Vol. 2, No. 1 April 1998
Ritual, Music,
Sociability and Censure:
Making a Film on Sufi 'dhikr' in Egypt
by Valerie J. Hoffman
Article
[1] No other aspect of the academic
teaching of religion demands an audiovisual presentation more than ritual.
Despite that fact, such materials on Islamic ritual are extraordinarily rare.
Few films on Islam show more than a single prostration of the complex liturgical
prayer, salat, that is performed five times daily (a pedagogical gap I
had to fill with a video intended for converts instructing them how to pray),
and until recently the hajj, or pilgrimage to Mecca, was rarely shown
on film. The one video I had seen on the Five Pillars (obligatory rituals) of
Islam, issued by a company that distributes many educational videos on religion,
was marred by inaccuracies and incompleteness.
[2] Even more difficult to convey
verbally is the Sufi ritual of communal dhikr, the "remembrance" of God
through concentrated repetition of some of his "Beautiful Names," accompanied by
stylized movements of the body such as bowing or swinging from side to side,
often employing methods of breath control and done in some countries (Egypt
included) to musical accompaniment. Sufi dhikr is not only a religious ritual designed to open the mind to God's influence
and lead to increased spiritual awareness, it is very much a social event,
indeed the focus of Sufi social life, often accompanied by elaborate
hospitality. The ritual includes many actors simultaneously performing different
roles, besides the people actually doing the recitation (the number of which may
vary from a handful to several hundred). Of singular interest is the munshid,
or singer, who inspires the participants in dhikr with his lyrics of praise to the Prophet or other saintly figures
and of the mysteries of mystical experience, drawn from a classical corpus of
Sufi poetry mixed with contemporary improvisation. The interaction of the munshid's praise of the Prophet and the participants' recitation of the
divine names is complex and fascinating. The munshid is said to "give
life" to the dhikr, as a singer as well as his ability to impart
spiritual intensity are critical to the ritual's success. Accompanying him is a
group of musicians, typically playing percussion and violin or flute, and
occasionally lute, though the latter is often reserved for secular music. There
are also a number of other people involved in various ways: a man who stands
between the rows of participants to keep their movements synchronized; the host,
if the dhikr is held at a private mosque or party; the cooks and
servers of food and drinks; and the large numbers of observers, who often
outnumber the participants and may be talking or smoking on the sidelines.
Videoclip
[3] For years I searched in vain for a
film or video on Sufi dhikr for classroom use. I attempted to fill in
the gap with verbal explanations, audiocassettes of Sufi music, and even my own
imitations of the movements of Sufi dhikr for my class. In 1987 I went
to Egypt to study the role of women in the Sufi orders and the function of
saints' day celebrations (moulids in Egyptian Arabic), building on
earlier work I had done on Muslim women's religious lives in Egypt. I met Shaykh
'Izz al-'Arab al-Hawari, a Sufi shaykh (master or spiritual teacher), who was
extraordinarily open with me and took me on as a quasi-disciple, opening up for
me such a wealth of information that my project expanded into a broader study of
Sufism in Egypt, resulting in the publication of a book (Sufism, Mystics,
and Saints in Modern Egypt, University of South Carolina Press, 1995).
Sufism is an esoteric movement; Sufis are integral to Islamic religious life in
both Sunni and Shi'i Islam, but they consider their spiritual experiences divine
"secrets" that should be shared only with those whom God has spiritually
prepared. Before I met Shaykh 'Izz, my attempts to plumb the depths of Sufism
were met with derision by Suns who felt that even a Muslim would never
understand Sufi truths, let alone a foreigner like me. Sufi silence is based as
much on prudence as privilege, for many elements in Egyptian society, such as
modernists, fundamentalists, or government officials worried about Islam's image
in the West, oppose Sufism either on principle (stating, for example, that it is
an un-Islamic innovation that did not exist in the time of the Prophet), or for
pragmatic reasons: they are embarrassed by the emotionalism of dhikr,
verging at times on ecstasy or even apparent mental derangement.
Videoclip
Sufism's opponents criticize its
introspective, often apolitical attitude as an obstacle to modernization and
productivity.
[4] Fieldwork on Sufism therefore
presents many challenges, beyond the merely physical challenges of foregoing
sleep for long periods and enduring less than comfortable conditions. These
include the challenges of finding trust and acceptance, finding Sufis
self-conscious and articulate enough to explain their teachings and experiences
in a way that is understandable to the researcher, and resisting the censure of
Sufism's vocal opponents. Use of a tape recorder was acceptable only with
self-assured leaders, never with ordinary people, and I had to rely on my memory
of many conversations, which I recorded on my computer as soon as I returned
home. Certain aspects of popular religious life are virtually impossible to
photograph, let alone videotape: the police confiscate cameras taken into the
saints' shrines at the moulids, which form the core of Sufi social life and are
an important arena for the performance of dhikr. My own position as a
semi-anonymous participant-observer precluded the taking of many photos, except
of pilgrims who requested photographs of themselves posing before the sepulchre
of a great saint. Shaykh 'Izz did not mind attracting attention to himself and
was less likely to attract censure, so he sometimes took photographs of people
in dhikr for me.
[5] But what I really wanted was to
take home to my students a videotape of dhikr, to give them a visual
impression of the ritual. I dared not attempt to do tape in a public setting,
but Shaykh 'Izz had a mosque and encouraged me to videotape a dhikr he
planned in his mosque. I did not own a video-camera, and Cairo does not rent out
video-cameras, as shops do in the U.S. I contracted an Egyptian videographer
accustomed to videotaping weddings. It was a disaster. He used a bright light
and intruded between the rows of participants in dhikr, prompting
outcries and a quarrel that led the participants to leave. My "innocent" attempt
to provide instructional material for my students had led to the breakup of the
ceremony altogether, and aroused much resentment against both me and Shaykh 'Izz.
Shaykh 'Izz encouraged me to try again, but with a camera that did not require a
bright light. I succeeded in borrowing one from the British elementary school in
Cairo, and my husband videotaped a dhikr from the scaffolding of the
mosque, which was still under construction, later moving to the floor for a
closer image, but still careful not to intrude upon the ceremony or be too
conspicuous.
[6] Although that tape had the
potential to provide a visual image of delis, it was made in the PAL format and
suffered visual deterioration in the transfer to the NTSC format. I also wished
to obtain videotapes of dhikr performed in other social settings and
with other musical talents, because the setting and artists tremendously
influence the spiritual mood and even determine who may or may not participate
in the dhikr. After returning to the United States, I began to develop
a more ambitious goal: to create an educational videotape approximately a
half-hour in length that would include commentary and translation of some of the
lyrics and could convey Sufi dhikr as ritual, art (in the form of music
and poetry), and social event. I decided to contact other individuals who might
have videotapes of their own.
[7] I collected videotapes from three
other scholars. Some of the best footage, from a number of different dhikrs
with several different moulids and done in the American format, was
contributed by Michael Frishkopf, an ethnomusicology doctoral student from UCLA
researching Sufi music in Egypt. It is nonetheless indicative of government
sensitivities about Western exposure to popular and ecstatic expressions of
piety that he was banned from going to moulids or saints' shrines. His videotapes were all done at private celebrations,
though often in alleys and public squares, with the explicit approval of those
in charge. Marcia Hermansen, professor of religious studies at San Diego State
University, contributed a very short segment she videotaped of a weekly dhikr in an alley outside a saint's shrine in Cairo, fascinating for its
close-ups of women in dhikr (who are rarely seen in dhikrs held in mosques or other more "proper" settings), before she was forced to turn
off the video-camera.
Videoclip
[8] Nicolaas H. Biegman, a former Dutch
ambassador to Egypt (and current ambassador to the United Nations) as well as an
Arabist and afficionado of Sufism, contributed valuable footage from a number of moulids.
Videoclip
[9] Dr. Biegman does not believe his
diplomatic status had anything to do with his ability to
videotape the moulids and says no objections were ever
raised, but my own experience of having my camera confiscated by
the police at a moulid as well as the experiences of
Frishkopf and Hermansen lead me to suspect that his ability to
film the moulids unimpeded may have stemmed from his
diplomatic privilege. His videotape was also in the PAL format
and required conversion.
[10] The next step was interpreting the
tapes, not an easy task even for a trained Arabist. Understanding
the words, let alone interpreting their meaning from a Sufi
perspective, was a daunting task. It is often difficult enough to
understand English lyrics when there is a great deal of competing
noise and the words are sometimes distorted by the need to adapt
them to musical rhythms and rhymes. The munshids often sing over
public address systems that are inadequate for conveying words
clearly, especially in an extremely noisy context, with
competition not only from the musical instruments and the
participants in dhikr, but also from the conversations
and shouts of bystanders. Sufism has a specialized vocabulary
that is not understood by many non-Sufis. I searched through
email networks for anyone in the United States familiar with both
the Egyptian dialect of Arabic and this genre of Sufi music, but
came up with no one. I decided that I needed to bring Shaykh 'Izz
to the United States.
[11] The challenge of doing so was
enormous. First there was the financial challenge. Finding
funding for making an educational video based on videotapes of
homemade and variable quality proved unexpectedly difficult. I
was advised that the National Endowment for the Humanities would
not consider funding the making of a film with less than
professional-quality picture. My university's Research Board
would not fund it because it was not considered research but of
merely pedagogical value. Finally I obtained a small grant from
the Office of International Programs and Studies on our campus.
Then there were the legal hurdles. Shaykh 'Izz's application for
a tourist visa was denied. I learned that the university could
sponsor a request for him to be allowed to have a work visa for
the duration of this project, but normally English language
proficiency is required for a work visa, and the American embassy
in Cairo denied the request. It was only through Michael
Frishkopf's persistence in breaking through the lower echelons of
bureaucracy in the embassy and my faxing an urgent plea and
explanation to an official there that Shaykh 'Izz finally
obtained his visa. Space does not permit discussion of the
enormous challenges that ensued after his arrival in the United
States--Shaykh 'Izz had never been outside the Arab world and did
not speak English; this normally gregarious man found himself
confronted with agonizing isolation, despite my efforts to find
Arabic-speaking companions. For me, the challenges of meeting his
needs as well as those of my children and forcing him into an
unfamiliar American work schedule were frustrating and draining.
Despite all that, the task of translating and interpreting more
than twenty hours of videotape was accomplished.
[12] The financial cost of his stay
here far exceeded my expectations and not only exhausted my grant
but drained my personal finances as well. It is only the happy
circumstance of my appointment as a University Scholar, an honor
that provided a research account from which I could drawn funds,
that enabled me actually to create the educational videotape I
wanted. I had committed to showing the final product at an AAR
(the American Academy of Religion) panel that was to discuss the
pedagogical value of professor-made videos versus the production
quality of professionally made videos. My new research account
only cleared in October and the conference was in November.
Writing and recording the narration and selecting video clips
with the expert editing assistance of Timothy Jenvey of our
university's Educational Technologies Assistance Group, were all
performed under many time constraints. A preliminary half-hour
version of the video, "Celebrating the Prophet in the
Remembrance of God: Sufi Dhikr in Egypt," was shown
at the panel, eliciting both interest and suggestions for
improvement.
[13] The video was also shown at the
Middle East Studies Association and to my colleagues in religious
studies at the University of Illinois. Based on their feedback,
Mr. Jenvey and I redid the video, lengthening it to 39 minutes,
reducing the amount of narration, and allowing more segments
without voice over narration. Our university does not have the
technology to provide subtitles, a drawback that is not as
serious as some might think, because students often have
difficulty reading subtitles, especially against a white
background. The voice over translations are usually given just
before the lines of the songs, leaving the Arabists and
ethnomusicologists in the audience the opportunity to hear the
lines as they are performed.
Videoclip
[14] A couple of observers at the AAR
expressed a desire for a more personalized presentation of dhikr rather than the wide view usually taken by the camera. They
especially wished for interviews with participants. Even if the
opportunity for videotaped interviews presented itself,
experience suggests that most people would either refuse to speak
before a video-camera or would be unable to articulate their
experiences in a manner understandable to Western audiences. One
expert in ritual studies said he would have preferred to observe
the ritual unencumbered by my narration, but my experience
suggests that this would be extremely unwise. Many tourists and
other foreign observers regular see dhikr without having
the slightest understanding of what they are seeing, and often
interpret it as wild, uncontrolled behavior or even a
manifestation of demon-possession. While scholars of ritual might
be better equipped than ordinary tourists to do their own
interpretations, one cannot expect undergraduate students to be
able to do so. Furthermore, one of the main values of the video,
from my perspective, is that it explains the meaning of the
lyrics of the songs and their relationship to the experience of dhikr participants and Sufi teaching in general, as well as their
connection to social relationships and setting. This could not
have been done without narration. Feedback from scholars of
Islam, especially experts in Sufism, has been quite
positive,especially concerning the quality of the narration.
[15] My experience indicates that even
technologically challenged scholars like myself, using
"homemade" videotapes, can produce quality audiovisual
materials for educational purposes that make up in quality of
scholarship for what they might lack in artistry. Scholars may
face many challenges in doing so, not the least of which is
convincing funding agencies that their project is worthwhile. In
this case, issues of language, controversy and admission into
foreign countries (mine in Egypt, Shaykh 'Izz's into the United
States) complicated the task. However, the pedagogical and
historical value of the product makes the effort to overcome such
hurdles worthwhile.
NOTE
1. Celebrating
the Prophet in the Remembrance of God: Sufi Dhikr in Egyptis 39 minutes long, done on VHS
videotape, NTSC format. Contact Valerie Hoffman by e-mail at vhoffman@staff.uiuc.edu
|
