Al-Ghassani's account of the convent and nuns reminds me of a similar account I recently read in another English class. In this account, a woman becomes a nun and the man that loves her is deeply upset about the fact that she is joining the convent because he feels it is not her will to do so but the will of others, in which case were her parents. This man was disturbed at the thought of a such a beautiful creature giving up any possibility of a life she could of had with him outside the convent as he watched "...her buried beneath the pall which betokened her living death- we heard her dirge chanted by the ghost-like choir, and rung out by the tolling bell- we saw her shorn of her fair locks, crowned with thorns, and dressed in the dark garb of the cloister. Soon the rite was over, and we had taken our last look of her." (106-107) A similar notion is felt by al-Ghassani who describes a woman's becoming a nun as the following: "A woman's entry to a convent is like her death, for she will have no more desire for the world." (133) Al-Ghassani goes on to reiterate the point that it seems as though a woman's entry into a convent isn't her own, aside from those women who do have a calling to do so and act upon said calling. He writes of girls promised to the convent before they are old enough to speak, girls sent the convent by their parents as a protective measure against premarital sex, and women forced into the convent due to a lack of dowry. (134) I'm sure these were actually the reasons behind some women at the time becoming nuns, but we also have to remember that this is the account of a Muslim man, in whose culture women never did such things, but instead were free to marry and reproduce, or not to and live alone and without support, a daunting and nearly impossible task for a woman of this time period. Convents may not have been the most liberating places for women, but they certainly provided lodging, food and support that women may not have been able to find elsewhere. Though both of these accounts were written hundreds of years apart from one another, both share a similar disbelief- a disbelief that women would freely choose to live their lives apart from men. Al-Ghassani’s account of women in convents demonstrates that although a narrator may try their best to write from an objective point of view, there will always be some subjectivity in their observations simply because all humans affected in some way or another by their past, experiences and the way in which they were raised to think about the world
I think one of the things that fascinated me most about In the Land of the Christians was the fact that it was so incredibly accurate. We’ve read so many works this semester where the writing was not only offensive and prejudiced towards Islam, but also astoundingly inaccurate in terms of their religion, customs, and way of life. For example, in The Book of John Mandeville, we get a tale about an English knight who travels to the Orient and discovers all sorts of grotesque figures that live in a strange and barbaric place. Looking at this book now, we see how ignorant and frankly embarrassing it is (to us in this class at least) for someone to write all of these biased and prejudiced things towards Muslims that were not true about their culture at all. Islam and Christianity have always been like oil and water throughout history, which is why in so many of the works we’ve read, such as John Mandeville, they come across as ridiculously pro-Christian and obviously anti-Islam. However, when we look at In the Land of Christians, we find that the narrators are extremely knowledgeable and accurate when describing their notions of the Christians that they encounter in the Christian land. This land is unknown to them much like the Orient was to the many Christian writers we studied this semester, however, unlike the inaccurate Europeans, the Muslims that document their observations about the Christian world in this particular work are very accurate in what they write. I think it is quite impressive that although their cultures were so different, they were still able to produce accurate descriptions of the Christian people, instead of just write with a biased hatred towards them.
Therefore, we can trust these Muslim narrators in their accurate descriptions of the Europeans, while we can't trust some of the European Christian writers we've studied this semester. The fact that we have these documented writings from the Muslims in this book, we can get a more accurate account of history in general.
I agree, and I think in some cases historical records that survive today are totally indebted to the written work of medieval Muslim travelers. The example I'm thinking of is Ibn Fadlan and the Vikings, though there are others. Without Fadlan's observations, we would never have known about their iconic funeral burnings, or even the extent of their presence across Northern Europe. We would never have known about the Khazars, a Jewish military superpower. If it were left to Mandeville and Flaubert, this region would be described as a vague, savage land of monsters and a playground for the European.
I think that you are completely correct in your ideas about which culture is less biased in their writings of the "other". However I think that while the Muslims are definitely less biased they are not unbiased, not even close. While yes the Muslim writers of In the Land of the Christian are knowledgeable in their descriptions they still are anti-Christian. I think that it is an inaccurate assumption to make in saying that one version of history is more accurate than another, with the exception of Mandeville, because all sides are biased. Yet I do agree that it is impressive of the Muslims to write with such a restraint in light of how cruel the Christians see to have been to them.
I definitely think it is important that we read Western texts with a grain of salt, keeping an eye out for Orientalist bias. After having read texts like John Mandeville and even Othello, it becomes apparent that the stereotypical perspective of the East appeared frequently in Western literature. However, it is important to consider the idea of Occidentalism, which is a real thing that still happens today. Most cultures, in general, normally have to struggle with some form of negative stereotype - Occidentalism might not have been as prevalent as Orientalism in literature because Europeans have generally held the most power over other cultures throughout history. But that doesn't mean that Occidentalism doesn't still happen, and that the West isn't ever falsely and/or negatively represented by the East. Even some of the Ottomanist writers we've come across this semester are proof that the East can indeed be portrayed in a positive light by the West - and likewise, the West can also be negatively represented by the East.
I have to agree. The Muslim level of scholarship makes the reader respect their work far more than their Christian counterparts, especially in terms of understanding and demonstrating their appreciation for Christianity. Where we see embarrassing amounts of bigotry in texts such as the one written by John Manderville, In the Land of the Christians shows an appreciation for Christianity, and an understanding that many Christians even lack. The primary hope is that Christian authors would have taken these works as an example and model their own Islamic critiques and analytical texts after these very subjective examples.
Katie what struck me most about your post was this idea of “accuracy.” You’re very correct in saying that In the Land of the Christians is a reliable, truthful source of information about that time period, and the religion all of people who lived then. But I couldn’t help but connect Othello to this blog post.
Othello is a fantastic play filled with memorable quotes, scenes, and characters. People still enjoy it today, and even if one has not read it, they know it’s a Shakespearian play. Basically, this story has stood the test of time, and most likely will always be very popular. And yet, it is extremely racist.
In class when we went through the various ways Shakespeare was racist towards Turkish people and offensive to Muslims. It honestly blew me away that I never noticed any of this before. But what got me the most upset was how all of my various teachers never once mentioned Shakespeare’s “cruel” side when reading his works.
So my question is why does a racist, mean play like Othello stand the test of time, but In the Land of Christians barely does? No one would know what I was talking about if I brought the book up in conversation, but everyone would know Othello. So then why can’t an honest account, a true real account, be remembered by the masses?
I know we’ve talked about these questions in class before, but is it so horrible that it still bothers me? Yes, I suppose history is “written by the conquers” and once the Ottoman Empire fell there truly wasn’t a lot of people left to defend them, or even the Islamic religion in general. I’m not sure why these questions keep me up at night, but they really do.
So anyway Katie, thank you for making me ponder this! Whether something was accurate or not didn’t seem to matter much back in the 1600s, and sadly today as well.
I think it is important to note how the travelogues of Al-Ghassani relay a perspective of Muslims and Christians that seems to signify a lot about both cultures in both a Medieval and Modern context. We can see how the perspective of Muslims from Christians is one of harsh misrepresentation and misunderstanding. Also, the Muslim perspective of Christians being one of disgust in response to the extremism of Christian clergy and monarchs is quite evident in these accounts from Ghassani. These views have only been more and more propagated in the modern context. Muslim extremists often draw on Christian extremists to justify their actions of violence or discrimination; just as the Christians focus on the extremist Muslims to justify their ignorance and discrimination. I think that these views are important to note in this class. Even though our focus is generally on Medieval times, we are trying to draw out the history of perceptions on both sides. The Spanish Inquisition is the perfect example of how Christian extremists keep power within Christian spheres and drive out all of those who might challenge them. Nowadays, we see pastors such as Terry Jones and Billy Graham working to eradicate all elements of Islam from American culture; and extremist Muslim groups are trying to exemplify the ignorance of these Christian pastors. I guess my point for this post is that nothing has changed. This class, and Professor Akman, are teaching from a global perspective and I think in this day and age we should be moving towards a radical change in perception for the collective conscious of American, and the world as a whole. We need to realize the value in a global perspective. There is much to understand from other cultures that can benefit our own understanding of ourselves and the world as a whole. By gaining the most objective historical perspective we can, it would allow us to stop the disillusionment that is the discourse on politics and religion, especially in America, or at least that is my perception of it. I'm learning the history, laws, and literature of many different cultures in order to eradicate my misconceptions and to diminish the exaggerations that have been beaten into my head since I was old enough to grasp language. Now I see that a lot of what I have been taught is a subjective experience of a very specific group of people. This does not provide for much objectivity on any subject. The best way to reach objectivity is to learn as many different perspectives on one topic as possible, just as we are doing in this class with both the Christian and the Muslim side. I think that we can really reach a new conceptualization of the world through this interdisciplinary and comparative approach to history, literature, politics, religion, law, and life in general. It's about the human experience and the human conditions that we have all been exposed to. Every form of writing is just one person expounding on human ideas. Let us learn as many human ideas, conditions, experiences, and accounts as possible to better understand the world as a whole.
Well I guess that ends this rant, sorry for those of you who will actually read this if I have slighted anyone or if I came across as arrogant, I've been known to lapse into it accidentally, just as many other writers have a habit of doing.
I agree with the sentiment you seem to be conveying. I also find it disheartening that in this class, like many other historical courses, we are taught history and doomed to watch it repeat itself by those who refused to keep such facts in mind. It is easy to point out the inconsistencies in Medieval writings as well as Modern texts, but in reality these offensive practices are not only due to ignorance and ambivalence. The system that our world operates within is a system of power: a system of reaching out and convincing the lowest common denominator. When we educate ourselves and attempt to imagine a global perspective, we are viewed as dissenters by die-hard extremists. We are not only pitted against those who are unknowingly offensive but also those who are deliberately feeding opinions to the masses. Those in high levels of power use misinformation to retain that power. Those in the lowest levels are left to absorb the misinformation since they don’t have the necessary tools to realize that information is false. The status’ in between are left with the ever-important task to inform those around us who may seem hateful and spiteful, but are misguided and incorrect. This is the system that oppressive writings have been working under for centuries and it is a model we should be aware of.
As is characteristic of the more informed, reality/fact-driven travelogues, the writings of Al-Ghassani reflect the pointed and unembellished people, place, and events he experienced. This travelogue does not claim to be a fantastic tale, like that of John Mandeville, nor does it claim to be a religious mission. Al-Ghassani is a man of books and diplomacy, and this level-headedness is present in his evaluation of the “Christian Lands”. His description of the women entering the convent, although extreme (“like death”) is not an uncommonly held view among practitioners of all the major religions in close enough contact with convents and monasteries to know what they were. Entering a convent is like death—that’s the point. To devote oneself to a monastic life, which for women would be life in a convent, is supposed to be a symbolic martyrdom: giving up the pleasures of the outside world, and committing oneself to prayer and contemplation, a spiritual life instead of a physical or carnal one. It is a metaphorical death. Monks were supposed to be ‘symbolic martyrs’, and in theory the same principle applies to cloistered nuns. The difference, the reason monks entering the monastery were not described in such detail as “death-like”, is the fact that women—especially in medieval Europe—were good for bearing and raising children. That is why many of the women who couldn’t afford their own dowries fell into the monastic life: it was the best, most wholesome option they had, if getting married was out of the question. The convent offered housing, food, and regular work to keep busy, as well as a favorable position in a strict Christian society.
Al-Ghassani's descriptions of the convent as a place to keep daughters until the parents want to marry them off is a chillingly familiar example of the abuse of religious institution for sexual purposes. Al-Ghassani is also struck by the injustice of this, as he says on page 134, "After we had conversed with them and were preparing to leave, one of them said, essentially, 'God has given you and us the path of salvation. But He has not shown us where He intends to lead us.' 'To hell and damnation' I said to her." The convent here is being used as a cage for young women to grow up in until their owners see it fit that they breed to preserve a family line or tie two families together. It is a very blatant and twisted way of abusing religious institutions to control people's sexuality, but, as many of us have said, such abuse of power is by no means unique to this time period or to Catholicism or Christianity.
In the U.S. we are very familiar with the recent sex scandals of the Catholic church, but may be less aware of the sex abuses in Muslim religious institutions. For example, Mullahs (clerics) in Iran have designed a legal document that is a kind of "temporary marriage," whereby a man and woman (only a man and woman, or a man and a nine year old girl) can have sex during a six hour period and then no longer be legally tied to each other. This is clearly a legal loophole for child prostitution, and a very dark chapter in Islamic history that continues today.
As I read Othello by William Shakespeare, I was able to see connections between the play and Al-Ghassani's encounter in the "West". On page 372 in Othello, the context writing illustrates how Orientalism is shown in Othello as it cites another author that we have read earlier in this course, Edward Said. Specifically it notes that "the Orient and Islam are always represented as outsiders having a special role to play inside Europe.” This goes back to Al-Ghassani’s experiences in the “West”. He comments on the “West” in a way that shows his surprise at the way that Christians conduct themselves. He does not understand the corruptness of the Friers- the religious leaders who are supposed to be the models of piety. Similarly, in Othello, the Moor shows his surprise at the rash actions of those around him. These include his very own lieutenant, Cassio, losing his reputation and his innocent and pure wife coming into question for adultery. A common theme found in both of these texts is the quickness to which Christians of lie due to desires that are self-interested in nature. This embodies the idea of orientalism where the realities about Islam are twisted.
The more I learn from this course and my comparative literature course, the more I feel that I have been cheated out of a well-rounded education during my primary and secondary schooling (and some semesters in college). I have always been one to ask my teachers: what was going on in other places while [insert event here] was happening? I never got a straight answer, or it wasn’t “in the scope of our course”. I would even assume that they did not know or that nothing of significance had happened.
Oh that silly rhyme that every grade school teacher taught students: 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. That was it—in the vacuum that is western education, all that happened in 1492 was Columbus “discovering” the Americas. Meanwhile the very people who sent Columbus on that mission were the ones more or less promoting genocide against all Spanish Muslims and Jews in Granada that very same year. As Akman mentioned in class, the success of the Spanish Inquisition resulted in today’s predominance of Christianity. I believe that it also set the narrative through which western education is taught, granting the dominant Christian nations to be selective about which events hold more importance in learning than others.
Al-Ghassani’s account of Columbus discovering the Americas revealed much more than what I had previously learned. On page 144, al-Ghassani states, “[Isabelle] gave him three ships with cavalry and cannons, and he set off to the place he had earlier seen, and where he had landed. The inhabitants of the land fought him, but he defeated them and became their master. He also captured their king.” The version of this story that many western students are taught all throughout their primary and secondary schooling is how Columbus went to the Americas that he mistaken for India, and traded with the natives. Here is a vastly different (and most likely more accurate) account in which Columbus had previously seen the Americas, found the natives to be lazy and indolent—another common aspect the west opposes on the “Other”—and went back with the intention to engage in combat with these people and “become their master”. Though many students realize what actually happened to the native population, western education chooses to sugarcoat these details to justify its predominant existence (and God forbid they give any credit to the Muslim scholars that laid down the foundation for their success). Even more interestingly, in the same calendar year, Ferdinand and Isabelle take over Granada and force Jews and Muslims to convert or to leave Spain. Many were also tortured and burned at the stake for being Muslim and Jewish.
So the rhyme should really be: 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue (and brutally conquered the natives) while Ferdinand and Isabelle banished/converted/murdered those who were Muslim and Jew.
I certainly agree with many of the points you make here; Western education and culture is a repeated culprit of selective memory/history. An example we’ve used multiple times in class is the Fall of Constantinople as the Romans called it, or the Conquest of Istanbul as the Ottomans called it. A similar example is the Dark Ages, from the 5th to 15th century in Western Europe. Throughout most of my schooling, this time period was engraved into my memory as an era of intellectual mediocrity and economic depression, and nothing more. But as we very quickly learned in this class, this thousand-year period also consisted of three different golden ages in the world of Islam. Islamic nations flourished in this time, but because Western culture limped its way through the Christian Dark Ages, we either choose to or are unable to learn of the prosperous eras of other cultures. Reflecting on my earlier years of education, it shocks me how much Western history neglects or omits some of the most significant aspects of the world, simply because they either did not affect the West, or affected it negatively. The saying, “history is written by the victors” of course holds true in many regards, but the losers certainly do their fair share of writing as well.
I cannot agree more. I specifically remember my AP World History class in high school. We had a unit on the Chinese dynasties, Feudal Europe, the French Revolution, and spent two days before the test on the Ottomans. I remember at the time thinking, as the teacher was cramming us with knowledge that I soon forgot, after regurgitating it onto my test from my short term memory, if this Empire spanned nearly 700 years, and was as powerful as we are being told, how is it that we are only spending two days on this? I even remember going to a review session before the test and asking a question about the Ottomans, and my teacher told me not to waste time on the Ottomans, that I needed to focus on the Chinese dynasties. This is very similar to the attitudes we witness throughout the Land of Christians. The western Christian society blatantly chooses to disregard the Eastern societies, in an attempt to boost their self-created image of importance. Inevitably, this leads to the ignorance that we witness in the work, and our modern society today.
There was a moment in the reading by Mohammed ibn abd al-Wahab al-Ghassani where he spoke about a misdeed on the part of Spanish clergymen which stuck out to me as particularly egregious as a 21st century reader: On page 180-181, al-Ghassani describes an instance in which a friar in the village of Ceuta coerces a girl of a very young age to give up her virginity, and the girl is subsequently blacklisted when the friar’s transgressions are revealed. Perhaps even more concerning, al-Ghassani writes “There are many similar stories, no need to mention them all.” Often times, as I sit here tapping away on my laptop computer enjoying the luxury of potable water and indoor plumbing, I find myself writing off the wrongdoings of earlier societies, Christian and Muslim alike. “That’s in the past,” I’ll tell myself, “They weren’t as knowledgeable as we are in 2014. We learn, always growing and adapting to make sure those sorts of things never happen again.” Then I’ll come across an account such as this one, detailing rampant sexual abuse among Christian clerics in the seventeenth century, and be driven to sheer anger that a scandal which has plagued a culture for over 300 years is allowed to continue well into the 21st century. In Seville, al-Ghassani encounters a young woman that, when the conversation turns to members of the Spanish clergy, is quoted as saying “Be damned if you trust them.” Besides the sentiment that clergy who devote their life to God and the promotion of Judeo-Christian values are supposed to be the most trusted citizens, the profound sadness I procure from the words of the woman in Seville is that her statement is an equally valid one today as it was in 1690. To put that in perspective, people today can read about sexual abuse within the Catholic Church on their iPhones and have the same opinion on the same issue as somebody who believed that the sun revolved around the earth. While reading Mohammed ibn abd al-Wahab al-Ghassani, I picked up on the clear sense that he was very disdainful of the Christians while he was in Spain. I’m slow to admit that my first reaction was to attribute this to religious intolerance on his part, but it began to dawn on me: that wasn’t it at all. He does not hate Christians for simply not following the teachings of the Qur’an (as a matter of fact, Muslims have an inherent reverence for all followers of the Abrahamic religions). Rather, he hates those who claim to act in the name of the Christian religion and work contrary to the religion’s teachings. Consider that al-Ghassani arrives in Spain amid the bloody and unreasonable Spanish Inquisition, on a mission to reclaim Muslim literature and relics that were unjustly taken from them centuries earlier. The savagery and paranoia which must have dominated the towns and cities of Spain at the time would enflame an already-biased diplomat like al-Ghassani to condemn the entire nation of despots and anyone who was okay with what they were doing.
Al-Ghassani's account of the convent and nuns reminds me of a similar account I recently read in another English class. In this account, a woman becomes a nun and the man that loves her is deeply upset about the fact that she is joining the convent because he feels it is not her will to do so but the will of others, in which case were her parents. This man was disturbed at the thought of a such a beautiful creature giving up any possibility of a life she could of had with him outside the convent as he watched "...her buried beneath the pall which betokened her living death- we heard her dirge chanted by the ghost-like choir, and rung out by the tolling bell- we saw her shorn of her fair locks, crowned with thorns, and dressed in the dark garb of the cloister. Soon the rite was over, and we had taken our last look of her." (106-107) A similar notion is felt by al-Ghassani who describes a woman's becoming a nun as the following: "A woman's entry to a convent is like her death, for she will have no more desire for the world." (133) Al-Ghassani goes on to reiterate the point that it seems as though a woman's entry into a convent isn't her own, aside from those women who do have a calling to do so and act upon said calling. He writes of girls promised to the convent before they are old enough to speak, girls sent the convent by their parents as a protective measure against premarital sex, and women forced into the convent due to a lack of dowry. (134) I'm sure these were actually the reasons behind some women at the time becoming nuns, but we also have to remember that this is the account of a Muslim man, in whose culture women never did such things, but instead were free to marry and reproduce, or not to and live alone and without support, a daunting and nearly impossible task for a woman of this time period. Convents may not have been the most liberating places for women, but they certainly provided lodging, food and support that women may not have been able to find elsewhere. Though both of these accounts were written hundreds of years apart from one another, both share a similar disbelief- a disbelief that women would freely choose to live their lives apart from men. Al-Ghassani’s account of women in convents demonstrates that although a narrator may try their best to write from an objective point of view, there will always be some subjectivity in their observations simply because all humans affected in some way or another by their past, experiences and the way in which they were raised to think about the world
ReplyDeleteI think one of the things that fascinated me most about In the Land of the Christians was the fact that it was so incredibly accurate. We’ve read so many works this semester where the writing was not only offensive and prejudiced towards Islam, but also astoundingly inaccurate in terms of their religion, customs, and way of life. For example, in The Book of John Mandeville, we get a tale about an English knight who travels to the Orient and discovers all sorts of grotesque figures that live in a strange and barbaric place. Looking at this book now, we see how ignorant and frankly embarrassing it is (to us in this class at least) for someone to write all of these biased and prejudiced things towards Muslims that were not true about their culture at all. Islam and Christianity have always been like oil and water throughout history, which is why in so many of the works we’ve read, such as John Mandeville, they come across as ridiculously pro-Christian and obviously anti-Islam. However, when we look at In the Land of Christians, we find that the narrators are extremely knowledgeable and accurate when describing their notions of the Christians that they encounter in the Christian land. This land is unknown to them much like the Orient was to the many Christian writers we studied this semester, however, unlike the inaccurate Europeans, the Muslims that document their observations about the Christian world in this particular work are very accurate in what they write. I think it is quite impressive that although their cultures were so different, they were still able to produce accurate descriptions of the Christian people, instead of just write with a biased hatred towards them.
ReplyDeleteTherefore, we can trust these Muslim narrators in their accurate descriptions of the Europeans, while we can't trust some of the European Christian writers we've studied this semester. The fact that we have these documented writings from the Muslims in this book, we can get a more accurate account of history in general.
I agree, and I think in some cases historical records that survive today are totally indebted to the written work of medieval Muslim travelers. The example I'm thinking of is Ibn Fadlan and the Vikings, though there are others. Without Fadlan's observations, we would never have known about their iconic funeral burnings, or even the extent of their presence across Northern Europe. We would never have known about the Khazars, a Jewish military superpower. If it were left to Mandeville and Flaubert, this region would be described as a vague, savage land of monsters and a playground for the European.
DeleteI think that you are completely correct in your ideas about which culture is less biased in their writings of the "other". However I think that while the Muslims are definitely less biased they are not unbiased, not even close. While yes the Muslim writers of In the Land of the Christian are knowledgeable in their descriptions they still are anti-Christian. I think that it is an inaccurate assumption to make in saying that one version of history is more accurate than another, with the exception of Mandeville, because all sides are biased. Yet I do agree that it is impressive of the Muslims to write with such a restraint in light of how cruel the Christians see to have been to them.
DeleteI definitely think it is important that we read Western texts with a grain of salt, keeping an eye out for Orientalist bias. After having read texts like John Mandeville and even Othello, it becomes apparent that the stereotypical perspective of the East appeared frequently in Western literature. However, it is important to consider the idea of Occidentalism, which is a real thing that still happens today. Most cultures, in general, normally have to struggle with some form of negative stereotype - Occidentalism might not have been as prevalent as Orientalism in literature because Europeans have generally held the most power over other cultures throughout history. But that doesn't mean that Occidentalism doesn't still happen, and that the West isn't ever falsely and/or negatively represented by the East. Even some of the Ottomanist writers we've come across this semester are proof that the East can indeed be portrayed in a positive light by the West - and likewise, the West can also be negatively represented by the East.
DeleteI have to agree. The Muslim level of scholarship makes the reader respect their work far more than their Christian counterparts, especially in terms of understanding and demonstrating their appreciation for Christianity. Where we see embarrassing amounts of bigotry in texts such as the one written by John Manderville, In the Land of the Christians shows an appreciation for Christianity, and an understanding that many Christians even lack. The primary hope is that Christian authors would have taken these works as an example and model their own Islamic critiques and analytical texts after these very subjective examples.
DeleteKatie what struck me most about your post was this idea of “accuracy.” You’re very correct in saying that In the Land of the Christians is a reliable, truthful source of information about that time period, and the religion all of people who lived then. But I couldn’t help but connect Othello to this blog post.
DeleteOthello is a fantastic play filled with memorable quotes, scenes, and characters. People still enjoy it today, and even if one has not read it, they know it’s a Shakespearian play. Basically, this story has stood the test of time, and most likely will always be very popular. And yet, it is extremely racist.
In class when we went through the various ways Shakespeare was racist towards Turkish people and offensive to Muslims. It honestly blew me away that I never noticed any of this before. But what got me the most upset was how all of my various teachers never once mentioned Shakespeare’s “cruel” side when reading his works.
So my question is why does a racist, mean play like Othello stand the test of time, but In the Land of Christians barely does? No one would know what I was talking about if I brought the book up in conversation, but everyone would know Othello. So then why can’t an honest account, a true real account, be remembered by the masses?
I know we’ve talked about these questions in class before, but is it so horrible that it still bothers me? Yes, I suppose history is “written by the conquers” and once the Ottoman Empire fell there truly wasn’t a lot of people left to defend them, or even the Islamic religion in general. I’m not sure why these questions keep me up at night, but they really do.
So anyway Katie, thank you for making me ponder this! Whether something was accurate or not didn’t seem to matter much back in the 1600s, and sadly today as well.
I think it is important to note how the travelogues of Al-Ghassani relay a perspective of Muslims and Christians that seems to signify a lot about both cultures in both a Medieval and Modern context. We can see how the perspective of Muslims from Christians is one of harsh misrepresentation and misunderstanding. Also, the Muslim perspective of Christians being one of disgust in response to the extremism of Christian clergy and monarchs is quite evident in these accounts from Ghassani. These views have only been more and more propagated in the modern context. Muslim extremists often draw on Christian extremists to justify their actions of violence or discrimination; just as the Christians focus on the extremist Muslims to justify their ignorance and discrimination. I think that these views are important to note in this class. Even though our focus is generally on Medieval times, we are trying to draw out the history of perceptions on both sides. The Spanish Inquisition is the perfect example of how Christian extremists keep power within Christian spheres and drive out all of those who might challenge them. Nowadays, we see pastors such as Terry Jones and Billy Graham working to eradicate all elements of Islam from American culture; and extremist Muslim groups are trying to exemplify the ignorance of these Christian pastors.
ReplyDeleteI guess my point for this post is that nothing has changed. This class, and Professor Akman, are teaching from a global perspective and I think in this day and age we should be moving towards a radical change in perception for the collective conscious of American, and the world as a whole. We need to realize the value in a global perspective. There is much to understand from other cultures that can benefit our own understanding of ourselves and the world as a whole. By gaining the most objective historical perspective we can, it would allow us to stop the disillusionment that is the discourse on politics and religion, especially in America, or at least that is my perception of it. I'm learning the history, laws, and literature of many different cultures in order to eradicate my misconceptions and to diminish the exaggerations that have been beaten into my head since I was old enough to grasp language. Now I see that a lot of what I have been taught is a subjective experience of a very specific group of people. This does not provide for much objectivity on any subject. The best way to reach objectivity is to learn as many different perspectives on one topic as possible, just as we are doing in this class with both the Christian and the Muslim side. I think that we can really reach a new conceptualization of the world through this interdisciplinary and comparative approach to history, literature, politics, religion, law, and life in general. It's about the human experience and the human conditions that we have all been exposed to. Every form of writing is just one person expounding on human ideas. Let us learn as many human ideas, conditions, experiences, and accounts as possible to better understand the world as a whole.
Well I guess that ends this rant, sorry for those of you who will actually read this if I have slighted anyone or if I came across as arrogant, I've been known to lapse into it accidentally, just as many other writers have a habit of doing.
I agree with the sentiment you seem to be conveying. I also find it disheartening that in this class, like many other historical courses, we are taught history and doomed to watch it repeat itself by those who refused to keep such facts in mind. It is easy to point out the inconsistencies in Medieval writings as well as Modern texts, but in reality these offensive practices are not only due to ignorance and ambivalence. The system that our world operates within is a system of power: a system of reaching out and convincing the lowest common denominator. When we educate ourselves and attempt to imagine a global perspective, we are viewed as dissenters by die-hard extremists. We are not only pitted against those who are unknowingly offensive but also those who are deliberately feeding opinions to the masses. Those in high levels of power use misinformation to retain that power. Those in the lowest levels are left to absorb the misinformation since they don’t have the necessary tools to realize that information is false. The status’ in between are left with the ever-important task to inform those around us who may seem hateful and spiteful, but are misguided and incorrect. This is the system that oppressive writings have been working under for centuries and it is a model we should be aware of.
DeleteAs is characteristic of the more informed, reality/fact-driven travelogues, the writings of Al-Ghassani reflect the pointed and unembellished people, place, and events he experienced. This travelogue does not claim to be a fantastic tale, like that of John Mandeville, nor does it claim to be a religious mission. Al-Ghassani is a man of books and diplomacy, and this level-headedness is present in his evaluation of the “Christian Lands”.
ReplyDeleteHis description of the women entering the convent, although extreme (“like death”) is not an uncommonly held view among practitioners of all the major religions in close enough contact with convents and monasteries to know what they were. Entering a convent is like death—that’s the point. To devote oneself to a monastic life, which for women would be life in a convent, is supposed to be a symbolic martyrdom: giving up the pleasures of the outside world, and committing oneself to prayer and contemplation, a spiritual life instead of a physical or carnal one. It is a metaphorical death. Monks were supposed to be ‘symbolic martyrs’, and in theory the same principle applies to cloistered nuns. The difference, the reason monks entering the monastery were not described in such detail as “death-like”, is the fact that women—especially in medieval Europe—were good for bearing and raising children. That is why many of the women who couldn’t afford their own dowries fell into the monastic life: it was the best, most wholesome option they had, if getting married was out of the question. The convent offered housing, food, and regular work to keep busy, as well as a favorable position in a strict Christian society.
Al-Ghassani's descriptions of the convent as a place to keep daughters until the parents want to marry them off is a chillingly familiar example of the abuse of religious institution for sexual purposes. Al-Ghassani is also struck by the injustice of this, as he says on page 134, "After we had conversed with them and were preparing to leave, one of them said, essentially, 'God has given you and us the path of salvation. But He has not shown us where He intends to lead us.' 'To hell and damnation' I said to her." The convent here is being used as a cage for young women to grow up in until their owners see it fit that they breed to preserve a family line or tie two families together. It is a very blatant and twisted way of abusing religious institutions to control people's sexuality, but, as many of us have said, such abuse of power is by no means unique to this time period or to Catholicism or Christianity.
DeleteIn the U.S. we are very familiar with the recent sex scandals of the Catholic church, but may be less aware of the sex abuses in Muslim religious institutions. For example, Mullahs (clerics) in Iran have designed a legal document that is a kind of "temporary marriage," whereby a man and woman (only a man and woman, or a man and a nine year old girl) can have sex during a six hour period and then no longer be legally tied to each other. This is clearly a legal loophole for child prostitution, and a very dark chapter in Islamic history that continues today.
As I read Othello by William Shakespeare, I was able to see connections between the play and Al-Ghassani's encounter in the "West". On page 372 in Othello, the context writing illustrates how Orientalism is shown in Othello as it cites another author that we have read earlier in this course, Edward Said. Specifically it notes that "the Orient and Islam are always represented as outsiders having a special role to play inside Europe.” This goes back to Al-Ghassani’s experiences in the “West”. He comments on the “West” in a way that shows his surprise at the way that Christians conduct themselves. He does not understand the corruptness of the Friers- the religious leaders who are supposed to be the models of piety. Similarly, in Othello, the Moor shows his surprise at the rash actions of those around him. These include his very own lieutenant, Cassio, losing his reputation and his innocent and pure wife coming into question for adultery. A common theme found in both of these texts is the quickness to which Christians of lie due to desires that are self-interested in nature. This embodies the idea of orientalism where the realities about Islam are twisted.
DeleteThe more I learn from this course and my comparative literature course, the more I feel that I have been cheated out of a well-rounded education during my primary and secondary schooling (and some semesters in college). I have always been one to ask my teachers: what was going on in other places while [insert event here] was happening? I never got a straight answer, or it wasn’t “in the scope of our course”. I would even assume that they did not know or that nothing of significance had happened.
ReplyDeleteOh that silly rhyme that every grade school teacher taught students: 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. That was it—in the vacuum that is western education, all that happened in 1492 was Columbus “discovering” the Americas. Meanwhile the very people who sent Columbus on that mission were the ones more or less promoting genocide against all Spanish Muslims and Jews in Granada that very same year. As Akman mentioned in class, the success of the Spanish Inquisition resulted in today’s predominance of Christianity. I believe that it also set the narrative through which western education is taught, granting the dominant Christian nations to be selective about which events hold more importance in learning than others.
Al-Ghassani’s account of Columbus discovering the Americas revealed much more than what I had previously learned. On page 144, al-Ghassani states, “[Isabelle] gave him three ships with cavalry and cannons, and he set off to the place he had earlier seen, and where he had landed. The inhabitants of the land fought him, but he defeated them and became their master. He also captured their king.” The version of this story that many western students are taught all throughout their primary and secondary schooling is how Columbus went to the Americas that he mistaken for India, and traded with the natives. Here is a vastly different (and most likely more accurate) account in which Columbus had previously seen the Americas, found the natives to be lazy and indolent—another common aspect the west opposes on the “Other”—and went back with the intention to engage in combat with these people and “become their master”. Though many students realize what actually happened to the native population, western education chooses to sugarcoat these details to justify its predominant existence (and God forbid they give any credit to the Muslim scholars that laid down the foundation for their success). Even more interestingly, in the same calendar year, Ferdinand and Isabelle take over Granada and force Jews and Muslims to convert or to leave Spain. Many were also tortured and burned at the stake for being Muslim and Jewish.
So the rhyme should really be: 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue (and brutally conquered the natives) while Ferdinand and Isabelle banished/converted/murdered those who were Muslim and Jew.
I certainly agree with many of the points you make here; Western education and culture is a repeated culprit of selective memory/history. An example we’ve used multiple times in class is the Fall of Constantinople as the Romans called it, or the Conquest of Istanbul as the Ottomans called it. A similar example is the Dark Ages, from the 5th to 15th century in Western Europe. Throughout most of my schooling, this time period was engraved into my memory as an era of intellectual mediocrity and economic depression, and nothing more. But as we very quickly learned in this class, this thousand-year period also consisted of three different golden ages in the world of Islam. Islamic nations flourished in this time, but because Western culture limped its way through the Christian Dark Ages, we either choose to or are unable to learn of the prosperous eras of other cultures. Reflecting on my earlier years of education, it shocks me how much Western history neglects or omits some of the most significant aspects of the world, simply because they either did not affect the West, or affected it negatively. The saying, “history is written by the victors” of course holds true in many regards, but the losers certainly do their fair share of writing as well.
DeleteI cannot agree more. I specifically remember my AP World History class in high school. We had a unit on the Chinese dynasties, Feudal Europe, the French Revolution, and spent two days before the test on the Ottomans. I remember at the time thinking, as the teacher was cramming us with knowledge that I soon forgot, after regurgitating it onto my test from my short term memory, if this Empire spanned nearly 700 years, and was as powerful as we are being told, how is it that we are only spending two days on this? I even remember going to a review session before the test and asking a question about the Ottomans, and my teacher told me not to waste time on the Ottomans, that I needed to focus on the Chinese dynasties.
DeleteThis is very similar to the attitudes we witness throughout the Land of Christians. The western Christian society blatantly chooses to disregard the Eastern societies, in an attempt to boost their self-created image of importance. Inevitably, this leads to the ignorance that we witness in the work, and our modern society today.
There was a moment in the reading by Mohammed ibn abd al-Wahab al-Ghassani where he spoke about a misdeed on the part of Spanish clergymen which stuck out to me as particularly egregious as a 21st century reader: On page 180-181, al-Ghassani describes an instance in which a friar in the village of Ceuta coerces a girl of a very young age to give up her virginity, and the girl is subsequently blacklisted when the friar’s transgressions are revealed. Perhaps even more concerning, al-Ghassani writes “There are many similar stories, no need to mention them all.” Often times, as I sit here tapping away on my laptop computer enjoying the luxury of potable water and indoor plumbing, I find myself writing off the wrongdoings of earlier societies, Christian and Muslim alike. “That’s in the past,” I’ll tell myself, “They weren’t as knowledgeable as we are in 2014. We learn, always growing and adapting to make sure those sorts of things never happen again.” Then I’ll come across an account such as this one, detailing rampant sexual abuse among Christian clerics in the seventeenth century, and be driven to sheer anger that a scandal which has plagued a culture for over 300 years is allowed to continue well into the 21st century. In Seville, al-Ghassani encounters a young woman that, when the conversation turns to members of the Spanish clergy, is quoted as saying “Be damned if you trust them.” Besides the sentiment that clergy who devote their life to God and the promotion of Judeo-Christian values are supposed to be the most trusted citizens, the profound sadness I procure from the words of the woman in Seville is that her statement is an equally valid one today as it was in 1690. To put that in perspective, people today can read about sexual abuse within the Catholic Church on their iPhones and have the same opinion on the same issue as somebody who believed that the sun revolved around the earth.
ReplyDeleteWhile reading Mohammed ibn abd al-Wahab al-Ghassani, I picked up on the clear sense that he was very disdainful of the Christians while he was in Spain. I’m slow to admit that my first reaction was to attribute this to religious intolerance on his part, but it began to dawn on me: that wasn’t it at all. He does not hate Christians for simply not following the teachings of the Qur’an (as a matter of fact, Muslims have an inherent reverence for all followers of the Abrahamic religions). Rather, he hates those who claim to act in the name of the Christian religion and work contrary to the religion’s teachings. Consider that al-Ghassani arrives in Spain amid the bloody and unreasonable Spanish Inquisition, on a mission to reclaim Muslim literature and relics that were unjustly taken from them centuries earlier. The savagery and paranoia which must have dominated the towns and cities of Spain at the time would enflame an already-biased diplomat like al-Ghassani to condemn the entire nation of despots and anyone who was okay with what they were doing.