[ad_1]
Hisham Jouait, philosopher, thinker and Tunisian historian, has managed to produce books and scientific and in-depth studies on Arab-Islamic history and heritage, most of which have been translated into several languages. He has also written and lectured on developments in the Arab countries and participated in his struggle for political reform, democracy and human rights.
Some describe him as the most important historian and thinker of the last fifty years, he has produced many rare documents and led to the scientific conclusions opposed by many orientalists, academics and writers of Western and Arab countries. Among his opponents were secularists and Salafist Islamists, including his three books on the biography of the prophet and the beginnings of Islam.
Among his most prominent works are "The Arab Islamic Character and the Arab Destiny", "Europe and Islam: The Shock of Culture and Modernity", "Kufa: The Origins of the Arab Islamic City "and" Sedition: The Dialectic of Religion and Politics in Ancient Islam "" Prophet's Biography: Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy, Prophecy prophecy, prophecy and prophecy "And the victory of Islam. "
The result of our meeting with him was the following dialogue:
About 50 years after the publication of your famous book "Arab Islamic Personality and Arab Destiny", 40 years after your book "Europe and Islam" and a series of your writings on the latest developments in the Arab and Islamic world with its intellectual dimensions , cultural, historical and geostrategic. What are the results of the eight years of the Tunisian revolution and the Arab revolutions?
Politicians tend to assess the reality of Arab and Islamic countries and geopolitical developments by focusing on immediate factors and political, military, economic and technical indicators, but on the historical, intellectual and scientific dimensions and the effects of religious and philosophical.
The attention of the majority of politicians in the world in general and in Arab countries, especially the need for policy makers and senior officials of the state and society to absorb the context religious, cultural and social of the Arab and Islamic peoples, for example.
Our countries need intellectuals and politicians with in-depth knowledge of culture and knowledge, as well as the conditions of democracy and human rights in the Arab countries.
It is impossible to understand developments and geostrategic variables in Arab countries, including Tunisia, without understanding the roots of Arab-Islamic thought and the depth of the transformations experienced by the Islamic world and Europe in past centuries. when Europe has obtained the map of intellectual, philosophical, cultural and economic modernization.
Progress in the West took place at a time when the great Islamic State, led by the Ottomans in Istanbul and Turkey, the Safavids in ancient Persia, historical Iran, Khurasan and parts of the country. Iraq, India and the Caucasus, as well as its capital, Tabriz, Qazvin and Isfahan, have fallen.
The Arab region was in the least developed period of one of the two major Muslim states. While the state of the Mongols retreats until the mid-nineteenth century British occupation of India.
After the intellectual and scientific revolutions in industrial and political Europe, the occupation of most Islamic and Arab countries has become the Arab region less adapted to the progress and stages of intellectual, scientific and political modernization, appeared in Europe in modern and contemporary pacts.
The pioneers of reform and renewal appeared in the nineteenth century, before and after the building of the British and French occupation, especially at the level of the elites who were moving towards modernization or following the evolution of Arab-Islamic culture. After the Second World War, the new national leaders and the declaration of independence tried to take further modernization measures.
The relationship between laity and Arab Islamists must be revised
However, the measures taken are limited and have important shortcomings, notably the impossibility of achieving Arab and Islamic unity and the success of development and modernization policies that take into account the cultural, intellectual and religious specificities of Arab and Islamic societies. , including Tunisia.
The conflicts of interest and the contradictions of the old and new colonial powers in the Arab region, particularly in Palestine and in neighboring countries, then in the rich Arab and Muslim Gulf countries, have complicated the situation of the Muslim world and the reality of "the national state" recognized by the United Nations and the great powers after the war. And the Declaration on Decolonization in its old form.
The stalemate of reforms and revolutions does not cancel its success in the medium and long term
In this historical and geopolitical context, the Arab revolutions took place. About 10 years ago, millions of Arabs participated in demonstrations and movements demanding political, economic, social and dignity reforms. But such revolutions are difficult because they need a generation to achieve their goals.
As everyone has noticed, the situation is complicated in the Arab countries and regional and international wars have taken place in many of them. All scenarios became available.
But the path of change and reform does not only depend on the balance between military and economic situation, but many factors need years and maybe a generation to develop in the sense of consolidating the ideas of the reformers and the current of rebirth, change and revolution.
Geo-strategic factors
Q: The developments in Tunisia and the Arab and Islamic countries are historical and are governed by many geostrategic factors: do the pessimists continue to face the failure of the revolutions, especially in the short term in the Arab Mashreq? and in Libya, or do they share the optimistic vision of successful reform and change in the medium and long term?
The movement of history is governed by laws: unlike politicians interested in circumstantial factors, the role of thinkers and intellectuals is to focus more on intellectual, religious and cultural contexts and on anthropological and cultural factors. structural.
History has shown the interplay of cultural, religious, philosophical and cultural factors and the extent of their impact on the states and trajectories of their peoples and societies.
German Orientalist and Anglo-Saxon schools are deeper than French schools
The path of reform and change requires time and, to the extent that the negative economic, political and military developments in the Arab countries that delay the achievement of the objectives of the symbols of the currents of revival and reform of the last two centuries, we must aspire to achieve many of the goals of the Tunisian revolution and the Arab revolutions in the medium and long term.
The path of reform and change will triumph. But he may need a whole generation in which tests are closely related and where his will struggles. At the same time, we must recognize that the Arab world is in a period of work that can be prolonged and difficult to predict the short-term evolution due to the complexity of the data and the large number of actors local and international.
The situation of freedoms and human rights in the Arab countries is worrying. There are signs of the emergence of new dictatorships and an individual rule that offsets the tyranny of some old ruling families. But many factors militate in favor of liberalization and openness, including the former communist split and Asian giants such as China, India and Pakistan. Such openness will contribute to a certain balance in relations between Arab countries with America and Europe.
Correct relations between Islamists and laity
Many experts believe that the silence behind the failure of the Arab revolutions in general and in Tunisia, particularly the inability to resolve the relations between religious and political and new conflicts between the new secular and Islamist or between the modernists and Salafists.
How did the philosopher, thinker and historian Hisham Jayyat, who devoted his life to investigating religious, scientific and political resources and documents, find this dualism that almost paralyzes the political and intellectual life and the world? involvement of the elites for decades in ideological and political struggles that seem marginal for public opinion and young people?
Once again, I affirm that reality can not be understood without reading history and studying the religious sphere in its anthropological and sociological dimensions, with the reading of contemporary history and the circumstances of the emergence of secular modernist currents in Europe and later in their colonies and their tendencies of left and Western Marxism. And these currents were different religious and patrimonial positions, and the intellectuals of our country were more affected than the French secular schools of thought and not the Anglo-Saxon and German schools.
Modern secular elites and Arab Marxism were influenced by the thought of Western Europe during the period of direct colonialism and the Declaration of Independence. It was natural that Arab or Islamic nationalist currents emerge from different sources, such as the call for Arab unity or the unity of Islamic states.
Bourguiba was modern at his age and can not today bring down some of his jurisprudence. And a democratic opposition
The feeling of disagreement with the colonizer and his interests led to the emergence of attempts to distinguish him intellectually and culturally by associating him with conflicting ideological currents belonging to Arab, Islamic or secular modernist identities.
However, it is in the interest of Tunisia and the countries of the region and their revolutions not to be mingled with new inflated ideological conflicts between lay people, Islamists and left-wing currents and nationalists, the priority to be given to the concerns. peoples in development, economic and social problems and the demands of young people,
Eight years ago, the Tunisian people and their youth managed to provide the world with a model of transition and peaceful change.
But elites, policymakers, politicians, secular intellectuals, modernists and Islamists, in all their currents, should give priority to the future of economic and social development.
At the same time, elites may realize that misunderstandings and violence may persist and that the period of conflict, war, and ideological and political conflict may last twenty years or more, adversely affecting the future of the map. the region and the balance between the old and the new colonial powers and the national state in the Arab region.
Awareness of history
Q Do you feel that the lack of understanding of Arab-Islamic history of the causes of political and ideological differences between modern laity and those affiliated to the current identity of Islamists and nationalists?
I think that those who want to understand the changes in Tunisia and in Arab and Islamic societies must first study in depth the Islamic religion, the biography of the prophet, the conditions of the Prophet Muhammad and his companions, as well as the beginning of this religion, which the German philosopher Hegel described as a "real revolution".
My studies of the biography of the Prophet, the Arabian Peninsula and Yemen before the advent of Islam, and then at the beginning of the early Islamic period, revealed that the history of the Arabs was linked to large chains, including First revolution, which had emerged with the great change led by the Prophet Muhammad in the Arabian Peninsula, when he had managed to unify the Arabs.
We know that Baji is the leader of the Tunisian opposition since 1974
Then came the "Great Islamic Revolution" which culminated in the creation of the Abbasid State with its many national, religious and Islamic branches. The influence of Arab, Persian, Chinese and Indian legislation, Greek philosophy and the sciences of different cultures and cultures are multiplying east and west.
After studying the sources, I drew scientific conclusions and criticized many orientalists in Europe, which resulted in the seizure of my books in a number of countries of the world, although translated into several languages, including French and French.
Bourguiba and the national state
Q: But many in Tunisia and Arab countries still retain the positions of some modern state leaders such as Habib Bourguiba and his vision of the nation-state or the Tunisian nation-state?
The national state is located in Tunisia and in most Arab countries, despite the difficulties they face. And they have excellent indicators of sustainability and success in countries such as Tunisia, Morocco, Libya and Egypt … despite the specificities of each experience and despite the cultural affiliation of the peoples to larger spaces such as the Arab region and the Islamic world.
It is true that Bourguiba and his colleagues played a role in the building of a modern national state in Tunisia and tried to give it a particular identity, especially the pride of the state of Carthage and the adoption of policies opposing religion to public affairs and politics. for example
But the majority of Tunisians are moderate, anti-Muslim, anti-religious and religious groups. In Tunisia, a bourgeois bourgeoisie religiously bourgeois simultaneously belongs to the national state despite its cultural and religious belonging to the Islamic Ummah and the Arab region.
In Egypt, Libya, Iraq, Syria and a number of Arab countries, politicians have adopted the statements of Arab leaders and intellectuals such as Gamal Abdel Nasser and Baath leaders on the issue. Arab unity, but have resulted in devoting the reality of the national state and the specificities of each Arab country.
Islam, Islamophobia and Orientalists
Over the past 20 years, the world has experienced wars and conflicts in which the influence of racist and anti-Arab currents, of Islam and immigrants, and extremist currents opposed to the world. The West, all components of Arab and Islamic countries, How do you understand this phenomenon? Is it related to the so-called simplistic and superficial studies on Islam and Arab-Islamic history published by several Orientalists?
Most of the wars that have erupted in the region for more than a century and over the past decades and years have involved the use of Islam to justify it, without the fact that it is not possible to do so. it is religious or related to religion.
Here, Islam is not treated as a doctrine but as a culture, a reference and an ideology, but as a slogan against the colonizer or the enemy.
The slogans of Islamic and Arab movements and organizations today constitute an ideology that challenges the nature of relations with the West and the European countries that colonized the Arab and Islamic countries in the last two centuries. . Many of the leaders of these movements and their supporters see themselves as enemies of old and new colonialism and imperialist West.
But the literature of the leaders of these movements is not based on a thorough study of texts and references, but on political issues, where the dream of history is mixed for political reasons.
For classical orientalists, most have not written valuable and dignified books on prophetic biography, history, and Arab-Islamic heritage.
And most of their writings are not based on scientific methods, but exploit the desire of others to get to know the Islamic religion and Arab-Islamic culture, and then provide him with books that want to talk about religion more than the science of religion. and the story of the Koran and the biography of the prophet. They are very busy with everything from instant politics to contemporary Islamic movements.
With the exception of Tor Andrae, who focused on points of convergence between Islam and Christianity, Montgomery Watt and Martin Lings, most of the literature lacks precision, and 39 objectivity and scientific depth, and seems to be governed by the concerns, interests and political desires of some Western politicians. Some of these versions include projections and books with a superior methodology.
Unfortunately, the future is not necessarily conducive to depth and objectivity, but I think the role of intellectuals and thinkers worldwide will diminish because of the growing interest in modern technology science, the age of machines, economic imperialism and the authority of the modern media.
The relationship with Baji and the leader of the opposition
Professor Hisham was playing I have known most of the founders of the modern state, civil society and party leaders, including Baji Caid Sibsi. How do you see Tunisia today in the battle to "break the bones", witness between the executive leaders and the party leaders and union leaders?
I do not want to engage directly in political affairs and best complement my studies on the history of religions, heritage and civilization.
"The National State" won on projects of Arab and Islamic unity
I believe that the path of democratic and political reforms is faltering and that the new phase requires bold decisions on the part of all parties, including the announcement of President Baji that he will not show up for a new presidential term, and everyone will appreciate its positive role in the Tyr Palace especially between 2015 and 2017.
Baji was known as the leader of al-Sibsi in the mid-1970s, when he was working with former minister Ahmed Mestiri and a number of dissident or exiled politicians from the government and ruling party Bourguiba to form the Social Democratic Party of the opposition.
"We have prepared the documents for the political and economic orientations of the new party project, and we consider your book as our cultural and intellectual reference," he said at the time.
Above all, today, think about the future and give a new generation of politicians the opportunity to deal with accumulated economic and social development issues.
[ad_2]
Source link
