Shakib Arslan

Shakib Arslan (25 December 1869 – 9 December 1946) was an Arab writer, poet, historian, politician, and Emir in Lebanon. A prolific writer, he produced some 20 books and 2,000 articles, as well as two collections of poetry and a "prodigious correspondence". He was known as Amir al-Bayān due to his influential writings.
Biography
Influenced by the ideas of Jamal al-Din al-Afghani and Muhammad Abduh, Arslan became a strong supporter of the pan-Islamic policies of Abdul Hamid II. As an Arab nationalist, Arslan was an advocate of pan-Maghrebism (the unification of Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco). He also argued that the survival of the Ottoman Empire was the only guarantee against the division of the ummah and its occupation by the European imperial powers. For Arslan, Ottomanism and Islam were inseparable, and reform of Islam would naturally lead to the revival of the Ottoman Empire.
Exiled from his homeland by the French Mandate authorities, Arslan spent most of the inter-war years in Geneva, where he served as the unofficial representative of Syria and Palestine to the League of Nations and wrote a steady stream of articles for the periodical press of Arab countries. There he cofounded and edited a newspaper entitled La Nation Arabe. His partner in this activity was Ihsan Al Jabri, a Syrian exile. Arslan was also a contributor to Barid Al Sharq, a propaganda newspaper published in Berlin, Nazi Germany.
Advocacy
Amir Shakib proposed an interpretation of Islam imbued with a sense of political power and moral courage. He sought to rebuild the bonds of Islamic unity, urging Muslims from Morocco to Iraq to remember their common commitment to Islam despite their individual differences. Shakib believed that recognising and acting upon this common bond could lead to liberation from their existing subjugation. He also saw this unity as a way of reviving what he saw as their illustrious history. Arslan's work inspired anti-imperialist propaganda campaigns, much to the irritation of the British and French authorities in the Arab world.
He defended Islam as an essential component of social morality. His message, with its call to action and defence of traditional values in a time of great uncertainty, was well received and attracted widespread attention in the 1920s and 1930s. It was during this period that he wrote his most famous work which described what Arslan believed to be the reasons for the weakness of existing Muslim governments.
He contributed to Muhib Al Din Al Khatib's Cairo-based magazine Al Fath, a modernist Salafi publication.
Personal life
Born into a Druze family, he always tried to combine his faith with mainstream Islam, but later converted to Sunni Islam, "establishing himself as an orthodox Muslim serving the interests of Sunni Islam".
He married Suleima Alkhas Hatog, a Jordanian of Circassian descent. They had a son, Ghalib (born 1917 in Lebanon) and two daughters, May (1928–2013) and Nazima (born 1930 in Switzerland). His daughter May married the Lebanese Druze politician Kamal Jumblatt, making the Lebanese politician Walid Jumblatt a grandson of Arslan.
Arslan died on 9 December 1946, three months after returning to Lebanon.
Work
References
External links
Emir Shakib Arslan biography by Hassan Shami at Aide Sanitaire Suisse Aux Palestiniens
The Arab Nation of Shakib Arslan, a review of Islam Against the West, by Martin Kramer
Swiss Exile: The European Muslim Congress, 1935 (an event organized by Arslan), a chapter from Islam Assembled: The Advent of the Muslim Congresses (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986) by Martin Kramer
Rabah, Makram: Arslān, Shakīb, Amīr, in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.
1869 births
1946 deaths
People from Aley District
Shakib
Lebanese Druze
Lebanese princes
Lebanese politicians
Lebanese expatriates in Switzerland
League of Nations people
Lebanese exiles
Lebanese political philosophers
Arabic-language poets from the Ottoman Empire
Converts to Islam from Druzism