Based on a wide variety of previously unstudied sources, these articles explain how science was applied to three aspects of Islamic ritual in the Middle Ages: the regulation of the lunar calendar; the organisation of the times of the five daily prayers; and the determination of the sacred direction (qibla) towards the Kaaba in Mecca. Simple procedures of folk astronomy were used by the scholars of religious law who determined popular practice; more complicated mathematical methods were provided by the scientists - and this proved a powerful incentive for the development of scientific analysis and research. Some of these procedures were to have far-reaching consequences. For example, the astronomical alignment of the Kaaba - known to various medieval writers, but long forgotten - led to the adoption of similar alignments for the qibla, and the final articles show how these were calculated, whether from astronomical observation or geographical computation, and their impact on the orientation of religious and secular architecture across the Islamic world. C'est A partir d'une grande diversite de sources inexplorees que ces articles expliquent comment la science avait ete appliquee a trois aspects du rituel islamique au Moyen Age: la regulation du calendrier lunaire; l'organisation des heures assignees aux cinq prieres quotidiennes; et l'etablissement de la direction sacree (qibla) vers la Kaaba de la Mecque. Des procedes simples d'astronomie populaire etaient utilises par les erudits en droit religieux qui decidaient de la pratique populaire; des methodes mathematiques plus complexes etaient offertes par les hommes de science - ce qui, en effet, s'avera Atre une motivation puissante dans le developpement de l'analyse et de la recherche scientifique. Certains de ces procedes eurent des consequences d'une grande portee par la suite. L'alignement astronomique de la Kaaba - pour ne reprendre qu'un exemple connu

On 15th February 2003, two million people marched in the streets of London to call on the British government not to go to war with Iraq. Though Britain did enter war, the movement did not rest in defeat. This book tells the story of what happened behind the scenes of this extraordinary mass movement, looking specifically at the political relationship between Muslim and leftist activists. Crisis narratives about Muslims assume that they are only engaged with sectarian communalist forms of identity politics or that their supposed religious and social conservatism is incompatible with progressive values. Through telling this story, Massoumi looks closely at the role of identity politics within social movements, considering what this means in practice and whether we can meaningfully speak of identity politics. Arguing that identity politics can only be understood within the context of a wider social and political structure, this book analyses the conditions through which Muslim and leftist engagement emerges within this movement, and highlights the decisive leadership of Muslim women.

Muslims in Australia have attracted increased attention as citizens in the last decade. The research scholars in this book present a complex and dynamic picture of their presence and experiences in Australia, taking us far beyond simplistic notions of security threats and discrimination. Their contributions reveal that Muslims and non-Muslims, as individuals and communities, display many different attitudes towards each other and towards many issues, including reactions to the media, threats of terrorism and access to Islamic schools. The non-Muslim community does not always set the agenda for these interactions- Muslims experience exclusion while excluding others at the same time, often other Muslims. Muslims in Australia portrays the varied ways in which Muslims traverse spaces of inclusion and exclusion, and suggests ideas to encourage and sustain acceptance and social cohesion.

Though we can no longer hear how it sounded, the written sources that remain provide much information on the music of the medieval Islamic and Jewish worlds, on how it was regarded and on the importance that was attached to it. Amnon Shiloah has been a pioneer in the exploration of these sources, and the present volume brings together some of the results. The opening studies examine, with annotated translations, several key works expounding the meaning of music and its power, in terms of its ethical and therapeutic effects and properties. The following articles focus on scientific writings about music and on the transmission of musical knowledge, while the final section approaches the subject from the angle of religion, noting how the power attributed to music occasioned the distrust of many religious figures, who feared its capacity to deprave and debase its audience. Bien que nous ne puissions plus de nos jours l'entendre, les sources ecrites qui ont survecu apportent enormement d'information sur la musique des mondes juifs et islamiques, sur l'importance qui y etait attachee et sur son rAle. Le professeur Shiloah est un des pionniers en terme d'exploration de ces sources et le present volume rassemble un certain nombre des resultats de ses recherches. Les premieres etudes, accompagnees de traductions annotees, font l'examen de plusieurs travaux importants, exposant la signification de la musique et sa puissance de par ses effets et ses proprietes morales et therapeutiques. Les articles suivants se concentrent sur les ecrits scientifiques au sujet de la musique et sur la propagation de la connaissance musicale. La derniere section aborde le sujet A partir de l'aspect de la religion, soulignant combien le pouvoir attribue A la musique entraA (R)nait une certaine mefiance de la part d'un certain nombre de religieux, qui craignaient son aptitude A avilir et depraver ceux qui l'ecoutaient.

This book explores the tensions between the religious and legal principles of Islamic finance and Islamic banking in practice. It does not limit itself to a legal discussion and presents a truly interdisciplinary and intercultural dialogue between lawyers, theologians, and economists with roots in academia and practice. There is considerable divergence in their evaluation of the status quo and future of Islamic finance.Contributions cover aspects of Islamic finance in theory and practice. It provides insights into the interplay of religion, ethics and finance covering both the Islamic and Christian traditions that sets the scene for Islamic finance in practice: economic technicalities of Islamic banking services, its regulatory aspects, and the complex legal arrangements of Islamic finance in non-Muslim-majority countries. Islamic Finance is a truly international collaboration of outstanding scholars and practitioners in their field that reveals the complexities involved in applying religious principles and legal theory to the daily practice of business and finance.

This collection of papers presented at the 62nd Annual Meeting of the Permanent International Altaistic Conference explores the complex relations of religion and state in history, language and society of Altaic cultures, reflecting the unique interdisciplinary approach of the PIAC. It examines aspects of shamanism, religious belief, totemism and religious influences on contracts in historical literary monuments as well as in contemporary sources.

Abu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazzali (1058-1111) is one of the most important religious figures in Islamic history. He is particularly noted for his brilliant synthesis of mysticism and traditional Sunni Islam. Ghazzali's "The Alchemy of Happiness", written toward the end of his life, provides a succinct introduction to both the theory and practice of Sufism (Islamic mysticism). It thus offers many insights into traditional Muslim society. This translation is fully annotated for readers unfamiliar with Ghazzali and includes an introduction to his life and historical milieu.

0|Muslim women in Australia are at the forefront of a culture war, and not necessarily by choice. As visible representatives of Islam, veiled women face discrimination and abuse, and carry the stigma of a culture frequently deemed unacceptable and inferior. Despite these adverse conditions, Muslim women have demonstrated a remarkable resilience by maintaining their presence in the public domain and by continuing to make a positive contribution to Australia. The experiences of Muslim women in Australia cannot be typecast as a sisterhood of oppressed females. Challenging Identities questions the assumption of incompatible 'Australian values' and 'Islamic values', and provides valuable first-person accounts from the lives of Muslim women in Australia.

Abu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazzali (1058-1111) is one of the most important religious figures in Islamic history. He is particularly noted for his brilliant synthesis of mysticism and traditional Sunni Islam. Ghazzali's "The Alchemy of Happiness", written toward the end of his life, provides a succinct introduction to both the theory and practice of Sufism (Islamic mysticism). It thus offers many insights into traditional Muslim society. This translation is fully annotated for readers unfamiliar with Ghazzali and includes an introduction to his life and historical milieu.

This volume complements the selection of Wilferd Madelung's articles previously published by Variorum (Religious Schools and Sects in Medieval Islam), the earlier volume dealing principally with dogmatic issues, the present one concentrating on the political and social aspects. The first articles here examine the origins of the belief in the coming of the Mahdi and apocalyptic prophecies connected with this, such as arose among the Yemenite emigrants in Syria and Egypt. The following studies relate to Shi'ite and Alid movements under the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates and to the political ideology of the Buyids. The final group focuses on the Yemen, its social structures and its historiography, in particular Zaydi sources. A section of additional notes and a detailed index complete the volume. Ce volume vient s'ajouter en complement de la collection d'articles de Wilferd Madelung prealablement publiee par Variorum (Religious Schools and Sects in Medieval Islam); le volume precedent traitant de questions de dogme et celui-ci se concentrant sur les aspects sociaux et politiques. Les premiers articles font l'examen des origines de la croyance en l'avenement du Mahdi et des prophecies apocalyptiques lui etant rattachees - telles celles qui ont vu le jour parmi les emigres yemenites en Syrie et en Egypte. Les etudes suivantes se rapportent aux mouvements chi'ite et alide sous les caliphats umayyade et abbaside, ainsi qu'A l'ideologie politique des Buyides. Un dernier groupe s'attache au Yemen, A ses structures sociales et son historiographie, en particulier aux sources Zaydi. Une section de notes supplementaires et index detaille viennent s'ajouter au recueil.

Hailed in The New York Times Book Review as "the doyen of Middle Eastern studies," Bernard Lewis has been for half a century one of the West's foremost scholars of Islamic history and culture, the author of over two dozen books, most notably The Arabs in History, The Emergence of ModernTurkey, The Political Language of Islam, and The Muslim Discovery of Europe. Eminent French historian Robert Mantran has written of Lewis's work: "How could one resist being attracted to the books of an author who opens for you the doors of an unknown or misunderstood universe, who leads you within to its innermost domains: religion, ways of thinking, conceptions of power, culture--an author who upsets notions too often fixed, fallacious, or partisan."
In Islam and the West, Bernard Lewis brings together in one volume eleven essays that indeed open doors to the innermost domains of Islam. Lewis ranges far and wide in these essays. He includes long pieces, such as his capsule history of the interaction--in war and peace, in commerce and culture--between Europe and its Islamic neighbors, and shorter ones, such as his deft study of the Arabic word watan and what its linguistic history reveals about the introduction of the idea of patriotism from the West. Lewis offers a revealing look at Edward Gibbon's portrait of Muhammad in Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (unlike previous writers, Gibbon saw the rise of Islam not as something separate and isolated, nor as a regrettable aberration from the onward march of the church, but simply as a part of human history); he offers a devastating critique of Edward Said's controversial book, Orientalism; and he gives an account of the impediments to translating from classic Arabic to other languages (the old dictionaries, for one, are packed with scribal errors, misreadings, false analogies, and etymological deductions that pay little attention to the evolution of the language). And he concludes with an astute commentary on the Islamic world today, examining revivalism, fundamentalism, the role of the Shi'a, and the larger question of religious co-existence between Muslims, Christians, and Jews.
A matchless guide to the background of Middle East conflicts today, Islam and the West presents the seasoned reflections of an eminent authority on one of the most intriguing and little understood regions in the world.

This book highlights the lived experiences of gay Muslims in Malaysia, where Islam is the majority and official religion, and in Britain, where Muslims form a religious minority. By exploring how they negotiate their religious and sexual identities, Shah challenges the notion that Islam is inherently homophobic and that there is an unbridgeable divide between 'Islam' and the 'West'. Shah also gained access to gay Muslim networks and individuals for his in-depth research in both countries, and the book investigates the different ways that they respond to everyday anti-homosexual or anti-Muslim sentiments. Amid the many challenges they confront, the gay Muslims whom Shah encountered find innovative and meaningful ways to integrate Islam and gay identity into their lives. The Making of a Gay Muslim will appeal to students and scholars with an interest in contemporary Islam, religion, gender and sexuality.

The society and legal systems of Southern Arabia, both ancient and modern, form the subject of this second collection of articles by Professor Serjeant. His approach has been to make a detailed study of modern social structures and legal customs and to relate these to what we know of ancient society and law. The traditional tribal society of the region, he argues, has preserved in its customary law and practice a very great deal that derives directly from the pre-Islamic period, whereas the shari'ah, the law of Islam, though stemming from the same sources, has often diverged significantly from it. An understanding of the modern situation, therefore, is of immediate relevance to the interpretation of pre- and early-Islamic society. Among the particular topics covered are the interplay between tribal affinities and religious authority, marriage legislation and the "Frankish chancre" or (syphilis), and maritime customary law. From an ethnographic viewpoint, furthermore, these studies record peoples and lifestyles that have been increasingly overwhelmed by contemporary events. Les societes et les systemes juridiques de l'Arabie du Sud, moderne et ancienne, sont le theme de ce recueil d'articles par le professeur Serjeant. Il aborde le sujet avec une etude des structures sociales modernes, ainsi que du droit coutumier, puis les rattache A ce qui est connu de la societe et du droit anciens. La societe tribale traditionnelle de la region, affirme-t'il, a conserve un grand nombre d'us et coutumes trouvant des origines directes au cours de la periode pre-islamique, alors que le droit de l'Islam, le shari'ah, bien qu'issu des mAmes sources, s'en eloigne de faAon significative. Le fait de comprendre la situation moderne a donc un rapport immediat avec toute interpretation de la societe islamique A ses debuts. Parmi les themes specifiques que couvre l'auteur, se trouvent le droit marital et le "chancre" franc (syphilitique), le droit

Political Culture and Conflict Resolution in the Arab MIddle East develops a method for examining the explanatory capacity of political culture in relation to the issues of civil war and conflict resolution in Lebanon and Algeria. How perception, shaped by values and assumptions, affects political behaviour presents scholars with potentially valuable but also dangerous possibilities. Namely, seeking to explore the explanatory capacity of the nebulous concept of political culture can prospectively lead to the cul de sacs of essentialism or relativism. In an attempt to engage with the concept of political culture, Political Culture and Conflict Resolution in the Arab Middle East develops a method for examining the explanatory capacity of political culture in relation to the issues of civil war and conflict resolution in Lebanon and Algeria. Applying strict limits on the implementation of political culture in an explanatory capacity, namely its role as a secondary, relational and comparative concept, this book demonstrates how political culture operates to shape the form and affect the legitimacy of conflict resolution processes. This is applied to two peace agreements, Lebanon's Taef Agreement and Algeria's Civil Concord. Here. the importance of 'contextuality' is emphasised in developing a space where political culture can provide explanatory capacity whilst remaining connected to 'macro' theoretical concepts.

Paul Gilroy's After Empire - in many ways a sequel to his classic study of race and nation, There Ain't No Black in the Union Jack - explores Britain's failure to come to terms with the loss of its empire and pre-eminent global standing. Drawing on texts from the writings of Fanon and Orwell to Ali G. and The Office, After Empire shows that what we make of the country's postcolonial opportunity will influence the future of Europe and the viability of race as a political category. Taking the political language of the post 9/11 world as a new point of departure he defends beleaguered multiculturalism against accusations of failure. He then takes the liberal discourse of human rights to task, finding it wanting in terms of both racism and imperialism. Gilroy examines how this imperial dissolution has resulted not only in hostility directed at blacks, immigrants and strangers, but also in the country's inability to value the ordinary, unruly multi-culturalism that has evolved organically and unnoticed in its urban centres. A must-read for students of cultural studies, and Britain in the post 9/11 era.

This multidisciplinary book on Islamic finance covers Islamic economic, financial, and legal systems, insurance (takaful), commercial jurisprudence, and the socio-political and political-economy of the Islamic world. It examines the dichotomies and similarities between Islamic and conventional financial systems and suggests future roles and governance of Islamic financial institutions. Distinctive features of the second edition include an emphasis on the theoretical foundations of Islamic finance, the distinctions between the micro- and macroeconomic concepts and theories to the readers, and an expansion on Islamic approved forms of trade dealings, transactions, and contracts. Furthermore, this work discusses the newly introduced Islamic capital market products of the years 2020 to 2022-including the transition from the inter-bank-offer-rates (IBORs) as global benchmark lending rate to the new risk-free-rates (RFRs) that became effective on January 1, 2022-and discusses the transition of Saudi Arabia Monetary Agency to Saudi Central Bank in 2020. Though every effort is made to avoid tedious mathematical proof and derivatives, this work provides working calculations for the pricing of Islamic instruments and provides supplemental materials in the form of faculty resources and students' study guide and workbook. This work acts as a useful textbook for graduate and advanced undergraduate students who are looking at broadening their knowledge in finance. Similarly, this book is a helpful guide and tool for financial practitioners who are interested in learning more about the innovative discipline of Islamic finance. For financial practitioners to drive maximum benefits from this innovative financing mechanism, they need to know, understand, and participate in the investment opportunities which are provided by Islamic finance.

The Muslim shrine is at the crossroad of many processes involving society and culture. It is the place where a saint - often a Sufi - is buried, and it works as a main social factor, with the power of integrating or rejecting people and groups, and as a mirror reflecting the intricacies of a society. The book discusses the role of popular Islam in structuring individual and collective identities in contemporary South Asia. It identifies similarities and differences between the worship of saints and the pattern of religious attendance to tombs and mausoleums in South Asian Sufism and Shi`ism. Inspired by new advances in the field of ritual and pilgrimage studies, the book demonstrates that religious gatherings are spaces of negotiation and redefinitions of religious identity and of the notion of sainthood. Drawing from a large corpus of vernacular and colonial sources, as well as the register of popular literature and ethnographic observation, the authors describe how religious identities are co-constructed through the management of rituals, and are constantly renegotiated through discourses and religious practices. By enabling students, researchers and academics to critically understand the complexity of religious places within the world of popular and devotional Islam, this geographical re-mapping of Muslim religious gatherings in contemporary South Asia contributes to a new understanding of South Asian and Islamic Studies.

Winner of the 2016 Julian Minghi Distinguished Book Award of the Political Geography Specialty Group at the AAG Providing important insights into political geography, the politics of peace, and South Asian studies, this book explores everyday peace in northern India as it is experienced by the Hindu-Muslim community. * Challenges normative understandings of Hindu-Muslim relations as relentlessly violent and the notion of peace as a romantic endpoint occurring only after violence and political maneuverings * Examines the ways in which geographical concepts such as space, place, and scale can inform and problematize understandings of peace * Redefines the politics of peace, as well as concepts of citizenship, agency, secular politics, and democracy * Based on over 14 months of qualitative and archival research in the city of Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh, India

In the current climate of political extremism and violence, much attention has been directed towards "radicalisation" as the reasons behind such courses of action, along with a conviction that those who are radicalised represent an irrational deviation from the conventionally accepted norms of social and political behaviour. This book focuses on the current issues and analytical approaches to the phenomenon of radicalisation in North Africa. Taking a comprehensive approach to the subject, it looks at the processes that lead to radicalisation, rather than the often violent outcomes. At the same time, chapters expand the discussion historically and conceptually beyond the preoccupations of recent years, in order to develop a more holistic understanding of a complex individual and collective process that has represented a permanent challenge to dominant political, social and, on occasion, economic norms. With contributions from academics and policy-makers within and outside the region, the book is a comprehensive investigation of Islamist Radicalisation. As such, it will be of great interest to academics and students investigating North Africa and terrorism, as well as specialists in radicalism and extremism.

What Time is it There? is a history of worlds that encounter each other without ever meeting. The title comes from a film by Tsai Ming-liang which explores the desire to conquer the barriers of space and time by abolishing time differences and inventing substitutes for a coveted elsewhere. This preoccupation with other worlds and consciousness of the differences that separate them have become a persistent theme of our world today, shaped as it has been by the complex flows of people, images and ideas that we have come to associate with the term 'globalization'. But the dismantling of closed worlds that gradually opened cultures and peoples to one another is by no means new. In this remarkable book, Serge Gruzinski takes us back to the early modern period and examines two testimonies that require us to navigate between America and the Islamic world long before the images of 9/11 had entered our heads. One is a chronicle of the New World compiled in Istanbul in 1580, the other is a Repertory of the Times written in Mexico in 1606, which dwells at length on the Empire of the Turks. Why and how did the Turks come to know so much about America, and what made readers in Mexico ask questions about the Ottomans? Gruzinski conducts a dialogue between these two texts that emphasizes the singularities of the two visions, that of Islam and that of America, each already keeping a watchful eye on the other and yet irreducibly different, with this question always in the background: what did it mean to 'think the world' at the dawn of modern times?

This unique textbook enables social work practitioners to gain a deeper understanding of how Islamic principles inform and influence the lives of Muslim populations. Designed to support work with families and faith communities, this completely revised and updated edition examines religious precepts, cosmologies, philosophies and daily practices, while acknowledging cultural variants and population heterogeneity. It includes a comprehensive update of the research literature, international case studies, and new sections on religious extremism and ageing and end-of-life. This is the only book specifically on social work with Muslim communities and provides an essential toolkit for culturally sensitive social work practice.

The Islamic University of Medina was established by the Saudi state in 1961 to provide religious instruction primarily to foreign students. Students would come to Medina for religious education and were then expected to act as missionaries, promoting an understanding of Islam in line with the core tenets of Wahhabism. By the early 2000s, more than 11,000 young men from across the globe had graduated from the Islamic University. Circuits of Faith offers the first examination of the Islamic University and considers the efforts undertaken by Saudi actors and institutions to exert religious influence far beyond the kingdom's borders. Michael Farquhar draws on Arabic sources, including biographical materials, memoirs, syllabi, and back issues of the Islamic University journal, as well as interviews with former staff and students, to explore the institution's history and faculty, the content and style of instruction, and the trajectories and experiences of its students. Countering typical assumptions, Farquhar argues that the project undertaken through the Islamic University amounts to something more complex than just the one-way "export" of Wahhabism. Through transnational networks of students and faculty, this Saudi state-funded religious mission also relies upon, and has in turn been influenced by, far-reaching circulations of persons and ideas.

As Muslim women continue to be a focus of media-led debate, Naaz Rashid uses original scholarship and empirical research to examine how Muslim women are represented in social policy discourse and how the trope of the Muslim woman is situated within national debates about Britishness, the death of multiculturalism and global concerns over international terrorism.

This book explores the political integration of Muslims and Islam across contemporary democracies. The author focuses on France, a country in which the integration of Muslims is usually seen as being problematic and controversial, and which is struggling with both Islamic radicalisation on the one hand, and the new wave of extreme-right populism on the other. Whereas conventional approaches to the topic of the integration of Muslims in France have tended to focus on single methods and sources, such as demographic characteristics or cultural and economic resources, the 'field mixed-method approach' offered in this book allows for a more nuanced analysis. It sheds new light on the interactive dynamics between policy processes, the role of key meso-level actors such as movements and associations, and the political entrepreneurship of Muslims themselves within the overarching frame of French citizenship. The book thus assesses the extent to which a broad set of interactions link Muslim French to the broader community of French citizens. It will be of interest to scholars and students with an interest in Political Sociology, Islamic Studies, Citizenship and European Politics.

Motivated by the intellectual historian Shahab Ahmed's observation that "the history of Islamic paideia has yet to be written," Islam as Education explores multiple forms that the search for knowledge and the transmission of wisdom have taken in Islam, focusing on the classical period (800-1500 CE). Ghiloni draws on a wide range of Islamic primary source material, ranging from sacred texts and parables to neglected pedagogical literature and paintings. He depicts three Islamic religious practices-pilgrimage, prophecy, and jihad-as modes of pedagogy: embodied ways of defining, defusing, and defending sacred knowledge. Islam as Education's educational heuristic not only aids in understanding Islam, but also provides guidance for intercultural and interreligious relations. Ghiloni argues that Islam's grand 'ilm (knowledge) tradition serves as a bridge between Muslims and non-Muslims, and compares it with the educational theory of John Dewey, the celebrated American pragmatist. Based on this discussion, a final chapter develops practical tools for learning from cultural and religious difference.