit.. Ill, p. 313, 8. v. "al-Mukhtär (där al-Ikhshid) " — and the reference there to al-
Maqrizi 's Khitat. For Dayr al-Qusayr, see Abu 'l-IIasan 'Ali b. Muhammad
al-Shäbushti, al-Diyärät, ed. Kürkis 'Awwäd, Baghdad 1966, pp. 284 ff. and
pp. 397 fr. In connection with the poetry on Dayr al-Qu^ayr, it reads (p. 403):
"We have restricted ourselves, in this our choice of poetry from three poets, to
these particular lines wherein the name of the monastery occurs. These lines
excepted, the remaining ones only consist of ghazal and mujün which are in no
way connected to the Dayr concerned."
»ii->—Jc jr^d) J ,_^i-*^dl
jt>ji\ Ju J
(Tamim, p. 174)
Combining /«Mr and ghazal w&s natural for Tamim, considering his high
position. Other combinations, such as praise (madih) and ghazal, were
only possible with respect to those who stood higher than he himself
within the Fäfimid hierarchy. Actually the only people so highly placed
were his father, al-Mu'izz, and his younger brother, al-'Aziz, who fol¬
lowed the father in the holy position of the Caliphate. Tamim not only
composed poems of praise for his father which were introduced by gha¬
zal, but did so too for his brother, al-'Aziz, and in greater number.
An example is a poem of praise for al-'Aziz in rhyme -hunnah. This
consists of a ghazal part and a part containing the praise, separated
from each other by a short transitional deseription of a wine scene. The
poem happens to be important because of criticisms vented later by an
orthodox supporter of the Fäfimids.
It begins, as we have said, with ghazal: the poet addresses a group of
young women and allows himself to be carried away by his own meta¬
phors: "Are you really does, or are you genies?" The bodies of these
young women are so slender and so supple, like the reins of a horse!
(1) "Is it a herd of does which has appeared; or a group of genies,
whom you seem to be? But are not really?
(5) Never saw I such tender maidens whose sensuous manner of walk¬
ing has all the suppleness of a horse's reins."
But although the girls are very pretty, and make all sorts of promises,
they are leaving for a joumey — and leaving behind the love-crazed poet,
who obeys them in all things. Later he sadly asks his two companions to
help him relive the moming of their departure; if they cannot, it would
be better to call for wine, in whose moisture all sorrows are forgotten!
<>- j.1 JC Lf« ^ jJi
ä —• ü^'r" ^3
O*^ j öHr^i»
(Tamim, p. 440)
A^Jjjyj i^Jj^l cLaj
<^L..«a.«jJ U^Uai
ji—f jji- U.J
o ..VjÄil »Iop Irl» <dJii
1^1 Ji] jjju
Or jv^l JJ Uj^^Scil li|
(12) "But when they joumeyed forth they painted the dawn with the
moisture of their lovely cheeks in watercolours of their own rose-
red!
Wine, Love and Praise for tiie Fätimid Imäms 95
(13) By God! Bring me back that eariy moming again, that morning
which I obediently accepted, while my sweethearts went off in
rebellion!
(14) Bring me a white wine, wine that shields its drinker from sorrow
when the drinking begins in the early moming."
(Tamim, p. 441)
At this point the wine-scene begins; the consoling liquid is brought and
served. Happily for the poet, the waitresses are all especially beautiful.
So much so that they even help the takhallu?, the transition which leads
into the praise-section of the poem. It is their beauty which puts him
in mind of the subtle beauty of the nights and shining days of al-'Aziz.
With the mention ofthe name ofthe then-mling Caliph, the praise-sec¬
tion of the poem begins:
Ob jjij J oi^^ J—>- Lp-I jiilj Lip v_j jLj
-U^bjl Jif Cj» O-i lil J^ii^^ j«kL_j H
■CjjIjI Asrfj y.y^^ Cr-^ ü—^
(15) "Beautiful girls are bringing around the goblets of wine (...)
(16) Lovers of luxury who can't get up in the moming when they want
to, their buttocks are so heavy.
(17) Beautiful are they, as beautiful as the nights of al-'Aziz, and they
also bring with them the shining days which go with those nights."
(Tamim, p. 441)
As praise for al-'Aziz, we fmd the usual picture of great expenditures
made in his name. The Caliph spends such an enormous amount of
money that the money itself can never find a moment's rest. In fear of
being spent, it can never feel secure:
' *
Oi- Jill Jc ^._r^. H) Jp Cr^. cM
4:T«U» oiysr y Ca— »Ij Jl^i oJ* J» i
(18) "An Imäm who is miserly with his reputation, though not with
his money.
(19) You may well ask if his riches ever enjoyed one evening of com¬
fort, whether his generosity ever allowed the money to sit quietly
in one place for long."
(Tamim, p. 441)
It is quite surprising that such passages as those we have just seen in
the ghazal and the wine-scene ofthe takhallu§ could have been offered up
in praise of the Fätimid Imäm. So mueh the more so could criticism
have been forthcoming when we consider that such passages are not
exceptions in Tamim's work, but rather the rule. On the other hand,
material of this kind might well be expected from a Fätimid poet who
was not himself busy with affairs of state. His father, the Caliph al-
Mu'izz, had been forced to curb him in his youth on account ofhis wild
escapades. We read this in the relevant passage in Sirat al-Ustädh Jawd-
har. '* This is also the very probable reason why Tamim was passed by
in the succession to the Caliphate. After his father's death his younger
brother, following the father's explicit instruction (na^§), succeeded to
the holy office of the Imämate.'*
Tamim's poem was savagely criticized about 100 years later by a well-
known dignitary of the Fätimid Da'wah, al-Mu'ayyad fi '1-Din al-
Shiräzi.'* In one of his own poems which used the same kind of rhyme
Qunnah), he uses words taken from Tamim's poem, but puts them in a
wholly different context, one which often contradicts their original
meaning. Al-Mu'ayyad did not approve ofthe ghazal and wine passage
in Tamim's poem. He even criticizes the passage which praises al-'Aziz,
specifically the lines about his money.
Tamim in line 14 of his poem had called wine "a shield to ward off
cares", but al-Mu'ayyad prefers "a shield against the fire of Hell":
Or jUI ^ jUj (.U OrJI J:>U- Cj» '-4
(1) "A new moon appeared through the darkness, the Imäm of that
time is a shield against the fire (of Hell)."
(al-Mu'ayyad, p. 254)'*
Another of Tamim's points which al-Mu'ayyad turns around is his rhe¬
torical (juestion (verse 1) addressed to the young women, asking them
Vie de I'ustadh Jaudhar (contenant sermons, lettres et resents des premiers califes fatimides) ecrite par Mansür le secretaire ä I 'epoque du calife al-'Aziz billah
(365-386/975-996), traduite de l'arabe sur l'edition de M. Kämil Husain et
M. 'Add AL-HÄnt Cha'ira, par M. Canard, Alger 1958, pp. 181-82.
'* Compare the description given by the future caliph al-'Aziz himself as
to how his father al-Mu'izz chose him as successor to the throne from among
his brothers Tamim, 'Abd Allah and 'Aqil. (al-Muntaqä min akhbär Mi^r li Ibn
Muyassar, p. 169).
'■^ His full name was Abu Nasr Hibat Allah b. Müsä Abi 'Imrän b. Däwud
al-Shiräzi, al-Salmäni, died 470/1077 in Cairo.
The additional remark between brackets, "(al-Mu'ayyad, p. . . .)", may henceforth refer to the page or pages in the Diwän al-Mu'ayyad fi 'l-Din Dä'i
'l-du'äh, ed. Muhammad Kämil Husayn, Cairo 1949.
Wine, Love and Praise for the Fätimid Imäms 97
whether they are a herd of does or genies. Al-Mu'ayyad prosaically
rejects the "genies", or at any rate the wicked ones. Undoubtedly, he
also rejected the young women, since they were the tenor of the meta¬
phor. With an allusion to the Koran he describes his Imäm (al-Mustan-
§ir) as,
I ' ' . *
4^ j-i O'S O* J*' *; C^
(3) "An Imäm in whom the Loyal find their refuge from bad people
and bad genies."
(al-Mu'ayyad, p. 254)
Tamim compared (in verse 5) the young women in their swaying sup¬
pleness with the reins of a horse. But al-Mu'ayyad changes this to the
"reins of govemment", which must bend to conform to the wishes ofthe Infallible Imäm:
o, - *
jl 4j «ülj Jl \jS. <JSai- Ji- lij |.U
(7) "Whenever a dangerous situation arises, the reins of government
are pulled in the direction which the Imäm thinks best. "
(al-Mu'ayyad, p. 254)
More explicitly, al-Mu'ayyad attacks Tamim's description ofthe sweet¬
heart's red cheeks. This concerns the fantastic etiology (husn al-ta'liJ)
which Tamim proposes in verse 12. Tamim had stated that the red glim¬
mer ofthe moming had been borrowed from the girl's beautiful cheeks.
In a rather blunt fashion, al-Mu'ayyad tums to his Imäm, al-Mustan§ir,
> j >
Juj^ jjJl o_«J lij jUJJI Ja dlLai o
(20) "My tongue describes your excellence, whenever the other de¬
scribes how a woman's cheek reddens."
(al-Mu'ayyad, p. 255)
Finally, we might imagine that the praise passage in Tamim's poem
would have escaped al-Mu'ayyad's censure, but even though it contains
no ghazal he still feels constrained to criticize it. Tamim had (in
verse 19) rhetorically urged his reading public to put the following
questions to al-'Aziz's personified riches: Did they ever experience one
peaceful evening? Were they ever mutmaHnnah (i.e., safe from the
Caliph's generosity)? Al-Mu'ayyad, however, prefers to direct such
attention toward the Imäm himself There shouldn't be any such thing
as money which doesn't feel "safe". One should rather be speaking
about the spiritual wealth which the Imäm possesses and the soul ofthe
7 ZDMG 142/1
devout follower. The soul, in contradistinetion to money, should feel that it is "safe" when under the Imäm's care:
4:T»U« 1—iS'j JujI 1 TLxu-
•clai^ Jai} dij-JUj iijJbJI ^ dl>uJt«
(11) "Clouds body forth the Imäm's finger, the Imäm's hand, so that
his follower's soul may feel wholly secure (mutmäinnah).
(al-Mu'ayyad, p. 254)
In the last line of al-Mu'ayyad's poem Tamim himself is finally singled
out by name as the author of a worthless poem of praise. The current
Imäm, al-Mustansir, deserves better praise:
«0>- ^1 i_jjjdl JjjJ \j}yr
(21) "The lust for chit-chat cannot be Your Praise, but only service
to God, spiritual excellence, and the instincts by which we are
blessed at birth.
(22) Take this as my answer to the son of al-Mu'izz: 'Is it a herd of
does which has appeared, or a group of genies?'"
(al-Mu'ayyad, p. 255)
Al-Mu'ayyad's sharp criticisms of Tamim's poem of praise for Imäm-
Caliph al-'Aziz was formulated no more than 100 years after Tamim's
poem had been written. As we have seen, in al-Mu'ayyad's time another
Caliph, al-Mustan§ir, was in power." This Caliph is portrayed by the
main historical sources as a devout cleric — the statement that he was
once seen drinking wine on an important Muslim holy day comes per¬
haps from a hostile source.'* It seems that the whole atmosphere ofthe
" The Fätimid imäm al-Mustansir reigned 427-487 H.
" Al-Mustansir may well have been a devout cleric if we are to believe the report by Ibn Taghri Bardi: al-Nujüm al-zähirah, ed. Där al-kutub, p. 81. When the unruly Turkish mercenaries once asked for an increase in their salaries, al- Mustansir is alleged to have written on the backside ofthe petition words which testify to his pious attitude, that is, if they were not meant to produce a mere show of piety: "I do not hope for, nor do I fear, any one but my own God who is
full of mercy. My grandfather was my prophet and my father was my Imäm.
Whatever I teach consists of the dogma of Tawhid and 'AdX. "
Wine, Love and Praise for the Fätimid Imäms 99
Fätimid court had changed in the intervening period. The nature of al-
Mu'ayyad's reaction to the poem of praise written by the long dead son
of Caliph al-Mu'izz a hundred years earlier can be interpreted as the
expression of a more religious ethos in the latter period, at least with
respect to the outside world. On the other hand, we should also remem¬
ber that it was part of al-Mu'ayyad's function as High Propagandist
(Dä'i 'l-du'äh) to produce edifying sermons for the Lower Propagan¬
dists. Of the 800 Majälis Mu'ayyadiyyah which he produced, 300 have
Alas, these words are also believed to have been uttered albeit with some
slight alteration, by other presumably pious rulers: the historians suggest Fäti¬
mid Imäms like al-IIäkim or al-Amir (so aeeording to Ibn Munjib al-§ayrafi, ed.
IFAO 25 (1924), p. 29). The trend to describe the imäm al-Mustansir as owner of a soul disobedient to certain religious prescriptions as the prohibiton of wine, may find its origin in those historians who were hostile to the Fätimid religious tenets. Such a hostile report is found in Khitat, L 489, where al-Maqrizi quotes Ibn Dihyah. The latter reports on al-Mustansir's scandalous behaviour in words of neatly done rhyme prose:
"He (al-Mustansir) immediately departed with sacks fuh of wine which were
urged on their way by the camel-drivers of pleasure. Then he allowed those
camels to kneel in 'Ayn Shams amidst a throng of sinners. And there he institut¬
ed a whole marketplace of sins. But in that same year the Most Elevated visited upon him and upon all of Egypt a great drought. "
All this happened in a pleasurable place called Jvbb 'Umayrah, where al-
Mustansir (admittedly, just as other Caliphs before him) frequently came in the Hajj season. Al-Ma(|rr/.i suggests that instead of making the real pilgrimage,
al-Mustansir only pretended to do so while in fact giving himself over to all
manner of playfulness and libertinism (alä sabil al-la'bi wa 'l-majänah).
Al-Mustansir's sins are further explained and elucidated by linking them with some particular lines of a wine poem. This was evidently composed by a contem¬
porary, the poet al-Sharif al-'Aqili (see above note 7) on the Pilgrimage Day of 'Arafah:
"Rise and puncture the winesack on the Day of Slaughter together with the water. And do not kill the sacrificial animal withouth the white wine.
Call together your fellow pUgrim wine-bibbers, before they hurry to the Minä
of their partying, escorted by each slender one (i.e., each slender camel, or
better, each slender woman!).
And bend your way early in the moming to visit your spacious Mecca, where
you can tread the Circuit round the Cornerstone of lute and flute."
[Diwän al-Sharif al-'Aqili, ed. Zaki al-Maijäsini, Cairo no date, p. 37; Ibn Sa'id: Al-Nujüm al-zähirahß hudä hadrat al-Qähirah, qism khäs? bi 'l-Qähirah min kitäb al-Mughrib fi hulä 'l-Maghrib, ed. Husayn Nassar, Cairo 1970, p. 207. In these two sourees this blasphemous poetry is quoted, but without the accompa¬
nying tale of al-Mustansir's drinking scene.)
According to Ibn Dihyah, the Years of the Terrible Drought in Egypt should
be seen as merely resulting from these two glaring manifestations of sin. (cf al-
Kutubi, Fawdt al-Wafayät III, 18-19).
7»
been printed to date.'* These sermons are of course didactic in nature,
but al-Mu'ayyad's poetry is not very different in this respect. His Diwän
is less of a work of poetic art than it is a metrical, rhyming continuation
ofthe Majälis. His purpose was to bring masses of relatively uneducated
people closer to the esoteric teachings of the current ideology. Al-
Mu'ayyad had relatively little use for poetry as such. This is apparent
from his total lack of sympathy for Tamim's fantastic etiologies, which
are highly poetic, as well as from the manner in which he attacks the
praise-passage of Tamim's poem.
Al-Mu'ayyad's censures of Tamim can thus be explained as the cen¬
sures of a more prosaic, less poetic sensibility, but we may also see
some more general tendencies operating as a larger context: a desire to
adapt the tradition of laudatory poetry for the Imam-Caliphs to the
more religious norms of the mamdüh. One argument in favour of this
view is the poetry of ^äfir al-Haddäd, who lived 50 years after al-
Mu'ayyad. The tone of his praise is more religious, his nasib, which
introduces the praise, is in accordance with the ancient schemes of
Imru'u '1-Qays, but it remains rather formal, id est, one feels that the
poet only wished to comply with the old topoi^", and the traditional
wine-scene is in ^äfir's poetry a rare phenomenon.^'
'* Al-Mu'ayyad fi '1-Din Hibat Allab al-Sbiräzi, Dä'i 'l-du'äh, Al-Majälis al- Mu'ayy adiyy ah, ed. Mustafä Ghälib, "al-mi'ah al-ülä" = Beirut 1974, "al- mi'ah al-thälitha" = Beirut 1984.
Cf Diwän Zäfir al-Haddäd ibn al-Iskandariyyah, pp. 104-105, where we
find the following lines in a nasib:
(23) "I came with footsteps so hidden that had I stepped on someone it would not have been noticed, so light was my tread.
(24) Then I kissed awake the maiden ol' the tribe, who stared at me with the
eyes of an orix kid which has wandered from the herd.
(25) And I greeted her, but she was paralyzed with fear. Confused, her welcome was mingled with anger.
(26) I stayed a long while kissing her and let her know the effect which love
had in me, while she leaned low against my arm.
(27) I told my (own) heart when it was afraid of the sharp sword, 'This is a
watering-place in a milhon, so come and drink!'
(28) Then she took her farewell from me and moaned, 'I'm afraid for your life
should you return!'
(29) I left when the armies of the night had passed by, and Destined Time
gnawed both its hands (not only its fingers!) out of jealousy."
(From the Däliyy ah, jaladi rhyme, for the govemor of Alexandria, Sa'id b. Zafar)
^' For once, Zäfir composed "in [the genre of] the khamriyyät, in the basit metre", — on the subject of that same Christian convent Dayr al-Qusayr, high
Wine, Love and Praise for the Fätimid Imäms IOI
In Tamim's time, however, when the Fäfimid Cahphate was just
beginning its Egyptian period, there were no rehgious scruples object¬
ing to a sensual ghazal, or a wine-passage introducing the Imäm's
praise. The contrary, in fact, was true, as we can see from Tamim's
rhyming poem, al-khaddi. " This poem almost has the appearance of a
program advertising the sort of laudatory poetry Tamim was still plan¬
ning to write. It was composed of praise to al-'Aziz, and was the first
qa^idah that he wrote for his brother on the occasion of his becoming
Caliph in 365 H. The poem reflects a certain degree of dependence on
his brother, who now has a higher position than the poet does.
This poem also shows the same combination of ghazal and praise that
we have seen earlier. Although the ghazal section is not really porno¬
graphic in tone, the poet nevertheless portrays himself spending plea¬
surable hours with his sweetheart — to be more pointed, the hours be¬
tween midnight and dawn. Lying on a veritable bed of roses, he plucks
the fruit of the wine from a laughing mouth whose lips consist of rose
petals. He admires his sweetheart's figure, which is twig-like, and which
shows two pomegranate breasts:
♦ . . ' , .
JLjj bjUj «0 j-aP If-aPi Ji jjjl j
jtf. Jlp j Ju cy J^-^^ '■=^ Uw
" •
Jj3 O* **Ui^ c!l»oi^ cy r*^' cT^'
(3) "In her night (is she) the full moon and on her hill of sand there is
a twig from which depends the two pomegranates of her breasts . . .
upon the Muqattam hills, which had been such a favourite playground for
Tamim, — the following lines:
(12) "Until I finally arrived at Dayr al-Qusayr, where I could not restrain my tears for anjrtbing except for remaining there overnight.
(13) And I said to the priest, 'Pour me a wine that long has matured so that
I can find my way in the coming darkness,
(14) And pour nothing but a blood-red wine, such as the Devil himself drank in the Garden of Eternity.'
(15) And then the sack of wine offered its bouquet: a wine so purely white no
lamps or lanterns were necessary in the night!
(16) So that after (a moment of) despair, it (the wine) appeared in his hands as a lion in the hollow of his den.
(17) And as the bride of the winesack appears without her veil, empty for the
wine-cup what is left in the purse!"
{Diwän Zäfir, pp. 338, 339-40, from the poem on rhjmie al-shamämiai)
Diwän Tamim, pp. 100-101.
(5) We spend the night together in the shadow of the darkness on a
bed spread with roses.
(6) I pluck the fruit of the wine from a laughing mouth, whose lips are
made of rose petals."
(Tamim, pp. 100-101)
This is the usual style of Tamim's ghazal. Nevertheless, it is very
interesting that he connects his nighttime love-escapade with the per¬
son of the newly-named Caliph. Elsewhere he has respectfully sung the
elevated qualities ofthis Caliph, who was his younger brother, in the fol¬
lowing terms (rhyme yadhari):
* a?- jW LftLj »y>=!" *iUi ijftUj '-j._Vil jy
J^l ^ ll^ J\ J,</1 ^
,A\j
(33) "[You are] a subtle light, whose essence so elevates you that it
surpasses the boundaries of both the sun and the moon.
(34) [You are] a motif of the first appearance of Reason which preceded
the creation of the "hule" (i.e. the first matter) and the initial spreading out of earth and loam."
(Tamim, pp. 224-25)
Now Tamim connects this Caliph, al-'Aziz, who is almost an immaterial
body of spirit, formed from Light and the subtlety of hülfe, with his own
nightly activities, which apparently took place in Gizah (and thus
within the demesne ofhis brother's authority). Gizah is then the link in
the takhallu? that moves toward the poem's praise-section:
J14J J5L eJlj H
-wj o* oi-J' jiy- Jji Wi Jt-Ji Jji ^1
(12) "May GizaA remain a place of refinement, made so by each round-
breasted, flat-bellied girl.
(13) I enjoy life in GizaJi because al-'Aziz's generosity secures its com¬
fort."
(Tamim, p. 101)^*
^' Tamim's takhallus, his transitional passage here between the ghazal section and the section of praise, is much more exciting than the takhailu? in Kafir's däliyy ah dedicated to Sa'id, the govemor of Alexandria, ^äfir has nothing but a traditional word play on the name and its adjectival connotation "fortunate", (33) "No soul defamed has ever attained the highest, nor has any ambition
achieved its end from one day to the next.
Wine, Love and Praise for the Fätimid Imäms 103
It is not only that we are surprised by this unashamed assoeiation be¬
tween the love-scene in Gizah and the beneficience ofthe Caliph: as if it
could be expected as a matter of course that the Caliph would create
opportunities for sexual pleasure. The copyists who transcribed the
Diwän manuscripts seem to have had some problems with these two
lines. Ofthe 9 manuscripts which are extant, this takhallus linking Gizah
with the name of al-'Aziz as mamdüh only appears in one of them.In
the other 8 these verses are left out and only the "anonymous" verse 14
(which appears in all versions) is left. This verse is very vague and
general in the payment of its praise:
(14) "Fame always smiles at one who is famous; but the famous one
smiles even more broadly at Fame."
Considering the fact that Arab critics customarily reject the anonymous
mamdüh in laudatory poems, we may assume that the takhallu? lines of
the single Diwän manuscript referred to above were the original ones
that preceded the anonymous lines of the other versions.^*
All of this leads us to the conclusion that although the Caliphate in
theory was supposed to be holy, it was not so holy that an exciting gha-
(34) Rather ascribe fortune (al-sa'd) to the praising of Sa'id — then you will find a helpful sea in which you cannot drown."
(Diwän Zäfir, p. 105, from the poem on rhyme jaladi.)
Compare this with another takhallus, invented by al-Ma'arri who has a more
felicitous use of "sa'id" as a double entendre,
"(The camels) kept asking me, upon which I answered, saying, 'Our destina¬
tion will be fortunate (sa'id).' . . .," etc.
Here al-Ma'arri refers imphcitly to the name ofthe praiseworthy personage
who is no other but the Ilamdanid Amir of Aleppo, Sa'id al-Dawlah. (See
P. Smoor: Kings and Bedouins in the Palace of Aleppo as reflected in Ma'arri's
works, JSS monograph 8, Manchester 1985, pp. 54-55).
^* The two lines of Tamim, vss. 12-13, occur in the manuscript hä' only, see Diwän Tamim p. 101. According to the "Muqaddimatu 'l-muhaqqiqin li 'l-}ab'ali 'l-ülä", p. sin in the Diwän Tamim, this manuscript hä' originally was in the pos¬
session of Muhammad Kämil Ilusayn who conjectured it as of Yamanite origin,
having been transferred later on to India (the hä' stands for al-Hind). It is pre¬
sently in the Där al-kutub, Cairo, under number 25709 zäy.
Poetical lines dedicated to an anonymous mamdüh were usually dis¬
approved of by Arab critics. One may compare the criticism aired by Ibn al-Sid
al-Batalyawsi (died 521/1127) on certain verses, Saqtiyyät by Abu 'l-'Alä'
al-Ma'arri, whose mamdüh remained anonymous and vague (See P. Smoor, op.
cit., p. 54.)
# OsrU Jl ^1—> Jb^ll
(Tamim, p. 101)
zal as preface to poems of praise was thought sinful; at least not in
Tamim's time. Tamim, who was well acquainted with the mores ofthe
court, was the trend-setter in such matters. Thus we see that the un¬
usual, sometimes extremely esoteric teachings of the Fätimids as
bearers of the Grodly Light were balanced on the other hand by an
equally extreme, equally exoteric description of Love and its "shield
against all sorrows". Wine.
Persische Etymologien in der Geschichte
der jakutischen Wortforschung
Von Marek Stachowski, Krakau
Schon wegen der geographischen Entfemung scheint die Suche nach
pers. Lehngut im Jak. wenig erfolgreich sein zu müssen. W. Schott
schrieb sogar im Jahre 1843: „Der Islam, die Religion aller übrigen Tür¬
ken, ist niemals bis zu ihnen [= den Jakuten] gedmngen und wahr¬
scheinlich hat ihnen auch kein muhammedanisches Volk jemals eine
längere Periode hindurch nahe gewohnt; denn ihre Sprache besitzt kein
einziges arabisches oder persisches Wort (. . .)" (Schott 333f.). Berück¬
sichtigt man jedoch den Umstand, daß die Jakuten in ihrer frühesten
Geschichte viel südlicher seßhaft waren, sowie die Tatsache, daß sie
sowohl mit anderen Türkvölkem als auch mit Mongolen und in neuerer
Zeit auch mit Russen in Berühmng kamen, so seheint die Vermutung,
daß einige wenige pers. Lehnwörter durch Vermittlung anderer Spra¬
chen bis ins Jak. gelangt sind, weit besser begründet zu sein.
Im vorliegenden Aufsatz werden Wörter aufgeführt und besprochen,
die in der Vergangenheit von verschiedenen Forschem auf das Pers.
zurückgeführt worden sind, und dies unabhängig davon, ob die gege¬
bene Etymologie auch heute noch als einwandfrei zu betrachten ist.
Diesen Wörtem fiige ich köyül und Myrsa hinzu, die m. W. bisher nieht
aus dem Pers. hergeleitet wurden. Wie aus der am Ende des Artikels
dargestellten Einteilung in richtige und unrichtige Etymologien ersicht¬
lich, sind die Endresultate der bislang — anfänglich doch teilweise nur
intuitiv — durchgeführten Forsehungen als sehr befriedigend zu bewer¬
ten: über die Hälfte der seit Böhtlingk vorgeschlagenen EtjTnologie-
versuche können auch heute noch akzeptiert werden.
Auf eine detaillierte Ermittlung der Wanderwege in jedem einzelnen
Fall und auf eine endgültige Feststellung der unmittelbaren Entleh¬
nungsquelle ins Jak. wird hier verzichtet, da dies erst möglich sein wird,
nachdem Kontakte des Jak. zu anderen Türksprachen geklärt sein wer¬
den.
