Does Islam make people violent? Does Islam make people peaceful? In this book, A. Kevin Reinhart demonstrates that such questions are misleading, because they assume that Islam is a monolithic essence and that Muslims are made the way they are by this monolith. He argues that Islam, like all religions, is complex and thus best understood through analogy with language: Islam has dialects, a set of features shared with other versions of Islam. It also has cosmopolitan elites who prescribe how Islam ought to be, even though these experts, depending on where they practice the religion, unconsciously reflect their own local dialects. Reinhart defines the distinctive features of Islam and investigates how modernity has created new conditions for the religion. Analyzing the similarities and differences between modern and pre-modern Islam, he clarifies the new and old in the religion as it is lived in the contemporary world.

Death lies at the beginning of the Arab uprisings, and death continues to haunt them. Most narratives about the 'Arab Spring' begin with Mohammed Bouazizi, a Tunisian fruit vendor who set himself on fire. Egyptian protesters in turn referred to Khaled Said, a young man from Alexandria whom the police had beaten to death. This book places death at the centre of its engagement with the Arab uprisings, counterrevolutions, and their aftermaths. It examines martyrdom and commemoration as performative acts through which death and life are infused with meaning. Conversely, it shows how, in the making, remembering, and erasing of martyrs, hierarchies are (re)produced and possible futures are foreclosed. The contributors argue that critical anthropological engagement with death, martyrdom, and afterlife is indispensable if we want to understand the making of pasts and futures in a revolutionary present. This book was originally published as a special issue of Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology.

This book addresses the complexity of Islam in Thailand, by focusing on Islamic charities and institutions affiliated to the mosque. By extrapolating through Islam and the waqf (Islamic charity) in different regions of Thailand the diversity in races and institutions, it demonstrates the regional contrasts within Thai Islam. The book also underlines the importance of the internal histories of these separate spaces, and the processes by which institutions and ideologies become entrenched. It goes on to look at the socio economic transformation that is taking place within the context of trading networks through Islamic institutions and civil networks linked to mosques, madrasahs and regional power brokers. Brown casts this study of private Islamic welfare as strengthening rather than weakening relations with the secular Thai state. The current regime's effectiveness in coopting these Muslim elites, including Lutfi and Wisoot, into state bureaucracies assists in widening their popular base in the south, in the north-east, and in Bangkok. Such appointments were efficacious in reinforcing the elite's Islamic identity within a modern, secular, literate, and cosmopolitan Thai culture. In challenging existing studies of Thai Muslims as furtive protest minorities, this book diverts our attention to how Islamic philanthropy provides the logic and dynamism behind the creation of autonomous spaces for these independent groups, affording unusual insights into their economic, political and social histories.

Whereas most studies of Islamism focus on politics and religious ideology, this book analyses the ways in which Islamism in the Arab world is defined, reflected, transmitted and contested in a variety of creative and other cultural forms. It covers a range of contexts of production and reception, from the early twentieth century to the present, and with reference to cultural production in and/or about Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, the Gulf, Lebanon and Israel/Palestine. The material engaged with is produced in Arabic, English and French and includes fiction, autobiography, feature films, television series, television reportage, the press, rap music and video games. Throughout, the book highlights the multiple forms and contested interpretations of Islamism in the Arab world, exploring trends and tensions in the ways Islamism is represented to (primarily) Arab audiences and complicating simplistic perspectives on this phenomenon. The book considers repeated and idiosyncratic themes, modes of characterisation, motifs, structures of feeling and forms of engagement, in the context of an ongoing struggle for symbolic power in the region.

This is the first volume of Goldziher's Muslim Studies, which ranks highly among the classics of the scholarly literature on Islam. Indeed, the two volumes, originally published in German in 1889-1890, can justly be counted among those that laid the foundations of the modern study of Islam as a religion and a civilization.The first study deals with the reaction of Islam to the ideals of Arab tribal society, to the attitudes of early Islam to the various nationalities and more especially the Persians, and culminates in the chapter on the Shu'ubiya movement which represents the reaction of the newly converted peoples, and again more especially the Persians, to the idea of Arab superiority. The second essay is the famous study on the development of the Hadith, the "Traditions" ascribed to Muhammed, in which the Hadith is shown to reflect the various trends of early Islam: Goldziher's name is mainly associated with the critical study of the Hadith, of which this essay is the chief monument. The third essay is about the cult of saints, which, though contrary to the spirit and letter of the earliest Islam, played such an important part in its subsequent development.These essays, with the author's marvelous richness of information, profound historical sense, and sympathetic insight into the motive forces of religion and civilization, are today as fresh as at the time of their original publication and their reissue is indispensable for the growing number of students of Islam. Hamid Dabashi contributes a major eighty-five-page study of Goldziher's life and scholarship, situating both in the intellectual and political currents of his own time while evaluating his work in the context of the current debate over Orientalism.

it challenges common assumptions and enriches our understanding of modern Islam.

Who was Muhammad? What do we know historically, and does that differ from how he is seen by his followers and venerated today? Memories of Muhammad presents Muhammad as a lens through which to view both the genesis of Islamic religion and the grand sweep of Islamic history--right up to the hot button issues of the day, such as the spread of Islam, holy wars, the status of women, the significance of Jerusalem, and current tensions with Jews, Hindus and Christians. It also provides a rare glimpse into how Muslims spiritually connect to God through their Prophet, in the mosque, in the home, and even in cyberspace.

This definitive biography of the founder of Islam by a leading Muslim-American scholar, Omid Safi, will reveal invaluable new insights, finally providing a fully three-dimensional portrait of Muhammad and the one billion people who follow him today.

The Ismailis represent an important Shi'i Muslim community with rich intellectual and literary traditions. The complex history of the Ismailis dates back to the second/eighth century when they separated from other Shi'i groups under the leadership of their own imams. Soon afterwards, the Ismailis organised a dynamic, revolutionary movement, known as the da'wa or mission, for uprooting the Sunni regime of the Abbasids and establishing a new Shi'i caliphate headed by the Ismaili imam. By the end of the third/ninth century, the Ismaili da'is, operating secretly on behalf of the movement, were active in almost every region of the Muslim world, from Central Asia and Persia to Yemen, Egypt and the Maghrib. This book brings together a collection of the best works from Farhad Daftary, one of the foremost authorities in the field. The studies cover a range of specialised topics related to Ismaili history, historiography, institutions, theology, law and philosophy, amongst other intellectual traditions elaborated by the Ismailis. The collation of these invaluable studies into one book will be of great interest to the Ismaili community as well to anyone studying Islam in general, or Shi'i Islam in particular.

This book makes the Qur'an accessible to the English-speaking student who lacks the linguistic background to read it in the original Arabic by offering accessible translations of, and commentary on, a series of selected passages that are representative of the Islamic scripture. Mustanstir Mir, Director of the Center for Islamic Studies at Youngstown State University, offers clear translations and analysis of 35 selected passages of the Qur'an that will help students understand what kind of book the Qur'an is, what the scripture says, and how it says it.

Education and Extremisms addresses one of the most pressing questions facing societies today: how is education to respond to the challenge of extremism? It argues that the implementation of new teaching techniques, curricular reforms or top-down changes to education policy alone cannot solve the problem of extremism in educational establishments across the world. Instead, the authors of this thought-provoking volume argue that there is a need for those concerned with radicalisation to reconsider the relationship between instrumentalist ideologies shaping education and the multiple forms of extremisms that exist. Beginning with a detailed discussion of the complicated and contested nature of different forms of extremism, including extremism of both a religious and secular nature, the authors show that common assumptions in contemporary discourses on education and extremism are problematic. Chapters in the book provide a careful selection of pertinent and topical case studies, policy analysis and insightful critique of extremist discourses. Taken together, the chapters in the book make a powerful case for re-engaging with liberal education in order to foster values of individual and social enrichment, intellectual freedom, criticality, open-mindedness, flexibility and reflection as antidotes to extremist ideologies. Recognising recent criticisms of liberalism and liberal education, the authors argue for a new understanding of liberal education that is suitable for multicultural societies in a rapidly globalising world. This book is essential reading for academics, researchers and postgraduate students with an interest in religion, citizenship education, liberalism, secularism, counter-terrorism, social policy, Muslim education, youth studies and extremism. It is also relevant to teacher educators, teachers and policymakers.

Shaykh Tantawi Jawhari was an Egyptian exegete known for having produced a scientific interpretation of the Qur'an. A pioneering scholar in terms of familiarising the people of his time with many previously neglected matters regarding Islam and science, his publications shocked the Cairo educational system and other Muslim places of learning in the early twentieth century. This book examines the intersection between Tantawi Jawhari and Egyptian history and culture, and demonstrates that his approach to science in the Qur'an was intimately connected to his social concerns. Divided into three parts, part one contains three chapters which each introduce different aspects of Tantawi Jawhari himself. The second part explores the main aspects of his tafsir, discussing his approach to science and the Qur'an, and how he presented Europeans in his tafsir, and then addressing the impact of his tafsir on wider Muslim and non-Muslim society. The third section draws attention to the themes from all 114 suras of the Qur'an that are discussed within his commentary. It then analyses the current status of his views and the post-Jawharism perspective on science and the Qur'an, both today and in an imaginary future, in 2154. Providing new English translations of Tantawi Jawhari's work, the book delivers a comprehensive assessment of this unique figure, and emphasises the distinctive nature of his reading of the Qur'an. The book will be a valuable resource for anyone studying modern Egypt, the Qur'an, Islam and Science, and scientific interpretation and inimitability.

This book provides a comprehensive and systematic analysis of the various schools of Qur'anic exegesis, from the earliest periods through to the present day. Employing a comparative-contrastive methodology, the author examines traditional and rational schools of thought - such as the Mu'tazili, Shi'i, Ibadi, Sufi, metaphysical, modern, and scientific approaches to the interpretation of the Qur'an - to give a detailed analysis of the similarities and differences in their theological views. The study spans a broad period, covering exegetical techniques adopted in Qur'anic exegesis from its infancy during the 1st/7th century up to the beginning of the 15th/21st century. Furnished with copious micro- and macro-level examples which explicate the Qur'anic notions and the points of view relevant to each school and exegetical approach, the book provides a rounded empirical study of Islamic thought. This thorough and holistic historical investigation is an important contribution to the study of Qur'anic exegesis and Islamic theology, and as such will be of enormous interest to scholars of religion, philosophy and Islamic studies.

South Asia is probably the largest area in the world where Islam exists within a mixed composite culture, overlapping with several other religions. No matter how many origins of political conflicts one may find in the domain of culture and religion, there are, at the same time, elements of peaceful co-existence as well.

In a book written with the poignancy and beauty appropriate to its subject matter, the author opens by reminding us that "the essence of a society is in a sense identical with its history." Classical Islam also serves as a reminder that in the case of Islam, despite its triumphs on the fields of battle, telling its history is the only way open to us to render that essence accessible and show it from all sides. The work offers a grand narrative of a faith that offers an interpretation of the world, a way of life, and a style of thinking, that goes far beyond institutional or political supports. The relevance of this historical perspective is beyond dispute. The period from 610 A.D. when Muhammad received his "call" until the conquest of Baghdad by the Mongols in 1258 is known as the classical period of Islam. This was the period of the great expansion of Islam both as a political structure and as a religious and intellectual community. It established the base for the development of the high Islamic civilization of North Africa, the Near East, Persia, and India, as well as further expansion of the Islamic religious and intellectual community throughout the world. This book presents an authoritative history of the period written by one of the world's leading experts on the subject.Classical Islam examines the relationships, both cultural and political, between the Islamic world and the Mediterranean countries and India and elaborates on the economic, social, and intellectual factors and forces that shaped the Muslim world and molded its interactions with "infidels." The work is written in a clear and direct narrative form, emphasizing simultaneously the major intellectual trends and the political events and tendencies of the formative period in Islamic history that still resonates today.

In this ground-breaking new study, Teren Sevea reveals the economic, environmental and religious significance of Islamic miracle workers (pawangs) in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century Malay world. Through close textual analysis of hitherto overlooked manuscripts and personal interaction with modern pawangs readers are introduced to a universe of miracle workers that existed both in the past and in the present, uncovering connections between miracles and material life. Sevea demonstrates how societies in which the production and extraction of natural resources, as well as the uses of technology, were intertwined with the knowledge of charismatic religious figures, and locates the role of the pawangs in the spiritual economy of the Indian Ocean world, across maritime connections and Sufi networks, and on the frontier of the British Empire.

Veils and veiling are controversial topics in social and political life, generating debates across the world. The veil is enmeshed within a complex web of relations encompassing politics, religion and gender, and conflicts over the nature of power, legitimacy, belief, freedom, agency and emancipation. In recent years, the veil has become both a potent and unsettling symbol and a rallying-point for discourse and rhetoric concerning women, Islam and the nature of politics. Early studies in gender, doctrine and politics of veiling appeared in the 1970s following the Islamic revival and 're-veiling' trends that were dramatically expressed by 1979's Iranian Islamic revolution. In the 1990s, research focussed on the development of both an 'Islamic culture industry' and greater urban middle class consumption of 'Islamic' garments and dress styles across the Islamic world. In the last decade academics have studied Islamic fashion and marketing, the political role of the headscarf, the veiling of other religious groups such as Jews and Christians, and secular forms of modest dress. Using work from contributors across a range of disciplinary backgrounds and locations, this book brings together these research strands to form the most comprehensive book ever conceived on this topic. As such, this handbook will be of interest to scholars and students of fashion, gender studies, religious studies, politics and sociology.

This book examines the process of secularization in the Middle East in the late 19th and early 20th century through an analysis of the transformation and abolition of Islamic Caliphate. Focusing on debates in both the center of the Caliphate and its periphery, the author argues that the relationship between Islam and secularism was one of accommodation, rather than simply conflict and confrontation, because Islam was the single most important source of legitimation in the modernization of the Middle East. Through detailed analysis of both official documents and the writings of the intellectuals who contributed to reforms in the Empire, the author first examines the general secularization process in the Ottoman Empire from the late 18th century up to the end of the 1920s. He then presents an in-depth analysis of a crucial case of secularization: the demise of Islamic Caliphate. Drawing upon a wide range of secondary and primary sources on the Caliphate and the wider process of political modernization, he employs discourse analysis and comparative-historical methods to examine how the Caliphate was first transformed into a "spiritual" institution and then abolished in 1924 by Turkish secularists. Ardic also demonstrates how the book's argument is applicable to wider secularization and modernization processes in the Middle East. Deriving insights from history, anthropology, Islamic law and political science, the book will engage a critical mass of scholars interested in Middle Eastern studies, political Islam, secularization and the near-global revival of religion as well as the historians of Islam and late-Ottoman Empire, and those working in the field of historical sociology and the sociology of religion as a case study.

The Prophet Muhammad's reported traditions have evolved significantly to affect the social, cultural, and political lives of all Muslims. Though centuries of scholarship were spent on the authentication and trustworthiness of the narrators, there has been less study focused on the contents of these narratives, known as Hadith or Sunnah, and their corroboration by the Qur`an. This book is a first step in a comprehensive attempt to contrast Hadith with the Qur`an in order to uncover some of the unjust practices by Muslims concerning women and gender issues. Using specific examples the author helps the reader appreciate and understand the magnitude of the problem. It is argued that the human rights and the human development of Muslim women will not progress in a meaningful and sustainable manner until the Hadith is re-examined in a fresh new approach from within the Islamic framework, shifting the discourse in understanding Islam from a dogmatic religious law to a religio-moral rational worldview. The author argues that such re-examination requires the involvement of women in order to affirm their authority in exegetical and practical leadership within Muslim societies, and she encourages Muslim women to stand up for their rights to effect change in understanding the role of sunnah in their own life.

This book, first published in 1958, examines the life and works of Avicenna, one of the most provocative figures in the history of thought in the East. It shows him in the right historical perspective, as the product of the impact of Greek thought on Islamic teachings against the background of the Persian Renaissance in the tenth century. His attitude can be of guidance to those in the East who are meeting the challenge of Western civilization; and to those in the West who have yet to find a basis on which to harmonize scientific with spiritual values.

In this book, first published in 1973, Professor Parviz Morewedge, an expert on Islamic philosophy and mysticism, provides a critical exposition of one text of ibn Sina (Avicenna), the great Persian philosopher who lived from 980 to 1037. The text is his Metaphysica in the Danish Nama-I 'ala'I (The Book of Scientific Knowledge). In addition to a translation of the text from Persian into English, this edition includes a critical commentary on the major arguments found in the text, and notes and references to other texts of ibn Sina as well as to relevant texts of Greek philosophers, particularly Aristotle, Plotinus and Proclus. There is also a glossary of the key terms used in the Metaphysica, with their Persian, Arabic, Greek and Latin equivalents where necessary. This book is concerned primarily to show that although in the text ibn Sina resorts to the Aristotelian vocabulary and Neo-Platonic themes, and appears to be in accord with the Islamic tradition, there is evidence that many doctrines expressed by him may be considered non-Greek and non-Islamic. These include his peculiar doctrine of Self (nafs) and the doctrine of the Necessary Existent (wajib al-wujud). The author attempts to clarify the extent to which salient features of ibn Sina's position are in agreement with what may be regarded as Sufic doctrines.

This book examines the development of identity politics amongst the Alevis in Europe and Turkey, which simultaneously provided the movement access to different resources and challenged its unity of action. While some argue that Aleviness is a religious phenomenon, and others claim it is a cultural or a political trend, this book analyzes the various strategies of claim-making and reconstructions of Aleviness as well as responses to the movement by various Turkish and German actors. Drawing on intensive fieldwork, Elise Massicard suggests that because of activists' many different definitions of Aleviness, the movement is in this sense an "identity movement without an identity."

Both in everyday language and religious metaphor, the heart often embodies the true self and is considered to be the seat of emotion in many cultures. Many Muslim thinkers have attempted to clarify the nature of Sufism using its metaphorical image, particularly in the tenth and eleventh centuries. This book examines the work of Abu Talib al-Makki and his wider significance within the Sufi tradition, with a focus on the role of the heart. Analysing his most significant work, Qut al-qulub ('The Nourishment of Hearts'), the author goes beyond an examination of the themes of the book to explore its influence not only in the writing of Sufis, but also of Hanbali and Jewish scholars. Providing a comprehensive overview of the world of al-Makki and presenting extracts from his book on religious characteristics of the heart with selected passages in translation for the first time in English, this book will give readers a better understanding not only of the essential features of Sufism, but also the nature of mysticism and its relation to monotheistic faiths.

Imam Abu Hamid al-Ghazali 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 Ghazali and aims to establish the extent to which this relationship explains Ghazali's political theology. Articles concerned with Ghazali'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 Ghazali'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 Ghazali'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.

This book explores the role of halal production, trade, and standards based on ethnographic material from Malaysia, Singapore, and Europe. It explains how the global markets for halal comprise divergent zones in which Islam, markets, regulatory institutions, and technoscience interact and diverge.