The Reformation

by Will Durant

  History has for its true object to make us understand the social state of man, i.e., his civilization; to reveal to us the phenomena that naturally accompany primitive life, and then the refinement of manners... the diverse superiorities that peoples acquire, and which beget empires and dynasties; the diverse occupations, professions, sciences, and arts; and lastly all the changes that the nature of things can effect in the nature of society.57

  Believing himself the first to write history in this fashion, he asks pardon for inevitable errors:

  I confess that of all men I am the least able to traverse so vast a field.... I pray that men of ability and learning will examine my work with good will, and when they find faults will indulgently correct them. That which I offer to the public will have little value in the eyes of scholars .... but one should always be able to count on the courtesy of his colleagues.58

  He hopes that his work will help in the dark days that he foresees:

  When the world experiences a complete overturn it seems to change its nature in order to permit new creation and a new organization. Hence there is need today of an historian who can describe the state of the world, of its countries and peoples, and indicate the changes in customs and beliefs.59

  He devotes some proud pages to pointing out the errors of some historians. They lost themselves, he feels, in the mere chronicling of events, and rarely rose to the elucidation of causes and effects. They accepted fable almost as readily as fact, gave exaggerated statistics, and explained too many things by supernatural agency. As for himself, he proposes to rely entirely on natural factors in explaining events. He will judge the statements of historians by the present experience of mankind, and will reject any alleged occurrence that would now be accounted impossible. Experience must judge tradition.60 His own method, in the Muqaddama, is first to deal with the philosophy of history; then with professions, occupations, and crafts; then with the history of science and art. In succeeding volumes he gives the political history of the various nations, taking them one by one, deliberately sacrificing the unity of time to that of place. The true subject of history, says Ibn-Khaldun, is civilization: how it arises, how it is maintained, how it develops letters, sciences, and arts, and why it decays.61 Empires, like individuals, have a life and trajectory which are their own. They grow, they mature, they decline.62 What are the causes of this sequence?

  The basic conditions of the sequence are geographical. Climate exercises a general but basic influence. The cold north eventually produces, even in peoples of southern origin, a white skin, light hair, blue eyes, and a serious disposition; the tropics produce in time a dark skin, black hair, “dilatation of the animal spirits,” lightness of mind, gaiety, quick transports of pleasure, leading to song and dance.63 Food affects character: a heavy diet of meats, condiments, and grains begets heaviness of body and mind, and quick succumbing to famine or infection; a light diet, such as desert peoples eat, makes for agile and healthy bodies, clearness of mind, and resistance to disease.64 There is no inherent inequality of potential ability among the peoples of the earth; their advancement or retardation is determined by geographical conditions, and can be altered by a change in those conditions, or by migration to a different habitat.65

  Economic conditions are only less powerful than the geographical. Ibn-Khaldun divides all societies into nomad or sedentary according to their means of getting food, and ascribes most wars to the desire for a better food supply. Nomad tribes sooner or later conquer settled communities because nomads are compelled by the conditions of their life to maintain the martial qualities of courage, endurance, and solidarity. Nomads may destroy a civilization, but they never make one; they are absorbed, in blood and culture, by the conquered, and the nomad Arabs are no exception. Since a people is never long content with its food supply, war is natural. It is war that generates and renews political authority. Hence monarchy is the usual form of government, and has prevailed through nearly all history.66 The fiscal policy of a government may make or break a society; excessive taxation, or the entry of a government into production and distribution, can stifle incentive, enterprise, and competition, and kill the goose that lays the revenues.67 On the other hand, an excessive concentration of wealth may tear a society to pieces by promoting revolution.68

  There are moral forces in history. Empires are sustained by the solidarity of the people, and this can be best secured through the inculcation and practice of the same religion; Ibn-Khaldun agrees with the popes, the Inquisition, and the Protestant Reformers on the value of unanimity in faith.

  To conquer, one must rely upon the allegiance of a group animated with one corporate spirit and end. Such a union of hearts and wills can operate only through divine power and religious support.... . When men give their hearts and passions to a desire for worldly goods, they become jealous of one another, and fall into discord.... . If, however, they reject the world and its vanities for the love of God .... jealousies disappear, discord is stilled, men help one another devotedly; their union makes them stronger; the good cause makes rapid progress, and culminates in the formation of a great and powerful empire.69

  Religion is not only an aid in war, it is likewise a boon to order in a society and to peace of mind in the individual. These can be secured only by a religious faith adopted without questioning. The philosophers concoct a hundred systems, but none has found a substitute for religion as a guide and inspiration for human life. “Since men can never understand the world, it is better to accept the faith transmitted by an inspired legislator, who knows better than we do what is better for us, and has prescribed for us what we should believe and do.”70 After this orthodox prelude our philosopher-historian proceeds to a naturalistic interpretation of history.

  Every empire passes through successive phases. (1) A victorious nomad tribe settles down to enjoy its conquest of a terrain or state. “The least civilized peoples make the most extensive conquests.”71 (2) As social relations become more complex, a more concentrated authority is required for the maintenance of order; the tribal chieftain becomes king. (3) In this settled order wealth grows, cities multiply, education and literature develop, the arts find patrons, science and philosophy lift their heads. Advanced urbanization and comfortable wealth mark the beginning of decay. (4) The enriched society comes to prefer pleasure, luxury, and ease to enterprise, risk, or war; religion loses its hold on human imagination or belief; morals deteriorate, pederasty grows; the martial virtues and pursuits decline; mercenaries are hired to defend the society; these lack the ardor of patriotism or religious faith; the poorly defended wealth invites attack by the hungry, seething millions beyond the frontiers. (5) External attack, or internal intrigue, or both together, overthrow the state.72 Such was the cycle of Rome, of the Almoravids and Almohads in Spain, of Islam in Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Persia; and “it is always so.” 73

  These are a few of the thousands of ideas that make the Muqaddama the most remarkable philosophical product of its century, Ibn-Khaldun has his own notions on almost everything but theology, where he thinks it unwise to be original. While writing a major work of philosophy he pronounces philosophy dangerous, and advises his readers to let it alone;74 probably he meant metaphysics and theology rather than philosophy in its wider sense as an attempt to see human affairs in a large perspective. At times he talks like the simplest old woman in the market place; he accepts miracles, magic, the “evil eye,” the occult properties of the alphabet, divination through dreams, entrails, or the flight of birds.75 Yet he admires science, admits the superiority of the Greeks to the Moslems in that field, and mourns the decline of scientific studies in Islam.76 He rejects alchemy, but acknowledges some faith in astrology.77

  Certain other discounts must be made. Though Ibn-Khaldun is as broad as Islam, he shares many of its limitations. In the three volumes of the Muqaddama he finds room for but seven pages on Christianity. He makes only casual mention of Greece, Rome, and medieval Europe. When he has written the history of North Africa, Moslem
Egypt, and the Near and Middle East, he believes that he has narrated “the history of all peoples.”78 Sometimes he is culpably ignorant: he thinks Aristotle taught from a porch, and Socrates from a tub.79 His actual writing of history falls far short of his theoretical introduction; the volumes on the Berbers and the Orient are a dreary record of dynastic genealogies, palace intrigues, and petty wars. Apparently he intended these volumes to be political history only, and offered the Muqaddama as a history—though it is rather a general consideration—of culture.

  To recover our respect for Ibn-Khaldun we need only ask what Christian work of philosophy in the fourteenth century can stand beside the Prolegomena. Perhaps some ancient authors had covered part of the ground that he charted; and among his own people al-Masudi (d. 956), in a work now lost, had discussed the influence of religion, economics, morals, and environment on the character and laws of a people, and the causes of political decline.80 Ibn-Khaldun, however, felt, and with some reason, that he had created the science of sociology. Nowhere in literature before the eighteenth century can we find a philosophy of history, or a system of sociology, comparable in power, scope, and keen analysis with Ibn-Khaldun’s. Our leading contemporary philosopher of history has judged the Muqaddama to be “undoubtedly the greatest work of its kind that has ever yet been created by any mind in any time or place.”81 Herbert Spencer’s Principles of Sociology (1876–96) may compare favorably with it, but Spencer had many aides. In any case we may agree with a distinguished historian of science, that “the most important historical work of the Middle Ages”82 was the Muqaddama of Ibn-Khaldun.

  CHAPTER XXXI

  Suleiman the Magnificent

  1520–66

  I. AFRICAN ISLAM: 1200-1566

  IT is hard for us, pigeonholed in Christendom, to realize that from the eighth to the thirteenth century Islam was culturally, politically, and militarily superior to Europe. Even in its decline in the sixteenth century it prevailed from Delhi and beyond to Casablanca, from Adrianople to Aden, from Tunis to Timbuktu. Visiting the Sudan in 1353, Ibn-Batuta found there a creditable civilization under Moslem leadership; and a Negro Mohammedan, Abd-er-Rahman Sa’di, would later write a revealing and intelligent history, Tarik-es-Sudcm (c. 1650), describing private libraries of 1,600 volumes in Timbuktu, and massive mosques whose ruins attest a departed glory.

  The Marini dynasty (1195–1270) made Morocco independent, and developed Fez and Marraqesh into major cities, each with august gateways, imposing mosques, learned libraries, colleges squatting amid shady colonnades, and wordy bazarres where one could buy anything at half the price. In the thirteenth century Fez had some 125,000 inhabitants, probably more than any city in Europe except Constantinople, Rome, and Paris. In its Karouine Mosque, seat of Morocco’s oldest university, religion and science lived in concord, taking eager students from all African Islam, and—in arduous courses of three to twelve years—training teachers, lawyers, theologians, and statesmen. Emir Yaqub II (r. 1269–86), ruling Morocco from Fez or Marraqesh, was one of the most enlightened princes of a progressive century, a just governor, a wise philanthropist, tempering theology with philosophy, shunning bigotry, and encouraging friendly intercourse with Europeans. The two cities received many refugees from Spain, and these brought a new stimulus to science, art, and industry. Ibn-Batuta, who had seen nearly all of vast Islam, called Morocco the earthly paradise.

  On the way from Fez to Oran the modern traveler is surprised to find at Tlemcen the modest remnant of what in the thirteenth century was a city of 125,000 souls Three of its once sixty-four mosques—the Jama-el-Kebir (1136), the mosque of Abul Hassan (1298), and that of El-Halawi (1353)—are among the finest in the Mohammedan world; marble columns, complex mosaics, brilliant mihrabs, arcaded courts, carved wood, and towering minarets survive to tell of a splendor gone and almost forgotten. Here the Abd-el-Wahid dynasty (1248–1337, 1359—1553) maintained for three centuries a relatively enlightened rule, protecting Christians and Jews in religious freedom, and providing patronage to letters and arts. After the Turks captured the city (1553) it lost its importance as a center of trade, and declined into the shadows of history.

  Farther east, Algiers flourished through a mixture of commerce and piracy. Half-hidden in a rock-bound semicircular bay, this picturesque port, rising in tier upon tier of white tenements and palaces from the Mediterranean to the Casbah, provided a favorite lair for “privateers”; even from Pompey’s days the corsairs of that coast had preyed upon defenseless shipping. After 1492 Algiers became a refuge for Moors fleeing from Spain; many of them joined the pirate crews, and turned with vengeful fury upon what Christian shipping they could waylay. Growing in number and audacity, the pirates manned fleets as strong as national navies, and raided the North Mediterranean coasts. Spain retaliated with protective expeditions that captured Oran, Algiers, and Tripoli (1509–10).

  In 1516 a colorful buccaneer entered the picture. The Italians called him Barbarossa from his red beard; his actual name was Khair ed-Din Khizr; he was a Greek of Lesbos, who came with his brother Horush to join the pirate crew. While Khair ed-Din raised himself to command of the fleet, Horush led ‘an army against Algiers, expelled the Spanish garrison, made himself governor of the city, and died in battle (1518). Khair ed-Din, succeeding to his brother’s power, ruled with energy and skill. To consolidate his position he went to Constantinople, and offered Selim I sovereignty over Tripoli, Tunisia, and Algeria in return for a Turkish force adequate to maintain his own authority as vassal governor of these regions. Selim agreed, and Suleiman confirmed the arrangement. In 1533 Khair ed-Din became the hero of Western Islam by ferrying 70,000 Moors from inhospitable Spain to Africa. Appointed first admiral of the entire Turkish fleet, Barbarossa, with eighty-four vessels at his command, raided town after town on the coasts of Sicily and Italy, and took thousands of Christians to be sold as slaves. Landing near Naples, he almost succeeded in capturing Giulia Gonzaga Colonna, reputed the loveliest woman in Italy. She escaped half clad, rode off with one knight as her escort, and, on reaching her destination, ordered his death for reasons which she left to be inferred.

  But Barbarossa aimed at less perishable booty than a beautiful woman. Landing his Janissaries at Bizerte, he marched against Tunis (1534). The Nefsid dynasty had ruled that city reasonably well since 1336; arts and letters had flourished under their patronage; but Muley Hassan, the current prince, had alienated the people by his cruelties. He fled as Barbarossa approached; Tunis was taken bloodlessly; Tunisia was added to the Ottoman realm, and Barbarossa was master of the Mediterranean.

  It was another crisis for Christendom, for the unchallenged Turkish fleet could at any moment secure a foothold for Islam in the Italian boot. Strangely enough, Francis I was at this time allied with the Turks, and Pope Clement VII was allied with France. Fortunately, Clement died (September 25, 1534); Pope Paul III pledged funds to Charles V for an attack on Barbarossa, and Andrea Doria offered the full co-operation of the Genoese fleet. In the spring of 1535 Charles assembled at Cagliari, in Sardinia, 400 vessels and 30,000 troops. Crossing the Mediterranean, he laid siege to La Goletta, a fort commanding the Gulf of Tunis. After a month’s fighting, La Goletta fell, and the Imperial army marched on to Tunis. Barbarossa tried to stop the advance; he was defeated and fled. Christian slaves in Tunis broke their chains and opened the gates, and Charles entered the city unresisted. For two days he surrendered it to pillage by his soldiers, who would otherwise have mutinied; thousands of Moslems were massacred; the art of centuries was shattered in a day or two. The Christian slaves were joyously freed, and the surviving Mohammedan population was enslaved. Charles reinstated Muley Hassan as his tributary vassal, left garrisons in Bona and La Goletta, and returned to Europe.

  Barbarossa escaped to Constantinople, and there, with Suleiman’s funds, built a new fleet of 200 ships. In July 1537, this force effected a landing at Taranto, and Christendom was again besieged. A new “Holy League” of Venice, the papacy, and the Empire took form
, and gathered 200 vessels off Corfu. On September 27 the rival armadas, at the entrance to the Ambracian Gulf, fought an engagement almost in the same waters where Antony and Cleopatra had met Octavian at Actium. Barbarossa won, and again ruled the seas. Sailing east, he took one after another of the Venetian possessions in the Aegean and Greece, and forced Venice to a separate peace.

  Charles tried to win Barbarossa to his service by gifts and an offer to make him vassal king of North Africa, but Khair ed-Din preferred Islamic bait. In October 1541, Charles and Doria led an expedition against Algiers; it was defeated on land by Barbarossa’s army, and at sea by a storm. Barbarossa returned the call by ravaging Calabria and landing, unhindered, at Ostia, the port of Rome. The great capital shivered in its shrines, but Paul III was at that time on good terms with Francis, and Barbarossa, allegedly out of courtesy to his ally, paid in cash for all that he took at Ostia, and departed peacefully.1 He sailed up to Toulon, where his fleet was welcomed by the matter-of-fact French; he asked that the church bells should suspend their ringing while Allah’s vessels were in the harbor, for the bells disturbed his sleep, and his request was law. He joined a French fleet in taking Nice and Villefranche from the Emperor. Then, seventy-seven, the triumphant corsair retired with full honors to die in bed at eighty (1546).

  Bona, La Goletta, and Tripoli fell back to Islam, and the Ottoman Empire reached from Algiers to Baghdad. Only one Moslem power dared to challenge its predominance in Islam.

  II. SAFAVID PERSIA: 1502–76

  Persia, which had enjoyed so many periods of cultural fertility, was now entering another epoch of political vitality and artistic creation. When Shah Ismail I founded the Safavid dynasty (1502–1736) Persia was a chaos of kinglets: Iraq, Yazd, Samnan, Firuzkuh, Diyarbekir, Kashan, Khurasan, Qandahar, Balkh, Kirman, and Azerbaijan were independent states. In a succession of ruthless campaigns Ismail of Azerbaijan conquered most of these principalities, captured Herat and Baghdad, and made Tabriz again the capital of a powerful kingdom. The people welcomed this native dynasty, gloried in the unity and power it gave their country, and expressed their spirit in a new outburst of Persian art.