Who knows Djemal ed-Din al-Afghani (1838-1897)? In the West, this name does not tell us much, except for a few exegetes and experts in Islamic thought. However, in Muslim countries, he remains a true icon who continues, 125 years after his death, to fill the bookstores of Cairo, Gaza, Damascus and Tehran.
“The man is captivating and at the same time difficult to grasp,” says Guillaume Lavallée, in an interview with To have to. “Yet he was one of the first Muslim thinkers who tried to reconcile Koranic principles with the modern world. »
For several years, the Arabist journalist and AFP bureau chief in Jerusalem has been passionate about the character. Holder of a master’s degree in Islamic philosophy from the University of Beirut, he also devoted a large part of his postgraduate studies to Djemal ed-Din, whom he considers to be one of the “most influential” thinkers of the 19th century.e century.
“He was fascinated and obsessed by the technical and scientific progress of the West,” sums up the journalist. He considered that the Muslim world was behind on these issues. His reflections on the place of women or the superiority of philosophy over the Koranic word will make him a controversial personality, but also the mentor of a whole generation of young intellectuals. »
This is one of the worst anti-Muslim attacks in recent years, and it happened in Quebec, in my own city. I know this is an isolated act motivated by hate. I don’t want to generalize, but at that time I felt the need to write this book as the beginning of a dialogue, to better understand the richness and complexity of Islamic thought.
The journalist wanted for a long time to tell the originality of the self-taught character, born, it seems, in Iran, in spite of a surname which evokes Afghan origins. It was finally the attack on the Quebec mosque in January 2017 (killing six people and injuring several) that persuaded him to write Trips in Afghani, which relates the tumultuous life of the intellectual and political adventurer.
“This is one of the worst anti-Muslim attacks in recent years, and it happened in Quebec, in my own city. I know this is an isolated act motivated by hate. I don’t want to generalize, but at that time I felt the need to write this book as the beginning of a dialogue, to better understand the richness and complexity of Islamic thought. »
The shock of colonization
If the author devotes his work to Djemal ed-Din al-Afghani, it is because he lived at a time of great intellectual ferment, where the ways of thinking in Islamic lands were far from being monolithic. “Muslim thought does not stop in the XIVe century with the so-called classical Arab philosophy, that is to say Averroes, Avicenna, Al-Fârâbî. One has the impression that nothing happened during the five centuries that followed, which is completely false. »
Muslim history is not fixed, insists the author. 200 years ago, in the 19e century, there were already cultural particularities specific to each region. There is the Persian, Turkish or Arab world. Sets crossed by many political concepts and religious beliefs.
“In the middle of the nineteenthe century, the balance of power shifted in favor of the Europeans, begun by the Napoleonic expedition to Egypt. Russian troops eye the Caucasus, the Ottoman Empire begins to crumble, France colonizes Algeria, and the British weaken Muslim states in the Middle East. »
The 19the century is in this respect a pivotal period, maintains Lavallée. It is the encounter between Western modernity and contemporary Muslim thought. Islam discovered this modernity when it came into brutal contact with the colonizing West.
“Faced with the invasion of Western powers, the world of Islam finds itself besieged and Muslims humiliated. Djemal ed-Din then endeavored to mobilize the people against foreign domination, but to achieve this, he believed that Islam must undertake profound reforms by rehabilitating the sciences and drawing inspiration from European technological advances, all this without betray his religious origins. »
Like figures like Rifa’a al-Tahtawi, Muhammad Abduh or Muhammad Iqbal, the reformist was part of the Nahda current, a movement for cultural renaissance and collective emancipation among the Muslim peoples of the time.
Nourished both by medieval Islamic philosophy and European liberalism, the “Shia and rationalist” thinker also does not hesitate to criticize the ulema (theologians who are the guardians of the faith), corrupt leaders and other Muslim despots who, according to him, prevent people from accessing modernity. “Positions that will cause him several problems. Considered a political agitator, he will have to flee from Turkey, Iran and Egypt. »
An Islamist or an avant-garde?
A thousand leagues from polemical works on the veil, the burkini, halal food or on an alleged Islamic danger, Trips in Afghani is rather a reflection on the impacts of human history on philosophical thought. “Djemal ed-Din did not just want to be a witness of his time. He wanted to change the course of events. Wherever he went, from Afghanistan to Turkey, via Syria, India, Egypt or even Paris, he got involved with elites and decision-makers. »
The essay reads like a thriller. In order to clearly identify the elusive personality of his character, who liked to maintain enigma and mystery, Guillaume Lavallée became an investigator by conducting his own research in European diplomatic archives, including Paris police reports.
“He settled in Europe for some time from 1883. It was in the heart of the French capital that he spread his anti-imperialist ideas in his desire to unite all Muslims around a common goal, the pan-Islamism. The man was watched and wiretapped by the authorities, which did not prevent him from publishing his political ideas in a Parisian newspaper. »
The French period is an opportunity for the author to come back to a famous scandal which features the reformer Ernest Renan, writer and philologist specializing in Semitic languages. The two will oppose each other with articles on the relationship between Islam and science. “Renan and Djemal ed-Din embark on one of the most epic and emblematic confrontations between Enlightenment Europe and modern Arab philosophy, between the northern and southern shores of the Mediterranean,” writes the author.
After his death, the thinker’s fame declined in Europe. In the Muslim world, its influence is growing and will be the source of great misunderstanding, Lavallée believes. “Some of the rigorous circles have made Djemal ed-Din the father of Islamism. They retained from him only his fight against colonization and put aside his modern reflections. When you read it, you realize that there is no rejection of the Western world, but more a desire to make a synthesis. »