Muhammad_Article.349.. - Dr. Wesley Muhammad
Muhammad_Article.349.. - Dr. Wesley Muhammad
Muhammad_Article.349.. - Dr. Wesley Muhammad
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
A particularly instructive case is that of the Arab poet RabÊ# b. #$mir of the early<br />
Umayyad period, better known as MiskÊn al-D§rimÊ (d. 90/708). MiskÊn was a distinguished<br />
member of noble ancestry from the Banå D§rim from TamÊm of Iraq. 50 A pure Arab born to a<br />
wealthy family, he was known for being “very dark, handsome, courageous, and eloquent”. 51<br />
MiskÊn was famously black-skinned (al-aswad; al-sumra) and a pureblooded Arab. 52 At a certain<br />
point in his life MiskÊn became a very religious ascetic. He gave up his wealth with its finery and<br />
his poetry, and all but locked himself in a mosque in Medina. According to a well-known<br />
anecdote, MiskÊn proposed to a woman of his tribe who rejected him because of both his<br />
blackness and (now) poverty. She instead married a wealthy, fairer-skinned man who was not a<br />
pure Arab. One day MiskÊn passed the two on the street and recited some verses to them,<br />
boasting of his noble heritage and denigrating her spousal choice for his lack of the same. He said<br />
before them:<br />
I am MiskÊn to those who know me.<br />
My complexion is dark brown (al-sumra),<br />
the complexion of the Arabs. 53<br />
Regarding her husband MiskÊn said: “the wealth of his house (samÊn al-bayt) is poverty with<br />
respect to genealogy (mahjål al-nasab),” 54 i.e. his material wealth cannot equal MiskÊn’s pure Arab<br />
genealogy, which her choice lacks. This anecdote articulates an important historical truth: pure<br />
Arabs were black-skinned Arabs. 55 Secondly, and related to this point, fair-skinned Arabs were<br />
considered of ignoble birth. 56<br />
That a fair complexion was a distinctly non-Arab trait is equally well documented in the<br />
Classical Arabic sources. Ibn Maníår affirms:<br />
Red (al-Èamr§#) refers to non-Arabs due to their fair complexion which predominates<br />
among them. And the Arabs used to say about the non-Arabs with whom white skin was<br />
characteristic, such as the Romans, Persians, and their neighbors: ‘They are red-skinned<br />
(al-Èamr§#)…” al-Èamr§# means the Persians and Romans…And the Arabs attribute<br />
white skin to the slaves. 57<br />
Ibn Maníår goes on to quote important commentary on MuÈammad’s famous claim, “I was<br />
sent to the Whites (al-aÈmar) and the Blacks (al-aswad)’: “i.e., the Arabs and the non-Arabs, for the<br />
predominant complexion of the Arabs is dark brown [al-sumra wa l-udma] and that of the non-<br />
50 On him see AbÊ al-Faraj al-Ißfah§nÊ, Kit§b al-agh§nÊ (Beirut: D§r al-Thaq§h, 1955) 20: 167-178; EI 2 7:145<br />
s.v. MiskÊn al-D§rimÊ by Ch. Pellat.<br />
51 EI 2 7:145 s.v. MiskÊn al-D§rimÊ by Ch. Pellat.<br />
52 Al-Ißfah§nÊ, Kit§b al-agh§nÊ, 174.<br />
53 Al-Ißfah§nÊ, Kit§b al-agh§nÊ, 174. On sumra see below.<br />
54 Al-Ißfah§nÊ, Kit§b al-agh§nÊ, 175.<br />
55 Vollers, “Rassenfarden,” 86, 88.<br />
56 For another anecdote making the same point see Ibn AbÊ al-\adÊd, SharÈ nahj al-bal§ghah, ed. MuÈammad<br />
AbÊ al-Fa∙l Ibr§hÊm (Cairo: #^s§ al-B§bÊ al-\alabÊ, 1959) V:55.<br />
57 Ibn Maníår, Lis§n al-#arab, s.v. رمح IV: 210.<br />
10