Interpretations of Kawakibi's Thought, 1950-1980s

of the salafist circle of Muhammad Abduh and Rashid Rida. With the latter he also established a close friendship. Kawakibi's fame was a result of two books which he published in his last years (he died in 1902). The first, Tabai' al-Istibdad wa-Masari' al-Isti'bad (The Characteristics of Tyranny and the Harms of Enslavement), was a manifesto against the Ottoman tyranny, which was one of the reasons for Kawakibi's decision to leave Aleppo for the more liberal Cairo. The second work, Umm al-Qura (one of the traditional names of Mecca) was a fictional description of an international Islamic conference that takes place in Mecca. The ideas which were articulated in these books, either directly by Kawakibi or indirectly by the delegates who 'convened' in Mecca, are significant in marking a new vein of thought among the Salafists. It not only offered a scathing criticism of the Ottoman regime, but furthermore brought the Arabs to the foreground of the Islamic Umma as the most pristine Muslims and, hence, those who were entitled to lead the Umma and to assume the Caliphate from the Turks. These treatises signify a milestone in the emergence of Arab nationalism and of the concept of Arabism within the Ottoman Empire. They were a challenge not only to the Ottomans, who were struggling to hold the crumbling empire together, but also to other Arab intellectuals, including those in Kawakibi's close milieu, who were contemplating questions of identity and political authority vis-a'-vis the Ottoman Empire. Kawakibi's was the first discussion of Arabism by a Muslim Arab, and was to a large extent less religious in its tone than the writings produced by contemporary Muslim writers. His ideas can be seen as a critical link between the cultural revival in the Arab Middle East, religious literary and scholarly, and the translation of the cultural ideas and achievements into political claims, platforms and organizations.