Can Islam Explain Haitian Violence?
Slavishness and violence.
One of the fascinating features of Arabic is that, due to the extreme linguistic conservatism dictated by the Quran, the Arabic of the 10th century is read and understood today. One example is the poetry of Al-Mutanabbi.
Al-Mutanabbi, born 915, was an Arabic poet. His name as translated into english as "The Would-be Prophet," which refers to his adventures early in life as a Shi'ite Qarmatian revolution. Following his imprisonment and release, he became a wandering poet.
Al-Mutannabi found patronage in an odd way. Abu al-Misk Kafur, a black slave, found himself ruling the Ikhshidid Kingdom of Egypt and Syria. Kafur was described as originating from Sudan, Ethiopia, or Nubia. He was originally purchased by Muhammad ibn Tughj al-Ikhshid.
The term Ikhshid is Iranian, related to the term "khshāyathiya." "Khshayathiya" derives from "kšáyati," he who rules or has power, which is cognate with the Sanskrit "kṣatrá," the term for supremacy, related to the term "kṣatriya," the warrior class. In a round about way, the term “Ikhshid” is related to the term “kshatriya.”
Kafur began ruling the Ikhshidid Kingdom in 946, and became a patron of the arts. Al-Mutannabi expected Kafur to grant him a desired honor, but when this was not bestowed, al-Mutannabi insulted Kafur’s eunuchry, appearance, and heritage.
The practice of scholars insulting the heritage of various rulers was well established in Rome. Many of the Roman emperors were insulted for being Dacian, Thracian, German, Arab, Syrian, African, or of any non-Italian heritage. However, Race and Slavery by Bernard Lewis argues that Islamic racism was distinct from these previous forms of discrimination:
"The advent of Islam created an entirely new situation in race relations. All the ancient civilizations of the Middle East and of Asia had been local, or at most regional. Even the Roman Empire, despite its relatively large extent, has essentially a Mediterranean society. Islam for the first time created a turly universal civilization, extending from Southern Europe to Central Africa, from the Atlantic Ocean to India and China. By conquest and by conversion, the Muslims brought within the bounds of a single imperial system and a common religious culture people as diverse as the Chinese [..], black Africans, and white Europeans. [..] The Muslim obligation of pilgrimage [..] brought travelers from the remotest corners of the Muslim world [..].”1
Lewis quotes Toynbee arguing the opposite:
"the Primitive Arabs who were the ruling element in the Umayyad Caliphate called themselves "the swarthy people," with a connotation of racial superiority, and their Persian and Turkish subjects, "the ruddy people," with a connotation of racial inferiority [..] brunettes are the first choice of Allah's "Chosen people." [..] the White Muslims were in contact with the Negroes of Africa and with the dark-skinned peoples of India from the beginning [..] White Muslims have demonstrated their freedom and race-feeling by the most convincing of all proofs: they have given their daughters to black Muslims in marriage."2
Lewis responds as follows:
"The Middle East is an ancient land of myths in which the mythopoeic faculty--the ability to create myths, to believe in them, and to make others believe--has by no means died out. It would be wise to subject nay widely held assumption regarding this area to critical scrutiny."3
Lewis argues against this picture of "interracial utopia." He cites two stories from "The Thousand and One Nights": that of King Shahzaman, who kills his wife and black slave for sleeping together, and King Shahriyar, who found 20 of his female family members "attended" by 20 male black slaves.4 The implication here is that blacks are either lustful, or that the blackness of the slaves is used to increase the “scandal” of infidelity, or both.
In Arabic, however, terms like "black" and "white" are sometimes relative, meaning "darker" or "lighter”:
"The Arabs, for example, sometimes describe themselves as black in contrast to Persians, who are red, but at other times as red or white in contrast to the Africans, who are black. The characteristic color of the Bedouin is variously stated as olive or brown. [..] the Persians are sometimes spoken of as "the red people," with a suggestion of ethnic hostility. [..] Redness is similarly ascribed to the conquered natives of Spain, to the Greeks, and to other Mediterranean peoples of somewhat lighter skin than the Arabs. [..] There are verses, indeed many verses, attributed to pre-Islamic and early Islamic poets which would suggest very strongly a feeling of hatred and contempt directed against persons of African birth or origin."5
"Arab poetry and legend have preserved the names of several famous figures in ancient Arabia who are said to have been born to Ethiopian mothers and who in consequence were of dark complexion. The most famous of these was the poet and warrior 'Antara, whose father was of the Arab tribe of 'Abs and whose mother was an Ethiopian slave woman called Zabiba. He is considered one of the greatest Arabic poets of the pre-Islamic period. [..] There are [..] verses ascribed to him, indicating that his African blood and dark skin marked him as socially inferior and exposed him to insult and abuse. For example:
Enemies revile me for the blackness of my skin, but the whiteness of my character effaces the blackness."6
Lewis also argues that throughout the history of Islamic slavery, although there were both black and white slaves, “white female slaves were more expensive than black ones and they were rarely used for rough labor and filled higher positions in domestic and administrative employment.”7
The general Muslim justification for differences in skin color was climatological, as was the Greek. However, the theory of the Jews Maimonides (d. 1204) and Abu’l-Barakat argued that the difference was not external, as in the case of temperature or the dryness of the air, but was internal, springing from the essence of the soul. This is similar to the Greek concept of phusis, as the internal nature of a thing which comes out through training. Barakat argues that “If the substances and natures of souls were one and the same, it would follow that all men are free.” This, of course, is the exact line of logic which is followed in Christianity and modern liberalism. However, Barakat reverses the causality: since some men prefer slavery to death, they must prefer this because of their soul. Men of noble souls do not tolerate slavery, and will fight to the death without surrender, or will starve rather than serve a master without dignity or rights.
The Relation of Violence and Slavery
The theory of Barakat, that those who have “noble souls” will not tolerate enslavement, implies that those who are more violent will be less likely to endure slavery. Yet the opposite seems to be the case. Take the example of Haiti. Haitians are, to an even greater degree than African Americans, the descendants of slaves. Not only are they the descendants of slaves, but they were enslaved at a ratio of about 10 to 1. That means for every 10 slaves, there was one non-slave. Even in the worst areas of American slavery, where slaves made up the majority of the population (such as Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia), the ratio was not nearly this skewed. Why were the slaves of Haiti so easy to enslave, and why are they so violent and cannibalistic today?
The question is not one merely of “inferiority,” but of relation between two seemingly opposite traits — violence and slavishness. Wouldn’t a population which is extremely violent be more resistant to enslavement? On the other hand, wouldn’t a population like Japan or Korea, which has an extremely low crime rate, be extremely easy to enslave? Why is it then, that throughout Japanese history, the Japanese have been the most fanatic defenders of their independence, and have resisted foreign domination until 1945?
Biological explanations of violence state that violence is a function of testosterone. While this may have some element of truth, this still does not solve the problem of slavishness. Why would populations with higher testosterone be more likely to be enslaved, such as Africans, while populations with lower testosterone have more effectively resisted enslavement, such as the Japanese?
An alternative explanation, which steps over the controversy of biology and materialism, will invert the causality of violence. Instead of seeing violence as a result of the “soul” (or of biochemistry, genetics, biology), violence is a result of its effect. Societies are violent where violence is effective. In other words, if hitting your child gets them to behave, parents will be encouraged to hit their children. If whipping your slave is effective in controlling them, then slave masters will reign supreme.
Alternatively, if you hit your child as a means of punishment, and that child runs away from home, or tries to stab you in the dead of night, then violence is not effective. Similarly, if whipping your slave doesn’t provoke submission, but rather defiance and a slave revolt, then slavery becomes impossible.
One of the features of the violence in Haiti is that it is performative. Cannibalism is psychological warfare. Haitians, who practice Voudou, are extremely superstitious, and believe that cannibalism has some kind of magical power behind it. Haitian terrorists engage in cannibalism not because they are “genetically determined” to be cannibals, or because there is a “cannibal gene,” but because it is effective in gaining power and prestige among people who are inherently ruled by fear and superstition.
In other words, populations are not violent more because they inherently have some greater capacity or internal desire for violence, but because those populations fear and respect violence much more. Therefore, violence becomes a much more effective tool of control. Populations which do not fear death — Buddhists, Christian martyrs, Vikings — go on to build the most orderly, crime free, peaceful societies. The cycle of violence is not perpetuated, because the population in question does not find violence effective as a means of control. Such a population is more concerned with honor, respect, sacredness, manners, politeness, esteem, popularity, fame, or regard.
Slaves are shameless because they do not care for how others perceive them. Instead, they are ruled by the fear of physical violence and physical pain. This is their internal psychological state which allows them to be effectively controlled, in mass numbers, by the whip and the chain. This is the state of animals, such as the horse and donkey, who are whipped and carry the load.
When a slave society disintegrates, and the masters are done away with, the slaves can only govern one another through violence, intimidation, and terrorism. Appeals to “human rights,” virtues, values, or morality have no effect. This is the state of Haiti today.
Race and Slavery in the Middle East: An Historical Enquiry. Bernard Lewis, 1990. Page 18
As quoted by Lewis, pages 18-19.
Lewis, page 19.
Lewis, p. 19.
Lewis, p. 22.
Lewis, p. 24.
From the abstract, Lewis, Chapter 8.