Anglophone scholars of Islam, who do not have reading comprehension of French, will be familiar with Joseph Arthur de Gobineau (1816-1882) through his infamous Inequality of Human Races, and through his reputation as “the father of racist ideology.” They may also have come across The World of the Persians and Selected Political Writings, as well as some of his novels.

This short study will present themes in Gobineau’s oeuvre by referencing what has been made accessible by Daniel O’Donoghue in Comte de Gobineau and Orientalism: Selected Eastern Writings. O’Donoghue has translated sizeable extracts from two of Gobineau’s most important works: Trois ans en Asie and Les religions et philosophies dans l’Asie centrale. From this point onward page numbers given in brackets will refer to pages in O’Donoghue’s translation. Those interested in studying the work of Gobineau in more depth may consider the resources already cited above as well as Father of Racist Ideology by Michael Denis Biddiss, Gobineau’s Hidden Social Theory by Francesco Maiello or The Philosophy of the Count de Gobineau by G. M. Spring, among other works, including numerous doctoral dissertations.

Although Gobineau spreads all sorts of stereotypes regarding Persians and other ethnic groups (33, 85, 105, 108), the author is, in many regards, sympathetic to his subjects (3). It should be remembered that this is a man who, since he was a child, loved the East, called himself a Muslim, and yearned to make the pilgrimage to Mecca (2). He was also highly critical of European imperialism (3). Despite the sensitivity he often showed for his subjects, Gobineau made some monumental mistakes regarding Shi‘ism and Sufism.

Although he provided little to no evidence to substantiate his claims, Gobineau advanced the theory that Shi‘ism was a Persian response to the Arab conquest. He asserts that the attraction the Persians feel for ‘Ali was “a sort of disguised protest against the Arabs and therefore against Islam itself” (37), that Persian nationality manifests itself in the veneration of the Imams “which borders on worship” (26), and that this “cult of the Imams’ places them above the Prophet” (38). For Gobineau, Shi‘ism, “strangely disfigured Islam” (133) “would have been unrecognizable to Muhammad’ (37) is “full of sentiments, ideas, prescriptions borrowed from Magism” (63). In short, Gobineau believes that the Sassanid religion was more or less resurrected as Shi‘ism (131).

According to Gobineau, “The only way…of understanding Persian ideas in matters of faith is to consider…suppressed cults or beliefs” (41). He insists that “Kitman serves as a kind of perpetual carnival” (122) and that the Persians engage in some sort of collective hypocrisy (8, 35). He claims that the Persians care more about Jamshid and Cyrus than about the Prophet (25). He shares the belief of a Sufi who claimed that there was not a single absolute Muslim in all of Persia (122). Since the Persians have such a predilection for preserving and practicing secret suppressed religions, Gobineau concludes that “the masses are in reality not Muslim” (41). He even attributes the origin of several Shi‘a sects stretching as far as Syria to the Persian partiality for the descendants of ‘Ali (38). As historians are aware, and Gobineau most certainly ignored, the Persian masses only embraced Shi‘ism after the Safavids (who ruled from 1501-1736) imposed Twelver Shi‘ism as their state religion. Prior to this period, the most important Shi‘a scholars had been Arabs (218).

Basing himself on oral sources, Gobineau attributes extremist ideas to mainstream Twelver Shi‘as. When speaking of the Imams, he claims that “The world is preserved, justified, directly led only by them and their actions” (132). This belief, of course, belongs to a group of extremist Shi‘as known as the mufawwidah or delegators. The notion that the world is sustained by the Imams is also attributed to the Shaykhis. This extremist doctrine, however, is anathema to Twelver Shi‘ite theologians. Gobineau also claims that in Shi‘ism, “reading the Koran without the participation of a mullah was a grave heresy” (37) and can lead to “excommunication” (131). It suffices to say that no Twelver Shi‘a scholar has ever taken such a stance. Although a process of excommunication exists among the Isma‘ilis, no such practice exists in Twelver Shi‘ism.

The French orientalist also asserts that “other than in Persia Islam has no priests and no provision for them” (37). But Twelver Shi‘ism is not structured like a Church. Shi‘as do not have priests and clerics: they have scholars. These scholars are not appointed from above, but rise up in rank on the basis of their academic achievements. Shi‘a scholars are primarily jurists and not intermediaries or intercessors with the Divine. The most learned of them are followed exclusively in matters of law, not articles of faith. Furthermore, Shi‘as are free to select the jurist they wish to emulate, and can change their legal allegiance at any time. The claim that Shi‘as have a priesthood is incorrect and represents the imposition of a Catholic construct on Shi‘a Islam.

Gobineau provides a particularly harsh assessment of the Shi‘a scholars of his times. He states that “the Muslim clergy of Persia largely merits the disdain and hatred it inspires” (40). While he admits that there may be some exceptions, he stresses that he has not seen any and that, even were they to exist, they cannot redeem an entire corps (41). Since Gobineau lived from 1816-1882, and served as the first secretary in the French embassy in Tehran from 1855-1856, as chargé d’affaires until 1858, and then as minister to Persia in 1862-1863, he was a contemporary of leading Shi‘a scholars such as Muhammad-Hasan Najafi (d. 1849), Shaykh Murtada Ansari (d. 1864), Muhammad Mahdi Qazwini (d. 1882), Muhammad ‘Irwani (d. 1888), Hasan Shirazi (d. 1894), Muhammad-Hasan Mamaqani (d. 1895), Jamal al-Din Asadabadi (1838-1897), Muhammad Shirazi (d. 1896), Husayn Tihrani (d. 1908), Fadl Allah Nuri (1843-1909), Muhammad-Kazim Yazdi (d. 1918), and Muhammad Taqi Shirazi (d. 1919). While there are always bad apples, such as court clerics and quietists, condemning the entire class of Shi‘a scholars is inappropriate.

Besides attacking the ‘ulema’, Gobineau attempts to undermine the sources which they employ. He claims that Shi‘a scholars developed their doctrines on the basis of a multitude of hadiths “of which no one but themselves in the entire Muslim world has ever heard, and multiplying those traditions according to their needs” resulting in “voluminous collections as to defy the imagination” (37). Evidently, if Gobineau had any familiarity with Sunni and Shi‘a sources, he would have known that there is an enormous degree of overlap between both bodies of traditions and that the majority of spurious sayings were excluded from the canonical books of traditions.

Although millions of traditions were circulating during the early centuries of Islam, only a small percentage of them were authentic. Bukhari, for example, collected more than 600,000 traditions, and only accepted 7,275 as authentic, many of which are repetitions, bringing the total number of trustworthy traditions to 3,000. Abu Dawud accepted only 4,800 traditions out of 50,000. The main hadith collection accepted by the ‘Ibadis contains 1,005 authentic traditions. According to an ‘Ibadi tradition, there are only 4,000 authentic traditions in total. As for Kulayni, he collected 15,176 traditions of which 5,072 are considered authentic. So, there is no question that thousands of sayings were falsely attributed to the Prophet and the Imams. Still, the overwhelming majority of these spurious sayings were long suppressed from the canonical books of traditions. What remains are mostly authentic, good, and weak narrations.

The mistakes made by Gobineau are virtually interminable. Not only is he misinformed about the Shaykhis (41-42), he gets the Usuli-Akhbari dispute all wrong (9), and falsely attributes the belief in the ritual impurity of infidels and certain animals to Magism (63). He is particularly harsh on the Arabs alleging that they did not create anything new, but merely incorporated remnants of conquered civilizations (7). Consequently, there is no such thing as “Islamic” civilization (7). Gobineau describes Sunni Islam as a “meagre and very dry branch of Chaldaism” (123). He claims that Islamism is vague and uncertain, that is has inconsistent principles, that its moral teaching is imperfect, and that it has no sense of justice (128-129). He also asserts that the Islamic empire, which stretched from Spain to India, suffocated Muslims under its dominion (131). He even claims that Persians “arise from a mixture of Arabic speaking and consequently Semitic multitudes” (30). Evidently, historical, linguistic, and DNA studies certainly do not support this. If the Shi‘as seem hard hit, Gobineau claims that Sufis are not Muslims (38, 43). He sums up Sufism as the bringer of “Quietism, beng and opium” (10), evidently unaware that some of the greatest soldiers of Islam were Sufis, including Imam Shamil (1797-1871) and Omar Mokhtar (1862-1931), among legions of others ferocious fighters from the advent of Islam to the present day.

Gobineau also makes the strange assertion that the Qur’an adopted a “talismanic style” filled with alliteration (127). For a person who claims to have read the Qur’an under the guidance of a mullah, Gobineau seems to have little sense of the style of the scripture. And, just when he thinks he has convinced the credulous reader that Shi‘ism is simply some secret form of Zoroastrianism; he professes that “Persian Islam is half Hindu” (47). He argues that “the continual movement of heresies that torment the Muslim world, particularly in Persia, and which at every moment revives, reawakens, renews, or imports notions of Indian theology into Koranic law” (80).

When speaking of Persian culture and society, Gobineau makes a number of outlandish claims. He asserts that, at the age of seven or eight, boys receive a woman to take care of them, and that these women are wives (92). Clearly, the women in question are nannies, and not spouses. He also claims that “It is unusual for a woman to reach the age of twenty-three or four without having had a least two husbands, and often many more, for divorces are obtained with excessive facility” (92).

In this case, he refers to a real practice, that of fixed-term marriages, but ignores that they do not end in divorce but expire, and greatly exaggerates their prevalence. According to Gobineau, “The custom still exists in Persia of taking a husband to make the pilgrimage to Karbala or Mecca when the real husband is unable to accompany his wife; but upon return the temporary husband ceases to be part of the family” (93). This comical claim, namely, that married women can take temporary husbands, may have been inspired by the practice of marrying single women to older, married men, while performing pilgrimages. These contracts stipulate that no sexual relations will take place and the “husband” really assumes the role of a mahram relative, thus permitting the woman in question to share the same living accommodations during her travels. After engaging in a long-series of disparaging remarks regarding Persian women, Gobineau surprisingly states that “in my quality as European I have seen none of them and speak by mere hearsay” (94).

Evidently, not all is erroneous in Gobineau. He was one of the first observers to point out the widespread use of the “Allah lexicon” among the Persians, particularly in the use of expressions such as inshallah, mashallah, khudavand-i alam, hazrat-i payghambar and salvat allah ali hu ala [sic] (35). The last transliteration, in particular, demonstrates Gobineau’s inability to properly decipher Persian pronunciation. As all Iranians are aware, the words are salvat Allah alayhi va ‘ala aalih. Despite coming across a socio-linguistic jewel, Gobineau is quick to dismiss the sincerity of these sayings, asserting that “scarcely one out of twenty Persians corresponding to his portrait believes what he is saying” (35). He does provide some inside information regarding the Ahl-i Haqq which he obtained from his valet, who was a “saint” or leader in the cult (45-64). Gobineau is also an important source on the early history of Baha’ism.

Like a mad genius in the process of brainstorming, and coming up with all kinds of absurd ideas, Gobineau occasionally shows signs of insight. Properly disciplined, controlled, and directed, some of these disjointed ideas could have been developed into something meaningful. His claim that Catholic religious dramas were borrowed from Shi‘a ta‘ziyyahs is interesting (116). According to available evidence, however, the flagellation rituals which take place during ‘Ashura were only introduced in the 1500s by extremist Shi‘as or ghulat of Turkish extraction who may have adopted the practice from Christian penitents. Could the process have been the inverse? Could the Christian holy week flagellants been inspired by Shi‘as? The hypothesis, however weak, might deserve some exploration.

Although he thought he was formulating a new theory, Gobineau’s insistence that the Prophet was not illiterate was not novel (125). It is amply supported by Shi‘a sources which stress that the Prophet and the Imams were literate, not only in Arabic, but in virtually every other language imaginable. When speaking of the Arabia, he wrote that “Today there is no less Muslim country in all of Islam” (124), an academically inappropriate overgeneralization. He also presents the Prophet in a positive light, describing him as a serious man of gentle ways, who was selfless, had enormous good will, and a love for justice (128). Although he insists on Muhammad’s authorship of the Qur’an, he recognizes it as a literary masterpiece (126-127). He also accurately assesses the literary value of the Bab’s (1819-1850) books:

The style of ‘Ali Muhammad is dull and lacking in brilliance, of tiresome rigidity, of dubious richness, of suspect correctness. Not all of the many obscure points one finds stem from intention, but rather many of them are merely the manifestation of an obvious incapacity. The Koran has absolutely nothing to fear from the comparison…the Koran, in literary terms, is undeniably the work of a great genius, whereas the Sura of Joseph, or, better said, the commentary thereon, closely resembles the work of a schoolboy. (136)

As mediocre, misinformed, and misguided as Gobineau’s ideas may have been, they were eagerly embraced by his fellow orientalists. Ernst Renan (1823-1892), Paul Anton de Lagarde (1827-1891), Richard August Reitzenstein (1861-1931), Edgard Blochet (1870-1937), and Edward Granville Browne (1862-1926) all helped to spread the stubbornly held theory that Shi‘ism was a Persian response to the Arab conquest.

Gobineau’s ideas on Persian race/history might also be said to have filtered directly or indirectly via other western Orientalists through to Iranian secularists and nationalists of the last nineteenth and early twentieth century such as Mirza Aqa Khan Kirmani, Ahmad Kasravi and those who today glorify Iran’s ancient but condemn its more recent Islamic past. Nikki Keddie has noted the fashion among certain Iranians for “glorification of ancient Iran and its religion, the hatred of Arabs and their identification with Islam and of both with Iran’s downfall” (14).

Since he greatly exaggerated the differences between Sunnism, Shi‘ism, and Sufism, and attempted to place them into racial categories, Gobineau’s ideas proved useful for imperialists and missionaries on a mission to divide and conquer the Muslim world.

Although he praises the Qur’an and the Prophet, Gobineau undermines both by insisting that Muhammad based the holy book on a combination of Christian Apocrypha, Jewish traditions, and Aramaic philosophy (127). While not the first to make such a claim, Gobineau has certainly inspired the likes of Patricia Crone (b. 1945) and Michael Cook (b. 1940), who argue that Islam is a Jewish heresy; Gerd Rüdiger Puin (b. 1940) and Christoph Luxenberg, who stress the existence of a significant Christian substrate; and John Edward Wansbrough (1928-2002) who emphasize a Judeo-Christian origin to Islam.

Like many orientalists, Gobineau had a poor command of Arabic and Persian (212, n. 5; 228, n. 8; 229, n. 16). He favoured imagination and intuition over the scholarly method, basing himself on flights of fancy rather than fact. Although he speaks with authority, his understanding of Islam, in all its expressions, was incomplete, as was his understanding of Muslim cultures in general. His Religions and Philosophies of Central Asia reads more like travel literature than scholarship, positioning himself as the outsider who asserts to have seized the essence of the “other” when, in reality, he has scarcely scratched the surface of his subject.

As much as Gobineau may have loved the East, the path to perdition is paved with good intentions. Ultimately, as a result of his influential theories, Gobineau did a great deal of damage to Islam and Muslims. The stereotypes he sowed, and the theoretical weeds he planted, have proven exceedingly difficult to uproot. The situation has been further complicated by the fact that his followers have fertilized them for over a century. Far from being beneficial plants, Gobineau’s theories deserved to be declared as noxious invasive weeds. For scholars seeking to understand the basis of many orientalist ideas, with the view to perhaps eradicating them, a study of Comte de Gobineau is essential.