Morality and revelation in Islamic thought and beyond : a new problem of evil / Amir Saemi.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Saemi, Amir, author.

Series:

Oxford scholarship online.

Oxford scholarship online

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Islamic ethics--History.

Islamic ethics.

Good and evil--Religious aspects--Islam.

Good and evil.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xii, 239 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Oxford University Press, 2024.

Summary:

This text is about the moral problem generated by morally controversial passages in scripture (and in the Qur'an in particular), passages that seem to allow violence and discrimination against women and sexual and religious minorities. The conservatives argue that scripture can override our own moral judgments and thus certain acts of violence or discrimination can be morally justified through scripture. The book explores this conservative argument and finds ways to undermine it. The book aims to show how a progressive Muslim, or a theist in general, can reject violence and discrimination without renouncing scripture as God's word. Moreover, the book provides a refreshing overview of the history of ethics in the Islamic tradition.

Contents:

Cover

Morality and Revelation in Islamic Thought and Beyond

Copyright

Epigraph

Dedication

Contents

Acknowledgments

Prologue: Defining a New Problem of Evil

Summary of the Chapter

1. Two Stories

2. Morally Controversial Scriptural Passages

3. Seeming Prescribed Evil

4. The New Problem of Evil and the Structure of the Book

5. Historical Background

Part I: Scripture First

1. The Consequentialism of the Late Ashʿarites

1. Divine Command Theory of the Early Ashʿarites

2. The Consequentialism of al-​Ghazālī

3. The Moral Epistemology of al-​Ghazālī

4. The Argument for Strict Adherence to Scripture

5. Taqlīd and the Rule of Figurative Interpretation

2. The Deontological Ethics of the Muʿtazilites

1. The Ashʿarites and the Problem of Evil

2. The Metaethics of the Muʿtazilites

3. The Normative Theory of ʿAbd al-​Jabbār

4. The Moral Epistemology of ʿAbd al-​Jabbār

5. Natural Evil, Prescribed Evil, and Skeptical Theism

3. The Virtue Ethics of Islamic Philosophers

1. The Project of the Reconciliation of Reason and Religion

2. Al-​Fārābī's View on Epistemology and Religion

3. Averroës's View on the Harmony of Religion and Philosophy

4. The Virtue Ethics of al-​Fārābī

Part II: Ethics First

4. The Impermissibility of Moral Deference

1. Moral Deference in Contemporary Philosophy

2. Al-​Rāzī's Ethical Theory

3. Al-​Rāzī on Moral Deference

4. Moses and Impermissibility of Pure Moral Deference

5. A Solution to the Problem of Prescribed Evil

5. The Reliability of Our Moral Judgments

1. The Debate on Objective and Subjective Ought

2. Scripture, Ignorance, and Uncertainty

3. Ignorance Revisited

4. Kantian Arguments for the Accessibility Constraint

5. Moral Knowledge Optimism and the Muʿtazilites

6. The Case of Abraham

6. The Hermeneutics of Scripture

1. Ethics-​First Solutions to the Problem of Prescribed Evil

2. Lessons from a Philosophical Tale

3. The Nature of Law

4. Legal Interpretation Defended

5. The Moral Functions of Scripture

Index

Notes:

Also issued in print: 2024.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource and publisher information; title from PDF title page (viewed on November 16, 2023).

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Other Format:

Print version: Saemi, Amir. Morality and revelation in Islamic thought and beyond

ISBN:

0-19-768626-5

0-19-768624-9

0-19-768625-7

OCLC:

1399530023