The Logic behind the Succession of Saintliness among the Bedouins of the Western Desert of Egypt : An Integration of the theories of Arab Descent and Islamic Saint Veneration

本研究通过对埃及西部沙漠贝都因人中“穆拉比廷”人所处的社会边缘地位的分析，试图将阿拉伯后裔理论与伊斯兰圣崇拜理论相结合。它澄清了一个事实，即圣徒的后裔群体是穆拉比廷人的原型，因为他们既体现了伊斯兰教义中圣徒的边缘地位，也体现了阿拉伯后裔体系中附庸部落的边缘地位。同时，本研究在对伊斯兰圣人崇拜的研究中引入了一个罕见的案例，缺乏苏菲主义或伊斯兰神秘主义的元素。数据的数字化，包括首席调查员自1988年以来在贝都因人中收集的实地记录和照片，几乎已经完成。尽管如此，需要对数据进行更精确的交叉引用。不幸的是，传统贝都因仪式歌曲的翻译仍然不完整，因为没有充分确保土著助手的合作，这是不可或缺的因素。这项研究的一个成果是首席研究员在两个国际研讨会上阅读论文，一个是2001年10月在日本木萨拉津举行的题为“穆斯林社会的活力：伊斯兰地区研究的新视野”的研讨会，另一个是2002年9月在德国美因茨举行的第一届中东研究世界大会。这些论文现在正被改写，准备与泰勒和弗朗西斯出版社的论文集一起出版，该出版社的首席研究员恰好是一名编辑。他还准备了三篇日文文章，介绍这项研究的结果。这些内容将被收录在名为“伊斯兰地区研究”的八卷丛书中，计划由东京大学出版社于2003年和2004年出版。

Through an analysis of the marginal position that is socially occupied by the "Murabiteen" people among the Bedouins of the Western Desert of Egypt, this research sought to integrate the theories of Arab descent and Islamic saint veneration. It served to clarify the fact that the descendant groups of saints are an archetype of the Murabiteen, because they embody both the marginality of the saints in the Islamic doctrines, and that of the client tribes in the Arab descent system. At the same time, the research introduced into studies on Islamic saint veneration a rare case, which lacked an element of Sufism or Islamic mysticism.Digitalization of the data, including field notes and photos which the head investigator had collected among the Bedouins since 1988, was almost completed. All the same though a more refined cross referencing of the data needs to be done. Unfortunately the translation of traditional Bedouin ritual songs has remained incomplete, due to the fact that the cooperation of native assistants, an indispensable factor, was not adequately secured.A fruit of the research was the fact that the head investigator read papers at two international symposiums, one entitled "The Dynamism of Muslim Societies : Toward New Horizons in Islamic Area Studies," which was held at Kisarazu in Japan in October, 2001, and the other being the first World Congress of Middle East Studies at Mainz in Germany, on September, 2002. Those papers are now being rewritten for publication along with a collection of treatises by Taylor & Francis, where the head investigator happens to be an editor. He is also preparing three articles in Japanese encompassing the results of this research. These are due for inclusion in an eight volume series of books entitled "Islamic Area Studies," scheduled for publication by the University of Tokyo Press in 2003 and 2004.