Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah
Tāriqu l-Ḥakīm, called
bi Amr al-Lāh (Arabic الحاكم بأمر الله "Ruler by God's Command"), was the sixth
Fatimid Caliph in
Egypt, ruling from
996 to
1021.
Born in
Egypt in
985, Ḥakīm succeeded his father
Abū Mansūr Nizār al-ˤAzīz in
996 at the age of eleven. Because it had been unclear whether he would inherit his father's position, this successful transfer of power was a demonstration of the stability of the
Fatimid dynasty. In his long reign as
Khalīfa, Ḥakīm extended
Fatimid rule to the Emirate of
Aleppo.
Ḥakīm's most rigorous and consistent opponent was the
Abbāsid Caliphate in
Baghdad, which sought to halt the influence of
Ismailism. This competition lead to the
Baghdad Manifesto of
1011, in which the Abbāsids claimed that the line Ḥakīm represented did not legitimately descend from .
Ḥakīm also struggled with the
Qarmatiyya rulers of
Bahrain, an island in the Persian Gulf. His diplomatic and missionary vehicle was the
Ismā'īlī daˤwa, with its organizational power center in
Cairo.
Ḥakīm's reign was characterized by a general unrest. The Fatimid army was troubled by a rivalry between two opposing factions, the Turks and the Berbers. Tension grew between the Caliph and his viziers (called
wasītas ""), and near the end of his reign the
Druze movement, a religious sect centered around Ḥakīm, began to form. It was the Druze who first referred to Ḥakīm as "Ruler by God's Command".
In
1005 Ḥakīm founded the
Dar al-ˤIlm "
House of Knowledge", with its great public library; there philosophy and astronomy were taught in addition to purely Islamic studies of the
Qur'ān and
ahadīth. In
1013 he completed the
mosque in
Cairo begun by his father, the
Masjid al-Ḥakīm "Ḥakīm's Mosque".
Ḥakīm is also known for his persecution of
Christians and
Jews and other strange behavior. In
1009, he destroyed the
Church of the Holy Sepulchre in
Jerusalem, then under
Fatimid control and persecuted the
Christians and other
dhimmis in
Palestine. Towards the end of his reign he became increasingly erratic and feared by those around him - high ranking officials were executed frequently (including the
Vizir Barjuwan), and a series of idiosyncratic laws were enacted, including the prohibition of
Mulūkhiyya, a characteristic Egyptian dish, as well as the prohibition of
chess. Ḥakīm allegedly punished cheating merchants by having a one of his slaves,
Masoud, sodomize them.
Ḥakīm disappeared in
1021 on a trip to the Muqattam Hills. Although he presumably died, the
Druze believe he had been hidden away by God and will return as the
Mahdi on Judgement Day.
Ḥakīm was succeeded by his young son
Ali az-Zahir under the regency of his sister
Sitt al-Mulk.
*
Al-Hakim*
Institute of Ismaili Studies: al-Ḥakīm bi-Amr Allah.
