The Divine Tragi-Comedy of the Taliban
Cheikh Anta Diop in his classic Cultural Unity of Africa, deconstructed Northern Cradle culture from Southern, i.e., European culture from Afro-Asian-Latin culture. As per theatre, Diop deconstructed Northern Cradle drama with perennial themes of murder, lust for power, debauchery, hubris and other self deprecating themes in the deep structure of this literature as evidenced from the Greeks to Shakespeare. Of course, environmental factors were critical in the Northern cradle's cultural pathology. Diop told us how the cold environment made its inhabitants kill the stranger and ask questions later, while in the Southern Cradle we welcomed the stranger as an honored guest. Of course in his classic work, The Destruction of African Civilization, Chancellor Williams said our anti-zenophobia that led to our destruction 6,000 years ago. When we allowed, no, when we welcomed the stranger into our house, our destruction was set in stone, though we did not know it. Alas, in modern times, in Afghanistan's similar custom of treating guests as royalty, especially when Osama bin Laden was their guest, has led to their present crisis. Yes, after twenty years, the Taliban won the final battle with the American and European infidels, but have they won the war, for war is politics by other means and politics is war by other means, though let there be no doubt the Taliban are in power and thus victorious, alas, a tragi-comedy of he who laughs last laughs the longest.
But let us note in the Southern Cradle dramatic tradition, Diop noted how African drama evolved in harmony with nature, and we now speak of the most dramatic natural event from the Congo to the 4,000 miles of the Hapi River, aka, Nile with its annual ebb and flow or destruction and resurrection of agricultural life, the prototype of human life in the Southern Cradle, thus the critical myth-ritual was not death but the eternal joy of resurrection dramatized in the myth-ritual drama of Osiris, the prototypical myth-ritual drama. (See Kersey Graves, The Sixteen Crucified Saviors before Christ).
Diop declares there is no African or Southern Cradle in which murder or tragedy is the endgame. Alas, as per the Taliban's abysmal ignorance and reactionary religiosity, do we not sense they are in the tragi-comedy tradition of the Southern Cradle that Diop deconstructed for us in his Cultural Unity of Africa?
Thus, no matter the extreme reactionary religiosity of the Taliban, the future of Afghanistan is in the very definition of Talib, i.e., student. As students who were in power twenty years ago and have been blessed to regain power, shall they reveal themselves as sycophants of Ya'um jahiliya (days of ignorance) or shall they transcend to enjoy the Southern Cradle dramatic tradition of joy and happiness after crucifixion and resurrection, i.e., ascension.
Let us pray for the Taliban and all the suffering people of Afghanistan at this hour. They are the valiant people who destroy empires, from Alexander the Great to Babylon the Great, the USA.
I love the lyrics of that old song Don't Mess Bill, Leave My Billie alone. Alas, don't mess with nobody who doesn't fear death because he is an intractable enemy as the Taliban proved to be.
--El Muhajir/Marvin X
10/20/21
