Fatima.Mernessi_The-Forgotten-Queens-of-Islam-EN

The Lady of Cairo 173
were executed. In order to escape these persecutions, Christians
and Jews asked to become Muslims, and there were mass conversions.
59 But neither the banishing of women from public space and
their seclusion in their houses, nor the persecution of Jews and
Christians and their subsequent desire to become Muslims seemed
to stem the inflation nor make the waters of the Nile rise. The
economic crisis continued unabated and the search for bread became
the major problem.
The caliph resumed his nightly and daily ramblings. As they
increased in number, incidents of violence along his route became
almost inevitable:
One day as he passed a butcher's shop he seized the butcher's chopper
and with it struck and killed one of his attendants, passing on without
paying any more attention to the body; the terrified crowd did not
dare to do anything and the body remained there until al-Hakim sent
a shroud in which to bury him. 60
People walked with wary eyes through the shadowy streets on
the lookout for the shameful phantom whose solitary wandering
reflected the loneliness of each of his subjects. They had lost all
contact with who was supposed to lead them to Paradise. Entangled
in a vicious circle that chained an unloved caliph to his frightened
and disillusioned subjects, they no longer knew the way to Paradise.
In this state of affairs the presence of Sitt al-Mulk in the palace
was all the more reassuring. The people of Cairo were kept informed
by the rumours spread by the thousands of artisans, slaves, and
servants employed at the palace. They knew her character and had
heard about her vain attempts to reason with her brother and to
counteract the effects of his caprices and the influence of the extremist
Shi'ite da'is who crowded around him. One man in particular
had appeared in his entourage and had come between al-Hakim
and his sister, pushing him over the brink into madness by telling
him that he was God in person, not just a mere imam. 61
There were all sorts of extremist da'is in Fatimid Cairo. They
were hangers-on at the court just as were the astrologers, mathematicians,
and ideologues. But Hamza Ibn 'Ali was like no one else,
and no one else could weave such megalomaniac dreams as that of
al-ta'aluh, the dream, so tempting for all mortals, of escaping death.
Was death not the only mystery that could turn a caliph into an
insomniac? We will never know what it was that tormented al-
Hakim, what drove the commander of the faithful into night-