A Modern History of the Somali. I. M. Lewis

the status of brother in religion for that of clansman, so that men who are divided by clan affiliation may share common adherence to the same religious Order. In this way, by their very nature, the Muslim Orders contribute to national unity through Islam and seek to overcome the sectional rivalries which separate men in their secular activities. However, given the circumstances of Somali life and society in which, lacking any large centralized political units, the only security was provided by small bands of kinsmen, the loyalties of kin and clan remained paramount. Thus the transcendental appeal to unity through Islam which the Orders preached, although it found a response in the cultural nationalism of the Somali, remained only a potential force overridden by the more restricted political realities of everyday life. Indeed it was only realized, and then only partially, in a few religious communities and teaching centres established usually in those regions where the brethren could support themselves by cultivation and cattle-rearing. Elsewhere, the Orders merely provided, as for the most part they still do today, a congregational basis for worship; and in all large settlements of population each brotherhood has usually its own mosque.

      Historically, the first Order to be introduced into Somaliland was the Qadiriya, the oldest Order in Islam, founded in Baghdad where its originator Sayyid ‘Abd al-Qadir al-Jilani died in A.D. 1166. It is not yet certain when the Qadiriya came to Somaliland, but by the nineteenth century it was strongly established and had split into two powerful local branches, one associated with the name of Sheikh ‘Abd ar-Rahman Seyla ‘i who died in the Ogaden in 1883, and the other with that of Sheikh Uways Muhammad who was assassinated in 1909. The former branch held sway in the north, in the British Protectorate and the Ogaden; while the latter was entrenched in the Benadir and south of Somalia. The other main Order of importance locally is the Ahmadiya, founded at Mecca in Arabia, by Sayyid Ahmad ibn Idris al-Fasi (1760–1837). This modern reformist movement with its sudsidiary branches had, by the end of the nineteenth century come to rival that of the longer established Qadiriya.¹

      Between them, these two Orders had by 1900 a score of permanent community settlements scattered throughout Somaliland, but concentrated mainly in the fertile regions between the Juba and Shebelle rivers. At this time, one of the most important centres in the north was Sheikh Maddar’s (1825–1917) large Qadiriya settlement at Hargeisa amongst the Habar Awal clan containing representatives of most of the Isaq clans. This was a haven of peace in a turbulent area, strategically placed at the intersection of the caravan routes leading from the coast to the Ogaden.² Other Qadiriya settlements were established in the Ogaden itself, while others again lay farther south in Somalia. Ahmadiya centres were similarly widely distributed; and, outside these local settlements, almost the entire Somali population was divided in religious affiliation between the two Orders.

      Competition between the two brotherhoods was considerably increased when the militant Salihiya branch of the Ahmadiya Order, founded at Mecca by Sayyid Muhammad Salih(1853–1917), was introduced into Somaliland towards the end of the nineteenth century. It was to this reformist and puritanical movement that the Somali Sheikh Muhammad ‘Abdille Hassan belonged, and under its banner he developed the campaign to free his country of ‘infidel’ dominion.

       The rise of Sayyid Muhammad ‘Abdille Hassan

      Muhammad ‘Abdille Hassan, according to his family’s records,³ was born on 7 April, 1864, at a small watering-place between Wudwud and Bohotle in the Dulbahante country of the eastern part of the British Somaliland Protectorate. His grandfather, Sheikh Hassan Nur, of the Ogaden clan, had left his homeland to settle amongst the Dulbahante in 1826 and had married there. At the early age of seven, Muhammad began to learn the Quran under a local teacher, and by the age of ten, when his grandfather died, could read the Quran and became his teacher’s assistant. Some five years later, having decided to dedicate his life to religion, he set up as a teacher on his own account, and by the early age of nineteen had won the title of ‘sheikh’ for his learning and piety.

      About this time Sheikh Muhammad left his home to travel widely in search of learning, visiting, as was customary, such local seats of Islam as Harar, and Mogadishu – where a tree, in whose shade he is said to have prayed regularly, is remembered to this day: he also travelled as far afield as the Sudan and Nairobi. Some nine years or so passed thus, devoted to learning and teaching. About 1891 he returned to his home amongst his mother’s people, the Dulbahante, and there married a woman of his own clan, the Ogaden. Three years later, in company with thirteen other sheikhs and friends, Sheikh Muhammad set out to go on pilgrimage to Mecca and spent about a year in Arabia, visiting also – it is said – the Hejaz and Palestine. At Mecca, Sheikh Muhammad met Sayyid Muhammad Salih and fell under the spell of his teaching. Consequently having joined the Salihiya Order, the Sheikh returned to Somaliland to preach its message, and settled for a time at Berbera where he married his second wife. Here with messianic zeal he taught and preached, denouncing smoking, the chewing of the stimulant Kat plant,⁴ and generally condemning all excessive indulgence and luxury and exhorting his countrymen to return to the strict path of Muslim devotion.

      Sheikh Muhammad’s activities and his enthusiasm for the new Salihiya Order attracted considerable attention in this port where the majority were staunch adherents of the older Qadiriya brotherhood. Tradition records that about 1897 a colloquy of sheikhs and religious leaders was held to discuss Sheikh Muhammad’s theological position and to examine his aims. The meeting took place in the house of one of the leading notables of Berbera. Amongst those present were Sheikh Muhammad’s former teacher, Sheikh ‘Abdille Arusi, and Sheikh Maddar, head of the Qadiriya community at Hargeisa. Sheikh Maddar, it is recorded, opened the proceedings by asking Sheikh Muhammad the name of the Order which he followed. Sheikh Muhammad replied, apparently, by remarking that it was laid down in Islam that for each generation God had provided one pre-eminent saint (the quth al-zaman), and that for his generation this was his master Sayyid Muhammad Salih whose ‘Way’ he was teaching. Sheikh Maddar agreed that it was the orthodox teaching that each generation had its great saint of Islam, but reminded Sheikh Muhammad that whoever he followed, and whatever he preached, God would judge him according to the strict ordinances of the Divine Law. This, of course, was a warning not to transgress the law of Islam, and came from one renowned for his piety and strict devotion.

      Other members of the assembly then called upon Sheikh Muhammad to prove the power of his new Order with a sign, Sheikh ‘Abdille Arusi, remarking, it is said, that he marvelled at the strength of the town’s foundations which had prevented Berbera from being turned upside down. To this veiled comment on his lack of immediate success in gaining adherents, Sheikh Muhammad replied that indeed the town was blessed in possessing strong religious foundations. However, Sheikh Muhammad urged that whereas formerly he had followed Sheikh ‘Abdille Arusi, now he exhorted his teacher to follow him and share the blessings of the new Order.

      Not long after this very characteristic Somali inquisition which had made clear to the leaders of the established Qadiriya the revolutionary character of Sheikh Muhammad ‘Abdille’s message, the Sheikh came into contact with the French Roman Catholic mission which had opened a station in the north of the Protectorate in 1891. This was originally at Berbera, but had now moved to Daimole, inland on the road towards Sheikh. The story goes that Sheikh Muhammad met a boy at the mission school and asked him his name. To his amazement and wrath, the boy replied ‘John ‘Abdillahi’. Another account relates that the Sheikh met a party of boys from the mission who when asked what clan they belonged to – the stock Somali inquiry to elicit someone’s identity, replied ‘the clan of the Fathers’ (in Somali, reer faddar), thus apparently denying their Somali identity (many of the boys were actually orphans).

      However apocryphal these accounts may sound to modern ears, in Somali terms they are highly credible, and without doubt they commemorate encounters with the mission which served to confirm Sheikh Muhammad’s belief that Christian colonization sought to destroy the Muslim faith of his people. This fired his patriotism and he intensified his efforts to win support for the Salihiya, preaching in the mosques and streets that his country was in danger, and urging his compatriots to remove the English ‘infidels’ and their missionaries. He also inveighed against the practice of drinking alcohol which the foreigners had introduced. At first there was considerable resistance to his call, especially on the part of the Qadiriya who resented Sheikh Muhammad’s messianic