Fez is one of the North African cities to have had most madrassas, of great architectural beauty. Madrassas, former Koran schools and now open for visits as public monuments, formerly provided one of the functions that raised Fez to the height of its splendour: the study of Islamic tradition and the body of laws and regulations governing social life. They were also the home of the students. Madrassas: Bu Inaniyya (1350), al-Attarin (1323), Seffarin (1280), al-Sahri (1321).

Fez is the Moroccan city with the liveliest tradition of artisans. Far from being "just a job", the activity of the artisan reflects a whole conception of the world and a way of experiencing time and giving it meaning. This native wisdom is passed down from parents to children, from the maalem, the master, to the apprentice.

A man (played by the filmmaker Nacer Khemir) returns home to Tunis to bury his mother. After the burial, his father gives him an "amana" to be handed to a certain Sheikh named Muhyiddin. Taken by his father's request, the man immediately sets out on an epic journey to find the long lost Sheikh and deliver the "amana." Throughout the trip, he is guided by a mysterious spiritual master and the many friends of the Sheikh he encounters along the way. As the adventure unfolds, we discover the rich life of this Sheikh and his uncompromising love for humanity. For under his teachings, different beliefs, faiths, and ways of life can only converge and become one The more we learn about Sheikh Muhyiddin, the more we understand why he is venerated across cultures and continents. Looking for Muhyiddin is a deeply lyrical odyssey into the soul of Islam through the life and work of one of its beloved mystics: Ibn Arabi

collection Petites Planètes. ‘Jihad’ is a fundamental Arab concept. In these times of conflict and violence, we only hear the mass media version – the extreme meaning of the term, which has strayed from its original sense – while its deeper meaning is ignored. Jihad can be translated as effort, commitment, and struggle in the broad sense. It is a concept and an experience with two different levels, one subordinate to the other. On one hand there is the ‘small jihad’ which has to do with effort, with the communal struggle to attain a society that is fairer and more aware of the mystery of reality (Al-Haqq) and of life (Al Hayy), which are two of the names of Allah. And the other is the ‘great jihad’, which is considered more important, and which determines whether the success, failure, or digression of the small jihad. This great struggle is the inner quest, the effort to cleanse everything inside us that distances mankind from the real... everything that favours a world made up of separate, selfish entities, a world that is closed, appropriable, and doomed to conflict. One of the most beautiful and profoundly meaningful practices of the great jihad is the ritual ceremony of ‘dhikr’ (zikr), an Arabic word that means memory... and in this context refers specifically to the memory of Allah... a personal reencounter - within a collective ceremony - with the mystery of the Real... in other words, with that which is cannot be defined, represented, or appropriated... that which is beyond physical or rational measure. According to this tradition, only one organ is capable of accommodating such an immensity: the human heart. Sufism struggles to remain within the heart of Islam. And in suffering Chechnya, Sufism is the most widespread form of Islam. Vincent Moon and Bulat Khalylov recorded a beautiful, immersive form of the experience of this dhikr ceremony.

Anonymous guide. Fes el Bali, the old medina of Fez founded in 809 by Idris II, is still completely contained within city walls. The gates (Bab Bou Jeloud, Bab Fteuh, Bab Er Rsif, Bab Guissa...) therefore retain all their social and symbolic value, associated with the different activities of the city and its inhabitants.

There is an anarchist essence inherent in Islam, which deserves our attention. Koranic cosmology states that a human being in the state of nature is a ‘slave (or serf) of Al-lâh, just as a sunflower is a slave of the sun, because they are organically linked. The concept of submission to a Single Reality (al- islam) does not translate into submission to human institutions, rather the reverse: it leads to a rejection of all external coercion as contrary to the nature of things. Muslims reject the limits that the market and the institutionalisation of life impose on their freedom, as an inner space in which intimacy with Creation becomes possible. The freedom that Muslims recognise is not political freedom under protection of the State, but an inner state/space that enables us to reject the world of representations, reject the fiction of power that some sheathe themselves in. This is based on idea that human beings are noble in essence, that their state of nature (fitrah) is superior to their state of culture. Ibn Jaldún says: “The political and educational order is contrary to the power of the soul because it embodies an instance of external control”.This point explains why Islam has been described as ‘mystical anarchy’. Abdennur Prado is a writer, president of the Catalan Islamic Council and co-director of the International Congress of Islamic Feminism.