Fayez Sayegh- the Party Years (1938-1947)

by Adel Beshara

  Fifth, the Party has succeeded in steering the nation in the right social direction and in educating the people about the reality of the national issues they are likely to encounter in the course of life. Through its proclamations, statements, bulletins, lectures, and speeches, the Party has provided much needed guidance to the people. It has helped the nation understand its interests by lighting the way before it and clarifying its issues and concerns as they arose. Such a service is of great value in a country whose people are in short supply of rational guidance and sensible leadership.

  Sixth, the Party has eliminated the myth that we are people unworthy of life and cannot rely on ourselves. With this, it restored self-confidence to the nation, guided it to areas of strength buried inside it, and rekindled a new faith in a new future.

  Seventh, the Party manifested certain fighting virtues and struggle ethics for which the nation was in dire need. It allowed these virtues to blossom over the years bursting with impediments, obstructions, and persecutions. The history of the Party’s struggle is ample proof of its sincerity and of the heroism of its members.

  At a time when loyalty to the nation was an object of ridicule and mockery, reckless allegations by the deceived and misguided, and the recoil of the indifferent, the Nationalists were surging with an incredible faith to defy such a sick spirit. They relished every persecution and endured humiliation for the sake of the nation’s life. They affirmed its right to exist, or rather, what is more sublime than existence: its right to freedom, dignity, and progress.

  At a time when the public arenas were packed with fakers claiming that the price of struggle and fighting should be awarded to them, the Nationalists were brimming with the resolve of the believer that such a price and the sacrifices that must be endured as a price for victory ought to be borne by him.

  At a time when the so-called advocates of patriotism were dispersing and fleeing at the first shock, leaving others to bear its brunt, dodging responsibilities, and being unconcerned except for their own standing and reputation, the Nationalists were dashing to sacrifice (the silent kind of sacrifice). They were fuelled by the insistence that each of them should carry the burden of the entire nation and shoulder the entire shock that strikes the soldiers of reform in the battles of life.

  At a time when men lurked in the corners of their homes, satisfied with securing their livelihood and seeking to keep life going, the nationalists were disdaining livelihood and scorning life because they had envisioned something more sublime than life itself: to contribute to the betterment of life, its advancement, and revival anew.

  At a time when patriotism was a function of deeply confused and disoriented political work and a parody of vague and resounding slogans, the nationalists were treating their movement as no less than a total revolution spinning inside every soul and penetrating every city, village, and home to shake off the old, destroy the corrupt, and establish the edifice of a new sound life.

  At a time when parties and movements were established with meteoric speed only to collapse under the pressure of circumstances or hollow structure or lack of resources, the National Revival was a unique and striking phenomenon in the history of this nation. Its enduring spirit, tenacious struggle, and a firmness that knows no retreat or compromise marked it distinctly from all other movements. It was determined to stay the full course until final destiny.

  Finally, at a time when politicians were trying to attract great masses, enticing them, and begging for their applause, the National Party was working hard to build the new individual: a conscious and mature person who is prepared to volunteer as a soldier in the salvation movement and who expects no reward save sacrifices and difficulties.

  These new virtues of struggle, which manifested themselves in the National Revival, thus forming a unique new phenomenon in the history of the nation, are our joy and the source of our pride. They are the testimony of history to the eternity of our cause and the integrity of our movement. We present them to you, Ladies and Gentlemen, as proof of the values that define the National Party.

  Also, Ladies and Gentlemen, you and the rest of the population are the arbitrators to whom we resort for judgment of our revival and the support on whom we lean in our confidence in the victory of this revival. Our victory is your victory. Our goal is to make the people happy and jubilant. We refuse to derive strength or popularity except through the support of the people, and we refuse to streak to the final victory except by the will of the people.

  5

  THE NATION IS ONE SOCIAL COMMUNITY

  The National Party does not suffice with the political dimension of national life. Nor does it suffice with independence as a political reality to achieve. The Party does not make the error of ascribing the maladies of society to foreign wills. Indeed, internal danger is more serious than external danger. If combating external dangers is a component of treating a disease, then combating internal dangers is a precaution against contracting the disease in the first place.

  Moreover, the Party does not regard independence as the pinnacle of national struggle. Instead, it considers independence a starting point in its illustrious journey. Independence is not an end in itself, but a means to attain the primary objective of our nation’s ascendancy and dignity. True independence is not mere legal formalities: it is a slow, silent, and endless internal reconstruction process.

  Therefore, the Party distinguishes between independence as a mere political concern and true independence that encompasses all aspects of life. It declares that true independence is (a) a perpetual internal struggle; (b) independence from internal corruption, maladies, and the forces of its decadence; and (c) independence from external interests and their objects. At a time when patriotic movements focused on the political aim, confining their efforts to arbitrary activities in pursuit of independence in its narrow political sense, the National Party announced a comprehensive national program of action that transcends politics, extends to all the interests and aspects of life, and expands beyond the narrow political sphere. Hence, the Party was the first national movement to integrate economic, social, cultural, and intellectual affairs in its reform program and to declare that the nation’s revival would remain incomplete if it does not occur in each of these fields.

  Accordingly, the Party inclines toward the social aspect. It analyzes its weaknesses and presents programs for their treatment. Meanwhile, it has found the primary danger to society’s unity and the chief impediment to mobilizing the nation’s powers to defend its rights and desire for progress in the nation’s disintegration into hostile groups. Consequently, the Party declared that the nation is one social community and set out to proclaim that sectarian divisions, tribal hostilities, class struggle, and all other forms of division in the nation are national dangers that must be mastered and overcome. It also declared an unrelenting war on all aspects of our social lifestyle that are likely to augment the various manifestations of these divisions. Thus, it fought sectarianism in policy-making and spoke against the interference of the clergy in the affairs of the national state and its judiciary. Through this attitude, the Party restored the spiritual relation between man and God. To religion, it restored the holy position that befits it and the respect it deserves when it rises to the center of spiritual power that dwells in souls and deems itself far above being a tool of exploitation or a catalyst for enmity and hate. By combating sectarianism, the Party saved religion and authentic religiosity from the thorns dotted around them.

  Some of the results of the basic principle “the Nation is one social community” are:

  The internal unity of society as a condition more desirable than fragmentation and hostility;

  The participation of all citizens in the life of their nation, each within the context of their own class and profession regardless of their sect, region, and family;

  The need to respect the diversity of classes, sects, duties, and professions and to consider this diversity a source of enrichment to the national life instead
of seeking to suppress it or encouraging conflict between the groups;

  The capacity of every citizen to carry out their vocation in the service of the nation;

  The need to respect the right of every citizen in life and the respect that the citizen must demonstrate for his or her duties toward society.

  6

  REFORM IN NATIONAL LIFE

  Any living being must have justification for its existence. These justifications vary. Some originate from the will of those with concentrated interests clutching to existence, while others originate from the wills of groups that rebel against such interests and rise to destroy them and eliminate them from existence.

  What is the justification for the existence of the National Party and its survival and endurance? When foreign imperialism was crouching heavily on our nation’s chest, stifling its breath, shackling its hands, sucking its blood, paralyzing its powers, tearing its unity apart, and impeding its development and progress, the semi-partisan political movements and self-styled leaders and pseudo-leaders had no slogan to define themselves and their work except passive patriotism and liberation from the foreigner. But this was a passive slogan: pale and stricken. Indeed, it was a confused and bewildered slogan with no direction.

  The patriotic movements would sing the praises of independence, but for them, independence was only a sentimental expression to which the masses were too much inclined and which orators could use to beg for applause. Independence at the time, with its confused meaning and undefined essence, constituted the final stage of national struggle and the point at which all hopes and expectations ended. It was a mere expedient for the self-serving, the seekers of fame, the professional maneuverers, and those who barter with the most sacred sentiments of the people.

  In the midst of that emotional exuberance formed of a sound tendency toward a life marred with the passivity of the work for independence as such and misguided by the expediency of opportunistic political corporations, a man as obstinate as conscience, as solid as steel, and as firm in faith as a mountain stood up. An army of vigilant faithful youth stood behind him. He aroused slumbering powers inert in the souls of the nation to gush forth, fiercely and daringly, to rush and crush the obstacles that the colonialist and the dwarves (who found their support in colonialism and in whom colonialism found its best support) had placed in their way. Amid that emotional exuberance, a man stood up and screamed:

  Independence in itself is not my nation’s ambition. Nor is it the aim of the sacred current that cries out loud deep inside my brothers’ thoughts, yearning for a free sublime life. Independence is not an objective where our hopes end and our efforts cease upon attaining it. Independence is not the culminating point of struggle. Rather, true independence is only the curtain raiser for the solemn stage of exalted struggle.

  A liberation that suffices with ejecting the foreigner and leaves his legacy of germs and parasites to roam freely and actively in the nation’s body is nothing but a superficial, deceptive, and empty liberation. A liberation that does not seek to achieve the objectives that subjugation has prevented us from realizing is, in every respect, subjugation. Our liberation from others, if it does not originate from liberation in ourselves, is baseless.

  If we respond to the call for liberation and work for it while we are not free and are not enjoying the blessing of creativity and innovation that lie at the essence of freedom, then the freedom that we demand is a shame on us and a smirch on our history.

  If we succeed in saving ourselves from the oppression of the foreigner without saving ourselves from his legacy of diseases, weaknesses, poverty, hunger, chaos, disunity, sterility, indifference and lack of confidence; if we suffice with a ceremonial freedom without freeing ourselves from the nightmare of slavery whose germs have gnawed at the core of our consciences; if we remove the foreigner, but our history remains tied to his whims and dictated by his will and our future remains subservient to currents and circumstances not within our grasp, then we would have done no service to our nation.

  The cry of a true national conscience crystalized in a righteous son of this country and resonated in a national revival. It has since been vindicated by the course of events. For, independence did come, and here we are living in its shadow. But is this the ideal outcome we had hoped for? Has sectarianism disappeared; has class discrimination dissipated; has exploitation and monopoly receded; and has chaos and scandals in the administration abated? Are we basking in economic prosperity, security, safety, stability, and freedom of opinion and speech?

  I will leave the answer to the conscience of each listener. The answer I might give is likely to be less vicious than the answer your conscience might give.

  * * *

  The National Party’s first message is: “Formal independence in itself is not our ultimate aim, but rather the pursuit of a free, advanced, and prosperous life.”

  The National Party’s fundamental aim is: “Our objective is not to work and struggle for the sake of a formal independence that (a) is granted by the foreigner under the pressure of circumstances and the exigencies of international conflict; (b) maintains corruption and iniquities as they are; and (c) sustains the elements of slavery on the inside. Rather, our aim is to work and struggle to build a new nation; to resurrect the national conscience; to define the path to a truly good and correct life, and to uproot the evils and corruption that contribute to our sterility, humiliation, disunity, and our perpetual deterioration.”

  Additionally, this is the cry of the National Party: “We do not consider the evacuation of foreign armies – officially finalized today from our beloved Lebanon - practically and literally complete until it is paired with the evacuation of all the maladies under which the people groan and is directly coupled with true comprehensive and fundamental reform.”

  The National Party denotes: “The Party is not a mere political alliance or an organization that indulges in superficialities, styles, formal uniforms, ranks, and Information. Nay! The Party is the conscience of a nation that has awakened, and the spirit of a people that has rebelled in pursuit of glories. The National Party embodies this awakening of the consciences of the faithful aroused by the memories of ancient glories and stirred by the belief that the nation can be and will be as glorious as it was in the past.”

  The main justification for the existence of the National Party is to work toward:

  resurrecting and reviving the nation,

  liberating it internally,

  building it on sound foundations,

  establishing edifices of justice, love, and solidarity throughout it,

  reviving its confidence in itself, and

  raising it to the summits of glory and to heights where only eagles soar.

  Subsequently, if someone asks: “What justification is there for the existence of the National Party now that we have attained independence and the evacuation of all foreign troops is complete?” we answer: “Today – particularly today, and today more than ever – the existence of the National Party is an indispensable necessity in view of its constructive reform commitment.”

  We are well aware that the reform we desire – a reform that encompasses all aspects of our national life – cannot be attained unless it is comprehensive and unbroken or truncated. It cannot be realized through patchwork but only through basic destruction and reconstruction. It cannot be achieved by treating the effects but by treating the causes. It cannot be embedded into institutions and systems before it is embedded, first, into the ethos of individuals.

  Accordingly, the National Party has determined that individual personal reform, as a factor that takes place in the depth of every citizen, is the only key to effective reform, because construction is less concerned with outward appearances, styles, and superficialities and more concerned with foundations, pillars, and mainstays.

  The general reform of the nation, which can only be conducted by the will of the nation and which only emerges from the people, pivots around a single axis: the ethos of
the citizens. For this reason alone, the National Party managed to carry out its slow and silent work unaffected by the buzz of clamor and undaunted by the ignorance of the uncomprehending except through clamor and commotion.

  The Party has done its work well to build the new citizen. This citizen is loyal to his nation; works hard in its cause; is fully aware of the nation’s entity, unity, and mission; and is free of the vices of selfishness, greed, and exploitation. The heart of the citizen is full of faith in himself, his cause, and his country. It pulsates with love and cooperation. He is aware of his responsibility and propelled by the power of duty; and he is strong by the power of spirit and faith. One day, this new citizen will be the pillar of the new nation.

  Indeed, the National Party has worked hard to build this new citizen. The totality of these citizens, in their interaction in the Party, has formed a new society in the heart of the old and worn-out society: a leaven to resurrect the new nation and disseminate high ideals and new virtues in it. Indeed, the Party has been an enterprise that embodies this new nation and a vanguard of its advent. The Party, thus, has been the conscience of the nation that awakened after a long slumber only to become, in itself, the vanguard of the new nation and its model. The Party has been the living voice of the nation that cries out to the nation so that it can live. It is the echo of this cry and the embodiment of the life of the new nation.

  * * *

  Therefore, we see the Party as a reformist institution that strives for reform and not for any private ambition. We deem the Party above having any interest other than the nation’s interest, especially as it teaches its members that: “the nation’s interest supersedes every other interest.” Far be it that the Party would make itself a barrier between the citizen and serving the nation.