The Druze Faith
• Introduction
• Druze History
• The Role of al-Hakim
• The Druze Concept of God
• The World
• God and Man
Introduction
The Druze movement sprang from Isma‘ili Shi‘i Islam in the
year AH 408/AD 1017, during the time of the sixth Fatimid
caliph-imam, al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah. Headquartered in Cairo,
the movement soon took hold in Mount Lebanon and the
Anti-Lebanon Range, in northern and southern Syria, in and
around Damascus and in northern Palestine.
Most of the adherents to this faith were members of those
Arabian tribes, such as the Tanukh, Kalb, Kilab and Tayyi’,
who had already come under the political and creedal impact
of Isma‘ili Fatimid hegemony. Druze epistles were also sent
to the Hijaz, to the eastern part of Arabia and to Yemen.
They reached as far as India. This suggests that adherents
to the Druze movement may have existed in those countries.
The name by which the Druze like to be known is Muwahhidun
(sing. Muwahhid), which reflects their central belief in a
mystical oneness (tawhid) with the One. Ironically, however,
the followers of this movement acquired their popular name,
the Druze, from a certain Muhammad ibn Isma‘il al-Darzi
(also known as Nashtakin or Anushtagin al-Darazi). He was a
high state functionary enrolled in the movement in its early
stages, but who came, before long, to have major differences
(1) with other of its leaders: this prompted Hamza ibn ‘Ali,
the movement’s head, together with Caliph al-Hakim, to expel
him from it, causing him to rise up against Hamza ibn ‘Ali
and to ally himself with the non-adherents to the faith
among the Cairenes. He led an insurrection that ended with
his defeat on 29 Dhu l-Hijja AH 409/9 May AD 1019 and his
execution on the following day.
In order to understand the Druze faith, we must step back to
consider the evolution of Islamic approaches to the Qur’an.
As Muslims came into greater contact with Greek philosophy,
Persian thought, Indian mysticism, and Jewish and Christian
theology, they began to interpret the literal message of the
Qur’an in order to gain insight into its deeper
ramifications.
This new approach to Islam became more distinctive as
Muslims increased their acquaintance with Sufism. An
interaction between Greek rationalism and Oriental
mysticism, which was intensified by the emergence of Sufi
sages, especially in the ninth and tenth centuries AD,
prepared the way for the emergence, at the beginning of the
eleventh century (fifth century AH), of the Druze movement
as an offshoot of the esoteric Isma’ili approach to Islam.
Adherents to the movement believed that a third and last
stage of Islam had begun: namely, al-haqiqa,
‘self-realization,’ as true a feeling of unity with the One
as is humanly possible.
The first stage, al-shari‘a (literal or exoteric Islam), had
paved the way for the second one, al-tariqa (inner or
esoteric Islam), but now it was the time of al-haqiqa. These
three Sufi terms ― al-shari‘a, al-tariqa, and al-haqiqa ―
were used by the Druze synonymously with islam, iman and
ihsan (or tawhid), the latter three being common among other
Muslims as well, Sunni and Shi‘i alike. (Islam here refers
to the first stage, not to the religion as such.)
For the Druze, this last and third stage, variously known as
al-haqiqa, ihsan, or tawhid (oneness with the One), is
reached by passing through the states of gnostic
preparedness instilled during the preceding two stages. It
is the nature of tawhid to lead the adherent to behold his
or her divine reality where no relative is mystically apart
from the absolute and no outward existence is independent of
divine reality. The Muwahhid is thus led to identifying him
or herself and, consequently, every existing being, with the
One. At this stage, the Muwahhid is mystically subsumed into
the all-inclusiveness of the One, whose existence is the
only real existence.
Courtesy:
www.druzeheritage.org
Druze
History
It was during the period of
Crusader rule in Syria (1099-1291) that the Druze first
emerged into the full light of history, in the Gharb region
of the Shuf mountains. As redoubtable warriors serving the
Muslim rulers of Damascus against the alien invaders, the
Druze were given the task of keeping watch over the
Crusaders in the seaport of Beirut, with the aim of
preventing them from making any encroachments inland.
Subsequently, the Druze chiefs of the Gharb placed their not
inconsiderable military experience at the disposal of the
Mamluk rulers of Egypt (1250-1516); first, to assist them in
putting an end to what remained of Crusader rule in coastal
Syria and, later, to help them safeguard the Syrian coast
against Crusader retaliation by sea.
(In 1425, a Druze contingent
from Beirut and the Gharb joined in a major Mamluk naval
expedition against Cyprus, where the last remnant of
Crusader rule in the Near East was reduced to subservience).
In return for the valuable services rendered by the Druze of
the Gharb and other parts of the Shuf mountains, the Mamluks
appear to have allowed them the freedom to manage their
internal affairs with minimal interference from the central
government in Cairo, or its Syrian agency in Damascus.
(The history of the Gharb Druze during the Crusader and
Mamluk periods is known from the work of two remarkable
Druze historians, Salih ibn Yahya (d. ca. 1435) and Ahmad
ibn Hamza ibn Sibat (d. 1523), no such documentation being
available regarding the Druze of other Syrian regions. It
appears, however, that the Druze of Hauran were among the
peasants and tribesmen of that area who fought and decimated
the forces of the Second Crusade, as they advanced from
Palestine to attempt the capture of Damascus in 1147.
Notably, the Druze placed their military resources at the
disposal of the Sunni Muslim state against the Crusaders at
a time when their community was being singled out for
special condemnation by the Sunni religious establishment on
account of its beliefs.)
Unlike the Mamluks, the Ottomans who succeeded them as the
rulers of Syria in 1516 were not prepared to allow the Shuf
Druze the customary local freedoms which they had come to
regard as established rights. Consequently, the sixteenth
and seventeenth centuries were to witness a succession of
armed Druze rebellions against the Ottomans, countered by
repeated Ottoman punitive expeditions against the Shuf in
the course of which the Druze population of the area was
severely depleted and many villages laid waste. These
military measures, however, severe as they were, did not
succeed in reducing the local Druze to the required degree
of subordination. This led the Ottoman government to agree
to an arrangement whereby the different nahiyes (districts)
of the Shuf would be granted in iltizam (that is, in fiscal
concession) to one of the region’s emirs, or leading chiefs,
leaving the maintenance of law and order in the area, and
the collection of its taxes, in the hands of the appointed
emir. This arrangement was to provide the cornerstone for
the privileged status which ultimately came to be enjoyed by
the whole of Mount Lebanon in Ottoman Syria, Druze and
Christian areas alike. (The history of the Shuf Druze for
the Ottoman period is known from the work of
Christianmainly Maronitehistorians, as well as from other
local and Ottoman sources, and from Ottoman archival
material.)
(Remarkably, the Shuf Druze had taken up arms against
Ottoman rule when the Ottoman Empire was at the peak of its
power. Starting from the middle decades of the nineteenth
century, the Hauran Druze of Jabal al-Duruzwhose earlier
history remains obscure due to a lack of documentationput
up a similar resistance to determined efforts on the part of
the Ottoman state to tighten its weakened control over
Syria. Later, in the mid-1920s, these same Hauran Druze rose
in armed rebellion against the French shortly after France,
emerging victorious from the First World War, was allotted
its mandate over Syria and Lebanon. This Druze revolt was to
trigger a general Syrian insurrection against the French
Mandate, lasting for nearly three years.)
Historically, the close relations between the Druze and
Christians of the Lebanon date back to the sixteenth
century, when the Druze of the Shuf, whose livelihood
depended on silk production, first opened their country to
large-scale Christianand principally Maronitepeasant
migration from the north, to help produce the silk. To
encourage this Christian immigration, the leading Druze
chiefs of the area made generous donations of land to
Maronite and other Christian monastic orders for the
building of monasteries and churches; tradition has it that
the Druze villages where the Christian newcomers settled
came to be called ‘honoured villages (diya‘ musharrafa)’.
Meanwhile, as the Druze emirs holding the iltizam of the
Druze area gained control over the adjacent Maronite nahiye
of Kisrawan, the management of the affairs of Mount Lebanon
developed into a close Druze-Maronite partnership.
Having the advantage of numbers and of privileged external
connections, the Maronites eventually started to gain the
upper hand in this partnership. This development appears to
have elicited little Druze concern in its initial stages
but, before long, tensions began to rise. Incited and openly
backed by France, the Maronite clerical and feudal
leaderships began, from the 1840s, to seek complete
dominance over the whole of Mount Lebanon, causing the Druze
to feel dangerously threatened on their very home ground.
When the Druze reaction, in full force, finally came in
1860, its violence was such that the Christian parties who
had provoked it fled the scene, leaving the defenceless
Christians of the Druze regions to their fate.
While the manner in which the Druze fell upon their
terrified Christian neighbours in 1860in the Shuf, Wadi al-Taym
and elsewherewent far beyond the justifiable limits of
self-defence, what it represented at the time was an
outburst of pent-up feelings of hostility provoked by
decades of equally unjustified Christian provocation. Over a
century later, during the course of the multi-faceted
Lebanese civil war of 1975-1991, Christian provocation was
even more pronounced and included indefensible attacks on
isolated and unprotected Druze communities in different
parts of Mount Lebanon (notably, in the Matn and Shahhar
districts). This was a decisive factor in eliciting the
violence with which the Druze attacked Christians living in
their midst in 1983, devastating their villages and forcing
a massive Christian exodus from the Shuf. In both instances,
the Druze recourse to violence represented a departure from
the historical Druze norm, which had emphasized peaceful
coexistence on the basis of equitable partnership and mutual
goodwill. However, to maintain this norm, the community had
first to attend to its survival, which is why, at various
turning points in their history, the Druze felt compelled to
resort to arms when they perceived their community to be in
danger. This compulsion was the same regardless of whether
the perceived danger came from a neighbour or an external
power, or whether the odds were with the Druze or
overwhelmingly against them.
Proud of their communal identity and solidarity, the Druze
have also been staunchly attached to their native soil; the
same Druze families have lived in the same towns and
villages, if not the same houses, for centuries, with hardly
an interruption. Attachment to community and territory,
however, has never been a bar to active Druze involvement in
the affairs of the broader societies to which they belonged;
nor has it obstructed the Druze commitment to the wider Arab
identity that they share with other Muslim and Christian
communities of the Near East. Moreover, though socially
conservative, the Druze have exhibited a remarkable openness
to Western cultural influences in modern times. During the
nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries, Lebanese Druze
chiefs welcomed and offered their protection to British and
American missionaries arriving to establish schools and
colleges in the Shuf mountains, as they had in Beirut;
furthermore, by sending their own sons and daughters to
these teaching institutions, they set the example for
others. As a result, the spread of modern education began
particularly early among the Druze, no less than among
Lebanese Christians. In due course, Druze educated at home
or abroad came to be counted among those playing leading
roles in the social, economic and cultural advancement of
Lebanese society, as of the broader Arab society, thereby
placing their community in the vanguard of Arab development.
All of these considerations make the heritage of the Druze
community a subject worthy of serious academic
investigationbeginning with a thorough survey of Druze
literature and of centuries of literature written about the
community, both by its supporters and by its detractors.
Hopefully, the present bibliography, sponsored by the Royal
Institute for Inter-Faith Studies in Amman, Jordan, will
help provide not only basic material, but also an incentive
for further study in the field.
Kamal Salibi
Courtesy:
www.druzeheritage.org
The
Role of al-Hakim
The Druze doctrine maintains that, four hundred years after
the advent of Islam (one thousand years after Christ),
esoteric interpretation of the Qur’an achieved its task and
the stage of iman or al-tariqa terminated with the arrival
of the caliph-imam, al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah. Just as the
Prophet Muhammad had delivered the divine message
(literally, islam or shari‘a) and was the last conveyor (natiq)
of it, so was al-Hakim the last of the esoteric imams who,
starting with ‘Ali ibn ‘Abi Talib down through the Fatimid
caliphs, took upon themselves the task of interpreting God’s
message and implementing the second stage (iman or tariqa)
by establishing the Fatimid state, thus transmitting the
esoteric meaning of the divine Word to mankind. (Hence, the
Fatimid imam was known as the maqam or ‘station’ of the
esoteric divine Word.) With al-Hakim, the third stage
started.
Consequently, on 1 Muharram AH 408/30 May AD 1017, al-Hakim,
according to the Druze, relinquished the esoteric Imamate
and appointed Hamza ibn ‘Ali as the imam of the third stage
(tawhid). He also appointed a distant cousin, ‘Abd al-Rahim
ibn Ilias, as heir presumptive of the Muslims (wali ‘ahd al-Muslimin)
and another Fatimid personality, Abu Hisham ‘Abbas ibn
Shu‘ayb, as heir presumptive of the Mu’mins (wali ‘ahd al-Mu’minin).
The Fatimid imam was thus replaced by the holders of three
different positions, the first dealing with the Muslims (in
other words, the followers of exoteric Islam), the second
dealing with the Mu’mins (the followers of iman) and the
third dealing with the Muwahhidun (the followers of tawhid.)(3)
Al-Hakim was now solely the maqam.
Courtesy:
www.druzeheritage.org
The
Druze Concept of God
The doctrine of tawhid maintains that God is not an entity
in Himself (dhatiyya); nor is He merely above this
existence. For the Druze, God is absolute existence.
Consequently, He is not a creator in that He created the
universe ex nihilo. Rather, physical existence is God’s
expression, His manifestation (badw). Since God is absolute,
He has not created the world outside of Him for, as
absolute, He has no limit: similarly, the world did not
emanate from Him in time. He is the One: there is none other
than God; He is the only Existent. The world is a constant
projection from Him, by Him, within Him and to Him. This is
what the Druze doctrine means by ibda‘, not an act that
occurred outside of God.
The world is, therefore, in existence due to God’s divine
nature (amr). The Qur’anic verse, “His amr, when he wills a
shay’ , is to say to it, ‘Be,’ and it is,” (4) lies at the
basis of the Druze doctrine of existence according to Hamza
ibn ‘Ali. The word amr in this verse means sha’n (affair,
activity) and is equivalent to the Latin word res. (5)
According to the Druze interpretation of this Qur’anic
verse, the amr of God, that is, His will, activity, is
transformed into the divine imperative: “Be!” For the Druze,
God is to His amr as a word’s meaning is to the word. As
meaning both transcends the word that it expresses and is
immanent in it, the absolute Existent transcends the world
while being immanent in it. Hence, God is referred to by the
Druze as both transcendent (munazzah) and immanent (mawjud).
Tawhid is defined as tanzih wa wajud, that is, transcendence
and immanence.
Hamza ibn ‘Ali refers to God’s amr as ‘aql, an Arabic verbal
noun that originally meant ‘to bind’: equivalent to the
Greek nous, it should not be misunderstood as ‘mind’ or
‘reason’. As an intelligent and purposive principle,
however, the ‘aql is inclusive of all existing beings. The
‘aql or amr of God binds and encompasses (‘aqala) the whole
world. It is the finite projection, so to speak, of the
absolute One (al-mubda‘ al-mahdud min al-mubdi‘ al-ahad).
Just as a word is in constant union with the meaning which
it expresses, so God’s amr or ‘aql is, by its very nature,
in constant union with God. However, as a finite projection
of the absolute, the ‘aql is also, by its very nature, aware
of being projected (mubda‘) by the One. This awareness made
it feel that it was an entity in its own right, although one
within the absolute oneness of God: the ‘aql had become
aware of its self.
By being aware of its self, the ‘aql was deflected, so to
speak, from its original course, for self-awareness impeded
it from full awareness of the One. This deflection from
feeling in union with God to ‘focusing upon’ and ‘enjoying’
its self made the aql feel that it was separate from God.
This deflection, however, was nothing more than relative
absence from the One, the absolute Existent, an absence of
light (nur mahd) that is the same as utter darkness (zulma
mahd). This is a delusion (‘adam). The absence of divine
light is what the Druze call adversity (didd). It is a
selfish attitude, the origin of discord, contrariety, and
division.
However, the ‘aql realized that it had been deflected from
the One and developed an imploring passion to return to Him.
I say ‘imploring’ because the ‘aql realized that it is, by
its very nature, completely dependent upon the One. It has
no power of its own. Hamza called this passion nafs (‘wish’,
‘desire’, ‘endeavour’, ‘eagerness’ or himma) (6) and it is
the shay’ mentioned in the Qu’ranic verse quoted above.
Here, shay’ is the verbal noun of the Arabic verb sha’a (‘to
desire’). For the Druze, it is the second cosmic principle.
The first is the ‘aql; the third, according to the Druze
interpretation of the verse, is the ‘saying’ (al-qawl, al-kalima)
implied in the phrase, an yaqula; the fourth is the
imperative “Be!” (“Kun!”). This imperative precedes its
implementation, yakun, which is the fifth cosmic principle.
Hence, the amr or irada corresponds to the ‘aql; the shay’
corresponds to the nafs; the qawl (in the phrase an yaqula)
corresponds to the kalima; the imperative kun to the sabiq;
and the implementation of kun, namely, yakun, corresponds to
the tali, in other words, that which follows. These are the
five cosmic principles (al-hudud al-khamsa) that are always
associated with the Druze. They are derived from the Druze’s
esoteric interpretation of the Qur’anic verse (36:82)
“Innama amruhu idha arada shay’an an yaqula lahu kun fayakun.”
(His amr (nature, activity), when he wills a shay’ (desired
thing), is to say to it, ‘Be’, and it is.)
Courtesy:
www.druzeheritage.org
The
World
From the fifth cosmic principle, therefore, came forth the
world. The world is the expression of the fifth cosmic
principle, which is, in turn, the expression of the fourth
cosmic principle, and so on, all of the way back to the
first cosmic principle, the res divina, the divine will, the
‘aql, the finite projection of the absolute. Now, since man
is the quintessence of this world, which originated as a
spark from the ‘aql and, since the ‘aql, as the finite
projection of the absolute, is eternal, then so is man’s
reality—his soul. The human soul is to the human body as its
meaning is to a word. Just as a meaning makes sense only
when expressed through its word, so must the human soul be
expressed in a human body. The human soul realizes itself in
the human body. The human body, therefore, serves as the
sole medium for the human soul to achieve actualization and
to participate in the progress of man toward knowledge and
self-realization. The true knowledge of the oneness of God,
through which man realizes his purpose of feeling as much in
union with the One as is humanly possible, can only be
achieved through man’s gradual yet continuous spiritual
experience and through his constant preparedness for the
gnostic discovery of human union with the One. For the
Druze, the span of a single life is not enough for an
individual to realize this ultimate purpose.
Courtesy:
www.druzeheritage.org
God
and Man
Since man is the only being who possesses the faculty to
comprehend this gnostic reality, he alone can strive to
discover it. He is the only being who can check the
egotistic drive that throws him into the delusion of
plurality and, consequently, deflects him from his true
nature. Here lies the seed of vice in man: taking joy in his
own ego and living in the delusion of plurality. Virtue, on
the other hand, lies in living in this plural world, but
without taking it as an aim, that is, in moving away from
one’s own ego toward unity with the rest of humanity and,
therefore, in union with the One, inasmuch as it is humanly
attainable. Those who succeed in reaching this goal do so
through divine love. Hence, love is seen by the Druze as a
mystical feeling of endless striving for such a union with
the One, whereas hatred is understood as a product of
metaphysical egotism in which one separates one’s own being
and interests from the being and interests of the whole.
Union can be reached if man believes in and spiritually
realizes the following: the non-dualism and absoluteness of
the One; that God’s amr, the ‘aql, is the finite
manifestation of the absolute; and that the cosmic
principles are the source of all being, with the ‘aql as
both their origin and their goal. In addition, man should
practice, truly and through the exercise of his free nature,
the following virtues:
1. Veracity in the broadest sense of the word, that is, to
profess the truth, to act according to the truth and to live
for the truth.
2. Safeguarding, helping and guiding his fellow men or
seeking their guidance along the path of truth and real
knowledge.
3. Renouncing all beliefs leading to repudiation of the
oneness of God and, consequently, to falsehood.
4. Dissociation from those who transgress against
righteousness and justice, that is, those who hinder man
from knowing the truth and treading upon the path of real
knowledge.
5. Striving endlessly to achieve the real purpose of man,
namely, to be in union with the One as much as is humanly
possible.
6. Contentment (rida) with the divine law.
7. Submission (taslim) to God’s will and deeds.
In order, these seven tenets are the true meanings of the
seven Shi‘i pillars of Islam, namely, the two testimonies,
prayer, almsgiving, fasting, pilgrimage, strife in God’s way
(jihad) and allegiance (walaya). It is by means of these
pillars that man moves away from egotism and plurality
toward union with the One. In the Druze faith, the aim of
ethics is not merely to acquiesce to a superior will only,
but to lead man, rationally and spiritually, to the natural
fulfilment of his being through virtuous behaviour. This
approach is what led the Druze to call for complete equality
among human beings, including equality of opportunity: it is
only thus that man may realize himself, to the highest
possible degree, in the One. This is why the Druze doctrine
strictly condemns polygamy. The Druze law of domestic
relations stipulates that, when a man marries a woman, he
must put her on the same footing as himself, materially as
well as spiritually. Husband and wife must treat one another
with complete equality and justice. In case of divorce, the
spouse proven to have been unjust must pay the other half of
what he or she owns. This approach stems from the central
position that the Druze doctrine gives to the human being.
In order to try to live up to such a standard, men and women
must strive to attain the purpose of their being, which is
self-realization in the One and living accordingly, in real
love. The individual’s capacity to reach such oneness with
the One depends upon his or her intellectual and spiritual
preparedness. True discovery of the self will enable the
individual to behold the One, as if he or she looked into a
mirror and saw his or her own image. It was through such
manifestations that the presence of God was revealed to man,
just as a word reveals its meaning to the reader in as much
as the reader is prepared to receive it. God is infinite and
transcendent in His boundless immanence and omnipresence.
The onus is on man, through intellectual and spiritual
preparedness, to behold such immanence and omnipresence. Man
can achieve the harmony of these two forces only if he opens
his heart to divine love. No one, however, can walk the path
of self-realization without a guide to show him that God, in
His oneness, is both inside and outside of him, both
transcendent and immanent, both divine and human.
Notes (1) Marshal G. S. Hodgon, “Al-Darazī and Hamza
in the Origin of the Druze Religion,” Journal of the
American Oriental Society 82 (1962) : 5-20. See, also, Kamal
Salibi, “Introduction,” to The Druze Heritage: An Annotated
Bibliography, compiled and edited by Talal Fandi and Ziyad
Abi-Shakra (Amman: Royal Institute for Inter-Faith Studies,
2001), 1ff. (2) Sami Makarem, The Druze Faith (Delmar, NY:
Carvan Books, 1974), 19-22. (3) Cf. Sami Makarem, “Al-Hākim
bi-Amrillāh’s Appointment of His Successors,” Al-Abhath 23
(December 1970), nos. 1-4. (4) Qur’an 36:82; Makarem, The
Druze Faith, 43. (5) Cf. Sami Makarem, “Al-Amr al-Ilihi wa
mafhumhu fi l-‘aqida al-Isma‘iliyya,” Al-Abhath 20, no. 1
(March 1967) : 3-16. (6) E. W. Lane, “Nafs,” in An Arabic
English Lexion (London: William and Norgate, 1893).
Courtesy:
www.druzeheritage.org
|
