Islam and the challenge of civilization / Abdelwahab Meddeb ; translated by Jane Kuntz.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Meddeb, Abdelwahab, author.

Contributor:

Kuntz, Jane, translator.

Standardized Title:

Pari de civilisation. English

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Islam--21st century.

Islam.

Islamic civilization.

Islamic renewal.

Muslims--Non-Islamic countries.

Muslims.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (192 p.)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Fordham University Press, [2013]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Abdelwahab Meddeb makes an urgent case for an Islamic reformation, located squarely in Western Europe, now home to millions of Muslims, where Christianity and Judaism have come to coexist with secular humanism and positivist law. He is not advocating “moderate” Islam, which he characterizes as thinly disguised Wahabism, but rather an Islam inspired by the great Sufi thinkers, whose practice of religion was not bound by doctrine. To accomplish this, Meddeb returns to the doctrinal question of the text as transcription of the uncreated word of God and calls upon Muslims to distinguish between Islam’s spiritual message and the temporal, material, and historically grounded origins of its founding scriptures. He contrasts periods of Islamic history—when philosophers and theologians engaged in lively dialogue with other faiths and civilizations and contributed to transmitting the Hellenistic tradition to early modern Europe—with modern Islam’s collective amnesia of this past. Meddeb wages a war of interpretations in this book, in his attempt to demonstrate that Muslims cannot join the concert of nations unless they set aside outmoded notions such as jihad and realize that feuding among the monotheisms must give way to the more important issue of what it means to be a citizen in today’s postreligious global setting.

Contents:

Front matter

Contents

Prologue: Religion and Violence

1. The Koran as Myth

2. The Clash of Interpretations

3. On the Arab Decline

4. Civilization or Extinction

5. Enlightenment between High and Low Voltage

6. The Physics and Metaphysics of Nature

Epilogue: Religion and Cosmopolitics

Appendix A: The veil unveiled: dialogue with Christian Jambet

Appendix B: Obama in Cairo

Notes

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references.

Description based on print version record.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

9780823251889

0823251888

9780823252916

0823252914

9780823251247

0823251241

OCLC:

846997935