For God or Empire : Sayyid Fadl and the Indian Ocean World / Wilson Chacko Jacob.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Jacob, Wilson Chacko, Author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Faḍl ibn ʻAlawī, Amir of Ẓafār, 1825-1900.

Faḍl ibn ʻAlawī.

Sufis--India--Malabar--Biography.

Sufis.

Moplahs--India--Malabar--Biography.

Moplahs.

Political activists--India--Malabar--Biography.

Political activists.

Sovereignty--Religious aspects--Islam.

Sovereignty.

Islam and politics--Indian Ocean Region--History.

Islam and politics.

Turkey--History--Ottoman Empire, 1288-1918.

Turkey.

India--History--British occupation, 1765-1947.

India.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (302 pages)

Place of Publication:

Stanford, CA : Stanford University Press, [2020]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Sayyid Fadl, a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad, led a unique life—one that spanned much of the nineteenth century and connected India, Arabia, and the Ottoman Empire. For God or Empire tells his story, part biography and part global history, as his life and legacy afford a singular view on historical shifts of power and sovereignty, religion and politics. Wilson Chacko Jacob recasts the genealogy of modern sovereignty through the encounter between Islam and empire-states in the Indian Ocean world. Fadl's travels in worlds seen and unseen made for a life that was both unsettled and unsettling. And through his life at least two forms of sovereignty—God and empire—become apparent in intersecting global contexts of religion and modern state formation. While these changes are typically explained in terms of secularization of the state and the birth of rational modern man, the life and afterlives of Sayyid Fadl—which take us from eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Indian Ocean worlds to twenty-first century cyberspace—offer a more open-ended global history of sovereignty and a more capacious conception of life.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Illustrations

Preface

Acknowledgments

Note on Transliteration

Introduction. Life In-Between

1. Remaking the Indian Ocean World

2. “Where the Sun Rises to Where the Sun Sets”

3. “The Tear Will Widen”

4. “Time Is the Only Veil”

5. Uncertain Returns

6. “This True and Merciful Way”

Conclusion. Sovereignty and Life’s Mysterious Unity

Notes

Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 23. Jul 2020)

ISBN:

1-5036-0964-2

OCLC:

1178769179