Alexander the Sleepless XV

The clergy, seeing every day how things were going, professed their admiration but were privately consumed by envy. [....] Taking counsel together, they went and entreated the military commander, asking him one favor: that he banish the holy one and his brothers to the city of Chalcis in Syria. But God, Who loves humankind, made their knavery a benefit, since the blessed one's Syrian retreat would expedite his reunion with spiritual children he had not laid eyes on after twenty years.

The faith of everyone [in Chalcis] was strengthened upon Alexander's entry into the city. The rulers' fear of him was such that he spent some time as a ward of the public guards, only for the citizens to take over his protection, such was their desire to be with him. And he marveled at God's forbearance, and how He had frustrated the subterfuge of [Antioch's] wicked people, of which Alexander was well aware.

After some time, he resolved to withdraw and move on someplace else, as he had done six times in the past. He could not take leave openly, due to the military commander's orders, so he changed clothes with a beggar, and in this dress made his departure by night. 

Many days on the road later, he came to a place where he discovered a monastery called "Barleycorn," whose men were distinguished for their piety. He went in and greeted them all, and was struck by the order and consistency of the holy brothers' life, and the greatness of the love they shared. "I recognize this way of life," he said to himself, "as if it bore the stamp of my old precepts. I wonder how they were spread into this region, for their leaders are new to me. Never on all the roads I've traveled have I seen anything like it." Then, on learning who had instituted the monastery and its principles, he discovered that it was founded by one of his own flock! And he gave glory to God, Who showed him that his labors had borne fruit, even in that [unknown, but seemingly westward-lying] place. 

The Life of Alexander the Sleepless III.40-2

Oil in classical Arabic tradition

Although there is no historical evidence by which a first discoverer of oil and its properties might be singled out, classical Arabic tradition can be identified as the premodern linguistic culture most permeated by words for oil, in its onomastics, proverbs, and poetry going back to pre-Islamic times. Occurrences of the word nafṭ in classical verse have modern political implications, highlighting the historical priority of the Arabs where oil is concerned, and the falsehood of Western claims to it. On this point, it should not go without saying that Western notice of oil in the region began with an Arab merchant from Bahrain, who mentioned it to a quartermaster of the British army while at Addis Ababa. That officer resigned his post forthwith and transferred to the Gulf in search of oil.

The word nafṭ calls attention for its antiquity and its particularity, indicating that Arabs have understood oil's nature for over 2,000 years. It denotes the reality of oil better than terms in use by the Europeans who, judging from basic appearances, called it petroleum, that is, "rock oil," as if it were a culinary oil pressed from rock. The Arabic designation of nafṭ is less naïve, designating a rare substance with distinct properties [from those of botanic oils, which are called in Arabic by a different word]. But those who hypothesize a relation between nafṭ and nabt "vegetation" [best defended through a shared connection to nabṭ, which is "the issue of water from the ground"] hit on the fact that geological oil is an organic substance. This would not preclude the possibility that nafṭ entered Arabic from another cultural domain, or that it derives from more ancient languages.

Nafṭ has an array of meanings in Arabic. As a substantive noun, it refers to petroleum. As an epithet, it conveys the sense of boiling, sneezing, or furious anger; correspondingly, the verb nafaṭa yanfiṭu is said of a pot [when it boils], a goat [when it sneezes], and a man [suffused by anger]. Nafṭ also signifies a blister filled with fluid that appears on the hand after manual labor. There is clear affinity among these meanings, in that they all have to do with the emergence of something with force and violence. And although this similitude was incomprehensible until modern times, the topology of an oil deposit resembles that of a blister on the skin.

Nafṭ also carries the meaning of tar (qār), which is properly speaking a category of nafṭ. Ibn Manẓūr in Lisān al-‘arab (art. √qwr) states that "Qār is a black substance that camels are smeared with [to treat their mange], and also boats, in order to prevent water from seeping in." The Arabs were well acquainted with the fundamental properties of tar, in particular the intensity of its blackness and the impossibility of its taking on other colors. There are many proverbs to this effect, such as "I'll do that when tar turns white" [i.e., never]. In Averroes's commentary on the Posterior Analytics (I.6), he mentions [tar, saying: "Whereas predication of essential attributes is possible when these are substances, it is necessary when they are accidents, in] the way that white is predicated of snow, and black is predicated of qār." [....] And Mu‘āwiya al-Ḍabbī said (meter: ṭawīl):

     Until I see tar gleaming like the dawn [mughraban],
         or I see the mute stones speaking, I am stuck here.

The word mughrab is glossed as "white" in Lisān al-‘arab (art. √ghrb), where the verse is explained: "The poet wound up in a spot that was disagreeable to him, from which rescue was impossible unless tar should turn white, or stones begin speaking—things that do not and should not happen in the normal course of events." These proverbial expressions are sufficient to indicate that petroleum was a familiar, everyday part of early Arab life. 

After the entry of the Mongols into Baghdad at the end of the Abbasid Dynasty, the scientific heritage of the Arabs suffered major losses, especially in the discipline of chemistry. However, the poems and stories that remain have a lot to tell us. Poetry has many functions, one of the most important being the witness it bears to matters that are not otherwise recorded, thereby preserving the history of the nation. Even low forms of verse spoken hundreds of years ago have important political and sociohistorical implications for our time. Among these is the fact that the Muslims of Baghdad were familiar with petroleum. Nor were they the only ones, but—as indicated in books of Islamic law and history, as well as poetry [of the 9th century CE]—Muslims were the first to establish a legal and administrative framework for the utilization of oil, which they extracted from deposits called nafāṭāt. The city of al-Qayyāra outside Baghdad was so named precisely for the number of nafāṭāt in that region. And Dhū Qār [site of the famous battle] was nothing but a boggy area where oil rose to the earth's surface.

To oversee the qayyārāt and nafāṭāt and regulate their exploitation by the oil sector, the Abbasid caliph appointed an "oil czar" (wālī al-nafāṭāt), whose office resembled present-day ministries of oil. This is attested in verses [by ‘Abd al-Ṣamad ibn al-Mu‘adhdhal] appearing in al-Zamakhsarī's Campsite of the Righteous, later quoted in the chapter "On vices of governorship" in Ibrāhīm ibn Muḥammad al-Bayhaqī's Virtues and Vices [and, before either of these, in the Virtues and Their Opposites of al-Jāḥiẓ] (meter: ṭawīl):

     By my life! You put on such pompous airs,
         as if ministering from the dais of al-Faḍl ibn Marwān. 
     And if, Abū 'l-‘Abbās, you governed in his stead
         as my superior, I would not expect your character to change.
     How proud would you be of musk and ambergris,
         if you're this proud to oversee pools of nafṭ?
     Brook your hauteur. Don't lose your humility.
         A governor of nafṭ ought not be haughty.

One of the topmost authorities of energy law in our time—a British legal counselor to the World Bank and a number of oil-rich countries—was reduced to amazement when I recited these verses and explained them to him, for Westerners think they were first to bring oil extraction within the domain of law in the late nineteenth century. And these verses highlight the fact that the Abbasids were the first to do this. 

From "Political Implications of the Word Nafṭ in Classical Arabic Tradition" (2018), a blog post by Anas Alhajji

Alexander the Sleepless XIV

Theodotus, bishop of Antioch, was in thrall to a party of wretched hypocrites (called periodeutae). On learning that the blessed Alexander had entered the city with a mob of monks singing psalms without pause, he gave orders for their abuse and expulsion with blows, and this warrant to injure the servants of God was carried out unsparingly as they were driven away. But the holy one saw through the Devil's trappings and, in the middle of the night, together with his brethren, he re-entered the city unseen, and found an old bathhouse in which to resume their continuous singing of hymns. [The acoustics were probably amazing.] Their audacity sparked the bishop's wrath, which he dared not take out on them again for fear of the people of his city. For the Antiochenes, having heard of Alexander's incredible feats and seen them for themselves, revered the blessed one as a prophet, wherefore they abandoned the church to attend to him and his wondrous teachings.

Finding that honor, glory, and the license to speak universally without restraint were now his, and that his preaching was enjoyed by all, and that they were ready to do anything he called them to, he saw it was time for action, and turned straightaway to caring for the city's poor. Here too, the holy one's majesty of soul is cause for wonder. Hounded from place to place, this man without possessions focused his zeal on the construction of a hospice. He gathered the city's wealthy before him, and lectured them as the divine presence dictated, and that is how the necessities of the hospice were furnished. Even with the bishop and the military commander, he was conspicuously unrestrained in his complaints about many things they had left undone. In short, he made himself the teacher and the trainer of all and sundry.

The Life of Alexander the Sleepless III.38-9

Aubade

          (On ½ a line of Suhrawardi)

                    Why did papyrus have to go away
                    Why not come in sheets to write on
                    or else forget it as it’s happening
                    and forever wonder why
                    It takes a lot of time to turn aside
                    from all I thought I saw along the way
                    Bright planet, form a sign for me
                    because don’t you know the
                    stars that wander are the noble ones
                    Hasty are we, in harness pressing on
                    The nearest place to where we are
                    is miles away
                    Some thing to travel on
                    as high as it is wide
                    the next to go will be the ultimate
                    Read it to me softly, now
                    from papers on the floor
                    printed lightly with two feet to fly on

          By David Larsen (2022)

It's Out and It's On

    

      Thank you Patrick Durgin, editor and publisher of Kenning Editions
      Thank you Faride Mereb, who designed the cover
      Thanks to all subscribers to the press
      Thanks to Sinan and Rachel

      ISBN 979-8-9856628-2-5
      iv + 75 pages, 21 cm. $16
      Poetry is a furnace

Out of My Hut

     Get out of my hut, you mice who hug the shadows!
     You mice will find no fodder in Leonidas's crock.
     The old man's fine with two barley loaves, if there's salt.
     My forefathers lived this way, and I heed their example.
     So why scrabble in my corners, treat-seeking
     where prandial tidbits are never spilled?
     Go on to houses that aren't so frugal
     where sustenance is yours to scuttle away with

By Leonidas (Greek Anthology 6.302)

Auspicious Sana‘a

     I say to my near one through flowing tears
         when the will to go abroad is on me:
     Let me make my journey, let me pass unmourned.
         The stars that wander are the noble ones.
     Travel leads to betterment of outcome.
         Sitting still in comfort is the way of ruin.
     In darkness I see illumination,
         as if day switched place with night,
     when lightning from [auspicious] Sana‘a reminds me
         my destination isn't far away.
     Why should I rejoice at spending nights out in the desert
         when high above Ursa Minor is my home?
     And how will I be food for worms, with
         four elements on every side?
     How long will I live next to Draco
         with constellated serpents for my friends?
     My union with that light will be annihilation,
         and my passing out of knowing left from right,
     and the walls will echo with a pounding
         by rejectors of my secrets with their heads.

By Suhrawardi (meter: wāfir)

If in New York City and If Not

Mysteries of the simile

On this subject, there is a story about ‘Abd al-Rahman the son of Hassan ibn Thabit. When he was a boy, he ran crying to his father, "I got stung by a flying creature!"
    "My son," said Hassan, "tell us how it looked."
    "Like it was dressed in mantles of Yemen," he said, for it was a hornet that had stung him.
    "By the Lord of the Kaaba," Hassan said, "my son will be a poet!"

As you see, what demonstrated the boy's talent for poetry was his creation of a simile. This is what distinguishes the poet's mind from the non-poet's. Hassan rejoiced at this, just as he rejoiced at his son's poetic spirit when [a schoolteacher rounded up a group of boys for some mischief, and was going to punish ‘Abd Allah along with them, until*] ‘Abd Allah said (meter: basīṭ):

    God knows I was [not there, but] in the house of
        Hassan, hunting insects on the wing all by myself.

You might say that similes are special effects that substitute for painting and drawing, but that's not what provoked Hassan's response. What pleased him was that ‘Abd Allah said the bug was as if "dressed" (multaff). If he had called it "a flying creature with stripes like a Yemeni mantle," the expression would be less effective, for it gives away the point of likeness. The combination [of hornet and mantle is by itself sufficient to imply the stripes, and this] was the sign of young ‘Abd Allah’s genius.

Now even though "dressed" was what provoked Hassan's admiration, it is still a case of simile, and an exemplary one at that, insofar as the hornet's likeness is captured by its "wearing" of the mantle's stripes and colors.

From The Secrets of Eloquence by ‘Abd al-Qahir al-Jurjani

*Context supplied in al-Kāmil by al-Mubarrad

Shortener of days

It was reported to me by Abu ‘Ubayd Allah al-Marzubani that Ibn Durayd said: It was reported to me by ‘Abd al-Rahman, the fraternal nephew of al-Asma‘i, that

Al-Asma‘i said: I was staying with a man of the Banu Kilab who had celebrated his marriage at Basra, and was raising his family at Dariyya. We were at Dariyya's market when we were approached by an old woman of dignified dress and unfaded beauty, mounted on a camel. She bade the camel kneel, and tied it up and came toward us, supporting herself on a shepherd's crook. She sat by us, and said, "Is any poetry being recited?"
     I said to my Kilabi friend, "Have you got anything?" "No," he said. So I recited for her these verses by Bishr ibn ‘Abd al-Rahman al-Ansari (meter: kāmil):

     The days have a shortener. Who spends them with her
         craves more, even at the cost of other friendships.
     The likes of her choke a man with longing
         for her demure air, and her antelope's eye—
     the eye of a doe of the lowlands, sallow of hide
         as if jaundiced by the deer's shyness.

     At this, the old woman rose to her knees, and began tracing lines on the ground with her crook as she recited [these verses by Ibn al-Dumayna]: (meter: ṭawīl):

     Dear Umayma of my heart, do as you will.
         But let me voice my passion and my greeting
             [to this spot].
     When you tell me, "Walk through fire," I know it's
         your caprice. But could it bring us closer, all the same?
     Capricious as you are, I take it as a gift,
         and put my foot in fire and tread it.
     On the sandhill where moringa grows, ask the tallest tree
         if I hailed the ruins of your abode,
     and if I choose to haunt the ruins
         at nightfall like a heartsick person.
     May you be happy at the way my cheek shines,
         and how I clutch myself at losing you.

Al-Asma‘i said: By God, the world around me went dim from the eloquence and sweetness of her delivery and dialect. I went up to her and said, "My God! Your recitation surpasses mine." And I saw a gleam of laughter in her eye, as she went on to recite (meter: ṭawīl):

     Many a guarded maid casts off reserve when I come calling,
         dragging a train of infatuation behind.
     They let love mount, and when it's theirs,
         rip it away and swell our battles.
     Their talk is civil, low and yielding,
         winning them soft hearts for free.
     They foil the plans of the softhearted fool.
         Their jest and earnestness maze the astute.
     My blamers, meanwhile, blame the love
         that tells me to ignore dissuaders.

[The Tribulations of Impassioned Lovers by al-Sarraj adds this postscript:
     "Brava!" I said, "by Him Who created you!" "You really mean it?" she asked. "Yes," I said. "Then I share the praise with you as an equal," she said, and decamped. And by God, I have heard no poetry recital more exquisite than the one she gave.]

The meaning of "shortener of days" in the Ansari's verse is that his joy in the woman's presence is complete. So sweet are her beauty and her conversation that any day spent with her is short, for brevity is an attribute of joyful days.

From the Dictations of Abu 'l-Qasim ‘Ali al-Murtada

Oíche Shamhna Shona Daoibh

Inside rear cover of Evidence of Frozentown 4 (1995): "Dead Friends,"
ed. Rachel Frost. Linoleum block print, 7" x 7"

Somebody stole a knife

Abu 'l-Fath Kushajim elegized a penknife that was stolen from him, saying (meter: basīṭ):

     God's war be on the bureau scribes
          who think that others' knives are theirs for lifting!
     I am the victim of an elegant deceit.
          Its edge was like a sword's, honed finely.
     Vacant is the resting-place where it had spent an age
          beside the inkwell of a man distracted by writing,
     now weeping for the blade that Time made away with,
          the torturer of pen-nibs raided from me.
     It hewed my pens and made them special.
          The cuts that vexed them pleasured me,
     as I brought laughter to my pages, cloaking them
          with flowers, whole beds of them becoming to the eye.
     And it was good for spot removal. It scaled away each fleck
          and left my pages like the cheeks of calf-eyed maidens.
     It had an onyx handle fastened to the blade
          by metal pins of gorgeous make and fashion.
     Pins of gold and silver, elegant and fine—
          a deity, praise to Him, told them to "Be!"
     But my cutter turned malicious, taking joy
          in infamy, overmastery, and derision.
     I kept it close—so close, it impersonated
          my aloofness and my lofty rank.
     There is no substitute. Long as I live,
          I'll never be consoled and never forget.
     I'd give up this whole world, and my faith in the world to come,
          as ransom for the knife they stole from me.

From The Flowers of Belles-lettres and Fruits of Intellect of Abu Ishaq Ibrahim al-Husri al-Qayrawani

City of poetry

I am informed by Abu Hatim that ‘Imran ibn ‘Aqil said: I was told by my father—meaning ‘Aqil ibn Bilal—that he was told by his father—meaning Bilal ibn Jarir—that [Bilal's father]

Jarir said: I paid a call on one of the Umayyad caliphs, who asked me, "Can we talk about the poets?" "Of course," I said.
      "Who was the greatest poet?" he asked. "Ibn ‘Ishrin (The Child of Twenty)," I said, meaning Tarafa [who lost his life at that age].
      "What do you have to say about [Zuhayr] ibn Abi Sulma and al-Nabigha [al-Dhubyani]?" he asked. I said, "Their poetry was woven at a loom."
      "And Imru’ al-Qays ibn Hujr?" he asked. I said, "That villain took poetry for a pair of sandals, to trample as he pleased."
      "And Dhu 'l-Rumma?" he asked. I said, "He can do with poetry what no one else can do."
      "And al-Akhtal?" he asked. I said, "Up to his death, the [full measure of the] poetry within him went unrevealed."
      "And al-Farazdaq?" he asked. I said: "He grips poetry in his hand like a [bow of] grewia."
      "You've left nothing for yourself!" the caliph said. "By God," I said, "of course I have, O Commander of the Faithful! I am the city of poetry, from which it sallies forth and in which takes refuge. Truly, I glorify poetry in a way that no one before me has."
      "And what way is that?" the caliph asked. I said, "My love-lyrics are innovative, my invective verse is ruinous, and my panegyric is uplifting. In ramal I'm abundant, in rajaz I'm the sea, and I compose in modes of poetry unknown to anyone before me."

From the Dictations of Abu ‘Ali al-Qali

Another Book of Songs

In the handwriting of Abu 'l-Hasan ‘Ali b. Muhammad b. ‘Ubayd b. al-Zubayr al-Kufi al-Asadi,
I found it written that he was told by Fadl b. Muhammad al-Yazidi:

I was with Ishaq b. Ibrahim al-Mawsili when a man came up and said, "O Abu Muhammad! [That is, Ishaq.] Give us the Book of Songs."
      "Which one?" said Ishaq. "The book I wrote, or the one that was written in my name?"—meaning by the former, his book of reports on individual singers, and by the latter, the Big Book of Songs that's out there.

I was informed by Abu 'l-Faraj al-Isbahani that he was told by Abu Bakr Muhammad b. Khalaf Waki‘ that

Hammad b. Ishaq said: "My father never wrote that book," (meaning The Big Book of Songs) "nor claimed credit for it. Most of the lyrics in it are falsely inserted into reports of singers who never sang them. To this day, most them have never been performed. Comparison to the songbooks my father actually wrote shows how worthless that book is. It was cobbled together after his death by one of his copyists, except for the opening chapter on the permissibility [of music], which my father did write, although the reports in it are my narrations [from my father]."

Abu 'l-Faraj told me: This is the story as I remember Abu Bakr Waki‘ telling it, though not verbatim. And I heard from Jahza [b. Musa al-Barmaki] that he knew the copyist's name:

"The copyist was one Sindi b. ‘Ali, who had a shop along the Archway of Rubbish and used to copy books for Ishaq.* For the book that he foisted on him, he worked with a collaborator."
      This is the book that used to be known by the title al-Surāh (The Night-Travelers). Its first chapter is on permissibility [of music], and is the work of Ishaq without a doubt.

From the Fihrist of (Ibn) al-Nadim

* Footnote by Ayman Fu’ad Sayyid: "In the sources at my disposal, I do not find [in Baghdad] an 'Archway of Rubbish.' Perhaps it is the Archway of al-Harrani mentioned ahead [in the entry for Ja‘far b. Ahmad al-Marwazi] that is meant. In al-Ya‘qubi's day, there were over a hundred stationers' shops in the markets of that area."