Showing posts with label Ibn Battuta. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ibn Battuta. Show all posts

Saturday 11 February 2017

Ibn Battuta, the greatest Muslim traveller to ever live

 
Ibn Battuta – then and today





Mohammed Ibn Battuta (1304-1369 CE / 703-770 Hijri), one of the greatest travellers and explorers  who ever lived, a man of Berber descent, was born into a family of Islamic legal scholars in Tangier/Morocco. Knowing the Deen well and thus being able to act like a judge arbitrating conflicts helped him throughout all his life.*


The human dramas of his age were as overwhelming as the ones today. During his lifetime great political and natural disasters ravaged Eurasia: From 1346–1353 CE the black death, the plague killed 30–60% of Europe's total population. In northern Europe England and France fighting their Hundred Years’ War. In the south the Muslim civilization of Al-Andalus, which had already lasted 6 centuries, had by then entered its last 200 years, having been reduced to the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada, the last Muslim dynasty on the Iberian península, which built the Alhambra palace. For this very reason Ibn Batutta could travel to Granada, but not anymore to Seville and Cordoba. For a Muslim from Moroccan then, travelling East was not only indicated by the obligatory Hajj journey.

The devastating conquests of the great Mongol Empire (1206-1368) had also passed the climax of their stormy expansion: the Mongols were driven out of China, in Persia they dissolved into two parts, and in Eastern Europe they lost their position as a great power. This is why Ibn Battuta did not stop after having completed his Hajj, but he continued his travels over a period of thirty years, visiting most of the known Islamic world as well as many non-Muslim lands. Islam was still expanding into the East. Ibn Battuta’s journeys followed its light, in fact he was part of it.

The many adventures and anecdotes he recounts in the book, which is called “Travels (arab. Rihlat) of Ibn Battutah” or with its full title “A Gift to Those Who Contemplate the Wonders of Cities and the Marvels of Travelling.” (1355) There we read about him, from travelling with sledges drawn by dogs in today’s Russia (a story which today is rather seen as literature he copied than experienced fact), to meeting the highly erratic Sultan of Delhi, then the wealthiest Muslim man in the Muslim world. Under him Ibn Battuta leads the high life of a trusted subordinate before falling under the suspicion of treason; he sees strange animals (rhinoceros) most people in his homeland have never seen. Among the Turks and Mongols, he was astonished at the freedom and respect enjoyed by women and remarked that on seeing a Turkish couple in a bazaar one might assume that the man was the woman's servant when he was in fact her husband. On the Maldives and in some sub-Saharan regions in Africa he suffers a culture shock, being scandalized by women moving about bare-breasted in public. On the Maldives he is also half-kidnapped into staying, becomes chief judge and marries into the local royal family. During his lifetime he meets extraordinary Men of Allah, but also nearly loses his life in an ambush he suffers by a group of bandits in India. Even if his Rihla is not fully based on what its author personally witnessed, it provides an impressive account of much of the 14th-century world.


We Muslims from Granada called our travel agency after his name to remind us on the wide spectrum of what a journey can be: whether you just want to spend a few relaxed days in the beautiful and rich historic landscapes of today’s Spain, whether you want to visit the sights of the amazing Muslim history in Al-Andalus, or whether you understand your journey as Ibn Battuta did: as Rihla travel practice which connects you to the collective consciousness of the ummah, generating a larger sense of community. In the time of Al-Andalus the performance of Rihla was an obligatory qualifier for the future elite of teachers and leaders. “Travel is the only thing you buy that makes you richer” someone said.



What was true for Ibn Battuta is true today: there is no better education than travelling with open eyes. “Travelling – it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller.” said Ibn Battuta. All we have to do, is to set out. Welcome to Spain, to the historic land of Al Andalus. Today you may see all those beautiful places, onto which even an explorer like Ibn Battuta could not set his eyes upon.

Ibn Battuta's travel