The following is an excerpt from a paper I wrote for my history professor, who seemed like a nice guy but was really cold, and merciless. I wrote this section with him in mind. He is about 32ish, and an eligible bachelor, but still a cruel...bastard. I don't really mean that but cruel bastard is a sort of idiom with no adequate substitute.
Not only was Al Jahiz an early ethnographer, he seemed to be a sociologist of sorts as well. He made human observations about emotions, such as envy, jealousy, and of course, love. In his essay, “Love and Women,” he tells us of the difference between men and women, about when women are superior to men and vica versa, what occupations and rights women ought to observe. During this time period, passionate love or eros was distinct from conjugal love, because the eros could only be aroused by professionals, like “singing slave-girls,” a class of prostitutes that are cultured, and educated in specific arts like the geisha. One passage of note describes how women are the most important objects in men’s lives:
Thus, men care for their women, and change themselves for the pleasure of their women. Jahiz also writes about how under certain circumstances, women are superior to men. “It is [women] who are desired, courted, loved and pursued. It is they who are ransomed and guarded,” he writes (Coville, 174). Jahiz even asks you to compare the riches to the “joy of sex” and declares that you would “choose lasting poverty coupled with uninterrupted pleasure” (Coville, 174). His candidness on matters of love and sex is surprising given that this is written in eighth century Baghdad.
In fact, Jahiz is the first to discuss sex candidly in Arabic literature, without the dense metaphors or flowery language that characterizes much of love discourse during medieval Islam. He writes a piece titled “The Pleasures of Girls and Boys Compared” in which he describes the habits of men and the pleasures derived from a little “frivolity” (Coville, 202). He writes how there are some seemingly pious men who are against the mention of vulgar words like cock, and hot-box (Coville, 203). These turns of phrases “would have already been removed from the language for reasons of probity and to protect purity” but they were not removed, so they can continue to be used (Coville, 203). In the same passage, there is mention of grunting during sex, and metaphoric reference to a man and woman’s “honey” (Coville, 204). The fact that such candor existed during the high Abbasid period is unbelievable.
Jahiz further explores love and the relationship between the sexes when he writes about “true Arab passion”:
There are two types of men who do not love with true Arab passion. One is the poverty-stricken wretch whose heart is too preoccupied to fall deeply in love and explore love’s furthest limits. The other is the great sultan; for duties of state, maintenance of law and order and the need to ensure the revenue supply take up half of his attention and prevent him, too, from falling deeply in love and being consumed by passion. (Coville, 177)
This seems particularly true today when the furies of work and school leave our hearts isolated and unforgiving. There are far too many eligible investment bankers and doctors and businesspeople, men and women both, who fail to allow themselves the intimate joy of good conversation and company. Rather, it is about the easy, quick, and effortless means of entertainment that preoccupy our lives. But what about the true Arab passion? Al-Jahiz asks. We are not sultans, and we are not wretches, yet our hearts do not find solace in the deeper possibilities of love.
Not only was Al Jahiz an early ethnographer, he seemed to be a sociologist of sorts as well. He made human observations about emotions, such as envy, jealousy, and of course, love. In his essay, “Love and Women,” he tells us of the difference between men and women, about when women are superior to men and vica versa, what occupations and rights women ought to observe. During this time period, passionate love or eros was distinct from conjugal love, because the eros could only be aroused by professionals, like “singing slave-girls,” a class of prostitutes that are cultured, and educated in specific arts like the geisha. One passage of note describes how women are the most important objects in men’s lives:
Compared with what they give women, men only give each other things of little consequence. It is because of women that men bother to use fragrance, hair-dye, and antimony, shave their beards, cut their hair and wear clean, smart, well-ironed clothes. (Coville, 171)
Thus, men care for their women, and change themselves for the pleasure of their women. Jahiz also writes about how under certain circumstances, women are superior to men. “It is [women] who are desired, courted, loved and pursued. It is they who are ransomed and guarded,” he writes (Coville, 174). Jahiz even asks you to compare the riches to the “joy of sex” and declares that you would “choose lasting poverty coupled with uninterrupted pleasure” (Coville, 174). His candidness on matters of love and sex is surprising given that this is written in eighth century Baghdad.
In fact, Jahiz is the first to discuss sex candidly in Arabic literature, without the dense metaphors or flowery language that characterizes much of love discourse during medieval Islam. He writes a piece titled “The Pleasures of Girls and Boys Compared” in which he describes the habits of men and the pleasures derived from a little “frivolity” (Coville, 202). He writes how there are some seemingly pious men who are against the mention of vulgar words like cock, and hot-box (Coville, 203). These turns of phrases “would have already been removed from the language for reasons of probity and to protect purity” but they were not removed, so they can continue to be used (Coville, 203). In the same passage, there is mention of grunting during sex, and metaphoric reference to a man and woman’s “honey” (Coville, 204). The fact that such candor existed during the high Abbasid period is unbelievable.
Jahiz further explores love and the relationship between the sexes when he writes about “true Arab passion”:
There are two types of men who do not love with true Arab passion. One is the poverty-stricken wretch whose heart is too preoccupied to fall deeply in love and explore love’s furthest limits. The other is the great sultan; for duties of state, maintenance of law and order and the need to ensure the revenue supply take up half of his attention and prevent him, too, from falling deeply in love and being consumed by passion. (Coville, 177)
This seems particularly true today when the furies of work and school leave our hearts isolated and unforgiving. There are far too many eligible investment bankers and doctors and businesspeople, men and women both, who fail to allow themselves the intimate joy of good conversation and company. Rather, it is about the easy, quick, and effortless means of entertainment that preoccupy our lives. But what about the true Arab passion? Al-Jahiz asks. We are not sultans, and we are not wretches, yet our hearts do not find solace in the deeper possibilities of love.
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