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early horizons" (1982), "From Yehudah to God" (1985), and "A preliminary
introduction to early Mohammedan Islam" (1994).
Professor Tizini finished six parts of his project before turning to
concentrate on the problem of "Arabic Renaissance" (in Arabic termed 'Nahda',
means literally to revive or rise up). This second phase of Tizini's thought, which
started approximately on mid Nineties, has concentrated on the obstacles of
Arabic renaissance (Nahda). Whether, those obstacles belong to Arabic thought,
or those resulting from the pressure of the West. In this period he wrote, among
many other works, "From Western Orientalism to Moroccan Occidentalism"
(1997), "The Qur'anic Text and the Problematic of its Structure and Reading"
(1997), and "From the Trinity of Corruption to the Issue of the Civil Society"
(2001).
With reference to the intellectual turn of Professor Tizini, it can be said that,
despite his continued commitment to Marxism, two basic aspects have marked
such a turn. First, giving up the classical Marxist analysis of social change, which
is based on 'Class struggle', and replacing it by an evolutionary process that
encounters the whole spectrum of the sections of the society. Second, exclusion of
Islamic religious thought, which is a natural position in Marxism, is replaced by
acknowledging the importance of understanding religious belief and Islamic
faith, as an inner experience of the layperson, as an element in the mechanisms
of societal evolution.
His Philosophy
Philosophical thought of Professor Tizini is based on an essential concept
that my be viewed as the central concept of the whole of his philosophical
project. Tizini tries in several forms to prove that the 'Arabic Thought', and this
includes the pre-Islamic era, is part of the evolution of history of human thought
in the general sense. This position produces two consequences. First, despite that
Arabic thought have flourished within the 'Islamic' civilization as well as
'Islamic' thought, nevertheless, as a part of evolution of human thought, it can be
analyzed using the materialist dialectic methodology. Second, the concept of
'Euro-centrism' which makes Arabic thought marginal to European thought
making it a passive carrier of the miraculous Greek thought, is pointless, and
even unscientific.
The centrality of this concept appears clearly from his classification of the
Arabic thought as belonging to the 'medieval era', based on dividing history of
human thought into ancient, medieval, and modern. It also appears in his
analysis of the 'Arabic thought', starting from its 'early' phase before Islam, on
the basis of the social, economic, and political circumstances before and after
Islam.
On this basis, professor Tizini sees that his position liberates contemporary
Arabic thought from the domination of the Western one. For, in this case it
becomes possible to resume the Arabic thought as a part of the evolution of
human thought. In addition, this position represents a means to overcome the
domination of the traditional 'Islamic' thought on the basis of the possibility of
re-reading the history of the Arabic thought as a part of the history of human
thought. In such a way, the process of the historical re-reading of the Arabic
thought would constitute an additional motive toward resuming such a thought
in the present time.
His methodology
In his work "On the Road to Methodological Clarity", Tizini expounds his
view of the correct methodology of dealing with the Arabic thought. In this work
two basic characteristics of his methodology is declared. First, acknowledgement
of pluralism, whether on the methodological or the theoretical level; no one
possesses absolute reality. Second, asserting the objective necessity of depending
on the historical-dialectic methodology. With respect to his concept of pluralism,
he states,
he says, as well,
At the end two issues arise, the first is the necessity of acknowledging the
systematic and methodological differentiation between philosophy and
religion, and that each of them has its own way, which should be
respected by the other. The second issue expresses itself in a specific
formulation that is based on that each one should not interfere in the
mechanisms and the rout of the other, as well as the results of its
contemplating or research activities. (Contemporary Arabic philosophical
horizons, P. 212)
On the basis of the dialectical relation between the materialist and idealist
sides of existence, and in order to found such a relation in the Arab/Islamic
thought, Tizini introduces the idea of the 'Myth" as the starting point in which
the two sides of the relation were unified before its evolution into a dialectic
relation. The function of the concept of the 'Myth" as a basis for such a relation
is to justify the appearance of religion, in general, and Islamic religion, in
particular in the context of a humanistic history. He expresses this as follows,
After founding the dialectic relation between the two forms of thought, the
materialist and the idealist, Professor Tizini starts to build on this relation his
vision of the Arabic thought. He formulates a general framework through which
the materialist dialectical reading of the Arabic thought will be accomplished,
from on side, and the justification of the appearance of an autonomous Arabic
thought, as a part of human thought, from the other. He says,
When we say this, we don't purport to point to the new views of modern
or contemporary philosophy, but our aim here is to uncover the various
types of novelty in the philosophical thought of the Arab/Islamic
philosophers between the eighth century to the twelfth, approximately,
especially, what relates to the materialist inclination in their philosophy.
Through accomplishing this trial, we will gain assurance that continuity in
evolution of human theoretical thought, as a whole, does not exhaust the
specific discontinuity of some parts of such an evolution… These two
moments (i.e. continuity and discontinuity) in the theoretical evolution
form together a deep and relative dialectical unity, without it we can't
comprehend, deeply and scientifically, the history of philosophy in its
general outline as well as its details… Some of the research works in the
theoretical, experimental, social, political and economic fields, although
still a few, present a sufficient material as a proof on the existence of
specific qualitative turnings (and discontinuities) for different peoples,
among them undoubtedly, the Arab/Islamic people in the medieval era. (a
project for a new vision of the medieval Arabic thought, P. 11-12)
Rejection of Euro-Centrism
Professor Tizini articulates his position from 'Euro-centrism' on his general
view which puts the Arabic thought as a unique moment within the general
course of evolution of human thought, he expresses this position as follows,
On the basis of this analysis Tizini criticizes both of the major positions in
modern and contemporary Arabic thought, for being unhistorical. The religious
'Salafi' (i.e. the traditional) position, is criticized, for resorting to the 'Original
medieval' Islamic conceptions, hence, ignoring history as such. The followers of
the Western thought, with its diverse philosophical and practical positions, is
criticized, for trying to impose different forms of closed logical systems on the
Arabic realities, and hence, ignoring, too, history. (a project for a new vision of
the medieval Arabic thought, P. 134)
Here we find our selves in front of a very important result that touches
the issue of the deep factors that prepared for the appearance of the
Islamic 'movement' with its important social side. On the basis of such a
strong tie, with its objective conditions, between slaves and free men and
the partially free, the far motives of this movement have been formulated
and crystallized. (a project for a new vision of the medieval Arabic
thought, P. 150)
He also depends on the economic analysis of this society and draws on the
effects of the appearance of 'usury' capitalism in this society and the
accumulation of the number of slaves. As a consequence, the appearance of
Islam became an outlet from such dramatic societal changes, he writes,
In the end, according to Tizini's social, and economic analyses, the Arabian
tribes became prepared to receive the Mohammedan message. This shows
clearly, the 'phenomenal' dialectic between the material (economic and social)
factors and the idealist (religious) factors in the thought of Professor Tizini, in
his words,
The Islamic movement has introduced an exit from this situation through
the idea of 'withdrawal from the material world', and liberated through it
the slaves and the poor, but at the same time, it is not legitimate to explain
this major change through miraculous factors. The Islamic movement has
expressed, in this period, the realities of the accumulated misery of the
poor and slaves of the Arabic society in its own way. This way of
expression, which depends primarily on withdrawal from the material
world (the natural and the social) doesn't mean at all excluding the direct
and positive results that have been reflected upon the lives of the poor. On
the contrary, it means only negating the direct relation between it and the
social, economic and political facts that have been the reason of the
appearance of the Islamic movement… No drought it is important to
adhere to the 'historicity' of the social, thoughtful, and religious structures,
i.e., asserting that these structures have been existing through a long
preceding history, in some way. However, it is important, too, to stress on
that the 'religious conceptions' include conditionally a trial to get rid of the
historical and real, in a way that forms a gap between what the person
beliefs in and what he does. What may appear positive, in this framework,
is essentially what the person gains from following such conceptions.
However, the conceptions themselves represent a prepared way to
withdraw from the historical defined moment in which he lives. (a project
for a new vision of the medieval Arabic thought, P. 155-156)
both Christianity and Judaism. We here see that this is embedded in its
being 'profane' in nature. This appears clearly when we compare it with
Orthodox Christianity.
If the relation between Man and God, within the framework of Trinity, for
the prevailing forms of Christianity at that time, is based on a specific
'ontological' relation between God and Man, and between Man and God,
then it takes the following form: Father, Son and the Holy Spirit. On the
basis of this relation we see that there is no unbridgeable gap between
Man and God. Man (the Messiah) is in some way part of God, or
something similar to it, depending on time and the self.
On the other hand, the situation, in some specific points, differs in Islam.
In Islam, there is an unbridgeable gap between God and Man. For, God
has created Man, not from himself (i.e. not from God himself), nor from
some specific eternal material, but from absolute negative nihility. Qur'an
(the Islamic sacred book) stresses on this concept: "Jesus for God is the
same as Adam, he created him from dust and said be then he became" (Al
Omran, verse no. 32).
As a result of this gap, Philosophers and Sophists in the Arab/Islamic state
became obliged to struggle for humanizing the relation between Man and
God in order to present Human as an active member, not only in the
material world, but also in the hereafter, God's world. For this very
reason, philosophies of 'unity of being' and 'the theory of emanation' has
occupied a prominent position in the intellectual life of such a state.
Within this view, the problem of 'reaching up' to God from Man,
according to the different Christian sects, is solved within Christianity
itself. But, in Arab/Islamic Sophism, this problem of reaching to God has
undertaken a pivotal position, as well as in philosophy to some extent.
This contradiction, in the theoretical position, between Islam and
Christianity has led to a contradiction on the practical level. In
Christianity the negative relation between the negative God and the
tortured Man, or the negativity of both God and Man, is apparent. It is an
alienation toward the real material world. Hence, it is noticed that the
emphasis on the 'individual' in Christianity is formal only. For, in reality
this emphasis is not for the role of 'thinking', but for a subjective
contemplating position that participates in the process of alienation of this
'thought' toward its true objective reality. It is a subjective negativity that
expresses itself in its role in 'salvation' of the individual person from 'this'
cursed World filled with misery. This was, and still, an essential side of
the Christian conception about the relation between Man and God.
However, we see that the situation is different in Islam. For, the
individual, here, sees himself confronting numerous and deep duties
toward himself, and his 'salvation' is dependent on himself to a great
extent. The original 'Sin' that could be 'forgiven', or its effects could be
reduced, within Christianity through a personal sacrifice, but negative, this
very 'Sin' confronts the Muslim person with definite profane duties that
should be overcome. Hence, not the negative 'torture' is the way for
'salvation', as it is the case in Christianity, but the profane 'struggle'
covered by religious form is the content of 'salvation' in Islam.
Salvation, in Islam, takes a different content, for, Islam stresses on the
definite personalized average human being. In addition, among the things
that needs more scrutiny the fact that 'Islam", which appeared in the
seventh century within critical social, economic, and cultural
circumstances, have realized a new important phase of the phases of
surpassing the previously deep superstitious frameworks. In it a Clerical
system that is separate from the prevailing social structure has not been
formed. The 'Sheikh', or 'Emam', or 'Faqih' was not a religious position as
such (recently this position has appeared), but he has been working in the
same time in a specific profession, such as being a carpenter, merchant, or
peasant, etc.
No doubt, this distribution of classes of the social structure of the society
of Muslim 'believers' has played a crucial role in the evolution of 'thought'
at that time, and lately within the Arab/Islamic state. This social
distribution of classes represented the 'social' background of the
'thoughtful' and religious distribution within Muslims.
In addition to this revolutionary motive, that accompanied the existence of
such a state, we may mention the rejection of Islam to the notion of the
'mediator', as an added element in deepening its profane horizons. In the
event of the death of the 'prophet' Muhammad, on 8th of June 632, the first
ruler after Muhammad (Khalifa) stood up saying for the Muslim
community "Whoever worships Muhammad, Muhammad has died, and
whoever worships God, God is alive and doesn't die". Muhammad, in
Islam, did not possess the descriptions that were endowed to Jesus. Jesus
is the 'eraser of grief of the world', he dies under torture as an immolation
for the others. The Christian salvation is realized in the act of immolation
that is introduced by Jesus.
Within this context it is a fatal mistake to equate the Islamic concept of
"Shafa'a" (literally means to ask for forgiveness) by Muhammad with the
Christian concept of 'Salvation'. For, the "Shafa'a" (asking for forgiveness)
does not express the notion of the 'mediator' who presents his sacrifice and
bears on his shoulder the sins of the whole humanity, for in Islam every
'person' gets what he gains". In Islam the human being stands before God
without a mediator, in other words, without a Cleric organization. This
includes in itself a result, which is that the Muslim is in no need to be
'Unified' with God to realize his final aims and higher values. Such aims
can be realized in his true human world.
Hence, the Islamic God is capable of reaching to any person, but the
opposite is not true, i.e., the human being is not capable to reach to God or
unify with him. Naturally he can 'reach' to God in an allegoric way, i.e., in
the meaning that he obeys God's orders that are written is his book, hence,
he is close to him and beloved by him.
However, it is important to note that such a relation between the Muslim
as a human being and God can't lead in any way to an 'ontological'
closeness between God and Man. The concepts of 'transcendence' and
'separateness' are privileges that are limited only to God, in the same time
where the human world stays within the circle of act and react through the
requirements of the 'caring Deity'. However, despite that, such a relation,
seen from God to Man, represented indirect early traits of a cosmological
conception that is based on an 'Idealistic Unity of Being'. Or may be more
accurate to see in such a relation (from God to Man) factors of emergence
and evolution of an Arab/Islamic theory of unity of being.
When some Islamic historians see Qur'an not only as a religious text but
also as a legal, ethical, economic and social one, we should say that this is
true if we take into account the double sided nature, the spiritual and the
practical, of Islam. No doubt, the 'spiritual' side has affected such domains
positively. However, such effect can be assimilated through understanding
the socio-civilizational situation at this historic period. Any concept or
notion bears different social theoretical meanings with different historical
cases. This means that the problematic should be defined through the
'historical legitimacy' as well as the 'cognitive truth' at the same time. We
dealt with this concept in another place in this book. Here, we should
stress only on that both the idealist and the materialist thought, religion
and science, are legitimate historical phenomena, even if it were not all
real from a scientific cognitive strict view. (a project for a new vision of
the medieval Arabic thought, P. 211)
Secularism
Within this general view of the relation between the 'idealist' and the
'materialist' or between Islam and social relations, Tizini introduces his
conception of 'Secularism' as follows,
Arab secularism advocates have looked to the issue from the position of
differentiating between two sides in the dominating religion, and in every
religion that have an effect on the society. Those sides are belief and
civilization; or the 'believing' function and the 'civilizing' function of such
a religion in the society. If it turns out that the civilizing function of a
specific religion can act mutually between members of the society who
embrace different religions, then the 'believing' function of such a religion
represents a relation only between the believer of this religion and his
God. In this way the civilizing function of the prevailing religion in the
Arabic society can play its role without being associated with the
'believing' role of such a religion. This is what exactly meant by the
slogan expressed before (Religion is for God and the Nation is for all).
For, religion here becomes a civil face of the civic society and the national
state. Hence, dealing with it, here, becomes liable to advancement and
evolution laws of human life. For, the issue here is related to a set of legal,
economic, social, etc procedures, which is subject to such laws. Whereas,
the 'believing' position, or the 'position from God' in this slogan is
considered personal as much as it is respected and protected. (On the road
of Methodological Clarity – Secularism in the Arabic thought, P. 52-53)
word 'revolution' that exists in the title of the project no longer has a
meaning, irrespectively of the justifications that may be given to it. The
language of the era can no longer bear such a word. Hence, I have
contemplated my project and decided to start from the real world to the
book and from the book to reality…and I understood that the project of
the 'revolution' itself has reached a dead point. From this understanding
and throughout my thorough reading of both the Arabic and European
contemporary thought, I realized what in my opinion should be the
suitable alternative to the concept of 'revolution' and its project, it was the
concept of 'renaissance' (Nahda, in Arabic) and its project…
Whence I have reached to this concept, it occupied a wide space in my
intellectual and political live, and I realized that the most important
element of the project of 'revolution' and 'renaissance' (and I mean here
the real revolution) is understanding the identity of the social carrier of
any 'revolution' or 'renaissance' movement. Therefore, I had a thorough
thought in the issue until I reached to the understanding that the social
carrier of any movement in the Arabic societies is the society itself…the
whole society. Instead, we, in the past, were used to consider the class as
the social carrier and speak about classes struggle and the class
problematic, this is no longer viable. The carrier of the new project, the
renaissance, can't be except a class or a political alliance that incorporates
the whole sections of the society. World became to a great deal different
since dismantling of the Soviet Union and the emergence of a new world
system in which the United States leads it alone. I have realized from the
position of the socio-political science that the real social carrier of a
renaissance project can only be represented by the Arabic Nation from its
outset to its outset. In a more ideological definition, I found that the social
carrier of any future project should be represented by a spectrum from
extreme nationalist democratic right to extreme national left. I have
followed this socio-cultural and political issue and I discovered that our
speech about a 'revolutionary project' is not only misleading but
dangerous too. Hence, I moved to the new position, and I decided to
review my old theoretical project…and reformulate it in a new title,
reconstructing what I had to reconstruct…then I left it aside, to formulate
instead another totally different project, its title is 'from Heritage (Al-
Turath) to Renaissance'. (dialogue - Alhayah newspaper)
Therefore, such a relation has been forged to fit Europe's point of view
and in favor of its benefits. If we take into account the limited hybrid
reformist structure of the Arabic renaissance thought, which aroused in a
difficult situation governed by the aforementioned conspiracy, something
very important will appear, which is that the process of forging the east-
west relation have pervaded through many of renaissance Arabic thinkers.
What is of prime importance, in this issue, is not its effect on the Arabs,
but its resulting wide and great confusion in the structure of the Arabic
renaissance thought toward itself. All of this has created for the Arabic
thought pseudo-problems that occupied such thought instead of its real
and new problems. In fact, we can express this situation as a problematic
that did not find the required research tools that can define and deal with
it, which is a situation understood by itself. As a consequence, different
positions from this problematic have taken the form of ideological illusory
reflexes not real scientific positions. (On the road of Methodological
Clarity, P. 20-21)
However, looking to the problem from the other side, the side of the
historical advancement, invites us to take into account something that
bears a specific importance, the vast advancement of the capitalist
imperialist societies, which is basically an industrial, technical and
scientific one. But on the social level, such societies is suffering from a
deep and all encompassing crisis, in such a way that it started to affect the
first side and create real problems. It can be noticed that classes struggle
of the working people, there, is confronted by great difficulties, of which
two arise. The first is the widespread coercing system quantitatively and
qualitatively. The scientific technical advancement provides increasing
abilities for the authority to confront the unpredicted actions that might be
taken by the working people during its struggle. The electric devices
became capable of furnishing the intelligent systems with all the
information about every person or family. The other difficulty lies in that
contemporary capitalist societies became deeply and widely complicated,
which makes it difficult to discover how far is the economic and social
detriment of the working people there. In other words, the process of
uncovering the mechanisms of exploitation and discrimination in the
imperialist capitalist societies has become complex and indirect. (On the
road of Methodological Clarity – Arabic thought from the position of
criticism, the imperialist intrusion and the symptoms of the European
thought, P. 175-176)
First of all he criticizes Aljabri's statement, himself, that his own writings
has opened new horizons for Arabic thought equal to the horizons opened by the
new classification of the modern biological science. He also criticizes Aljabri's
trial to make an essential differentiation between western 'Moroccan' writers,
who follow the exact guidelines of scientific thought and the eastern Arabic
writers who write only for living and don't care for the quality of their work
(From Western Orientalism to Moroccan Occidentalism, Pp. 21-24).
The second problematic that Professor Tizini has dealt with during his
second phase is how to read religious thought, in general, and 'Qur'an' (the
Islamic sacred text), in particular. In this context, he criticizes the traditional
readings as refusing to admit that history affects out understanding of our
religion and opens new horizons for advancement. In addition, he tries to found
his 'advancement' view of the Islamic religion on 'Qur'an' and the historical
sayings of the prophet Muhammad. (Islam and the epoch – challenges and
horizons, P. 101 – 109).
On these two basic rules, the possibility of a pluralistic reading and the
pluralistic nature of the 'Qur'anic' text, Tizini concludes, through detailed
analysis of Islamic traditional texts, that every reading of 'Qur'an' is essentially
an Ideological social reading and that every reading possesses its own legitimacy.
(Islam and the epoch – challenges and horizons, P. 128 – 134). He epitomizes
this position as follows,
[of Qur'an] from heavens as one whole text. The second, of "historical
nature", is defined by the becoming of Qur'an as an historical,
historicized, incident, not after receiving of Qur'an by the prophet but
within the context of this receiving itself. . (Islam and the epoch –
challenges and horizons, P. 134).
The third problematic, which Professor Tizini dealt with in his second phase
is the necessary conditions for a new Arabic renaissance. Form his point of view,
one condition for such an achievement is the appearance of a new Arabic
philosophical thought.
In addition, Tizini, in his efforts to deal with this third problematic, issued
what we can view as a message for the Arabic societies, a medium size booklet
titled "A Declaration in Arabic Renaissance and Enlightenment", 2001. In this
'declaration' he tried to make a complete formulation of this essential
problematic. In this work he divides conditions of Arabic renaissance into four
basic levels. First, the theoretical basis upon which such evolution should be
constructed. Second, Definition of the obstacles of renaissance that should be
targeted to overcome. Three, theoretical concepts of a renaissance movement.
Fourth, social conditions for such an evolution.
In the second chapter of this work, Tizini introduces his view of the obstacles
toward renaissance. 1) Fundamentalism and political Islam. 2) Globalization and
being part of the West. 3) Structural functionalism, which limits advancement to
specific functions of the society. 4) Postmodernism and breaking with self-
culture. 5) End of history and demise of ideology. (A Declaration in Arabic
Renaissance and Enlightenment, p. 53-84 )
The social carrier of the project is the collective of classes and elements of
the society. The internal structure of the self is based on preserving self-
identity, depth in history, historical memory, and consciousness of the
mechanisms of the ups and downs of the Arabic historical course.
Coexistence and co-evolution between renaissance and enlightenment.
Asserting the central role and duty of the Arabic intellectuals and
acknowledging their weaknesses and failure. The need for a growth in the
intellectual theoretical woks, especially the rational and serious ones. (A
Declaration in Arabic Renaissance and Enlightenment, p. 85-129 )
His Works
• 'A project of a new vision for the Arabic thought in the medieval
era', Damascus house, Damascus, 1971, five prints
• In Rushd and his philosophy with the text of the dialogue between
Muhammad Abduh and Farah Anton, authored by Farah Anton,
introduction by Tayyeb Tizini, Dar Alfarabi, Beirut, 1988.
In German
• Die Matemie auffassung in der islamischen Philosophie des
Mittelalters , 1972 Berlin.
With Others
• Islam and major problems of the era, with another researcher,
Damascus, 1998.
• Islam and the epoch: challenges and horizons, with Muhammad Said
Albouty, Abdlewahed Elwany (ed.), Dar Alfikr, Damascus, 1998.
Sources:
• Union of Syrian and Arab Writers (in Arabic)