Muslim Society by Ernest Gellner

Review by: Ira Lapidus

International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 15, No. 3 (Aug., 1983), pp. 421-424
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Reviews 421 Reviews 421
YAACOV
BAR-SIMAN-TOV,
The
Israeli-Egyptian
War of Attrition, 1969-70: A Case
Study
of
Limited Local War
(New
York: Columbia
University Press, 1980). Pp.
xi + 248.
Because it was a "limited local
war,"
the series of battles
fought
between
Egypt
and Israel
along
the Suez Canal from 1969 to 1970 does not
always
command the
attention, interest,
or
scholarly
research received
by
the Arab-Israeli wars in
1948, 1956, 1967, 1973,
and
now,
1982
(the
"limited" Lebanese
war).
Bar-Siman-Tov's
monograph helps
make
up
for
any deficiency
that
may
exist in
study
of the 1969-70 confrontation which he calls the
"Israeli-Egyptian
War of Attrition." His
study usefully supplements
other detailed exami-
nations such as Lawrence L. Whetten's The Canal War: Four-Power
Conflict
in the
Middle East
(MIT Press, 1974)
or
Edgar
O'Ballance's The Electronic War in the Middle
East
(Faber
and
Faber, 1974).
The first two of the
eight chapters (about
a fifth of the
book)
offer a framework for
study
of limited local wars and a theoretical discussion for "war of attrition." While these
are admirable
attempts
to
impose
a theoretical framework on the
subsequent analysis
and
discussion,
at times
they
seem somewhat
forced, i.e.,
an
attempt
to fit the events of the
period
into too
rigid
or "scientific" a
categorization.
This
by
no means detracts from the
usefulness and
significance
of the substantive
study
that follows.
The next five
chapters
and the conclusion offer a
finely researched, well-documented,
and detailed
survey
of the
military
and
diplomatic
events in the war, from its initiation
by
Egypt
to the conclusion via the initiative of U.S.
Secretary
of State William
Rogers.
Especially
commendable is the author's
presentation
of diverse
perspectives-Israeli,
Egyptian, American, and Soviet-without
politically
biased overtone or
polemical
under-
tone.
Perhaps
the
range
of sources makes this
possible. They
include most of the standard
primary
and
secondary
works on the
period, especially
accounts of
diplomats
and soldiers,
as well as extensive
reports
and
commentary
from the Israeli and
Egyptian press (notably
Heikal's commentaries in al-Ahram).
Despite
the lack of Russian sources, the author has
given
a
very
credible account of Soviet attitudes and
perceptions, largely by way
of
Egyptian
observers.
An
important aspect
of the discussion is that a "limited local war" can have
far-ranging
consequences
of
ultimately global scope;
that
although
nations
may
initiate "local wars"
for
relatively
modest
military
or
political objectives,
it is
extremely
difficult to contain or
manage
them. Neither
Egypt
nor Israel
really gained from the war
although Egypt
came
out ahead of Israel in the
game,
the author concludes. But
Egypt's "faulty understanding
of limited war," its
misperception
that it could
"by
means of a limited war . .. achieve the
aims of total war . ..
challenged
the basic
concept
of a limited war." The author observes
that: "Unlike the wars that
preceded it, the War of Attrition ended without a clear-cut
military
decision. It ended in a
strategic
draw and the
wearing
down of both contestants."
His theoretical conclusion is that the external constraints of U.S. and Soviet intervention
rather than local limitations
prevented
the war from
escalating
further and
finally
termi-
nated it.
State
University of
New York, Binghamton DON PERETZ
ERNEST GELLNER, Muslim
Society (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1981). Pp.
267.
Muslim
Society
is a collection of Gellner's
essays
and book reviews
published
between
1970 and 1979 with the addition of a new and
lengthy paper,
"Flux and Reflux in the
Faith of Men." The articles shine
throughout
with Gellner's honed
intelligence
and his
YAACOV
BAR-SIMAN-TOV,
The
Israeli-Egyptian
War of Attrition, 1969-70: A Case
Study
of
Limited Local War
(New
York: Columbia
University Press, 1980). Pp.
xi + 248.
Because it was a "limited local
war,"
the series of battles
fought
between
Egypt
and Israel
along
the Suez Canal from 1969 to 1970 does not
always
command the
attention, interest,
or
scholarly
research received
by
the Arab-Israeli wars in
1948, 1956, 1967, 1973,
and
now,
1982
(the
"limited" Lebanese
war).
Bar-Siman-Tov's
monograph helps
make
up
for
any deficiency
that
may
exist in
study
of the 1969-70 confrontation which he calls the
"Israeli-Egyptian
War of Attrition." His
study usefully supplements
other detailed exami-
nations such as Lawrence L. Whetten's The Canal War: Four-Power
Conflict
in the
Middle East
(MIT Press, 1974)
or
Edgar
O'Ballance's The Electronic War in the Middle
East
(Faber
and
Faber, 1974).
The first two of the
eight chapters (about
a fifth of the
book)
offer a framework for
study
of limited local wars and a theoretical discussion for "war of attrition." While these
are admirable
attempts
to
impose
a theoretical framework on the
subsequent analysis
and
discussion,
at times
they
seem somewhat
forced, i.e.,
an
attempt
to fit the events of the
period
into too
rigid
or "scientific" a
categorization.
This
by
no means detracts from the
usefulness and
significance
of the substantive
study
that follows.
The next five
chapters
and the conclusion offer a
finely researched, well-documented,
and detailed
survey
of the
military
and
diplomatic
events in the war, from its initiation
by
Egypt
to the conclusion via the initiative of U.S.
Secretary
of State William
Rogers.
Especially
commendable is the author's
presentation
of diverse
perspectives-Israeli,
Egyptian, American, and Soviet-without
politically
biased overtone or
polemical
under-
tone.
Perhaps
the
range
of sources makes this
possible. They
include most of the standard
primary
and
secondary
works on the
period, especially
accounts of
diplomats
and soldiers,
as well as extensive
reports
and
commentary
from the Israeli and
Egyptian press (notably
Heikal's commentaries in al-Ahram).
Despite
the lack of Russian sources, the author has
given
a
very
credible account of Soviet attitudes and
perceptions, largely by way
of
Egyptian
observers.
An
important aspect
of the discussion is that a "limited local war" can have
far-ranging
consequences
of
ultimately global scope;
that
although
nations
may
initiate "local wars"
for
relatively
modest
military
or
political objectives,
it is
extremely
difficult to contain or
manage
them. Neither
Egypt
nor Israel
really gained from the war
although Egypt
came
out ahead of Israel in the
game,
the author concludes. But
Egypt's "faulty understanding
of limited war," its
misperception
that it could
"by
means of a limited war . .. achieve the
aims of total war . ..
challenged
the basic
concept
of a limited war." The author observes
that: "Unlike the wars that
preceded it, the War of Attrition ended without a clear-cut
military
decision. It ended in a
strategic
draw and the
wearing
down of both contestants."
His theoretical conclusion is that the external constraints of U.S. and Soviet intervention
rather than local limitations
prevented
the war from
escalating
further and
finally
termi-
nated it.
State
University of
New York, Binghamton DON PERETZ
ERNEST GELLNER, Muslim
Society (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1981). Pp.
267.
Muslim
Society
is a collection of Gellner's
essays
and book reviews
published
between
1970 and 1979 with the addition of a new and
lengthy paper,
"Flux and Reflux in the
Faith of Men." The articles shine
throughout
with Gellner's honed
intelligence
and his
This content downloaded from 193.49.18.51 on Sat, 5 Oct 2013 23:05:35 PM
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
422 Reviews
capacity
to concentrate his
insights
into dense formulas and models of societies. He is
worth
reading
to see how he thinks as well as to see what he
says.
Two themes
pervade
this book: one is the
adaptability
of Islam to
modernity;
the other
is Gellner's own model of Muslim
society.
In Gellner's
view,
there are two kinds of Islam.
One is the faith incarnate in
holy
men; friends of God who channel God's
power
and
blessing
into the
world,
and are believed to intercede between
ordinary persons
and the
divinity.
This faith is
expressed
in
festivals, magical practices,
and ecstatic
ceremonies,
and in the
acceptance
of the saints as mediators
among segmentary
communities. The
other is
Scriptural
Islam,
built
upon
textual transmission and reverence for the word.
Expressed
in
prayer, study,
and
conformity
to custom and
legal norms,
this
Islam,
in the
custody
of the ulama and the educated urban middle
classes,
serves to
legitimate
the
political order,
and is
egalitarian
and universalistic. New
research, however,
is
showing
that the rural sufi
pir,
like his urban
counterpart,
combines education and
practice
of
hadith and law with
mystical
exercises. Between the two extremes there is a wide middle
ground
in which
scriptural
and sufi
aspects
of Islam are
integrated,
a middle
ground
which
may
well constitute the norm of Islamic belief in both rural and urban societies.
This does not diminish Gellner's
telling
observations about the relevance of Islamic
symbols
to the modern world. Modern
societies,
he
observes,
are
"organic,"
based on a
complex
division of labor and
mobility
of
persons,
held
together by
literate culture and
nationalist sentiment.
They
are the antithesis of societies
organized
into
ritually defined
and
symbolically
validated sub-communities. In the
process
of modernization, states
sup-
press
tribal and other autonomous communities and make the
saintly style
redundant.
With the abolition of
parochial divisions, the centralization of
political power,
and
develop-
ment of a
complex
division of labor, egalitarian scripturalism
fuses
easily
with nationalism
to
symbolize
the formation of a mass
society.
In Gellner's words, "By
various criteria-
universalism, scripturalism, spiritual egalitarianism,
the extension of full
participation
in
the sacred
community
not to one, or some, but to all, and the rational
systematization
of
social life-Islam is, of the three
great
Western monotheisms, the one closest to
modernity"
(p. 7).
This
modernity
differs from case to case. Gellner
points
out that in
Algeria,
maraboutism
has
given way
to
scripturalism,
and tribal communities have been
supplanted by
a new
petite bourgeoisie
and state elite that
symbolize political independence
and nationalist
purpose
in
scriptural
Islamic terms.
Libya
under the
dictatorship
of
Gaddafy espouses
an
ultra-scriptural position
which
strips away
not
only
Islamic law, but also
hadith,
to return
to the
pure
word of the
Qur'an;
the result is to undermine the
authority
of the ulama and
to allow
Gaddafy
absolute
authority,
untrammelled
by
traditional
religious
restraints in
the name of Islam. In Senegal,
sufi sheikhs
supply
the Muridin with
leadership
and a
work ethic that enable the Wolof to seize Fulani lands and
exploit
them for cash
crop
production. In
Iran,
and elsewhere, a fusion of Islam and Marxism allows collective
identity
to be combined with a modern identification of the outside
enemy
and
pragmatic
economic
policies.
In various
guises Islam gives modernity
moral value.
A second critical contribution of this volume is the restatement of Gellner's basic model
of Muslim
society.
A Muslim
society,
in Gellner's view, is the
product
of an arid zone
ecology
and reverence for the written word. Such a
society
is defined
by segmentary
pastoral communities, urban societies and economies, and weak states derived from
pas-
toral
conquest. Segmentary
tribes are cohesive, egalitarian
communities that resist strati-
fication and the centralization of
power.
To
function, however, these
segmentary
units
require
venerable mediators or saints who become the cultic focus of
community identity
and mediate
among
tribal
groups.
As Gellner
says,
"tribesmen come to saints for
political
leadership
rather than
mystical
exercises . . .
"
(p. 147). Towns, by contrast,
are
lacking
in
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Reviews 423
cohesion and are
politically impotent. They
have no bounded
corporate
communities: the
ulama "often serve the
state,
and sometimes lead the
people;
but
they
do not form self-
governing
communities"
(p. 44).
The urban lower
classes, however,
are attached to saint
worship
as an
escape
from and
compensation
for the absence of
community.
Town
populations
are the natural
prey
of
tribes,
but tribesmen need the towns for craft
products,
commercial
exchanges, luxuries,
cultural
leadership,
and moral
legitimation.
Shared
Islamic
religious symbols
and identities
integrate
the otherwise
antagonistic
societies.
States are created
by
tribal
conquests,
but
they really
serve as a
regulating
mechanism
for the
larger society.
Tribes create the
state,
but
they
can never allow it to become so
powerful
as to crush their
autonomy.
Cities
depend upon
the state for
protection against
nomadic
assault,
and urban
religious
elites therefore tend to
legitimate
and
support gov-
erning regimes,
but
they
also seek to
protect
the townsmen from the
arbitrary
whims of
rulers. Both tribes and cities have an interest in states
powerful enough
to
express
tribal
domination and
provide
for urban
security
but still too weak to
damage
either tribal or
urban interests.
Thus,
while
religion
is essential to tribe-town
relations,
the state is
epiphenominal.
"A weak state and a
strong
culture-that seems to be the formula"
(P. 55).
What about the "terrible
Turk,"
those eastern Middle Eastern
regimes
based on a non-
tribal, slave, military elite,
bureaucratic
administration,
and a docile
peasant population?
The Ottoman
polity,
Gellner
recognizes,
"endeavored
deliberately
to make itself
indepen-
dent of the two
customary
social bases of the Muslim state"
(p. 74).
This he considers
"very exceptional,"
an aberration on the normal
system
of Muslim
society,
that
society
based on the circulation of tribal elites first described
by
Ibn Khaldun.
Here Gellner, seizing
on some of the lessons of Ibn Khaldun, ignores others. Ibn
Khaldun
recognized
the differences between
mashriq
and maghrib and noted that eastern
regimes
were
inherently
more stable and were not
subject
to the
ordinary rotation of
tribal elites. Gellner underestimates the
importance
of the
very
facts he observes-the
dominance of non-nomadic
populations
and "Mamluk" and Ottoman
regimes
in
Tunisia,
Egypt, Syria, Iraq,
and
Turkey.
We
may
add to the
sedentary-imperial category
the
preceding
Abbasid and
Saljuq empires
and the
contemporary
Safavid and
Mughal sul-
tanates. One could
plausibly argue
that this is the norm and that the
weakly institu-
tionalized state
regimes
and
perennially powerful
tribal forces of Morocco
represent the
exception.
Rather than
merely try
to stand Gellner on his head, however, I think it would be more
useful to
modify
his
powerful
model to allow for Ottoman and Moroccan variations of
Muslim
society,
and the cases in between. First, a variant model must, of course, include
segmentary, tribal, or clientele-based local communities. In certain
regions-Algeria,
Morocco, Iran, eastern Anatolia, the north Arabian desert, and
upper Egypt-tribal
populations
hold the balance of
political power,
if not the
demographic preponderance.
Also, waves of Arab, Saljuq, Turkish, Ottoman, and
Mongol conquerors introduced
nomadic
populations
into the historic areas of
sedentary peasant populations. The model
must also
give
full
weight
to the
agrarian
commercial societies
throughout
the
region
which are not
only economically
and
religiously
essential to the
viability
of the
pastoral
way
of life, but are also the basis of institutionalized imperial regimes.
Secondly,
the more
comprehensive
model has to
modify Gellner's concept
of urban
society.
Urban societies cannot be
regarded
as a unit but must be seen as
composed
or
organized groups, including guilds, quarters, lineages,
ulama schools of law, sufi
tariqat
and informal clusters of merchant, landowner, or scholar
patrons
and their clients. The
urban milieu is not an undifferentiated whole but is
composed
of
politically active
segments.
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424 Reviews 424 Reviews
Finally,
the state must be taken as an
independent
variable. Even where it is established
by
nomadic
conquest,
it is
ordinarily
institutionalized on the basis of
slave-military
for-
mations and bureaucratic
administration,
and
legitimized
in terms of a
lasting
cultural
tradition which combines
Muslim, patrimonial,
and
cosmopolitan
cultural
concepts.
The new scorecard
(the players
defined as
political collectivities)
allows us to consider
the whole
spectrum
of variation of Middle Eastern and North African Muslim
society.
From this
point
of
view,
Muslim societies are variations on
patterns
of common institu-
tions. For
example,
the Ottoman
Empire
had an institutional order which
emphasized
the
centralized state
regime
based
upon relatively strong military
and bureaucratic institutions
-highly legitimate
in both Muslim and non-Muslim
terms-dominating
almost all of the
organized segments
of Ottoman
society, including
the Sunni ulama
religious
establishment
that served
virtually
as a
department
of
state,
the Sufi
brotherhoods,
non-Muslim
millets,
guilds,
and even Turkish and Arab tribal
groups.
In its
heyday,
the Ottoman
Empire
controlled its
subjects
to a
degree unparalleled
in the rest of the Muslim world. In the
fertile
crescent-Egypt, Tunisia,
and
Algeria-the
state had to share
power
with
organized
tribal
communities,
and
appears
in variant forms.
The Safavid
regime
exhibits another variation. The Safavids were
highly legitimate
in
Sufi,
Shi'a and Islamic
cosmopolitan
cultural terms.
They
were able to maintain a
dynastic
principle,
control the Shi'a
religious establishment,
at times construct a centralized slave
army
and
administration,
and to defend the frontiers of their
empire,
but
by
and
large,
the Safavid Shahs were
hardly
more than suzerains over a
society
which was
actually
governed by
numerous tribal lords and their followers.
The Safavid case seems close to the Moroccan which was also characterized
by powerful
tribal forces, but had weak ulama and urban communities, and a state which had
only
the
barest elements of institutionalization and
imperial legitimacy.
But the Moroccan sul-
tanates were not
nothing.
The sultans were not
only
vehicles of baraka but
they
were
legitimated
in
Caliphal terms, supported by
urban ulama, and did
attempt
to build slave
forces and administrative bureaucracies. They
also were
relatively
successful in
maintaining
dynastic continuity
for
very long periods
of time. Even in the Moroccan
case,
the state
had at least a rudimentary
existence. It was neither
beyond
the
pale
of Muslim societies
nor the model for all of them.
As Gellner remarks, Muslim societies can be understood as different hands dealt from
the same
pack
of cards.
Perhaps
we should
play
with a
slightly larger
deck in order to
deal out the full range
of
possible
hands.
University of California, Berkeley
IRA LAPIDUS
MARIA MACUCH (ed.
and tr.), Das Sasanidische Rechtsbuch "Mdtakddn I Hazdr Ddtistdn",
Teil II (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1981). Abhandlungen
fur die Kunde des
Morgenlandes
45/1.
For
legal
historians interested in the
genetic relationship
between Islamic law and the
legal systems
of the
pre-Islamic
Middle East, Sasanid law has so far been
something
of a
factor X. It is a reasonable
assumption
that Sasanid law contributed to the formation of
the Sharlta
along
with other
legal systems.
But
apart
from material scattered in Zoro-
astrian books such as the Ddtistdn-i denTk, Dinkart and
Rivdyat-i
emit-i
asavahistdn,
the
law in
question
is known only
from the Mdtakddn-i hazdr ddtistdn (Book of a Thousand
Decisions),
and of this work there was until
recently only
one translation; one so unreliable
as to make it
completely
unfit for use (S. J. Bulsara [tr.],
The Laws
of
the Ancient
Finally,
the state must be taken as an
independent
variable. Even where it is established
by
nomadic
conquest,
it is
ordinarily
institutionalized on the basis of
slave-military
for-
mations and bureaucratic
administration,
and
legitimized
in terms of a
lasting
cultural
tradition which combines
Muslim, patrimonial,
and
cosmopolitan
cultural
concepts.
The new scorecard
(the players
defined as
political collectivities)
allows us to consider
the whole
spectrum
of variation of Middle Eastern and North African Muslim
society.
From this
point
of
view,
Muslim societies are variations on
patterns
of common institu-
tions. For
example,
the Ottoman
Empire
had an institutional order which
emphasized
the
centralized state
regime
based
upon relatively strong military
and bureaucratic institutions
-highly legitimate
in both Muslim and non-Muslim
terms-dominating
almost all of the
organized segments
of Ottoman
society, including
the Sunni ulama
religious
establishment
that served
virtually
as a
department
of
state,
the Sufi
brotherhoods,
non-Muslim
millets,
guilds,
and even Turkish and Arab tribal
groups.
In its
heyday,
the Ottoman
Empire
controlled its
subjects
to a
degree unparalleled
in the rest of the Muslim world. In the
fertile
crescent-Egypt, Tunisia,
and
Algeria-the
state had to share
power
with
organized
tribal
communities,
and
appears
in variant forms.
The Safavid
regime
exhibits another variation. The Safavids were
highly legitimate
in
Sufi,
Shi'a and Islamic
cosmopolitan
cultural terms.
They
were able to maintain a
dynastic
principle,
control the Shi'a
religious establishment,
at times construct a centralized slave
army
and
administration,
and to defend the frontiers of their
empire,
but
by
and
large,
the Safavid Shahs were
hardly
more than suzerains over a
society
which was
actually
governed by
numerous tribal lords and their followers.
The Safavid case seems close to the Moroccan which was also characterized
by powerful
tribal forces, but had weak ulama and urban communities, and a state which had
only
the
barest elements of institutionalization and
imperial legitimacy.
But the Moroccan sul-
tanates were not
nothing.
The sultans were not
only
vehicles of baraka but
they
were
legitimated
in
Caliphal terms, supported by
urban ulama, and did
attempt
to build slave
forces and administrative bureaucracies. They
also were
relatively
successful in
maintaining
dynastic continuity
for
very long periods
of time. Even in the Moroccan
case,
the state
had at least a rudimentary
existence. It was neither
beyond
the
pale
of Muslim societies
nor the model for all of them.
As Gellner remarks, Muslim societies can be understood as different hands dealt from
the same
pack
of cards.
Perhaps
we should
play
with a
slightly larger
deck in order to
deal out the full range
of
possible
hands.
University of California, Berkeley
IRA LAPIDUS
MARIA MACUCH (ed.
and tr.), Das Sasanidische Rechtsbuch "Mdtakddn I Hazdr Ddtistdn",
Teil II (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1981). Abhandlungen
fur die Kunde des
Morgenlandes
45/1.
For
legal
historians interested in the
genetic relationship
between Islamic law and the
legal systems
of the
pre-Islamic
Middle East, Sasanid law has so far been
something
of a
factor X. It is a reasonable
assumption
that Sasanid law contributed to the formation of
the Sharlta
along
with other
legal systems.
But
apart
from material scattered in Zoro-
astrian books such as the Ddtistdn-i denTk, Dinkart and
Rivdyat-i
emit-i
asavahistdn,
the
law in
question
is known only
from the Mdtakddn-i hazdr ddtistdn (Book of a Thousand
Decisions),
and of this work there was until
recently only
one translation; one so unreliable
as to make it
completely
unfit for use (S. J. Bulsara [tr.],
The Laws
of
the Ancient
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