Shakib Arslan (; 25 December 1869 – 9 December 1946) was a Lebanese writer, poet, historian, politician, and

Emir Emir (; ' (), also Romanization of Arabic, transliterated as amir, is a word of Arabic language, Arabic origin that can refer to a male monarch, aristocratic, aristocrat, holder of high-ranking military or political office, or other person po ...

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 Sayyid Jamāl al-Dīn al-Afghānī (Pashto/), also known as Jamāl ad-Dīn Asadābādī () and commonly known as Al-Afghani (1838/1839 – 9 March 1897), was an Iranian political activist and Islamic ideologist who travelled throughout the Mus ...

and

Muhammad Abduh Muḥammad ʿAbduh (also spelled Mohammed Abduh; ; 1849 – 11 July 1905) was an Egyptian Islamic scholar, judge, and Grand Mufti of Egypt. He was a central figure of the Arab Nahḍa and Islamic Modernism in the late 19th and early 20th ce ...

, Arslan became a strong supporter of the

pan-Islamic Pan-Islamism () is a political movement which advocates the unity of Muslims under one Islamic country or state – often a caliphate – or an international organization with Islamic principles. Historically, after Ottomanism, which aimed at ...

policies of

Abdul Hamid II Abdulhamid II or Abdul Hamid II (; ; 21 September 184210 February 1918) was the 34th sultan of the Ottoman Empire, from 1876 to 1909, and the last sultan to exert effective control over the fracturing state. He oversaw a Decline and modernizati ...

. 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 The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...

was the only guarantee against the division of the

ummah ' (; ) is an Arabic word meaning Muslim identity, nation, religious community, or the concept of a Commonwealth of the Muslim Believers ( '). It is a synonym for ' (, lit. 'the Islamic nation'); it is commonly used to mean the collective com ...

and its occupation by the European imperial powers. For Arslan,

Ottomanism Ottomanism or ''Osmanlılık'' (, . ) was a concept which developed prior to the 1876–1878 First Constitutional Era of the Ottoman Empire. Its proponents believed that it could create the Unity of the Peoples, , needed to keep religion-based ...

and

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

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 Geneva ( , ; ) ; ; . is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland and the most populous in French-speaking Romandy. Situated in the southwest of the country, where the Rhône exits Lake Geneva, it is the ca ...

, where he served as the unofficial representative of Syria and

Palestine Palestine, officially the State of Palestine, is a country in West Asia. Recognized by International recognition of Palestine, 147 of the UN's 193 member states, it encompasses the Israeli-occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and th ...

to the

League of Nations The League of Nations (LN or LoN; , SdN) was the first worldwide intergovernmental organisation whose principal mission was to maintain world peace. It was founded on 10 January 1920 by the Paris Peace Conference (1919–1920), Paris Peace ...

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. However, Arslan did not personally agree with Nazism, instead viewing them as a tool to break the other colonial powers. In 1939, he wrote to Daniel Guérin that if the Germans proved to be no better to the Arabs, "they would have only changed masters." In his diary, he remarked that the Italians would simply turn Palestine into an Italian colony.

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 Anti-imperialism in political science and international relations is opposition to imperialism or neocolonialism. Anti-imperialist sentiment typically manifests as a political principle in independence struggles against intervention or influenc ...

propaganda campaigns, much to the irritation of the British and French authorities in the

Arab world The Arab world ( '), formally the Arab homeland ( '), also known as the Arab nation ( '), the Arabsphere, or the Arab states, comprises a large group of countries, mainly located in West Asia and North Africa. While the majority of people in ...

. He defended Islam as an essential component of social

morality Morality () is the categorization of intentions, Decision-making, decisions and Social actions, actions into those that are ''proper'', or ''right'', and those that are ''improper'', or ''wrong''. Morality can be a body of standards or principle ...

. His message, with its call to action and defence of traditional

values In ethics and social sciences, value denotes the degree of importance of some thing or action, with the aim of determining which actions are best to do or what way is best to live ( normative ethics), or to describe the significance of different a ...

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 Field marshal () was a Five-star rank, five–star officer rank and the highest attainable rank in the Iraqi Armed Forces. Field marshal ranks immediately above colonel general, but is now generally considered to be obsolete. The rank was typical ...

's Cairo-based magazine ''Al Fath'', a modernist Salafi publication.

Personal life

Born into a

Druze The Druze ( ; , ' or ', , '), who Endonym and exonym, call themselves al-Muwaḥḥidūn (), are an Arabs, Arab Eastern esotericism, esoteric Religious denomination, religious group from West Asia who adhere to the Druze faith, an Abrahamic ...

family, he always tried to combine his faith with mainstream

, but later converted to

Sunni Islam Sunni Islam is the largest Islamic schools and branches, branch of Islam and the largest religious denomination in the world. It holds that Muhammad did not appoint any Succession to Muhammad, successor and that his closest companion Abu Bakr ...

, "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 May is the fifth month of the year in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. Its length is 31 days. May is a month of spring in the Northern Hemisphere, and autumn in the Southern Hemisphere. Therefore, May in the Southern Hemisphere is the ...

(1928–2013) and Nazima (born 1930 in Switzerland). His daughter May married the Lebanese Druze politician Kamal Jumblatt, making the Lebanese politician

Walid Jumblatt Walid Kamal Jumblatt (; born 7 August 1949) is a Lebanese politician who was the leader of the Progressive Socialist Party from 1977 until 2023. A Druze and former militia commander, Jumblatt led the Lebanese National Resistance Front, allying ...

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

{{DEFAULTSORT:Arslan, Shakib 1869 births 1946 deaths People from Aley District Shakib Lebanese Druze people Lebanese princes Lebanese collaborators with Nazi Germany Lebanese expatriates in Switzerland 20th-century Lebanese politicians Lebanese Sunni politicians League of Nations people Lebanese exiles Lebanese political philosophers Arabic-language poets from the Ottoman Empire Converts to Islam from Druzism Nazi propagandists