Tim’s: An Ancient Muslim Tradition
It’s a common refrain among Canadian Muslims, “Tim Horton’s is the second mosque,” yet few Muslims know just how true that is. Aside from the fact that coffee originated in Muslim lands, and that many of the key words about the brew come from Muslim culture, such as Mocha, Java, and Coffee itself, the strong black liquid has played a key roll in Muslim culture since the outset, even having an impact on the religion itself.
Sufism and other mystic practices have always been a source of curiosity and contention, even in cultures where they are mainstream. They seem to rub shoulders with the very edges of acceptable religious practice, many mystics even confidently step over that line by stating “I am the source of Divine Truth,” as one Sufi famously did. Be it Alevism in Anatolia, or Zoroastrian hangovers in Persia, Rumi’s divine love, or Ghazali’s philosophical proofs, mysticism has always, and will always, ride along on the periphery of mainstream thought, and at one point, right along that periphery, someone found coffee.
Imported first from East Africa to Yemen, the coffee beans were eaten directly before someone quickly learned that their essence could be distilled through boiling water. As a few people started using the substance, its effects on the mind were quickly identified, and it was suddenly found circulating the Sacred Mosque in the hands of those strange people who sought to stay up through the nights in large prayer vigils that were sometimes uncomfortably ecstatic, at least for authorities of the time. It was immediately banned, and word of the dangers of this foreign intoxicant spread faster than the beans themselves.
It didn’t take long for politics to play out on the scene of minor religious grievances, and soon coffee (by then a major export of Yemen) was made permissible again. People always marvel at the political power that small mystic groups possess, and here’s just one more thing to marvel at. But the associations that drugs have with the cultures that use them are incredibly strong, and caffeine is no exception. Some argue that the positive or negative effects of a drug are secondary to their cultural status as driving factors for their adoption or prohibition, this is why marijuana has always struggled, where the obviously more harmful substance alcohol has always prospered (even when it is forbidden). The use of marijuana is associated with marginalized political groups that lack real force, such as the fabled Hashishun, who worked to topple dynasties but ultimately never rose to power. Alcohol is associated with political might and refinement, largely because the process is relatively long and expensive, so it requires capital and stability.
Coffee though? Certainly Tim Horton’s doesn’t see itself as a drug dealer, and very few other coffee shops do (with the notable exception, perhaps, of Starbucks). Furthermore, the mystic roots of coffee seem to have mostly faded into history (again with the exception of Starbucks), so what exactly am I getting at here?
Enter: the Turks.
The Ottoman Empire, being the seat of the last true Caliphate and the most modern major Islamic empire, is one of the most resounding cultural forces that colour modern Islamic practice. Their political symbol, the star and crescent, is taken as universal religious iconography, the ‘Ottoman brand,’ of Islam has far outlived its founders, and the same is true of their effects on coffee.
Once the substance was made permissible, it circulated around groups that needed to find ways to excite their brains and urge them on in the struggle to adapt and modernize their cultures. Foremost among these adaptive, thinking cultures was the Ottoman Empire, and that is where we see the birth of the very first coffee houses. These stores dedicated to the distribution of coffee gathered intellectuals and sat them down with the fringe radicals who had been the source of the beans so many centuries before. Finally there was a place for the likes of Ghazali to simply happen upon the likes of the famous explorer Piri Reis.
These coffee houses proved to be enormously popular, and politically fringe intellectual engagement became the culture of coffee, carried by the Ottomans into Eastern Europe.
Coffee Revolution
One can hardly speak of coffee and coffee houses without mentioning the Austrian coffee haus. These establishments and their counterparts in other countries fueled massive changes in European thought and political structure, and coffee found itself in the awkward position of playing a pivotal role in revolutions across Europe, from political to anarchist, to theological, to antitheist. At some point coffee can be found somewhere in every great riot of the Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, and right through to modern times.
Even now, hipsters congregate in coffee shops to engage in the slightly radical intellectualism that they foster, but through centuries of Eurocentricism these establishments have lost the central linchpin that is the archetype of radical intellectualism: Islam.
Now the most Islamic thing we see in Tim’s is ‘pure arabica beans.’
But that’s not entirely true. What we see in modern coffee shops is community, the need to push the brain, and in some less commercial ventures we still see that radical intellectualism. This may not be our second mosque, but it certainly is our legacy, a gift freely given from our intellectual forefathers to all of humanity, even if they don’t know it. From the Sufis fighting to drink coffee next to the kaba, to the Yemenis wanting to open trade, and at last with the Ottomans sharing intrigue over a steaming cup of espresso, these people have given a great lasting charity with their right hand that those who are left hardly notice.
And that is one of the most Islamic practices out there.
