From Kavad to al-Ghazali

From Kavad to al-Ghazali PDF Author: Patricia Crone
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000385507
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 367

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Book Description
This volume brings together twelve articles by Patricia Crone dealing with pre-Islamic and Islamic religion, law and political thought. The first section focuses on the centuries before Islam, with studies on Mazdakism in Iran and on Islam as the key factor behind the outbreak of Iconoclasm in Byzantium. The second group of studies looks at problems in legal history, including the codification of the Qur'an, while the third investigates questions of political thought, amongst them a study of early Muslim anarchists, and an examination of the authorship of a work ascribed to al-Ghazali.

From Kavad to al-Ghazali

From Kavad to al-Ghazali PDF Author: Patricia Crone
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000385507
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 367

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Book Description
This volume brings together twelve articles by Patricia Crone dealing with pre-Islamic and Islamic religion, law and political thought. The first section focuses on the centuries before Islam, with studies on Mazdakism in Iran and on Islam as the key factor behind the outbreak of Iconoclasm in Byzantium. The second group of studies looks at problems in legal history, including the codification of the Qur'an, while the third investigates questions of political thought, amongst them a study of early Muslim anarchists, and an examination of the authorship of a work ascribed to al-Ghazali.

Ghazali

Ghazali PDF Author: Eric Ormsby
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1780742053
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 183

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Book Description
This fascinating work profiles Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (1058-1111), the foremost Islamic scholar and mystic of the medieval period. Attracting the patronage of the vizier Nizam al-Mulk early in his career, he was appointed head of the Nizamiyyah College at Baghdad, and attracted audiences from across the Islamic world, who sought his teachings on Islamic philosophy and jurisprudence. Eventually renouncing his position due to a spiritual crisis, he went into self-imposed exile, during which he wrote the Sufi masterpiece, "Revival of the Sciences of Religion". Concise and lucid, this is a perfect introduction to the great man's life and work.

Ghazali's Politics in Context

Ghazali's Politics in Context PDF Author: Yazeed Said
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136159509
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
Imam Abü Hamid al-Ghazalı is perhaps the most celebrated Muslim theologian of medieval Islam yet little attention has been paid to his personal theology. This book sets out to investigate the relationship between law and politics in the writings of Ghazalı and aims to establish the extent to which this relationship explains Ghazalı’s political theology. Articles concerned with Ghazalı’s political thought have invariably paid little attention to his theology and his thinking about God, neglecting to ask what role these have contributed to his definition of politics and political ethics. Here, the question of Ghazalı’s politics takes into account his thinking on God, knowledge, law, and the Koran, in addition to political systems and ethics. Yazeed Said puts forward the convincing argument that if Ghazalı’s legal and political epistemology provide a polemic analogous to his writings on philosophy, for which he is more famed, they would reveal to us a manifesto for an alternative order, concerned with a coherent definition of the community, or Ummah. This book will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars of the Middle East, political theology and Islamic studies.

Historical Dictionary of Islam

Historical Dictionary of Islam PDF Author: Ludwig W. Adamec
Publisher: Scarecrow Press
ISBN: 0810863030
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 520

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Book Description
The second edition of the Historical Dictionary of Islam presents a concise overview of Islamic history, religion, philosophy, and Islamic political movements.

The A to Z of Islam

The A to Z of Islam PDF Author: Ludwig W. Adamec
Publisher: Scarecrow Press
ISBN: 1461671930
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 516

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Book Description
There is both unity and variety in the Islamic world. Muslims are not a homogeneous people who can be explained solely by their normative texts: the Koran and the Sunnah. Muslims differ vastly in their interpretation of Islam: modernists want to reinterpret Islam to adapt to the requirements of modern times while traditionalists tend to look to the classical and medieval periods of Islam as their model of the Islamic state. The A to Z of Islam presents a concise overview of Islamic history, religion, philosophy, and Islamic political movements. This is done through a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, and cross-referenced dictionary entries, which include the biographies and thoughts of medieval thinkers, as well as those of modern members of the religious and political establishments. Articles describe the major sects, schools of theology, and jurisprudence, as well as aspects of Islamic culture. Together, this book represents a brief introduction to the field of Islamic studies.

Early Islamic Theology: The Mu`tazilites and al-Ash`ari

Early Islamic Theology: The Mu`tazilites and al-Ash`ari PDF Author: Richard M. Frank
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000226247
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Book Description
This is the second of three volumes reprinting the collected papers on Islamic subjects by Richard M. Frank, Professor Emeritus at the Catholic University of America. It brings together Franks's articles on early kalam, the Mu`tazilites, and the development of the thought of al-Ash`ari. The studies in this collection are of particular importance for the study of kalam, in that they represent an original attempt to make philosophical sense and understand the theoretical underpinnings of the foundational theological tradition in early Islam, the Mu`tazilite school of Basra. They focus, among others, on Abu l-Hudhayl al-`Allaf, al-Jubba`i, and al-Ash`ari, and include a critical edition and translation of the latter's al-Hathth `ala l-bahth.

Kashefi's Anvar-e Sohayli

Kashefi's Anvar-e Sohayli PDF Author: Christine van Ruymbeke
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 900431475X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 428

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Book Description
Kashefi’s Anvar-e Sohayli (15th c. A.D.) is a Persian rewriting of the timeless and influential Kalila wa-Dimna text, done at the Timurid court. Christine van Ruymbeke offers a first in-depth analysis of the contents and style of this important text and also addresses the Kalila wa-Dimna field across its full rewriting history. This analysis shows how Kashefi’s additions function as an invaluable commentary that opens up our understanding and the appreciation of this seminal text. This studies revisits several received ideas and current misapprehensions about the text and shows why it has been such an international best-seller before being unjustly relegated to children’s literature. In Van Ruymbeke’s words, Kalila wa-Dimna is a grim text, exposing the mechanisms of sophisticated psychological manipulation and exploring universal philosophical themes, known since Antiquity and still relevant today.

The Erasure of Arab Political Identity

The Erasure of Arab Political Identity PDF Author: Salam Hawa
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1317390067
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 195

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Book Description
This book explores the long history of the evolution of Arab political identity, which predates the time of the Prophet Muhammad and is characterized by tolerance, compassion, generosity, hospitality, self-control, correct behaviour, equality and consensus. The author argues that present-day struggles in many Arab countries to redefine polities and politics are related to the fact that the underlying political culture of the Arabs has been overridden for centuries by successive political regimes which have deviated from the original political culture that the Prophet adhered to. The book outlines the political culture that existed before Islam, examines how the Conquests and the rule of the early dynasties (Umayyad and Abbasid) of the Islamic world found it necessary to override it, and analyses the effect of rule by non-Arabs – successively Mamluks, Ottoman Turks and Western colonial powers. It discusses the impact of these distortions on present day politics in the Arab world, and concludes by appealing for a reawakening of, and respect for, the cultural elements underlying the origins of Arab political identity.

The Great Caliphs

The Great Caliphs PDF Author: Amira K. Bennison
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300154895
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 255

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Book Description
This endlessly informative history brings the classical Islamic world to lifeIn this accessibly written history, Amira K. Bennison contradicts the common assumption that Islam somehow interrupted the smooth flow of Western civilization from its Graeco-Roman origins to its more recent European and American manifestations. Instead, she places Islamic civilization in the longer trajectory of Mediterranean civilizations and sees the ‘Abbasid Empire (750–1258 CE) as the inheritor and interpreter of Graeco-Roman traditions.At its zenith the ‘Abbasid caliphate stretched over the entire Middle East and part of North Africa, and influenced Islamic regimes as far west as Spain. Bennison’s examination of the politics, society, and culture of the ‘Abbasid period presents a picture of a society that nurtured many of the “civilized” values that Western civilization claims to represent, albeit in different premodern forms: from urban planning and international trade networks to religious pluralism and academic research. Bennison’s argument counters the common Western view of Muslim culture as alien and offers a new perspective on the relationship between Western and Islamic cultures.

In the Shadow of the Sword

In the Shadow of the Sword PDF Author: Tom Holland
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0385531362
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 614

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Book Description
The acclaimed author of Rubicon and other superb works of popular history now produces a thrillingly panoramic (and incredibly timely) account of the rise of Islam. No less significant than the collapse of the Roman Republic or the Persian invasion of Greece, the evolution of the Arab empire is one of the supreme narratives of ancient history, a story dazzlingly rich in drama, character, and achievement. Just like the Romans, the Arabs came from nowhere to carve out a stupefyingly vast dominion—except that they achieved their conquests not over the course of centuries as the Romans did but in a matter of decades. Just like the Greeks during the Persian wars, they overcame seemingly insuperable odds to emerge triumphant against the greatest empire of the day—not by standing on the defensive, however, but by hurling themselves against all who lay in their path.