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Warriors of the Cloisters: The Central Asian Origins of Science in the Medieval World

Christopher I. Beckwith

This book tells how key cultural innovations from Central Asia revolutionized medieval Europe and gave rise to the culture of science in the West. Medieval scholars rarely performed scientific ... More

This book tells how key cultural innovations from Central Asia revolutionized medieval Europe and gave rise to the culture of science in the West. Medieval scholars rarely performed scientific experiments, but instead contested issues in natural science, philosophy, and theology using the recursive argument method. This highly distinctive and unusual method of disputation was a core feature of medieval science, the predecessor of modern science. We know that the foundations of science were imported to Western Europe from the Islamic world, but until now the origins of such key elements of Islamic culture have been a mystery. This book traces how the recursive argument method was first developed by Buddhist scholars and was spread by them throughout ancient Central Asia. It shows how the method was adopted by Islamic Central Asian natural philosophers—most importantly by Avicenna, one of the most brilliant of all medieval thinkers—and transmitted to the West when Avicenna's works were translated into Latin in Spain in the twelfth century by the Jewish philosopher Ibn Da'ud and others. During the same period the institution of the college was also borrowed from the Islamic world. The college was where most of the disputations were held, and became the most important component of medieval Europe's newly formed universities. As the book demonstrates, the Islamic college also originated in Buddhist Central Asia. Using in-depth analysis of ancient Buddhist, Classical Arabic, and Medieval Latin writings, this book will help to transform our understanding of the origins of medieval scientific culture.Less

Visionaries of Silence: The Reformist Sufi Order of the Demirdashiya al-Khalwatiya in Cairo

Earle H. Waugh

Founded in the sixteenth century, the Demirdashiya Sufi order in Cairo has played an influential role in Egypt's public life, and through a line of family sheikhs has channeled the impulses of its ... More

Founded in the sixteenth century, the Demirdashiya Sufi order in Cairo has played an influential role in Egypt's public life, and through a line of family sheikhs has channeled the impulses of its Sufi origins into different types of reform. Practicing a visionary form of piety, the Demirdashiya—once legendary for its wealth and secrecy—continues to influence a small but important segment of contemporary Cairo's inhabitants. This study highlights the Demirdashiya's sophisticated and complex relationship with both politics and Islamic culture. As part of his research, the author of this book attended the order's liturgies—the dhikrs (remembrance) and khalwa (retreat) —normally closed to outsiders. During an annual khalwa, the adept silently meditates for three days in his own cell. More than giving up human discourse, the mandated silence is a reordering of sensitivities to the divine, and a path to insight into the many ways that God conveys Himself to humans. Examining the role of the Demirdashiya in Egypt's history as well as its visionary piety, the book explores the dialectic between reform and vision in a stable Sufi order. It also probes how these competing ideals were incorporated into the physical world of the zawiya, mosque, and living quarters, and the extension of its influence in Europe through its most famous daughter, Qut al-Qulub, noted visionary author and mother of the order's current sheikh.Less

Founding Gods, Inventing Nations: Conquest and Culture Myths from Antiquity to Islam

William F. McCants

From the dawn of writing in Sumer to the sunset of the Islamic empire, this book traces four thousand years of speculation on the origins of civilization. Investigating a vast range of primary ... More

From the dawn of writing in Sumer to the sunset of the Islamic empire, this book traces four thousand years of speculation on the origins of civilization. Investigating a vast range of primary sources, some of which are translated here for the first time, and focusing on the dynamic influence of the Greek, Roman, and Arab conquests of the Near East, the book looks at the ways the conquerors and those they conquered reshaped their myths of civilization's origins in response to the social and political consequences of empire. The Greek and Roman conquests brought with them a learned culture that competed with that of native elites. The conquering Arabs, in contrast, had no learned culture, which led to three hundred years of Muslim competition over the cultural orientation of Islam, a contest reflected in the culture myths of that time. What we know today as Islamic culture is the product of this contest, whose protagonists drew heavily on the lore of non-Arab and pagan antiquity. The book argues that authors in all three periods did not write about civilization's origins solely out of pure antiquarian interest—they also sought to address the social and political tensions of the day. The strategies they employed and the postcolonial dilemmas they confronted provide invaluable context for understanding how authors today use myth and history to locate themselves in the confusing aftermath of empire.Less

Europe and the Islamic World: A History

John Tolan, Henry Laurens, and Gilles Veinstein

This book sheds light on the shared roots of Islamic and Western cultures and on the richness of their inextricably intertwined histories, refuting once and for all the misguided notion of a “clash ... More

This book sheds light on the shared roots of Islamic and Western cultures and on the richness of their inextricably intertwined histories, refuting once and for all the misguided notion of a “clash of civilizations” between the Muslim world and Europe. The book brings to life the complex and tumultuous relations between Genoans and Tunisians, Alexandrians and the people of Constantinople, Catalans and Maghrebis—the myriad groups and individuals whose stories reflect the common cultural, intellectual, and religious heritage of Europe and Islam. Since the seventh century, when the armies of Constantinople and Medina fought for control of Syria and Palestine, there has been ongoing contact between the Muslim world and the West. This sweeping history vividly recounts the wars and the crusades, the alliances and diplomacy, commerce and the slave trade, technology transfers, and the intellectual and artistic exchanges. Here readers are given an unparalleled introduction to key periods and events, including the Muslim conquests, the collapse of the Byzantine Empire, the commercial revolution of the medieval Mediterranean, the intellectual and cultural achievements of Muslim Spain, the crusades and Spanish reconquest, the rise of the Ottomans and their conquest of a third of Europe, European colonization and decolonization, and the challenges and promise of this entwined legacy today. As provocative as it is groundbreaking, this book describes this shared history in all its richness and diversity, revealing how ongoing encounters between Europe and Islam have profoundly shaped both.Less

Rediscovering the Islamic Classics: How Editors and Print Culture Transformed an Intellectual Tradition

Ahmed El Shamsy

Islamic book culture dates back to late antiquity, when Muslim scholars began to write down their doctrines on parchment, papyrus, and paper and then to compose increasingly elaborate analyses of, ... More

Islamic book culture dates back to late antiquity, when Muslim scholars began to write down their doctrines on parchment, papyrus, and paper and then to compose increasingly elaborate analyses of, and commentaries on, these ideas. Movable type was adopted in the Middle East only in the early nineteenth century, and it wasn't until the second half of the century that the first works of classical Islamic religious scholarship were printed there. But from that moment on, as this book reveals, the technology of print transformed Islamic scholarship and Arabic literature. The book tells the story of how a small group of editors and intellectuals brought forgotten works of Islamic literature into print and defined what became the classical canon of Islamic thought. Through the lens of the literary culture of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Arab cities—especially Cairo, a hot spot of the nascent publishing business—the book explores the contributions of these individuals, who included some of the most important thinkers of the time. Through their efforts to find and publish classical literature, the book shows, many nearly lost works were recovered, disseminated, and harnessed for agendas of linguistic, ethical, and religious reform. The book is an examination of the central role printing and its advocates played in the intellectual history of the modern Arab world.Less

Love's Subtle Magic: An Indian Islamic Literary Tradition, 1379-1545

Aditya Behl

Wendy Doniger (ed.)

The encounter between Muslim and Hindu remains one of the defining issues of South Asian society today. This encounter began as early as the eighth century, and the first Muslim kingdom in India ... More

The encounter between Muslim and Hindu remains one of the defining issues of South Asian society today. This encounter began as early as the eighth century, and the first Muslim kingdom in India would be established at the end of the twelfth century. This powerful kingdom, the Sultanate of Delhi, eventually reduced to vassalage almost every independent kingdom on the subcontinent. This book uses a little-understood genre of Sufi literature to paint an entirely new picture of the evolution of Indian culture during the earliest period of Muslim domination. These curious romantic tales transmit a deeply serious religious message through the medium of lighthearted stories of love. Although composed in the Muslim courts, they are written in a vernacular Indian language. Until now, they have defied analysis, and been mostly ignored by scholars east and west. The book shows that the Sufi authors of these charming tales purposely sought to convey an Islamic vision via an Indian idiom. They thus constitute the earliest attempt at the indigenization of Islamic literature in an Indian setting. More important, however, the book's analysis brilliantly illuminates the cosmopolitan and composite culture of the Sultanate India in which they were composed. This in turn compels us completely to rethink the standard of the opposition between Indian Hindu and foreign Muslim and recognize that the Indo‐Islamic culture of this era was already significantly Indian in many important ways.Less

Jami

Hamid Algar

ʿAbd al-Rahman Jami (1414–1492) is a culminating figure in Perso-Islamic culture, whose reputation and influence have endured undiminished throughout the eastern Islamic world — the Ottoman Empire ... More

ʿAbd al-Rahman Jami (1414–1492) is a culminating figure in Perso-Islamic culture, whose reputation and influence have endured undiminished throughout the eastern Islamic world — the Ottoman Empire and Central Asia, Iran, India, China and the Malay world. Primarily celebrated as a poet, Jami was also an accomplished Islamic scholar and Arabist, a Sufi of great standing, and an acerbic polemicist and social critic. This book begins with a sketch of the geographical and historical landscape behind the events of Jami’s life in Herat and beyond. It explains the influences upon his character and work; what shaped his poetic output, its literary forms, and thematic concerns; the reasons for the precise configuration of his Sufism within the Naqshbandiyya; and his combative support for some of the doctrines of Ibn ʿArabi. The book also discusses Jami’s practice of ‘seclusion within society’, whereby the Sufi was attentive to the problems of the community while being detached from them. Finally, it surveys the transmission of Jami’s literary, intellectual, and spiritual legacy to the eastern Islamic world, and presents an overview of recent Jami scholarship in the Islamic world, the West, and China.Less

Medicines of the Soul: Female Bodies and Sacred Geographies in a Transnational Islam

Fedwa Malti-Douglas

In this volume, the autobiographical writings of three leading women in today's Islamic revival movement reveal dramatic stories of religious transformation. As interpreted by this book, the ... More

In this volume, the autobiographical writings of three leading women in today's Islamic revival movement reveal dramatic stories of religious transformation. As interpreted by this book, the autobiographies provide a powerful, groundbreaking portrayal of gender, religion, and discourses of the body in Arabo-Islamic culture. At the center of each story is a lively female Islamic spirituality that questions secular hierarchies while reaffirming patriarchal ones.Less