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Shakib Arslan

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Shakib Arslan
Born25 December 1869
Choueifat, Ottoman Syria
Died9 December 1946(1946-12-09) (aged 76)
Beirut, Lebanon
NationalityLebanese
Other namesAmir al-Bayān
Occupations
  • Politician
  • writer
  • poet
  • historian
ChildrenMay Arslan
RelativesEmir Majid Arslan II
Emir Talal Arslan
Walid Jumblatt (grandson)

Shakib Arslan (Arabic: شَكيب أَرْسَلان‎; 25 December 1869 – 9 December 1946) was a Lebanese writer, poet, historian, politician, and Emir in Lebanon. A prolific writer, he produced some 20 books and 2,000 articles,[1]: 103  as well as two collections of poetry and a "prodigious correspondence".[2]: viii  He was known as Amir al-Bayān (Arabic: أَميرُ البَيان, lit. 'Prince of Eloquence') due to his influential writings.

Biography

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Influenced by the ideas of Jamal al-Din al-Afghani and Muhammad Abduh, Arslan became a strong supporter of the pan-Islamic policies of Abdul Hamid II. As an Arab nationalist, Arslan was an advocate of pan-Maghrebism (the unification of Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco).[3]: 69–70  He also argued that the survival of the Ottoman Empire was the only guarantee against the division of the ummah and its occupation by the European imperial powers. For Arslan, Ottomanism and Islam were inseparable, and reform of Islam would naturally lead to the revival of the Ottoman Empire.[4]: 131 

Exiled from his homeland by the French Mandate authorities, Arslan spent most of the inter-war years in Geneva, where he served as the unofficial representative of Syria and Palestine to the League of Nations and wrote a steady stream of articles for the periodical press of Arab countries. There he cofounded and edited a newspaper entitled La Nation Arabe.[5] His partner in this activity was Ihsan Al Jabri, a Syrian exile.[5] Arslan was also a contributor to Barid Al Sharq, a propaganda newspaper published in Berlin, Nazi Germany.[6]: 88  However, Arslan did not personally agree with Nazism, instead viewing them as a tool to break the other colonial powers. In 1939, he wrote to Daniel Guérin that if the Germans proved to be no better to the Arabs, "they would have only changed masters."[7] In his diary, he remarked that the Italians would simply turn Palestine into an Italian colony.[8]

Prince Shakib (second from right) on a visit to Saudi Arabia in the early 1930s, dressed in a Bedouin costume. On his right are Mohammad Amin al-Husayni, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, and Hashim al-Atassi, who later became President of Syria.

Advocacy

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Amir Shakib proposed an interpretation of Islam imbued with a sense of political power and moral courage. He sought to rebuild the bonds of Islamic unity, urging Muslims from Morocco to Iraq to remember their common commitment to Islam despite their individual differences. Shakib believed that recognising and acting upon this common bond could lead to liberation from their existing subjugation. He also saw this unity as a way of reviving what he saw as their illustrious history. Arslan's work inspired anti-imperialist propaganda campaigns, much to the irritation of the British and French authorities in the Arab world.[3]: 69–70 

He defended Islam as an essential component of social morality. His message, with its call to action and defence of traditional values in a time of great uncertainty, was well received and attracted widespread attention in the 1920s and 1930s.[9] It was during this period that he wrote his most famous work, Our Decline: Its Causes and Remedies [ar], which described what Arslan believed to be the reasons for the weakness of existing Muslim governments.[10]

He contributed to Muhib Al Din Al Khatib's Cairo-based magazine Al Fath, a modernist Salafi publication.[11]

Personal life

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Letters of Shakib Arslan (1931)

Born into a Druze family, he always tried to combine his faith with mainstream Islam, but later converted to Sunni Islam, "establishing himself as an orthodox Muslim serving the interests of Sunni Islam".[2]: 49 

He married Suleima Alkhas Hatog, a Jordanian of Circassian descent. They had a son, Ghalib (born 1917 in Lebanon) and two daughters, May (1928–2013) and Nazima (born 1930 in Switzerland). His daughter May married the Lebanese Druze politician Kamal Jumblatt, making the Lebanese politician Walid Jumblatt a grandson of Arslan.[12]

Arslan died on 9 December 1946, three months after returning to Lebanon.[9]

Work

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  • Arslan, Shakib (2004). Our Decline: Its Causes and Remedies. Islamic Book Trust. ISBN 9789839154542. OL 9198790M.

References

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  1. ^ Kramer, Martin (2017). Arab Awakening and Islamic Revival: The Politics of Ideas in the Middle East. Routledge. ISBN 9781351531313. OL 36233138M.
  2. ^ a b Cleveland, William L. (1985). Islam Against the West: Shakib Arslan and the Campaign for Islamic Nationalism. University of Texas Press. ISBN 9780292737334. OL 28477052M.
  3. ^ a b Lawrence, Adria K. (2013). Imperial Rule and the Politics of Nationalism: Anti-Colonial Protest in the French Empire. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-03709-0. OL 26182119M.
  4. ^ Cleveland, William L.; Bunton, Martin (2016). A History of the Modern Middle East. Avalon Publishing. ISBN 9780813349800. OL 26884840M.
  5. ^ a b Nir Arielli (2008). "Italian Involvement in the Arab Revolt in Palestine, 1936–1939". British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies. 35 (2): 188. doi:10.1080/13530190802180597. S2CID 145144088.
  6. ^ Motadel, David (2014). Islam and Nazi Germany's War. Belknap Press. doi:10.4159/harvard.9780674736009. ISBN 9780674736009. OL 27419676M.
  7. ^ Guérin, Daniel (1954). Au Service Des Colonisés, 1930-1953. Éditions de Minuit. p. 20.
  8. ^ Gershoni, Israel (2014). Arab Responses to Fascism and Nazism: Attraction and Repulsion (First ed.). University of Texas Press. pp. 90–91. ISBN 978-0-292-75745-5.
  9. ^ a b Makram Rabah. "Arslan, Shakib (Emir [Prince], Amīr, Amir al-Bayān". 1914-1918 Online. Retrieved 26 October 2023.
  10. ^ "Shakib, Arslan". Wilson Center Digital Archive. Retrieved 26 October 2023.
  11. ^ Mehdi Sajid (2018). "A Reappraisal of the Role of Muḥibb al-Dīn alKhaṭīb and the YMMA in the Rise of the Muslim Brotherhood". Islam and Christian–Muslim Relations. 29 (2): 194, 196, 201–204. doi:10.1080/09596410.2018.1455364. S2CID 149627860.
  12. ^ William L. Cleveland (1985). Islam against the West. Shakib Arslan and the Campaign for Islamic Nationalism. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. pp. 38, 166. doi:10.7560/775947-012. ISBN 9780292771536. S2CID 240112446.
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