Yale Journal of Music & Religion

Volume 6 Number 1 Article 2

Warfare and Welcome: Practicality and Qur’ānic Hierarchy in Ibāḍī Muslims’ Jurisprudential Rulings on Music

Bradford J. Garvey Amherst College

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Recommended Citation Garvey, Bradford J. () "Warfare and Welcome: Practicality and Qur’ānic Hierarchy in Ibāḍī Muslims’ Jurisprudential Rulings on Music," Yale Journal of Music & Religion: Vol. 6: No. 1, Article 2. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17132/2377-231X.1167

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Cover Page Footnote My thanks go to the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research for funding this project, as well as to my consultants and friends in Oman who so graciously shared their time. I want to thank Brian Bond for thoughtfully reading an early version of this article. I appreciate the continued support of my dissertation committee as well: Peter Manuel, Steven Blum, Virginia Danielson, and Jane Sugarman.

This article is available in Yale Journal of Music & Religion: https://elischolar.library.yale.edu/yjmr/vol6/iss1/2 Warfare and Welcome Practicality and Qur’ānic Hierarchy in Ibāḍī Muslims’ Jurisprudential Rulings on Music Bradford J. Garvey

And the instruments of entertainment that have no use Outside of themselves are to be broken whenever they are found, In all of their types that exist, Because in this there is no benefit.

—‘Abdullah bin Ḥumayd “Nūr al-Dīn” al-Sālimī (1286–1332/1869–1914) in the Jawhār al-Niẓām

Omani Orientations to the Ibādism, the third major branch of Islam. Charge of “Music” Though no official population count exists, A few days before Ramadan began in the Interior province of the modern sultanate, 2016, I was sitting in my friend Ḥamad’s along with adjacent regions, was until the majlis, a large sitting room adjacent to his 1950s part of one of the longest-lasting home, enjoying a ḥilba, a milky, fenugreek- theocratic regimes in the world, called the flavored drink. Over the course of the last Ibāḍī Imamate. Overthrown by the current year or so, I had interviewed Ḥamad dozens sultan’s father in the late 1950s (despite of times in his role as the manager of a local himself and all his line being nominally men’s performance group that specialized Ibāḍī), the Imamate has cast a long shadow in the performance of a choral ode called over Oman’s historiography. I found myself al-‘āzī and a war dance, al-razḥa. Though darting in and out of that long shadow my research was focused on the highly in interviews, poetry discussions, and charged exchange of praise poetry and conversations with performers throughout governmentally directed dispensation, I had my year of researching men’s performance. slowly come to realize the delicacy of the The tension around engaging in a religious toleration of these public praise variety of performance genres—drumming, genres in Oman. The ‘āzī and the razḥa were, dancing, singing—was palpable during my in the eyes of most, expressions of Omani research in many ways. Early on, I realized pride, masculine solidarity, and communal that a direct approach to the music question obligation. But that did not mean they were got me nowhere. In fact, framing my not Islamically suspect, even here, in the research as studying “music” was met only small, rural town of Manah in the Interior by furtive glances and unsure responses. Yes, region of the Sultanate of Oman. I was assured, there was “music” in Oman, Nestled in the southeast corner of the surely; Bedouins or “mountain folks” (‘and Arabian Peninsula and boasting some three al-jabāl) play “music,” that’s probably what million citizen-residents, the sultanate and I meant. I quickly found out that the key its various historical polities have remained term was not music, or mūsīqā, but funūn— one of the few bastions of ’Ibādiyya, or the “arts.” The performance genres I studied

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 19 were properly “arts,” not music. The reason the hundreds of smaller mosques and the for this tentative response was, of course, dozens of huge jāmi‘ (one in each town, that Ibāḍīs had quite a dim view of “music.” all confusingly named the “Sultan Qaboos And yet, there I was, months into research Grand Mosque”) was very obvious to me on a practice that was but was not musical. but brooked no comment from performers. And so we return to that day in Hamad’s “Oh, lord spread blessings and mercy like majlis, seated with our backs to the short, rain. That is a good question for the Islamic threadbare couch that lined all four walls; scholars. I do not know.” the beige, satiny gloss of the new paint Months earlier, I was discussing some glinting in the strong fluorescent lighting; of the local arts that were less well known the walls boasting hand-painted sūra-s of than the razḥa and the ‘āzī with Khamīs, the Qur’ān hanging amid floating palm trees the leader of a new troupe in the town of painted in permanent bloom. I was setting ’Izkī. We were meeting in his ‘azba, a kind of out my notebook and recorder when Ḥamad semipermanent camp and corral for grazing noticed a book on the status of music in stock, eating dates by the goat pen that he Islam sticking out of my bag. affectionately referred to as the “UN” (“I’ve “Oh, father,” he moaned, “what is this?” got every type of goat in there,” he boasted, “This?” I picked up the book. “This is a “Indian, Pakistani, Sindhi, Afghan, Somali, book about Islamic jurisprudence . . . .” Kenyan, Nubian, Egyptian, Georgian, “Well, I can see that, doctor. What do Bosnian, Iraqi, Persian, Balochi, Roman, and you want with it [shtibā bih]?” Chinese—it’s the UN of goats [al-’umum al- “I just wanted to know the opinions of mutaḥḥida māl al-hūsh]”). After a half-hour Ibāḍī scholars on music . . . .” of chatting, a pickup full of Khamīs’s male “That’s fine,” Ḥamad said, leaning back kin pulled up. We exchanged pleasantries and pulling his long white dishdāsha robe and they joined us in eating dates. over his feet, “but you’re not studying “We’re talking about music [mūsīqā] ,” ‘music’ [mūsīqā]. If you want to know about Khamīs said casually, flicking his eyes over that, it’s not in razḥa. There’s no melody, to his younger brother. there’s no singing, there’s no instruments “The arts?” his brother replied. [mā shay al-naghmāt, mā shay al-ghinā’, mā “No, music,” he insisted., “This shay al-ma‘āzif]. But I’m no scholar, don’t Englishman wants to study music here.” ask me. I don’t know. Listen, I don’t want “Well, not music, God lengthen your to enter into that issue, I don’t even want lives,” I jumped in. “I want to study the to enter into it [mū bāghī adakhkhalu]. The arts. But we were chatting a bit about music razḥa is for warfare and welcome [al-ḥarb around here. Khamīs said that you all wa-l-tarḥīb], that’s what I say to any imam.” perform al-rūgh in the early dusk?” Al-rūgh “That reminds me, why isn’t the razḥa is a genre of instrumental reed-pipe music ever performed if a new mosque is opened?” accompanied by drumming and some sung I asked facetiously, trying to corner him. I poetry. The word rūgh refers to both the had been studying the role of razḥa and genre and the reed-pipe, which is shaped and ‘āzī in civil celebrations of governmental played like the more common mijwiz. I have generosity, and so the conspicuous absence never encountered any source that discusses of praise poetry to celebrate the opening of al-rūgh and so it may be a genre that is

20 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) mostly performed by shawāwī (seminomadic his Music in the World of Islam.4 “The debate herders) performers, whose music is largely elicited views that varied from complete undocumented in Western scholarship. negation to full admittance of all musical The area around ’Izkī is, however, home to forms and means, even dance,” Shiloah many rare and undocumented instruments, writes, adding that “between these two including a kind of gourd resonator extremes we can find all possible nuances.”5 monochord, a large family of African-derived Oman, as we’ve seen, is no exception. Early idiophones, and so on. in my research, when I was not pursuing “Al-rūgh,” his brother chuckled, “that’s Omanis’ perceptions of the Islamic status the horn-pipe of Satan [mizmār al-shayṭān],1 of musical sounds, I nevertheless recorded a that al-rūgh. The only thing worse is the zār. wide range of beliefs. These often correlated Did you hear about the zār?” The zār is a with the social and economic position of the common name for a genre of healing music speaker: an official in the Omani Center for mostly performed by and for women: as it Traditional Music told me that “that debate deals with metahumans like jinn, among is over, from the Middle Ages the scholars other supernatural beings, it is roundly agree that music is permitted”; a performer condemned by Islamic scholars.2 of the Sufi-inflected6 mālid genre told me “Zār? You want to see a zār, doctor?” that “rhythm [al-‘īqā‘] is a powerful tool Khamīs perked up. “Mizmār al-shayṭān, ha! for religion, and must be used with care”; a I hold a zār here every night. Zār and mizmār, performer of the razḥa at the Muscat Festival all night.” Of course, Khamīs did not hold a brought me a fatwa declaring attendance at performance of zār or rūgh every night, but the Muscat Festival to be avoided if possible he was voicing an opinion contrary to his because it included music (mūsīqā, “especially brother’s take on the Islamic status of things from Bahrain,” he added). called music. Rather than acquiescing to the In this article, I want to offer the putative illicit nature of some practices, as following two interventions in this much- Ḥamad would later do, Khamīs pushed back discussed area: first, I want to positively against that discourse, claiming to embrace reassess Lois Ibsen al-Faruqi’s landmark a profoundly controversial genre of mūsīqā. 1985 article “Music, Musicians, and As these anecdotes show, Ibāḍī Omanis Muslim Law” by engaging with her central express a wide range of discursive and diagrammatic expression of Qur’ānic metadiscursive perspectives on the charge hierarchy; and second, I want to highlight of music, from those like Khamīs’s—that an under-recognized aspect of Muslim embrace targeted sonic practices even in the jurisprudential scholarship with regard face of condemnation—to those that scorn to a variety of sonic practices: the issue them.3 However, before we discuss particular of function and practicality. Rather than Ibāḍī perspectives on the issue of defining criticizing or attempting to replace al- “music,” we should outline the general stakes Faruqi’s claims, I want to think positively of the debate over the status of artistically alongside her work in order to tease out engineered sound in Muslim discourse. further dimensions of her linear model. Such a foray bears a long pedigree: as just Adding the value dimension of practicality— one example, Amnon Shiloah introduces which I explore through recent Ibāḍī the question as an “interminable debate” in scholarship—to her linear schematic model

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 21 (and thereby pluralizing the relational the context of a discursive tradition that network between sonic practices and includes and relates itself to the founding Qur’ānic recitation) both allows a useful texts of the Qur’an and the Hadith.”14 This co-conception7 of Islamic jurisprudential is precisely al-Faruqi’s initial point in her scholarship on music and highlights a article, published a year before Asad’s heuristic mode often overlooked in previous remarks, in which she urges researchers discussions. Specifically, I want to draw out to utilize materials “that a consensus of of al-Faruqi’s model a latent Dumontian8 the Muslims themselves consider to be premise: rather than a linear hierarchy of authoritative in these matters.”15 The irony, gradual transformation from most similar of course, is that starting “as Muslims do” to least similar to Qur’ānic recitation, reveals precisely the core complexity of recitation may be best understood as discussing “music” and Islam: that there “encompassing” other Islamically licit sonic is no obvious universal position. The only forms. Sonic practice might therefore exist— sūra, or verse, in the entire Qur’ān that in anthropologist Joel Robbins’s terms9— scholars have argued refers directly to within a plural value scheme, with any “music” is Luqmān 6: “And of those people specific practice tugged toward contrasting who buy idle talk to lead [others] astray polarities. In taking up the question of value from the path of God without knowledge, and modes of valuation, I engage the recent and take it as mockery, they will [face] a revival in anthropological studies of value,10 humiliating punishment.” The central term and specifically the ongoing reevaluation in this sūra, “idle talk,” is a translation of of the work of Louis Dumont applied to al-lahū al-ḥadīth, whose exact translation cases outside of the Indian subcontinent.11 has been subject to many opinions, as we While Dumont’s work has encountered shall see. Indeed, this is why Asad promotes serious critique in its applications to studying Islam and Islamic practices actually existing social structures and value as “discursive traditions.”16 Practices are regimes in South Asia,12 certain elements constituted within discourses that relate to of Dumont’s thinking have been usefully past, present, and future, and are Islamic applied to conceptual schemes as opposed insofar as they are practices that induct to social structure.13 In so engaging, I seek persons as Muslims. An Islamic practice not to champion one or another theoretical so constituted, for Asad, is authorized as approach, but to evaluate the purchase orthodoxy. “Wherever Muslims have power afforded by value-oriented approaches to regulate, uphold, require or adjust correct in examining a potent and historically practices,” Asad claims, “and to condemn, perduring conceptual hierarchy. exclude, undermine, or replace incorrect ones, there is the domain of orthodoxy,” Starting “As Muslims Do,” Ending Up which is “crucial to all Islamic traditions.”17 Where We Started For our discussion here, we should recognize Understanding how differently positioned that the “interminable debate” over the Muslims regard sonic practices requires legal status of any one sonic practice is both historical and ethnographic precisely the kind of discursive tradition to engagement. To do this, we should begin, which Asad is drawing attention. However, in Talal Asad’s terms, “as Muslims do, from despite Asad’s claim of the constant push for

22 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) orthodoxy (and orthopraxy), the status of constituted themselves as Muslims: poetry certain practices remains doggedly murky. exegesis, esoterica, musical rapture, and so This situation is noted by historian on. Orthodoxy hangs less as a North Star Shahab Ahmed when he criticizes Asad’s and more as point in a complex constellation. notion of Islam as a tradition in What Is In Oman and among Ibāḍīs, what is Islam? Troubled by Asad’s identification interesting about the outcome of this of the push to orthodoxy as the core debate over the status of certain sonic of Islamic practices, Ahmed concludes practices is not that Muslims do not seek that it is incorrect “to put forward a orthodoxy and orthopraxy, since they schema where the definitive purpose decidedly do. Rather, the avowedly Islamic of the discursive tradition/Islam is the conclusions of the debate admit the production of orthodoxy.”18 Ahmed performance of controversial practices— instead argues that, at least within what he the ‘āzī and the razḥa—for controversial terms the “Balkans-to-Bengal complex,” a reasons. In ‘āzī, a lead singer sing-recites a “temporal-geographical entity” stretching formal, monorhymed ode on a given topic, from Sarajevo to Dhaka, a huge range of most often praising local leaders, while a discursive practices have flourished— choral group sings antiphonal responses “Avicennan philosophy, Akbarian Sufism, and plays drum rolls. The razḥa, on the Suhrawardīan Illuminationism, Ḥāfiẓian other hand, is a circle dance that involves poetics, figural painting and wine- lines of dancers trading lines of sung drinking”—practices that never strive for poetry, coordinated by a pair of drums. orthodoxy, embrace complexity, but are These practices are linked to each other in nevertheless “at the very center of the that they are both performed by the same discursive tradition” and hence Islam.19 group of men but are also conceptually One of Ahmed’s strongest statements of associated with warfare. Poems sung in this fact comes from analyzing the musical each often deal with belligerence, violence, life of Amīr Khusraw, the famed inventor of bravery, and the glories of combat, inciting qawwālī (650–725/1253–1325). Noting the participants to courage in arms. Neither, that music is rarely considered “Islamic,” as I have noted, is considered “mūsīqā,” he shows that despite this, “in the self- but then neither is considered wholly statement of Muslims, we find that music Islamically licit. Here, Ibāḍī charges of is made meaningful precisely in . . . Islamic “music” are not simply a matter of applying terms.”20 Ahmed claims that Khusraw’s or constructing an orthodoxy under which heterodox and anti-authoritarian “couplets everything is either accepted or not, as on music constitute and make normative Asad would have it; nor do legal scholars statements that are at once philosophy, merely privilege the capacity of practices Sufism, theology, Qur’ānic exegesis and to “have meaning” for Muslims over and law” and hence take part in the “discursive above the desires of centralized power, as tradition” as much as any scholars seeking would Ahmed. Instead, we can see a strong orthodoxy. What Ahmed articulates is pragmatic thread, attending closely to the plurality of values that might animate context and wary of the ramifications of Islamic practice in one or another of the overzealous condemnation. Rather than varied contexts in which Muslims have trying to establish an Ibāḍī “doctrine” on

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 23 sonic practices, we can use Ibāḍī writings because they are practical: they serve some and fatwas to trace their shifting role in explicit, useful purpose for Ibāḍīs. the lives of Omani Muslims. As we shall see, historically, the razḥah and the ‘āzī Music and Muslim Law, Redux; or, seem to have been tolerated because A Chain of Beings of Decreasing Dignity they were technologies of warfare—and Al-Faruqi’s classic investigation of the status insofar as they supported war, they were of music in Islam (writ broadly) presents deeply connected to statecraft, elites, and a hierarchy of “sound art expressions” leadership. They are tolerated merely

Figure 1. The Qur’ānic hierarchy. A linear vertical representation of the relative legal ranking of various sound-art expressions by Muslim legal scholars. Qur’ānic recitation occupies the highest value position, and all others are related by way of decreasing Islamic legitimacy. Other value orderings can be read into sections of the diagram, such as the role of words or the voice, the inculcation of emotional states, or the presence of musical instruments. Adapted from al-Faruqi 1985, 8.

24 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) (handasah al-ṣawt) that are arranged in such employments with considerable relation to two poles whose statuses are nuance. Virginia Danielson points to the clear.21 I reproduce this linear model in repertory of Umm Kulthum as one example Figure 1. At the top of the hierarchy lies of an explicit link between Qur’ānic the most legitimate form of handasah al- recitation and Arabic song. Specific features ṣawt: Qur’ānic recitation (qirā’a), and at like nasalization, hoarseness or baḥḥaḥ, the bottom is “sensuous music associated and a full and deliberate pronunciation with unacceptable contexts.”22 Virtually all of emphatic, velar, and uvular consonants Islamic scholars are in agreement on the were all used by Umm Kulthum in order position of these two forms. In al-Faruqi’s to evoke recitation in her performances of hierarchy, she places Qur’ānic recitation poetic texts.26 However, while this seems to and religious chants that are a “duty to hold for those sonic practices that al-Faruqi believers” (adhān, tahlīl/ṭalbiyyah, etc.) sees as closely related to the Qur’ān as well above poems with noble themes and a as serious metered song, where does this variety of occasional musics. Conceptually leave lullabies, works songs, and military “below” these are the controversial genres of parades? art song, improvisations, non-Islamic, and Here, I want to turn to a useful tool sensuous music. of structural analysis that has seen some Al-Faruqi concludes that the intention recent rehabilitative theoretical work: of the hierarchy was not to “destroy all Louis Dumont’s notion of hierarchy, sound-art,” but rather to submit musical and specifically that of “hierarchical pleasure to higher ethical standards.23 She opposition.”27 Hierarchical opposition argues that “a number of interrelated aspects refers to a value relation that is measured seem to have been involved in determining between “a set or whole and an element the implicit hierarchy of sound-art that is of that set or whole.”28 This nesting of described here.”24 However, the four aspects values is regarded as revealing “levels” of she picks out (conformity with Qur’ānic value, heuristically described as “higher” or chant; conformity with the “aesthetic “lower.” The crucial feature of hierarchical demands of the culture”; community opposition is that relatively higher values acceptance or esteem; and “conformance in encompass relatively lower values, in this sound-art to the moral demands of Islam”) sense meaning that higher values include do not seem to imply a unidirectional—or as part of their value those lower ones as monist, following Robbins—organizational well (as in the Euler diagram in Figure 2). hierarchy.25 Al-Faruqi posits that formal Lower values are recognized as supporting similarity to Qur’ānic recitation is the higher values, as deriving their value metric by which sonic practices are aligned: from just a part or parts of higher values. those like Qur’ānic chant are next in line Nevertheless, since they offer a value below it, those that are less similar further dimension that is distinct from a higher away, and so on. One reason this valuation one, they are considered “contradictory.”29 by similarity works is that the forms and We can operationalize this in our discussion stylistic features of Qur’ānic recitation are of the Qur’ānic hierarchy by pointing out often strategically employed by capable that Qur’ānic recitation does not serve as performers, and astute listeners evaluate a performative model for other Islamically

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 25 one another.”34 Musicians may be regularly

subordinated in wider society and occupy rather low-status positions even though the skills they possess may make them—under Encompassing, Cardinal, Encompassed or or Higher-value: Lower-value: certain conditions—immensely valuable Qur’ānic recitation Practicality to power, say, for purposes of propaganda, playing dance music, enlivening feasts and festivals, accompanying parades, and

so on. While the “cardinal value” of any social structure may be something like

Figure 2: Dominance hierarchy. A depiction of the patrilineal descent from the Prophet, on encompassing and encompassed values within any certain occasions, this higher value makes Dumontian hierarchy, here the Qur’ānic hierarchy. Adapted from Dumont by way of Leonhard Euler. room for musicians and other skilled laborers to be contextually highly valued. licit genres to mimic; rather, it provides a The value attributed to any one practice

cardinalFigure 2: Dominance value hierarchy. to A depiction which of the encompassingthey are and encompassed ultimately values in the Qur’ānic hierarchy that al-Faruqi within any Dumontian hierarchy, here the Qur’ānic hierarchy. Adapted from Dumont by way 30of ordinated,Leonhard Euler. subordinated, and coordinated. tracks may or may not be fully realized by The question of whether Qur’ānic the dimension of similarity. I follow Naomi

recitation acts as a monist “supervalue” Haynes and Justin Hickel in concluding that that encompasses all others can be what is most useful in tracking hierarchical approached by way of Joel Robbins’s arrangements is the “way that they reveal pluralist conception of Dumont’s notion of particular ideological arrangements, that is, hierarchy.31 Dumont writes that hierarchy topographies of value.”35 is not “a great chain of beings of decreasing If the perfection of Qur’ānic recitation dignity,” which Robbins interprets as for Muslims is not approximated in Dumont’s recognition of the potential Ottoman mehter military marches, nor yet plurality of values exposed in differing in Omani ‘āzī or razḥa, or lullabies or work contextual relations.32 Robbins continues songs or poetry with noble themes for that by pointing out that “chains in which matter—then what makes these practices successive elements are distinguished by valuable, that is, licit, is that they are not decreasing amounts of a single valued made to oppose the higher value of recitation, feature are clearly organized by a single but are, in fact, held to be subordinate to value” and hence fail to regard other, and supportive of it. The overriding value of concurrent, crosscutting plural values that the recitation of the Qur’ān and the values may spring into importance within various to which that practice points for listeners concrete contexts.33 Such values may be “makes room,” in some sense, for other quite diverse and contextually specific. practices that might be evaluated along As Jonathan Glasser has recently argued, different but supervened value dimensions. “[Dumontian] hierarchy presupposes a Nested levels of “reverse supervenience” segmentation of values: social worlds are the very stuff of Dumontian hierarchy. are suffused by diverse and extendable In other words, lower levels of difference rankings that can come into complex, are determined and shaped by—and must overlapping, and intertwined relation with ultimately be cashed out in terms defined

26 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) by—higher levels. Rather than higher levels rather than expressing one hierarchical of value relying on lower ones for coherence, spectrum, I choose to break apart the model lower ones rely on higher ones. Practitioners into independent practices in order to track can perform and value lower-level sonic value segmentation. The upper purple practices in circumscribed contexts and field represents the “highest value level” of otherwise regard them as safely inferior to recitation. The grey circles carved out of that or dependent on the recitation of the Qur’ān. field are two potential contradicting lower Figure 3 is a diagram that I propose values—similarity and practicality. Rather as a co-conception with al-Faruqi’s: here, than trying to fit lullabies or work songs into

Figure 3. Relational-hierarchical model of the Qur’ānic hierarchy. In this model, the linear descending order is broken into various “lower”-value dimensions, which I have provisionally named similarity, practicality, corruptability, and apostasy. I only explore the value dimension of practicality here. Specifically, what this model displays is that each practice is not fitted somewhere along a monist continuum of similarity, but is evaluated against Qur’ānic recitation as a “higher” or encompassing value. The purple field represents the capacity of Qur’ānic chant to define the total value landscape of any non-mūsīqā practice and the grey circles represent the delimited domains of lesser values that operate within that space. The lower diagram, or mūsīqā section, is provisional—a polar model of the Qur’ānic hierarchy would necessarily include recitation’s obverse, that is, sensuous music. The dotted lines represent the potential of mūsīqā practices to be encompassed not by recitation, but by sensuous music instead.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 27 a monist descending scheme, pluralizing the a linear model this subtlety is subsumed to model allows us to more fully explore the explanation via a higher value. Practicality exceptions and legal specificities that allow may never be important at higher levels of practical genres to flourish as legitimate valuation, but it does come into play—and ones despite sharing little in common with quite specifically in the case of the ‘āzī and other licit genres. Nevertheless, everything the razḥa in Oman. Now we shall turn to here is ultimately “reduced” to the positions the evidence that points to practicality as a they occupy within al-Faruqi’s model. “lower value” in the Qur’ānic hierarchy of Taking apart the linear model allows us to sonic practices. track relations between the various entities as encompassed by Qur’ānic recitation, or, “Devotion Is a Wide Door”: Islam, Ibāḍī the obverse, as potentially encompassed by Pragmatism, and the “Problem” of sensuous music. In this model, sensuous Useful Music music operates not so much as a category In this section, I want to first draw out drained of all the elements of Qur’ānic the seriousness with which Ibāḍī scholars recitation, but as a polar opposite to it, as condemn practices called “music” in a potential encompassing value to which order to contextualize the importance of some practices may be oriented instead. embracing practicality as a value in genres While I won’t dwell on this potential here, that bear no resemblance to Qur’ānic the threat of sensuous music’s capacity to recitation—specifically, sounds organized encompass certain genres of undecided for war. When we look at Ibāḍī scholars’ legality may help explain their medial judgments pertaining to musical sound, position in al-Faruqi’s diagram. Rather than one contemporary scholar’s work stands a unidirectional decline in value, we have a out: Khālid bin ‘Īsā bin Ṣāliḥ al-Sulaymānī’s contestation. What this model exposes, I Al-ghinā’ wa al-ma‘āzif fī al-mayzān: qirā’a think, is that similarity is one value vector fī al-aḥkām al-fiqhiyya al-mut‘aliqa bi al- amongst many by which Omani Ibāḍī ghinā’ wa al-ma‘āzif wa ḥukumhumā fī al- Muslims implicitly and explicitly experience islām (Singing and Musical Instruments this value hierarchy. Hence, similarity to in the Balance: A Study on Jurisprudential recitation may be operant in some cases Judgments Pertaining to Singing and as a mode by which sonic practices are Musical Instruments and Their Judgment encompassed within the Qur’ānic hierarchy, in Islam).36 Al-Sulaymānī gives an overview but it may coexist alongside many others. of the debate surrounding singing and The relational-hierarchical model thus musical instruments first by looking at the exposes the “level” at which other values Qur’ān and the “pure sunna” (Ibāḍīs regard may operate within the entire hierarchy. In only a small selection of ḥadīth-s as “pure”), this case, I pick out but one, practicality, then by taking up a philological approach and show how it more parsimoniously to the definition of the key terms “singing” explains the licit nature of what al-Faruqi (al-ghinā’) and “the playing of musical describes as “occupational music,” “life cycle instruments” (al-ma‘āzif). These two music,” and—my special focus in the next terms are often used in conjunction with section—“military music.” Similarity is the each other in the Islamic jurisprudence wrong value to explain these cases, but in on music, referring at least in general to

28 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) “singing” and “musical instruments and the passionate love, amorous poetry and playing of musical instruments.” obscenity . . . which moves the still and reveals the hidden . . . this is that type Al-ghinā’ and al-ma‘āzif of singing if it has poetry that celebrates Al-Sulaymānī writes that “singing” (al-ghinā’) [women in verse] by mentioning women and descriptions of their beauties, and is a “polluted word” (kalima mulawwitha) mentioning wine and other forbidden due to its association with “those that draw things upon which there is no difference from singing a craft and profession; and [of opinion among scholars] in their those that bring to it musical instruments being forbidden . . . As for what the Sufis that move/agitate the spirit, that arouse have created these days it is from an passionate love and obscenity.”37 It is for addiction to listening to the sung [samā‘ this reason that “those with common sense al-mughannī] and the instruments of arab.”41 are on their guard against using the word ṭ ‘singing’ (al-ghinā’) and avoid it, and they As we saw above, at some point the last replace it with other words such as the word definition, that is, singing being associated inshād.” 38 Such a shift in vocabulary does not with immorality, became the most commonly change the status of music that is already used definition of al-ghinā’. Other types “polluted.” “If we come to the general of singing used to be referred to as ghinā’, meaning of the word al-ghinā’ among the including the Islamically licit genres of Arabs,” al-Sulaymānī continues, it has come wedding/life-cycle and occupational music. to refer only to “al-ghinā’ al-mājin (‘immoral Over time, however, for many Islamic singing’).” 39 Al-Sulaymānī concludes by scholars, the word ghinā’ itself has come to firmly distinguishing betweenal-ghinā’ al- represent all that is negative in vocal music. mubāḥ and al-ghinā’ al-muḥarram. Mubāḥ Al-ma‘azif, in a similar process, has (permissible) in Islamic jurisprudence means come to refer to all musical instruments something that is permitted but for which and the playing of them. Early definitions, there is neither reward nor punishment: such as those compiled by Ibn Manẓūr (d. something toward which one ought to 711/1312), indicate that al-ma‘āzif referred cultivate indifference.Al-ghinā’ al-mubāḥ for only to the playing of instruments, not the al-Sulaymānī “is chaste, modest, respectable, instruments themselves, equating it with authentic singing, free from the traces of malāhī, or “entertainment.” Later scholars indecency and which is not accompanied amended the meaning of al-ma‘āzif to by musical instruments and the forbidden include musical instruments as objects.42 ṭarab. This type is now classified under the name inshād.” 40 These include the categories Ibāḍī Pragmatism: Condemnation and that we have modeled as licit: lullabies, work Conciliation songs, military marches, and so on. As for When al-Sulaymānī shifts his focus to al-ghinā’ al-muḥarram, al-Sulaymānī quotes presenting the perspectives of Ibāḍī Māliki scholar Abū ‘Abdullah al-Qurṭabī perspectives on music, he is unequivocal: (610–671/1214–1273): The reader of the books of Ibāḍī scholars It is immoral singing . . .[as al-Qurṭabī that treat the question of singing said] it is “singing which agitates and musical instruments and what is the spirits and that arouses them to related to them (in the judgment of

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 29 jurisprudential scholars) finds that was without adornment’ [’idha kān li-ghayr Ibāḍism is among the harshest of all zayna], [though] if the value of the ṭunbūr the Islamic schools in condemning seemed high, then most scholars permitted singing and its instruments. There is no breaking it ‘even if it was of great value.’”46 difference among Ibāḍī scholars and their rulings, neither in the past nor in the Ibāḍīs were careful to condemn not present, on the question of forbidding just their own music, but that of Africans, singing and musical instruments. Rather, British subjects, and Indians as well.47 their statements on the two are the most British imperial officers stationed in Muscat ruthless of all statements, and they noted in 1869 that the influence of Sa‘īd consider the two among the greatest sins bin Khalfān al-Khalīlī, an Ibā ī scholar, 43 ḍ and most reprehensible actions. had reached such a level that he outlawed Such is the position espoused by Muḥammad the weekly music sessions of the Siddi-s (a bin ’Ibrāhīm al-Kindī, cited above: “listening population derived from enslaved Africans) to entertainment is disobedient, sitting in the capital.48 Similarly, the British political among it is sinfulness, and working in it is agent in Muscat had to intervene when Ibāḍī apostasy (of ungratefulness towards God’s leaders requested that he prevent his Indian blessings, kufr al-nu‘ama) .” 44 Many Ibāḍī subjects from scholars have interpreted this kind of harsh beating drums or playing musical judgment as permitting the destruction of instruments. Disbrowe [the political instruments as a means of defense against agent in Muscat] refused to heed the them. The breaking of instruments is a request. Instead, he replied that if these common behavior cultivated in “enjoining activities were restricted [to] hours when it is unreasonable or caused disturbance, the right and forbidding the wrong.” Such then an understanding could be reached a statement is recorded by the eleventh-/ between the two sides. [Imam] ‘Azzān seventeenth-century Ibāḍī scholar Shaykh in his reply stated that music was to be Muḥammad bin ‘Abdullah bin Jum‘a bin banned at all times and no concession ‘Abīdān al-Nizwī: would be made to British subjects.49 As for the dahra/daïre and the mizmār-s ‘Azzān’s time as imam was predicated on his and all the instruments of entertainment, opposition to imperial ingresses in Oman it is permitted for you to break them if and his call to reassert the religious basis of you are able, if they are used or not. As the Imamate. for the dahra/daïre, the āṣnāj [cymbals] and zamārāt, they are to be broken The essential statement on music for wherever found, used or not. As for the our purposes, however, is a qaṣīda written reed instrument [qaṣba], as it has been by the famed Imam ‘Abdullah bin Ḥumayd said: “when it is used and there is singing “Nūr al-Dīn” al-Sālimī (1286–1332/1869– with it” . . . as for the duff-s, if they are 1914) in the Jawhār al-Niẓām fī ‘ilmī al- used outside of the month of marriage, ’adyān wa-l-aḥkām (The Jewel of Order in then they are to be broken.45 the Science of Religions and Judgments), a Another instrument mentioned by the Ibāḍīs, collection of poems and prose sections that more familiar in Central Asia, is the ṭunbūr. gather and expound on Ibāḍī Islamic themes. Interestingly, Mūsā bin Ābī Jābir al-Manḥī Nūr al-Dīn was one of the most prolific and (of Manaḥ, d. 181/797) writes that one popular scholars of the Ibāḍī renaissance of has “permission to leave it unbroken ‘if it the late nineteenth century, and his poems

30 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) are widely read, bought, memorized, and ‘just meanings’” for using instruments are interpreted today—virtually any library or provided, they are clearly phrased in terms bookstore in Oman contains his work. In of function: insofar as drums are useful the section entitled “Book of the Order of in times of war (to terrorize enemies and the World,” in the subsection “Enjoining the coordinate soldiers) and peace (to gather Right and Forbidding the Wrong,” he writes the Muslims to festival and consultation), the following lines: they are permitted. This is a clear expression And the instruments of entertainment of what al-Faruqi presented as the hierarchy that have no use of handasa al-ṣawt, but the justification of it Outside of themselves are to be is presented in terms not of the practice’s broken whenever they are found, similarity to the recitation of the Qur’ān, In all of their types that exist, but of its benefit to believers in other ways. Because in this there is no benefit. The current grand muftī of the Sultanate Bin Maḥbūb told us about his compatriot; of Oman, Aḥmad bin Ḥamad al-Khalīlī, That he played a drum with no mind has issued several fatwas about music to it. and echoes his predecessors very closely. And in their telling, he [Bin Maḥbūb] Condemnation should be the general stance, rent the leather [of the drumheads] but bets are hedged. The general Ibā ī And that is incumbent upon any of ḍ the proper [Muslims]. interpretation of music contends that the “al-lahū al-ḥadīth” mentioned in Luqmān 6 And they are not permitted to play the refers to music, musical instruments, the drum For entertainment—but for two “just purchase or renting of music, and nearly meanings”: everything else related to it. In an undated And that is the terrorization of enemies, fatwa issued by the muftī, he summarizes And as a response to the distant cries the Ibāḍī position: [of communication], Al-lahū is impermissible [yaḥram al- And as a call to the prayers of the festival lahū] when it pulls to it corruption [al-‘īd] and emits iniquity. Its impermissibility Or to a serious and purposeful is evidenced by the true speech of the 50 meeting between them [Muslims]. Most High: “And of those people who Nūr al-Dīn once again demonstrates the buy idle talk to lead [others] astray from the path of God without knowledge” harsh Ibā ī injunction to destroy musical ḍ [Luqmān 6]. Al-lahū al-ḥadīth in this instruments. What this passage shows verse is “singing,” as narrated by the most clearly, however, is the pragmatic learned interpreter and translator of Ibāḍī interest in function and uselessness. the Qur’ān Ibn ‘Abbās—God’s mercy The poet’s main criticism of music and upon him. Thus it was told about the musical instruments in this passage is that Prophet—may God send prayers and the instruments of entertainment are to peace—through the telling of twelve be broken “because in [them] there is no of his followers, of [his] prohibition of singing and playing and instruments benefit” and they “have no use outside of [al-ghinā’ wa-l-‘azif wa-l-zamr]. Despite themselves.” Al-Sulaymānī adds that musical this, scholars have permitted, in the instruments are “not [the kind of things] case of war, what inspires ḥamās [vigor, that are benefited from.”51 When the “two enthusiasm] in the believers and

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 31 strengthens their resolves. However, Peace be upon you, and God’s blessings war songs [inshād-s] that carry ḥamās and mercy, are conditional provided they do not The included attachment with the come at the expense of religious duties, letter is a group of inshād-s that include such as impeding the duty to remember various vocal expressions. Since the God and the duty of prayer; surely, God controversy among people has increased knows best.52 around [music’s] judgment according to the Sharia, we submit it to your Here we have a good example of the capacity Eminence, seeking from you the blessing of Qur’ānic recitation (and the values of notifying us as to its status. within which it is situated) to encompass The attachment is ordered as follows: a contradicting lower value: war songs are 1. Al-duff? tolerated “provided they do not come at the 2. Western music/rhythm? [al-‘īqā’ al- expense of religious duties.” Once again, gharbī] function outweighs the doctrinal slash- 3. Sea music with or without interlocking and-burn prohibition of music. Music clapping? is, in fact, too useful to ban completely. 4. Invigorating military music? Practicality is valued at one level but cannot 5. Melismata [Āhāt]—by a natural human voice? overwhelm the cardinal value of the Qur’ān 6. Melismata by sampler (a human voice and Islamic duty. In my discussions of this entered into a computer, then used in with another religious scholar, he explained performance)? to me that non-Muslims often think that 7. Autotune (a human voice entered into Muslims ban alcohol and music without a computer and purified to become sharp, exception: “In fact,” he pointed out, “alcohol free from melodic impurities)? and music are common. Why? Because you 8. Vocal alternatives (a human voice need alcohol for cleaning, chemistry, for entered into a computer which then undergoes editing until it becomes like useful things [ashiyā’ mufīda] like perfume. another voice)? It is the same with music. It is not ḥarām 9. Bass [al-bayz] (a rough voice without exception—if it is useful and accompanying music/rhythm either beneficial to the Muslim, he must use and human or nonhuman)? benefit from it.” The answer: It is well known that The definition of permitted sonic art for devotion is a wide door. So he who Ibāḍīs is also quite wide—as al-Faruqi notes, is prudent leaves [unmolested] the it is only that music which is most strongly nonprohibited—that is most safe and forthright. As for the judgment, I do associated with immoral settings that is not find in what has been presented uniformly denounced. In a 2005 fatwa, in these expressions something that the muftī also commented on a variety of is forbidden except for Western inshād-s that were sent to him. The letter music, insofar as it is in imitation and response read:53 of nonbelievers, and sea music with interlocking clapping due to the July 2005 / Jumādā al-thānī 1426 Fatwa clapping. Surely God knows best.54 In the name of God, the merciful, the compassionate. His Eminence the Shaykh In this letter, values that we might imagine / ’Āḥmad bin Ḥamad al-Khalīlī the to be central (such as the unmodulated Venerable Grand Muftī of the Sultanate: human voice) are not regarded as interesting,

32 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) whereas “Western music/rhythm” remains this kind of thinking is given by al-Nabahānī as clearly condemned, as al-Faruqi’s diagram when he writes that the large qaṣba (“reed,” makes clear. flute) was “beneficial in remembering the Nevertheless, the contemporary Omani hereafter (or death in another reading). It state has embraced certain aspects of was reported about al-Wuḍāḥ bin ‘Aqaba “Western music,” establishing highland [fl. 237/851] that his son Ziyād saw him bagpipe regiments in the army, multiple listening to the sound of the large qaṣba orchestras, compulsory music education while crying.”57 in primary classrooms, and, most recently, This practical mode of thinking in opening the Royal Opera House in 2011. religious matters was reported by Mandana Ethnomusicologists Anne Rasmussen and Limbert in her ethnographic research Majid al-Harthy have documented the on sociality in Bahlā’ as well.58 However, Omani state’s huge investment in music Limbert notes the reverse: older Bahlawis and the arts more generally.55 This official considered social visiting to be an aspect of support of both music and its official Ibāḍī pious living, while “being social, younger condemnation has largely been understood Bahlawis argued, was a distraction from the as reflecting the personality of the former constant remembering of God” and therefore sultan, who is said to love European music. ought to be condemned.59 “Thus,” Limbert The Opera House has witnessed a number continues, “rather than considering this of minor protests over the years for “un- sociality to be ‘proper’ (that is, religiously Islamic” activities, such as an event in 2013 sanctioned), younger Bahlawis argued that in which verses of the Qur’ān were read it was useless (ghayr nafa’a), a waste of time, or sung during a live jazz performance.56 and thus a sin.”60 Rather than the usefulness At the same time, the government has of a practice determining its acceptability, long patronized the dozens of traditional it is the uselessness of an action (within a performance groups that specialize in a certain discourse) that condemns it. Despite variety of local arts, whose status is at the protestations that visiting might, in fact, very least questionable (such as the “sea be a kind of work (shughl), its frivolity is music” in the letter above). enough to make it sinful. Limbert notes that philosopher Oliver Leaman traces this Is “Music” Useful or Useless? tendency of equating “uselessness” with What emerges from the preceding discussion sin back to the third-/tenth-eleventh- most clearly is (1) that proscriptions on century Islamic jurist ‘Abd al-Jabbar, who individual sonic practices made by Ibāḍīs first presented the uselessness of an action are very fine-grained, and (2) that a crucial as “sufficient condition of its evilness,” deciding factor is whether or not the practice whatever the consequences.61 If, as ‘Abd al- or instrument serves a discrete and necessary Jabbar claims, “everything has value because social function. Hence, while musical there is a purpose behind its existence,” then instruments are broadly impermissible, “anything which is not in accordance with commonly held exceptions exist to preserve this purpose must be evil. The performance what is useful and beneficial. Similarly, of a useless action must be objectionable practices that are considered to have no use on such a view, since it involves acting as or benefit are prohibited. One example of though there were no all-encompassing

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 33 purpose at work in creation.”62 Despite the The same Muslim jurist notes that “it may high-mindedness of this claim, for Omanis then be permitted, though his preference the concept of uselessness is a very everyday would be for the use of the Islamic war-cry one. A common saying among Omanis when ‘God is greatest!’”66 Even more shocking, evaluating something is to say “mā yaṣlaḥ,” some Omani imams seemed to have toyed which means both “it’s not proper” and “it’s with the idea of permitting expressly not usable, not practicable,” or the opposite, forbidden actions if they occurred during “yaṣlaḥ,” meaning “it is fitting, serviceable, war. Once again, while practicality wins or useful.” The Omani proverb gald al-fi’r out at one level—justifying a war-cry—the mā yaṣlaḥ l-al-raḥmānī (literally, “A mouse’s legal scholar nevertheless would prefer not hide isn’t useful/enough to skin a raḥmānī to have to make such a diversion to a lower drum”) is used to refer to meager attempts level of value. Al-Nabahānī notes the same to solve a big problem. Encouragements process regarding drums in the Interior: to drink more water, juice, or coffee, to eat “it seems,” he offers, “that drums acquired more, or to use incense are accompanied by their legitimacy from some Islamic scholars the phrase “it will benefit you” yistafīdak( ). due to the effect they had during war and After many interviews and performances, in meeting the enemy.”67 Al-Nabahānī I was asked, “Did you benefit from it?” continues that “Shaykh Khamīs bin Sa‘īd al- (tistafīd minnu?). Discussing the moral Shaqṣī [ca. 1030s–1090s/1620s–1680s)] dangers of coffee and coffee consumption in confirms that [legitimacy] when he said:… Bahlā’, Limbert cites a jurisprudential qaṣīda ‘In our days, the drum is not considered poem by the scholar Mājid bin Khamīs al- shameful [lā yistaqbaḥ al-ṭabl] especially ‘Abrī (1252–1340/1836/37–1921/22), if it was a time of war, in a parade at the who “simply notes that there is nothing [military?] camps, and perhaps as a sign or wrong with coffee and that its effects are not notice of that.”68 Al-Shaqṣī concludes that harmful, but rather useful.”63 “each time period and people has its own legal judgment,” and al-Nabahānī astutely Legitimating the Drums of War notes that this is perhaps written with a This circumscribed commitment to sense of resignation. Al-Shaqṣī was active practicality is what allows the ‘āzī and the during a period in which the Imamate was razḥa to flourish in contemporary Oman. struggling to repel the invaders and contain “It is noteworthy that the attitudes of the internal separatist movements: “a time of [Ibāḍī] jurists are not uniformly hardline,” the wars to unify the nation and throw out writes Michael Cook, and that “the single the occupying Portuguese.”69 Anticolonial most prominent motive behind the softer necessities prompted a vigorous, if qualified, views is military.”64 Cook notes that chess acceptance of the drums of war. might be roundly condemned and yet could While warfare seems to draw even the be allowed in the case of military instruction, most condemnatory scholars into a more that “male shrieking” was illegitimate as pragmatic mode, it is worth pointing out that “a residue of the [pre-Islamic] Jāhiliyya” none of the razḥa-s I recorded, participated though it could be legitimate when it in, or witnessed were related to the actual functioned as a “war-cry intended to rally prosecution of war. Instead, razḥa-s were the troops and strike fear into the enemy.”65 generally linked to war by way of their

34 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) production of ḥamās, a heightened state of others. Values may be so nested, and if vigor, enthusiasm, and élan associated with so, the logic of their partibility requires fighting or conflict. Inducingḥ amās, then, investigation. Dumontian hierarchy provides was the practical function of the razḥa, which, one avenue for this. It is worth noting that in turn, was linked to warfare. Ḥamās is a Dumont’s approach may be especially well complex phenomenon with considerable suited for a conceptual hierarchy such as the historical precedent that I cannot engage Qur’ānic one precisely because it does not here. Nevertheless, this juncture is where we appear to map in any straightforward way to can witness the controversial slippages that social structure, as notions such as caste and manifest among the complicated and nested marginalization might.70 The link between legal logics cum valuations that animate the such conceptual hierarchies and social ones acceptance or condemnation of any genre. seems decidedly more fraught with hazard, The overlapping relations between war, though careful work here is a useful guide.71 ḥamās, and collective performance are enough Elaboration of a successful heuristic to support the contingent and controversial confirms the value of the original legal rulings that form the backbone of formulation. While the relational diagram Islamic debates about the value(s) of music. of a posited “Qur’ānic hierarchy” that I Values do not simply emerge and interact presented here can be read alone, it should alone: they are motivated as part of discursive be read as a complement to and elaboration projects by situated actors in order to deal of al-Faruqi’s linear approach. Breaking with the complex exigencies of everyday life. apart al-Faruqi’s continuum allows some Importantly, those motivated discourses help hidden aspects of the hierarchy to emerge. shape the topographies of value that Islamic At the same time, some aspects of the linear scholars navigate. Differently valued “levels” model are obscured, such as the role of the of a hierarchy may merge and shift within word or the presence of musical instruments. discourses as they accrue the successive Nevertheless, by drawing out some of the sedimentations of historical deployment. latent “lower-value” dimensions of the hierarchy I have pointed to the potential If hierarchies imply a “segmentation of for plural value schemes to exist within values,” then one such segmentation may be the overwhelming importance of recitation revealed by bracketing certain universally by explaining one aspect of one edge case: licit sonic practices within the Qur’ānic military music. Other cross-cutting values hierarchy, such as military marches, and may be drawn out in a similar way. Building revealing the contradictory values by on al-Faruqi’s approach can fruitfully explore which they are rendered acceptable. While the historical and ongoing segmentation practicality, function, benefit, or usefulness of values within the Islamic tradition of may be relevant for some sonic practices, the debate about music as a project based on safeguarding of production (occupational sophisticated legal logics of precedent and music) and reproduction (life-cycle music) analogy, as well as being deeply embedded within Muslim communities may be for in the everyday.

Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) 35 NOTES

1 The famous rebuke uttered by the Prophet’s Anthropological Quarterly 90/1 (2017): 139–66; father-in-law and longtime follower Abū Bakr in an Michael Houseman, “The Hierarchical Relation: A equally famous ḥadīth. Abū Bakr admonished two Particular Ideology or a General Model?” trans. Eléonore women of the ‘Anṣār singing in the presence of the Rimbault, HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 5/1 Prophet on a festival day by saying, “The horn-pipes (2015): 251–69; Timo Kallinen, “Christianity, of Satan [mizāmir al-shayṭān] in the house of God’s Festishism, and the Development of Secular Politics Prophet!” The Prophet’s reply: “Let them sing, O Abū in Ghana: A Dumontian Approach,” Anthropological Bakr, verily to every nation there is a festival, and this Theory 14/2 (2014): 153–68; Ton Otto and Nils is our festival.” Bubandt, eds., Experiments in Holism: Theory and 2 See Janice Boddy, Wombs and Alien Spirits: Practice in Contemporary Anthropology (Oxford: Wiley- Women, Men, and the Zar Cult in Northern Sudan Blackwell, 2010); Knut M. Rio and Olaf H. Smedal, (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995) for eds., Hierarchy: Persistence and Transformation in Social a deeper discussion of zār. Formations (New York: Berghahn, 2009); Joel Robbins, 3 In this article and in my research more “Equality as Value: Ideology in Dumont, Melanesia generally, I only focus on the reception of Ibāḍī and the West,” Social Analysis 36 (1994): 21–70; jurisprudential rulings in the Interior province Joel Robbins, “Monism, Pluralism, and the Structure of Oman, Dakhilliyah. Oman is by no means a of Value Relations: A Dumontian Contribution to monocultural country, and various opinions and the Contemporary Study of Value,” HAU: Journal traditions interact according to unique dynamics in of Ethnographic Theory 3/1 (2013): 99–115; Joel different regions. WhileẒ āhirah, on the Saudi border, Robbins and Jukka Siikala, “Hierarchy and Hybridity: may take a dimmer view of music even than the Toward a Dumontian Approach to Contemporary Interior, Bedouin groups, Sunnis in the coastal town Cultural Change,” Anthropological Theory 14/2 of Ṣūr, and the southern capital of Ẓūfār may have (2014): 121–32; Olaf H. Smedal, “Demotion as sharply divergent opinions to those I present here. Value: Rank Infraction among the Ngadha in Flores, Research on the role of “music” in social life outside of Indonesia,” Social Analysis 60/4 (2016): 114–33; as the Interior is an important project for future scholars. well as the special issue on Dumont of Anthropological 4 Amnon Shiloah, Music in the World of Islam: A Theory 14/2 (2014). Socio-Cultural Study (London: Scolar Press, 1995), 31. 9 Robbins, “Monism, Pluralism.” 5 Ibid. 10 For recent work on value in anthropology, 6 Valerie J. Hoffman points out that a major see David Graeber, Toward an Anthropological Theory of difference between Ibāḍī and Wahhābī doctrine Value: The False Coin of Our Own Dreams (New York: is the importance of mysticism to Ibāḍī scholars. Palgrave, 2001); Naomi Haynes and Jason Hickel, While few Ibāḍīs might refer to themselves as Sufis, “Introduction: Hierarchy, Value, and the Value of a similar concept of sulūk, or “pathways” in religion, Hierarchy,” Social Analysis 60/4 (2016): 1–20; is present in many of the writings of scholars during Michael Lambek, “Value and Virtue,” Anthropological the nineteenth-century Ibāḍī “renaissance.” Valerie J. Theory 8/2 (2008): 133–57; Otto and Bubandt, Hoffman, “Mysticism, Rationalism and Puritanism in eds., Experiments in Holism; Ton Otto and Rane Modern Omani Ibāḍism (18th–Early 20th Century),” Willerslev, “Prologue: Value as Theory: Value, Action, The Muslim World 105/2 (2015): 251–65, https:// and Critique,” HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory doi.org/10.1111/muwo.12091. 3/2 (2013a): 1–10; Robbins, “Equality as Value” 7 I’m not sure if this is a real word. I’m using it and “Monism, Pluralism”; Smedal, “Demotion as instead of “reconception” to mean thinking along with, Value”; Terence Turner, “Marxian Value Theory,” rather than overturning. Co-conceiving would mean Anthropological Theory 8/1 (2008): 43–56. thinking along with, holding two ideas or models as 11 Houseman, “Hierarchical Relation”; Ronald mutually if contrastingly meritorious. Parkin, Louis Dumont and Hierarchical Opposition 8 Following the recent and ongoing (New York: Berghahn, 2009); Robbins, “Monism, reinterpretation of Louis Dumont’s conceptions Pluralism”; Smedal, “Demotion as Value.” of hierarchy and encompassment found in Homo 12 Steve Barnett, Lina Fruzzetti, and Akos Hierarchicus: The Caste System and Its Implications, Ostor, “Hierarchy Purified: Notes on Dumont and (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980), see His Critics,” Journal of Asian Studies 35/4 (1976): also Jonathan Glasser, “Musical Jews: Listening 627–46, doi:10.2307/2053675; Sumit Guha, for Hierarchy in Colonial Algeria and Beyond,” Beyond Caste: Identity and Power in South Asia, Past and

36 Yale Journal of Music & Religion Vol. 6, No. 1 (2020) Present (Leiden, Netherlands: Brill, 2013); Ravindra 43 Ibid., 95. Khare, ed., Caste, Hierarchy, and Individualism: Indian 44 Ibid., 96. Critiques of Louis Dumont’s Contributions (New York: 45 Ibid., 98. Oxford University Press, 2006). 46 Walīd al-Nabhānī, Min tārīkh al-mūsīqā fī 13 Houseman, “Hierarchical Relation.” ‘Umān ’ishkālīyāt wa nuṣūṣ (From the History of Music 14 Asad, “On the Idea of an Anthropology of in Oman: Problems and Texts) (Muscat, Oman: Islam,” 14. Mu’assasat ‘Umān li-l-ṣaḥāfa wa-l-nashr wa-l-i‘lān, 15 Lois Ibsen al-Faruqi, “Music, Musicians, and 2016), 45. Muslim Law,” Asian Music 17/1 (1985): 3–36. 47 Michael Cook, Commanding Right and 16 Talal Asad, “The Idea of an Anthropology of Forbidding Wrong in Islamic Thought (Cambridge: Islam,” Occasional Papers Series (Washington, D.C.: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 409–10. Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown 48 Shelly Johny, ‘The Decline of Oman’s University, 1986), 14. Maritime Empire during the Late Nineteenth Century,” 17 Ibid., 15. Ph.D. thesis (Jawaharlal Nehru University, 2010), 70. 18 Shahab Ahmed, What Is Islam?: The Importance 49 Ibid., 70–71. of Being Islamic (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 50 Al-Sulaymānī, Al-ghinā’ wa al-ma‘āzif, 96–97. 2016), 272–73. 51 Ibid., 97. 19 Ibid., 277. 52 Ibid., 106. 20 Ibid., 427. 53 I have not yet found the sound examples that 21 Al-Faruqi “Music, Musicians, and Muslim accompanied the letter. Law,” 7–8. 54 Al-Sulaymānī, Al-ghinā’ wa al-ma‘āzif, 22 Ibid., 8. 109–10. 23 Ibid., 27. 55 Anne K. Rasmussen and Majid al-Harthy, 24 Ibid., 13. “Music in Oman: An Overture,” The World of Music, 25 Ibid.; Robbins “Monism, Pluralism.” n.s.: “Music in Oman: Politics, Identity, Time, and 26 Virginia Danielson, “The Qur’ān and the Space in the Sultanate,” Volume 1 / 2 (2012): 63–99. Qasīdah: Aspects of the Popularity of the Repertory 56 “49 Held for Oman Opera House Protest Sung by Umm Kulthum,” Asian Music 19/1 (1987): Freed,” Gulf Daily, March 11, 2013, https://gulfnews. 26–45. com/world/gulf/oman/49-held-for-oman-opera- 27 Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus; Per Hage, house-protest-freed-1.1156678. Frank Harary, and Bojka Milicic, “Hierarchical 57 Al-Nabahānī, Min tārīkh al-mūsīqā, 45–46. Opposition,” Oceania 65/4 (1995): 347–54. 58 Mandana Limbert, In the Time of Oil: Piety, 28 Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus, 240. Memory, and Social Life in an Omani Town (Stanford, 29 Glasser, “Musical Jews,” 147. CA: Stanford University Press, 2010). 30 Joel Robbins, “Equality as Value: Ideology in 59 Ibid., 14. Dumont, Melanesia and the West,” Social Analysis 36 60 Ibid. (1994): 21–70. 61 Oliver Leaman, “’Abd Al-Jabbar and the 31 Robbins, “Monism, Pluralism,” 103. Concept of Uselessness,” Journal of the History of Ideas 32 Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus, 239; Robbins, 41/1 (1980): 129–31. “Monism, Pluralism,” 104. 62 Ibid., 129. 33 Robbins, “Monism, Pluralism,” 104. 63 Limbert, In the Time of Oil, 66. 34 Glasser, “Musical Jews,” 143. 64 Cook, Commanding the Right, 410. 35 Haynes and Hickel, “Introduction,” 5. 65 Ibid. 36 Khālid bin ‘Īsā bin Ṣāliḥ al-Sulaymānī, Al- 66 Ibid, 411. ghinā’ wa al-ma‘āzif fī al-mayzān: qirā’a fī al-aḥkām 67 Al-Nabahānī, Min tārīkh al-mūsīqā, 46. al-fiqhiyya al-mut’aliqa bi al-ghinā’ wa al-ma‘āzif wa 68 Ibid. ḥukmhumā fī al-islām (Al-Sīb, Oman: Maktabat al- 69 Ibid. Ḍāmirī, 2011). 70 Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus; Glasser, 37 Ibid., 20. “Musical Jews.” 38 Ibid. 71 Haynes and Hickel, “Introduction”; Bruce 39 Ibid., 21. Kapferer, “Louis Dumont and a Holist Anthropology,” 40 Ibid., 23. in Otto and Bubandt, eds., Experiments in Holism; 41 Ibid., 24. John Levi Martin, Social Structures (Princeton, NJ: 42 Ibid., 24–26. Princeton University Press, 2009).

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