jordan pulse -

Prof. Ali Hayasat

I write this piece aware I tread rugged ground, where political despotism, closed religious discourse, and a complicit culture form a suffocating triangle that grips the Arab spirit. This triangle never sanctified the past out of love for heritage, but weaponised it to justify tyranny, turning it into an idol summoned to tame peoples.

From the moment the caliphate turned into kingship under Muawiya ibn Abi Sufyan, the outlines of this alliance between politics, religion, and culture were drawn. Rule relied not only on the sword, but also on gold and loyalties. Poets were bought with gifts, clerics tempted with mounts, obedience to rulers likened to obedience to God and His Messenger. Since then the scene repeats: authority purchases loyalty, religion justifies despotism, intellectuals beautify ugliness.

Today, despite all our slogans of progress, we remain captives of the same game. The politician speaks of protecting identity but in truth guards power. The cleric waves texts without context, silencing questions under fear of sedition. The intellectual, meant to be society’s conscience, often echoes power instead, weaving new illusions rather than breaking old ones.

The ordinary citizen is the weakest link. Publicly he applauds, inwardly he suffocates. He battles poverty, unemployment, and blocked horizons, yet is asked to chant for the nation as though hunger and humiliation vanish with fiery speeches or sacred slogans. Thus society becomes a theatre of collective hypocrisy.

Renaissance will not come from pompous orations or recycling past glories, but from breaking the suffocating triangle. We need courage to reread history critically, expose narratives forged by political power, and distinguish what inspires the future from what hinders it. We need bravery to confront political despotism, ground legitimacy in justice and freedom, and liberate religion from clerics who hijacked it, so it returns as a voice of mercy and dignity, not fear and restraint.

The wait has dragged on too long. Change is no longer an intellectual luxury but a condition for survival. If we surrender to the whirlpool of the past, corruption will recycle, tyranny will be inherited, and religious-cultural discourse will regenerate illusion. But if we face truth with courage, we realise no saviour comes from outside or descends from history — salvation lies in our consciousness, will, and boldness to say ‘enough’.

True deliverance begins when the Arab chooses to live free — neither follower nor slave — when he writes his history anew and believes the future is not predestined fate, but a horizon seized through work, courage, and will.