The Four Generation Rule

Prestige lasts at best four generations in one lineage

The world of the elements and all it contains comes into being and decays. This applies to both its essences and its conditions.

Minerals, plants, all the animals including man, and the other created things come into being and decay, as one can see with one’s own eyes.

The same applies to the conditions that affect created things, and especially the conditions that affect man. Sciences grow up and then are wiped out.

The same applies to crafts, and to similar things.

Prestige is an accident that affects human beings. It comes into being and decays inevitably. No human being exists who possesses an unbroken pedigree of nobility from Adam down to himself.

The only exception was made for the Prophet, as a:

• special act of divine grace to him
• measure designed to safeguard his true character.

Nobility originates in the state of being outside. That is, being outside of leadership and nobility and being in a vile, humble station, devoid of prestige.

This means that all nobility and prestige is preceded by the non-existence of nobility and prestige, as is the case with every created thing. It reaches its end in a single family within 4 successive generations.

This is as follows.

The Four Generation Rule

The builder of the family glory knows what it cost him to do the work. He keeps the qualities that created his glory and made it last.

The son who comes after him had personal contact with his father and thus learned those things from him.

However, he is inferior to his father, in as much as a person who learns things through study is inferior to a person who knows them from practical application.

The third generation must be content with imitation, in particular, with reliance on tradition.

This member is inferior to the second generation, in as much as a person who relies (blindly) upon tradition is inferior to a person who exercises independent judgment.

The fourth generation is inferior to the preceding ones in every respect. This member has lost the qualities that preserved the edifice of their glory.

He:

• actually despises those qualities
• imagines that the edifice was not built through application and effort
• thinks that it was something due his people from the very beginning by virtue of their noble descent, and not something that resulted from group effort and individual qualities.

He sees the great respect the people have for him. But he does not know how that respect originated and what it was for.

He imagines that it is due to his descent and nothing else. He keeps away from those in whose group feeling he shares, thinking that he is better than they.

He trusts that (they will obey him because) he was brought up to take their obedience for granted, and he does not know the qualities that made obedience necessary.

Such qualities are humility (in dealing) with (such men) and respect for their feelings. Therefore, he considers them despicable, and they, in turn, revolt against him and despise him. They transfer (political) leadership from him and his direct lineage to some other related branch (of his tribe), in obedience to their group feeling, as we have stated.

They do so after they have convinced themselves that the qualities of the (new leader) aresatisfactory to them. His family then grows, whereas the family of the original (leader) decays and the edifice of his “house” collapses.

This is the case with rulers who have royal authority. It also is the case with all the “houses” of tribes, of amirs, and of everybody else who shares in a group feeling, and then also with the “houses” among the urban population. When one “house” goes down, another one rises in (another group of) the same descent. “If He wants them to disappear, He causes them to do so, and brings forth a new creation. This is not difficult for God.” 86

The rule of four generations with respect to prestige usually holds true. It may happen that a “house” is wiped out, disappears, and collapses in fewer than four (generations), or it may continue unto the fifth and sixth (generations), though in a state of decline and decay. The four generations can be explained as the builder, the one who has personal contact with the builder, the one who relies on tradition, and the destroyer. There could not be fewer.

The fact that prestige lasts four generations is considered (in statements discussed) under the subject of praise and glorification. Muhammad said= “The noble son of the noble (father) of the noble (grandfather) of the noble (great-grandfather)= Joseph, the son of Jacob, the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham.” 87

This indicates that (Joseph) had reached the limit in glory.

The Torah writes:

“God, your Lord, is powerful and jealous, visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and the fourth generations.”

This shows that four generations in one lineage are the limit in extent of ancestral prestige.

The Kitab al-Aghani reports, in the story of ‘Uwayf al-Qawafi, that Khosraw asked an-Nu’man whether there was among the Arabs a tribe that was nobler than other tribes.

When the answer was yes, he asked= “How does such greater nobility show itself?”

An-Nu’man replied: “(In cases of men) with three successive ancestors who were leaders, and where the fourth generation, then, was perfect. The ‘house’ thus belongs to his tribe.”

He looked for such people and found that the only ones that fulfilled the condition were the family of Hudhayfah b. Badr al-Fazari, the house of Qays; the family of Hajib b. Zurarah, the house of Tamim; the family of Dhu1-Jaddayn, the house of Shayban; and the family of al-Ash’ath b. Qays, of the Kindah.

He assembled those clans and the families attached to them, and appointed impartial judges. Hudhayfah b. Badr stood up; then al-Ash’ath b. Qays, because of his relationship to an-Nu’man; then Bistam b. Qays of the Shayban; then flajib b. Zurarah; and then Qays b. ‘Asim.

They made long speeches. Khosraw (finally) said: “Each one of them is a chieftain who occupies his proper place.”

Those “houses” were the ones that enjoyed the greatest reputation among the Arabs after the Hashimites. To them belonged also the house of the Banu ad-Dayyan,92 of the Banu1-Harith b. Ka’b, the house of the Yemen.

All this shows that prestige lasts at best four generations.

15. Savage nations are better able to achieve superiority than others.

Chapter 1 Part 3 stated that 93 desert life is the reason for bravery and that savage groups are braver than others.

They are, therefore, better able to achieve superiority and to take away the things that are in the hands of other nations. The situation of one and the same group changes, in this respect, with the change of time.

Whenever people settle in the fertile plains and amass 94 luxuries and become accustomed to a life of abundance and luxury, their bravery decreases to the degree that their wildness and desert habits decrease.

This is exemplified by dumb animals, such as gazelles, wild buffaloes (cows), and donkeys, that are domesticated. When they cease to be wild as the result of contact with human beings, and when they have a life of abundance, their vigor and violence undergo change.

This affects even their movements and the beauty of their coat. 95 The same applies to savage human beings who become sociable and friendly.

The reason is that familiar customs determine human nature and character.

Superiority comes to nations through enterprise and courage. The more firmly rooted in desert habits and the wilder a group is, the closer does it come to achieving superiority over others, if both (parties are otherwise) approximately equal in number, strength, and group (feeling).

In this connection, one may compare the Mudar with the Ijimyar and the Kahlan before them, who preceded them in royal authority and in the life of luxury, and also with the Rabi’ah who settled in the fertile fields of the ‘Iraq.

The Mudar retained their desert habits, and the others embarked upon a life of abundance and great luxury before they did. Desert life prepared the Mudar most effectively for achieving superiority.

They took away and appropriated what the other groups had in their hands.

The same was the case also with the Banu Tayy, the Banu ‘Amir b. Sa’sa’ah, and the Banu Sulaym b. Mansur 96 later on. They remained longer in the desert than the other Mudar and Yemenite tribes, and did not have any of their wealth. The desert habits thus preserved the power of their group feeling, and the habits of luxury did not wear it out.

They thus eventually became the most powerful (group) among (the Arabs).

Thus, wherever an Arab tribe leads a life of luxury and abundance, while another does not, the one holding fast to desert life the longer will be superior to and more powerful than the other, if both parties are (otherwise) equal in strength and number.