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This book could easily be called 'A Guide for the Modern Muslim', for someone to whom the sentiments of his or her ancestors resonate but who cannot accept the canonised formulas of a stultified education. Charfi spells out what, for him, is the essential message of Islam, followed by a history of its unfolding through the person of the Prophet Muhammad, who was a visionary seeking to change the ideals, attitudes and behaviours of the society in which he lived. The message and its history are delineated as two separate things, conflated by tradition. Charfi's reflections cross those horizons where few Muslim scholars have dared until now to tread. He confronts with great lucidity those difficult questions with which Muslims are struggling, attempting to reconsider them from a moral and political perspective that is independent of the frameworks produced by tradition."e;
Mohammed Arkoun was one of the most prominent and influential Arab intellectuals of his day. During a career spanning more than thirty years, he was revered as an outstanding research scholar, a bold critic of the theoretical tensions embedded within Islamic Studies and an outspoken public figure, upholding political, social and cultural modernism. This Festschrift honours Arkoun's scholarship, bringing together the contributions of eleven distinguished scholars of history, religious studies and philosophy. It offers a comprehensive selection of critical engagements with Arkoun's work, reflecting on his considerable influence on contemporary thinking about Islam and its ideological, philosophical and theological dimensions. The authoritative reference study on the work of Mohammed Arkoun, The Construction of Belief is essential reading for students and scholars of Islam, Muslim societies and cultures, modernity, religious studies, philosophy and semanti.
The translation of an essay first published in Egypt in 1925, which took the contemporaries of its author by storm. At a time when the Muslim world was in great turmoil over the question of the abolition of the caliphate by Mustapha Kamal Ataturk in Turke
A comprehensive assessment of the origins and staying power of Middle East autocracies, as well as a sober account of the struggles of state reformers and opposition forces to promote civil liberties, competitive elections and a pluralistic vision of Islam. Drawing on the insights of some 25 leading Western and Middle Eastern scholars, the book highlights the dualistic and often contradictory nature of political liberalization. Yemen suggest, political liberalization - as managed by the state - not only opens new spaces for debate and criticism, but is also used as a deliberate tactic to avoid genuine democratization. In several chapters on Iran, the authors analyze the benefits and costs of...
The contributions in this volume offer the first comprehensive effort to describe and analyse the collection, classification, presentation and methodology of information in the knowledge society of mediæval Islam in the disciplines of religious and legal learning, as well as the rational sciences of Hellenistic origin philosophy, mathematical and medical sciences. The volume begins with a general discussion of the concept of encyclopædia. Successive chapters explore the bases of authority in the institutions of religion and law; biographical literature and handbooks of law; compendia of scientific and philosophical learning based on Iranian and Greek sources; and the more specialised expositions of mathematics and philosophy. The special character of Muslim institutions, their teaching traditions and syllabi is also put into perspective.This is a reference work for the principal genres of enyclopædic outlines and manuals biography, legal handbooks, historiography of knowledge transmission, cosmography, and the philosophical sciences and a major contribution to the literary and intellectual history of scholarly writing in the pre-modern Islamic world.
"This work attempts to introduce the characteristics of the Mohammedan Mission, with the aspiration to be faithful to its essential purposes and to historical truth at the same time. The author thus illustrates the different ways in which people have understood the Mission and the reasons that led them to those various interpretations. The book presents several alternative interpretations that actually existed but did not enjoy widespread acceptance and popularity.". "This book looks to the future, attempting to respond to the needs of those who are rapidly becoming integrated into modern life, and to the new generations aspiring to an Islamic thought adapted to these processes."--Jacket.
SchraederAlfred StepanMark TesslerFrédéric VolpiLucan WayFrederic WehreySean L. Yom
In recent years, Islamic fundamentalist, revolutionary, and jihadist movements have overshadowed more moderate and reformist voices and trends within Islam. This compelling volume introduces the current generation of reformist thinkers and activists, the intellectual traditions they carry on, and the reasons for the failure of reformist movements to sustain broad support in the Islamic world today. Richly detailed regionally focused chapters cover Iran, the Arab East, the Maghreb, South Asia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Turkey, Europe, and North America. The editor's introductory chapter traces the roots of reformist thinking both in Islamic tradition and as a response to the challenge of modernity for Muslims struggling to reconcile the requirements of modernization with their cultural and religious values. The concluding chapter identifies commonalities, comparisons, and trends in the modernizing movements.
With contributions by more than thirty of the world's leading scholars of democracy, this volume presents the most comprehensive assessment available of the state of democracy in the world at the beginning of the new millennium.
These case studies link genealogical knowledge to particular circumstances in which it was created, circulated and promoted. They stress the malleability of kinship and memory, and the interests this malleability serves. From the Prophet's family tree to the present, ideas about kinship and descent have shaped communal and national identities in Muslim societies. So an understanding of genealogy is vital to our understanding of Muslim societies, particularly with regard to the generation, preservation and manipulation of genealogical knowledge.