The Luzumiyat

by Abu al-ʻAlaʼ al-Maʻarri

At the height of the Islamic Golden Age, in the first half of the 11th century, the Arab poet and freethinker Abu al-ʻAlaʼ al-Maʻarri touched off an entire literary scene around himself in his hometown of Maʻarra, Syria. With a religious skepticism bordering on atheism, al-Maʻarri attacked the established religious orthodoxy of his day, venturing to criticize Islamic, Christian, and Jewish doctrines alike. Calling himself “thrice-imprisoned” by his blindness, isolation, and physical embodiment,