Humor in early Islam
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Humor in Early Islam , first published in 1956, is a pioneering study by the versatile and prolific scholar Franz Rosenthal (1914-2003), who (having published an article on mediaeval Arabic blurbs), should have written this text himself. It contains an annotated translation of an Arabic text on a figure who became the subject of many jokes and anecdotes, the greedy and obtuse Ashʿab, a singer who lived in the eighth century but whose literary and fictional life long survived him. The translation is preceded by chapters on the textual sources and on the historical and legendary personalities of Ashʿab; the book ends with a short essay on laughter. Whether or not the jokes will make a modern reader laugh, the book is a valuable source for those seriously interested in a religion or a culture that all too often but unjustly is associated, by outsiders, with an aversion to laughter.
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"Translation of texts":p. [36]-131. :
1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references. :
9789004215733 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Christian doctrines in Islamic theology /
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By the tenth century Islamic theology had become an integrated system by which theologians constructed sophisticated accounts of the nature of the world and God's relationship with it. They also used it to establish proofs that Islam was the only rationally tenable form of belief, building these in part on proofs of the illogicalities in other faiths, including Christianity. Through excerpts from key works of the theologians al-Nashi' al-Akbar, al-Maturidi, al-Baqillani and ʿAbd al-Jabbar, this book shows how Muslim theologians in this period made use of Christian doctrines as examples of misguided thinking to help confirm the correctness of their own theology, and how among Muslim theologians Christianity had ceased to attract serious attention as a rival to Islam.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [379]-383) and index. :
9789047442059 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Envisioning islamic art and architecture : essays in honor of Renata Holod /
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Envisioning Islamic Art and Architecture: Essays in Honor of Renata Holod is a collection of studies on the portable arts, arts of the book, painting, photography, and architecture spanning the medieval and modern periods and across the historical Islamic lands. The essays reflect the wide-ranging interests and diverse methodologies of Renata Holod and attend to the physical, material, and aesthetic properties of their objects, offer nuanced explanations of complex relations between objects and historical contexts, and remain critically aware of the shape of the field of Islamic art and architecture, its canonical objects, approaches, and historiographies. Essential reading for scholars working on Islam and the Islamic world in the disciplines of history of art and architecture, history, literature, and anthropology. With contributions by María Judith Feliciano, Christiane Gruber, Leslee Katrina Michelsen, Nancy Micklewright, Stephennie Mulder, Johanna Olafsdotter, Yael Rice, Cynthia Robinson, David J. Roxburgh, D. Fairchild Ruggles, Alison Mackenzie Shah, and Pushkar Sohoni.
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1 online resource (xxx, 311 pages) : illustrations (some color) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 279-296) and index. :
9789004280281 :
2213-3844 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Nuzhat al-zāhid : Adʿiya-yi maʾthūr az imāmān-i maʿṣūm (ʿalayhim al-salām) bā tawḍīḥāt-i fārsi-yi sada-yi shishum /
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Together with Shaykh Ṭūsī's (d. 460/1067) Miṣbāḥ al-mutahajjid and ʿAlī al-Tamīmī's (early 6th/12th cent.) Dhakhīrat al-ākhira , the anonymous Nuzhat al-zāhid (ca. 600/1200) is among the oldest surviving testimonies of Duʿāʾ literature among the Shīʿa. As such, it can be regarded as a connecting link between Ṭūsī and the later tradition of Shīʿī Duʿāʾ literature, after Ibn Ṭāwūs (d. 664/1266). The Nuzhat al-zāhid is important because besides Ṭūsī's Miṣbāḥ it also uses other older sources, which often allows the author to provide much more detail than him, adding new material as well. In this sense, the Nuzhat al-zāhid can truly be regarded as a major reference in its field. It is a complete work, covering all the aspects of petitionary prayer in the life of the believer. Written in the sweet kind of language of its times, its explanations constitute a fine example of medieval Persian spiritual prose.
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1 online resource. :
9789004395305
9789645568397
Early Islam between Myth and History : Al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī (d. 110H/728CE) and the Formation of His Legacy in Classical Islamic Scholarship /
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This volume examines the process through which a historical character named al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī was transformed into a myth by several groups in medieval Islam. Al-Ḥasan lived in the city of Basra, southern Iraq, and was famed for his piety, which attracted to him a large number of disciples who went on to play important roles in the formation of several religious trends. The literary corpus (sayings, stories and letters) ascribed to him has been used as a window into early Islamic religious and intellectual thought. But as this study shows, this corpus was largely forged in different periods, in some cases even a thousand years after al-Ḥasan's death. It tells us more about the beliefs of those who forged the sayings, stories and letters rather than about al-Ḥasan's thought and time.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789047416708
9789004148291
Tarjuma-yi Anājīl-i arbaʿa /
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Mīr Muḥammad Bāqir Khātūnābādī (d. 1127/1715) was a Shīʿī scholar who entertained close relations with the Safavi ruler Shāh Sulṭān Ḥusayn (d. 1139/1726-27) in Isfahan. In the late 17th century, Isfahan was the center of international commerce and diplomacy in Persia. Besides serving the commercial interests of their homeland, some of the foreign representations also had missionaries in their ranks, with the obvious purpose of propagating Christianity among the local population. To this end, they also distributed Arabic copies of the Gospels. In those days, Isfahan was the scene of Christian-Muslim dialogue and polemics. The Persian translation of the Gospels published in this volume was made by Khātūnābādī on the order of Shāh Sulṭān Ḥusayn. It was meant to provide Muslim scholars with the necessary background for their debates. It is a critical, documented, almost scholarly translation, with all the weak points of the Gospels recorded in its margins.
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1 online resource. :
9789004401754
9789648700077
Defending the "people of truth" in the early Islamic period : the Christian apologies of Abū Rā̕̕iṭah /
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The apologetical writings of the Jacobite Christian, Abū Rā'iṭah al-Takrītī († c. 835) have remained relatively unknown in Western scholarship. Yet his engagement with Muslim questions about Christianity provides a significant insight into the theological debate between the two communities in the early ʿAbbāsid period. Abū Rā'iṭah's treatises take up many of the topics that become standard for Christian-Muslim apologetics: proofs of the true religion, the Trinity, the Incarnation, and Christian practices. In each case, he provides his reader with complex arguments in defense of Christian doctrines that can be used to convince both Muslims and wavering Christians of the truth of Christianity. This new Arabic edition and English translation seeks to contextualize Abū Rā'iṭah's important writings and to make the original texts available to modern scholars interested in all aspects of the early development of Muslim-Christian relations.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [359]-365) and index. :
9789047408550 :
1570-7350 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The legend of Sergius Baḥīrā : eastern Christian apologetics and apocalyptic in response to Islam /
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From the eighth century onwards, Christians living under Islam have produced numerous apologetic and polemical works, aimed at proving the continuing validity of Christianity. Among these is the Legend of Sergius Baḥīrā, which survives in two Syriac and two Arabic versions, and appears here in edition and translation. Being a counterhistory of Islam, it reshapes early Muslim traditions about a monk recognizing Muḥammad as the final Prophet by turning this monk into Muhammad's tutor and co-author of the Qur'an. In response to Muslim triumphalist propaganda, it portrays Islam's political power as predestined but finite and unrelated to its religious message. This feature sets the legend apart from similar Christian accounts of the origin of Islam, East and West, which are reviewed in this study as well.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [529]-560) and index. :
9789047441953 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Materialien zur alten islamischen Frommigkeit /
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Arabic texts dating from the Third-4th/9th-10th centuries by the following five authors are here presented: Abū Shaykh al-Burjulānī, Ibrāhīm al-Khuttalī, Ibn al-Naḥḥās, Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Rūdhabārī and Ibn Ḥamakān. The texts appear in transliteration along with a German translation. Their chains of transmission (isnāds) are analyzed and parallels with other authors are noted. The subject dealt with throughout is mystical piety. These highly interesting materials throw light on Islamic mysticism's early stage of development.
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1 online resource (xxvii, 374 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [329]-335) and indexes. :
9789047443667 :
1875-0664 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
In defense of the Bible : a critical edition and an introduction to al-Biqāʻī's Bible treatise /
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The history of the Islamic interaction with the Scriptures of Judaism and Christianity has been studied extensively in academia. The prevailing view is that Muslims had hardly any religious appreciation to the Bible and when used by Muslims it was mainly in apologetic or polemical settings. The document presented here squarely contradicts such a view. The treatise argues for the permissiblity of using the Bible by Muslims for religious purposes. Al-Biqāʿī, the author of this treatise, wrote a huge Qurʾān commentary that used the Hebrew Bible and the Gospels to interpret parts of the Qurʾān. Al-Sakhāwī, a bitter enemy, opposed such a practice. The document preserves for us a fundamental argument inside Islam about the value of the Scriptures of other religions.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [221]-223) and indexes. :
9789047433781 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Muslim exegesis of the Bible in medieval Cairo : Najm al-Din al-Tufi's (d. 716/1316) commentary on the Christian scriptures /
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Najm al-Dīn al-Ṭūfī's (d. 716/1316) extraordinary commentary on the Christian scriptures has not received the scholarly attention it deserves. Illustrating the way in which the Bible was read, interpreted and used as a proof-text in the construction of early 14th century Muslim views of Christianity, his al-Ta'līq 'alā al-Anājīl al-arba'a wa-al-ta'līq 'alā al-Tawrāh wa-'alā ghayrihā min kutub al-anbiyā' (Critical Commentary on the Four Gospels, the Torah and other Books of the Prophets) is an invaluable treasure for the study of Muslim-Christian dialogue and its history. In Muslim Exegesis of the Bible in Medieval Cairo, Lejla Demiri makes this important and unusual work available for the first time in a scholarly edition and English translation, with a full introduction that places Ṭūfī in his intellectual context.
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1 online resource (xiv, 566 pages) : illustrations. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004243200 :
1570-7350 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Qāmūs al-baḥrayn : Matn-i kalāmi-yi fārsi-yi taʾlīf bih sāl-i 814 qamarī /
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Muḥammad Abu ʼl-Faḍl Muḥammad's (fl. ca. 800/1400) Persian Qāmūs al-baḥrayn was written in 814/1411. About the author's life and times nothing is known other than that his nickname 'Ḥamīd Muftī' points at a certain level of expertise in the legal profession. Being a theological summa, the Qāmūs al-baḥrayn stands in a long tradition. The author used numerous theological and philosophical sources, referring explicitly to such authorities as Avicenna (d. 428/1037), Suhrawardī (d. 587/1191), Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī (d. 606/1210), and Naṣīr al-Dīn Ṭūsī (d. 672/1274). The work contains so many obvious borrowings from Rāzī that the Qāmūs al-baḥrayn is factually an exposition of his thought. In the edition, a special effort was made to point this out in each case where a concrete reference could be given. There are few theological summae in Persian; readers of Persian will therefore be delighted to discover this comprehensive work and its mellifluous style of composition.
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1 online resource. :
9789004395428
9789004395220
Tafsīr-i Shahristānī al-Musammā bi-Mafātīḥ al-asrār wa-maṣābīḥ al-abrār. Volume 2 /
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Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Karīm al-Shahristānī (d. 548/1153) was a prominent historian of religions who was well-versed in Islamic theology and the sciences of the Qurʾān. He is mostly known for his Kitāb al-milal wal-niḥal , a ground-breaking history of religions, his Kitāb muṣāraʿat al-falāsifa , a critical exposition of the philosophy of Avicenna (d. 428/1037)-later refuted by Naṣīr al-Dīn Tūsī (d. 672/1274) in his Maṣāriʿ al-muṣāriʿ -and the Mafātīḥ al-asrār wa-maṣābīḥ al-abrār , his partial Qurʾān commentary contained in the present two volumes. The Mafātīḥ al-asrār was written in the final years of Shahristānī's life and clearly bears the stamp of Ismailism, a branch of Shīʿism to which he had been introduced as a young man by his teacher in Qurʾānic studies in Nishapur, Abu ʼl-Qāsim al-Anṣārī (d. 512/1118). Even if the Mafātīḥ al-asrār is a work that remained unfinished, it is a fine and rare specimen of the richness of Ismaili taʾwīl . 2 vols; volume 2.
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1 online resource. :
9789004402300
9789648700435
The Qur'an, morality and critical reason : the essential Muhammad Shahrur /
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This book presents the work and ideas of the Syrian writer Muhammad Shahrur to the English-speaking world. Shahrur is at the moment the most innovative intellectual thinker in the Arab Middle East. Often described as the 'Martin Luther of Islam,' he offers a liberal, progressive reading of Islam that aims to counter the influences of religious fundamentalism and radical politics. Shahrur's innovative interpretation of the Qur'an offers groundbreaking new ideas, based on his conviction that centuries of historical Islam, including scholarship in the traditional Islamic religious sciences, have obscured or even obliterated the Qur'an's progressive and revolutionary message. That message is one that has endured through each period of human history in which Islam has existed, encouraging Muslims to apply the most contemporary perspective available to interpret the Qur'an's meaning.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [559]-570) and index. :
9789047424345 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Early Islamic law in Basra in the 2nd/8th century : Aqwāl Qatāda born Diʻāma al-Sadūsī /
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The manuscript of the Aqwāl Qatāda has repeatedly attracted particular interest among modern scholars, as it raises questions concerning the early development of the Ibāḍī Basran community and the emergence of Islamic jurisprudence in Iraq. It is a unique document because it attests to the existence of a scholarly link between Sunnīs and Ibāḍīs during the early development of Islamic law. The fact that the legal responsa and traditions of Qatāda born Diʿāma al-Sadūsī (60/680-117/735) are part of an Ibāḍī collection, in which the traditions of Ibāḍī Imam Jābir born Zayd (d. 93/ 711) have been transmitted through ʿAmr born Harim and ʿAmr born Dīnār, proves that the Ibāḍī lawyers of the first generations considered Qatāda to be a faithful upholder of Jābir's doctrine. Given the lack of material available for Jābir , instructions must have been given to collect whatever was transmitted through Qatāda. Qatāda's legal responsa must have corresponded to those of the first Ibāḍī authorities, which explains why the collator of the Aqwāl Qatāda (probably Abū Ghānim al-Khurāsānī) included them in an Ibāḍī manuscript. The present volume sheds light on the relationship between the Aqwāl Qatāda and Ibāḍī authorities such as al-Rabī, Abū Ubayda, and Jābir.
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1 online resource (516 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004339538 :
0929-2403 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
La transmission écrite du Coran dans les débuts de l'islam : le codex Parisino-petropolitanus /
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The codex Parisino-petropolitanus is one of the earliest witnesses of the handwritten transmission of the Qurʾanic text which has survived to this day. The various fragments which were part of the original manuscript are scattered among various collections; once put together, they provide a unique picture of the state of the text during the 7th century (orthography and textual peculiarities) and of the circumstances in which the canonical version as we know it today took shape physically. The present study, first of its kind, paves the way for a more accurate understanding of the beginning of Islam, based on a significant document, and of the evolution of the Qurʾan during that period. Le codex Parisino-petropolitanus est l'un des plus anciens témoins de la transmission manuscrite du texte du Coran qui aient été conservés. Ses différents fragments sont dispersés entre plusieurs collections; une fois mis ensemble, ils donnent un aperçu unique sur l'état du texte au 7e siècle (orthographe et particularités textuelles) et sur les conditions dans lesquelles s'est organisée matériellement la constitution de la version canonique telle que nous la connaissons. Cette étude, première de son genre, ouvre la voie à une compréhension plus fine, appuyée sur un document significatif, des premiers temps de l'islam et de l'évolution du Coran au cours de cette période.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789047426196 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The Epistle of the eloquent clarification concerning the refutation of Ibn Qutayba /
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This is an edition of an early Shiite/Fatimid Arabic epistle that includes a controversy pertaining to several issues on Islamic law. Al-Qadi al-Nu'man (d. 363/974), the most famoust jurist of the early Fatimid period refutes the illustious Ibn Qutayba (d. 276/889). In his book Adab al-Katib, Ibn Qutayba claimed that it was enough for civil servants (kuttab) to memorize a few legal formulas in order to be able to effectively do their work without the need of long dissertations on law from jurists. In the introduction to his epistle, al-Nu'man claims that without these dissertations the civil servants would not be able to apply the law correctly. Following this, al-Nu'man launches lengthy dissertations on each one of the succinct formulas listed by Ibn Qutayba. The main argument of al-Nu'man is that the only lawgivers in Islam are the prophet Muhammad and the Imams descendents of Ali (until the seventh Imam).
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1 online resource (22, 175 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004216662 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Early Ibadi Theology: New Material on Rational Thought in Islam from the Pen of al-Fazārī (2nd/8th Century) /
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Al-Fazārī's writings are a unique source of information about Ibadi teachings on ʿilm al-kalām and the early development of this branch of religious knowledge. It is for this reason that scholars of Islamic theology are particularly interested in early Ibadi theology. In this volume newly discovered, re-edited texts by al-Fazārī are presented, with previously lacking fragments included, texts that had already begun to offer new perspectives on Islamic ʿilm al-kalām , and on its origins and the sources of its concepts and debating techniques. In their revised state these Ibadi texts represent a major contribution to scholastic theology. They demonstrate how their respective theological debates already took place at the beginning of the second/eighth century and how associated ideas, as well as related sects and treatises, remained current for some time afterwards, thereby contradicting earlier claims that these debates started in the third/ninth century.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004459571
9789004399136
Ḥikmat-i Khāqāniyya : Shāmil-i yak dawra-yi mukhtaṣar-i mantiq, ṭabīʿiyyāt u ilāhiyyāt /
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Bahāʾ al-Dīn Iṣfahānī (d. 1137/1725), better known as Fāḍil Hindī, was born into a comfortable home in Isfahan. Being a particularly precocious child, he completed his studies in the traditional and the foreign sciences by the age of thirteen, even carrying the title of mujtahid (someone authorized to issue legal opinions in Shīʿī Islam). He then accompanied his father to the court of the Mughal emperor Awrangzīb (r. 1658-1707), where he remained for several years before returning to Isfahan. At a time at which Isfahan was under the spell of the anti-speculative, literalist Akhbārī school in Shīʿism, Fāḍil Hindī was one of the few to engage in philosophy, so much so that one could call him equally a juristic philosopher or a philosophical jurist. The present work is a very readable, complete course in logic and philosophy that bears witness to his originality as a thinker in each of these domains.
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1 online resource. :
9789004402126
9789649073361
Rasāʾil-i Ḥazīn-i Lāhijī /
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Born into a wealthy intellectual family in Isfahan, Muḥammad ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib, better known as Ḥazīn Lāhijī (d. 1180/1766), was a particularly gifted child. Greatly stimulated by his father, he received a varied education: from literature and the traditional Islamic sciences to mysticism, logic, philosophy and more. Until the siege of Isfahan by the Afghans in 1135/1722, Ḥazīn lived mostly in that city. He then fled the capital, leading a wandering existence in Persia, Arabia and Iraq. Ten years later and seeing no future for Persia, he left the country for good to settle in India, dying in Benares, aged 74. Ḥazīn is mostly famous as a poet and intellectual who left his imprint on India's Persian-speaking, ruling élites. His attractive prose-pieces on a wide variety of subjects, from Qurʾān interpretation and knowledge of the soul to pearl-diving and the lifting of weights, are much less known. The present volume aims to fill this gap.
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1 online resource. :
9789004401808
9789649073330