The Penguin Anthology of Classical Arabic Literature

by Robert Irwin

  ‘ “So I got some clothes of a kind difficult to sell and brought them and offered them to him and chaffered with him until he agreed to buy them on credit. The luckless regard credit as a gift, and the unsuccessful reckon it as a present. I asked him for a document for the amount, and he drew one up in my favor. Then I neglected to claim what was due until he was in the direst straits. And then I came and demanded what he owed. He asked for a delay, to which I agreed; he asked me for more clothes, which I brought him; and I asked him to give me his house as security and as a pledge in my hand. He did so, and then I induced him in successive negotiation to sell it to me so that it became mine by rising fortune, lucky chance, and a strong arm. Many a man works unwittingly for others, but I, praise be to God, am lucky and successful in matters such as these. Just think, O my master, that a few nights ago when I was sleeping in the house together with my household, there was a knock at the door. I asked, ‘Who is this untimely caller?’ and there was a woman with a necklace of pearls, as clear as water and as delicate as a mirage, offering it for sale. I took it from her as if by theft, so low was the price for which I bought it. It will be of obvious value and abundant profit, with the help and favor of God. I have only told you this story so that you may know how lucky I am in business, for good luck can make water flow from stones. God is great! Nobody will inform you more truthfully than you yourself, and no day is nearer than yesterday. I bought this mat at an auction. It was brought out of the houses of the Ibn al-Furat family when their assets were confiscated and seized. I had been looking for something like this for a long time and had not found it. ‘Fate is a pregnant woman;’ no one knows what it will bear. It chanced that I was at Bab al-Taq, and this mat was displayed in the market. I weighed out so many dinars for it. By God, look at its fineness, its softness, its workmanship, its color, for it is of immense value. Its like occurs only rarely. If you have heard of Abu ‘Imran the mat maker, it is he who made it. He has a son who has now succeeded him in his shop, and only with him can the finest mats be found. By my life, never buy mats from any shop but his, for a true believer gives good advice to his brothers, especially those admitted to the sanctity of his table. But let us return to the madira, for the hour of noon has come. Slave! Basin and water!”

  ‘God is great, I thought, release draws nearer and escape becomes easier.

  ‘The slave stepped forward, and the merchant said, “Do you see this slave? He is of Greek origin and brought up in Iraq. Come here, slave! Uncover your head! Raise your leg! Bare your arm! Show your teeth! Walk up and down!”

  ‘The slave did as he said, and the merchant said, “By God, who bought him? By God, Abu’l-‘Abbas bought him from the slave-dealer. Put down the basin and bring the jug!”

  ‘The slave put it down and the merchant picked it up, turned it around, and looked it over; then he struck it and said, “Look at this yellow copper – like a glowing coal or a piece of gold! It is Syrian copper, worked in Iraq. This is not one of those wornout valuables, though it has known the houses of kings and has circulated in them. Look at its beauty and ask me, ‘When did you buy it?’ By God, I bought it in the year of the famine, and I put it aside for this moment. Slave! The jug!”

  ‘He brought it, and the merchant took it and turned it around and said, “Its spout is part of it, all one piece. This jug goes only with this basin, this basin goes only with this seat of honor, this seat of honor fits only in this house, and this house is beautiful only with this guest! Pour the water, slave, for it is time to eat! By God, do you see this water? How pure it is, as blue as a cat’s eye, as clear as a crystal rod! It was drawn from the Euphrates and served after being kept overnight so that it comes as bright as the tongue of flame from a candle and clear as a tear. What counts is not the liquid, but the receptacle. Nothing will show you the cleanliness of the receptacles more clearly than the cleanliness of what you drink. And this kerchief! Ask me about its story! It was woven in Jurjan and worked in Arrajan. I came across it and I bought it. My wife made part of it into a pair of drawers and part of it into a kerchief. Twenty ells went into her drawers, and I snatched this amount away from her hand. I gave it to an embroiderer who worked it and embroidered it as you see. Then I brought it home from the market and stored it in a casket and reserved it for the most refined of my guests. No Arab of the common people defiled it with his hands, nor any woman with the corners of her eyes. Every precious thing has its proper time, and every tool its proper user. Slave! Set the table, for it is growing late! Bring the dish, for the argument has been long! Serve the food, for the talk has been much!”

  ‘The slave brought the table, and the merchant turned it in its place and struck it with his fingertips and tested it with his teeth and said, “May God give prosperity to Baghdad! How excellent are its products, how refined its craftsmen! By God, observe this table, and look at the breadth of its surface, the slightness of its weight, the hardness of its wood, and the beauty of its shape.”

  ‘I said, “This is all fine, but when do we eat?”

  ‘ “Now,” he said. “Slave! Bring the food quickly. But please observe that the legs and the table are all of one piece.” ‘

  Abu’1-Fath said, ‘I was fuming, and I said to myself, “There is still the baking and its utensils, the bread and its qualities, and where the wheat was originally bought, and how an animal was hired to transport it, in what mill it was ground, in what tub it was kneaded, in what oven it was baked, and what baker was hired to bake it. Then there is still the firewood, when it was cut, when it was brought, and how it was set out to dry; and then the baker and his description, the apprentice and his character, the flour and its praises, the yeast and its commentary, the salt and its saltiness. And then there are the plates, who got them, how he acquired them, who used them, and who made them; and the vinegar, how its grapes were selected or its fresh dates were bought, how the press was limed, how the juice was extracted, how the jars were tarred, and how much each cask was worth. And then there were the vegetables, by what devices they were picked, in what grocery they were packed, with what care they were cleaned. And then there is the madira, how the meat was bought, the fat was paid for, the pot set up, the fire kindled, the spices pounded so that the cooking might excel and the gravy be thick. This is an affair that overflows and a business that has no end.”

  ‘So I rose, and he asked, “What do you want?”

  ‘I said, “A need that I must satisfy.”

  ‘He said, “O my master! You are going to a privy which shames the spring residence of the amir and the autumn residence of the vizier! Its upper part is plastered and its lower part is whitewashed; its roof is terraced and its floor is paved with marble. Ants slip off its walls and cannot grip; flies walk on its floor and slither along. It has a door with panels of teak and ivory combined in the most perfect way. A guest could wish to eat there.”

  ‘ “Eat there yourself,” I said. “The privy is not part of the bargain.”

  ‘Then I made for the door and hurried as I went. I began to run, and he followed me, shouting, “O Abu’1-Fath, the madira!“ The youngsters thought that al-madira was my byname, and they began to shout it. I threw a stone at one of them, so angry was I, but the stone hit a man on his turban and pierced his head. I was seized and beaten with shoes, both old and new, and showered with blows, both worthy and vicious, and thrown into prison. I remained for two years in this misfortune, and I swore that I would never eat a madira as long as I lived. Have I done wrong in this, O people of Hamadan?’

  ‘Isā ibn Hishām said, ‘We accepted his excuse and joined in his vow, saying “The madira has brought misfortune on the noble and has exalted the unworthy over the worthy.” ‘

  Bernard Lewis, Islam: From the Prophet Muhammad to the

  Capture of Constantinople, vol. 2, pp. 262–8

  COMMENTARY

  This maqama can be read as a parody of the descriptive mode, wasf, which was so fashionable in the ‘Abbasid period.

  Madira
is a dish which is made with sour milk. In In a Caliph’s Kitchen. Medieval Cooking for the Modern Gourmet (London, 1989), David Waines gives a recipe for a madira whose ingredients include lamb, goat’s yoghurt, an aubergine, an Indian gourd, an onion, a lemon, asparagus, mint, coriander and cumin.

  Raqim and his companions feature in Muslim and Christian legend as the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus, who, fleeing from religious persecution, took refuge in a cave where they slept for 309 years. The dog who accompanied them was called Kitmir. The names of the Seven Sleepers and their dog commonly featured on evil-averting talismans.

  Despite the enormous reputation of Hamadhani’s Maqamat, in the twelfth century its fame was overtaken by Hariri’s somewhat similar work, also entitled Maqamat. The latter book is, together with Kalila wa-Dimna by Ibn al-Muqaffa‘, the most famous work of prose fiction produced in the Arab world. Many people did not bother to have the book on their shelf, since they already knew it by heart. It has had less appeal to readers in the West in modern times and D. S. Margoliouth, the author of the relevant article in the Encyclopaedia of Islam, wrote as follows: ‘The reasons for this extraordinary success… are somewhat difficult to understand and must be accounted for by the decline of literary taste.’

  Abu Muhammad al-Qasim ibn ‘Ali al-HARIRII (1054–1122) was born in Basra. He was a scholar with private means and he led a quiet life on an estate outside the city. His Maqamat was allegedly written under the patronage of a vizier who served first the ‘Abbasid caliph al-Mustarshid and later the Seljuk Sultan al-Mas’ud. However, although Hariri claimed that his book was written at the behest of ‘one whose suggestion is a command and whom it is a pleasure to obey’, one should bear in mind that this was not an age when writers were supposed to write to please themselves. If they had no patron or potential recipient for what they were about to write, then they invented one. Structurally Hariri’s Maqamat resembles that of his predecessor. It consists of fifty maqamas, each notionally set in a different part of the Islamic world. In each of these places Hariri’s narrator, al-Harith, encounters the wily old rogue Abu Zayd who is spinning a yarn in order to extract money from the gullible. Abu Zayd, who is often in disguise, is a master of the Arabic language and (in the words of R. A. Nicholson) he offers his bemused listeners ‘excellent discourses, edifying sermons, and plaintive lamentations mingled with rollicking ditties and ribald jests’. In the sixth maqama alternate lines are written in letters which have or do not have the dots that define letters of the Arabic alphabet. The sixteenth maqama is devoted to palindromes. The seventeenth is full of riddles. The nineteenth is about the language of food. The twenty-second is a munazara debate on the respective merits of accountants and secretaries. The forty-ninth celebrates the gloriously disreputable life of the Banu Sasan. Only in the fiftieth and final maqama does Abu Zayd repent.

  Abu Zayd, liar and cheat though he is, is steeped in the Qur’an. The Maqamat abounds in direct quotations and allusions to the text. Not only is Abu Zayd well-versed in the Qur’an, most of what he says, as opposed to practises, is thoroughly edifying. Like the jackal Dimna in Kalila wa-Dimna by Ibn al-Muqaffa‘, Abu Zayd is an unworthy narrator. Abu Zayd discourses in saj’ and this contributes to the difficulty of the text. Hariri’s prose is even more elaborate and opaque than Hamadhani’s. (Imagine trying to read a Times crossword puzzle as if it were a short story.) It is impossible fully to understand Hariri’s Maqamat without a commentary, and indeed after the Qur’an this book has attracted more commentaries than any other Arabic book. (It was common to bind in the commentary with the text of the Maqamat.) Abu Zayd’s taxing use of the Arabic language was not a contingent feature of the Maqamat, for Hariri designed the book as a teaching vehicle which would give instruction on the difficult points in Arabic grammar and vocabulary. Although this was an age in which there was considerable prejudice against fiction, Hariri was able to defend his book by pointing to its use in teaching. Indeed the Maqamat was and is used to teach knotty linguistic points and bright children who had succeeded in memorizing the Qur’an were often given the Maqamat to memorize next. Most of the chapters in the Maqamat are named after places in the Islamic world. The chapter extracted below is known as the ‘Damascus Maqama’ The translator, R. A. Nicholson, has taken the trouble to imitate the rhymes of the original.

  Al-Hárith son of Hammam related:

  I went from ‘Irak to Damascus with its green watercourses, in the day when I had troops of fine-bred horses and was the owner of coveted wealth and resources, free to divert myself, as I chose, and flown with the pride of him whose fullness overflows. When I reached the city after toil and teen on a camel travel-lean, I found it to be all that tongues recite and to contain soul’s desire and eye’s delight. So I thanked my journey and entered Pleasure’s tourney and began there to break the seals of appetites that cloy and cull the clusters of joy, until a caravan for ‘Irak was making ready – and by then my wild humour had become steady, so that I remembered my home and was not consoled, but pined for my fold – wherefore I struck the tents of absence and yearning and saddled the steed of returning.

  As soon as my companions were arrayed, and the agreement duly made, fear debarred us from setting on our way without an escort to guard us. We sought one in every clan and tried a thousand devices to secure a man, but he was nowhere to be found in the hive: it seemed as though he were not amongst the live. The travellers, being at the end of their tether, mustered at the Jairun gate to take counsel together, and ceased not from tying and unbinding and twisting and unwinding, until contrivance was exhausted and those lost hope who had never lost it.

  Now, over against them stood a person of youthful mien, garbed in a hermit’s gaberdine: in his hand he held a rosary, while his eyes spake of vigil and ecstasy; at us he was peering, and had sharpened his ear to steal a hearing. When the party was about to scatter, he said to them, for now he had laid open their secret matter, ‘O people, let your cares be sloughed and your fears rebuffed, for I will safeguard you with that which will cast out dread from your breasts and show itself obedient to your behests.’ Said the narrator: We demanded of him that he should inform us concerning his gage, and offered him a greater fee than for an embassage; and he declared it was certain words rehearsed to him in a dream of the night, to serve him as a phylactery against the world’s despite. Then began we to exchange the furtive glance and wink to one another and look askance. Recognizing that we thought poorly of his tale and conceived it to be frail, he said, ‘Why will ye treat my solemn assurance as an idle toy and my pure gold as alloy? By God, I have traversed many an awesome region and plunged into deadly hazards legion, and it hath enabled me to do without the protection of a guide and to dispense with a quiver at my side. Furthermore, I will banish the suspicion that hath shaken you and remove the distrust that hath o’ertaken you by consorting with you in the desert lands and accompanying you across the Samawa sands. If my promise prove true, then do ye make my fortune new; but if my lips forswear, then my skin ye may tear and spill my blood and not spare!’

  We were inspired to give his vision credit and allow the truth to be as he said it, so we refrained from harrying him, and cast lots for carrying him; and at his bidding we cut the loops of delay and put aside fear of harm or stay. When the pack-saddles were tied and the hour of departure nighed, we begged him to dictate the words of the magic ritual, that we might make them a safeguard perpetual. He said, ‘Let each one of you repeat the Mother of the Koran at the coming of eve and dawn; then let him say with a tongue of meekness and a voice of weakness, “O God! O quickener of bodies mouldering in their site! O averter of blight! O Thou that shieldest from affright! O Thou that dost graciously requite! O refuge of them that sue for favour in Thy sight! O Pardoner and Forgiver by right! Bless Mohammed, the last of Thy prophets for ever, him that came Thy message to deliver! Bless the Lights of his family and the Keys of his victory! And save me, O God, from the intrigues of the satanical and the assaults of the tyrannical; from the ve
xation of the insolent and the molestation of the truculent; from the oppression of transgressors and the transgression of oppressors; from the foiling of the foilers and the spoiling of the spoilers; from the perfidy of the perfidious and the insidiousness of the insidious! And, O God, protect me from the wrong-doing of them that around me throng and from the thronging around me of them that do me wrong; and keep me from the hands of the injurious, and bring me out of the darkness of the iniquitous, and in Thy mercy let me enter amongst Thy servants that are righteous! O God, preserve me from dangers on my native soil and in the land of strangers, when I roam and come home, when I go in quest and return to rest, in employment and enjoyment, in occupation and vacation! And guard me in myself and my pelf, in my fame and my aim, in my weans and my means, in my hold and my fold, in my health and my wealth, in my state and my fate! Let me not decline toward fortune’s nadir, or fall under the dominion of an invader, but grant me from Thyself a power that shall be my aider! O God, watch over me with Thine eye and Thine help from on high; and distinguish me by Thy safeguarding and Thy bounteous rewarding; and befriend me with Thy favour and Thy blessing alone, and entrust me not to any care but Thine own! And bestow on me a happiness that decayeth not, and allot to me a comfort that frayeth not; and relieve me from the fears of indigence, and shelter me with the coverlets of affluence; and suffer not the talons of mine enemies to tear, for Thou art He that hearkeneth to prayer.” ‘