With the exception of an unpublished thesis on Ibn Khaldūn, I am not aware of any book-length treatment of the economic concepts of any Islamic scholar, in the English language. This makes the publication of Dr. Islahi’s work on the economics of Ibn Taimīyah a singular event for Islamic economics – an actuality which is also a pointer to the many potentialities awaiting scholars like Islahi. I urge them to come forward, now that the path has been broken. May Allah guide us to His ways.
| Centre for Research inIslamic Economics, Jeddah18 Jumādā 1, 140718 January, 1987 | Muhammad Nejatullah Siddiqi |
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* For bibliographical details, see the Bibliography at the end of the book. Words within parentheses, in this quotation and those following, have been added to make the meaning of Ibn Taimīyah’s Arabic text clear.
The age of Ibn Taimīyah (1263–1328) was characterized by massive social and political upheavals. Barely five years before his birth, the centuries-old Abbasid caliphate at Baghdad had been destroyed by the Mongols. And only three years before his birth, Tatars entered Damascus and Aleppo as conquerors. Tatars attacked and plundered Ḥarrān,1 the birthplace of Ibn Taimīyah, when he was about seven years old. Many of the inhabitants of that area were forced to migrate to Syria and Egypt. The family and household of Ibn Taimīyah moved to Damascus to seek refuge and, since they were learned people, to continue their academic pursuits.2
Thirteen years before the birth of Ibn Taimīyah, the Mamluk dynasty had established itself in Syria and Egypt. The Arabic word mamlūk means slave, and these Mamluks had originally been settled by their owners, the Ayyubid sultans, on an island in the Nile, whence their other common name, Bahrites (from baḥr meaning river). The rulers in the first Mamluk dynasty (1260–1382 AD) were drawn from this group and so known as the Bahrite Mamluks.3 Since their rule coincides with the life-time of Ibn Taimīyah (1263–1328), spent mostly in Damascus but also partly in Cairo, it seems appropriate to outline here the political, social and economic conditions of Egypt and Syria in this period.
The influence of the Mamluks had been growing steadily during the Ayyubid Sultanate of Egypt. In 1250, the Ayyubid Sultan Tūrān (1249–50) was slain by Bahrite Mamluks who seized power. The amir Aibak (1250–57), a slave of Tūrān, became the head of the administration, and later proclaimed himself as the Sultan. Aibak was himself assassinated in 1257 and his minor son was raised to the titular Sultanate, while Qutuz (1259–60) a distinguished Mamluk assumed the post of vicegerent. After two years Qutuz took power directly in his own name. He gave, for the first time, a crushing defeat to the Mongols. Despite the victory however, he was stabbed to death the very next year by another slave, Baibars (1260–77), who became Sultan of Egypt. Baibars, through wise administration, succeeded in securing his power and popularity. He reduced the taxes that had made his predecessors’ rule unpopular, and fostered public works, improved canals, harbours and fortifications.
(a) Re-establishment of the Abbasid caliphate
After capturing the Egyptian throne, Baibars conceived the idea of re-establishing the Abbasid Caliphate which, two or three years previously, had been swept away and the whole Abbasid house destroyed, by Hūlāgū (1256–65) at Baghdad. Having heard that an Abbasid had survived the Mongol massacre, Baibars had him brought from Syria to Cairo, and there installed him as caliph. Baibars and officers of state swore fealty to him, while he in turn conferred on Baibars the sovereign title.4 Thus, with this religious approval from the caliph, Baibars strengthened his rule.
During the Mamluk rule, the position of the Abbasid caliph varied little under the different sultans: his office remained but a shadow and a name. He was brought out on important state occasions, such as every fresh succession to the sultanate, as the religious head, to grant his recognition of the title, and then put back again. Nevertheless, largely owing to the presence of the Abbasid caliph in Cairo, Egypt became the focus of the then Islamic world. ‘Ulamā’, jurists and scholars were attracted to Cairo and their residence in it made Egypt the centre of learning in the Islamic world.
(b) Sultan Nāṣir Muḥammad bin Qalāwūn
After Baibars’ death, in a period of thirty-three years (from 1277 to 1309) nine sultans came to the throne, but none was able to survive long except Qalāwūn (1279–90) who proved a wise and strong monarch. During his twelve-year reign, he defeated all his enemies and opponents, and left Egypt politically and economically stronger.
In 1309, Nāṣir Muḥammad bin Qalāwūn (1293–94, 1298–1308, 1309–41) came to power for the third time and ruled for the next thirty-two years, a period considered to be the golden age of the Mamluk dynasty. He introduced a number of political and economic reforms,5 and extended diplomatic relations with the neighbouring countries. He respected the ‘ulamā’ and the learned men.
Ibn Taimīyah’s great achievements in the academic, political and economic fields belong in this age. Nāṣir gave him the highest rank among the ‘ulamā’, though he had him put in prison in his last years on account of misunderstandings created by rival jurists against him and his ideas.6
Nāṣir died in 1341. The Bahrite Mamluk dynasty lasted to 1382 but, though many sultans came to the throne, they were not as successful and strong as their predecessors.
(c) Foreign policy
There were very close ties between the Egyptian sultans and the Indian kings. Sultan Muḥammad Tughluq and after him Fīrūz Shāh obtained their titles of sovereignty from the Abbasid caliph in Egypt.7 They sent their envoys to Egypt to request help against their common enemy – the Mongols.8 Trade was another important factor that helped sustain relations between Egypt and India. Egypt was the meeting point between East and West, Alexandria being one of the few great harbours of the world at that time.9
The greatest danger to the Mamluk dynasty in its early days was from the Mongols of Transoxania who extended their dominion to Iraq and had attacked Syria several times. It was the Mamluk Sultans who broke their pride of invincibility. Although the Mamluks were sometimes obliged to retreat, Nāṣir gave the Mongol governor such a crushing defeat in 1302 that no Mongol ever again dared to look toward Egypt. In 1304, Uljāitū Khudābanda (1304–16), son of Arghūn (1284–91), succeeded Ghāzān (1295–1304); he