Exaggerated harshness is harmful to royal authority

The interest subjects have in their ruler is not interest in his person and body, for example, in his good figure, handsome face, large frame, wide knowledge, good handwriting, or acute mind. Their interest in him lies in his relation to them.

Royal and governmental authority is something relative, a relationship between two things (ruler and subjects).

Government becomes a reality when (there is a ruler who) rules over subjects and handles their affairs. A ruler is he who has subjects (ra’aya), and subjects are persons who have a ruler. The quality accruing to the ruler from the fact of his correlative relation with his subjects is called “rulership” (malakah).

That is, he rules them, and if such rulership and its concomitants are of good quality, the purpose of government is most perfectly achieved. If such rulership is good and beneficial, it will serve the interests of the subjects. If it is bad and unfair, it will be harmful to them and cause their destruction.

Good rulership is equivalent to mildness.

If the ruler uses force and is ready to mete out punishment and eager to expose the faults of people and to count their sins, (his subjects) become fearful and depressed and seek to protect themselves against him through lies, ruses, and deceit. This becomes a character trait of theirs.

Their mind and character become corrupted. They often abandon (the ruler) on the battlefield and (fail to support his) defensive enterprises. The decay of (sincere) intentions causes the decay of (military) protection. The subjects often conspire to kill the ruler. Thus, the dynasty decays, and the fence (that protects it) lies in ruins.

If the ruler continues to keep a forceful grip on his subjects, group feeling will be destroyed, for reasons stated at the beginning. 195 The fence (which protects the dynasty) is torn down, for the dynasty has become incapable of (military) protection.

(On the other hand,) if the ruler is mild and overlooks the bad sides of his subjects, they will trust him and take refuge with him. They (then) love him heartily and are willing to die for him in battle against his enemies. Everything is then in order in the state.

The concomitants of good rulership are being kind to one’s (subjects) and defending them. The true meaning of royal authority is realized when the ruler defends his subjects. To be kind and beneficent toward them is part of being mild to them and showing an interest in how they are living.

These things are important for the ruler in gaining the love of his subjects.

An alert and very shrewd person rarely has the habit of mildness. Mildness is usually found in careless and unconcerned persons. The least (of the many drawbacks) of alertness (in a ruler) is that he imposes tasks upon his subjects that are beyond their ability, because he is aware of things they do not perceive and, through his genius, foresees the outcome of things at the start.

The ruler’s excessive demands may lead to his subjects’ ruin. Muhammad said= “Follow the pace of the weakest among you,” 195a

Muhammad, therefore, made it a condition that the ruler not be too shrewd. The source for (this statement) is a story about Ziyad b. Abi Sufyan.

When ‘Umar deposed him (as governor) of the ‘Iraq, he asked ‘Umar why he had been deposed, whether it was because of his inability or his treachery. ‘Umar replied that he had deposed him for neither of those reasons but because he disliked having people become the victim of his superior intelligence.

This is the source for the statement that the ruler should not be too shrewd and clever, as were Ziyad b. Abu Sufyan and ‘Amr b. al-‘As. For such (qualities) are accompanied by tyrannical and bad rulership and by a tendency to make the people do things that it is not in their nature to do. This will be mentioned at the end of the book.197

The conclusion is that it is a drawback in a political leader to be (too) clever and shrewd. Cleverness and shrewdness imply that a person thinks too, much, just as stupidity implies that he is too rigid. In the case of all human qualities, the extremes are reprehensible, and the middle road is praiseworthy.

This is, for instance, the case with generosity in relation to waste and stinginess, or with bravery in relation to foolhardiness and cowardice,198 And so it is with all the other human qualities. For this reason, the very clever person is said to have the qualities of devils.

He is called a “satan” or, “a would-be satan,” and the like.

23. The meaning of caliphate and imamate.

The real meaning of royal authority is that it is a form of organization necessary to mankind.

Royal authority requires superiority and force, which express the wrathfulness 201 and animality (of human nature). The decisions of the ruler will therefore, as a rule, deviate from what is right.

They will be ruinous to the worldly affairs of the people under his control, since, as a rule, he forces them to execute his intentions and desires, which it may be beyond their ability (to do).

This situation will differ according to the difference of intentions to be found in different generations. (But) it is for this reason difficult to be obedient to (the ruler).

Disobedience makes itself noticeable and leads to trouble and bloodshed. Therefore, it is necessary to have reference to ordained political norms, which are accepted by the mass and to whose laws it submits. The Persians and other nations had such norms. The dynasty that does not have a policy based on such (norms), cannot fully succeed in establishing the supremacy of its rule.

If these norms are ordained by the intelligent and leading personalities and (best) minds of the dynasty, the result will be a political (institution) on an intellectual (rational) basis. If they are ordained by God through a lawgiver who establishes them as (religious) laws, the result will be a political (institution) on a religious basis, which will be useful for life in both this and the other world.

This is because the purpose of human beings is not only their worldly welfare. This entire world is trifling and futile. It ends in death and annihilation.

God says= “Do you think that we created you triflingly?” 204 The purpose (of human beings) is their religion, which leads them to happiness in the other world, “the path of God to whom belongs that which is in heaven and that which is on earth.”

Therefore, religious laws have as their purpose to cause (human beings) to follow such a course in all their dealings with God and their fellow men. This (situation) also applies to royal authority, which is natural in human social organization.

The religious laws guide it along the path of religion, so that everything will be under the supervision of the religious law. Anything done by royal authority that is dictated by force, superiority, or the free play of the power of wrathfulness, is tyranny and injustice and considered reprehensible by (the religious law), as it is also considered reprehensible by the requirements of political wisdom.

Likewise, anything (done by royal authority) that is dictated (merely) by considerations of policy or political decisions without supervision of the religious law 206 is also reprehensible, because it is vision lacking the divine light. “He for whom God makes no light has no light whatever.” 207

Muhammad knows better than the mass itself what is good for them so far as the affairs of the other world, which are concealed from the mass itself, are concerned. At the Resurrection, the actions of human beings, whether they had to do with royal authority or anything else, will all come back to them.

Muhammad said= “It is your own actions that are brought back to you.”

Political laws consider only worldly interests. “They know the outward life 208of this world.”

On the other hand, the intention the Lawgiver has concerning mankind is their welfare in the other world. 209 Therefore, it is necessary, as required by the religious law, to cause the mass to act in accordance with the religious laws in all their affairs touching both this world and the other world. The authority to do so was possessed by the representatives of the religious law, the prophets.

Later on, it was possessed by those who took their place, the caliphs. This makes it clear what the caliphate means. (To exercise) natural royal authority means to cause the masses to act as required by purpose and desire.

To exercise political (royal authority) means to cause the masses to act as required by intellectual rational insight into the means of furthering their worldly interests and avoiding anything that is harmful.

To exercise the caliphate means to cause the masses to act as required by religious insight into their interests in the other world as well as in this world.

The worldly interests have bearing upon the interests in the other world, since according to the Lawgiver (Muhammad), all worldly conditions are to be considered in their relation to their value for the other world. Thus, (the caliphate) in reality substitutes for Muhammad, in as much as it serves, like him, to protect the religion and to exercise (political) leadership of the world.