Against Smoking. Ahmad al-Rumi al-Aqhisari
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fī l-ṭā‘ūn – Epistle on the plague. MS. Harput 429, ff. 164v– 184v.
19) Risāla fī l-arāḍī – Epistle on the [Legal nature] of lands. MSS. Ali Emiri Arabi 4343, ff. 40–46 (1114/1702); Darülmesnevi 258, ff. 130v–137r; Haci Beşir Ağa 662, ff. 194v–204v; Harput 429, ff. 185r–194r; Kasidecizade 682, ff. 45v–57v (1089/1678); Kılıç Ali Paşa 1035, ff. 71v–80r; Ragip Paşa 461, ff. 154v–157v (1066/1655). Yazmalar: Manisa, İHK, 45 Hk 2937/7, ff. 63v–71r.2
There is nothing peculiar in the fact that an Ottoman religious scholar like al-Aqḥiṣārī was interested in writing on the Qur’ān and the Ḥadīth, monotheism and prophethood, worship, spiritual wayfaring and submission to religious authorities. As for the topics dealt with in several of his other writings, how could they leave the historian indifferent? The dual nature of innovations, Raghā’ib and Berāt prayers, the remembrance of God (dhikr), the invoking of divine blessings during the Friday sermon, shaking hands after the collective prayer, Sufi dancing and whirling, the visiting of tombs and tobacco are indeed some of the very hot issues having divided Qāḍīzādelis and their Sufi opponents. With the exception of dhikr, Kātib Çelebi notably devotes a chapter of his amazing Balance of Truth to every one of them.1 Now, needless to say, on each of these issues, al-Aqḥiṣārī does not appear to have been among those whom Kātib Çelebi calls “the intelligent ones”, i.e. those who kept out of “a profitless quarrel, born of fanaticism”.2 He rather seems to have been, on all these issues, among the “foolish people” persistently attached to one side, in this case, as easily predictable, that of the strict ulema and prohibitionists who shared in some measure the views of Qāḍīzāde, Birgivī, Ibn Qayyim and Ibn Taymiyya.
The present book is devoted to one of al-Aqḥiṣārī’s epistles, namely his Risāleh dukhāniyyeh – Epistle on tobacco. The choice of this particular text has probably no other reason than the interest in the use of drugs in Islamic societies that has already led me to translate Ibn Taymiyya’s fatwā on cannabis and to study opium addiction and coffee in Ottoman Turkey.3 Besides tobacco, al-Aqḥiṣārī indeed also has something to say about these three substances in his Dukhāniyyeh. Before presenting this particular epistle, it will be worthwhile taking a little time to explore further the age and personality of its author.
THE COMPLEXITIES OF A RADICAL PIETISM
AL-AQḤIṢĀRĪ lived in a period marked by a financial crisis around 1008–9/1600, by the disintegration of the imperial Ottoman authority and the corruption of the elites, by a deep societal unrest and by grave tension between popular mosque preachers and medresse ulema, puritanical zealots and licentious or innovating shaykhs.1 The hundred topics entered upon in his Majālis show that he is mainly concerned with personal piety, commercial righteousness, religious and social issues, rather than with affairs of court, political and military matters.
1 The remembrance of God (dhikr Allāh)
2 The eminence of dhikr
3 The eminence of faith
4 Love of the Prophet
5 Faith in his teachings
6 Tasting the savour of faith
7 Faith in the Prophet
8 Obeying and disobeying the Prophet
9 Following the Prophet
10 Believer (mu’min), Muslim, mujāhid…
11 The best dhikr and invocations
12 The intercession of the Prophet
13 Pure monotheism (ikhlāṣ al-tawḥīd)
14 The faith that will save
15 The natural state of Islam (fiṭrat al-islām)
16 The various kinds of unbelief
17 The prohibition of praying near tombs
18 The various kinds of innovations
19 Raghā’ib & other innovated prayers
20 The eminence of ḥajj & its innovations
21 The eminence of almsgiving & forsaking it
22 The eminence of fasting
23 The eminence of fasting in Sha‘bān
24 Laylat al-barā’a: sunna and innovations
25 The sighting of the Ramaḍān new moon
26 Ramaḍān
27 Intention, fasting, breaking the fast
28 Tarāwīḥ prayers
29 Delaying the prayer and breaking the fast
30 Expiation for breaking the fast
31 Ramaḍān retreat & Laylat al-Qadr
32 Ṣadaqat al-fiṭr, the Feasts & innovations
33 Fasting in Shawwāl
34 The ten first days of Dhū l-Ḥijja
35 The sacrifice
36 Muḥarram and ‘Āshūrā’ fasting
37 ‘Āshūrā’: traditions and innovations
38 Curing the sick
39 Evil & good omens, blameworthy & sunnī
40 Brotherhood in this world’s affairs
41 Disasters, repentance and invocations
42 Repelling disasters with invocations
43 Praying in case of frights
44 Prayers for the solar and lunar eclipses
45 Praying for rain
46 Learning the prescriptions and Qur’ān
47 Recitation of the Qur’ān
48 The call to prayer
49 The eminence of Friday
50 Shaking hands
51 The obligation of prayer
52 The obligation of praying as prescribed
53 The five daily prayers and expiation
54 The eminence of collective prayer
55 Funeral prayer
56 Saying Lā ilāha illā Llāh and Paradise
57 The visitation of tombs
58 Remembering death and getting ready
59 The plague and prophylaxis
60 Patience in case of plague
61 The eminence of patience and disasters
62 On the ḥadīth “Collect five things…”
63 The calling of servants to account
64 Calling oneself to account before death
65 Inviting the umma to repent now
66 On “God accepts the repentance…”
67 The intelligent and the foolish
68 Piety (taqwā) and good character
69 Lawful earnings
70 The prohibition of monopolies
71 The fates of traders in the hereafter
72 Trading, truthfulness and trustfulness