Arabs (11 page)

Once Isma‘il Bey had provoked Muhammad Bey’s anxiety, he turned next to play upon the latter’s ambition. ’Ali Bey, he argued, had left the path of Islam by entering into a pact with the Russian empress against the sultan. “Now any Muslim would be permitted by Islamic law to kill [‘Ali Bey] with impunity, claim his harem and his wealth,” Isma’il Bey argued.
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Essentially, Isma‘il Bey reasoned that Muhammad Bey would gain redemption before God and the sultan, and promotion to ’Ali Bey’s position of primacy over Egypt, by turning against his master. Isma‘il Bey’s arguments carried the day, and two of ’Ali Bey’s most trusted generals were now returning to Egypt at the head of a huge Mamluk army bent on the overthrow of their former master.

 

Shock waves reverberated around the Eastern Mediterranean after the Mamluks’ conquest and rapid abandonment of Damascus. “The people of Damascus were completely astonished by this amazing event,” a contemporary chronicler exclaimed, and so too were Zahir al-‘Umar and his allies. While the Mamluk forces were attacking
Damascus, Zahir had taken the town of Sidon and had placed a 2,000-man garrison in Jaffa. Overextended, he had now lost his most important ally and risked facing the wrath of the Ottomans alone. For his part, ’Ali Bey recognized his situation was hopeless. He could only raise a token number of supporters, and these were scattered after a skirmish with the army led by Muhammad Bey. In 1772, ’Ali Bey fled Egypt to take refuge with Zahir in Acre.

‘Ali Bey’s dreams of a neo-Mamluk empire dissolved with his flight from Egypt. Muhammad Bey established himself as the ruler of Egypt and sent Isma’il Bey to Istanbul to secure for him the governorship of both Egypt and Syria. Not for him dreams of empire; Muhammad Bey instead sought recognition within the Ottoman framework.

‘Ali Bey was impatient to reclaim his throne and acted in haste, before he had the chance to mobilize enough of an army to confront the formidable Mamluk household he himself had created. He set off for Cairo in March 1773, at the head of a small force in a hopeless bid to recover his kingdom. Muhammad Bey’s army engaged him in battle and routed ’Ali Bey’s forces. ‘Ali Bey was wounded and taken prisoner. Muhammad Bey took his master back to Cairo and kept him in his own home, where ’Ali Bey died a week later. Inevitably, there were rumors of foul play. “Only God knows the manner of his death,” the chronicler al-Jabarti concluded.
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The death of ’Ali Bey proved a disaster for Zahir. He was now a very old man—well into his eighties at a time when life expectancy was half that. He had no allies in the region and had entered into outright treason against his Ottoman sovereign. Improbably, Zahir still sought formal recognition from the authorities and, with the Ottomans mired in their wars with Russia and keen to secure peace in their troubled Syrian provinces, seemed to be on the verge of realizing his lifetime ambition. In 1774 the Ottoman governor of Damascus informed him that he would be appointed governor of Sidon, including northern Palestine and parts of Transjordan.

The imperial decree from Istanbul confirming Zahir’s gubernatorial appointment never arrived. In July 1774, the sultan concluded a peace treaty with Russia, bringing the six-year war to an end. He was in no mood to reward traitors who had entered into alliance with his Russian foes. Instead of sending a decree of promotion, the sultan dispatched Muhammad Bey, at the head of a Mamluk army, to overthrow the aged strongman of Palestine. Egyptian troops overran the city of Jaffa in May 1775 and massacred the inhabitants. Panic spread to the other towns under Zahir’s control. Zahir’s administration and much of the population fled Acre by the end of the month. Muhammad Bey occupied Acre in early June.

Remarkably, Muhammad Bey, the hale and hearty Mamluk ruler of Egypt, took ill almost as soon as he occupied Acre. He died suddenly of a fever on June 10, 1775. Zahir reclaimed his city days later and restored order after the panic of the Egyptian
occupation. But Zahir’s reprieve proved short-lived. The Ottomans sent the admiral of their fleet, Hasan Pasha, with fifteen vessels to demand Zahir’s submission and payment of back taxes. Zahir mounted no opposition. “I am an old man,” he told his ministers, “and I don’t have the nerve anymore for fighting.” His battle-weary ministers agreed: “We are Muslim people, obedient to the Sultan. For the Muslim, believing in One God, it is not permitted to fight against the Sultan in any form.”
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Zahir’s plans for a peaceful retirement were shattered by his own family. He had agreed to withdraw from Acre with his family and retainers and take refuge with his Shi’ite allies in south Lebanon. He was betrayed by his son, ‘Uthman, who suspected his father of feigning a retreat only to return to power at the first opportunity, as he had done time and again. ’Uthman called on one of Zahir’s long-serving officers, a North African commander named Ahmad Agha al-Denizli, and told him that his father was fleeing the city of Acre. “If you wish to be [Admiral] Hasan Pasha’s favourite person, carry out God’s will on my father, for he is outside, alone with his family.” Al-Denizli gathered a group of North African mercenaries and waited to ambush Zahir.

The assassins had to lay a trap to catch the elusive old shaykh. Fifteen minutes beyond the gates of Acre, Zahir noticed that one of his concubines was missing. The rest of his household had no idea where she was. “This is no time to leave a person behind,” the old shaykh chided, and rode back to collect the abandoned woman. He found her near the spot where al-Denizli’s band were hiding and reached down to pull her onto his horse. Age and anxiety had taken their toll. Zahir, now eighty-six years old, was pulled from his mount by the younger woman and fell to the ground. The assassins leapt out and struck down the old man with their daggers. Al-Denizli took out his sword and struck off Zahir’s head as a trophy for the Ottoman admiral, Hasan Pasha.

If al-Denizli had hoped by this act to gain favor with Hasan Pasha, he was to be sorely disappointed. The Ottoman admiral had his men clean Zahir’s severed head. He then placed it on a chair and meditated on the wizened face of the elderly shaykh. The admiral turned back to the mercenary. “May God not forgive me if I fail to avenge Zahir al-’Umar against you!”
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He then ordered his men to take al-Denizli away, strangle him, and throw his body into the sea.

 

So ended the story of Zahir al-‘Umar and ’Ali Bey al-Kabir. The Ottoman Empire had just withstood the most serious internal challenge to its rule after more than 250 years of dominion over the Arab world. Two local leaders, in league with a Christian power, had combined the wealth of two rich territories—Egypt and Palestine—to make common cause against the government of the sultan. Yet even at this critical juncture, when ‘Ali Bey seemed on the verge of reestablishing the ancient Mamluk
Empire of Syria, Egypt, and the Hijaz under his personal rule, the Ottomans still exercised tremendous influence over their rebellious subjects in the Arab lands. Mamluk generals like Isma’il Bey and Muhammad Bey crossed the threshold of rebellion only to retrace their footsteps to the limits of legitimacy and seek the Porte’s recognition. Most local leaders still believed that “rebellion against the Sultan” was, in Isma’il Bey’s words, “one of the schemes of the Devil.”

The fall of Zahir al-‘Umar and ’Ali Bey did not signal the end of local rulers in the Arab world. The Mamluks continued to dominate political life in Egypt, though no single ruler emerged after the deaths of ’Ali Bey and of Muhammad Bey. Instead, the Mamluk households reverted to factional fighting that left Egypt in a state of instability for the remainder of the eighteenth century. The Ottomans reasserted their hold over the Syrian provinces and appointed strong governors to Damascus, Sidon, and Tripoli. More remote places, like Mount Lebanon, Baghdad, and Mosul, continued to be ruled by local leaders, though none attempted to challenge Istanbul’s rule directly.

 

The next real challenge to Ottoman rule in the Arab world arose beyond the boundaries of the empire, in the heart of Central Arabia. The movement was all the more threatening for its ideological purity, and it would menace Ottoman rule in an arc stretching from Iraq through the Syrian Desert to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina in the Hijaz. Unlike Zahir al-‘Umar and ’Ali Bey, the leader of this movement now enjoys the distinction of being a household name in both the Middle East and the West: Muhammad ibn ’Abd al-Wahhab, the founder of the Wahhabi reformist movement.

 

Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab was born in 1703 to a family of scholars in the small oasis town of ’Uyayna in the Central Arabian region known as the Najd. He traveled widely as a young man, pursuing his religious studies in Basra and Medina. He was trained in the most conservative of the four legal traditions of Islam—the Hanbali school—and was profoundly influenced by Ibn Taymiyya, a fourteenth-century theologian. Ibn Taymiyya argued for a return to the practices of the early Muslim community of the Prophet Muhammad and his first successors, or caliphs. He condemned all mystical practices associated with Sufism as deviations from the true path of Islam. Ibn ’Abd al-Wahhab returned home to the Najd with a clear set of beliefs and the ambition to put them into practice.

At first the passionate young reformer enjoyed the support of the ruler of his home town. However, his views soon proved controversial. When Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab ordered the public execution of a woman for adultery, leaders in neighboring towns and key trade partners of ’Uyayna were appalled—and alarmed.
This was not Islam as the townspeople of ’Uyayna had known and practiced their faith. They pressured their ruler to kill the radical theologian, but he chose to exile Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab instead.

The exiled young theologian with the dangerous ideas did not have far to wander. Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab was welcomed by the ruler of the nearby oasis of al-Dir‘iyya, Muhammad ibn Sa’ud. Modern Saudis date the founding of their first state to this historic meeting in 1744–1745, when the two men agreed that the reformed Islam preached by Ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab would be observed by the Saudi ruler and his followers. The “Dir’iyya Agreement” set out the basic tenets of the movement that would come to be called Wahhabism.

 

At the time the movement was forming, the Wahhabis were widely misunderstood by the outside world. They were described as a new sect and accused of unorthodox beliefs. Quite the contrary, their beliefs were extremely orthodox, calling for a return to the pristine Islam of the Prophet and his successors, the caliphs. The Wahhabis sought to draw a line around the third century after the revelation of the Qur’an, and to ban all subsequent developments as “pernicious innovation.”

The single most important tenet of Wahhabism was the unique quality of God, or, as they put it, the “oneness of God.” Any association of lesser beings with God was denounced as polytheism (in Arabic,
shirk
), for if one believed God had partners or agents, one believed in more than one God. Islam, like many other religions, is a dynamic faith and has undergone significant changes over time. Over the centuries, a number of institutions had developed in Islam that fell foul of this absolute tenet of Wahhabism, the unity or oneness of God.

There was, for instance, a widespread veneration of saints and holy men in the Arab world, from the companions of the Prophet Muhammad to the humblest of local village holy men, each with his own shrine or sacred tree. (These shrines are still maintained in many parts of the Arab world today.) The Wahhabis objected to Muslims praying to holy men to intercede on their behalf with God, as this compromised God’s oneness. They argued that greater reverence was shown to outstanding Muslims by following their example rather than worshiping at their graves. The shrines to saints, and the annual pilgrimages marking a given saint’s day, were thus an early target of Wahhabi attack. Muhammad Ibn ’Abd al-Wahhab chopped down sacred trees and shattered the tombs of holy men with his own hands. This horrified mainstream Sunni Muslim society, which saw such desecration of tombs as a mark of disrespect to some of the most revered figures in Islam.

Along with his abhorrence of saint worship, Ibn ’Abd al-Wahhab was particularly intolerant of the mystical practices and beliefs associated with Sufism. Islamic mysticism takes many forms, from mendicant ascetics to the famous whirling dervishes.
Sufis use a wide range of techniques, from fasting to chanting and dancing to self-immolation, to reach the ecstasy of mystical union with the Creator. Organized into orders that convened regular prayer sessions, Sufism was a fundamental part of Ottoman religious and social life. Some orders built fine lodges and attracted the elites of society, and others called for complete abstinence and abandonment of worldly goods. Certain trades and professions were linked to particular Sufi orders. It is hard to think of a religious institution more closely connected to Ottoman society. Yet the Wahhabis believed that all who engaged in Sufism were polytheists for aspiring to mystical union with their Creator. It was a very serious charge.

By defining much of Ottoman Islam as polytheistic, the Wahhabis set themselves on a collision course with the empire. Although Orthodox Islam decrees tolerance of other monotheistic faiths, such as Judaism and Christianity, it is absolutely intolerant of polytheism, or the belief in many gods. Indeed, all good Muslims have a duty to persuade polytheists of the error of their ways and convert them to the true path of Islam. Failing that, Muslims have a duty of jihad to fight and eliminate polytheism. By characterizing mainstream practices such as Sufism and the veneration of saints as polytheistic, Wahhabism posed a direct challenge to the religious legitimacy of the Ottoman Empire.

The challenge of Wahhabism was easy for the Ottomans to overlook so long as the movement remained confined to the central Arabian region of the Najd, beyond Ottoman frontiers. Between 1744 and the death of Muhammad ibn Sa’ud in 1765, expansion of the Wahhabi movement was limited to the oasis towns of central Najd. It wasn’t until the late 1780s that Wahhabism reached Ottoman frontiers in southern Iraq and the Hijaz.