He was reading and writing for 18 hours, with the Brotherhood in the middle of Sheikh Al-Qaradawi to take the position of General Guide.. the late thinker Muhammad Emara, biography and career

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Muhammad Emara - who passed away on the evening of Rajab 4, 1441 AH, corresponding to February 28, 2020 - is a prominent sign of an important historical stage, no matter how different we differ in our positions on him and his intellectual production.

Yusra and Yamna fluctuated in the worlds of ideas, it all started early before everyone else, and it was a pioneer for everyone.

Experiment, think, manage, write, present and struggle.

In his first phase he was a leftist;

It was a view influenced by a broad young generation who later became great thinkers of various currents.

Amara treated his ideas meticulously at times, and at other times exaggeratedly;

He approached from the left, he approached the Mu'tazilah, he approached the Brotherhood, he approached the Salafists, and he worked with Al-Azhar headed by Sheikh Dr.

Ahmed El tayeb;

But he remained independent and self-made, who could not be counted against anyone but himself.

He had the advantage of precedence, and the virtue of respectful moral attitudes, he did not compliment or alter what he really believed.

He was steadfast in his principles, especially as he was renouncing positions, travels and jobs that he recovered very early after his graduation and then divorced her until his death.

The following is an interview conducted with him in the year 1431 AH / 2010 AD in the context of preparing a documentary film - for Al Jazeera Channel - about his personal biography and intellectual career. This is in its text and meaning, not even in its wording, with a few exceptions imposed by editing and casting speech.

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I was born on Rajab 27 ,

1358 AH, corresponding to December 8, 1931 AD, in a village called “Sarwa” in the center of “Qalin” in the Kafr El-Sheikh Governorate, in the north of the Delta.

I was born into a well-to-do country family, neither rich nor poor, who lives off their land, and I joke that I am of the "gentlemen";

My father is from the pharaohs, and my mother is from the family of the house, the family embodies the embrace of Egypt with Arabism and Islam. Religious science.

I had an experience in the "writers" in which there was extreme cruelty and violence, and people thought that the "corporal" or the sheikh who was beaten hard was the one who taught a good education.

This course alienated me from education, so I tried to work in agriculture like my brothers, but my father was keen to fulfill his vow, so he punished me with a cruelty more severe than the cruelty of the book.

I moved to another book where a sheikh named Muhammad al-Jundi, may God have mercy on him, taught us about it.

He was an Azharite who did not complete his education, he was cheerful and had a good mood, and when I went to him, God opened his eyes to me, and things started to go in the right way.

I memorized the Qur'an and its quality, and in the same period I was going to compulsory education, learning the rules of arithmetic and all these modern civil matters.

In 1945 AD, I went to the religious institute in the city of Desouq, and there were five institutes in Egypt at that time: the Alexandria Institute, the Desouq Institute, the Tanta Institute, the Cairo Institute, and the Assiut Institute, and now there are more than 8,000 institutes.

Primary on that date was like middle school now, we were entering the first primary after memorizing the Qur’an, its recitation, arithmetic and spelling.

And the primary school in Al-Azhar on that date was teaching high sciences. In the fourth grade of primary school, we were studying 'The Roots of Gold' (= a reference book in grammar by Ibn Hisham al-Ansari, who died in 761 AH/1360 AD), which is taught in four years at the Faculty of Arts, what we study in primary in one year. He was taught in four years at King Fouad University!

The experience of primary education opened many doors for me, especially that the atmosphere in Al-Azhar was characterized by stagnation, and we were studying the notes and comments. We were carrying out strikes, sit-ins and protests demanding the reform of Al-Azhar and the introduction of foreign languages.

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I was fortunate to

have a number of professors who benefited me greatly, such as Sheikh Abd al-Rahman Jalal, who was a good man and a scholarly jurist, who encouraged me to read, and Sheikh Muhammad Kamel al-Fiqi, may God have mercy on him, who was the spark that ignited thought, reading and writing in me. At that time to Desouq, he was distinguished as a sheikh, he read newspapers and magazines, and this was strange to the sheikhs of that date.

We were in the second year of primary school and he was teaching us grammar, and he was reading the editorial for us in Al-Masry newspaper. He entered one day and asked: Who among you can buy a book other than the prescribed books?

So I went and bought the book “The Looks” by Al-Manfaluti (d. 1924 AD), and this was the first book I bought in my life outside the prescribed books. He told me: Bring it with you, and I used to read and study it, and at the end of the school year we held a party for the sheikh and gave him a “Benboni box,” and I wrote A poem in praise of poetry.

In our village there was a scholar named Sheikh Abdul-Tawab Al-Shennawi, who was a reader and preacher and enjoyed a kind of leadership in the village. Al-Risala, which contained the original copy of the magazine Al-Urwa Al-Wathqa, the eyes of Islamic thought and a number of translated books from European languages.

His family was illiterate, which made the library neglected. When I turned to reading, I began to buy this library, so I bought the library for forty pounds (each book with a penny), and I bought it in installments, as the amount was buying a large land at the time.

I used to read this library, especially during the vacation period (four months), so I used to read until the lines were lost in front of my eyes, so I rested and then read again.

I read in this library the book 'Nahj al-Balaghah' with the explanation of Imam Muhammad Abdo (d. 1905 AD), and the theory of [Evolution and Rise] by Charles Darwin (d. 1882 AD), and I read about socialism.

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It happened that I met people from the "Misr Al-Fatat" party, and I began working in politics through the national movement in Egypt, and through the Palestinian cause.

The first demonstration I participated in was in 1946, during the period of the Institute (1945-1946), and demonstrations against the Sedky/Bevin project about the English evacuation from Egypt.

In 1947, I began preaching in mosques against the Jews (= Israelis), and for the sake of the Palestinian cause, and I wrote the first article entitled “Jihad” about the fedayeen who entered Palestine before the Arab armies, and it was published on the first of April 1948 in the newspaper “Misr Al-Fata”, and I think The publication of this article determined my future and my destiny in my relationship with writing.

I had anxiety at this point;

Do you belong to the Muslim Brotherhood or Egypt the girl?

“Misr Al-Fatta” was a national, progressive Islamic party, and the Brotherhood was an Islamic group, and I saw in a dream Ahmed Hussein (d. 1982 AD) and Hassan Al-Banna (d. 1949 AD). The students who belonged to the Brotherhood had a specific program in reading that they did not go beyond, and the group specified it to them, and I had an aversion to reading, so this restriction on the freedom to read and see is what made the girl’s Egypt more likely to me.

In addition, my father, may God have mercy on him, fell ill, and he was afraid if he died that I would not complete my education, so he wrote me a condition of two hundred pounds, and this was a large amount, and he asked me to register this condition in the court of Desouk, and the court employee was providing publications to the girl’s Egypt, and I was also reading the Egypt newspaper. The girl, and I know the news of the fedayeen who entered Palestine from Egypt and Syria before the Arab armies entered Palestine in May 1948.

After that, I switched to the Socialist Party, which gave me an opportunity that many of my generation of students of Azhar education did not have;

The Azhari student was reading in heritage, and the civil education student was reading in Western thought, but I had the opportunity to read both in heritage and Western thought.

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When the events of the Palestinian cause intensified

I volunteered to be trained in weapons and go to Palestine, but because of my age and that Desouq was a small town, I did not have the opportunity to enter Palestine, and when the 1936 treaty between Egypt and England was canceled in 1951, I trained in weapons as well.

Then I also trained in weapons to go to the Suez Canal and fight the English army in the military bases there, but the Cairo fire happened and I postponed the matter.

But I was able to go to the channel to confront the tripartite aggression in 1956, when I had a relationship with the Egyptian left, which had cooperation between it and the government to confront the tripartite aggression.

At the primary and secondary levels - before joining the left - I had experience in spiritual struggle and non-tariqa mysticism, and I was preaching on the pulpit against the Sufi orders and teaching people the duties of religion and resisting injustice. Some people thought that I was aware of the details of the July revolution, and others thought that I was one of the righteous guardians of God.

And when the parties - including the Young Egypt and the Socialist Party - were abolished, we had no choice but to confront feudalism. The left at that time was the knight of the social issue and social justice, and it had a position on the national issue;

It was against military bases and foreign presence.

I had entered the left through the social issue, the revolutionary issue.

There are two issues that are necessary in my life - from the beginning until this date - which are: the issue of freedom and the liberation of the homeland, and the issue of social justice, which mobilized man to stand with the poor, and this is what made me belong to the left.

The left also allowed me to read Marxism and Western thought, and this added to me and did not deduct from me. There were many things in Marxism that I realized had parallels in Islamic thought, such as the idea of ​​debate and the relationship between social phenomena.

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One

of the consequences of my association with the left was that I was expelled from the university for a year;

Because I led a national and national convention, and I was arrested for about six years, which delayed my graduation to 1965 (instead of 1958).

During the period of imprisonment and detention - despite the torture in it - I worked on reading and writing. Pen and paper were forbidden, but we used to smuggle them through the jailers.

Because I am a farmer and have experience in agriculture, and this allowed me to contact the people of the oases.

During that period she wrote four books;

Before prison, I wrote a book about Arab nationalism and America’s conspiracies against the Arabs, while I was a student at Dar Al Uloom. I wrote it in the face of a leftist thought that denies the existence of an Arab nation, and I, with my Islamic heritage, realized that the Arab nation was formed with the advent of Islam, so I worked hard for a week and wrote this book, and it was the first book in Egypt publishes on Arab nationalism after the union between Egypt and Syria, printed in two editions and translated into Russian.

Written in 1957 and printed in 1958.

When I entered prison and things settled down, I started reading to develop this study. I wrote books: 'The Dawn of National Awakening', 'Arabism in the Modern Era', 'The Arab Nation and the Cause of Unity', and 'Israel Is Semitic?';

It is a study comparing the Zionist project and the Crusader project.

These books were published after I got out of prison.

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I entered the left for the social issue, but by reading and meditating in prison I realized that the solution to the social problem lies in Islam, in the theory of succession and not in the class struggle and Marxism, and this is what made me - after leaving prison in 1954 and obtaining a license in 1965 - devote myself to the intellectual project since the middle of the sixties.

There was a sharp polarization in the intellectual life between Westernization and the so-called Salafism, so it was Islamic moderation and Islamic renewal - that is, the connection with origins and roots with renewal - that preoccupied me.

My stances in the left, national and then Islamic phases matured and developed, but there were no sharp breaks between them.

I was a leftist in the revolutionary social sense, not in the ideological sense. There was no atheism;

Because the spiritual experience and the authentic religious formation prevented me from being absorbed in materialistic thought and material theory.

When I realized that the solution to the social problem was in Islam - and not in Marxism - this was the beginning of maturity in the Islamic position.

In the Nasserite period, there was a focus on the national and Arab dimension, and I was and still realize that nationalism is one of the circles of the Islamic League, so there was no contradiction between the victory for Arab unity and Arab nationalism and the Islamic circle.

In the left stage, I do not deny that a kind of intellectual ambiguity happened to me, and one of the negative aspects of the left stage - for me - is that I used to memorize many collections of poetry, then I forgot this in the left stage because I was occupied with publications and political activity, but the intellectual confusion began to disappear in the Islamic stage little by little. After 1967, the national project declined and the focus became on the Islamic circle.

Also, what deepened my Islamic position was the emergence of the Islamic awakening in the eighties, and the escalation of Western challenges to the Islamic awakening and the Islamic solution after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, which made me single out many books to confront Western thought and respond to the extremists of the secular, but the national and Arab circle, and the issue of social justice and revolution remained. Social injustice is noticeable in my writings, and the human circle and interaction with different civilizations has been present in my intellectual project.

As for the subject of Mu'tazila;

I wrote my master's and doctoral theses as a form of hobby, because from the beginning I resolved and prayed to God not to be an employee, and to devote all my time to intellectual work.

I wrote a master's in 1970 about the Mu'tazila and the problem of human freedom, and what prompted me to do this - an idea that I still maintain - is that I embrace all the nation's heritage, all the nation's sects, and do not ditch in a particular sect or sect.

I found that those who wrote about the Mu'tazila before me were writing about the Mu'tazila from the books of their opponents.

Because the Mu'tazila manuscripts had not been discovered, even Karl Brockelmann (d. 1956 AD) when he wrote 'History of Arabic Literature', he did not write about Mu'tazila manuscripts, and the Zaidi imams had collected the Mu'tazila heritage and imprisoned it and no one knew about it, and when I went in 1951 - on a mission from the University of The Arab countries and the Egyptian House of Books - to Yemen, learned about the newly discovered Mu'tazila heritage, and the Zaydiyyah had a relationship with the Mu'tazila, so they preserved their texts and manuscripts.

Before that, Taha Hussein (d. 1973 AD) had been interested in the manuscripts of Judge Abdul-Jabbar (d. 415 AH / 1025 AD) and he published “Al-Mughni” and many of these books. The rest of the sects, I wrote my doctoral thesis on the theory of the Imamate between the Mu'tazila and the Shi'ites and the various Sunni sects.

Moreover, the accusation of retiring is still present, but I say: I did not trench into a group, which did justice to the Mu'tazila as knights of Islamic rationality, and they were the knights of spreading Islam in the metropolises that were opened and where schools of philosophy were in them, so it was necessary for rational thought to confront these schools.

At the time when I was studying the Mu'tazilites, I was publishing the works of Rifa'a Rafi' al-Tahtawi (d. 1873 AD), Muhammad Abdo and Jamal al-Din al-Afghani (d. 1897 AD), Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibi (d. 1902 AD), Qasim Amin (d. 1908 AD) and Ali Mubarak (d. 1893 AD).

I invite those who consider retirement as a charge to distinguish between the Mu'tazila of Basra and the Mu'tazila of Baghdad, and the developments that occurred after that.

When I call for embracing all the nation’s heritage and selecting from it, I am against migrating to a sect and digging into its trench or rejecting a sect;

Salafi thought has great things about it, and when I approached Ibn Taymiyyah (d. 728 AH / 1328 AD) I wrote about him and his rationality, and now we are called the “new modernists,” and before we were called “the new heritage,” a name that was given to me, Tariq al-Bishri and Adel Hussein. (died 2001 AD).

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I started publishing at an early age ,

since I was in elementary school, and this gave me a feeling that this is my natural place. The most beautiful place to put my name is a newspaper or a book.

I used to consider the job a kind of slavery, and after we got out of prison, my fellow leftists found a job in the press and others based on a deal with the government.

When I asked the reason for this, I was told: There are many thieves and we want you to prevent theft in the association!

I told them: But there is a possibility that I will turn into a thief like them!

I realized that this job was an attempt to morally kill, my salary was twenty pounds, and I was taking an unpaid leave to spend most of my time (18 hours) in the Egyptian Book House (in the postgraduate stage), and sometimes I was paid seven pounds a month after deducting a period Holiday.

My father used to send me unleavened bread, bread, sugar and tea by train from the country.

I realized that this moral killing must be resisted, especially since I tried to work as a corrector in the printing press, but they refused, and after two or three years, I asked to be transferred to the Ministry of Culture in Heritage in the General Book Authority, and I began to work on heritage investigation, and I had the opportunity to review Islamic books with sensitivity Very poor salary.

I was often offered to go to Arab universities in the oil countries, but I refused;

Because myself did not allow me to work for a sponsor, and because my main goal was to devote myself to intellectual work, and what helped me in this was that my wife was so understanding of my intellectual ambition, that she left her postgraduate studies in agriculture and emptied the house and carried its burdens, and my house is a library, which I built again after I It was looted after the arrest.

I used to go daily to the book fair to buy books with the sums I collected, and my library grew until it covered all the walls of the house, and my wife was asking me: What do we do with books?

I tell her jokingly: We'll hang her on the ceiling.

My children were born in a library, and I had a method of teaching children to train from a young age on pictures and paper, and to develop a relationship between them and paper.

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Writing for me -

like reading and intellectual work in general - is a message, rather it is the mother of worship.

My office is a mihrab, and I believe that sincerity to what I believe is a matter of principle. People strive hard and may be wrong, but the important thing is sincerity in seeking the truth.

We are waging a fierce battle and a declared war on Islam, so I live in the face of challenges, and I have book projects that I neglected for many years because of these challenges.

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There are many flags that I have been influenced by in the moral aspect and intellectual stationing on the frontiers of Islam, more than I have been influenced by their writings;

The modern school that I was deeply affected by and belonged to is the school of revival and renewal, especially al-Afghani and Abdu, for their heritage was the starting point for the process of revival and renewal in the modern era.

There was a strong spiritual relationship between me and Sheikh Muhammad Al-Ghazali (d. 1996 AD), before I read the Sheikh’s books when I wanted to defend him against the Salafi attack on him.

I was very impressed with Abbas Al-Akkad (d. 1964 AD) in his Islamism and not in politics, and when I was on the left I was writing letters of criticism and severe attack, and he was replying to me in the newspaper “Akhbar Al-Youm”, I used to write under a pseudonym and he gave me violent responses;

Because he supported the King and the English, his political side made him less than he is.

In al-Akkad, I liked his self-taught, gigantism and pride. I saw him in Tahrir Square, and I admired him very much.

I also admired Taha Hussein, although his literary side is more than the intellectual side, but his career and struggle were sources of intellectual admiration for these figures.

However, I did not delve into the heritage of those who knew, except for the group that worked on spreading its heritage and ideas (Al-Tahtawi, Al-Afghani, Ali Mubarak, Muhammad Abdu and Qasim Amin), and I learned the verification of books from the investigation of Aisha Abdul Rahman (the girl of the beach who died in 1998 AD) to the letters of Abi Al-Ala Al-Maari (d. 449AH/1058AD).

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I make writing for me a wall against the surrounding influences ,

immersing myself in intellectual work so as not to be affected by the negatives that exist in social and political life.

Politics was divorced in the colloquial sense (state politics) because the reformist school - and in particular Muhammad Abdo - believed that the nation before the state and education before politics, and blamed the Islamic movements for their immersion in politics in the common sense.

Intellectual work and immersion in it is a cure even for the organic diseases that a person suffers from.

I used to write without a draft;

I bring the material of the book (chips and scraps) and write, then I found myself recently writing a draft that I review and then whiten, and write the draft on small scraps with a red dry pen, then write on beautiful lined paper, and make a margin for it with the ruler on both sides, and write with a black ink pen because I photograph it later ;

Black ink seems clearer.

I write in the morning after breakfast until lunch, then rest and write again.

In the past, circumstances were more conducive to writing, but health conditions require mitigation now, although the intellectual project is large, and many of my books are turned into sources for me, and the great training in using the sources has become a human being, although I do not work on the computer, but the experience in Sources and references are now helping a person to reach what he wants easily, but the blessing is abundant, praise be to God.

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There are books that I realized that reprinting them is not useful and in need of re-examination, these have stopped reprinting, and I mentioned this in my list of books, and there are things I wrote that I did not reconsider except that I wrote what corrected them.

Sometimes it relied on some sources and then found that they were not reliable, such as the book 'The Imamate and the Policy' (attributed to Ibn Qutayba al-Dinwari, who died 276 AH / 889 AD), so these writings were corrected.

But the journey is long;

I started writing since 1948, and it is normal for ideas to develop and revisions take place in curricula and rulings, and those who do not revise their ideas are the dead!

Therefore, I see that intellectual reviews and intellectual development are an advantage and a virtue.

In addition;

There is the issue of priorities and they differ from revisions. Each stage has its own priorities and challenges. In the national stage, the focus was on the Arab circle more than the Islamic circle, and in the Islamic stage, nationalism was included in the framework of the Islamic circle, then the focus was on Westernization and secular extremism.

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What I wrote about the national character of Islam

I emphasized that religious monotheism is just one aspect, but the other aspect is the unity of the nation. I had previously focused on national unity, but then I focused on Islamic unity. I was influenced by the idea of ​​class struggle, then I adopted the theory of succession and the theory of the nation, and the theory of balance, social justice, social security and interdependence.

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Because I had a complete cessation of this work, and I worked 18 hours every day, and I paid a price for that: cartilage, cervical vertebrae, etc., as well as the cessation of social relations, as even my relatives and children visit me more than I do, and people are familiar with this.

Another thing is that my books are about 240 books, but 100 of them are brochures or extracts from books.

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I wrote a pamphlet about “One Salafist or Salafis”, and I wrote about it in the book “Currents of Islamic Thought”, and Muhammad Abdo was talking about being a Salafist and wanted to understand religion as the predecessor of this nation understood it before the dispute arose.

Every human being is my ancestor, every human being has a past, but what is your past?

Is it the era of prosperity or the era of decline?

How do you deal with your predecessor?

Do you migrate from the present to the past, or are you inspired by the predecessors and the past to read the reality and solve the problems of reality?

So we have different predecessors.

Therefore, when I read Ibn Taymiyyah in recent years, I found amazing things about him, and some of those who read what I wrote about Ibn Taymiyyah from among the Salafis told me: Our sheikhs did not read Ibn Taymiyyah and did not understand him!

I have always distinguished in Salafism between the stage of Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal (d. 241 AH / 855 AD) and the reaction to Greek thought and Mu'tazili exaggeration, and between the development of Salafism according to Ibn Aqil al-Hanbali (d. 513 AH / 1119 AD), Ibn al-Jawzi (d. 597 AH / 1201 AD), Ibn Taymiyyah and Ibn al-Qayyim (d. 751AH/1350AD).

I also distinguish between the reaction of Imam Al-Ash'ari (d. 324 AH / 936 AD), and between the stage of development of Ash'ari thought according to Al-Isfraini (d. 418 AH / 1028 AD), Al-Juwayni (d. 478 AH / 1085 AD) and Al-Ghazali (d. 505 AH / 1111 AD).

It is necessary to be aware of the idea of ​​the development of systems within the Islamic sects, and it is an idea that makes man appear ancestral and progressive.

I consider myself a ancestor, a progressive, a revolutionary and a reformer at the same time, and there is no contradiction between these labels, but it is necessary to control who is your predecessor?

How do you deal with it?

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I have a great intellectual project ,

and repetition is possible;

When I want to write about Hassan Hanafi, for example, in the book “Reading the Religious Text” between Western interpretation, Islamic interpretation and absurd interpretations, and I find myself writing about this issue with Saeed Al-Ashmawi (d. 2013 AD), I can use the previous texts again and this is not a repetition, nor Deny repetition in the sentence, but reusing earlier material is not an enlargement of the project, but rather natural things in intellectual work.

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Many books ,

such as “The Landmarks of the Islamic Method,” which talks about the features of Islamic moderation, and it is a unique book in its chapter;

As well as what I wrote about “currents of Islamic thought” and the chaos of terminology, and what I wrote about refuting suspicions in general, and about the Qur’an and Sunnah, tolerance, human rights, the status of women, Sunnis and Shiites, religious war and jihad, and what I wrote in the face of Westernization projects and Western extremism and secular extremism in response to Nasr Abu Zaid (died 2010 AD), Hassan Hanafi and Saeed Al-Ashmawi.

وكذلك ما كتبته عن المعارك الفكرية التي دارت حول الشعر الجاهلي وعلي عبد الرازق (ت 1966م) وحول سلامة موسى (ت 1958م) ومستقبل الثقافة، وعن سيد قطب (ت 1966م) وانتمائه الحضاري القديم عندما رد على كتاب طه حسين ‘مستقبل الثقافة‘ سنة 1938، وفي الرد على تيارات التغريب سواء في تحقيق تراث المدرسة الوسطية الإسلامية (سلسلة "الأعمال الكاملة")، أم في التراث القديم ككتاباتي عن ابن رشد (ت 595هـ/1199م) وتحقيق ‘فصل المقال‘ له، وتحقيق ‘رسائل العدل والتوحيد‘ (= رسائل مختلفة لمجموعة من أئمة المعتزلة)، وهي أعمال اكتشفت من خلالها المساحة المشتركة بين تيارات الفكر الإسلامي.

• ما أهم ملامح هذا المشروع الفكري الذي تتحدث عنه باستمرار؟

– أن نبرز حقيقة الإسلام ومعالمه: العقيدة والشريعة والمنظومة الفكرية، والإحياء الإسلامي للمجتمع، والهداية الإسلامية للإنسان، وعالمية الإسلام، وأيضًا فقه الواقع الذي نعيش فيه وإنزال هذه الأحكام الإسلامية على الواقع الذي نعيش فيه، والتصدي للحرب المعلنة على الإسلام. باختصار: ما هو إسلامنا؟ ما هو الواقع الذي نحن بحاجة إلى فقهه وإلى أسلمته؟ وما التحديات التي تواجه هذا الإسلام؟ هذه هي معالم المشروع الفكري.

• هل ترى في هذا المشروع ميلاً نحو المحافظة بعد أن كنتَ ثوريًّا، وخاصة في المرحلة الأخيرة من حياتك؟

– هذا ليس محافظة؛ فعندما أكتب عن غلاة العلمانية والمتغربين يبدو أنني محافظ، وعندما أكتب في نقد الجمود والتقليد يبدو أنني ثوري وتقدمي؛ هذا موضوع يتعلق بالمجال الذي أكتب فيه، لكن هناك معالم أساسية لا تتغير وهي: الحفاظ على رؤيتي للإسلام ومعالم الإسلام، وعملي الدؤوب لإنهاض وإخراج الأمة من عنق الزجاجة الذي وقعت فيه، ومواجهة التحديات الغربية الشرسة والحرب الصليبية المعلنة على الإسلام.

5- المعارك والخصومات:
• يتهمك البعض أيضًا بأن لديك نزعة انفصالية تجاه الغرب؟

– بالعكس كتبت منذ أكثر من 30 سنة كتاب ‘الغزو الفكري وهم أم حقيقة‘، وقدمت فيه نظرية للعلاقة بين الحضارات، هي ليست من اختراعي ولكنها قراءة لتاريخ هذه العلاقة. ليس هناك أسوار صينية بين الحضارات، فالانغلاق يذيب الشخصية، والتبعية والتقليد تذيب الذات وتمسخها. ولذلك ميزت بين المشترك الإنساني العام، وهذا لا تتغير قوانينه بتغير الحضارات، وبين البصمة الثقافية العقدية والفلسفية وفي الآداب والفنون، فكل حضارة لها بصمتها وتميزها الثقافي.

أنا معجب بسيد قطب عندما يتحدث عن عبقرية الحضارة الغربية في الإبداع المادي، ولذلك أنا لا أقيم قطيعة مع الحضارة الغربية، ولكنني أتحفظ على الجانب المادي والفلسفي والوثني الذي انتقل إلى الحضارة الغربية من الفكر اليوناني، ومن باب أولى الغزو والاستعمار للعالم الإسلامي، فأنا أنادي بالتفاعل بين الحضارات، وأهاجم القطيعة والتبعية.

• كان ثمة هجوم عليك من الكنيسة القبطية، كيف تفسر ذلك؟

– لأن الكنيسة القبطية ساد فيها مشروع عنصري قومي، وقد نشأت لدينا في مصر سنة 1952 جمعية اسمها "الأمة القبطية" تقول: مصر كلها وطننا، اغتصبها العرب والمسلمون قبل أربعة عشر قرنًا، اللغة القبطية هي لغتنا، الإنجيل دستورنا، المسيح زعيمنا.

اختلفت هذه الجماعة مع الكنيسة سنة 1954 فاختطفوا البطريرك ثم قُبض عليهم في أبريل/نيسان من العام نفسه من قبل نظام جمال عبد الناصر (ت 1970م)، وكان منهم البابا شنودة (ت 2012م) الذي دخل الدير في يوليو/تموز 1954 وظهر في 1971 وتبنت الكنيسة هذا المشروع العنصري، ومن هنا بدأت الفتنة الطائفية. لم تكن لدينا في مصر فتنة طائفية قبل مجيء البابا شنودة.

أنا سألت السؤال الذي لم يسأله أحد وهو: لماذا لم تكن بمصر فتنة طائفية قبل مجي البابا شنودة؟ الأمر الذي أغضبهم، وأيضًا لأني كتبت ردودًا على منشورات تنصيرية توزع في مصر، وكتبتها بحكم عضويتي في مجمع البحوث الإسلامية، فالدولة طلبت بيان الحكم الشرعي في هذا، ومجلة "الأزهر" نشرتها في ملحقها.

كتبت عن الفتنة الطائفية والمشروع العنصري الذي يريد إحلال اللغة القبطية محل العربية، والذي يقول بالنص: "إنك إذا قلت للقبطي: إنك عربي فهذه إهانة"، ولذلك أشدتُ بمكرم عبيد (ت 1961م) عندما كتب في ‘الهلال‘ في أبريل/نيسان 1939 "مصريون عرب"، فأثبت عروبة المصريين قبل الفتح الإسلامي، وكان يدافع في المحاكم ويقرأ القرآن ويقول: أنا مسيحي ديانةً مسلم وطنًا.

• كيف تصف لنا علاقتك بالحركة الإسلامية عامة، وبالإخوان خاصة، وقد كنتَ مرتيْن الوسيطَ بين الإخوان والشيخ يوسف القرضاوي، وقدمتَ له عرض التنظيم بأن يكون المرشدَ العام؟

– الإخوان يثقون بي ويحبونني، وأنا أعتبر التنظيم كبرى الحركات الإسلامية، خاصة في ظل حالة التشرذم في الحركة والأحزاب، فليس لدينا رصيد في الشارع إلا الإخوان. سبق أن كتبت نقدًا للحركات ومنهم الإخوان؛ لأنهم ركزوا على السياسة بالمعنى الدارج، وأهملوا المشروع الإصلاحي، كما أهملوا الحديث عن الاحتلال الذي تعيشه الأمة والقواعد العسكرية التي تنتشر في كل بلاد الأمة، والأساطيل التي تنتشر في البحار والمحيطات.

أيضًا الإخوان أهملوا العدل الاجتماعي، رغم أنني حين كتبت عن حسن البنا وجدته يطالب بالإصلاح الزراعي قبل الحزب الشيوعي المصري، وكان لديه برنامج اجتماعي ثوري، وكذلك خاض الشيخ الغزالي معركته ضد الظلم الاجتماعي، وحتى سيد قطب كتب ضد الظلم الاجتماعي، ولكن كل هذا غاب. الإخوان رصيد كبير لا ينبغي أن نفرط فيه، ويجب أن نسانده.

• بعد وفاة الشيخ محمد الغزالي رحمه الله؛ يبدو أنك تحولت إلى فكرة رد الشبهات والدفاع عن الإسلام، وقد استغرق هذا منك الكثير من الجهد، وقد يُفهم هذا على أنه تراجع من البناء إلى الدفاع. ما خلفية هذا التحول؟

– في آخر لقاء بيني وبين الشيخ الغزالي في منزله؛ دخل وأحضر لي آخر كتبه ‘نحو تفسير موضوعي للقرآن الكريم‘، وكتب لي إهداء أحسست أنه يحمّلني الأمانة، كتب لي: "إلى أخي الحبيب د. عمارة داعية الإسلام وحارس تعاليمه. محمد الغزالي"، ثم سافر بعد ذلك إلى الجنادرية (في السعودية)، فتوفي ودُفن هناك في البقيع.

ولي قصة مع الشيخ؛ فقد كنت أسمع به ولم تكن لي به صلة، وكان ثمة معركة بين المشايخ وعبد الرحمن الشرقاوي (ت 1987م) حول كتاباته اليسارية، فألقى الشيخ الغزالي محاضرة في قَطَر عن الغزو الفكري الذي يتمدد في فضائنا، وذكر من بين الأسماء الشرقاوي ومحمد عمارة، ثم حكى الشرقاوي هذا الكلام في مقال له في صحيفة ‘الأهرام‘.

صادف أن قرأت المقال وفيه اسمي، ولكنني لم أتأثر؛ لأنني كنت أحب الغزالي من بعيد، ثم بعد أن قرأ الشيخ مجموعة مقالات لي -ولم يكن قد قرأ لي شيئًا قبلها- أرسل إلي رسالة، وقال لي فيها كلامًا هزني من الأعماق. قال: قالوا لي عنك إنك تفسر الشريعة تفسيرًا ماديًّا، وما كان يليق بمثلي أن يحكم على الرجال من خلال مقالات الآخرين، وإن القليل الذي قرأته لك ردني إلى الصواب في أمرك، ولقد ذهبتُ إلى الذين حدثوني عنك فقلت لهم: هذا عقاد العصر، وهذا وهذا…!

يقودنا هذا إلى الشيخ محمد متولي الشعراوي (ت 1998م) أيضًا؛ فقد كان يدرّس البلاغة في طنطا وأنا طالب، ولم تكن لديه مواهب أكثر من مدرس بلاغة، ثم شاء الله -في حقبة الستينيات عندما علا صوت الفكر المادي- أن يظهر الشعراوي فجأة في مواجهة هذا.

التقيت به في 1992 عندما أقمنا لجنة لعمل صلح بين وزارة الداخلية وجماعات العنف، وتوثقت العلاقة بيننا فكان يعلق عليّ آمالا كبيرة، وفي آخر لقاء بيني وبينه يوم وفاة الشيخ جاد الحق (ت 1996م)، كان الناس يستقبلون المعزين وكان هو يجلس على كرسي، فحين دخلت انتفض واقفًا وعانقني وقبلني ثم رفع يديه إلى السماء وقال: "ربنا يجعل فيك العوض، ربنا يجعل فيك العوض"! أحسست أن جبلاً وُضع على أكتافي!

• عملتَ فترة في الرقابة على الكتب وتقييمها، وكتابة تقارير فيها؛ فهل سبق لك أن أوصيتَ بمصادرة بعض الكتب التي قمتَ بتقييمها؟

– بحكم القانون المصري؛ فإن مجمع البحوث الإسلامية ذو ولاية على الشأن الديني، ولذلك فإن الأعمال الفنية أو الفكرية التي لها علاقة بالإسلام يستشار فيها المجمع، ومنها الكتب الواردة من الخارج، وبحكم عضويتي في المجمع يحيلون إليّ رقابة بعض الكتب. وقد راجعت بعض الكتب التنصيرية، وكنت أول من اقترح الرد عليها لا أن يُكتفى بكتابة تقرير عنها، واقترحت أن تُنشر هذه الردود كملاحق في مجلة ‘الأزهر‘.

وفي هذا الإطار؛ راجعت بعض كتب عبد الكريم سروش، ورغم أنك تختلف معه لكن لا تصادَر كتبه وإنما تُناقش وتُنقد، وكذلك كتب جمال البنا (ت 2013م)، راجعت له ستة كتب أجزت له خمسة منها، والكتاب السادس كان عن المرأة وفيه يتحدث عن أن عورة المرأة هي الثديان، وحتى "المايو البكيني" لا لزوم له! راجعت كذلك كتابًا لسعيد العشماوي عن الأصول المصرية لليهودية، يقدم فيه اليهودية باعتبارها فكرًا مصريًّا لا دينًا، طبعا يكذّب القرآن ويكذّب الروايات القرآنية.

لا أحبذ مصادرة الكتب؛ لأنني أضع نفسي مكان الكاتب، ولي تجربة شخصية في هذا الشأن. ففي الستينيات قدمت كتابي ‘فجر اليقظة القومية‘ إلى "الدار المصرية للتأليف والترجمة" التابعة لوزارة الثقافة، فأجازه المراقب ولكن رئيس مجلس الإدارة لم يكن يريد نشره بسبب خلفيتي اليسارية، فأحاله مجددًا إلى الشيخ أمين الخولي (ت 1966م). وكان لي أحد الأصدقاء من تلامذة الشيخ، فكلمه في شأن الكتاب ولكن الشيخ لم يعجبه الأمر مخافة الشبهة!

ثم ذهبت إلى الشيخ الخولي لأول مرة سنة 1965 فقال لي: أختلف معك في كذا وكذا، لكن لك وجهة نظر، ولديك أسلوب مميز فاحرص عليه. كتب الخولي عن كتابي تقريرًا إيجابيًّا لم يُكتب من قبلُ، وعندما ذهبت إلى الدار المصرية أسألهم عن الكتاب رحبوا بي وقدموا لي قهوة! ولكن رئيس مجلس الإدارة كان مصرًّا على عدم نشره، فأرسله مجددًا إلى مكتب جمال عبد الناصر للشؤون العربية برئاسة حسن صبري الخولي (ت 1985م)، فأحال الكتاب إلى المعهد العالي للدراسات الاشتراكية.

It happened that the person to whom the book was referred read my first book on Arab nationalism and was impressed with my ideas, so he approved the book and then received a reward of one hundred pounds.

But I had spent it running after the book.

Therefore, when I examine books, I put myself before the author, and I stayed for many years reviewing Islamic books in the General Book Authority, and I rescued authors from neglect whose names had been crossed out;

But I discovered a genius in them.

My job is to make my observations and the author reconsiders them and then authorizes the book.

I am keen to preserve the conscience of the author and the creator in dealing with books.