Defining Neighbors. Religion, Race, and the Early Zionist-Arab Encounter - Jonathan Marc Gribetz

IMAGInInG ThE “ISrAElITES” • 153

that mirrors certain eighteenth- and nineteenth- century european en-
lightenment writings.^74 Late Ottoman palestine’s intellectuals, espe-
cially those Muslim elites such as ruhi al- Khalidi, must be understood
in the context of an Islamic world in which one of the most renowned
and respected Islamic scholars of his day would not only argue for re-
ligious toleration but also insist that there is room for Jews and Chris-
tians in heaven.
rida at once disparages European anti- Jewish persecution— viewing
it as decidedly un- Islamic— and yet, similar to al- Khalidi, explains it
in such a way that suggests it is understandable and perhaps even the
fault of the Jews themselves. In 1903 rida wrote at length about the
Jews in a passage that links a number of themes already discussed in
this chapter:

the people of Israel are unique among the peoples of the world

in the tenacity of their religious bond and their racial solidar-

ity [tamassukihi­bi-­r-­rābaṭa­al-­milliyya­wa-­l-­ʿaṣabiyya­al-­jinsiyya].

they like to and try to divert toward themselves all of the ad-

vantages of the peoples among whom they live. Were it not for

the fact that they believe that their religion is exclusively for

them and thus they do not have to proselytize, they would try

to turn all of the religions back to it [Judaism] with the [same]

determination with which they try to transform the strengths of

all of the people to the benefit of the Children of Israel. All of

this— were it not for its excessiveness— are excellent qualities.

however, excessive self- love, just like insufficient self- love, is

(^74) Cf. Gotthold ephraim Lessing’s play Nathan­the­Wise (1779). On rida’s place within
the nahḍa, the Arab Enlightenment, see hourani, Arabic­Thought­in­the­Liberal­Age,­1798–­
1939 , 222– 43. hourani points to rida’s attempts to revise and moderate certain conven-
tional rulings in Islam. related to the issue of religious freedom, hourani writes of rida’s
position on Muslim religious apostasy. rida, hourani explains, “gave up the traditional
view that the Muslim who abandoned Islam should necessarily be put to death. Instead,
he made a distinction between the apostate who revolts against Islam and is therefore a
threat to the umma, and him who abandons it quietly as an individual: the first should be
put to death if captured, the second not. his reasoning in favor of this conclusion shows
the principles of his thought. the condemnation of the apostate to death is supported,
it is true, by the unanimous ijmaʿ of the jurists; but one must go beyond this, and ask if
the ijmaʿ is based on a clear text of the Qurʾan or not. In this case, there is no text of the
Qurʾan stating that all apostates should be killed; on the contrary, there is a text [Qurʾan
2:256] condemning all compulsion in religion (lā­ikrāh­fī­ad-­dīn). the ijmaʿ is therefore
in contradiction with the principles of Islam, and must be rejected.” Ibid., 237. hourani
shows the way in which rida similarly limited other Islamic concepts and practices, such
as that of jihād. For more recent studies of rida’s perspective on other religions, see
ryad, Islamic Reformism and Christianity; Wood, Christian Criticisms, Islamic Proofs. On the
relationship between Jews and the nahḍa, see levy, “Jewish Writers in the Arab East.”