Being naked or next to, often reminds me of the Qalandar. For those who don’t know, the Qalandar is the card a person pulls when Islam gets dogmatic and “literal.” Back in the day, people used to pull the Sufi Card. It was a zinger! It was clean, crisp, dutiful, and loving. When legalism revealed itself for what it was…legalism, out came the Sufi Card. It was radical in its niceness. A friendly card. A card with “adab.” Sufism was the decadent antidote to the atrophied heart of everyday boredom. Sufism was the idea that Islam was not a burden. Just maybe “Islamic Sufism” had relevance for people NOT interested in Religion ™.
Then the “white guys in shorts” showed up. (I owe this term to a professor of mine referring to a well-known experimental poet who he referred to as “still just another white guy in shorts with a palm pilot”). They were tame. They were safe. They preached to a well rehearsed choir. They LOVED the idea of the wine of the beloved’s wine-bearer’s wine and imitated the cadence and verse of “Sufi Poetry” with a taxodermists flare! Loved it! Their “love” of Rumi had a tinge of racism to it as he was pedestaled above “Muslims.” “Sufism is beyond religion,” they would say. And there’s some truth to that. But religion is beyond Religion ™ too! However, by the time the white guys in shorts had completely excavated Rumi and “Sufism” from this totalitarian “Muslim religion,” what remained was a lifeless caricature whirling in the safety of a secular society where people are encouraged to “do” as long as nothing gets “done.” (But I’ll take that anyday over the “Other Option”). The revolution of Rumi was no more. The brilliance of white guys in shorts being their ability to simply lift their “interests” out from a most cumbersome obstacle, “culture, ” and to vacate it of all it’s nuance. The edges are smoothed over to resemble a most Condo-esque furniture.
I had to realize early on that no wonder I was always put off by “Suf-ism.” It was just another -ism maintaining the status quo. A Turkish representative at “Culture Day.” It was the aspect of Islam everybody liked. They liked it so much they continually try to rip it from the dark and scary clenches of Islamic fingers. Sometimes Islam is happy to give it up. Other times, “it’s ours and you can’t have it!” Ahh… what can we expect from the Age of Misappropriation in all its understandable paranoia, though paranoia nonetheless.
So who was it that I was thinking of early on in my testing of Middle Eastern mystic pools? Certainly there was a group that NO ONE wanted to call their own. Certainly there were people who disturbed the white guys in shorts and were deemed heretics by the Islamic ulema. Certainly there was a group that I could find some semblance of authenticity in.
Introducing: The Qalandars. Those unruly, hairless, bangle wearing, patched-frock toting, acetic wanderers. We love them and thank goodness for their existence every time the rules and duties get a wee bit absurd. Use your pinky and pointer to clean out your nose. That’s SUNNAH!!!
Now I’ve been around the block enough times to know that it doesn’t matter how “radical” or how “transgressive” a person or group is. The identity of which will eventually be enveloped by the Spectacular Packaging Machine (i.e. society predicated on objectification), whose incomprehensible vastness subsists on fields of happily-chaotic-and-open-ended-possibility-infused approaches to life and runs them through the SPM and shoots them out onto shopping mall shelves in cellophane wrapping for $29.99. Export necessitates marketablility. So I’m aware that The Great Closing-In has begun in regards to Qalandars. In fact, I think it’s safe to say that my even being able to reference this non-group as a group is evidence of the impending doom. Such is life I suppose. Keeps us on our toes and reinforces the good lesson of nonattachment.
But fear not! To my chagrin, spirit remains. That thing I so want to see removed from all discourse! Nevertheless, something resembling it’s nature remains constant. Just as we take cues from Muhammad’s (s) example rather than mimic his actions (i.e. people were pretty quick to use toilet paper instead of the prescribed “three clean stones.” See. Even the fascists know when to be selective on what is to be parroted. Next time you meet a fascist about to do the deed, be sure to bring him a few clean stones to wipe himself with. We’ll see who’s so Sunni! Innovation I tell you!) No. It is the “why” of an action that gives hope and gives breathing room. The “what” is an idol. The “why” is the hammer!
As such, it is the “why” of the various antinomians the scholars so willing lump into the Qalandariyya wandering the earth that intrigue me so. And for good reason. I live in New York City in the year 2006 CE. Shaving my beard, and wearing a bunch of bracelets, and patches isn’t going to position my ego in direct opposition to materialist society. What it’s probably going to do is get me thrown into some basement filled with sweaty boys preaching to yet another well rehearsed choir to the rhythm of some sub-denomination of punk/hardcore. And goodness, we can’t have that again. As the old joke goes: How many… (insert ANY movement here. I always heard riot grrls, but I’ll stick with the theme.) How many hardcore kids does it take to change a lightbulb? None. Hardcore kids can’t change anything. Of course you could easily put me in place of hardcore kids and get the same answer. Because ANY movement whose foundation is its own reduction will merely reinforce that which it intends to change. The individual anarchisms within the movements themselves get the work done.
And so the story goes. It is the quiet end of day in a lamp lit museum basement. The intern finds a brass bangle lieing on the floor. She picks it up and turns it around in her hand. She lifts it and recognizes the scent of rose. She closes her eyes and for a moment feels the cool shade of a forest in summer. She then turns and makes her way down the deep alphabetical aisle lined with drawers stacked ten feet high. L… M… N… O… P… Q… She pauses. Reaches for the correct drawer. Pauses again and slips the bangle in her pocket.
It is the individual anarchisms that get the work done.
March 18th, 2006 at 10:33 am
“The “what” is an idol. The “why” is the hammer”
PERFECT
March 18th, 2006 at 5:23 pm
Thanks Leila! I know I didn’t provide much info on the Qs in this piece, but read “Scandal” or “Sacred Drift” by Peter Lamborn Wilson (cheap on amazon), and try and get a copy of the Unruly book.
I contacted a few online once who claim to be in line with Qalandar principles (whatever that is!). They have a guru or “baba.”
Much love!
March 19th, 2006 at 1:12 pm
Very cool. Have you read “God’s Unruly Friends”, by the way? It’s a long out of print book about the craziest Muslim heretic groups, Qalandars among them.
Lately I’ve been very interested in Anarchisms among traditional Judaism, in part because of the Orthodox Anarchist, Radical Torah, etc sites I found through your links. And partially just through reading very traditional books on Kabbalah and the Chasidim.
March 20th, 2006 at 8:43 am
Hey DA. There’s a little bit of a discussion on the previous post/comments re. The Unruly book. I have it right here on my desk actually. Have read about 50% of it. It tends to be a “bathroom” read. So, short sessions.
I’m so glad the Jewish Anarchism caught your eye. I have been meaning to update my side bars, but have yet to get around to it.
March 20th, 2006 at 9:18 am
Is it true that Kabbalah is supposed to be limited to married men
over 40? Israeli Kabbalists were frothing at the mouth when
Madonna–a non-Jew, in their eyes, and a woman–went on her little
red string pilgrimmage. What’s radical Torah?
March 20th, 2006 at 10:28 am
> limited to married men over 40?
Sounds like the US presidency to me.
Not so sure. Best to ask a well versed Jew of radical tendencies. I was raised Catholic, or so they told me. My wife and I have a hard time distinguishing between the red string of Kabbalah and the red string of Shambhala Buddhism a la Chogyum Trungpa.
March 20th, 2006 at 9:20 pm
Well, if there were any Kabbalah teachers who were the kind of a abusive drunks Trungpa was, it probably would have caught on faster
The “Crazy Wisdom” people would have eaten it up.
Yeah, some people claim Kabbalah has those age/gender restrictions, some don’t. I think this fake-ass trendy hollywood Kabbalah is whack for reasons having nothing to do with gender, age, or marital status. Anyway, go to the Orthodox Anarchist page, and there’s a link to radical Torah.
Oh, and Matisyahu’s new CD is pretty boss. My friend Sasha was playing b-ball with him and says a) the guy can ball, and b) he plays in full hasid gear. Fuckin awesome.
March 21st, 2006 at 8:55 am
They’re definitely out there. Just have to look. Ask the anarchist guy who he’s into etc… I knew Zalman pretty well in Boulder if from afar. Not an “anarchist” but definitely going down in history as a major movement (basically founded Jewish renewal). I would say about 90% of my friends are Shambhala people or at least heavily informed by Chogyam. There are many flavors to those who studied with him or form his books. Not all of it crazy “crazy wisdom” but still crazy potent stuff. Myth of Freedom is basically my second Qur’an. There’s more to Trungpa than getting drunk. His working with alcohol is almost unprecidented in the states. Conscious drinking. I totally believe in it as a practice, though I don’t practice it. I think most people? many people abuse it and go the hey I’m crazy wisdom drunk guy approach, but for those who get it they do well. This leads me straight into my views on what is an intoxicant and what is not, and how the West is unique in it’s views on this subject, but can’t possibly go there right now.
Matisyahu is blowing up. I’ll have to get a single or soemthing. Not into his stuff too much, but gotta play what people are hearing.
March 21st, 2006 at 1:33 pm
Oh this blog just gets better and better!
Wasalaam
TMA
March 21st, 2006 at 7:49 pm
Second to what Yakoub says. Amazing post. Yay.
restive
March 22nd, 2006 at 8:54 am
Thanks both of you! That means sooo much. I don’t take it for granted and appreciate every word. I’m always interested in knowing what people think.
March 24th, 2006 at 10:37 am
Howdy ya’ll.
Site looks very nice and the article was timed nicely for me as i’m writing about spiritual anarchists in general and right now about anarchists in Islam specifically. Very interesting but in general there seems -as far as i can tell- far less of the sort of groups in Islam that appear in, say, Christianity a la Ranters, Levellers, Diggers, Taborites, Liberation Theology/Berrigan Brothers/Ammon Hennesy/Catholic Worker style anarchism, etc. In Islam the Assassins and the Kharijites seem to come the closest but 1) Not much seems to be known about them and 2) what is known about them seems to suggest that they are less egalitarian and anti-authoritarian than many of the above-mentioned Christian groups.
The rest of what may be considered anarchistic in Islam seems to be related to Sufistic and Qalandariyya expressions which are more akin to lifestyle anarchism AKA hippieism than radical organized social movements demanding social change or attempting to establish an alternative society. The individualist hippie approach is also a lot easier to commodify than something based on community and social change (like the Plowshares which -as far as i know- has yet to turn voluntary jailtime into a pop trend). I’m not placing any value judgments here (neither for or against) but this seems to be what i have seen so far. I am certainly open to correction.
One exception to the above observation might be Qaddafi’s Green Book which is a fairly anarchistic document. How well it is implemented -well, i’d love to hear someone in Libya tell me about it!
Aside from the God’s Unruly Friends book (which i don’t have but saw on sale for $125!), i’m appreciative of any tips (including modern expressions that one can’t find from linking around this site).
Wa salaam.
/T.R.O.Y.
P.S. Just noticed that God’s Unruly Friends seems to be available at an online library for those of you who like spending hours in front of computer screens…
http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=99320115
PPS Tried finding an e-mail for you (Robert) but no luck. Qué es?
March 24th, 2006 at 12:09 pm
WOW. Excellent read, you held me rapt throughout.
I especially loved this:
“i.e. people were pretty quick to use toilet paper instead of the prescribed “three clean stones.” See. Even the fascists know when to be selective on what is to be parroted. Next time you meet a fascist about to do the deed, be sure to bring him a few clean stones to wipe himself with. We’ll see who’s so Sunni! Innovation I tell you!”
*smile
Warmly,
Baraka
March 24th, 2006 at 1:02 pm
Baraka. I’m so glad you enjoyed it. I find, and I don’t mean any disrespect by this, that taking note of Muhammad’s actions and statements regarding the bodily fluids tells quite a lot. Look for hints re. menstruation, number 1 and number 2 (ha!), etc…
T.R.O.Y. Thanks so much for the comments! And I’m excited to hear more about your project. Hmmm. Sustained anarchist formal “groups” in Islam… I would agree that there isn’t really a thread there. There are a number of reasons I could posit for that, regarding emphases and such. I would disagree with the “hippieism” analogy. I think A. that term doesn’t really mean much, and B. I don’t see any of the commodified hippy aesthete in Islam. And I am absolutely against any demarcations of “lifestyle anarchism.” I really think that is an aggressive term with little basis other than to marginalize a “group.” At least that is the way I have encountered the term thus far. I do appreciate your comments and would love to talk further, I just think there are a number of assumptions about identity and affiliation you are making that are contestable. People interested in anarchism may benefit from looking less at the splinters and more at the trees.
MOdern expressions.. hmmm… Of course there’s Yakou over at http://anarchomuslim.blogspot.com/. Of course there is me. I think one of the beauties of Islam and anarchism, is that the expressions sort of blend in to the fabric. There’s a very wandering can’t really place it quality of Islamic Muslims. I think this comes form a desert vastness that just lends itself to individuals doing their individual stuff. This is not to say that there isn’t anarchist tendencies in larger movements, this site is of course happily under the progressiveislam.org umbrella. And PMU has had an anarchist leading person here and there. I think it’s just not as pronounced. With all that praying during the day, who has the time!
Keep me up to speed. What have you found, and are finding?
March 24th, 2006 at 1:05 pm
Spelling errors abound! So sorry!
Yakou=Yakoub
anarchist leading person=anarchist LEANING person
blend in to=blend into
etc etc and freaking etc.
March 25th, 2006 at 5:58 pm
Greetings Robert,
I believe our disagreements are more in terminology rather than substance. But who knows?
“Hippieism” for me was a casual term i tossed out that did not imply commodification but rather referred to the sort of libertine individualism that i associate with the Qalandariyya and the “hippie” equivalents in say Hakim Bey for example. Similarly, i recognize that the term “lifestyle anarchism” has a negative connotation especially if one’s thoughts are drawn towards Bookchin’s literary attack on Bey and others (”Social Anarchism versus Lifestyle Anarchism: the Unbridgeable Chasm”). Instead, what i am simply saying is that i do not see a whole lot of Muslim groups throughout history that have engaged in the same sort of quest for radical egalitarianism, collectivity, and anti-authoriatiarianism as quite a few Christian groups.
And, i might add, nor have i seen (m)any Muslim pacifist groups throughout history. On both accounts, i guess an equivalent to the Quakers would be interesting to see in Islam. Of course, i recognize that much of my ignorance may be due to the fact that i neither speak Arabic nor am i immersed in an Islamic culture.
As for my project, i am trying to simply present a rough overview of spiritual anarchists (broadly defined) in general. This project is intended to be neither in-depth nor an academic work. Nonetheless, i am, to the best of my abilities, trying to present information coherently and without bias. I’ll leave it to one of you folks to write the authoritative work on Muslim Anarchism. I’m just trying to provide a small glimpse of anarchistic tendencies within different religions. In Islam, I do not really have much more than i mentioned already: Kharijites, Assassins, Qalandars, and Qaddafi’s Green Book.
The only additional aspects would be: the Ibadhis, an interview with Aki Nawaz (Fun-Da-Mental), and a section about Hakim Bey and the anarchist debate around him. The Ibadhis/Ibadiyya are usually considered a moderate Kharijite sect. They deny this. It seems to me as if they regard themselves to be like the original Muslims in a way similar to the Bruderhof claim that they are like the original Christians. And they seem to enjoy being associated with the “extreme” Kharijites about as much as any good ol’ Southern Baptist would like to be associated with the radical Anabaptist revolutionaries of the 1500’s. Read more about Ibadhis here if you like:
http://www.angelfire.com/ok5/ibadhiyah/
And maybe some Alawiyya could be considered anarchist but then again the guy i interviewed was _Alawi_ and did not consider himself Muslim. His religion had more in common with Native American shamanism than Islam. But back home in Turkey it was ‘Taqiya’ i guess (though he didn’t use the term). Pretending to be what one isn’t in order to survive in a hostile climate. So how to classify these folks?
And, yes, i’ve checked out Yakoub Islam, his site and his blog (and your site of course!) and Mike Knight though i’m new to the whole lot of you. It was very refreshing to see that a lot has developed in the last few years (at least on the net). It helps to be able to place the concept in a modern context as well. Though of course one could argue that there are anarchist aspects of the Nations of Gods and Earths I.S.L.A.M. = I Self Lord Am Master. After all, anarchist nationalism exists too. And i certainly will not attempt to determine who is a ‘real’ anarchist and who is not. That’s another arduuous task that i’ll leave to the true believers.
By the way, do you have your e-mail posted on the site? I couldn’t find it.
Peace in Justice,
T.R.O.Y.
March 26th, 2006 at 6:25 am
T.R.O.Y
Thanks so much for the comments! It sounds like you’re coming in contact with some really great stuff, even if limited in the Islamic venues.
It’s a shame that Qaddafi has to be a representative of Islamic anarchism, cause that book is a bit off the mark. “The Blacks” and “The Women?” Eek! I guess there’s some interesting stuff in there as far as critique of materialist society, but my word!
Have you picked Hakim Bey’s brain? Also consult Laury Silvers the founder of progressiveislam.org under which this site lives. She seems to have a good grasp on Islamic history. And Mike Knight as well. They seem to be well versed in social movements within and without Islam. Most of what I come up with is from looking at the Qur’an closely with a lens of my own making. I come to the Qur’an from my own histories and interests, etc. and this is what I come up with. I have found that most wandering Muslims, the types just hanging about the mosque, older types are just anarchists by default. They seem to have no interest in anything by Allah. So by default…
The historical example that I find myself relating to most is the now deemed “heretical” Murji’ah/Murjites. Do you know them? They are the “postponers” of God’s judgement. Basically stating that humans are in no place to judge another person’s taqwa (God consciousness) or “Muslim-ness.” They get considerably deeper than this, but this is the basis. There is VERY little written on them, and everything on the web is a horrendous discussion of whether or not THEY are Muslims! People use the anithesis of their critique to criticise them! Brilliant!
The book The Formative Period of Islamic Thought by William Watt has a nice section on them and relates them to other movements at the time. Easy read scholarly look at heresies and such. But not at all sensational. And kind of funny.
Also, check out Mahmoud Mohamed Taha and his understudy’s (so to speak) books: The Second Message of Islam: Mahmoud Mohamed Taha and Toward an Islamic Reformation: Civil Liberties, Human Rights, and International Law. Two men from Sudan and a radical reassesment of the application of Shari’a. They call for a shift from applying the “laws” of the later suras to that of the earlier more egalitarian ones. Not specifically anarchist, but anarchism is a process through which we undo I suppose. This is certainly within that chain of events. This is a major movement in Sudan and the founder (Taha) was of course put to death because of it. Here’s Taha’s wikipedia for quick reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Muhammad_Taha
Please query me more if need be. I sent you my email through email.
March 27th, 2006 at 10:23 am
Hi T.R.O.Y.,
Slightly off-topic here, but have you looked at Reclaiming and other anarcha/o(istic)-pagan groupings? Seems like they would fit right into your study of spiritual anarchists.
March 28th, 2006 at 3:35 pm
Hello Robert and Restive,
I’ll take the latter first. Thanks for the tip. Yes i’m familiar with Starhawk and Reclaiming and you’re right, it does fit right into the study and i just wish i could raise Bakunin from the dead arrange a debate between he and them! As for Robert’s tips, thanks again. Sure, the Green Book has some quirky comments about women -to say the least- but its combination of socialism and direct democracy can hardly be considered other than anarchism and i read somewhere (i think Bey) that his section on sports (i.e. that we ought to be participators not spectators) was inspired by Situationalist critiques! But no i have yet to speak to Hakim Bey. I may try to look him up but i know he doesn’t do e-mail… I’ve got some of his work but sometimes his reliance on “poetic facts” feels more like shaky ground. I am not familiar with Taha but it sounds like i ought to be. It sounds very similar to the sort of Islamism (i.e. the idea that the social order should be based on Islam) that a friend of mine has been studying in Egypt. He just wrote a book called (somewhat misleadingly) “Bin Ladin in Our Hearts: Globalization and the Growth of Political Islam”. Only part of the book is about revolutionary reactionary Islamism (a la Bin Ladin). Much of it has to do with what he refers to as social democratic Islamism to whom he counts the Muslim Brotherhood among their number. The Muslim Brotherhood apparently base themselves in large part on the work of Qutb (including his book “Social Justice in Islam”) and strive for an alternative to capitalism that is based on Islam as well as parliamentary democracy with all respect for human rights. I’m still reading the book but i find it fascinating because it’s not exactly what people (at least in the West) associate with Islamism. Any thoughts on the Muslim Brotherhood?
And no i don’t know much about the Murjites except small blurbs. That sort of thing reminds me a bit of the Christian Gnostics: various small groups that we know a tiny bit about and can spend lots of enjoyable hours filling in the blanks for the sake of our own merriment. That’s not a diss, just a natural reaction to dealing with historical fragments. I did however find a rabid Muslim article declaring that The Khawarij are the Murji’ah! http://www.allaahuakbar.net/khawariji/khawarij_are_the_murji.htm That’s all for this time.
Take care,
T.R.O.Y.