Knowledge and power in Muslim societies : approaches in intellectual history / edited by Kazuo Morimoto and Sajjad Rizvi.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Morimoto, Kazuo, 1970- editor.

Raz̤avī, Sajjād, editor.

Series:

Studies in Islamic intellectual history ; volume 1.

Studies in Islamic intellectual history ; volume 1

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Islam--History.

Islam.

Islam and civil society.

Muslims--Intellectual life.

Muslims.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (viii, 421 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Berlin : Gerlach Press, 2023.

Summary:

The study of Islam and of Islamic history is enjoying something of a revival with an emphasis on intellectual history and a greater concern with the 'subaltern' within that.<br><br>Why does religion continue to hold significance in our times? Are humans better off, adaptable, less violent, consistently unpredictable? How can we understand the course of our political history and the seeming dominance of democracy and its discontents, not least the legacies of coloniality and empire? While nationalist historiographies prevail in many contexts as well as Marxist and other approaches, the trend seems to be towards connected histories, the transnational and the global. Much of this constitutes intellectual history, which as one leading expert puts it, 'seeks to restore a lost world, to recover perspectives and ideas from the ruins, to pull back the veil, and explain why the ideas resonated in the past and convinced their advocates' (Richard Whatmore). Ideas are expressive of cultures and norms, practices and dispositions, of actions and events that lie at the very core of human experience such as sovereignty and power, mind and matter, profanity and spirituality.<br><br>There are noticeable differences of approach in the various chapters presented but what brings them together is a careful study of texts, not in a reductively philological manner derided quite often these days but in the way in which we recognise that texts are forms of speech acts and lie alongside other forms of self-expression that can elucidate and illuminate as well as occlude.

Contents:

Intro

Half Title

Series Page

Copyright

Contents

Foreword

Notes

Introduction: Diversifying the Intellectual History of Islam and Muslim Cultures

Bibliography

PHILOSOPHY

1 Three Portraits of a Philosopher in Islamic Cultures

A Decolonial Strategy

How to Study Islamic Texts in 'Philosophy'

Abū l-ʿAbbās Aḥmad Bābā of Timbuktu: Legal Activist as Philosopher

Umm Salama Bēgum Nayrīzī: Lover and Mystic as Philosopher

ʿAbd al-ʿAlī Muḥammad b. Niẓām al-Din [Baḥr al-ʿulūm]: Sunni Metaphysician and Court Philosopher

Concluding Remarks

2 Philosophy for Politics: Ancient Greek Philosophy Echoed in Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ's Writings

Introduction

Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ and the Political Advice Texts Attributed to Him

Al-Manṭiq

Kalīla wa-Dimna

The Kitāb al-Ādāb al-kabīr

The Kitāb al-Adab al-ṣaghīr

Political Epistles: The Risāla fī l-ṣaḥāba and al-Yatīma

Conclusions

Abbreviations for Ibn Muqaffaʿs Works

Ibn Muqaffaʿ's Oeuvre

Kitāb al-Ādāb al-kabīr

Kitāb al-Adab al-ṣaghīr

The Letter of Tansar

Risāla fī l-ṣaḥāba

Al-Yatīma

Other Sources and Studies

3 The Sorcerer Scholar: Sirāj al-Dīn al-Sakkākī between Grammar and Grimoire

Sakkākī's Reputation

Powerful Illusions

The Magical Miftāḥ

Those Who Know and Those Who Don't

The Sun Is a Pot of Gold

Poetry on Purpose

A Powerful Muse

Sakkākī the Man

Conclusion

Al-Sakkākī's Works

4 Knowledge for All: Zayn al-Dīn al-Kaššī (d. before 1228) on Philosophical Writing

Knowledge (ʿilm) and Philosophy (ḥikma)

The Duty to Write

Who Are Muqallids?: The Ġazālian Background of al-Kaššī's Notion of Taqlīd.

Al-Kaššī's Art of Writing

Sources

Studies

5 Cancelling the Apocalypse: Refracted Anticipation for the Awaited Mahdī

Sayyid Muḥammad and Kalām al-mahdī

A Paradox in the Manifestation of the Hidden Imām as the Awaited Mahdī

Immortality of the Eleven Imāms

Impossibility of the Hidden Imām's Manifestation

Modelling the Deputyship: The Theory of the Veil

Justification of the Deputyship: God's Ordeal and a "Weak" Mahdī

God's Ordeal

Mahdī of the Community

Kalām al-mahdī

Qurʾan

SCHOLARLY PRODUCTION

6 Didactic Discourse and Sarcastic Expressions in the Context of Abū Hilāl al-ʿAskarī's Criticism

Abū Hilāl al-ʿAskarī and His Literary Critical Position

Pedagogical and Didactic Discourse in al-Ḥathth ʿalā ṭalab al-ʿilm, al-Ṣināʿatayn and Faḍl al-ʿaṭāʾ

The Sarcastic Expressions That Abū Hilāl Used in His Critiques and How He Employed Them

7 Writing the Imams' Virtues under the Interconfessional Policy of al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh

Ibn al-Biṭrīq and the ʿUmda

Compilation of the ʿUmda under al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh

Exclusive Use of Sunni Sources

Interpretation of the Ghadīr Khumm Tradition

From ʿAlī to the Twelve Imams

The Mustadrak and the Khaṣāʾiṣ

8 A Jaʿfarid-Zaynabid Genealogy from Thirteenth-Century Egypt: ʿUrbān Uprising, Najafī Connection

The Genealogy of the Thaʿlabids: A Laudatory Genealogy

The Dedicatee: Najm al-Dīn ʿAlī b. Ḥiṣn al-Dīn Thaʿlab II

The Author: Ibrāhīm b. Yaḥyā al-Mashhadī al-Najafī, Ibn Ballūh

Treatment of the Twelve Imams: A Sunni Representation

Appendix

Bibliography.

9 ʿIlm al-Siyāq and Bureaucrats in Safavid Iran

History of ʿIlm al-siyāq

Safavid Siyāq Manuals

Ledgers and Administration

Rūznāmača

Tawǧīh

Avāraǧa

ʿIlm al-siyāq in the Social Context

10 Ma Dexin's Criticism of Saint Veneration: "Chinese"-Flavored Islam Formed by a Conflict

Ma Dexin's Argument on Sufi Masters and Its Sources

Ma Dexin's Creative Discussion of Sufi Masters and the Oneness of Being

Intellectual Trends in the Middle East in the Nineteenth Century

The Chinese Islamic Tradition

The Background of Ma Dexin's Negative Views on Sufi Masters

Discord with the Jahriyya Order

Jahriyya Justifications of Sufi Masters' Abilities

THE MAKING OF THE MODERN

11 The Politics of the Bayʿa Ceremony in Modern Morocco

Analytical Approach of This Study

Positive Measures to Install Religious Legitimacy through the Process of Institution-Building

Institution-Building Processes

Religious Legitimacy Supporting Royal Authority

Bayʿa Ceremony in Morocco

History of the Bayʿa in Morocco

Basic Structure of Morocco's Bayʿa Ceremony

Analysis of the Bayʿa and Khuṭbas: The Institutionalization of Religious Rituals

Venues of the Bayʿa Ceremony

Topics of the King's Speeches

The Roles of the Bayʿa Ceremony: Focusing on the Mohammed VI Era

Website

Newspapers

12 The Tawḥīd of the Painting of God the Mother

Argument

Qayrawān

Paintings

God the Mother

13 Teaching Iranian History: Narrative Style and Messages

Review of the History Textbooks

Method of Analysis

Analysis of the Textbooks (1): The Fight against Oppressors and the Established.

Good versus Oppressive Rulers

The Established versus the Deprived

Resistance to Oppressive Rulers

The ʿUlama's Leadership amidst Resistance

Analysis of the Textbooks (2): The Fight for National Integration and Independence

Integrated versus Disintegrated Iran

Independence versus Foreign Invasion and Occupation

Resistance to Foreign Invasion and Liberation from Foreign Domination

The ʿUlama's Leadership in Fighting Foreign Enemies

Analysis of the Textbooks (3): Iranians' Greatness

Contributions to Culture and Science

Conclusion: Narrative Style and Messages

Published Sources

Internet Sources

14 Inscribing "God's Words" in Japan: Connecting the Past to the Present through the Qurʾan

Translations of the Qurʾan: A Brief History

Connecting the Past to the Present

Reviving the Moments of the Revelation: The Koran by Toshihiko Izutsu

Relating the Revelation to Contemporary Lives: The Holy Qurʾan by Ryoichi Mita

Changes in the Interpretations

Mita's Successors: Japan Muslim Association

Postscript

About the Contributors.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 12 Sep 2025).

Includes bibliographical references.

ISBN:

3-95994-165-X

OCLC:

1381095619