Khalil Ahmad Khalil (Arabic:خليل أحمد خليل) is a Lebanese intellectual, researcher, translator, prolific, and academic.^[1][2] He was born in 1942^[3] in Sur, South Lebanon. He has many works in the fields of sociology in religion, politics, culture and philosophy, as well as a great number of translations, including Lalande's Encyclopedia of Philosophy^[4] and the glossary of philosophical terms.^[5][6] He is considered one of the most prominent Arab intellectuals of the 20th century, and a leading member of the Progressive Socialist Party.^[7] He joined the Party in 1968, and retired all organizational politics work after the assassination of Party leader Kamal Jumblatt.^[8] He received a prize^[9] for his published works and translations, which enriched the Arabic library, as well as his academic achievement in the Lebanese University.^[7][10]

Early life

Khalil Ahmad Khalil was born on the 12th of November 1942 in Sur. The death of two of his siblings had been a traumatizing event for his mother. In addition, he initially lived in this city, but later moved to live in a village with his grandmother Souda Al Shamiya, in Gaana, South Lebanon. However, he mostly lived with his aunt Mila’a.

Khalil studied in the English School in Sur, one of the oldest missionary schools in the city. He then received Quranic education when he was in the care of his uncle Ash Sheikh Muhammed Ali As Saaya. He also studied grammar, learning eloquence and the richness of the Arabic language. Afterwards, he studied in Hanouiyeh School, where he learned French in the first and second grade of his elementary school. He returned to his parents’ home in Sur when he turned ten years old and enrolled in the Jafaria School, where he received his official certificate. Khalil then lived some of his teenage years in a boarding school in Bahamdoun (the Arabic Institution), there he studied two grades of his senior year in one academic year. Before the end of the school year, he returned to Sur. Khalil was the only student that passed their baccalaureate examinations.^[8] Additionally, he studied philosophy in Sidon.

As a child living in the villages of Jabal ‘Amil, Khalil witnessed the 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight and the suffering of Palestinian refugees, as a result, he started his political and national work. The foundation of this, however, was built in Jafaria School that embraced many parties and political movements within it, examples: Arab Ba'ath movement, Syrian Social Nationalist Party, Arab Nationalists, and communists. All of these parties were present in his school of Sur.

Cultural and political activity

Khalil Ahmad Khalil originally started his cultural activity as a poet in 1963 under the guidance of Syrian-Lebanese poet Adunis. At the time, Adunis published his book Assawt Al Akhar, a book on modernism, discussing Khalil's poetry collection Al Abwab. In addition, Adunis translated “Khorooj”, one of the poems in the collection. Khalil also published the following four poetic works: Yawmīyāt Fallāḥ Fī Al-Ġābaẗ Al-H̱amrāʼ, Mzāmyr Al-Twrh Al-Fakīrah, Byr Āl-Slāsl, and Nwr ʿlā Ǧdār Al-Mwt. He also published many of his poems in magazines and newspapers. The last poem he published, “Rwāya Al-Rwāya” was in Al-Adab Journal in the days of the late writer Suhayl Idris. Khalil's poems are collected in two volumes.^[11]

Khalil's popularity was not for his poetry, but for being a prominent sociologists in the Arab world, and that is in all three fields of teaching, writing, and translation, particularly in political sociology.^[11] In the ‘60s, he started his journey in writing poetry and literature, and gradually progressed to specialized studies. He also worked later on dictionaries, encyclopedias, and translations, the most famous of which being his translation of Lalande's Encyclopedia of Philosophy, which was published by Oueidat Editions & Publications in 1991.^[11]

In 2006, after Khalil retired from the Institute of Social Sciences in the Lebanese University, he continued his journey in writing. He has over 140 works.

Khalil made a number of studies on Lebanese folk poetry, and research on the Lebanese war and other topics such as religion and sociology. Moreover, perhaps his most popular works are his dictionaries in political, philosophical, religious, linguistic, mythological, psychosocial, economics and computer terms. He also published a dictionary of humanities in both Arabic and French, and another of social concepts in French, English, and Arabic, as well as an encyclopedia of Arab luminaries.^[10]

Khalil's most notable achievement is his translation of Lalande's Encyclopedia of Philosophy.^[17] Through that encyclopedia, he attempted to convey the European and global mind in Arabic. He spent four years working on the project. With the help of Ahmad Oueidat, Oueidat Editions & Publications owner, who funded the project after taking out a mortgage on his apartment for 1 million Lebanese pounds, Khalil was able to complete his work.^[8]

Khalil has an interest in physical theories as well, which is related to the way in which leading physicists interpret the universe. This was made clear in his latest writings, particularly in ʿql Āl-ʿlm Wʿql Āl-Whm, and other articles, as well as Ḥkmt Allah, his translation of the book La Pensée de Dieu by the Bogdanoff brothers, which has not been published yet.^[11] He also worked on a project titled Ālmwswʿā Ālqrānyā between the years of 1956 and 2000, which is an encyclopedia that is yet to see the light.

Major works

Khalil has about 65 works in Arabic, and about 70 Arabicized books.^[8][18][19] In addition, it can be said that he has composed a set of foundational books, these include:

• Maḍmūn al-usṭūrah fī al-fikr al-ʻArabī, 1973.^[20][21][22][23] [translation: Mythology in the Arab Mentality].
• Naḥwa sūsyūlūǧīya li't-taqāfa aš-šaʻbīya: numūdaǧ Lubnān, 1979.^{[23][24][25][26][27]} [translation: Toward a Sociology of Popular Culture in Lebanon].
• Ālǧbhā ālwṭnyā wālʿml ālšʿby, 1979. The book was made in collaboration with Farhan Saleh.^[28] [translation: The National Front and People's Action Party].
• The Origins of Ismailism: A Study of the Historical Background of the Fatimid Caliphate by Bernard Lewis. Reviewed and presented by Khalil Ahmad Khalil, 1980.^[29]
• Mustaqbal al-falsafah al-ʻArabīyah, 1981.^[30] [translation: The future of Arab Philosophy].
• La dialectique de la durée by Gaston Bachelard. [translation: The Dialectic of Duration]. Translated by Khalil Ahmad Khalil, 1981.
• Ālʿrb wāldymqrāṭyā: bḥṯ fy syāst ālmstqbl [translation: Arabs and Democracy: A research on the Future of Politics] (192 pages), and Ālʿrb wālqyāda: bḥṯ āǧtmāʿy fy mʿnā ālslṭā wdwr ālqāʿd [translation: Arabs and Leadership: A Social Research on the Meaning of Power and the Role of a Leader] (a foundational work on political sociology) (288 pages), 1984.^[31][32]
• Ālmfāhym ālasāsya fy ʿlm ālaǧtmāʿ, 1984. [translation: The Principles of Sociology].
• Kamāl Junblāṭ: thawrat "al-amīr al-ḥadīth", 1984.^[33][34] [translation: Kamal Jumblatt: The Revolution of the Modern Prince].
• Ālmrā ālʿrbya wqḍāyā āltġyyr, 1985.^[35][36][37] [translation: The Arab Woman and Social Change].
• Al-ʻaql fī al-Islām, 1993. Originally a scientific research that was presented in Lebanese University.^{[38][39][40][41]}
• Jadalīyat al-Qurʼān, 1994.^[42] [translation: The Dialectic of Qur’an].
• Muʻjam al-muṣṭalaḥāt al-falsafīyah: ʻArabī-Faransī-Inklīzī, 1995.^[43] [translation: Arabic-French-English Dictionary of Philosophical Terms].
• Sūsyūlūjīyā al-Junūn al-siyāsī wa-al-thaqāfī : musāhamah fī naqd al-ḥiwār al-dīnī bayna al-Islām wa-al-Masīḥīyah, 1997.^[44] [translation: The Sociology of Political and Cultural Madness: A Contribution to the Critique of religious discourse of Islam and Judaism].
• Mʿǧm ālmṣṭlḥāt ālasṭwryā, 1997.^[45] [translation: Dictionary of Mythological Terms].
• Naqd al-ʻaql al-siḥrī: qirāʼah fī turāth al-thaqāfah al-shaʻbīyah al-ʻArabīyah, 1998.^[46] [translation: A Critique of the Magical Mind: A Reading on the Heritage of Arab Folk Culture].
• Muʻjam al-muṣṭalaḥāt al-siyāsīyah wa-al-diblūmāsīyah: ʻArabī-Faransī-Inklīzī, 1999.^[47] [translation: Arabic-French-English Dictionary of Political and Diplomatic Terms].
• Mwswʿt aʿlām ālʿrb ālmbdʿyn fy ālqrn ālʿšryn, 2001.^[48][49] [translation: Encyclopedia of 20th Century Arab Luminaries].
• Naqd al-taḍlīl al-ʻaqlī: Shīʻat Lubnān wa-al-ʻālam al-ʻArabī: Hal hum ākharūn fī al-niṣf al-ākhīr min al-qarn al-ʻishrīn?, 2001.[50] [translation: A Critique on Misinformation: The Shia of Lebanon and the Arab World: Are They “Others” in the Latter Half of the 20th Century?].^[50]
• Vocabulaire technique et critique de la philosophie by André Lalande. [translation: Encyclopedia of Philosophy]. Translated by Khalil Ahmad Khalil, 2001.^[4]
• Āltwryṯ ālsyāsy fy ālanẓma ālǧmhwrya ālʿrbya ālmʿāṣra, 2003.^[51] [translation: Political Heredity in Contemporary Republican Arab Regimes].
• Mulḥaq mawsūʻaẗ al-siyāsaẗ, 2003 (739 pages).خليل, خليل أحمد (2003). ملحق موسوعة السياسة (in Arabic). المؤسسة العربية للدراسات والنشر والتوزيع. [translation: Encyclopedia of Politics].
• Sūsiyūlūjiyā al-jumhūr al-siyāsī al-dīnī fī al-Sharq al-Awsaṭ al-muʻāṣir, 2005. أحمد, خليل، خليل (2005). سوسيولوجيا الجمهور السياسي الديني في الشرق الأوسط المعاصر (in Arabic). AIRP. ISBN 978-9953-36-731-6.</ref><ref>"سوسيولوجيا الجمهور السياسي والديني - البيان". 25 July 2005. [translation: The Sociology of the Political-Religious in Contemporary Middle East].
• Al-Ightiyāl: ḥarb al-ẓilāl wa-al-ʻunf al-muqaddas, 2011. [translation: Assassination: The War of Shadows and Sacred Violence].
• Li-mādhā yakhāfu al-ʻArab al-ḥadāthah? baḥth fī al-badūqrāṭīyah, 2011. [translation: Why are Arabs Afraid of Modernity? A Research on Bedoucracy].
• Jadalīyāt al-sulṭah wa-al-fatwá ʻashīyat thawrāt al-rabīʻ al-ʻArabī, 2014. [translation: The Dialectics of Power and Fatwa: The Revolutions of Arab Spring].
• ʿql alʿlm wʿql alwhm, 2015. [translation: Reason and Illusion].

References