Monday, March 07, 2011

The first party of Hizbullah in the Arab World in 1931 (in Syria)

I was going through my papers the other days and I realized that I had found at the Widener Library at Harvard a book (among many) that I had copied.  This one is an Internal Rules And Admissions Conditions for the Society of Hizbullah in Aleppo.  It was founded by Bashir Kamal and the book (or booklet) was published in 1359 AH (1931 AD).  The party's goals appear to be rather centered on peace and tolerance but then quickly turn to Christian puritanical/Victorian values.  It stipulates in Article 18, for example, that Hizbullah members should "lower their gazes when women pass near them and that they abstain from reading arousing love stories or crime stories, and that members should not put in their houses nude portraits (or illustrations) of women or men, or of love situations that are offensive to morals or timidity." (p. 13).Article 23 advises members to only marry one woman (p. 17).  Article 26 stipulates non-membership in "political societies".(p. 18).  Its conception of religion is very flexible and permissive: it says that if people are overweight, prayer may be too cumbersome for them.