tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-31440850994108794132024-03-13T14:21:48.644-07:00HikmatTexts, Translations, Thoughts, Philosophy, Literature, Shi'i Islam, Urdu, Persian, Iran, IndiaMulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.comBlogger182125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-20245709865986054952023-06-12T05:55:00.005-07:002023-06-12T07:07:55.550-07:00al-Ḥillī's The Way of Nobility and Polemics in Islamic Theologies <p> <span style="font-size: large;">The second volume in the series The Collected Writings of al-ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī published by <a href="https://www.amipress.co.uk">al-Mahdī Institute Press</a> has just been released. I discuss the first volume, <i>Clearing the Soul</i> and the broader context <a href="http://mullasadra.blogspot.com/2021/07/imami-theology-contribution-of-ibn.html">here</a>. </span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFgmEAQNK8XyR4RKyUQtEiIcBerBhY1S3MW228vvFElhYkJD2ZfwW-HLN26NdDOmWeXOnnzQBBrq5YRrL6GjsjEyVbwVcVqKzU7R_2nrCuHLERVkn4Qm0nrxCaS0xaxLMfPa8hKz34TEv2mgl86ioatIKhtfrVpRChUmRtp7iaLx0cakPhdBCs3qs1nQ/s1024/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09%20(1).jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFgmEAQNK8XyR4RKyUQtEiIcBerBhY1S3MW228vvFElhYkJD2ZfwW-HLN26NdDOmWeXOnnzQBBrq5YRrL6GjsjEyVbwVcVqKzU7R_2nrCuHLERVkn4Qm0nrxCaS0xaxLMfPa8hKz34TEv2mgl86ioatIKhtfrVpRChUmRtp7iaLx0cakPhdBCs3qs1nQ/s320/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09%20(1).jpeg" width="240" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7ixxKiuNO6TKD9quMUdwWamySX4iSwcjnC7qMZtciQ9RyRQzY07aE2y_VkeSZbAmQsUGDXvkYSwz5MDs5dQ-sSA1KMb9fKW3hJi4FicB1VnTXwL7PwQfHXcFJsJaUugQa2bYZ9-AQTyxPgedGKiSQbIRlU8ABhE1N1XTsu7v_C2EghEf2G6lX02wPOw/s1024/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09%20(2).jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7ixxKiuNO6TKD9quMUdwWamySX4iSwcjnC7qMZtciQ9RyRQzY07aE2y_VkeSZbAmQsUGDXvkYSwz5MDs5dQ-sSA1KMb9fKW3hJi4FicB1VnTXwL7PwQfHXcFJsJaUugQa2bYZ9-AQTyxPgedGKiSQbIRlU8ABhE1N1XTsu7v_C2EghEf2G6lX02wPOw/s320/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09%20(2).jpeg" width="240" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">The Way of Nobility (<i>Minhāj al-karāma</i>) is perhaps one of the most famous controversial and polemical texts of the post-Mongol period, inviting a rather excessive response from the famous Sunni Damascene polemicist Ibn Taymīya (d. 1328) entitled <i><a href="https://archive.org/details/Minhaj-us-SunnahByShaykhIbnTaymiyahr.a">Minhāj al-sunna al-nabawīya</a></i> (an English translation of an abridgement is <a href="https://ebnhussein1424.files.wordpress.com/2020/10/the-path-of-sunnah-of-the-prophet-minhaj-al-sunnah-in-english.pdf">here</a>). Ibn Taymīya's text is much longer and although it follows the original it is refuting, it meandering and digresses and tends to conflate Shiʿi positions (Twelver, Ismaili, and so forth). al-Ḥillī's text is a relatively concise case for the imamate of ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib based on scriptural sources and some elements of rational argument. </span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-bQg5bh4RxSI4oO_WTShDD5kdrRVa0ejlTzjsIkZx-nl92AuleAv3jvRA8oVfQaybuyUryTLPGpp91ETLvlu6xbBwtXRBuy2mdx4f9F2nqJmNw3tDjqL-2pAWZKepJCF51u-dygxVCJdkztLsRCYi3nBk9PI2vNkXyorAVFwtq8Xvo32y33EjN3xm5Q/s1024/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-bQg5bh4RxSI4oO_WTShDD5kdrRVa0ejlTzjsIkZx-nl92AuleAv3jvRA8oVfQaybuyUryTLPGpp91ETLvlu6xbBwtXRBuy2mdx4f9F2nqJmNw3tDjqL-2pAWZKepJCF51u-dygxVCJdkztLsRCYi3nBk9PI2vNkXyorAVFwtq8Xvo32y33EjN3xm5Q/s320/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09.jpeg" width="240" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibqSe1q92Y8h7kYsE8KqmlFH_9CBepJArTMCdKVb_bdh0IlHxI7o5O5XKvjwbXsCI_EreMrsDSAELoahcuqci0mWdD1jomaoT-ZeATfIHY1lm-9Qgq-R0XHms7VplNvvN1KP7Lquwzd_iewSvSFRQF74cGsJhyW1t6JmTlxQTVix6MJtcTog_RSWrRkQ/s1024/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.10.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibqSe1q92Y8h7kYsE8KqmlFH_9CBepJArTMCdKVb_bdh0IlHxI7o5O5XKvjwbXsCI_EreMrsDSAELoahcuqci0mWdD1jomaoT-ZeATfIHY1lm-9Qgq-R0XHms7VplNvvN1KP7Lquwzd_iewSvSFRQF74cGsJhyW1t6JmTlxQTVix6MJtcTog_RSWrRkQ/s320/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.10.jpeg" width="240" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The text is dedicated to the Mongol ruler of Iran, Öljeitü (r. 1304–1306) probably in 1311. <a href="https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/76222271.pdf">Tariq al-Jamil</a> discusses the text in the context of the polemic with Ibn Taymīya that followed (<i>Minhāj al-sunna</i> is commonly thought to have been penned in 1317). One could also read the text alongside al-Ḥillī's <i>al-Alfayn</i> and <i>Nahj al-ḥaqq wa-kashf al-ṣidq</i> which was also written at court for Öljeitü. This latter text initiated a cycle of polemics, the most recent of which is <i>Dalāʾil al-ṣidq</i> by Shaykh Muḥammad Ḥasan al-Muẓaffar (1883–1955) in <a href="https://archive.org/details/dlaylasedq1/part1/">8 volumes</a>. These texts are somewhat different - <i>al-Alfayn</i> is primarily scriptural but contains elements of logical reasoning. <i>Nahj</i> is more extensive and includes important corollaries on the nature of God - and provides more of the template for later Shiʿi polemics (one thinks of <i>al-Ṣirāṭ al-mustaqīm</i> of Ibn Yūnus al-Bayyāḍī al-ʿĀmilī in the 15th century). </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The text is divided into six chapters: the first on the various positions taken on the imamate and succession to the prophet (including the important corollary issue of divine justice and provision of facilitating grace - <i>luṭf</i> - that is so central to his theology), the second on the broad case for the Twelver Shiʿi position, the third is divided into four parts on the Shiʿi cased including rational and scriptural evidence, the fourth on the concomitance of the imamate of ʿAlī's successors, the fifth on their who do not qualify as leaders in lieu of the prophet, with final sixth on why Abū Bakr did not qualify as the successor. The case is therefore both positive and negative (why X was not), and comprising rational and scriptural proofs and consideration of evidence. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUAkIqOUSj2Wzpea1a3BBx1_8kuxnDyRL73cx1gzClwLXJhrfwFY90w1igfvcoVNsbap7P08xSuaXZA8YNyN2O6SbIcmEj1mYs2V_VqMBqL-z4c_RHnqmdx2gNVj7BigHDaUnUs3coi-SbtWgnScsed_EcCw8ThMV6rEMBsvnRLkVjhiDIaAXYyWKSFw/s1024/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09%20(3).jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUAkIqOUSj2Wzpea1a3BBx1_8kuxnDyRL73cx1gzClwLXJhrfwFY90w1igfvcoVNsbap7P08xSuaXZA8YNyN2O6SbIcmEj1mYs2V_VqMBqL-z4c_RHnqmdx2gNVj7BigHDaUnUs3coi-SbtWgnScsed_EcCw8ThMV6rEMBsvnRLkVjhiDIaAXYyWKSFw/s320/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09%20(3).jpeg" width="240" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4rgFGXxY-x1c_s5scu--K4zDSHKjUz0UlYFpyLSepD1XDarSE301stu289R551ZpeIiH6RiEroXlCVDxb8KcLyGIkXuuqc5VYUzxBOnc1wn6NCKsDNRmm_7nsLeFH5x4JHnXPxBsFyjcsxUGzRyQ92jB4hnZai-2ISgoCX2UF3AO2l4F363wrzxYjtQ/s1024/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09%20(4).jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4rgFGXxY-x1c_s5scu--K4zDSHKjUz0UlYFpyLSepD1XDarSE301stu289R551ZpeIiH6RiEroXlCVDxb8KcLyGIkXuuqc5VYUzxBOnc1wn6NCKsDNRmm_7nsLeFH5x4JHnXPxBsFyjcsxUGzRyQ92jB4hnZai-2ISgoCX2UF3AO2l4F363wrzxYjtQ/s320/WhatsApp%20Image%202023-06-12%20at%2012.49.09%20(4).jpeg" width="240" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;">The Arabic text used is the edition published in 1999 by Muʾassasat ʿĀshūrāʾ in Qum and edited by ʿAbd al-Raḥīm Mubārak based on three manuscripts from the Āstān-e quds-e rażavī library in Mashhad (MS 13754), and from the library of Āyatullāh Marʿashī Najafī in Qum (MS 29 and 2523). All of these are Safavid but the aim of the series is not necessarily to produce new critical editions. According to the Fankhā Union catalogue of manuscripts in Iran, there are 175 copies of the text but none reliably dated to before the Safavid period. The text is introduced and translated by Saiyad Nizamuddin Ahmad, who holds the Prophet Muhammad Chair of Shia Islamic Studies at <a href="https://sipa.fiu.edu/people/faculty/religious-studies/saiyad-ahmad.html">Florida International University</a>.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">It is worth contextualising this polemic and its response in the following cycles:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">1) The first was al-Jāḥiẓ (d. 255/869) and his <i>al-Risāla al-ʿUthmānīya</i> followed by a non-extant refutation by al-Ḥasan b. Mūsā al-Nawbakhtī (d. c. 310/922) a full refutation by Sayyid Jamāl al-Dīn Ibn Ṭāwūs (d. 673/1274) entitled <i>Bināʾ al-maqāla al-Fāṭimīya</i>. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">2) The second is this text by al-Ḥillī and its refutation by Ibn Taymīya which remains the most well-known.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">3) The third of al-Ḥillī's <i>Nahj al-ḥaqq</i> mentioned which led to a response by the litterateur and historian Faḍlallāh b. Ruzbihān al-Khunajī (d. 927/1521) to which there is the famous response of Sayyid Nūrullāh Shūshtarī (exe. 1610), <a href="http://alfeker.net/library.php?id=3129"><i>Iḥqāq al-ḥaqq</i>,</a> published with apparatus and extensive, voluminous notes by Āyatullāh Sayyid Shihāb al-Dīn Marʿashī Najafī. I have <a href="https://www.academia.edu/33501808/Shiʿi_polemics_at_the_Mughal_court_The_case_of_Qāzī_Nūrullāh_Shūshtarī">written</a> on it. Here is a shot of the opening of one of the British Library copies of Khunajī's <i>Ibṭāl nah al-bāṭil</i>:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEs9G7HKa6tL4fwXzMhasP83lj5oFH2rmyGp5ok3wfznk8H4TFQuQyn_Byen7m2B51wf97uLq08AX0el5lIq1Z7t3pZPS1p7LgEFrNqvn3wvMJXRxTo8KtQoVkMTI1V1uL9SS-eTqz_SJsCbJQW_5HrptXbLUjw5jL6tIvexCyzPkDefOoD7MVFdUFZQ/s1024/0A4D6007-34C4-47FF-AE62-CC87CD74342C_1_105_c.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1024" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEs9G7HKa6tL4fwXzMhasP83lj5oFH2rmyGp5ok3wfznk8H4TFQuQyn_Byen7m2B51wf97uLq08AX0el5lIq1Z7t3pZPS1p7LgEFrNqvn3wvMJXRxTo8KtQoVkMTI1V1uL9SS-eTqz_SJsCbJQW_5HrptXbLUjw5jL6tIvexCyzPkDefOoD7MVFdUFZQ/s320/0A4D6007-34C4-47FF-AE62-CC87CD74342C_1_105_c.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">4) The fourth is relatively well-known but also came out of the school of al-Ḥilla, namely <i>al-Risāla al-muʿāriḍa </i>of Yūsuf b. Makhzūm al-Aʿwar al-Wāsiṭī and its refutation by Najm al-Dīn Khiḍr al-Ḥabalrūdī and his <i>al-Tawāḍīḥ al-anwār bi-ḥujaj al-wārida li-dafʿ shubhat al-Aʿwar</i> completed in 839/1435. Here is a shot from the British Library MS of the text:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeIXxiWkIcpQoeNDA_TEGvlMSWuqEd2Xs878m-_5zA1E6T_uTB0m_WRkfhNfqj4z2Ymdk6mwzcTvuiJOQNuzgMrb1DsbAx-hlMnv7-fFxK6o4r9cBYFnpK72PJYJ0qpZfACizZv83Z_nXyccDdITZTBkgQDAWrwCQWQMh9K-i__1Kb_cDlgl_frViCzg/s1024/093FF279-8AA0-4E18-BD10-13AC35E26312_1_105_c.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1024" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeIXxiWkIcpQoeNDA_TEGvlMSWuqEd2Xs878m-_5zA1E6T_uTB0m_WRkfhNfqj4z2Ymdk6mwzcTvuiJOQNuzgMrb1DsbAx-hlMnv7-fFxK6o4r9cBYFnpK72PJYJ0qpZfACizZv83Z_nXyccDdITZTBkgQDAWrwCQWQMh9K-i__1Kb_cDlgl_frViCzg/s320/093FF279-8AA0-4E18-BD10-13AC35E26312_1_105_c.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">There are of course many others in Arabic on the imamate (in the contemporary period there are far too many which then circulate in English, Urdu and other translations) - and many more in Persian and other languages (perhaps the most famous in Persian being <i>Tuḥfa-ye isnāʿasharīya</i> of the Delhi scholar Shāh ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz [d. 1823] and its responses by Mīrzā Kāmil Dihlavī [d. 1810], Sayyid Dildār ʿAlī [d. 1820] and his sons in Lucknow, and of course <i><a href="https://archive.org/details/AbaghaatAlanwaarfarsi/abaghaat%20al%27anwaar%2010/">ʿAbaqāt al-anwār</a></i> of Sayyid Ḥāmid Ḥusayn Mūsavī Kintūrī [d. 1888]). </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">There is little doubt that al-Ḥillī's text and the response by Ibn Taymīya remain at the heart of modern polemics. Hence the importance of having this dual text available. I hope that AMI press will also take on <i>Nahj al-ḥaqq</i> and <i>al-Alfayn</i> in the future as they are with <i>Kashf al-murād</i> which is al-Ḥillī's most important exposition on theology.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><br /></span></div><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-11812415543271696002021-10-03T14:37:00.003-07:002021-10-03T14:38:37.396-07:00Maximalist Imamology - a new term for an older phenomenon<p> <span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Much ink has been spilled in the modern period in Shiʿi circles and beyond about the true nature of the Imām and his cosmic role - this debate is often around what since the late 19th century has been called <i>walāya takwīnīya</i> or the authority and control of the Imām over the cosmos and the objects within it. I am not particularly interested in the more normative question but what seems clear to me is that within Imāmology there has always been historically somewhat of a spectrum. Hence I have used the term 'maximalist imamology' to describe a conception of 'divine humanity' that still locates itself within the Twelver Shiʿi tradition without falling into the (contested) category of exaggeration or <i>ghulūw</i> and hence into Nuṣayrī-ʿAlawī or other conceptions of the Imām. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">'Maximalist Imamology' therefore renders this notion that the Imam has complete authority of the cosmos as the true mediating heir of the Prophet. Increasingly, as we begin to engage with Avicenna's prophetology we realise that the philosophical defence of a perfect mediating human whose very existence not only ensures the correct social, ethical and political order of the cosmos but also entails the metaphysical order of reality can easily be extended into Imamology. In the Twelver ḥadīth corpus, this is through the narrations on the Imāms as the divine names and as those who manifest the divine names and divine attributes. Maximalist Imamology takes up this theme and then develops a number of positions on the origins of the cosmos, its sustenance and its unfolding eschatology and soteriology. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Therefore Maximalist Imāmology constitutes a series of historically articulated and developed positions on the prehistory, history, and coming messianic moment of the Imām. The first of these includes the idea of the Imam in the world of spirits and motes (<i>ʿālam al-arwāḥ</i>, <i>ʿālam al-dharr</i>), and the third of these includes the role of the Imām in the apocalyptic return (<i>al-rajʿa, al-karra</i>) and the eschaton. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">To this end, I have now written three articles on the historical development of this Maximalist Imamology:</span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">1) <span style="background-color: #f0f2f5; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505;">‘Seeking the Face of God: The Safawid Ḥikmat Tradition’s conceptualisation of <i>walāya takwīnīya</i>’, in Gurdofarid Mizkinzoda, M.A. Amir-Moezzi and Farhad Daftary (eds), <i>The Study of Shiʿi Islam</i>, London: I.B. Tauris in association with the Institute of Ismaili Studies, 2013, pp. 391–410 [Maximalist Imamology I] This first piece dealt with an aspect of the Safavid manifestation. </span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFVdJ1GG7XbpfZHhztdyak7gURSr_CJcfmSGhJxN3aPnYi84UPsStm-pgpjmwQTLBRdXZ2sCi5Nxl8zZ-JOTwR9sOep0NoilY3ltKwIUpbJ-kdfe2Lq2F8vDkkc-qIeLnPvX-V1HbSBVZC/s1346/Screenshot+2021-10-03+at+22.15.48.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1196" data-original-width="1346" height="346" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFVdJ1GG7XbpfZHhztdyak7gURSr_CJcfmSGhJxN3aPnYi84UPsStm-pgpjmwQTLBRdXZ2sCi5Nxl8zZ-JOTwR9sOep0NoilY3ltKwIUpbJ-kdfe2Lq2F8vDkkc-qIeLnPvX-V1HbSBVZC/w390-h346/Screenshot+2021-10-03+at+22.15.48.png" width="390" /></a></div><br /><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="background-color: #f0f2f5; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5);">2) </span></span><span style="background-color: #f0f2f5;"><span style="color: #050505;">‘Shiʿi Political Theology and Esotericism in Qajar Iran: The case of Sayyid Jaʿfar Kashfī’, in Mohammed Ali Amir-Moezzi et al (eds), <i>Esotérisme shiʿite: ses racines et set prolongements</i>, Louvain: Peeters/EPHE, 2016, pp. 687–712 [Maximalist Imamology II] This turned to one significant Qajar development - there is much more to say on the Qajar context as it became a major issue of discussion by philosophers (of the school of Mullā Ṣadrā, the school of Ibn ʿArabī as well as among the Shaykhīya) as well as Sufis. </span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: #f0f2f5;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1to0eomW1-EowX-pFgGYUyYMcEqeVeWR8gbe5wfjeP_1WHtvoOITU0UR5DGa7yCAToSjLyURnXt5UbWRI8cLPSegOJ5jXWf3DmdM10DX_8nEfx3zIBxmodVOANt45NZjj1TTyJDZBV1Pb/s1986/Screenshot+2021-10-03+at+22.17.29.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1966" data-original-width="1986" height="384" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1to0eomW1-EowX-pFgGYUyYMcEqeVeWR8gbe5wfjeP_1WHtvoOITU0UR5DGa7yCAToSjLyURnXt5UbWRI8cLPSegOJ5jXWf3DmdM10DX_8nEfx3zIBxmodVOANt45NZjj1TTyJDZBV1Pb/w388-h384/Screenshot+2021-10-03+at+22.17.29.png" width="388" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /><span style="color: #050505;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: #f0f2f5;"><span style="color: #050505;">3) </span></span><span style="background-color: #f0f2f5; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505;">‘Esoteric Shiʿi Islam in the Later School of al-Ḥilla: Walāya and Apocalypticism in al-Ḥasan b. Sulaymān al-Ḥillī (d. after 1400) and Rajab al-Bursī (d. c. 1411)’, in Edmund Hayes and Rodrigo Adem (eds), <i>Reason, Esotericism, and the Construction of Authority</i>, Leiden: Brill, 2021, pp. 190–241 [Maximalist Imamology III - this work]</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhEbF9Mv3LwA5rEMIQJP6qU9pwu_0t7WNT3nJkoKFm7FUeV3wCLvmsfcdcoTZtKVXgacOfD1XQcAJ8CxQxsLCV8soKdiypJXG5XNexQFiP6Kzv_owLeu32RRaAdfQJJDpZlqDt4z5dRpZw/s2048/Screenshot+2021-10-03+at+22.14.53.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1812" data-original-width="2048" height="348" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhEbF9Mv3LwA5rEMIQJP6qU9pwu_0t7WNT3nJkoKFm7FUeV3wCLvmsfcdcoTZtKVXgacOfD1XQcAJ8CxQxsLCV8soKdiypJXG5XNexQFiP6Kzv_owLeu32RRaAdfQJJDpZlqDt4z5dRpZw/w393-h348/Screenshot+2021-10-03+at+22.14.53.png" width="393" /></a></span></div><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">Soon to come are two further articles. One looks at the issue of divine simplicity and its philosophical defence in Shiʿi philosophical theology and how it engages with a theology of the divine names to explains how the transcendent intervenes in the cosmos and how the immanent pervades it. The fifth in the series that will follow soon after will examine another episode of the exposition of Maximalist Imamology on the cusp of the Safavid period by examining the devotional literature especially of Taqī al-Dīn al-Kafʿamī. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;">While I don't think I will manage a full history of the idea of Maximalist Imāmology, I hope that these articles will put forward a certain account within Islamic intellectual history. The influence of Mohammad Ali Amir-Moezzi's work and his early articles on divine humanity in the Shiʿi context should be clear. <br /><span style="background-color: #f0f2f5; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505;"><br /></span></span></p>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-11794615953403786722021-07-27T16:36:00.003-07:002021-07-27T16:36:32.920-07:00Imāmī Theology: The Contribution of Ibn Muṭahhar al-Ḥillī (d. 726/1325) and a New Series of Publications <p> <span style="font-size: large;">The main intention of this blogpost is to say something about the <a href="https://twitter.com/amipress_couk?lang=en" target="_blank">Al-Mahdi Institute Press</a>' new series of editions and translations of the works of the major Imāmī theologian al-ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī. The translation of <i>Taslīk al-nafs ilā ḥaẓirat al-quds</i> - rendered as <i>Clearing the Soul for Paradise</i> - is the first of this series. And I should declare an interest as someone who has been consulted on the series and the whole production and its academic content. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrtwvHgTw6FJL5UwVtvVCJ6BeHON70JgK5oElO5JSMdQ2eoP6BaGJM1H-aAVjo3xZ9O6f-RuW70xvNqOz3AY8n1r1UkwqnVriRLYpQh2cepDjbTkt6HX43fVsDxOFEEZfJ_QTWey-dVshs/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.36.55.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="479" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrtwvHgTw6FJL5UwVtvVCJ6BeHON70JgK5oElO5JSMdQ2eoP6BaGJM1H-aAVjo3xZ9O6f-RuW70xvNqOz3AY8n1r1UkwqnVriRLYpQh2cepDjbTkt6HX43fVsDxOFEEZfJ_QTWey-dVshs/w359-h479/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.36.55.jpeg" width="359" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">But before saying something about this publication, it would be useful to locate it within a broader history of the development of Imāmī theological traditions from the classical period to the current age. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">We still have a long way to go in filling out an intellectual history of the course of theological traditions and especially philosophical theology in the Imāmī tradition. A sketch of a periodisation of rational (and increasingly systematic) theology known as <i>ʿilm al-kalām </i>among the Twelver Shiʿa might go something like this:</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">1) The period of the companions of the later Imāms, the mix of traditionalisms as well as the encounter with other traditions (<i>aṣḥāb al-maqālāt, al-milal</i>) and faiths on the ground of rational debate that was increasing - for which the translation of Aristotle's organon into Arabic was critically important. The key point about this period is the absence of fixed terminologies and technical discussions but the emergence of different modes of 'rationality' or intellectual inquiry, and not a simplistic opposition of 'traditionalism' and 'rationalism' - even the texts from the early generations such as al-Mufaḍḍal b. ʿUmar al-Juʿfī (d. c. 183/799), Hishām b. al-Ḥakam (d. 179/795), through to al-Faḍl b. Shādhān (d. 260/874) as well as the texts attributed to the Imām themselves (as in this study of Abrahamov). They are known for their views on creation and cosmology as a foundational metaphysics, determinism and human free will, the nature of prophecy and the imamate, and other issues - although most of their texts have not survived outside of doxographies and heresiographies like the works of hostile reporters like<i> al-Intiṣār</i> of al-Khayyāt (d. c. 300/913) and <i>Maqālāt al-islāmīyīn</i> of Abūʾl-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī (d. 324/936). </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK3Hysv4EWJPWasxS4fnI2KcU7OhSwAOmVyBfNQLj8Wd0IzvW3dTg1aTQItTMG4EfztXatNHVhMCodO6gQzp7-Xb0WY85VWolFqUOZ9n-NxCtZhajKLOEq6Mqy5S7fE-uuoup1ZqG6fuaI/s1278/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+22.47.28.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK3Hysv4EWJPWasxS4fnI2KcU7OhSwAOmVyBfNQLj8Wd0IzvW3dTg1aTQItTMG4EfztXatNHVhMCodO6gQzp7-Xb0WY85VWolFqUOZ9n-NxCtZhajKLOEq6Mqy5S7fE-uuoup1ZqG6fuaI/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+22.47.28.png" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-size: x-large;"> </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">2) The immediate period after the onset of the occultation of the Twelfth Imam and the Shiʿi moment under the Buyids that brought the Imāmī tradition even more into dialogue with the Muʿtazilī tradition. This is the period from the 'traditionalist' influenced by Muʿtazilī categories and responding to their themes, Ibn Bābawayh al-Qummī known as al-Shaykh al-Ṣadūq (d. 381/991) followed by his students and the first generation of serious Imāmī Muʿtazilī thinkers, al-Shaykh al-Mufīd (d. 413/1022) and his students al-Sharīf al-Raḍī (d. 406/1015) and al-Sharīf al-Murtaḍā (d. 436/1044) - the former was more closely aligned with the Baghdādī Muʿtazila since he had studied with ʿAlī b. ʿĪsā al-Rummānī, the main figure of the Ikshīdī branch of the Baghdādīs and engaged with the thought of Abūʾl-Qāsim al-Kaʿbī (d. 319/931), and al-Murtaḍā was more in line with the Basran Muʿtazila. The latter engaged with the school of Abū Hāshim al-Jubbāʾī (d. 321/933) and entered into polemics with the prominent Qāḍī ʿAbd al-Jabbār al-Hamadānī (d. 415/1024). Al-Mufīd had also studied with the first major Muʿtazilī Imāmī thinker Abū Sahl al-Nawbakhtī (d. 311/924) whose lost <i>Kitāb al-ārāʾ waʾl-diyānāt</i> also demonstrated knowledge of Aristotelian science and philosophy. The classic studies here are the following studies of McDermott and Abdulsater:</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU-xof7W4mPS3azzNBhGyOsoSKXnmGoxeQHvx_vzt6oCyBPXbHE410849Id-B7aY0oOEWnjsqVAPlqfE5Rll50Wvh5EiO0Jhg98ZHxlxhxxN83nChZZG4ixKH0vHYSsszqzS9nxc91MyGy/s1300/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.35.05.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1300" data-original-width="946" height="446" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU-xof7W4mPS3azzNBhGyOsoSKXnmGoxeQHvx_vzt6oCyBPXbHE410849Id-B7aY0oOEWnjsqVAPlqfE5Rll50Wvh5EiO0Jhg98ZHxlxhxxN83nChZZG4ixKH0vHYSsszqzS9nxc91MyGy/w325-h446/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.35.05.png" width="325" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIkfk4M2GDh7qZiEeaxr3_zldD_TnXHTEVidUWLfZ0sb1IbM464Uig202xUA6UaIItGMzMOaaDdIVtIHhn_bBR5LAFXIXs1EscwgAxTcVEk3MiwX55c6mzosl9s-YnPCUk7s2T5SM39KL1/s1092/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.44.20.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1092" data-original-width="730" height="425" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIkfk4M2GDh7qZiEeaxr3_zldD_TnXHTEVidUWLfZ0sb1IbM464Uig202xUA6UaIItGMzMOaaDdIVtIHhn_bBR5LAFXIXs1EscwgAxTcVEk3MiwX55c6mzosl9s-YnPCUk7s2T5SM39KL1/w284-h425/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.44.20.png" width="284" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">This MA is also important:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCyQg6fj_WnNbdmD9eOEj_mw-bcWxmHQjK6rXpqR1u9kVaIrYvBVK2KybRmpB11P_E-LpyaG78ZWdIKvlkiobzX0McUBr04Zke9WdXVRPi4lWxBc18aLoahFfdgUZeZguHQYii859wzfJU/s1748/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.34.39.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1748" data-original-width="1488" height="409" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCyQg6fj_WnNbdmD9eOEj_mw-bcWxmHQjK6rXpqR1u9kVaIrYvBVK2KybRmpB11P_E-LpyaG78ZWdIKvlkiobzX0McUBr04Zke9WdXVRPi4lWxBc18aLoahFfdgUZeZguHQYii859wzfJU/w348-h409/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.34.39.png" width="348" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">And the locus classicus of the development from al-Ṣadūq to al-Mufīd is the famous 'correction' by the later of his teacher's creed:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPkoSjv1hXTNIoS28VH1-0iIPKkm_oPPscDoty-BreLUQ2sK26mCJtarFftZzotHR9JhqcLSXgZhAOb4_P9Ye7rvQ-LAJBQ0QFUl7mhxUHW0j6gJ1Vu77I2VpNYEsArnxsrOct5nU7vMUt/s1836/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.33.15.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1836" data-original-width="1506" height="418" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPkoSjv1hXTNIoS28VH1-0iIPKkm_oPPscDoty-BreLUQ2sK26mCJtarFftZzotHR9JhqcLSXgZhAOb4_P9Ye7rvQ-LAJBQ0QFUl7mhxUHW0j6gJ1Vu77I2VpNYEsArnxsrOct5nU7vMUt/w342-h418/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.33.15.png" width="342" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUmGL2YFMOJnfMy4-3MYe1Ojp9KDog5IrAOGFkVFN2Q6etB8RPP-_HAmGTCxyPbTh4r-UpF3AYnaDeRJ1kU2sbQfaKFd5wslj-Y2jsOFQ3mli4WsB3e1bYGGRndhZS6r9z7vv1XhlGVkjC/s1108/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.33.37.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1108" data-original-width="718" height="377" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUmGL2YFMOJnfMy4-3MYe1Ojp9KDog5IrAOGFkVFN2Q6etB8RPP-_HAmGTCxyPbTh4r-UpF3AYnaDeRJ1kU2sbQfaKFd5wslj-Y2jsOFQ3mli4WsB3e1bYGGRndhZS6r9z7vv1XhlGVkjC/w244-h377/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+21.33.37.png" width="244" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">This period is marked by the 'rational', Muʿtazilī turn as well as the development of an Imāmī rationalism as well as finding space for arguments that are scripturally based especially pertaining to the main doctrine of the imamate. One also finds in that rationalist spectrum the importance of intra-Shiʿi disputation with the Zaydīs and the Ismailis.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>3) This is followed by that first classical period from al-Shaykh al-Ṭūsī (d. 460/1067) to Sālār al-Daylamī (d. 448/1057) who wrote a work on atoms and cosmology through Sadīd al-Dīn al-Ḥimmaṣī al-Rāzī (d. 600/1204) and his <i>al-Munqidh min al-taqlīd</i> through to the 13th century school of Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī (d. 1274) and his student Ibn al-Muṭahhar al-Ḥillī known as al-ʿAllāma (d. 726/1325). This period has recently been studied by Sabine Schmidtke and Hasan Ansari (although the period from al-Ḥimmaṣī to Ṭūsī is not so well known perhaps due to the uncertainties of the early Mongol age and the survival of texts and knowledge networks). Four important figures of the 12th century are the contemporaries Abu ʿAlī al-Faḍl al-Ṭabrisī (d. 548/1153) and Abūʾl-Futūḥ al-Rāzī (d. after 552/1157) authors of significant theologically inflected exegeses on the Qurʾan and Quṭb al-Dīn Rāwandī (d. 573/1177) and ʿAbd al-Jalīl Qazwīnī Rāzī whose <i>Kitāb al-naqḍ</i> is an invaluable source on <i>kalām</i> positions among the Shiʿa and others in Iran. This period is marked by the increasing influence of the Muʿtazilī thinker Abūʾl-Ḥusayn al-Baṣrī (d. 436/1044) and his follower Rukn al-Dīn Ibn al-Malāḥimī (d. 536/1141) as well as the rising impact of metaphysics of Ibn Sīnā (d. 428/1037). This is sometimes considered the truly classic period of Imāmī rational theology but also marked by different trends of reception, response and engagement with the Muʿtazila and the philosophical traditions. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">4) Perhaps the most important phase - and we will return to this in the description of the book - is Ṭūsī and al-Ḥillī that established the parameters of Imāmī <i>kalām</i> through some key texts such as <i>Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād</i> (on which see my previous posts <a href="http://mullasadra.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-summary-of-belief-tajrid-al-itiqad.html" target="_blank">part 1</a>, <a href="http://mullasadra.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-summary-of-belief-tajrid-al-itiqad_23.html" target="_blank">part 2</a>, and <a href="http://mullasadra.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-summary-of-belief-tajrid-al-itiqad.html" target="_blank">part 3</a>) as well as al-Ḥillī's famous creed <i>al-Bāb al-Ḥādī ʿashar </i>best read through the commentary <i>al-Nāfiʿ yawm al-ḥashar</i> by Miqdād al-Siyūrī (d. 826/1423). This then became the 'school of al-Ḥilla' in theology. <br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEbLUv-k-zoGvGitmX7gyb2jjOo3P_r2G7RDjzuLR6kEPY5oJHW15OUTR7PitD7HEofOzp7kZjeiiu8b0KtdbjMBeI7SdeynsQCtvv-TdJMMolYngYv8qo0rYRM2mu-DETWcfu84DXy3gv/s1512/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+22.07.59.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1512" data-original-width="1094" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEbLUv-k-zoGvGitmX7gyb2jjOo3P_r2G7RDjzuLR6kEPY5oJHW15OUTR7PitD7HEofOzp7kZjeiiu8b0KtdbjMBeI7SdeynsQCtvv-TdJMMolYngYv8qo0rYRM2mu-DETWcfu84DXy3gv/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+22.07.59.png" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhamF-YkJI_F9z8YclX81NdlgKgGZ2PCBKLiEfvdxyDNRa27BUQ7wV-15STuo7pUfigkq0byBdE6JH9hLP_im1r-9O9sKkaeRGbjgOGssHR_FkQdcd_shRO7lyttRgOwTtDzielDzNlC592/s1432/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.31.51.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1432" data-original-width="1246" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhamF-YkJI_F9z8YclX81NdlgKgGZ2PCBKLiEfvdxyDNRa27BUQ7wV-15STuo7pUfigkq0byBdE6JH9hLP_im1r-9O9sKkaeRGbjgOGssHR_FkQdcd_shRO7lyttRgOwTtDzielDzNlC592/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.31.51.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">5) Alongside that school, there was a more esoteric turn which engaged with maximalist Imamology, lettrism and the occult sciences as well as the increasing influence of the school of Ibn ʿArabī and here one thinks of a diverse set of 14th and 15th century thinkers from Sayyid Ḥaydar Āmulī (d. after 1385) to Rajab al-Bursī (d. 813/1411) [see my earlier <a href="http://mullasadra.blogspot.com/2014/08/some-notes-on-rajab-al-bursi-d-1411.html" target="_blank">blogpost</a> on him] and onto Ibn Abī Jumhūr al-Aḥsāʾī (d. 1502) especially in his massive <i>al-Mujlī</i> that attempts to 'reconcile' Imāmī <i>kalām</i> with the philosophical schools of Ibn Sīnā and Suhrawardī and the Sufi metaphysics of Ibn ʿArabī (d. 1240), and Taqī al-Dīn Ibrāhīm al-Kafʿamī (d. c. 1499), compiler of a famous sets of devotions entitled <i>al-Miṣbāḥ</i>. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo4Xg4XNgcwLyAVQdUcFzaNj6C2jTb3dppN1_2WDB1cPbK0OsRhmUBlaHfUqFGoTDGFgN5LxA1d_eXCHkCr9iX_OglIz3yVaGKkee-At4a1q154LiJeyWXPgo0g8YBSm8xooHpmuzNZDDl/s1366/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.34.58.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1366" data-original-width="902" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo4Xg4XNgcwLyAVQdUcFzaNj6C2jTb3dppN1_2WDB1cPbK0OsRhmUBlaHfUqFGoTDGFgN5LxA1d_eXCHkCr9iX_OglIz3yVaGKkee-At4a1q154LiJeyWXPgo0g8YBSm8xooHpmuzNZDDl/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.34.58.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">6) The Safavid theologians developed the esotericist line along with the Ṭūsī-Ḥillī school and also spread the schools through translation and composition in Persian. The best examples are the philosophical theology of Mullā Ṣadrā Shīrāzī (d. 1045/1636) as well as the commentary on the <i>Tajrīd</i> of his student ʿAbd al-Razzāq Lāhījī (d. 1070/1661) as well as his Persian work <i>Gawhar-i murād</i>. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdQJ4FxFKo1JPMRbq-9bejuekUlOK-V9saOnEdChJ3qtREjuAMO-7TqaESDOQWO1UA8PiFXrfMuYzcqKN9EmGJsG4ViLZSjSeDskRgCYIfMiimzceUJxX1wjJQ8I_YW4ki_1rm3WGeWdwu/s1596/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.37.03.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1596" data-original-width="1050" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdQJ4FxFKo1JPMRbq-9bejuekUlOK-V9saOnEdChJ3qtREjuAMO-7TqaESDOQWO1UA8PiFXrfMuYzcqKN9EmGJsG4ViLZSjSeDskRgCYIfMiimzceUJxX1wjJQ8I_YW4ki_1rm3WGeWdwu/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.37.03.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpRZ7Bb4-6z1T6t45OFtNlHGNJBuEOXv8c_7wwICDtG1-I7bc9Bnaf9jMx3yTV804IlW3Cqa0XYuhiuIMFybHn15dzBFxvSHW1_04GJ9g5-hwt7FOvvCvmtRszRIuuEPVNjgUqWDAM3BPq/s2048/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.38.06.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1619" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpRZ7Bb4-6z1T6t45OFtNlHGNJBuEOXv8c_7wwICDtG1-I7bc9Bnaf9jMx3yTV804IlW3Cqa0XYuhiuIMFybHn15dzBFxvSHW1_04GJ9g5-hwt7FOvvCvmtRszRIuuEPVNjgUqWDAM3BPq/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.38.06.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Other works that tried to extend the reconciliation of philosophical theology with scripture were penned by Mullā Ṣadrā's other major student and son-in-law Muḥsin Fayḍ Kāshānī (d. 1090/1680). </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">7) In the post-Safavid period, one finds the development of distinct parallel and rival branches (and that is without considering those who eventually self-identified outside of Imāmī Shiʿism such as the Bahais):</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">a) a deepening of Shiʿi Sufi theologies with figures such as ʿAbd al-Raḥīm Damāvandī (d. 1757) and Sayyid Quṭb al-Dīn Nayrīzī (d. 1761) that drew upon the Sufi metaphysics of Ibn ʿArabī</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiO5hBor3b9Fe07jCjxeKvxjBwVeBaBmvIs2UlWVsv6XEWk-b1VCUJqRQTuzQGqopyLWCRry-a7yxNTUNACVSAfFbEz11C6KO0OnUVTxdHAqWbEB7Y_WkIsxFtexLp9BsQjaVyQn6uhyphenhypheng6x/s730/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.50.16.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="730" data-original-width="458" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiO5hBor3b9Fe07jCjxeKvxjBwVeBaBmvIs2UlWVsv6XEWk-b1VCUJqRQTuzQGqopyLWCRry-a7yxNTUNACVSAfFbEz11C6KO0OnUVTxdHAqWbEB7Y_WkIsxFtexLp9BsQjaVyQn6uhyphenhypheng6x/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.50.16.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr2YJ_pMfG1jarxgt4O18Q3FVLyCmPQbri0pSo1yrcUFKHUYkqgoe6AVXaCgiE4xH3hqSHHu6vu0gpWjC5w-ZTJ7hM1Z9sLrOOmBNwXJjAmwFK0MSRXhp7iijB2ISQkkgZxaBelSLlQr1G/s2048/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.50.34.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1310" data-original-width="2048" height="258" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr2YJ_pMfG1jarxgt4O18Q3FVLyCmPQbri0pSo1yrcUFKHUYkqgoe6AVXaCgiE4xH3hqSHHu6vu0gpWjC5w-ZTJ7hM1Z9sLrOOmBNwXJjAmwFK0MSRXhp7iijB2ISQkkgZxaBelSLlQr1G/w403-h258/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.50.34.png" width="403" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">b) continuation of the main Safavid tradition culminating in the work of Hādī Sabzawārī (d. 1289/1873) and <i>Hādī al-muḍillīn</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwe7iUfm-2th7t1RKAs0yatr5CROYi8ofcyUZq-oWYkdc73ozAcRwQBKG6jdPSMaJRdUMgJZdIpbi4jtAHw-x1cGkWIdZZtvw8tJ0ZEQ3SDVoH9_wmvgWkQEnBykXQXB6DOh5viHNKYM1e/s1744/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.52.13.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1744" data-original-width="1358" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwe7iUfm-2th7t1RKAs0yatr5CROYi8ofcyUZq-oWYkdc73ozAcRwQBKG6jdPSMaJRdUMgJZdIpbi4jtAHw-x1cGkWIdZZtvw8tJ0ZEQ3SDVoH9_wmvgWkQEnBykXQXB6DOh5viHNKYM1e/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.52.13.png" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">c) a more extended esotericist Imāmology in the work of Sayyid Jaʿfar Kashfī (d. 1843) through to ʿAlī al-Ḥāʾirī al-Yazdī (d. 1333/ and his <i>Ilzām al-nāṣib</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><i><br /></i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjazG-2Z5anS0XQ_erLHF2as0flEOkAoFfBZew-RXtMq8pA3MSEc8NKgpJrJ8p1Uk7rPqUAIqH9xKd3RQ9OH2hLAmRdVr8xiT195lqskte_wSh0JT-vrMhGw8E69GqNGUpLGhd9DIr5MYX5/s1816/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.53.31.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1816" data-original-width="1330" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjazG-2Z5anS0XQ_erLHF2as0flEOkAoFfBZew-RXtMq8pA3MSEc8NKgpJrJ8p1Uk7rPqUAIqH9xKd3RQ9OH2hLAmRdVr8xiT195lqskte_wSh0JT-vrMhGw8E69GqNGUpLGhd9DIr5MYX5/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.53.31.png" /></a></div><br /><i><br /></i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">d) the best known esotericism of the Shaykhī school starting with Shaykh Aḥmad al-Aḥsāʾī (d. 1241/1826), his disciple Sayyid Kāẓim Rashtī (d. 1259/1844) and then the two traditions that developed in Kerman and Tabriz. Henry Corbin famously thought that the Shaykhī school represented the final esotericism of Imāmī Shiʿism. What was clear is that it represented a metaphysics and theology of presence that was critical of Ibn Sīnā and Mullā Ṣadrā and that found a more extended metaphysical role for the Imams as Aristotelian causes for the existence of the cosmos. A major feature of their work is philosophical theological exegesis on the Qurʾan and sayings of the Imams and devotional texts. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyZkP8mymTTHtaEo2MtF34YiKGLQftghvCgZKBgla621gEaKm-tTxEmGNyGU2REDFT7pILgM8QsYtXO-773HWNWO18ILYclx18cqVrar31pD8Oroqd_S4pLt9nlYXg5pHSFcnkaON0uoZj/s2012/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.56.34.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2012" data-original-width="1350" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyZkP8mymTTHtaEo2MtF34YiKGLQftghvCgZKBgla621gEaKm-tTxEmGNyGU2REDFT7pILgM8QsYtXO-773HWNWO18ILYclx18cqVrar31pD8Oroqd_S4pLt9nlYXg5pHSFcnkaON0uoZj/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.56.34.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEoyCoZefDO3I1KsS9-iisunNgXbgn2S2mTeJALqg4ljFItTcGGNpITJYT_anOObze6K9hEyliH6jmdYn4v8I7Kv5nGEuLTRRYeYtRi9kuD5E7qvvWgvnO5TnOgcRiFRPb5bBApxs8ycwG/s1302/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.57.03.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1302" data-original-width="826" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEoyCoZefDO3I1KsS9-iisunNgXbgn2S2mTeJALqg4ljFItTcGGNpITJYT_anOObze6K9hEyliH6jmdYn4v8I7Kv5nGEuLTRRYeYtRi9kuD5E7qvvWgvnO5TnOgcRiFRPb5bBApxs8ycwG/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.57.03.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPVZogMg_mmaNE-AbWok6_0vyBBgNMFbwg3raAzPe5lKGw7Aw9AduT4sDP4d7PYgZ7WXVp8y6CKThgfGrcE50ijG4dXdCgH7KXYaB707t6j-Wsj-j6Xm8ZyFlIy1ddbQJ6vgKn5maMd9P8/s2024/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.57.23.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2024" data-original-width="1416" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPVZogMg_mmaNE-AbWok6_0vyBBgNMFbwg3raAzPe5lKGw7Aw9AduT4sDP4d7PYgZ7WXVp8y6CKThgfGrcE50ijG4dXdCgH7KXYaB707t6j-Wsj-j6Xm8ZyFlIy1ddbQJ6vgKn5maMd9P8/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.57.23.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr8QLJ6H4KgZIFEzjWgax_Sh2g0X_BRNcbbpup4UD4XFlFIJuowRj5aPreGHm6AQnid47Lp_HfYRpCFSp3m7Qz3LBItLG9YFplcsGQdYdrDQRmVUgiP4IBCC2ug2joApO3KBt-7bnA2Lea/s1348/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.57.36.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1348" data-original-width="876" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr8QLJ6H4KgZIFEzjWgax_Sh2g0X_BRNcbbpup4UD4XFlFIJuowRj5aPreGHm6AQnid47Lp_HfYRpCFSp3m7Qz3LBItLG9YFplcsGQdYdrDQRmVUgiP4IBCC2ug2joApO3KBt-7bnA2Lea/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-27+at+23.57.36.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">8) In the modern period, alongside the continuation of Safavid esotericism and the school of al-Ḥilla (as well as the Shaykhīya), there are at least another three distinct trends:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">a) Reformists who criticised and increasingly attacked the core positions on the imamate from the time of Aḥmad Kasravī (d. 1946) and Sharīʿat-Sangalajī (d. 1944) through to Ḥaydar ʿAlī Qalamdārān (d. 1983), and more recently I would include the likes of ʿAbdolkarīm Sorūsh, Moḥsen Kadivar, Moḥammad Mojtehed Shabastarī, Moṣṭafā Malekiyān and others - though there are differences in their positions on hermeneutics and the nature of religion.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">b) The School of Separation (the <i>maktab-e tafkīk</i>) and their fideist rejection of philosophical theology in favour of insisting upon scripturalism and eschewing philosophical arguments since they 'bring into question' innate beliefs that all humans hold (such as the existence of God, and the necessity of prophecy and the imamate and so forth)</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">c) The New Theology (<i>kalām-e jadīd</i>) was one attempt starting with thinkers in Najaf such as Muḥammad Ḥusayn Iṣfahānī Kumpānī (d. 1942) and developing through his student ʿAllāma Sayyid Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ṭabātabāʾī (d. 1981) and his student Murtażā Mutahharī (d. 1979) to deploy the philosophical method and system of Mullā Ṣadrā to respond to the theological and intellectual challenges of forms of idealism, materialism, and dialectical materialism as well as atheism in the 20th century. This school is now one might say morphing into an 'analytical Sadrianism' which brings the philosophical theology of Mullā Ṣadrā into conversation with modern anglo-American analytic philosophy of religion and theology. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Now returning to the Ṭūsī-Ḥillī school, the publication of a dual text edition of Ḥillī's <i>Taslīk al-nafs</i> in a translation by Jari Kaukua, who heads up the ERC-funded <i><a href="https://islamicepistemology.com/2016/08/11/jari-kaukua/" target="_blank">Epistemic Transitions in Islamic Philosophy, Theology and Science</a></i> project, is a major event. Up to now, there are hardly any Imāmī theological text available in such an attractive design and binding - or even in translation. I can see how it will become essential for teaching purposes even within Shiʿi circles. The fact that the translation came out of the ERC-funded project also means that the digital copy is available online on a Creative Commons license. The text is also the first in a new series of translations of the works of al-Ḥillī.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3XL95A9aEWRX8UyKCjuBUC3o-L3FTpq6MR_niEX8dJsrZbn9zZ9oHCHEV9Gto_D8Q7gknmPe4JEzPA8HQKQF-88mG2qYWxTP4RhRe9nUIjDHApzAylybE15f3QYPFJnJ_l7pqVykAYe5o/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.01.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3XL95A9aEWRX8UyKCjuBUC3o-L3FTpq6MR_niEX8dJsrZbn9zZ9oHCHEV9Gto_D8Q7gknmPe4JEzPA8HQKQF-88mG2qYWxTP4RhRe9nUIjDHApzAylybE15f3QYPFJnJ_l7pqVykAYe5o/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.01.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiLMXYsUHmrsdIDIgB3cipb3oleNa23FoEsl8_4jOkYJid7Zc9mf0LPh-l97pQ45D-Vniz9kLWDC7d1OnCJz-HDUCKDWQFo5gXqV5drmauuIbAXMpSJZVNTdEd8A3SyAnh5iiaP2C4tKYH/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.07.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiLMXYsUHmrsdIDIgB3cipb3oleNa23FoEsl8_4jOkYJid7Zc9mf0LPh-l97pQ45D-Vniz9kLWDC7d1OnCJz-HDUCKDWQFo5gXqV5drmauuIbAXMpSJZVNTdEd8A3SyAnh5iiaP2C4tKYH/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.07.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">This work in a sense falls between the shorter creedal <i>al-Bāb al-Ḥādī ʿashar </i>and al-Ḥillī's more extensive works such as his commentary on the <i>Tajrīd</i>, <i>Kashf al-murād</i>, as well as his incomplete work on <i>kalām</i> (of which the metaphysics section is extant), <i>Nihāyat al-marām fī ʿilm al-kalām </i>and his well known <i>Manāhij al-yaqīn</i>.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb2uEQr8GmqEclZk1E_7-PiSyC3sR3kRllEkTgLCwM0H6zypBMH6Ah3ONWDHHhVq_RE5wve5d7nLRJMe9Jmek5BJL4eOyMoxChGtjkAjBXoo2OVYy8khfUiqmfyYoPJfbHsaJvGOrdBzX2/s1186/Screenshot+2021-07-28+at+00.01.52.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1186" data-original-width="774" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb2uEQr8GmqEclZk1E_7-PiSyC3sR3kRllEkTgLCwM0H6zypBMH6Ah3ONWDHHhVq_RE5wve5d7nLRJMe9Jmek5BJL4eOyMoxChGtjkAjBXoo2OVYy8khfUiqmfyYoPJfbHsaJvGOrdBzX2/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-28+at+00.01.52.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVJXgyjdT95bN6cdALM_HhsrFdXgKGxJ0bgRSgaVnBtpyBtRg-ivsObkGzp5oLhXV_nd7Ro_MPm4SIkgvdGh60g9izWDuPnVZucXbFQQOiEsgQ6TqiYTILlp6JCNbQie__QTnsPFI0Dfvr/s1148/Screenshot+2021-07-28+at+00.02.07.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1148" data-original-width="786" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVJXgyjdT95bN6cdALM_HhsrFdXgKGxJ0bgRSgaVnBtpyBtRg-ivsObkGzp5oLhXV_nd7Ro_MPm4SIkgvdGh60g9izWDuPnVZucXbFQQOiEsgQ6TqiYTILlp6JCNbQie__QTnsPFI0Dfvr/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-28+at+00.02.07.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc86f6Fg8AHRiFKwB8tfAlqk3UmBzsomE8XwmXFuyTT0Ob7fyb-sxFzQp0Rr4gKqQoc4lXyHP52bdF-2U5b3YKbEaAAjDnLQXDIR_CcoVT0s3xObF8KKwQ0wait0dekeUzDAKH_VjmF6Ne/s1654/Screenshot+2021-07-28+at+00.02.24.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1654" data-original-width="1128" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc86f6Fg8AHRiFKwB8tfAlqk3UmBzsomE8XwmXFuyTT0Ob7fyb-sxFzQp0Rr4gKqQoc4lXyHP52bdF-2U5b3YKbEaAAjDnLQXDIR_CcoVT0s3xObF8KKwQ0wait0dekeUzDAKH_VjmF6Ne/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-28+at+00.02.24.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Arabic text follows the earlier critical edition of Fāṭima Ramaḍānī - the translator cites Schmidtke on the 8 manuscripts of the text although there are many more that are extant. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIORwdK__xI2E-zA5OG9oIgWsVyxt54Q2jGmKR3kC2Dz6DwtWlzBrl0_NDehQaMclELuZF25SU1e_U5n1MGo5bVFnUN1gMYQEeX7jGjV_HpTRy1nDFYvJHgnQNzLkb4uaz9tB3fFHCIQ1W/s1372/Screenshot+2021-07-28+at+00.06.02.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1372" data-original-width="886" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIORwdK__xI2E-zA5OG9oIgWsVyxt54Q2jGmKR3kC2Dz6DwtWlzBrl0_NDehQaMclELuZF25SU1e_U5n1MGo5bVFnUN1gMYQEeX7jGjV_HpTRy1nDFYvJHgnQNzLkb4uaz9tB3fFHCIQ1W/s320/Screenshot+2021-07-28+at+00.06.02.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Ramaḍānī's edition is based on the two earliest manuscripts: 1) MS British Library Or 10971 dated 18 ṣafar 716/May 1316 in the life of the author in the hand of (probably his sister's son) Sayyid ʿAlī b. al-Ḥasan al-Ḥusaynī al-Aʿrajī - and the codex also includes an <i>ijāza</i> to his son Fakhr al-muḥaqqiqīn and some of his marginal glosses 2) MS Maktabat Āyatullāh al-Ḥakīm in Najaf 929 dated 22 ṣafar 722/March 1322 also in the lifetime of the author and it says it is based on the autograph (which has not survived). But this is a rough copy with mistakes that are corrected in the margins. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">It is unfortunate that the translation omits the detail of which Arabic text has been used or any of the critical apparatus. But the intention of the series is not to produce critical editions. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The introduction that follows does a decent job of outlining the importance of the text and the contribution of al-Ḥillī's ideas and his influence but independence from Muʿtazilī and Avicennian ideas. But much of it is based on Schmidtke's earlier published Oxford DPhil. One wonders whether there is more to say? </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The structure is as follows:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhH4Y05eEO7TqPhopUwUPmJweFAeHYBUe-kqajWxtui3z3We2E2vhE5qhaN5Fu9nbhBpznM4_uAdfP5KiRpG__ni3ORIiFvN_ZlkOohs_oNqK6kb1qNhw8PW9_D6pmgdv2fiTfg16p1XixW/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.12.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="444" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhH4Y05eEO7TqPhopUwUPmJweFAeHYBUe-kqajWxtui3z3We2E2vhE5qhaN5Fu9nbhBpznM4_uAdfP5KiRpG__ni3ORIiFvN_ZlkOohs_oNqK6kb1qNhw8PW9_D6pmgdv2fiTfg16p1XixW/w333-h444/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.12.jpeg" width="333" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0HerfNvU0uvbfcZH5ZVRsiB38rzjANBaCyWdDsi6_4OUmC00tcR-ZfbUdKQQRIr6-lipJ3gnqVRlpzki_2bo64vaZ5k5bANqMTjZ_vmIRkoLl6KMeW4k3xiF15MvB9qrUP6HgVRobE12R/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.17.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="415" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0HerfNvU0uvbfcZH5ZVRsiB38rzjANBaCyWdDsi6_4OUmC00tcR-ZfbUdKQQRIr6-lipJ3gnqVRlpzki_2bo64vaZ5k5bANqMTjZ_vmIRkoLl6KMeW4k3xiF15MvB9qrUP6HgVRobE12R/w311-h415/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.17.jpeg" width="311" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVSHurzdyofstfhCceNFjM6545UoYEl1ZxyVO8amcUgANwtHtqfCgCruAR1q3GEKPmWeWB1eY-YHeQ2_boAgxZfl0UnMA29ZeWYFyL9JthhEI3CnGINZLuaXwD-mL-_IV0sJko8-KUxipz/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.22.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="399" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVSHurzdyofstfhCceNFjM6545UoYEl1ZxyVO8amcUgANwtHtqfCgCruAR1q3GEKPmWeWB1eY-YHeQ2_boAgxZfl0UnMA29ZeWYFyL9JthhEI3CnGINZLuaXwD-mL-_IV0sJko8-KUxipz/w299-h399/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.22.jpeg" width="299" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">As with most later theological compendia, much of the text is taken up with metaphysics of general terms (general things seems a bit vague and it seems that one means the way in which we use terms like one and many and universal and particular - so the semantics of being) and categories of beings (substances and accidents and their properties). Another large chunk is on the nature of God and her attributes including the famous proofs for the existence of God. Here the important discussion of limited and compatibilist human free will as well as evil and the question of pleasures and pains as well as the very significant theological issue of God's facilitating grace (<i>luṭf</i>) are discussed in the section on theodicy. He consistently presents <i>kalām</i> arguments alongside the philosophical ones. Interesting on the major dispute on the eternity of the world he presents both arguments but does not adjudicate - elsewhere he does in favour of the theological position on creation out of nothing in time. The shortest section is on the imamate which is consistent with the other works of this genre. Given his extensive work on that topic of dispute, that is not surprising - and forthcoming titles in this series will engage with those such as the controversial <i>Minhāj al-karāma</i> currently being translated. The final section on the return includes the discussions on resurrection as well as the philosophical problem of how one can return to existence something that has become non-existent. It also ends with a brief discussion on the nature of faith (<i>īmān</i>) that takes up on old kalām debate - interestingly this section is entitled 'on names and judgements'.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The text is well designed and presented. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqQrPWYXL2GLJrcZkamwXvNlvXIoCTaLpPG_T4U4fiK40moCH0lh34ZydcGwRZqg3ZRjw6R79hixgS7Cnehv3lvy2AUKdj5byJocG8qGkSH81vEnWU53VpAzJxjKBYFSfVPoFFvvUFe_-4/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.32.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqQrPWYXL2GLJrcZkamwXvNlvXIoCTaLpPG_T4U4fiK40moCH0lh34ZydcGwRZqg3ZRjw6R79hixgS7Cnehv3lvy2AUKdj5byJocG8qGkSH81vEnWU53VpAzJxjKBYFSfVPoFFvvUFe_-4/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.32.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT9TomZZXk2_c4XfjQmp4O1YVx3nv3f1Z0AOWtXC5IcJjS4moXBCOWfu05c6IS1S-YjKiCIBdwsktoxN8mrmk3WRBNWFf4iTVcHXWX8RPDXbS-2JJtiCqmsMaHJyTLE3UhokUPxqHiKLxC/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.38.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT9TomZZXk2_c4XfjQmp4O1YVx3nv3f1Z0AOWtXC5IcJjS4moXBCOWfu05c6IS1S-YjKiCIBdwsktoxN8mrmk3WRBNWFf4iTVcHXWX8RPDXbS-2JJtiCqmsMaHJyTLE3UhokUPxqHiKLxC/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.38.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh91TsyAUmpNfgspXe7FlejoHlMdFxEoRRfuTdPRXIr2s10ernqTdDX6BgIG36fZc6IlCCPGumgWbarA9cQ3mtQHAUDBUBsED8kLdfnunE0s0xejcjoofIQ_PYT4O6yy3M8E866q7qircn8/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.43.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh91TsyAUmpNfgspXe7FlejoHlMdFxEoRRfuTdPRXIr2s10ernqTdDX6BgIG36fZc6IlCCPGumgWbarA9cQ3mtQHAUDBUBsED8kLdfnunE0s0xejcjoofIQ_PYT4O6yy3M8E866q7qircn8/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.43.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRS7DXxlURuRz90feBtiQ2tHCUenIkHIVI-qyLAhGC3pzVseCt0T1HFkLpFfeJDet_rPSPfPHHT25P0bEWuUpD_vQ4hrV8WfYIXpuvVuw7OFqv3yOzw86W7paW9HAwVbOpFD4Tqa6x3dpW/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.51.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRS7DXxlURuRz90feBtiQ2tHCUenIkHIVI-qyLAhGC3pzVseCt0T1HFkLpFfeJDet_rPSPfPHHT25P0bEWuUpD_vQ4hrV8WfYIXpuvVuw7OFqv3yOzw86W7paW9HAwVbOpFD4Tqa6x3dpW/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.37.51.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_ua8JAJ3rYwXipYVTh1KBi2c_TLrzfE0V40BFwG9bYXhFC_Z7hCiz1QXJ_TdxVIQYL1DQEFx_Na54Ya-bu3OiLb5F8zLsFp5AR6C5M_FJSkFlcTD0YCIu251Uzuyu1CnXbOBjAWT9n3uk/s1600/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.38.28.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_ua8JAJ3rYwXipYVTh1KBi2c_TLrzfE0V40BFwG9bYXhFC_Z7hCiz1QXJ_TdxVIQYL1DQEFx_Na54Ya-bu3OiLb5F8zLsFp5AR6C5M_FJSkFlcTD0YCIu251Uzuyu1CnXbOBjAWT9n3uk/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-07-27+at+22.38.28.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The translation itself is readable if at times rather literal or interpretative (in a manner with which I disagree - for example, charge for <i>taklīf</i> that is often rendered as legal or moral obligation). But at least we have a translation that is workable especially alongside the Arabic. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">On the whole there is little doubt that this is a contribution that is wonderfully produced and deserves to be widely disseminated, known and used. An essential step in the study of post-classical <i>kalām</i> and especially Imāmī <i>kalām</i>. </span></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-86045564075341345482021-03-20T13:10:00.003-07:002021-03-20T13:11:36.228-07:00Shiʿi Exegesis in South Asia: Some Further Notes on Lavāmiʿ al-tanzīl va-savāṭiʿ al-taʾvīl<p><span style="font-size: large;">Some years ago, I wrote a blogpost on Sayyid Abūʾl-Qāsim Riżavī Qummī Lāhorī (1833–1906) and on his extensive Persian exegesis <i>Lavāmiʿ al-tanzīl va savāṭiʿ al-taʾwīl</i> - I have now corrected some of the links to volumes of the text available as pdfs online. The first volume was printed in Lahore in 1299/1882:</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLGYhCc0kWMwonukjCRqZL2xQI3OUaW3eLCEEev0-pt40ndJGUuPqNV1i3yAerbY-llXkTSj4O9S5fsoHsJtRWGW5m_SEznNo-w8CLszB2b7jDTef-QQMdmiZ2QjMMt_ukwme2xWgJEHED/s1498/Screenshot+2021-03-19+at+17.24.13.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1498" data-original-width="1046" height="397" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLGYhCc0kWMwonukjCRqZL2xQI3OUaW3eLCEEev0-pt40ndJGUuPqNV1i3yAerbY-llXkTSj4O9S5fsoHsJtRWGW5m_SEznNo-w8CLszB2b7jDTef-QQMdmiZ2QjMMt_ukwme2xWgJEHED/w276-h397/Screenshot+2021-03-19+at+17.24.13.png" width="276" /></span></a></div><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><span style="font-size: large;">It begins with an extensive table of contents. There are seventeen preliminaries, to which I will return, followed by the discussion of the <i>istiʿādha</i> (formulaic seeking refuge from Satan), the <i>basmala</i> and the Fātiḥa. Each verse or section is divided into <i>mabāḥi<u>s</u></i>; further sub-divisions of exegetical glosses are called <i>īrād</i> and <i>ishkāl</i>. While the approach and register is scholarly - and he has an extensive key for the sources that he cites (both Shiʿi - <i>khāṣṣa</i> - and Sunni - <i>ʿāmma</i>) - the language is accessible and simple, perhaps indicating that the work was not merely intended for a scholarly Persophone audience of ʿulema but also for a wider Persian reading public (which in Lahore in this period was extensive as we know from the publishing and the literary scene onto which Iqbal emerged slightly later). </span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigOFaCxkNzLoRK7nBrw9_F2WdwqayAt6C2KYJ6V-k_GTry23db0_mgrmZQHQ4UiF7nXnIF5fPfCahoS90qwomxM_vuQmeK2OcHD0rbUuanrt2zO-7Z4BbN6jm89-kELbIuwkj0jX-dV3Dw/s1998/Screenshot+2021-03-20+at+18.59.10.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1940" data-original-width="1998" height="475" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigOFaCxkNzLoRK7nBrw9_F2WdwqayAt6C2KYJ6V-k_GTry23db0_mgrmZQHQ4UiF7nXnIF5fPfCahoS90qwomxM_vuQmeK2OcHD0rbUuanrt2zO-7Z4BbN6jm89-kELbIuwkj0jX-dV3Dw/w488-h475/Screenshot+2021-03-20+at+18.59.10.png" width="488" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span><br /></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">The table of contents is followed by three (chronogrammatic) poems in praise of the exegesis by Mīr Mūsā Shāh and Maulvī Muḥammad Sharīf Kābulī (the link may well be through Riżavī's Qizilbash patron ʿAlī Riżā Khān who spent some time in Kabul and was as we know a loyalist during 1857 - I have not for the moment attempted to identify the poets but one suspects if they are major figures that some <i>taẕkira</i> somewhere will throw up some details). Then we have a bunch of endorsements (<i>taqrīẓāt</i>) starting with Mīrzā Abūʾl-Qāsim Ṭabāṭabāʾī (1826–1901),</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqgGiGW9pphwu1MhSXyMXbvGXdiOkm8hLT6MJ4eNVzGu5CrQUKLJrfj_mT36yV07Oq5Hd-BGMHfxs_HKmULmi6CnWTn8DVG19eArYneWfQW3fM5bW2Pc0ZbCvHOcnXMFU2QyXFRC3KPa5I/s1904/Screenshot+2021-03-19+at+17.35.00.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1904" data-original-width="998" height="451" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqgGiGW9pphwu1MhSXyMXbvGXdiOkm8hLT6MJ4eNVzGu5CrQUKLJrfj_mT36yV07Oq5Hd-BGMHfxs_HKmULmi6CnWTn8DVG19eArYneWfQW3fM5bW2Pc0ZbCvHOcnXMFU2QyXFRC3KPa5I/w237-h451/Screenshot+2021-03-19+at+17.35.00.png" width="237" /></span></a></div><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><span style="font-size: large;">followed by the famous leader of the Tobacco boycott from Sāmarrāʾ Mīrzā Muḥammad Ḥasan Shīrāzī (1815–1896), </span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj22mrmhIhBqGJtAlxNn8eYxz6E5LzRluhel4cMe4BcIAGTcBqzacyJZFxGRASP_SGoEiTZ9DaH-hLzcK9dA5wts09A_y-CHvCSQIlkEwNXRd3W8-8ghyphenhyphenzx9v-GjN6gmLiIF7jwa9cqhkLO/s1590/Screenshot+2021-03-19+at+15.22.51.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1590" data-original-width="996" height="402" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj22mrmhIhBqGJtAlxNn8eYxz6E5LzRluhel4cMe4BcIAGTcBqzacyJZFxGRASP_SGoEiTZ9DaH-hLzcK9dA5wts09A_y-CHvCSQIlkEwNXRd3W8-8ghyphenhyphenzx9v-GjN6gmLiIF7jwa9cqhkLO/w251-h402/Screenshot+2021-03-19+at+15.22.51.png" width="251" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span><br />and Shaykh Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ardakānī, known as Fāżil-e Ardakānī (1820–1885)</span></span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsubXGT6BY_VfEUMnjhn0SVlVRt-QajIfi3GU99vBKFksgQ3QNwV50axlpw8k3CBdvkJ0Ah2BGuWjOmIWAgoT-An4-HsvBLTp5aqiHW9c56I4fYpGwJ1b0vQeJs2tZisUlAm6Kn5IiVH1F/s1940/Screenshot+2021-03-19+at+17.41.23.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1940" data-original-width="1256" height="396" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsubXGT6BY_VfEUMnjhn0SVlVRt-QajIfi3GU99vBKFksgQ3QNwV50axlpw8k3CBdvkJ0Ah2BGuWjOmIWAgoT-An4-HsvBLTp5aqiHW9c56I4fYpGwJ1b0vQeJs2tZisUlAm6Kn5IiVH1F/w256-h396/Screenshot+2021-03-19+at+17.41.23.png" width="256" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span>These endorsements - and we are also told that the exegesis was initiated in 1296/1879 just a few years prior - attest to the fame and network that Riżavī and his son had in the shrine cities of Iraq and the ways in which Shiʿi scholars of North India were rather well integrated into the hierocratic networks of the period. </span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Any work of exegesis tells us much about the exegete, his training and his contexts and the ways in which he seeks to engage the revelation. The preliminaries are therefore predicated on his understanding of the totality of the Qurʾanic arts that are needed to study the text. It also shows us that the exegetical uses of the Qurʾan in Riżavī's Hindustānī context went beyond merely <i>reading</i> the text but indicated the totality of the Qurʾanicity of the lived experience and engage with the artefact, the sonoscope and the totality sensory and cultural experience of the Qurʾan. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span>In the </span><i><span>khuṭba</span></i><span>, he tells us that in these last days of the 13th century (late 19th century CE), in North India and Lahore in particular (cited as the place of composition), many different confessions are using the Qurʾan and the process of exegesis to put forward a defence of their 'corrupt' and 'vain' theologies, 'resisting and denying the truth' of the revelation and sound doctrine. Given this contested nature of Islam in the colonial period and the role of the Qurʾan as a primary signifier of meaning of one's confessional adherence, Riżavī invokes the convention of meaning a group of friends (and students) asking him to present the Shiʿi tradition and case through the exercise of exegesis. His function is to explain difficult issues, response to objections and removed any doubts (whether ancient or modern) about the Shiʿi tradition in a godly and precise and effective manner, eschewing fake narratives and keeping decorum and an ethical mode of presentation founded upon proofs and reliable indicators. His method is to take forward the argument and the tradition through the complete homology and confluence of the use of rational discourse as well as citation of the authority of revelation </span><span>(<i>ʿaql va naql</i>).</span><span> Following further pious supplications, he then says that the work is dedicated to - and here again a whole list of honorifics that suggest scholarly status - Nawāb (Sir) Nawāzish ʿAlī Khān Qizilbāsh (1828–1890), the son of his patron ʿAlī Riżā Khān Qizilbāsh (d. 1865). </span></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY2FrPivsHdcsNsknDJSahdtN-HJx4-71sNEzjx_ywqFaSGVbBD85v0H-kpYNPUBX21B-rE3CEEEV31M3rOnARhufocGchn6_7uxoZouRqDf7jAipu6fNISbUxHOBhsO6cFd9a8MH2115l/s1978/Screenshot+2021-03-20+at+19.22.56.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="652" data-original-width="1978" height="182" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY2FrPivsHdcsNsknDJSahdtN-HJx4-71sNEzjx_ywqFaSGVbBD85v0H-kpYNPUBX21B-rE3CEEEV31M3rOnARhufocGchn6_7uxoZouRqDf7jAipu6fNISbUxHOBhsO6cFd9a8MH2115l/w555-h182/Screenshot+2021-03-20+at+19.22.56.png" width="555" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span><br /></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Here are the headings of those seventeen preliminaries (and the two most commonly cited authorities are <i>Majmaʿ al-bayān</i> of al-Ṭabrisī and <i>Majmaʿ al-baḥrayn</i> by Fakhr al-Dīn al-Ṭurayḥī - and on Sunni positions, the authority of <i>Tafsīr-e kabīr</i> or <i>Mafātīḥ al-ghayb</i> of Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī - as we have seen in the work of his teachers and the circles in Lucknow in this period, Rāzī represented authoritative Sunni positions on exegesis and <i>kalām</i>):</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">1. on the names of the Qurʾan and their meanings; </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">2. on both the exoteric and the esoteric exegesis (on the <i>tafsīr</i> and the <i>taʾwīl</i>) and on the distinction between the cognitive content and meaning (<i>maʿnā</i>) and the exposition (<i>bayān</i>);</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">3. on the Qurʾan as the defining 'miracle' of the Prophet and on some of the Qurʾanic arts needed to make sense of this miracle (in the sense of its eloquence and order and style) - while critiquing the majoritarian (Sunni) idea of the Prophet being 'unlettered' (<i>ummī</i>), and asserting the the Prophet was the source of many of the sciences and arts that were latter expanded;</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">4. on the precedence and superiority of the Qurʾan over other scriptures; </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">5. on the meaning of the seven <i>aḥruf</i>; </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">6. on the seven or fourteen canonical recitations (<i>qirāʾāt</i>) - he presents two tables for these and also asserts their being extensively corroborated in their transmission (<i>mutawātir</i>); </span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhp7bE8VK-64NGvNdhOus7dHYlDUDbNUUrbxE1oElB2pA0xs9JYpvmK7ppXo2ehDtryC1EkuG6kWznwQ-_JWvkWdjN5ZL7qfRJNoFV8RCCErxNSlwdhFm6KcVRNTKT49H2DX83mtTEy6uO0/s1684/Screenshot+2021-03-20+at+19.40.09.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1462" data-original-width="1684" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhp7bE8VK-64NGvNdhOus7dHYlDUDbNUUrbxE1oElB2pA0xs9JYpvmK7ppXo2ehDtryC1EkuG6kWznwQ-_JWvkWdjN5ZL7qfRJNoFV8RCCErxNSlwdhFm6KcVRNTKT49H2DX83mtTEy6uO0/s320/Screenshot+2021-03-20+at+19.40.09.png" width="320" /></span></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPipCP-2m2EdbOMDyTyga04S_i55PWMUecRA380xvDlRh-oJHduOsym5ZcJZQYqZP0kRTqxPQ2RFvKfW2NQHCKam7p4x6WaqU4E5zIHk8H569s2N22K8FhmUbINLjNQzqvLdXOeGA9lnHY/s1582/Screenshot+2021-03-20+at+19.40.21.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="814" data-original-width="1582" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPipCP-2m2EdbOMDyTyga04S_i55PWMUecRA380xvDlRh-oJHduOsym5ZcJZQYqZP0kRTqxPQ2RFvKfW2NQHCKam7p4x6WaqU4E5zIHk8H569s2N22K8FhmUbINLjNQzqvLdXOeGA9lnHY/s320/Screenshot+2021-03-20+at+19.40.21.png" width="320" /></span></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">7. on the number of verses and sūras and the difference between the Meccan and the Medinan;</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">8. On the recitation and the way of pronouncing the text (<i>tartīl</i> and <i>taʿyīn al-makhārij</i>) - a practical guide to stopping points, breathing and so forth; </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">9. on the rewards for correct and melodious recitation;</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">10. on the rewards for melodious recitation with a good voice; </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">11. on whether there is any omission or change in the Qurʾan - the problem of <i>taḥrīf</i> on which he says that while all Muslims agree that there is none, there are broadly two positions: the first of the literalist ḥadīth-folk (among the Shiʿa) who assert that there is and the second that there is not which is the position of the scholars from al-Ṣadūq to al-Sayyid al-Murtaḍā and so forth. Given the importance of the debate on this in this period in Persian and the pluralist and polemical context of Lahore, it is clear that he wished to exonerate the Shiʿa from this charge;</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">12. on the periodisation of the revelation and previous revelations and scriptures; </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">13. on ʿAlī and the Imams possessing the complete Qurʾan and its knowledge which is located in a polemic against Sunni polemicists like Ibn Ḥajar on the knowledge of the Imams and the question of <i>taḥrīf</i>; </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">14. on a quarter of the Qurʾan constituting the excellences and virtues of the family of the Prophet and on this in a polemical vein, he asserts that he will only use reliable Sunni sources to establish this; </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">15. on condemnation of exegesis by analogical reasoning (<i>qiyās</i>) or by one's own opinion (<i>raʾy</i>) - he includes in this Sufi exegesis of the school of Ibn ʿArabī (to whom he refers as Mumīt al-dīn al-Aʿrābī) and laments its preponderance; </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">16. on his use of reliable and authentic narrations and sources from both Sunni and Shiʿi traditions in this exegesis; </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">17. on the sources that he uses - and this is an extensive list that tells us how he defines the normative Shiʿi tradition and the Sunni traditions not just in exegesis and exegetical hadith but also kalām and related arts. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">What emerges from this brief perusal of the preliminaries is the way in which Riżavī's understanding of the Shiʿi tradition is steeped in the Lucknow tradition of Sayyid Dildār ʿAlī (d. 1820) and his family with its focus on rational theology, curbing the excesses of the hadith-folk, attacking Sufi orientation and especially the influence of the school of Ibn ʿArabī and defining the normative Shiʿi exegetical tradition though the major works in the 11th and 12th century of al-Ṭūsī, al-Ṭabrisī, and Abūʾl-Futūḥ al-Rāzī. In that sense, he can been seen as a Shiʿi defender of his tradition in a polemical sense in the colonial period defining the tradition in the religious marketplace of ideas in Lahore, differentiating himself from various Sunni, ahl-e Qurʾān and ahl-e ḥadī<u>s</u> and even Aḥmadī and other positions, as well as separating himself from more popular 'exaggerations' of the role of the Imams and the tying of that position with the Sufi metaphysics of the school of Ibn ʿArabī. </span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span><br /><br /></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-19758287713113001932021-03-17T04:28:00.000-07:002021-03-17T04:28:20.786-07:00A Shiʿi Controversialist of the school of al-Ḥilla: Khiḍr b. Muḥammad al-Ḥabalrūdī (d. after 859/1455)<p><span style="font-size: large;">In a recent issue of <i>Āyīna-yi Pažūhish</i>, there is a bibliographical article on a 15th century commentary on the works of al-ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī written by Najm al-Dīn Khiḍr b. Muḥammad al-Rāzī al-Ḥabalrūdī, which provides us with further evidence of the abiding and dominant nature of the theological school of al-Ḥilla in the pre-Safavid period as well as the uses of the shortish theological primer by al-Ḥillī entitled <i>al-Bāb al-ḥādī ʿashar</i> as a teaching text requiring glosses. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeKxSkZUQ6Q_deYaw2BWGiuyb4soMJJchkDwXtidFkGE0BGwKghYgtbiWlj8eoBj7YxwTpzgKck33jAioYTz-PD_oFKqIFgyd69kRFFM4kNmNiFh3HEN1ewifGQWNdHSQX8FiY7B2kBUgx/s1688/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.18.15.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1688" data-original-width="1176" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeKxSkZUQ6Q_deYaw2BWGiuyb4soMJJchkDwXtidFkGE0BGwKghYgtbiWlj8eoBj7YxwTpzgKck33jAioYTz-PD_oFKqIFgyd69kRFFM4kNmNiFh3HEN1ewifGQWNdHSQX8FiY7B2kBUgx/s320/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.18.15.png" /></span></a></div><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><span style="font-size: large;">I first came across Ḥabalrūdī when I was writing an article on Sayyid Nūrullāh Shūshtarī (d. 1019/1610) and his polemics and I located the latter's work within cycles of polemics. In al-Ḥilla in 839/1435, he had written a work entitled <i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">al-Tawāḍīḥ (or al-Tawḍīḥ) al-anwār bi-l-ḥujaj al-wārida li-dafʿ shubhat al-Aʿwar </span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">(The Clarifying Lights through scriptural proofs warding off the objections of the One-Eyed) responding to the Ashʿarī anti-Shiʿi polemic </span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">al-Risāla al-muʿāriḍa fī-l-radd ʿalā l-rawāfiḍ</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Brill Roman";"> (Refutation of the Rejectors) of Yūsuf b. Makhzūm al-Aʿwar al-Wāsiṭī. I then found a copy of the text in the British Library (Delhi Arabic 1953 - and there are copies of al-Aʿwar's works in manuscript there as well):</span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Brill Roman";"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEt-Pkx1D2drW6Pw8NuqkoBPy-lBXTPZAXWPfeza9hxu84UQ_eP-SF9GjAj4uhfLzP7s-rJrKSuoKkWZPIBhT5yU3ZJcGZy0XPc4bnNqF0kvr423Pke132waxO7NIi163CGaJ-g44s-6E8/s2048/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.12.33.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1084" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEt-Pkx1D2drW6Pw8NuqkoBPy-lBXTPZAXWPfeza9hxu84UQ_eP-SF9GjAj4uhfLzP7s-rJrKSuoKkWZPIBhT5yU3ZJcGZy0XPc4bnNqF0kvr423Pke132waxO7NIi163CGaJ-g44s-6E8/s320/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.12.33.png" /></a></span></div><p><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></p><span style="font-size: large;">The text was published by the Marʿashī library in Qum and is available as a pdf <a href="http://www.shiabooks.net/library.php?id=11326">here</a>.</span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhU60Ayct1WgNn1dgoKnOO84idFZTAbLI9WmEpg-aLOrcRtb1NIP3Lih3qJNDYw5GqI3soxQhfiIxAKw_iXEF3tFdQj5eYW69R9NhamFlOA-sbN56ZWo4tpnvUoQCH0GjdXYcG_k6AwhUm/s1138/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.34.58.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1138" data-original-width="782" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhU60Ayct1WgNn1dgoKnOO84idFZTAbLI9WmEpg-aLOrcRtb1NIP3Lih3qJNDYw5GqI3soxQhfiIxAKw_iXEF3tFdQj5eYW69R9NhamFlOA-sbN56ZWo4tpnvUoQCH0GjdXYcG_k6AwhUm/s320/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.34.58.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">For a broader study of the ways in which Shiʿi scholars responded to polemics, it is worth reading Sayyid ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Ṭabāṭabāʾī (d. 1995) and his <i><a href="http://shiaonlinelibrary.com/الكتب/4447_موقف-الشيعة-من-هجمات-الخصوم-السيد-عبد-العزيز-الطباطبائي">Mawqif al-shīʿa min hujūmāt al-khuṣūm</a></i>. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">We do not really know much about al-Ḥabalrūdī or even those to whom he missed licenses (<i>ijāzāt</i>). Ḥabalrūdī's family origins went back to Māzandarān although he seems to have been born and brought up in Najaf where he is said to have died - again some evidence for the importance of Najaf as a centre of Shiʿi learning for the school of al-Ḥilla in the Turkmen and Timurid periods. The famous bibliographer Āqā Buzurg al-Ṭihrānī suggested that his father Shams al-Dīn Muḥammad b. ʿAlī had been one of the students of Jamāl al-Din Abūʾl-ʿAbbās Ibn Fahd al-Ḥillī (d. 841/1437) in al-Ḥilla and in Najaf. Mīrzā ʿAbdallāh Afandī has an extensive entry on him praising his works in kalām especially but while identifying him as a contemporary of Jalāl al-Dīn Davānī (d. 908/1502) he also suggests that he was one of the court ʿulamāʾ of Shah Ismail the first Safavid ruler but there is no corroborating source for this.</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZt9FoSjtplnvPCOO72XoNV-kpRMKMRCC510P_BvPHGsBqKcOurXtAc1LlmDDEDGW6DMG_OqdJLp5Dmft_Dm_J2JDXnlZRZBT94h5r6vOLNl01Z4FVg-8j52WKEwbBaVccr54dNcZJGY2f/s1728/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.53.34.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1278" data-original-width="1728" height="282" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZt9FoSjtplnvPCOO72XoNV-kpRMKMRCC510P_BvPHGsBqKcOurXtAc1LlmDDEDGW6DMG_OqdJLp5Dmft_Dm_J2JDXnlZRZBT94h5r6vOLNl01Z4FVg-8j52WKEwbBaVccr54dNcZJGY2f/w381-h282/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.53.34.png" width="381" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">One teacher of his whom we do know and which suggests that he first studied <i>kalām</i>, logic and philosophy in Shiraz is Sayyid Shams al-Dīn Muḥammad, the son of the renowned al-Sharīf ʿAlī al-Jurjānī. He was a well known teacher of the rational (as well as the occult) arts and famously rendered his father's Kubrā on logic into Arabic as <i>Durrat al-manṭiq</i>. In fact, the first work that Ḥabalrūdī wrote was a commentary <i>Kāshif al-ḥaqāʾiq fī durrat al-manṭiq</i> dated 823/1420. </span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgybiKJBs52XWghrlEl-d-CH5ErJf7pXKTnhI3Fbqcz4gyOQMjJQRvw_jNcYjIx-1AF399Xcrk6yWitLndrgVVC6f0Dfqy-V66ag0hHMXxpXJqD2wNFDhQYzro4pqtea-VPW_hCl4l_BQY0/s450/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+10.19.45.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="396" data-original-width="450" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgybiKJBs52XWghrlEl-d-CH5ErJf7pXKTnhI3Fbqcz4gyOQMjJQRvw_jNcYjIx-1AF399Xcrk6yWitLndrgVVC6f0Dfqy-V66ag0hHMXxpXJqD2wNFDhQYzro4pqtea-VPW_hCl4l_BQY0/w240-h211/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+10.19.45.png" width="240" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">He may well have encountered Davānī in Shiraz as well. He also wrote two further works on logic in that period: <i>Jāmiʿ al-daqāʾiq</i> and <i>al-Qawānīn</i> (although the latter does not seem to be extant). </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">He then seems to have moved to al-Ḥilla and Najaf, finally becoming the librarian at the shrine. There he began to write commentaries on the works of al-Ḥillī. <i>Al-Taḥqīq al-mubīn fī sharḥ Nahj al-mustarshidīn</i> was completed in 827/1424 in the Madrasa Zaynīya in al-Ḥilla. In 834/1430 he completed <i>Jāmiʿ al-uṣūl fī sharḥ risālat al-fuṣūl</i> of Ṭūsī in Najaf. Later he also wrote a short work on <i>kalām</i> <i>Tuḥfat al-muttaqīn fī bayān uṣūl al-din</i> which has been published:</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE7xJ4rfIa3ChSEYDHFvMYJGlkSwup8wykH3mmkyLXl8jNW8kFUxZMRZJwU8XHo0lRh5ZRscCfw0qnXgu1uR0ApUIkfYLD1Z44-XT4w454FsGavhIyApyUXTm1q1ec2C6jRsaSTrwpMeGZ/s894/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+10.13.50.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="894" data-original-width="708" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjE7xJ4rfIa3ChSEYDHFvMYJGlkSwup8wykH3mmkyLXl8jNW8kFUxZMRZJwU8XHo0lRh5ZRscCfw0qnXgu1uR0ApUIkfYLD1Z44-XT4w454FsGavhIyApyUXTm1q1ec2C6jRsaSTrwpMeGZ/s320/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+10.13.50.png" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">There is also a good manuscript copy 8908 from the Majlis library in Tehran available <a href="https://ketabpedia.com/تحميل/تحفه-المتقين-في-بيان-اصول-الدين-از-خضر/">online</a>. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjz9Gvl8HXVOrACDREteI5mgmJenJHUR-_h7GmJ__yrvkLXNlSNae69cmjkmEFpEiH2b1C_Jb2upmk_J321Cx62OqnY0slA_YLOnKPVZrv9arwI2U2RJKKPsxYeG6jDfSJQET0klBsvNutr/s3894/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+10.25.05.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="807" data-original-width="3894" height="109" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjz9Gvl8HXVOrACDREteI5mgmJenJHUR-_h7GmJ__yrvkLXNlSNae69cmjkmEFpEiH2b1C_Jb2upmk_J321Cx62OqnY0slA_YLOnKPVZrv9arwI2U2RJKKPsxYeG6jDfSJQET0klBsvNutr/w530-h109/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+10.25.05.png" width="530" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Finally we have his commentary <i>Jāmiʿ al-durar fī sharḥ bāb al-ḥādī ʿashar</i> and its epitome <i>Miftāḥ al-ghurar</i> completed in 836/1432. There are plenty of extant copies of the epitome (over 70 in Iran and Iraq). Here is a still from MS Majlis 3150 of the latter:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicT4Qivxp_gXkkTy1HdqeYMwCI3GM18lbZ_te2VLBW1KtMouOmXKRU-_vYbjdvxF6o4DmuL895FPs-WtkCUWr3PMGZz6XYVCxudPanVrRLzYjSWhl9E77KyH_-sAKawIaXA6pk6KkFXLbR/s2048/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.17.08.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1506" data-original-width="2048" height="297" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEicT4Qivxp_gXkkTy1HdqeYMwCI3GM18lbZ_te2VLBW1KtMouOmXKRU-_vYbjdvxF6o4DmuL895FPs-WtkCUWr3PMGZz6XYVCxudPanVrRLzYjSWhl9E77KyH_-sAKawIaXA6pk6KkFXLbR/w405-h297/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+09.17.08.png" width="405" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;"><i>Jāmiʿ al-durar</i> itself is an extensive work and comes in a period in which there were a number of commentaries on <i>al-Bāb al-ḥādī ʿashar</i>. First there is the well known and published work of al-Miqdād al-Siyūrī (d. 826/1423) <i>al-Nāfiʿ yawm al-ḥashr </i>as well as the recently published commentary of the philosopher Ibn Abī Jumhūr al-Aḥsāʾī. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglTpy3uK2sUNqF5W5MluJ4CDikoimmw8X6sAgB9vo8Iq-iMTWQL-Njmo1FApDuouqMx83zd_fN2BFU6_hU86QGAWIla-RaCgbQqDiHAGHIs8UKtl752lnVaPyn0nC4LuBhK63fpIIFwccN/s908/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+11.14.38.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="908" data-original-width="558" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglTpy3uK2sUNqF5W5MluJ4CDikoimmw8X6sAgB9vo8Iq-iMTWQL-Njmo1FApDuouqMx83zd_fN2BFU6_hU86QGAWIla-RaCgbQqDiHAGHIs8UKtl752lnVaPyn0nC4LuBhK63fpIIFwccN/s320/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+11.14.38.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLShWSkDqk9gi1XS9kUtxox7nAsrr4ajHrWoxb9Myi9J2zhXHJmr2dz2afkChaOca1iHgg5-aFkOub2tDst3NxFoPPGHd_nXXbURjHSNCRbx1VImkuKzpm3ULLu-lT3BB-upSzrYH7VtbX/s898/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+11.14.55.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="898" data-original-width="632" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLShWSkDqk9gi1XS9kUtxox7nAsrr4ajHrWoxb9Myi9J2zhXHJmr2dz2afkChaOca1iHgg5-aFkOub2tDst3NxFoPPGHd_nXXbURjHSNCRbx1VImkuKzpm3ULLu-lT3BB-upSzrYH7VtbX/s320/Screenshot+2021-03-17+at+11.14.55.png" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">As is well known the original text of al-Ḥillī is divided into seven chapters: on the proof for the existence of God based on contingency (and the impossibility of an infinite regress of causes), on the positive attributes of God especially on knowledge and power (since they arise in many of the texts on the proof for the existence of God as significant corollaries), on negative attributes or the apophatic way of dealing with the divine nature, on divine justice and theodicy as well as an account of human agency, on prophecy, on the imamate, and on the return and the afterlife and eschatology. The section on the imamate just as the corresponding section in Ṭūsī's <i>Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād</i> and its commentaries tended to attract widespread commentary. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">In Iran there are 6 manuscripts of the text including two from the lifetime of the author - MS Kitābkhāna-yi Gharb (Hamadan) 10343 and MS Marʿashī (Qum) 866. One hopes to see the edition of the text soon so that we can build up a better picture of the development of Imāmī kalām from the period of the initial school of al-Ḥilla and the work of Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī and his student al-ʿAllāma through to the further transformations in the Safavid period in the circle of Mīr Dāmād and Mullā Ṣadrā. Furthermore, given the recent judgments of Robert Wisnovsky and Tony Street that follow the earlier findings of Ahab Bdaiwi, it would be interesting to see the development of a Shiʿi school of logic, <i>kalām</i> and even Avicennism that culminated in the Shirazi thinkers in the immediate generation after Ḥabalrūdī. In that sense, Ḥabalrūdī becomes an important link in that chain from al-Ḥillī to the Dashtakīs through to the Iṣfahānī thinkers of the Safavid period. </span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><br /></span></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Brill Roman";"><br /></span></span><p></p>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-91101871895860790732021-02-24T13:34:00.003-08:002021-02-25T03:58:29.932-08:00Arabic Philosophy? What's in a Name? <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqBn_i-feQQh7cOHg6U_XJ0J1LHxJ4fHL1G0GgcrCijF_b_OFgrd709qhRqIND66lTXS1PZ7rkrzBOdR-fwC-v2sey9u_V6D6gQIpHXNiB9CneAGQnOTtNIWgonJ0dG23dfbA5xDWnwEAO/s510/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+11.23.48.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="510" data-original-width="352" height="464" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqBn_i-feQQh7cOHg6U_XJ0J1LHxJ4fHL1G0GgcrCijF_b_OFgrd709qhRqIND66lTXS1PZ7rkrzBOdR-fwC-v2sey9u_V6D6gQIpHXNiB9CneAGQnOTtNIWgonJ0dG23dfbA5xDWnwEAO/w320-h464/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+11.23.48.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Whether we call it Arabic philosophy or Islamic philosophy or philosophy in the world of Islam (that seems more popular nowadays), there is little doubt that this philosophical tradition is significant for our understanding of human history and intellectual endeavour and indeed the world in which we live and deal with one other. Of course, at one level labels and names are important: naming is an act of defining, of making connections, and indeed of including. While one may debate whether Islamic as a label must necessarily entail a narrowly defined normative theological engagement, if we have learned anything from both Talal Asad's notion of <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/20685738?seq=1">Islam as a discursive tradition</a>, and <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691164182/what-is-islam">Shahab Ahmed's</a> consideration of Islam as a rich tradition within the Balkans-to-Bengal complex, it is that Islamic can be used in a far broader sense. And it is also the case that even for a number of the thinkers engaged in this volume (Avicenna in particular), it seems rather presumptuous to deny that their theological commitments were genuine. But even further for the current debates on the identity of Europe and the wider question of the role of Islam in Europe which is strongly resisted by the nativist right, it does matter that we embrace a more expansive notion of 'Islamic philosophy' and its receptions and indeed continuing living engagement (not in the name of tradition as such but in terms of the life of the mind with its extensive forms of embodied experience). Academic scholarship matters; it informs and identifies who we are and helps us to make sense of our world. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">This rich collection of articles, <i><a href="http://www.vrin.fr/book.php?code=9782711628551">La philosophie arabe à l'étude</a></i>, represents an excellent window into the state of research in European scholarship on the intellectual history of ‘Arabic philosophy’. The fact that this latter term is chosen is in itself indicative of a certain approach: Arabic and not Islamic with a focus on the language of philosophical expression and not the cultural context and theological and ethical commitment. In theory, one might even in that sense include works written in Turkish, Persian and other languages inflected by the Arabic debates – perhaps Islamicate philosophy or philosophy in the Islamic World (as is the term used by Peter Adamson whose approach through his popular podcast the <a href="https://historyofphilosophy.net">History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps</a> and his <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/philosophy-in-the-islamic-world-a-very-short-introduction-9780199683673?cc=gb&lang=en&">Very Short Introduction</a> has become highly influential). </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqEYSzz121jtRBHZeVAmflj2pmaJLLDs8DRd5khWbW4ZaKEKzqgnvwbm23qvt-90jVpi8vGwPp1zg67OqjazyXX91pcOcibhc2m7v58v2_JPPlnr6U_wZ0zT34ap0pwJx8lhrFobYI0Er9/s1090/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+11.36.23.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1090" data-original-width="702" height="416" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqEYSzz121jtRBHZeVAmflj2pmaJLLDs8DRd5khWbW4ZaKEKzqgnvwbm23qvt-90jVpi8vGwPp1zg67OqjazyXX91pcOcibhc2m7v58v2_JPPlnr6U_wZ0zT34ap0pwJx8lhrFobYI0Er9/w268-h416/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+11.36.23.png" width="268" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">But there is still a sense in which the term Islamic is too theologically compromised, too compromising to the analytic, precise and <i>rational</i> nature of philosophy. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Of course, by that token there is a focus on Arabic as a conduit and transformation of the ancient traditions and their influence on medieval and early modern scholasticisms in Europe, but also by implication somewhat a cut off point for inquiry; ‘Arabic philosophy’ whether in the form of ‘Islamic philosophy’ with its theological commitments in the period say after the 13<sup>th</sup> century, and in the form of contemporary debates, receptions of continental and analytic traditions in Arabic are both decidedly excluded (although there is some reference to the latter in one article). Nevertheless, given the focus on the question of method, this debate is engaged in the volume.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">After a brief introduction by the editors in which the volume is said to evolve from a conference in 2013 and where a brief question is raised about method and labelling and where there is an explicit comparison to studies that attempt to gauge the state of research in medieval Latin philosophy, the articles are divided into five sections. All of the major figures of the European study of Arabic philosophy are included here. Fittingly the volume is dedicated to two major figures whom we now miss in the field: <a href="https://www.uco.es/ucopress/ojs/index.php/mediterranea/article/view/11468">Marc Geoffroy</a> (1965–2018) who was working closely with Jules Janssens and Meryem Sebti on Avicenna’s commentaries especially on <i>Metaphysics Lambda</i> and the so-called <i>Theology Aristotelis/Uthūlūjiyā</i> (and had previously worked on Averroes and Fārābī, translating <i>al-Jamʿ bayna rayʾay al-ḥakīmayn - </i>a work that most people now think is pseudo-Fārābī), and <a href="http://aisg.cise.unipi.it/Materia-giudaica-2018/000-In%20memoriam.pdf">Mauro Zonta</a> (1968–2017), one of the leading specialists on medieval Jewish philosophy. Both went far too early. Requiescant in pace.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The first (and longest) part comprises eleven chapters on method and the historiography of the study of Arabic philosophy and unsurprisingly Dimitri Gutas looms large. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The first is a reprint of Dimitri Gutas’ classic study of the historiography of Arabic philosophy focusing on four approaches: Orientalism, mysticising, the conduit connecting ancient and medieval philosophy, and Straussianism or the political and esoteric reading of Arabic philosophy. The article was originally a lecture at the BRISMES conference in Cambridge in 2000 and has functioned as a defining text for the study of Arabic philosophy since. Orientalism accounts for the attitude that sharply divides philosophy and theology and religion, insists on its heterodoxy dealt a death blow by Ghazālī’s critique, identifies Averroes as a last hurrah for Aristotelianism, for philosophy to die away. In a sense a mysticising reading of philosophy is also Orientalist in that it objectifies and essentialises Arabic philosophy as the exotic other of analytic philosophy. The main extension of this – and Gutas’ favourite thinker to critique – is Henry Corbin and his ‘theosophical’ reading which allows his to establish his polemic against the use of the term ‘Islamic’ philosophy. The clash of orientalisms and essentialisms indeed. At stake of course is the very definition of philosophy: thought, explanation and analysis that includes the uses of poesis and myth, recourse to non-propositional thought and even mystical intuition allied with strong theological commitments takes the work into the realms of para-philosophy for Gutas. In a sense, the insistence on Avicenna as the Arabic philosopher begs the question of his own commitments: did Avicenna not have a sense of what philosophy was as a way of life, did the broader context of the assumption of Islam and the processes of divinity and prophecy not affect him? But then as a colleague recently commented why should we care about narrow definitions of philosophy, not least of what is analytic given the broad inability (the irony!) to establish a clear, coherent and explanatory definition of analytic philosophy. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">This piece is followed by Gutas’ postscript, a rather short note primarily concerned with critiquing the revival of Straussian approaches (represented in this volume by David Wirmer), and while broadly agreeing with his earlier piece also condemned some recent ‘fanciful’ and plainly bad histories of philosophy. Of course, more recently he has decried the problem of the eclipse of philosophy after the classical period and its dissolution into pseudo-philosophy (thought that has distinct theological and other commitments). At the end of the day, approaches and the way in which we seek to do the history of philosophy is directly related to how we define and understand philosophy and then locate that understanding in the texts that we study. If we define philosophy in Islam as Aristotelianism (somewhat influenced by but also suspicious of the excesses of Neoplatonism) and reject the possibility of distinct theological commitments and indeed any sorts of theological and ontological commitments that are extrinsic to the syllogistic substrate of argumentation, then one wonders what philosophy in Arabic, in the world of Islam can possibly be. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Catherine König-Pralong’s study examines the development of the concept of Arabic philosophy in European thought from the time of Pierre Bayle in the 17<sup>th</sup> century through to Ernest Renan in the 19<sup>th</sup> century. What she shows rather interestingly is the eclipse of earlier usages of Arabic philosophy in the Enlightenment (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9xvvzsoiWk">Jonathan Israel</a> has also commented on that) to a more orientalised and racialised notion of Arabic philosophy as medieval by the colonial period as an expression of colonialist epistemology. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Chiara Adorisio looks at Strauss’ study of Maimonides and his Muslim interlocutors as a form of true rationalism in philosophy that neither gives up on religion or politics. Rüdiger Arnzen’s contribution is a highly useful typology of eight approaches to the study of the history of philosophy in the world of Islam that relates it to wider concerns in the study of the history of philosophy and intellectual history. He makes a strong case for a broader and theoretically more serious engagement with Arabic philosophy as part of the study of non-Western philosophies. The real conundrum is a perennial one: are students of Arabic philosophy primarily historian-philologists focusing on texts and contextualisation, philosophers excavating new ground or intercultural apologists fighting the prejudices of philosophy in the world of Islam. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">This is followed by Anke von Kügelgen’s <a href="https://historyofphilosophy.net/contemporary-islam-von-kugelgen">interview to Adamson’s podcast</a>. It is the one piece dedicated to a broad study of Arabic philosophy into the modern period not surprising given her own specialisation (and indeed she is the <a href="https://www.islamwissenschaft.unibe.ch/forschung/laufende_projekte/grundriss_der_geschichte_der_philosophie_bd_iv_geschichte_der_philosophie_in_der_islamischen_welt_des_19_und_20_jahrhunderts/index_ger.html">editor of volume four of the History of Philosophy in Islam from 1800 onwards</a>, the <i>Gundriss der Geschichte der Philosophie</i> published by Schwabe Verlag). </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLZnGuCMvXXmBGHsFN2I7E7A9r5xI180KeaTf7qYFE9PByxLNt1y8PuAMVcqcYqeEkpFE0EJcsgIva5-OihvwjHfmvqmvp_uxyAhiBRG8PTfrEsHGr_vhWZVfpkTnAF8PAdni1rjbqKYXf/s954/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.03.27.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="954" data-original-width="670" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLZnGuCMvXXmBGHsFN2I7E7A9r5xI180KeaTf7qYFE9PByxLNt1y8PuAMVcqcYqeEkpFE0EJcsgIva5-OihvwjHfmvqmvp_uxyAhiBRG8PTfrEsHGr_vhWZVfpkTnAF8PAdni1rjbqKYXf/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.03.27.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Not only does she discuss the reception of the classical traditions as well as Kant and Heidegger in the modern Muslim world (on which now there is quite a literature from Mohsen Jahangiri and Karim Mojtehedy to Roman Siedel, Urs Gösken and the Fardid crowd - and volumes published in Iran), she also touches on the history of the critique of philosophy. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Damien Janos’ piece is the longest piece and theoretically sophisticated. It asks a very important question: to what extent does one find development of thought and position in the thinkers that we study and perhaps all too often we assume a holism of approach in their oeuvre. It is a contribution not just to the study of Arabic philosophy but in fact to how we study the history of philosophy. David Wirmer’s defense of the Straussian method of reading follows with an even longer article as well as an exemplification in his edition and translation of Ibn Bājja’s treatise <i>On the Desiderative Faculty</i>. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The late Mauro Zonta’s brief over of Jewish Averroism follows and how it may be compared to Jewish Avicennism. He maps out a whole tradition and shows that Averroism in Jewish contexts still needs further work. One could certainly argue that many of the articles are responses and modifications of Gutas: Lizzini takes his work as her starting point and re-engages the values and approaches that we ascribe to the terms ‘Arabic’, ‘Islamic’, and ‘philosophy’; it is a useful recapitulation of the debate with the summary that she wishes to study philosophy in Islam and not philosophy of Islam (and indeed how in some circles the two are conflated). <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Part two considers the echoes and reception of ancient thought in Arabic philosophy. Ricardo Chiaradonna’s excavation of the existence-essence distinction in late antique thought and his critique of Hadot’s suggestion that one might find the notion of <i>hyparxis</i> and the activity of the One above substance in the anonymous commentary on the Parmenides is an excellent example of a clear and precise work of intellectual history. Might be useful to compare Michael Chase's recollection of Hadot <a href="https://harvardpress.typepad.com/hup_publicity/2010/04/pierre-hadot-part-1.html">here</a>. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The eminent Neoplatonism specialist Dominic O’Meara looks at the Arabic reception of the opposition of Alexandrian Aristotelianism to Athenian Neoplatonism and Karl Praechter’s historiographical model and the whole question of the transmission of late Neoplatonism to the Arabs. Part of this involves a critical take on <a href="https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195376135.001.0001/acprof-9780195376135-chapter-3">Michel Tardieu's</a> conjecture on the thinkers of Ḥarrān. Cristina Cerami looks at the reception of the <i>Posterior Analytics</i> on the organisation of the physics in Averroes; another excellent philologically careful study. David Twetten studies the ‘orthodoxy’ of the notion of the Aristotelian First Mover in the thought of Averroes alongside two modern specialists Sarah Broadie and Enrico Berti.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Part three comprises there chapters and considers an area of growing concern in recent times, namely, the connections between philosophy ‘proper’ and three areas of systematic theology (<i>ʿilm al-kalām</i>), mysticism, and law and legal theory. Again, with reference to Adamson, this would link to the ‘expansive’ sense of philosophy – looking for argumentation, analysis and explanation regardless of the generic self-label applied in the text. Hence, one can easily find serious philosophical analysis in works of <i>kalām</i>, in elements of Sufi metaphysics, in Qurʾanic and other scriptural exegesis, and especially in legal theory. Parallel to this is a new series published by de Gruyter on <a href="https://www.degruyter.com/serial/PIWC-B/html">Philosophy in the Islamic World</a>. Ulrich Rudolph’s short piece on the metaphysics of Jāmī (d. 1492) takes up the earlier work of Nicholas Heer and shows how especially the <i>Precious Pearl </i>(<i>al-Durra al-fākhira</i>) is such an important witness and indeed conduit for how later theologians, philosophers, and even Sufis made sense of metaphysics; at some point in the 18<sup>th</sup> and 19<sup>th</sup> centuries there is some evidence that it became a major school text across the Ottoman, post-Safavid and Mughal contexts. The reception of this text as a bridge between philosophy and these related areas deserves further consideration. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdBiTkdbtcRIZ0lpy6yRBAtEh5IP2861lKFtwafts5TTJf3dMmtFMZXCQcyhrXS5DCg7sCmkMdbs5G2aS5tfCEkBWsKCCddGlQEQvPiHXDH7SVSdaeJ2upN1CKKS3dwjUXlU7k2VhXQ9KF/s954/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.18.48.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="954" data-original-width="610" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdBiTkdbtcRIZ0lpy6yRBAtEh5IP2861lKFtwafts5TTJf3dMmtFMZXCQcyhrXS5DCg7sCmkMdbs5G2aS5tfCEkBWsKCCddGlQEQvPiHXDH7SVSdaeJ2upN1CKKS3dwjUXlU7k2VhXQ9KF/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.18.48.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Steffen Stelzer’s rather generic chapter studies how mystics viewed philosophers as inauthentic and insincere followers of the Prophet (and hence heretics). This is a rather disjointed piece and invokes Ibn ʿArabī and at times some modern Sufi polemics; but it fails to engage with the wider observation that in the later period there is a strong convergence of philosophy and mysticism, for example, in the thought of Mullā Ṣadrā (d. 1636). However, he does raise an interesting question about the nature of authority and precedence in philosophy - at least from ancient times, philosophers have not been immune to polemics, rhetoric, and indeed appeal to authority. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Ziad Bou Akl completes this section with a study of the nature of divine volition in Averroes’ refutation of al-Ghazālī, specifically in the first discussion on whether God could choose a particular instant <i>t</i> at which to create (and the problem of indifference) and relates it to the famous medieval problem of Buridan’s ass, further taking the debate up to Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī. Certainly, the latter thinker is perhaps one of the most influential philosophers of the middle period and his <i>al-Maṭālib al-ʿāliya</i> that is studied here still deserves further recognition and engagement. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The fourth part on the reception of Arabic philosophy considers four studies on Latin and early modern thought. Massimiliano Lenzi analyses Aquinas’ reception of both the Latin Aristotle and Averroes on the causes and essence of nature in <i>Physics</i> II. Roland Hissette takes up the translations of the middle commentaries of Averroes on logic, particularly <a href="https://www.nli.org.il/en/books/NNL_ALEPH004106253/NLI">on the <i>Isagoge</i></a> by the 13th century translator Wilhelmus de Luna. It constitutes a valuable study in Arabic-Latin translation and how terms draw upon both Averroes and Boethius. Jean-Baptiste Brenet’s own contribution is a fascinating study in Averroism in Descartes’ Utrecht debate of 1641 with Henrik de Roy on the nature of the human (especially the particular hylemorphic nature). It demonstrates an element of Descartes as not the first of the moderns but rather someone working within the universe of Aristotelianism and Averroism. A broader study is needed to consider further elements of Averroism and Avicennism in his thought. Remke Kruk’s contribution looks at the reception of Ibn Ṭufayl’s <i>Ḥayy ibn Yaqẓān</i> in Dutch and its transmission to Defoe’s <i>Robinson Crusoe</i> and other narratives; philosophy does have an influence further into literature and culture. Specialists have known for some time about <a href="https://aeon.co/ideas/ibn-tufayl-and-the-story-of-the-feral-child-of-philosophy">Pococke’s Latin translation</a> and its influence on Defoe (most exemplary in the study of <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/au/the-shipwrecked-sailor-in-arabic-and-western-literature-9781848855526/">Mahmoud Baroud</a> that was originally an Exeter PhD, even if there is no direct textual transmission or evidence). </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_tqbXkReO_3mrT46IminBset4lt_NDroxiiREE7gGUwCYaQL8nPC52hMlHvwDfe4G6Q-tloMmYy5smGhm7j7J8fjQrFWlEqY0FPGRBeXf09nXdF-hMr_FWNAhZhyBbt380Zry5CCHBG-M/s1244/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.23.50.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1244" data-original-width="844" height="446" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_tqbXkReO_3mrT46IminBset4lt_NDroxiiREE7gGUwCYaQL8nPC52hMlHvwDfe4G6Q-tloMmYy5smGhm7j7J8fjQrFWlEqY0FPGRBeXf09nXdF-hMr_FWNAhZhyBbt380Zry5CCHBG-M/w302-h446/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.23.50.png" width="302" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">However, there does seem to be evidence in a Dutch work published in 1752, <i><a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/De_Walchersche_Robinson_zynde_een_zeldza.html?id=4ZXApzPFhtIC&redir_esc=y">De Walchersche Robinson</a></i> of a relationship with the Arabic text. Kruk shows how literary and even philosophical influence can be present even in the face of antipathy to the religious context of Islam. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">The fifth and final part is a series of studies on particular texts and traditions and includes seven chapters. Philippe Vallat’s long article continues his rebuttal of Straussian readings of al-Fārābī in his contribution (explained in more detail in his book); for him, philosophy remains superior to religion and has a stronger claim to soteriology. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgq4O28x1-GzIk61Ekq_osMAuvy7Q3D1tpKBY_rCgn2GAhKMvY6qIiCaRbcykIZAuIxSLkdZrhXMRzfETgPK-9VUWnv-NkTbpz981sI6AR9qtppL_HYvoTPLUEpSjrM36GkdtAOWBr-wLv4/s914/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.28.10.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="914" data-original-width="630" height="468" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgq4O28x1-GzIk61Ekq_osMAuvy7Q3D1tpKBY_rCgn2GAhKMvY6qIiCaRbcykIZAuIxSLkdZrhXMRzfETgPK-9VUWnv-NkTbpz981sI6AR9qtppL_HYvoTPLUEpSjrM36GkdtAOWBr-wLv4/w322-h468/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.28.10.png" width="322" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">He does affirm an esoteric reading but in a different sense to Leo Strauss (his main criticism is levelled at Charles Butterworth), and he repeats his reading of al-Fārābī as an anti-Qurʾanic and even anti-Islamic thinker. Certainly, it is fair to say that al-Fārābī’s conception of philosophy is far removed from the holistic commitments of Mullā Ṣadrā and Mīr Dāmād (and perhaps even Avicenna). For Vallat, the political theological concern for esotericism in al-Fārābī is only one of four possible functions. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">Meryem Sebti’s excellent edition and study of the <i>Risāla fīʾl-kalām ʿalā al-nafs al-nāṭiqa</i> places it within the pseudo-epigraphical works of Avicenna and suggests that it was written by an <i>ishrāqī</i> author in the later period (and her evidence certainly seems quite conclusive). Given the abundance of pseudo-epigraphica in Arabic and Islamic philosophy (often attributed to Avicenna, Ibn ʿArabī, Mullā Ṣadrā and so forth), this is a careful philological and philosophical model of how to establish an incorrect attribution. Yamina Adouhane studies the modal and causal distinction between the possible and the necessary in Avicenna and their reception in al-Ghazālī and Averroes. Significantly she points to the distinction between the notion of being necessary in itself and being without a cause. Jules Janssens takes up a wider task looking at the importance of Avicenna studies, the need for historical work and translation, of appropriate historical analysis, of not smoothing out the problems and tensions within Avicenna, of avoiding anachronistic readings. If one accepts that Avicenna is one of the greatest philosophers in history and a thinker with influence in the study of the sciences and medicine as well, he deserves a serious engagement not just in the world of Islam but beyond. This is very much an argument for the study of Avicenna within the history of global philosophy. Matteo di Giovanni considers an important polemical issue taken up historically but also in recent Arab intellectual history: how Islamic is Averroes’ philosophy? The question speaks directly to this debate on Arabic versus Islamic philosophy. It provides evidence for the contestation of Islam and indeed philosophy in Averroes’ time. The final contribution by Fouad Ben Ahmed looks at Ibn Ṭumlūs’ logic and medicine and acts as a brief introduction to his editions and book published with Brill; it provides an account of an important student of Averroes and his tradition. In a sense the recovery of Ibn Ṭumlūs tells us something about the imagining of an Arab Averroist tradition. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVgdexdVMW0QFIiCPK7FgC5HPElGuq9dHbmD8Vk6uJn1o9dzIbrLDmvfd1zBmNC2jSXUW5PvcFyGvzr0iR-hk7HoTU__7jYvev7wbfdBIjhvuwTp1M9cn8SlDILXfBivGQ8QZzbxqKcUUX/s1824/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.30.01.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1824" data-original-width="1204" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVgdexdVMW0QFIiCPK7FgC5HPElGuq9dHbmD8Vk6uJn1o9dzIbrLDmvfd1zBmNC2jSXUW5PvcFyGvzr0iR-hk7HoTU__7jYvev7wbfdBIjhvuwTp1M9cn8SlDILXfBivGQ8QZzbxqKcUUX/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.30.01.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">This is little doubt that this is a valuable collection of interventions, summaries and particular studies which tells us much about the field in its European manifestation: lots of Gutas, Avicenna, and Averroes. While there are hints that the editors and the volume want to go beyond that, the absences are notable: no real Suhrawardī (and this is a classic problem of distaste for Corbin and Nasr leading to the neglect of one of the more creative thinkers in the post-Avicennian period), no Mīr Dāmād (who is seriously neglected), no Mullā Ṣadrā, no Ottoman or Indian thinkers, no ethics. Of course, with any such volume, it is always churlish to expect it to conform to one’s own understanding of the field – and it is unreasonable for any volume not least one that emerged from a relatively small conference to be exhaustive. But then it is also the role of the reviewer to point students in the direction of other works: while a number of contributors warn against false leads and even fake friends and news (not least the works of Jackson and Campanini – I for one strongly disagree with that ascription of Jambet, which is a very serious philosophical engagement but as ever philosophical taste <i>semper est disputandum</i>), some indications of excellent recent work in Safavid and Qajar philosophy, the Oxford Handbook, studies of Ottoman philosophy and so forth are still important to make. </span><span face="Brill, sans-serif"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ5HxS_D6VQNCC8kgsUyfplIe-tiiHmNNGK8hHkz3HDD09o7tuI_uLx47XLmmtEDyg97n52b7Rtq_GNl5uzvHU3i2UG2tHP0u8JLvaAXoOHyJWqbfaLhlPGtiT_sE2-ySErYKJvcBfrkzZ/s1834/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.30.57.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1834" data-original-width="1258" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ5HxS_D6VQNCC8kgsUyfplIe-tiiHmNNGK8hHkz3HDD09o7tuI_uLx47XLmmtEDyg97n52b7Rtq_GNl5uzvHU3i2UG2tHP0u8JLvaAXoOHyJWqbfaLhlPGtiT_sE2-ySErYKJvcBfrkzZ/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.30.57.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKn7RWxiC__VNCyS25hyphenhyphenhREpKNHZPjawxBWsp0d2c9PaGVN4eKhb2c43GVWwT8-sgPnVoVd0-h_BRL4TZfJEmAaYWx7Wlj7W0d4ycD2JYeGRgySauca5ljjvRbUQMEacBhhrtf64Gxz3hw/s980/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.31.18.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="980" data-original-width="682" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKn7RWxiC__VNCyS25hyphenhyphenhREpKNHZPjawxBWsp0d2c9PaGVN4eKhb2c43GVWwT8-sgPnVoVd0-h_BRL4TZfJEmAaYWx7Wlj7W0d4ycD2JYeGRgySauca5ljjvRbUQMEacBhhrtf64Gxz3hw/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-24+at+21.31.18.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-6706005667665883932021-02-20T09:44:00.002-08:002021-02-20T10:15:16.300-08:00The Shahrastānī Dossier: His Persian Ismailism <p><span style="font-size: large;">For some time, specialists have been aware that the famous theologian and heresiographer Abūʾl-Fatḥ Muḥammad b. ʿAbd al-Karīm Shahrastānī (1074–1153) was more than just the run of the mill Shāfiʿī trained jurist and Sunni Ashʿarī theologian. His <i><a href="http://www.muslimphilosophy.com/books/nihya.pdf">Nihāyat al-aqdām fī ʿilm al-kalām</a></i> was considered to be an Ashʿarī textbook of the seminary and acts as a supplement to his heresiography. </span></p><p><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdLNNg_aL9N10dJeDyswbLgCRB8IShgW1m3wUuhP3s0p5yiDIV2YWa4J1yPaeQB2KphzHYsh703vNKCPpZnJfnJ0gG19_Dm8QbMHYEMHHqmxbmZ-H97c8UrgAf8kALpcpiObF5Qr2XBTqh/s1898/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.22.13.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1898" data-original-width="1316" height="379" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdLNNg_aL9N10dJeDyswbLgCRB8IShgW1m3wUuhP3s0p5yiDIV2YWa4J1yPaeQB2KphzHYsh703vNKCPpZnJfnJ0gG19_Dm8QbMHYEMHHqmxbmZ-H97c8UrgAf8kALpcpiObF5Qr2XBTqh/w263-h379/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.22.13.png" width="263" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">This text begins with the classic problem of the eternity of the cosmos which he rejects citing Ashʿarī authorities such as Abūʾl-Ḥasan al-Ashʿarī (874–936) himself, as well as Abū Isḥāq al-Isfarāyinī (and Imam al-Ḥaramayn al-Juwaynī (1028–1085).</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7tbsQkR710TMMjHQNXZ-bqnvJ5CEXMQ-ZQVYKoY0kjkHXccsZRDeBgarXAdCygPPK6tDR8Me8n_ve1qi1SKDJ1iUdWuh9qed-j2rqHrArUNC-5frzg-xzQ-hwO0LZEPnIhA9Lwex_TQ8S/s1492/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.26.18.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1492" data-original-width="1416" height="431" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7tbsQkR710TMMjHQNXZ-bqnvJ5CEXMQ-ZQVYKoY0kjkHXccsZRDeBgarXAdCygPPK6tDR8Me8n_ve1qi1SKDJ1iUdWuh9qed-j2rqHrArUNC-5frzg-xzQ-hwO0LZEPnIhA9Lwex_TQ8S/w410-h431/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.26.18.png" width="410" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcDTMIwtKACXMKU9NGls9fQfD0Xz0SxusiEMNR_d3MOwVji5ZyaaSabuQddBIzsmjcBroJp3ExlZT8hyCm7F6iaFwmxD0GGwZDNsYDL2kvxlAxB9wTpxgrgvtVgEgaHjfsTVp8zXaxaYJM/s1268/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.26.37.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1268" height="359" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcDTMIwtKACXMKU9NGls9fQfD0Xz0SxusiEMNR_d3MOwVji5ZyaaSabuQddBIzsmjcBroJp3ExlZT8hyCm7F6iaFwmxD0GGwZDNsYDL2kvxlAxB9wTpxgrgvtVgEgaHjfsTVp8zXaxaYJM/w379-h359/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.26.37.png" width="379" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjP-A-ekesasCU2crohSMCLTy3iTXaV4gbKNrJDfwvXYUmJyq_yoIgyNG5pbBeGok3tN7c6vFvNv9ogMqnErc_n9ZLUYhGQ52Tser79MqTOP3jz5JSMPdgzVCUWZL2mNwXdS2Q5lFt6nBjn/s1340/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.34.37.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1270" data-original-width="1340" height="417" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjP-A-ekesasCU2crohSMCLTy3iTXaV4gbKNrJDfwvXYUmJyq_yoIgyNG5pbBeGok3tN7c6vFvNv9ogMqnErc_n9ZLUYhGQ52Tser79MqTOP3jz5JSMPdgzVCUWZL2mNwXdS2Q5lFt6nBjn/w440-h417/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.34.37.png" width="440" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibMGYgO9BurI4btsWwTqvLEE8X8FzkiYGwUUq5duwOHX6s-cVvgrao4T76uITj3oEGQczoCZCAUuuukb_O4ETDSMEYLxy-DJuTTfF0dLdkcG8fem7drb6fEFzxm_qYmZcKRMujyN5wl8up/s1276/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.35.12.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="734" data-original-width="1276" height="254" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibMGYgO9BurI4btsWwTqvLEE8X8FzkiYGwUUq5duwOHX6s-cVvgrao4T76uITj3oEGQczoCZCAUuuukb_O4ETDSMEYLxy-DJuTTfF0dLdkcG8fem7drb6fEFzxm_qYmZcKRMujyN5wl8up/w441-h254/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.35.12.png" width="441" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">And of course the work for which he was best known was <i><a href="https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/christian-muslim-relations-i/kitab-al-milal-wa-l-nihal-COM_24627">al-Milal waʾl-niḥal</a></i>, an extensive heresiography and doxography (first edited by Cureton in 1846) in which not only does one find one of the best accounts of Ismaili thought but also in which in the long discussion of the roots and reasons for dissension in the early Muslim community one finds a rather sympathetic (to say the least) presentation of the Shiʿi position. </span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTJbdCmvzre7t_tuaRe_wq4vXCziwxoeXfdOttvgELlujVJKlaAEGoNid8XYSUt5FP2YIzUNg4lmX8quOj0MwnWwVT6wzu7IYHGIxsGtKlPITEMLhKQSEKVVPDBMR9vl4E-qO0uvcZCjWD/s742/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.18.48.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="742" data-original-width="552" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTJbdCmvzre7t_tuaRe_wq4vXCziwxoeXfdOttvgELlujVJKlaAEGoNid8XYSUt5FP2YIzUNg4lmX8quOj0MwnWwVT6wzu7IYHGIxsGtKlPITEMLhKQSEKVVPDBMR9vl4E-qO0uvcZCjWD/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.18.48.png" /></a></div><p><br /></p><span style="font-size: large;">On the former, we have this distinction between the 'old' kerygma of the early Ismailis in the name of the messianic Imam Muḥammad b. Ismāʿīl b. Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq and the new one of the Fatimids:</span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijvAsU3dJvf9QcWEliRmFuZmF441jgraLzLbOQhfNAzcPMU_tpKUrOD4EoK2inVVEQgQ39jR7QkZoIhcQa4ks_2UO67M0Cn3shAObeEcwn0HaI3-MuH_sX4Sl4DbhJawHS15EPZ5639Fha/s1090/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.42.25.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="318" data-original-width="1090" height="111" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijvAsU3dJvf9QcWEliRmFuZmF441jgraLzLbOQhfNAzcPMU_tpKUrOD4EoK2inVVEQgQ39jR7QkZoIhcQa4ks_2UO67M0Cn3shAObeEcwn0HaI3-MuH_sX4Sl4DbhJawHS15EPZ5639Fha/w383-h111/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.42.25.png" width="383" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2dU0lNwoW-PEaPLxN-0YlSXv_d-WOC8mugPZyGwD9eVkmlCc853SlrsDaqfUq6zjgoVrwwtWV3Arn2nRDDw9zc3j5tNI239TM0H2fX40fj-5D0OJnL2QNUkAv6KucqdAWgM55DS38s07U/s1064/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.42.32.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="464" data-original-width="1064" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2dU0lNwoW-PEaPLxN-0YlSXv_d-WOC8mugPZyGwD9eVkmlCc853SlrsDaqfUq6zjgoVrwwtWV3Arn2nRDDw9zc3j5tNI239TM0H2fX40fj-5D0OJnL2QNUkAv6KucqdAWgM55DS38s07U/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.42.32.png" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Then we have a bit further a more detailed examination of the Fatimids and after since Shahrastānī was active in Iran and familiar with the Nizārī mission that would make sense (and one finds reference to the <i>Fuṣūl-e arbaʿa </i>of Ḥasan-e Ṣabbāḥ):</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; 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margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1660" data-original-width="1454" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUqd3d6gMR2_4lZL65fT9H6h1qd-q6yYE-nxNrL7PcBj_LRtyE_zHONiWndk4HIMQ8p78mSYKIYtmZy-2oYWN4I2b5sv0YT_ETz74nHuAM3meoUkSX2IfDL4hR_SwVfsqKdl6K34GMuL22/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.48.34.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm6gVsRVzr_yiJCzWytofTDHkHJIDzVnd5AujlNjW354VPifMLjqs4gD4QqeYCb-y_PpQvsh-qE_jYg1OvkqqxTTwyDt91DAbM8Uk9kSf4iII1HxZoNRqLXK71HnyiGi1REwTKSbl7-9wd/s1452/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.48.42.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="644" data-original-width="1452" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm6gVsRVzr_yiJCzWytofTDHkHJIDzVnd5AujlNjW354VPifMLjqs4gD4QqeYCb-y_PpQvsh-qE_jYg1OvkqqxTTwyDt91DAbM8Uk9kSf4iII1HxZoNRqLXK71HnyiGi1REwTKSbl7-9wd/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.48.42.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyzQc0CxZaJJ5NHFCebUXCyWFLHOR87nv62bt0wkvTkBFk0OF5rqAMuAlh7HLwHzeEoMW1CzA11hm_TTPXKD9hDjLs4FuoBlJctke-Iek1rubDuBOmaksMeP93Ml00Z13MB_0EyrYxsKbL/s1900/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.48.51.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1900" data-original-width="1422" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyzQc0CxZaJJ5NHFCebUXCyWFLHOR87nv62bt0wkvTkBFk0OF5rqAMuAlh7HLwHzeEoMW1CzA11hm_TTPXKD9hDjLs4FuoBlJctke-Iek1rubDuBOmaksMeP93Ml00Z13MB_0EyrYxsKbL/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.48.51.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuKB6qq9oP6qIKy8ezvCJpubU7Y7GNpZkEhYuZrV3zVRZgX64ZHqVb1WhagjFE98k4qhAQ8LFFcoteNfCdI_y8OiumY24q5-Sa9eTLvPVkXUYpZEictot_hEpdRpIK6delOfZxPSfo-xQa/s1750/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.49.00.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1750" data-original-width="1462" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuKB6qq9oP6qIKy8ezvCJpubU7Y7GNpZkEhYuZrV3zVRZgX64ZHqVb1WhagjFE98k4qhAQ8LFFcoteNfCdI_y8OiumY24q5-Sa9eTLvPVkXUYpZEictot_hEpdRpIK6delOfZxPSfo-xQa/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.49.00.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Similarly in his presentation of the early dissension in Islam, one cannot help but feel an element of a philo-Shiʿi stance at the very least:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjylPetZ6RjqijIk5HVEL43YoeBBritPfLR6efhyphenhyphenK4uGgcQmZJ9da-CqXQk_WwoDOknHxlTwoP1RWR8aEmajv8cTk0HhZxlljErD76oIgjeMcFbpQ6napBWAPgzEF6pEyCT8qT_4ZaWXP40/s1904/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.54.08.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="456" data-original-width="1904" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjylPetZ6RjqijIk5HVEL43YoeBBritPfLR6efhyphenhyphenK4uGgcQmZJ9da-CqXQk_WwoDOknHxlTwoP1RWR8aEmajv8cTk0HhZxlljErD76oIgjeMcFbpQ6napBWAPgzEF6pEyCT8qT_4ZaWXP40/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.54.08.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN_zaUkTx3X3uRgqhp4kYREBBRvMGlxyxL8816vLa0djKe4T2-Dv1iCtNU-RQB3zc4ORqVGHPhqnaxrLTZzo9I8kZzXC5O0CESFBUqMC2MxlYzOxVgMfVEB58X5IxtTim9xqizPw3p8Z8B/s1214/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.54.58.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1214" data-original-width="1136" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN_zaUkTx3X3uRgqhp4kYREBBRvMGlxyxL8816vLa0djKe4T2-Dv1iCtNU-RQB3zc4ORqVGHPhqnaxrLTZzo9I8kZzXC5O0CESFBUqMC2MxlYzOxVgMfVEB58X5IxtTim9xqizPw3p8Z8B/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.54.58.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiXZfwHfvZmoRtwnolLW294ZQoNygt1-x1fQy0RqbamO6zUCIAKZyz2geIrfoDNW7qm1yECL2YzP8Ez-sR656wqSCa-lbssDGF6DcoFgOZItvGHk-PDuaF1x-i0uvbISEZrOomxVBgo80Q/s1090/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.55.10.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1014" data-original-width="1090" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiXZfwHfvZmoRtwnolLW294ZQoNygt1-x1fQy0RqbamO6zUCIAKZyz2geIrfoDNW7qm1yECL2YzP8Ez-sR656wqSCa-lbssDGF6DcoFgOZItvGHk-PDuaF1x-i0uvbISEZrOomxVBgo80Q/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.55.10.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ9JT51SQodceiyJpLy5ksxlizqWIm-qdaHtNN-ImoDp2y1EgfSKvmfxuajrej0EuuTLV-gRbwfA4mY__iTkYgVpUSvz2mJFHCAeU1uTZw08jCzLJj4kX8Gg7_fnicZWzfTHRyAtQxW519/s1120/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.55.18.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1114" data-original-width="1120" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ9JT51SQodceiyJpLy5ksxlizqWIm-qdaHtNN-ImoDp2y1EgfSKvmfxuajrej0EuuTLV-gRbwfA4mY__iTkYgVpUSvz2mJFHCAeU1uTZw08jCzLJj4kX8Gg7_fnicZWzfTHRyAtQxW519/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.55.18.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRjlufwBPT098bgX4o8K-bmUXf_w4Zxnvg3HsdeQ5VRLMCqJ1XEcWcNzhcc8MUhd41iSKn0AEMp0OwYNse9vmaBu6RYbLFH4Tb-1IJZx6H_WyDfrobsiD8PD_0rnQVGf9X7AUQf24Tb5T1/s1128/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.55.25.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="498" data-original-width="1128" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRjlufwBPT098bgX4o8K-bmUXf_w4Zxnvg3HsdeQ5VRLMCqJ1XEcWcNzhcc8MUhd41iSKn0AEMp0OwYNse9vmaBu6RYbLFH4Tb-1IJZx6H_WyDfrobsiD8PD_0rnQVGf9X7AUQf24Tb5T1/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.55.25.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Anyway beyond these indicators, three further sources are well known for Shahrastānī's Shiʿi (Ismaili/Nizārī) inclinations. The first of these is his Qurʾan exegesis, <i>Mafātīḥ al-asrār</i> or <i>Keys to the Arcana</i>, a partial work mainly on sūrat al-Baqara with some important preliminary discussions on hermeneutics of which the first volume has been translated into English by Toby Mayer. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH8MeI98TBaKlPCosz3qqmpLn1Gv3U9X8eY-Bj_bGVWEhRI_QigFT-UK5X7xRszjXAfzTr8-zoYqE97YDxdRGc6BoA7ncVNJRkZqFdPM_OMSLRF14x07NEIK94be4_XKA-XsMIMQQ5otGi/s840/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.57.09.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="840" data-original-width="508" height="429" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiH8MeI98TBaKlPCosz3qqmpLn1Gv3U9X8eY-Bj_bGVWEhRI_QigFT-UK5X7xRszjXAfzTr8-zoYqE97YDxdRGc6BoA7ncVNJRkZqFdPM_OMSLRF14x07NEIK94be4_XKA-XsMIMQQ5otGi/w260-h429/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+16.57.09.png" width="260" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><span style="font-size: large;">The second is his critique of Avicennian philosophy, <i>Muṣāraʿat al-falāsifa</i> or <i>Struggling with the Philosopher</i> as translated by Wilferd Madelung and Toby Mayer that one ought to see alongside other critics of Avicennian metaphysics such as al-Ghazālī (1058–1111), Shihāb al-Dīn al-Suhrawardī (1155–1191), Says al-Dīn al-Āmidī (1156–1233), and even ʿAbd al-Laṭīf al-Baghdādī (1162–1251). </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1b7SWTFr02Y2yaOGh7QvYioSZHcMk2tsHxxPIUYtEx0G9YALxnuONcRsWhDx-LusSx4x5ul-rXxj1XOlOpIsRYjINaBwxRs3xLdROAj_XwVjquKJjp9kxU1r_fnH9d1ESlfP6l75BsP_9/s478/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+17.02.26.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="478" data-original-width="300" height="425" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1b7SWTFr02Y2yaOGh7QvYioSZHcMk2tsHxxPIUYtEx0G9YALxnuONcRsWhDx-LusSx4x5ul-rXxj1XOlOpIsRYjINaBwxRs3xLdROAj_XwVjquKJjp9kxU1r_fnH9d1ESlfP6l75BsP_9/w267-h425/Screenshot+2021-02-20+at+17.02.26.png" width="267" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">While one would reconcile elements of the critique with Ashʿarism (even the critique of the notion of God as necessary existent which by the time of Shahrastānī was increasingly absorbed into Ashʿarī metaphysics and cosmology), there are also clear indications of an apophaticism and cosmology that are consistent with some Eastern Fatimid and Nizārī ideas. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The third text that I want to discuss here has been recently edited and translated by Daryoush Mohammad Poor and published in the same series as the previous two by the Institute of Ismaili Studies. <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjascZt4tLL8iHV1dSY2L6Nq2c7leP5oMlTXytv3fmosP8vyQDakJxKGyQPaMZ5ztYf0hnZJNANQoFXPyq-WuaereGqjOZMkXFcCwC2xTnREx4KXWJkdWN8Nf1VgYdZtAG3iE3gqdQ69W3L/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="476" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjascZt4tLL8iHV1dSY2L6Nq2c7leP5oMlTXytv3fmosP8vyQDakJxKGyQPaMZ5ztYf0hnZJNANQoFXPyq-WuaereGqjOZMkXFcCwC2xTnREx4KXWJkdWN8Nf1VgYdZtAG3iE3gqdQ69W3L/w357-h476/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26.jpeg" width="357" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4zXNxWr2Dd8eJZV_eJ7YkwZKvMjWSvtbMKlu65pSX8Cky2bRtQiA7Td9Ucu70ooqr42su9lKfMHndiONVXqY7lSa2ecEP50X9x0OxTDi6c6orvbVvE8viIjCmeHgc0TIfZEKHl_Q9bIyU/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25283%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4zXNxWr2Dd8eJZV_eJ7YkwZKvMjWSvtbMKlu65pSX8Cky2bRtQiA7Td9Ucu70ooqr42su9lKfMHndiONVXqY7lSa2ecEP50X9x0OxTDi6c6orvbVvE8viIjCmeHgc0TIfZEKHl_Q9bIyU/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25283%2529.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZjSJMFkX0BwWrvxy3G3z_j2HLeHHLLI9Frcn8COYqokM4ZRgsu5DVMhgukky4yEOX4sBHz_dxCX4QEt94CpBYEYhqtI8cxAfjfY4rxMhMt3aLqXAP1MwQKLwOnyVPCwpaKOCaPtA-10xH/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25282%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZjSJMFkX0BwWrvxy3G3z_j2HLeHHLLI9Frcn8COYqokM4ZRgsu5DVMhgukky4yEOX4sBHz_dxCX4QEt94CpBYEYhqtI8cxAfjfY4rxMhMt3aLqXAP1MwQKLwOnyVPCwpaKOCaPtA-10xH/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25282%2529.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFXRT15TRCXqGgk1_zftY6zGH694YbQHHJ6usfniDrByBijpMWC9Xzp2p58XAx2CjnUgWReXiqdDUeITPPmu7JWf-OjVzGW6bHWo5rASyLPa_LVKU40UWge2GFLq3Uy51_5u2I4BG1uU8R/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25281%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFXRT15TRCXqGgk1_zftY6zGH694YbQHHJ6usfniDrByBijpMWC9Xzp2p58XAx2CjnUgWReXiqdDUeITPPmu7JWf-OjVzGW6bHWo5rASyLPa_LVKU40UWge2GFLq3Uy51_5u2I4BG1uU8R/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25281%2529.jpeg" /></a></div><br />We have known about these two Persian sermons on cosmology since the appendix of Sayyid Muḥammad Riżā Jalālī Nāʾinī's appendix to Afżal al-Dīn Turka (d. 1446) and his Persian translation of <i>al-Milal</i>. ʿAbd al-Ḥusayn Zarrīnkūb, Guy Monnot and later Diane Steigerwald in her doctoral dissertation all discussed the Ismailism of Shahrastānī with respect to this work. Of course, the current edition is clearly an improvement: unlike Jalālī Nāʾinī's singular manuscript, it is based on three manuscripts: MS Marʿashī Qum 12868 dated 685/1286, MS Majlis-e Shūrā-ye Islāmī 10117, and finally MS Tehran University Central Library 643/24. The first is these is the only dated one, the earliest one and the basis for the edition. And of course a fluent English translation is presented along with appendices on terms and citations. One observation on the aesthetics of the Persian font - it strikes me as being rather clumsy and rounded. There are surely better Persian fonts to use out there. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1lB-8nsw0FcXhHTJSTsT64OrYpiRXTw02_JXMt39VIx3D1vciVeCCxH0eGYv_YO9tekDry3XrDrbmc7ivjLszYIVuEtL2-fyxTBQtTPIYJ8RQV1VWvD3vQ3gHVWFtex1LlCu20x3b7CvH/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25286%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1lB-8nsw0FcXhHTJSTsT64OrYpiRXTw02_JXMt39VIx3D1vciVeCCxH0eGYv_YO9tekDry3XrDrbmc7ivjLszYIVuEtL2-fyxTBQtTPIYJ8RQV1VWvD3vQ3gHVWFtex1LlCu20x3b7CvH/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25286%2529.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLgZNmrDQMQTqs-70z9lMKpYIVGdbUkT2q0X_cUSe8BUsVFb_eyrsM_Rud2_Ef3VnWki6flJ-8EW_4Q81m09kKkOoYinRxmQrBZNjtsUkZAUBbAz-VulWjckH4o_bgog6TKtzOtAI3vian/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25287%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="507" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLgZNmrDQMQTqs-70z9lMKpYIVGdbUkT2q0X_cUSe8BUsVFb_eyrsM_Rud2_Ef3VnWki6flJ-8EW_4Q81m09kKkOoYinRxmQrBZNjtsUkZAUBbAz-VulWjckH4o_bgog6TKtzOtAI3vian/w380-h507/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25287%2529.jpeg" width="380" /></a></div><br /> <br />Mohammad Poor provides an excellent and rather full introduction that is actually longer then the text (almost double in length) that presents the author and his work, examines the question of his Ismailism, contextualises the text here and brings out key elements of why this text provides evidence for Shahrastānī's Ismailism: the Nizārī doctrine of the <i>qiyāmat</i>, the comparison with other important Nizārī works such as the Fuṣūl and others as well as (ps-)Ṭūsī's <i>Rawżat al-taslīm</i> which is often said to be influenced by Shahrastānī. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuIvekvbVVAXgKxsYJu6Zl5RW6R_f1Qni59-DD-5nFHRpFyVs0-LCLC5is_vV8m7J0T5ZI_4k4GKY-v7hb4MaX_o-OkpC8SzKqPrhWAuuWRCUMBYZP-XApD-a44YehzAck1aC1o0uDixEF/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25285%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="414" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuIvekvbVVAXgKxsYJu6Zl5RW6R_f1Qni59-DD-5nFHRpFyVs0-LCLC5is_vV8m7J0T5ZI_4k4GKY-v7hb4MaX_o-OkpC8SzKqPrhWAuuWRCUMBYZP-XApD-a44YehzAck1aC1o0uDixEF/w310-h414/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-20+at+16.10.26+%25285%2529.jpeg" width="310" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">There is little doubt that much of what Mohammad Poor presents here is rather convincing. In the Majlis, Shahrastānī clearly identifies himself with the new Nizārī mission and on the question of cosmogony critiques Ashʿarī, anthropomorphist, and Avicennian ideas among others in his quest to explain the nature of the divine command. There are clear echoes of the work of Ḥasan-e Sabbāḥ (in the <i>Fuṣūl-e arbaʿa</i>) and of Abū Yaʿqūb al-Sijistānī (perhaps through the prism of Nāṣir-e Khusraw). While we know that the genre of the majlis was well known in Iran at this time - especially among preachers such as the Karrāmīya as well as among Sufis (one thinks of the work of ʿAbdullāh Anṣārī and the later majālis that led to the redaction of the exegesis of Rashīd al-Dīn Maybudī) - Mohammad Poor links it here to the Ismaili genre of preaching sermons that one found at the Fatimid court (the works of al-Muʾayyad fīʾl-dīn al-Shīrāzī and even al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān come to mind) as well as later in the Nizārī tradition. He even speculates on a direct meeting and teacher-disciple relationship between Ḥasan-e Sabbāḥ and Shahrastānī. While some elements to the Shiʿi affiliation (for example, in the exegesis) might suggest that Shahrastānī was Twelver Shiʿi (and of course his patron for most of these works was the Twelver Shiʿi naqīb al-ashrāf of Tirmidh) and this is the argument that <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwj28ue1iPnuAhVRi1wKHSvVAcIQFjABegQIAhAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Filahiyatstudies.org%2Findex.php%2Fjournal%2Farticle%2Fdownload%2F301%2F209&usg=AOvVaw2Kx3v3o1AUenT_Lu_MeYLr">Mustafa Öztürk</a> has made recently; Mohammad Poor is correct to designate this argument as weak - and we know that the middle period Imāmī tradition never claimed Shahrastānī and in fact Ibn al-Muṭahhar al-Ḥillī (1250–1325) the famous student of Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī made it clear that Shahrastānī's positions were contrary to Imāmī theology. Perhaps the most convincing and interesting section is the discussion of the intertextuality of the text read alongside Nizārī works and intriguing (one wonders about this in the Mongol Persian context) of Shahrastānī's work as a modification of Ashʿarism, perhaps even a Ismaili evolved or supplemented Ashʿarism? Of course, if one were to bracket Imamology, there is an interesting line of inquiry to be pursued on the theological relationship of Ashʿarī and Nizārī Ismaili positions. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Anyway, while Mohammad Poor is careful not to be too categorical in asserting Shahrastānī's Nizārism - he does say that he probably was. In the absence of clearer expressions in favour of the Imams of the time, this is understandable. Regardless, he is to be congratulated for producing this work as a intertextual intervention in the intellectual history of Persian theological writing in the pre-Mongol and early Mongol period. Certainly it is a further piece of evidence in the Shahrastānī dossier on his not-so-crypto-Ismailism. And one can imagine using the text fruitfully in classes on theology in Islam on the cusp of the Mongol invasions. </span></div><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><br /> </span><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-17583125865030185452021-02-12T11:38:00.002-08:002021-02-12T12:28:16.862-08:00Imāmī Qurʾān Exegesis in the Classical Period: The Case of al-ʿAyyāshī (d. c. 932)<p><span style="font-size: large;">Every Muslim confession from its earliest times tended to define itself with respect to its tradition through its hermeneutical engagement with scripture. While there are debates about the nature of the development of the genre of exegesis and the stages that it took, drawing upon not just aspects of the tradition in which the Prophet and his companions and family were said to have engaged the word of God, but also the development of certain disciplines of the humanities such as grammar and morphology, history, linguistics, logic, theology, and philosophy among others. Certainly we can say that features of early exegeses were the following: a concern to define how the language of the holy writ ought be be understood linguistically and the extent to which it ought be be read figuratively, the scope of meaning and cognitive content that was being conveyed in the texts, a recourse to the direct positions and readings of authorities from the time of the Prophet and his immediate circles and successors on the meaning of the text, and finally a desire to vindicate one's confessional position and assert its normatively as the tradition in the Qurʾan itself. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Within the Imāmī (Twelver) Shiʿi tradition as it developed in the earliest period, most of the exegeses tended to identity the verses of the Qurʾan with the family of the prophet, their opponents, and their followers, reading the scripture as a revelation that mapped out the unfolding of divine providence. This remained the case even when there were disputes over what constituted a canonical 'reading', orthography and articulation of the language and especially when there were claims that what had by the 4th/10th century been defined as the canonical readings and orthography of the Qurʾan were not in conformity to the words conveyed by the Prophet and preserved faithfully by ʿAlī and his family - the Imams succeeding the Prophet. Already back in 1999, Meir Bar-Asher had published a study of classical Imāmī exegesis and its features.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVAbCp1OPXkkRyQq1zW2ld65vK0hlsqqUY7dHjkUA1_OYXlAvJDJ6h5YRKffJ7WGFMhHhlfylHYHWpRqkRzJSPoZTWZYmLO9rgvCArAnvhC8NEqFjEB1MkBf3GYyAFRle4Q213HfIlaNFm/s742/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+15.53.16.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="742" data-original-width="502" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVAbCp1OPXkkRyQq1zW2ld65vK0hlsqqUY7dHjkUA1_OYXlAvJDJ6h5YRKffJ7WGFMhHhlfylHYHWpRqkRzJSPoZTWZYmLO9rgvCArAnvhC8NEqFjEB1MkBf3GYyAFRle4Q213HfIlaNFm/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+15.53.16.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">With respect to that period we can point to the following extant exegeses:</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">1) The exegesis attributed to Abūʾl-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Ibrāhīm b. Hāshim al-Qummī (d. c. 307/920). He was an important source for the hadith compiler and narrator Abū Jaʿfar al-Kulaynī (d. 329/941). There is some debate on whether this text actually is the work of al-Qummī. al-Nadīm in his <i>al-Fihrist</i> mentions the following works of al-Qummī: <i>Nawādir al-Qurʾan, Kitāb al-Manāqib</i>, <i>Kitāb Ikhtiyār al-Qurʾān (wa-riwāyatuhu)</i>, and <i>Kitāb Qurb al-isnād</i>. So no explicit mention of a <i>tafsīr</i> work. al-Shaykh Abū Jaʿfar al-Ṭūsī (d. 460/1067) does mention such a work. </span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDGa_z7cjJYHlXCqpEEj-lCAfFsnNxhR6dL8OwE2Gjh9PR8r7lx4_-HCbW41vbdXBufblKizrAOgi_1rmN_ganRCWrmYQjaYeRxFixf1k80SEIfm1D-UTKUYRdr3AyDr_vJWE-pLXgl9Gn/s2783/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.35.41.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1130" data-original-width="2783" height="169" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDGa_z7cjJYHlXCqpEEj-lCAfFsnNxhR6dL8OwE2Gjh9PR8r7lx4_-HCbW41vbdXBufblKizrAOgi_1rmN_ganRCWrmYQjaYeRxFixf1k80SEIfm1D-UTKUYRdr3AyDr_vJWE-pLXgl9Gn/w416-h169/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.35.41.png" width="416" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Majlisī also describes it as well known:</span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFNyS8rIMKwFJmhw_dplRnPFB4TEBiXXQkHZ-iamUXFAQ5oJPrduES4iD62iHwCsidC5sJoLdxoMJNyHsl3odC0uUDpZMbOOCKIFmZ9ojGeHA5XfhvddeIHOo-QKzi0m8GF6cTcswsmMs4/s2920/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.40.16.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="268" data-original-width="2920" height="42" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFNyS8rIMKwFJmhw_dplRnPFB4TEBiXXQkHZ-iamUXFAQ5oJPrduES4iD62iHwCsidC5sJoLdxoMJNyHsl3odC0uUDpZMbOOCKIFmZ9ojGeHA5XfhvddeIHOo-QKzi0m8GF6cTcswsmMs4/w464-h42/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.40.16.png" width="464" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">This is perhaps the best known of the classes Imāmī exegeses with a strong authorial voice that often comments on the reports; it is also uncompromisingly Shiʿi, condemning the opponents of the Prophet and the Imams (which has led to the self-censorship exercised by some of the editors of the text). The text is widely attested in the manuscript tradition; the best edition is that produced under the supervision of Sayyid Muḥammad Bāqir al-Muwaḥḥid al-Abṭaḥī in Muʾassasat al-Imām al-Mahdī and published in three volumes in Qum; this text is available <a href="http://alfeker.net/library.php?id=2911">here</a>.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLBH-M23E1rZt087oj5mbzCdIpHYomo4I17RAxhwqBFvNy4QzcjBbYFzdNj3oN6sM0JVAXL4q6W-Hgth8-wYm2U7O90TjJJunRva4tuneto3JyOpsQgS3mQ4yNlyw8U4POvaX3CiCsuVbj/s1194/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.00.21.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1152" data-original-width="1194" height="363" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLBH-M23E1rZt087oj5mbzCdIpHYomo4I17RAxhwqBFvNy4QzcjBbYFzdNj3oN6sM0JVAXL4q6W-Hgth8-wYm2U7O90TjJJunRva4tuneto3JyOpsQgS3mQ4yNlyw8U4POvaX3CiCsuVbj/w376-h363/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.00.21.png" width="376" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">An important strand of the text is the exegesis on the authority of Abūʾl-Jārūd Ziyād b. Mundhir al-Hamadhānī (d. after 150/767), a Kufan companion of Imām al-Bāqir and later Zaydī authority. In the introduction, the author discusses the intimate relationship between the Qurʾan and the family of the Prophet as bearers and guarantors of the tradition. He then goes on to discuss various aspects of the verses: the clear and the figurative, the intertextuality, the apparent revealed words and their interpretation, the polemics (against dualists, polytheists, incomplete monotheists, anthropomorphists and others), the praise of the Imams and the rejection of their opponents, moral exhortations, and so forth arranged in 41 categories of verses. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">2) The exegesis of Furāt b. Furāt al-Kūfī (fl. 4th/10th century): little is known about him but he seems to have been a contemporary of the two Ṣadūqs, the father Abūʾl-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Bābawayh (d. 329/940), and his more famous son Abū Jaʿfar Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Ibn Bābawayh (d. 381/991); Amir-Moezzi also says that he is presented as a student of the Zaydī exegete al-Ḥibarī whom we discuss a bit later. A number of the reports go through the chain of the Hāshimī family of reports as well as through key narrators from the time of the 'minor occultation' after the death of al-Imām al-Ḥāsan al-ʿAskarī in 874 which is often also described as the period of 'confusion' (<i>ḥayra</i>) in Shiʿi sources. Furāt does not seem to have been known to the classical biographical tradition but by the Safavid period become well-known. He is usually not cited as his exegesis is partial and most of the narrations on the meaning of verses cited from Imāms al-Bāqir and al-Ṣādiq are found in other sources; but still Muḥammad Bāqir Majlisī (d. 1110/1699) in his famous exposition of the Shiʿi tradition in the introduction to his mammoth <i>Biḥār al-anwār </i>(Seas of Light) describes it as trustworthy and important source for the tradition, from whom al-Ṣadūq narrated as well as the (probably Sunni) exegete al-Ḥākim al-Ḥaskānī (d. 490/1096), author of <a href="https://mktba.net/library.php?id=13027"><i>Shawāhid al-tanzīl</i>.</a></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOViSVZj0eG9TwvlumrfvqgTrVicRxKu9e0gwEdOVJJXJW7UInNvm15ckno5M9agHjSHG2uA_C2AW2SLfQwg9Arr1uqGG9wn0runGCtsf7UIc-1pWmbifZknb0lXbH4SlrkZysAiaS4gj-/s3000/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.13.33.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="902" data-original-width="3000" height="138" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOViSVZj0eG9TwvlumrfvqgTrVicRxKu9e0gwEdOVJJXJW7UInNvm15ckno5M9agHjSHG2uA_C2AW2SLfQwg9Arr1uqGG9wn0runGCtsf7UIc-1pWmbifZknb0lXbH4SlrkZysAiaS4gj-/w461-h138/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.13.33.png" width="461" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">This is very much a tradition based exegesis with reports and little by way of authorial commentary and intervention. While there are a few manuscripts of the text, mainly late, the standard edition by published in 1990 in Qum by Muḥammad al-Kāẓim in two volumes with the important editorial decision to change the order of the material to conform to the order of the Qurʾanic suras; but it is still partial missing at least 16 full suras as well as many verses within the remaining ones.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOY4Yf1eNdrZcw9U5CFBCQtFMtPi52CYDUZG1G89xRAAaFbK9xfnud8nEhXIOsLYHJ3ds35zbRL_d6fnuqKptSRqEc_3f-RZ0Py7gSFK2GmG_k4nuJ8BSrqeQS0Q_7jZKMj_OWjxa3EOWX/s1152/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.20.28.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1152" data-original-width="788" height="368" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOY4Yf1eNdrZcw9U5CFBCQtFMtPi52CYDUZG1G89xRAAaFbK9xfnud8nEhXIOsLYHJ3ds35zbRL_d6fnuqKptSRqEc_3f-RZ0Py7gSFK2GmG_k4nuJ8BSrqeQS0Q_7jZKMj_OWjxa3EOWX/w252-h368/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+16.20.28.png" width="252" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">The text itself can be found <a href="https://shiabooks.net/library.php?id=10334">here</a>.</span><p></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">3) The exegesis of Muḥammad b. Ibrāhīm al-Kātib al-Nuʿmānī (d. 360/971), a disciple of al-Kulaynī and author of a well known set of reports on the occultation (<i>Kitāb al-Ghayba</i>). This text is actually a set of reports from ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib extant in <i>Biḥār al-anwār</i> of Majlisī (90 odd pages in volume 90). </span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio58OP6x52vx5PP0-jBM13VNVOjdOCrNWohf-bp_re4nJ7egxTH3bsGjwRrvTUXW7G-AhuL0rLpc8nRjTiedIfZyPbHddQm6u5SlAdxYbaVk4yXyTgUzQh6GBqBy8BKIfpn_BZwgUHCoVU/s1926/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.03.48.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1926" data-original-width="1566" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio58OP6x52vx5PP0-jBM13VNVOjdOCrNWohf-bp_re4nJ7egxTH3bsGjwRrvTUXW7G-AhuL0rLpc8nRjTiedIfZyPbHddQm6u5SlAdxYbaVk4yXyTgUzQh6GBqBy8BKIfpn_BZwgUHCoVU/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.03.48.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg55SsRH1ggJCg8mTdfoOiRkTZL22qM54ydpAt4mtvigP8TAgqk8u8Wl8P4BQJL3oIk1xozpd9GB4KEU3rnLbmFXQLEgaqPlIEQAImSlvSpqqmh6bwQ5fa_XioQt_lXFrDWQN7b06O8-GdF/s1972/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.04.00.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1972" data-original-width="1596" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg55SsRH1ggJCg8mTdfoOiRkTZL22qM54ydpAt4mtvigP8TAgqk8u8Wl8P4BQJL3oIk1xozpd9GB4KEU3rnLbmFXQLEgaqPlIEQAImSlvSpqqmh6bwQ5fa_XioQt_lXFrDWQN7b06O8-GdF/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.04.00.png" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWF047OYUPLWUlATptYmROfEFEnd23Q43AdItq9JuLBn09hBx05tnlnXu_UE-3yRJGpBzpF5ukO7_fz-RrqYZ9pMQHU0Z3u-rBg2UdZrddnYriwTpLVx4PQl-jPpCRXbSUlVdtZacEoMkQ/s1464/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.04.26.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="700" data-original-width="1464" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWF047OYUPLWUlATptYmROfEFEnd23Q43AdItq9JuLBn09hBx05tnlnXu_UE-3yRJGpBzpF5ukO7_fz-RrqYZ9pMQHU0Z3u-rBg2UdZrddnYriwTpLVx4PQl-jPpCRXbSUlVdtZacEoMkQ/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.04.26.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">4) The exegesis of Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Ḥusayn b. al-Ḥakam al-Ḥibarī (d. 286/899) is the earliest extant one and the author was probably a Zaydī from Kufa. It was cited by Imāmī authors perhaps partly because its main transmitter was the Imāmī Abū ʿUbayd Allāh Muḥammad b. ʿImrān al-Marzubānī (d. 384/994). It is a broadly thematic work entitled <i>Tanzīl al-āyāt al-munzala fī manāqib Ahl al-bayt </i>or <i>Mā nazala min al-Qurʾān fī Amīr al-muʾminīn</i>. This latter title is also attested for a work by the Shiʿi narrator and historian Ibrāhīm b. Muḥammad al-Thaqafī (d. 382/896) but that work does not seem to be extant. The text is relatively short. Amir-Moezzi places it within the genre of what he considers to be a 'personalised commentary' or exegesis focused on particular individuals, and as such constitutes an early form of 'Shiʿi esotericism'. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG2SpWb8WR2e3b9yQ45OJjR_SqvE5j9M9sDD6NUSi2rp1iQBxC59GKn6jgwaytznVu_LKRZZtcSm1y1EQItfWRA1fdZXYSUToHr1Y5F20Amdtryi_b5rV6FcQviMlLn6ey99Hc7CbJiFe5/s968/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.06.08.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="968" data-original-width="794" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG2SpWb8WR2e3b9yQ45OJjR_SqvE5j9M9sDD6NUSi2rp1iQBxC59GKn6jgwaytznVu_LKRZZtcSm1y1EQItfWRA1fdZXYSUToHr1Y5F20Amdtryi_b5rV6FcQviMlLn6ey99Hc7CbJiFe5/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.06.08.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">al-Ḥibarī explains this through recourse to the famous narration from ʿAlī on the four parts of the Qurʾan:</span><p></p><p><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGh5kIWEoIRHjsnQF_zu0WY1ky156y7_hbMtwnQej-r6zxGyRumHi2IBK9-BI1Efxrtf9pFcnHelmw05OFtJa2OzK65dEbwVtnyE9gOTNPZLUT6XOFm5DUOpyL-hOPI3Pz3S40ovtLN-ek/s4036/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.55.57.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="754" data-original-width="4036" height="89" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGh5kIWEoIRHjsnQF_zu0WY1ky156y7_hbMtwnQej-r6zxGyRumHi2IBK9-BI1Efxrtf9pFcnHelmw05OFtJa2OzK65dEbwVtnyE9gOTNPZLUT6XOFm5DUOpyL-hOPI3Pz3S40ovtLN-ek/w473-h89/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.55.57.png" width="473" /></a></div><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">5) The <a href="http://alfeker.net/library.php?id=2316">partial exegesis</a> attributed to al-Imām al-Ḥasan b. ʿAlī al-ʿAskarī (d. 260/874), the eleventh Imam. This 4th/10th century text only covers the first two suras of the Qurʾan. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtBXIoEDHT0NGhJS2ZWdytXe4xUO-vTHkazVeElJypf2q0UmrOo1wvLVD_VYkWjm5e3aEWOtHDgeC01DdFodwbw3Jq7qHAuIB_6yBGsdc2iSjrPKUzlChoaF3hiHWkQT0K0nkizKPyl2nM/s1106/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.57.58.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1106" data-original-width="790" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtBXIoEDHT0NGhJS2ZWdytXe4xUO-vTHkazVeElJypf2q0UmrOo1wvLVD_VYkWjm5e3aEWOtHDgeC01DdFodwbw3Jq7qHAuIB_6yBGsdc2iSjrPKUzlChoaF3hiHWkQT0K0nkizKPyl2nM/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+17.57.58.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Like the other early exegeses it contains traditions and focuses very much on the importance of and love and devotion for (<i>walāya</i>) the family of the Prophet and dissociation (<i>barāʾa</i>) from their opponents. The two narrators of the exegesis - Abū Yaʿqūb Yūsuf b. Muḥammad b. Ziyād and Abūʾ-l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. Muḥammad b. Sayyār - are reported to have been Shiʿi from the Zaydi area of Ṭabaristān and are unknown to the early Shiʿi biographical tradition; hence most scholars from Ibn al-Ghaḍāʾirī onwards (including al-ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī) reject its attribution to the eleventh Imam. Also while it is similar to other classical Imāmī exegeses it is not cited by any of them. Majlisī mentions the text as reflective of the tradition. </span><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigpwDLtEan8udDbQ7TDiDVuBRBvmazSh721Rg6_CrQ5kKoUZtd0Wgw-t-3j-41Wt_GtPVG4deJsOnIGYFHgOeGwoJXnD6mMKnFehaKtBRg87DtTuGqyFwUQowTEH643cSYwwY8elr_htG6/s2906/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+18.07.40.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="534" data-original-width="2906" height="75" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigpwDLtEan8udDbQ7TDiDVuBRBvmazSh721Rg6_CrQ5kKoUZtd0Wgw-t-3j-41Wt_GtPVG4deJsOnIGYFHgOeGwoJXnD6mMKnFehaKtBRg87DtTuGqyFwUQowTEH643cSYwwY8elr_htG6/w405-h75/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+18.07.40.png" width="405" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">6) The exegesis narrated from al-Imām Jaʿfar b. Muḥammad al-Ṣādiq (d. 148/765), the sixth Imam. Now there are two texts known by this name: one is a famed Sufi work edited by Paul Nwyia and cited by Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021) and translated by Farhana Mayer. </span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAysXJBf_PW8IIowoNpDoeUFt-b0uMUn7AL1zqAz1k98AbfXFWqlzGJg2CO4tdIM0eaBqUBd7vN8K1ercyNQVdIGFlj8si_d81J2Nlky3E2r54oVB9PlcdWv-KIepdMxmnCS4kyvefBhVs/s1828/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+18.15.41.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1828" data-original-width="1262" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAysXJBf_PW8IIowoNpDoeUFt-b0uMUn7AL1zqAz1k98AbfXFWqlzGJg2CO4tdIM0eaBqUBd7vN8K1ercyNQVdIGFlj8si_d81J2Nlky3E2r54oVB9PlcdWv-KIepdMxmnCS4kyvefBhVs/s320/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+18.15.41.png" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">And as Böwering has shown this work presents an impeccably Shiʿi chain of narration. However, there is another far more extensive work that is similar to al-Qummī and others and which survives in around seven codices mainly dating from the 15th century in India (with one copy in Istanbul as well). Often the text is given with a narration from al-Kātib al-Nuʿmānī. For example, one codex that I consulted some time ago is MS Būhār (now in the National Library in Kolkata) Arabic 13 with some 309 folios dated 15 Jumāda II, 1019/September 1610. This works extensive. Its incipit has the following:</span><p></p><p align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0cm; text-align: right;"><span dir="RTL" lang="AR-IQ" style="font-family: "Arabic Typesetting"; font-size: 20pt;">حكي عن جعفر بن محمد أنه قال: كتاب الله على أربعة أشياء: العبارة والإشارة واللطائف والحقائق. فالعبارة للعوام والإشارة للخواص واللطائف للأولياء والحقائق للأنبياء.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0cm; text-align: right;"><span dir="RTL" lang="AR-IQ" style="font-family: "Arabic Typesetting"; font-size: 20pt;"><بسم> عن جعفر بن محمد قال: الباء بقاؤه والسين أسماؤه والميم ملكه...</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm; text-align: right;"><span style="font-family: Arabic Typesetting;"><span style="font-size: 26.66666603088379px;">and the explicit:</span></span></p><p align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; margin: 0cm; text-align: right;"><span dir="RTL" lang="AR-IQ" style="font-family: "Arabic Typesetting"; font-size: 20pt;">عن جعفر بن محمد في قوله: <قل هو الله أحد...> قال: يعني أظهر ما تريده النفوس بتأليف الحروف. فإنّ الحقائق مصونة عن أن يبلغه وهم أو فهم. وإظهار ذلك بالحروف ليهتدي بها من <القي السمع> وهو إشارة إلى غائب. والهاء هو تنبيه على معنى ثابت والواو إشارة إلى الغائب عن الحواس و<الأحد> الفرد الّذي لا نظير له لأنه هو الّذي أحدّ الآحاد.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times;"><span style="font-size: 26.66666603088379px;">Another copy is MS Khuda Bakhsh 1460 which is around 232 folios with more text on each and dating from the 18th century. </span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">7) Finally, we have the exegesis of Abūʾl-Naḍr Muḥammad b. Masʿūd al-ʿAyyāshī al-Samarqandī (d. 320/932) (according to Bar-Asher), which has recently been published in three volumes as a dual text edition, translated by Nazmina Dhanji and edited by Wahid Amin. It has been published by the <a href="https://www.almahdi.edu/ayyashi/">Al-Mahdi Institute</a>.</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizOi5VSmoxjsqHDQ5QiHY9VaGbAT5daHX7xaxKbJhluiPEZtKw2aFRIrS2MzHULAaet2T6oXqKxkQ9nXrqOKB_Z8_onaCdnOVCB5I4QRZhbOUWZl-cI33ROVM0DBuHXDzeji7t6ndiTsVk/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25282%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="561" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizOi5VSmoxjsqHDQ5QiHY9VaGbAT5daHX7xaxKbJhluiPEZtKw2aFRIrS2MzHULAaet2T6oXqKxkQ9nXrqOKB_Z8_onaCdnOVCB5I4QRZhbOUWZl-cI33ROVM0DBuHXDzeji7t6ndiTsVk/w421-h561/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25282%2529.jpeg" width="421" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8zRqZ3qO9bKbaAYr5xr85xPAQ2uV2LIxZNI_iiQdNAPdjLM0bMs2pF4hv0hxKKVBQMNm22oPmXLCXAnt7UB4_NiQpnXcM3oYVto5v3OZOLfbog6CBYYzsvD_BW_4PnKvs5bHhDQmOyEgf/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25283%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8zRqZ3qO9bKbaAYr5xr85xPAQ2uV2LIxZNI_iiQdNAPdjLM0bMs2pF4hv0hxKKVBQMNm22oPmXLCXAnt7UB4_NiQpnXcM3oYVto5v3OZOLfbog6CBYYzsvD_BW_4PnKvs5bHhDQmOyEgf/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25283%2529.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFVfV2UzlCUYyw4ll86V1d6Oe0gjJ3Ib7EwZ3jJysIzWoJoWwAE-KJi9UP-vMOHLReKfdZR4roAUiAhG7rr6tBrH1S8H7HY6TDsne1TzbnO0VbK-aIaowh180FoBugcUX2peKzZhO497qI/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25284%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFVfV2UzlCUYyw4ll86V1d6Oe0gjJ3Ib7EwZ3jJysIzWoJoWwAE-KJi9UP-vMOHLReKfdZR4roAUiAhG7rr6tBrH1S8H7HY6TDsne1TzbnO0VbK-aIaowh180FoBugcUX2peKzZhO497qI/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25284%2529.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiQmaEf-WLNv6El5BlkacOH94Eh8tfc4IZaIQYXrGF0X0JIQ-KjerVRgDVZZzHn0XZD_z_d00pbUwQvniGhNHmgq3rNRl4AvypdrJShx855ELuwQQFX3Jqb_wbPnjAANELiitlmhaud3zI/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25285%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiQmaEf-WLNv6El5BlkacOH94Eh8tfc4IZaIQYXrGF0X0JIQ-KjerVRgDVZZzHn0XZD_z_d00pbUwQvniGhNHmgq3rNRl4AvypdrJShx855ELuwQQFX3Jqb_wbPnjAANELiitlmhaud3zI/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25285%2529.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj147eKnwDqmb5lvXQrwz6vO_y6nieMe_vzQBqPRX5muDl2n4uoDAtvUX2O6Iq8zSCTxDjvR49onLmYO4VLqJcLU3Sy9Xy3562pwemTZzzKmCgXkJbUO0jpqO0G9ZGg_jGsZJAARQzp0ew8/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25286%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj147eKnwDqmb5lvXQrwz6vO_y6nieMe_vzQBqPRX5muDl2n4uoDAtvUX2O6Iq8zSCTxDjvR49onLmYO4VLqJcLU3Sy9Xy3562pwemTZzzKmCgXkJbUO0jpqO0G9ZGg_jGsZJAARQzp0ew8/s320/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25286%2529.jpeg" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjENG0GW2huICURewU2wWChxoz4VSw9qmKcfrSmGKIYVItdXY2KkBibxbXeLVKB2t5WKRSNDa1iKm7YKSRGlaVXirVcX58dn77-mTnGlqZMWl3WYDkZGPsdVXmWw3YiNdfmIEUurr1HoCHO/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="768" height="492" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjENG0GW2huICURewU2wWChxoz4VSw9qmKcfrSmGKIYVItdXY2KkBibxbXeLVKB2t5WKRSNDa1iKm7YKSRGlaVXirVcX58dn77-mTnGlqZMWl3WYDkZGPsdVXmWw3YiNdfmIEUurr1HoCHO/w369-h492/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47.jpeg" width="369" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Wahid Amin presents the short preface that introduces the text and its significant as a Shiʿi <i>tafsīr biʾl-maʾthūr</i> and for its abiding importance, even cited in the major modern exegesis of ʿAllāma Ṭabāṭabāʾī (d. 1981), <i>al-Mīzān fī tafsīr al-Qurʾān</i>, perhaps the most widely used Shiʿi exegesis. He then tells us that they are using the Arabic text produced by the Muʾassasat al-Biʿtha that draws on the following MSS: Kitābkhāna-yi Dastghayb (not Dastghīb) in Shiraz copied in 1091/1681, MS Āstān-e Quds-e Rażavī Mashhad 180, 1490 and 7513 all copied much later in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. While one does not expect what is mainly a translation project to produce a new critical edition, some further consideration of the manuscript tradition would have been useful. According to the Fankha catalogue, the earliest extant manuscripts in Iran are MS Markaz-e Iḥyāʾ in Qum 2622 and 2623 both dating from the 11th/17th century; the Dastghayb manuscript is MS Kitābkhāna-ye Millī 567/tā52. Another acephalous manuscript from Āstān-e Quds (MS 1490) is dated as 1154/1741 and not 1348/1929 as cited in the edition. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV7ygc8YF_4u4Vs5ixJFFoP6pz602bdvHGW7Zr4GXkhhUKSr7Dg5ITG17dEwqesCYIQVUltlLSvZ2M9eNOakuX1XQ0gfLCgRYjPoe-t66GX9-c5bEzzni3F4sv49w-zk5GXTIWiNSY5Xud/s1816/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+19.15.29.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1816" data-original-width="1290" height="395" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV7ygc8YF_4u4Vs5ixJFFoP6pz602bdvHGW7Zr4GXkhhUKSr7Dg5ITG17dEwqesCYIQVUltlLSvZ2M9eNOakuX1XQ0gfLCgRYjPoe-t66GX9-c5bEzzni3F4sv49w-zk5GXTIWiNSY5Xud/w280-h395/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+19.15.29.png" width="280" /></a></div><br />This preface is then followed by an introduction by the expert on classical commentary - Meir Bar-Asher. He presents the author and his exegesis as exemplifying what he describes as pre-Buwayhid Imāmī exegesis that is characterised by discussions on the reading and the question of the falsification of the text (on which ʿAyyāshī clearly rejects such a position), on the importance of the Imams in the scripture and as sources of its proper interpretation, and the importance of the exoteric as well as the esoteric. In many ways it represents a summary of the positions that he laid out in his classical study on Imāmī exegesis that I mentioned before. While he mentions that there are no dates given for ʿAyyāshī, I am somewhat confused about how he arrived at the death date that he chooses although it is plausible given what we know of the generations preceding and then succeeding him. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Majlisī famously also described the text as one of the foundational works of the tradition and one that was well known to the classical tradition:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3miRtu26_aHABJtBDbV2LxgRAvUmYCgsgQl8TM1lntKCAWQuX81We3SFVc9N9KCPdsVw6yjzWMCo-0SofwnQXUBG07M4CEMRZWtuCFbhFauSnONlm2ykRbnp2cjFT7fazR-wm2zPlAvfb/s2868/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+18.06.57.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="568" data-original-width="2868" height="93" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3miRtu26_aHABJtBDbV2LxgRAvUmYCgsgQl8TM1lntKCAWQuX81We3SFVc9N9KCPdsVw6yjzWMCo-0SofwnQXUBG07M4CEMRZWtuCFbhFauSnONlm2ykRbnp2cjFT7fazR-wm2zPlAvfb/w473-h93/Screenshot+2021-02-12+at+18.06.57.png" width="473" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">ʿAyyāshī was supposedly a Sunni narrator from Samarqand who then moved to Kufa and Baghdad where he trained with those narrating from al-Imām ʿAlī al-Riḍā. His exegesis only covers the first eighteen suras (up to sūrat al-Kahf); however, it is cited extensively by al-Ṭabrisī (d. 548/1154) in his <i>Majmaʿ al-bayān</i> and by Sayyid Ibn Ṭāwūs (d. 664/1266) which suggests that a full version was available. However, by the time of Majlisī it was curtailed as a partial commentary as attested in the extant manuscripts in Iran. The standard modern edition replicated the full version transmitted in manuscript with the additions reconstructed from the later exegetical citations. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">ʿAyyāshī's exegesis engages in a number of polemics: against Sunni detractors with the zeal of a convert, against the Muʿtazila especially on the question of the impeccability of the prophets (and there is some suggestion he may have been Muʿtazilī before), against the extremists on the integrity of the Qurʾanic text as it was with people (so against <i>taḥrīf</i>), and emphasising the importance of the central theme of the special knowledge of the Imams. It is also very clearly Shiʿi: the straight path to God mentioned in the first sura is ʿAlī</span><span style="font-size: x-large;">.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG6SY1ASoEsKgAzVPBmQyNgPK240X3r4sLo-2OTvmKPsJlCVraQxrfjhvIPGqDBKGxPbfLgagFrxWVJQAPYW_8dWU0C3Uk2o9I2jua-2LSQ4q5zcgHYiZwX___v6MEKLsrwX_1Fesc97GT/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+18.44.56.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="196" data-original-width="1024" height="90" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG6SY1ASoEsKgAzVPBmQyNgPK240X3r4sLo-2OTvmKPsJlCVraQxrfjhvIPGqDBKGxPbfLgagFrxWVJQAPYW_8dWU0C3Uk2o9I2jua-2LSQ4q5zcgHYiZwX___v6MEKLsrwX_1Fesc97GT/w473-h90/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+18.44.56.jpeg" width="473" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">The three volumes are beautifully produced: the Arabic text is on the right and the English translation on the left, and adequate annotation is provided on sources. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDQvOsOs4OiD5PKJ44YavVoFB3OLflTlGJtc2s3MP40HsMM6LMW7wvK5x9ec741SVorap0Q36xlO5CoQo4YF37Ae3Gb9O8FoI7X6bciW-BBNFqeDVfM4P2g_FmPhDCJ3mTIVu1uYT2-w4G/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25287%2529.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="768" data-original-width="1024" height="294" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDQvOsOs4OiD5PKJ44YavVoFB3OLflTlGJtc2s3MP40HsMM6LMW7wvK5x9ec741SVorap0Q36xlO5CoQo4YF37Ae3Gb9O8FoI7X6bciW-BBNFqeDVfM4P2g_FmPhDCJ3mTIVu1uYT2-w4G/w391-h294/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+15.40.47+%25287%2529.jpeg" width="391" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">The indices are also quite an excellent tool. One can imagine using the text used profitably for research as well as for teaching - the very absence of serious translations of Shiʿi materials makes it rather difficult to teach students more broadly in religious studies. And in that sense this is also the first major translation of a classical Shiʿi exegesis. If we want to be read Shiʿi texts and incorporating them into a more holistic study of the early and classical period, such works are essential. From my perusal, the translations are quite excellent, rigorous and careful, and the Qurʾan itself has been rendered (as far as it fits the exegesis) from the existing translations of Abdel-Haleem and ʿAli-quli Qara'i. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">Like the other early exegeses, ʿAyyāshī presents us with a series of narrations on the verses - and they are not exhaustive atomistic glosses on every single verse anyway. The introduction that precedes arranges narrations in a selective presentation of major themes: on the virtues of the Qurʾan (<i>faḍāʾil al-Qurʾān</i>), on the use of the Qurʾan as a standard to judge and verify hadith (<i>tark al-riwāyāt allatī bi-khilāf al-Qurʾan</i>), the famous idea of the four parts of the Qurʾan:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbhEcFEG0EW09CHyM6rw7kHn1Q2JZ01piFg9TNbARzEt_06zu1NRojgJKmuA3JNYY8N2G6tm3wHBXj4r0yDOAMjB10jOiJsHJlAiVgX3xzLzVxqJ_JZihY70rU4HutqS0iUSdQvMMxS7bD/s1024/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+18.57.04.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="436" data-original-width="1024" height="205" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbhEcFEG0EW09CHyM6rw7kHn1Q2JZ01piFg9TNbARzEt_06zu1NRojgJKmuA3JNYY8N2G6tm3wHBXj4r0yDOAMjB10jOiJsHJlAiVgX3xzLzVxqJ_JZihY70rU4HutqS0iUSdQvMMxS7bD/w483-h205/WhatsApp+Image+2021-02-12+at+18.57.04.jpeg" width="483" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">the Qurʾan being revealed in seven <i>aḥruf</i>, the importance of the Imams being mentioned in the Qurʾan and their knowledge of the proper (esoteric and exoteric) interpretation (<i>taʾwīl</i>) of it, and a final set of condemnations about the polemical use of the Qurʾan: against those who gloss the word of God according to their own whims and fancies and those who use it in vain disputation. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Imāmī exegetical tradition provides us with a number of insights about the nature of the text, its readings and its reception. As such better understanding of the tradition - and especially of this classical period that was later revived in the Safavid period excavation of narration based exegesis - is critical for a fuller intellectual history of the ways in which Muslim scholars over the centuries made sense of the text. Of course, there will always be the haters - for one I remember a review of the <i>Anthology of Qurʾanic Commentaries</i> volume I that was edited by Feras Hamza and myself that claimed the nefarious intention on our part to question and marginalise 'Sunni orthodoxy'; while such an intention would be an important element of decolonising the study of Islam, it was far from what we wanted to show. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: large;">If anything <i>tafsīr</i> does indeed narrate a story of reception and understanding that existed on the horizons of each exegete's training and experience. The question of 'truth' is somewhat quite different; that does not mean that the exegetes did not think they were engaged in a quest for truth or that they did not believe that the narrations that they cited stemmed from the Imams. Furthermore, the plurality of readings are also retained from the earliest such exemplars. One is minded to think of the famous reports on the esoteric and exoteric aspects of the revelation, the scope of the verses and their 'points of rising' that are cited in the earliest Sufi and Shiʿi exegeses. For the serious scholar, the pseudo-scholarly gatekeepers of orthodoxy are really neither here nor there. </span></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-9591100118961143692020-04-18T16:32:00.000-07:002020-04-19T04:34:36.211-07:00Greek Intellectual Heritage in Arabic: Some Notes on ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Badawī Part II<span style="font-size: x-large;">I first came across Badawī in 1996 as the editor of the famous '<i>Theologia Aristotelis</i>' or <i><a href="https://archive.org/details/mhamarab_yahoo">Uthūlūjiyā</a></i>, the text produced in the Kindī circle in Baghdad by Ibn Nāʿima al-Ḥimṣī based on paraphrases of sections of <i>Enneads</i> IV-VI of <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plotinus/">Plotinus</a> (d. 270), an edition that was first published through the French Institute in Cairo in 1955 and remains the main edition that we use. I bought it in a (probably pirated but quite excellent and well bound in leather) edition produced by Intishārāt-i Bīdār a small outfit run by Muḥsin Bīdārfar himself a <i>muḥaqqiq</i> in Gozarkhān in Qum, a shop that opened (or at least used to) for a short time before Zuhr prayers and before Maghrib prayers. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">This was called <i>Aflūṭīn ʿind al-ʿArab</i> and included the edition with a useful introduction on the manuscripts as well as tables of correspondence to the <i>Enneads</i> and a Greek-Latin-Arabic glossary. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0DHjW3IHz5c3gc1EmlBNGvLc1zGLS3H5g-kQZaesEVzwg5DFFZc8FON-mjd9b7-e-rA3qt6dwNA0fE6ZSZSZCy6UG_GNnIhpFDHOmQx03hmj7CtK33i-jUyDoyfeMLon5mkekm4vkgGq7/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+20.39.04.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="978" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0DHjW3IHz5c3gc1EmlBNGvLc1zGLS3H5g-kQZaesEVzwg5DFFZc8FON-mjd9b7-e-rA3qt6dwNA0fE6ZSZSZCy6UG_GNnIhpFDHOmQx03hmj7CtK33i-jUyDoyfeMLon5mkekm4vkgGq7/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+20.39.04.png" width="195" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The standard study on this is the <i>Arabic Plotinus</i> of Peter Adamson, his Notre Dame PhD dissertation published first in 2002 by Duckworth and then reprinted in 2017 with <a href="https://www.gorgiaspress.com/the-arabic-plotinus">Gorgias</a>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The ERC funded project of Cristina D'Ancona entitled <a href="http://www.greekintoarabic.eu/">Greek into Arabic</a> on the text has yet to produce a new critical edition - although she has herself produced an <a href="https://www.poligrafo.it/la-discesa-dell%E2%80%99anima-nei-corpi-enn-iv-86-plotiniana-arabica-pseudo-teologia-di-aristotele-capitoli">excellent one on the first chapter of the text with an Italian translation and commentary</a>. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCb4X-UALN24YYF1kGBFTbRy1QBI22TZzF6DdY2eDFdYO9W__i2dj0x5oQa_Z12B-lEC7OcJQmkE5KUpykt3-MlUgljjyp4t_oxvtqF2eRUMRop0BLnJ6NzGFBgWnFdQzrmgUOKWQTKteU/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+20.36.39.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="949" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCb4X-UALN24YYF1kGBFTbRy1QBI22TZzF6DdY2eDFdYO9W__i2dj0x5oQa_Z12B-lEC7OcJQmkE5KUpykt3-MlUgljjyp4t_oxvtqF2eRUMRop0BLnJ6NzGFBgWnFdQzrmgUOKWQTKteU/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+20.36.39.png" width="189" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Also in the same year, 1955, he published an edition of various Neoplatonic texts in Arabic (<i>al-Aflāṭūnīya al-muḥdatha ʿind al-ʿArab</i>) including the influential Liber de Causis (<i>fīʾl-maḥḍ al-khayr</i>), which was to be more significant in the Latin medieval tradition through its translation. the text was based on the Arabic Proclus and related elements. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">At the same time, the editions of the Arabic Aristotle appeared:</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The Arabic Aristotle (<i>Arisṭū ʿind al-ʿarab</i>) was published in 1947 by Dār al-nahḍa al-Miṣrīya (reprinted by the Kuwaiti government in 1978), and it contained book lambda of the <i>Metaphysics</i> as well as some of the famous commentarial glosses including Avicenna on book <i>lambda</i> from his non-extant <i>Kitāb al-inṣāf</i> (which has now been published with a <a href="http://www.vrin.fr/book.php?code=9782711625420">French edition</a> by Marc Geoffroy, Meryem Sebti and Jules Janssens by Vrin in Paris in 2014),</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqCHDie7tAnkDhr2o2RDsy64Wz1mIeXjxmBGZw3SklqIUIoPqKf8bmvnPY9BUbJm5omMHl6k6dqWk0okhShipcmZhuxKd28OtyQh9wXnGzehKr70K6MmGFDE45D8yH7X4rdEtQAMFmhk5B/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+23.17.24.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="948" data-original-width="612" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqCHDie7tAnkDhr2o2RDsy64Wz1mIeXjxmBGZw3SklqIUIoPqKf8bmvnPY9BUbJm5omMHl6k6dqWk0okhShipcmZhuxKd28OtyQh9wXnGzehKr70K6MmGFDE45D8yH7X4rdEtQAMFmhk5B/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+23.17.24.png" width="206" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">and his glosses on the <i>Theologia Aristoteles</i> also from the non-extant <i>Kitāb al-inṣāf</i> (which are forthcoming in an edition and French translation by Meryem Sebti, Daniel de Smet and Jules Janssens). These glosses were translated by <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Les_notes_d_Avicenne_sur_la_th%C3%A9ologie_d.html?id=8q3inAAACAAJ&redir_esc=y">Georges Vajda</a> back in 1951. Other important texts were various works of Alexander of Aphrodisias and the famous correspondence of Avicenna entitled <i><a href="http://alhassanain.org/arabic/?com=book&id=1095">al-Mubāḥathāt </a></i>that was later edited and published by Muḥsin Bīdārfar in 1992. There is a slightly revised edition of this correspondence by Bīdārfar within the new Collected Works project of the Iranian Academy of Philosophy. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH-LpuQ6ZV94FGZFRd0p0COuXk4qqyNPLH2sQJGlf8rKNJzJ2EipQTYwBklFqhVyNgRy55DTzZlMZfMoVgfjn-if32SGWs1ys8YKbSJWXPyYpk2wj1SwADdWU93TWL7DnTS_HeKIGRm7Ka/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+21.19.55.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1450" data-original-width="1156" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjH-LpuQ6ZV94FGZFRd0p0COuXk4qqyNPLH2sQJGlf8rKNJzJ2EipQTYwBklFqhVyNgRy55DTzZlMZfMoVgfjn-if32SGWs1ys8YKbSJWXPyYpk2wj1SwADdWU93TWL7DnTS_HeKIGRm7Ka/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+21.19.55.png" width="255" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/arabic-islamic-language/">logic</a> (<i>Manṭiq Arisṭū</i>) was published in 3 volumes in Dār al-nahḍa al-Miṣrīya in 1948, and reprinted by the Kuwaiti government in 1980. This was the complete organon: the Categories (<i>Māqūlāt</i>) translated by Isḥāq ibn Ḥunayn (c. 830-910), De interpretatione (<i>fīʾl-ʿibāra</i>) also rendered by Isḥāq ibn Ḥunayn, Prior Analytics (<i>al-Qiyās</i>) rendered by Theodorus (who seems to be unknown), Posterior Analytics (<i>al-Burhān</i>) translated by Abū Bishr Mattā ibn Yūnus (c. 870-940) based on Isḥāq's Syriac translation, Topics (<i>al-Jadal</i>) rendered by Abū ʿUthmān al-Dimashqī (d. c. 912), Sophistical Refutations (<i>al-Sūfisṭīqā</i>) in a team effort (consecutive drafts refined over generations) of Ibn Nāʿima, Yaḥyā ibn ʿAdī (893-974) and Abū ʿAlī ʿĪsā Ibn Zurʿa (943-1008). </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoSmb-WjOdkN44CfraStjfTyqBJ6Cy5xxXmO194pNnrYH-7hueZx27cqYd1nBnJvkvm9NNs1AslH0zitQSD6wSuyuMyNPXrSlCVaEEjqL9So9cM-U2mh8v9S-tUp6YdQx3q6vu1EVnpQVF/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+23.10.50.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="956" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoSmb-WjOdkN44CfraStjfTyqBJ6Cy5xxXmO194pNnrYH-7hueZx27cqYd1nBnJvkvm9NNs1AslH0zitQSD6wSuyuMyNPXrSlCVaEEjqL9So9cM-U2mh8v9S-tUp6YdQx3q6vu1EVnpQVF/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+23.10.50.png" width="191" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Since it was common in late antiquity to include the Poetics and the Rhetoric in the organon (and place the Isagoge of Porphyry as an introduction to the corpus), he published an edition of the Rhetoric (<i>fīʾl-khiṭāba</i>) in 1959 (reprinted in Kuwait in 1979), and on the Poetics (<i>fīʾl-shiʿr</i>) in 1953 along with the commentaries of Fārābī, Ibn Sīnā and Ibn Rushd (reprinted in 1973).</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghU1Eb14XCUqiatsX75-cOpCOoxyl6AaH0FtVQ6qwjqXs3p83mlXKkU1F8swM8ihJuPkGmAxIdtOuY16EIbN_BRdURjH6qPecemLqJ3y1_yFBHauvAphTsglIYMZHUb_H-Q8PX54qFOdg3/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+23.38.21.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="832" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghU1Eb14XCUqiatsX75-cOpCOoxyl6AaH0FtVQ6qwjqXs3p83mlXKkU1F8swM8ihJuPkGmAxIdtOuY16EIbN_BRdURjH6qPecemLqJ3y1_yFBHauvAphTsglIYMZHUb_H-Q8PX54qFOdg3/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+23.38.21.png" width="166" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">On the discussion of why the Poetics and the Rhetoric were considered as part of the organon see the classic study of <a href="https://brill.com/view/title/5717">Deborah Black</a>. Two years ago this useful study on the <a href="http://www.irip.ir/Home/Single/66278">history of the Poetics</a> appeared in Tehran by Sayyid Maḥmūd Yūsuf-i <u>S</u>ānī.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Later Rafīq ʿAjam and Gérard Juhāmī produced a new edition of the organon in the 1990s in two volumes, excluding the Poetics and the Rhetoric:</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzJC0_eae5lveCSILWn6rlE2S8_vh24L3pZwR_ZgxdcnuPoTMylT1MU32phtU5TFkzqV37wjkLyKWZUJGSPXXMMWdcMTYk8KwGNoVpLTnB_ad_jE4Zq45Bfo18VHfDPdjsHRy7PpILLaLo/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+23.48.33.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1153" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzJC0_eae5lveCSILWn6rlE2S8_vh24L3pZwR_ZgxdcnuPoTMylT1MU32phtU5TFkzqV37wjkLyKWZUJGSPXXMMWdcMTYk8KwGNoVpLTnB_ad_jE4Zq45Bfo18VHfDPdjsHRy7PpILLaLo/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-18+at+23.48.33.png" width="230" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The <i>De Anima</i> was published by Dār al-nahḍa al-Miṣrīya in 1954 in the translation of Ḥunayn ibn Isḥāq (809-873) along with some of the short commentaries. This was also reprinted in Kuwait in 1980. We know also from Rudiger Arnzen's <a href="https://brill.com/view/title/2493">work</a> that there were other translations of the Greek and also paraphrases including one prominent one into Persian by Afḍal al-Dīn Kāshānī (d. c. 1209).</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The De Caelo (<i>fīʾl-samāʾ</i>) appeared in 1961. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The Physics (<i>al-Ṭabīʿa</i>) appeared in 1965. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">On the nature of Animals (<i>Ṭibāʿ al-ḥayawān</i>) came out in 1977. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The Arabic <i>de partibus animalium</i> appeared in 1978. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-large;">[I cannot say more about these works as they are in my office and I do not have access to them]</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">One of the critical elements of the corpus was the recognition of the importance of the commentators on Aristotle and even the realisation that some of those works were only extant in Arabic - this was <i>Shurūḥ ʿalā Arisṭū mafqūda fīʾl-yūnānīya</i> published by Dār al-Mashriq in Beirut in 1972, mainly Alexander of Aphrodisias and Themistius.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8rWf_Kiab-THQk8UjobLYMpJQsxqff8mRzwfnUjdyaAQw8kw0MT8-6zA9EKTyBshDOkx4psaLpqjnNUiH-WdQ62z3zyNxFQqM9FN2oxAgclFJCJi_BKkWDDJP_xNGqVJMPQXYS4pOKlXk/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-19+at+00.07.12.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1522" data-original-width="1170" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8rWf_Kiab-THQk8UjobLYMpJQsxqff8mRzwfnUjdyaAQw8kw0MT8-6zA9EKTyBshDOkx4psaLpqjnNUiH-WdQ62z3zyNxFQqM9FN2oxAgclFJCJi_BKkWDDJP_xNGqVJMPQXYS4pOKlXk/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-19+at+00.07.12.png" width="245" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Badawī was one of the first to provide editions of the text of Proclus and Philoponus on the nature of the eternity of the cosmos that played a major role in the philosophical and theological debates in the ʿAbbāsid period and after. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">He also produced editions of the commentaries on Aristotle by Ibn Rushd as well as Ibn Sīnā's version of the Posterior Analytics, and on the Rhetoric by Ḥāzim al-Qarṭajannī in Cairo in 1961 and reprinted thereafter. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">As he has done for Plotinus early on, he published a volume of the corpus of Plato in 1973 - <i>Aflāṭūn fīʾl-islām</i>. This was the fruit of his year spent in Tehran and was published by the branch of the McGill Institute of Islamic Studies. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTGwqKsylesx7tRHkxUqdBZqK25pxBXbZkuHRHbVFib5BeDHzrzBnU8HefAGq0RqhyphenhyphenuxSCF1_TgBaPt-chImoBsmKU_oMlg8Dvx7ZUC2L4-d73yv53mE0UP3uSnE9KM8A7_IbPAKm8_Bis/s1600/Screenshot+2020-04-19+at+00.13.40.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1564" data-original-width="962" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTGwqKsylesx7tRHkxUqdBZqK25pxBXbZkuHRHbVFib5BeDHzrzBnU8HefAGq0RqhyphenhyphenuxSCF1_TgBaPt-chImoBsmKU_oMlg8Dvx7ZUC2L4-d73yv53mE0UP3uSnE9KM8A7_IbPAKm8_Bis/s320/Screenshot+2020-04-19+at+00.13.40.png" width="196" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Another result of that year was his edition of the <i>Ṣiwān al-ḥikma</i> of Sijistānī (d. c. 1000) that appeared in 1974, an important source for the history of philosophy and its conception in Arabic. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">This related interest in the history of philosophy also produced a very influential text - <i><a href="https://archive.org/details/booksscience1_gmail_20160922_1836/mode/2up">Ādāb al-falāsifa</a></i> of Ḥunayn ibn Isḥāq that was published in 1985. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Much later in his life, during his time in Kuwait, he wrote some works summarising his contribution such as <i>Transmission de la philosophie grecque au monde arabe</i> published by Vrin in Paris in 1968, </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">and<i> Histoire de la philosophie en islam</i> in two volumes published by Vrin in Paris in 1972, </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">[This work broadly ignored the post-classical work of Corbin and others and hence very much remained within the context of looking at philosophy up to Averroes]</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">His intellectual vigour and interests are further indicated by translations of literary works: Cervantes' <i>Don Quixote</i> and Goethe's <i>Faust</i> and <i>West-östlicher Diwan</i>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">There are plenty of other works such as on the nature of Platonic forms in Islamic philosophy, on the conception of history, the thought of Ibn Sabʿīn, Ibn ʿArabī, Ibn Sīnā and many more which would require yet another post.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">To do justice to the contribution of Badawī (even when one wishes to be critical of his editions, his conceptualisation and his historical vision) one would need a thorough research project to look at what he published, why he published it and to what end: did he have a vision of the nature of the tradition and how the 'Islamic' and the 'Greek' came together? Of course, elements of his memoirs and other writings give us a sense of that: that Sufism came together with Heideggerian existentialism, and in the quest for cultural authenticity the desire to recover the Arabic Aristotelian (and even the Neoplatonic) heritage. Unlike later historians and philosophers (foremost among whom is obviously Muḥammad ʿĀbid al-Jābirī) who engaged with that tradition, he was not dismissive of the Neoplatonic as some 'conspiracy' to deprive Arabs of their rationality. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Thus his career reflects various concerns of the emergence of modern Arab thought after or perhaps at the end of what Hourani famously called the 'liberal age' about the conception of philosophy that brought together tradition and the modern, the concern for the colonial subject emerging into the post-colonial space with new optimisms for the future articulation of individual subjectivity and cultural authenticity, the forging of a new liberal nationalism predicated on the dignity of the person, the liberal education, and the emergence of the culture wars to come between liberals, nationalists, and Islamists. Given the centrality of Egypt - and of Cairo University in particular - the contemporary Arab intellectual history, the story of Badawī is very much about the ebbs and flows of Arab philosophy and its dissemination into Iraq, the Levant and elsewhere, as well as its agonies and discontents after 1967. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-50230560977559120112020-04-18T11:36:00.000-07:002020-04-18T12:27:57.083-07:00Heidegger, Sufism and the Greek Intellectual Heritage in Arabic: Some Notes on ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Badawī Part I<span style="font-size: x-large;">The Egyptian existentialist philosopher ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Badawī (1917-2002) is well known to students of Islamic philosophy especially those interested in the Greek intellectual heritage in Islam. In this post, I examine elements of his biography and contribution to the dissemination of the thought of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) in Arabic as well as his contributions to the study of Sufism, the Arabic Aristotle and much beyond. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Heidegger in the later period became known also through the work of Charles Malik (1906-1987), the Christian Lebanese philosopher who had studied with him in Freiburg in the 1930s. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Badawī came from a well to do family in Upper Egypt and studied in Cairo in the 1930s and 1940s at the Egyptian University (as it was called from 1908), later Fuad I University from 1940 (later Cairo University from 1952) which at that time hosted a number of significant European thinkers, attracted by the ambitious new university which encouraged its Egyptian students to study abroad as well and also taking advantage of the situation in Europe in which scholars went into exile to avoid the restrictions and persecutions of the Nazis. Important figures teaching at the university then included the literary figure and later Minister of Education Ṭāhā Ḥusayn (1889-1973) and the novelist Naguib Mahfuz (1911-2006).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">In his memoirs, Badawī mentioned that at school he had already taken an interest in literary and intellectual matters and voraciously read articles by Ṭāhā Ḥusayn, as well as the journalists ʿAbbās Maḥmūd al-ʿAqqād (1889-1964) and Muḥammad Ḥusayn Haykal (1888-1956). </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">ʿAqqād left him cold and uninspired, Haykal evoked a nationalist fervour, but it was Ḥusayn's work that excited him and propelled him to the life of the mind. Already by the end of his elementary schooling he had encountered some work of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche in Arabic translation, and later Pascal. At the Saʿīdīya school in Cairo, he completed his secondary schooling, learning English, French and German and further developing his love for literature and philosophy. He mentions reading in 1932 the <a href="https://archive.org/details/aprimerphilosop00rappgoog/page/n7/mode/2up"><i>Primer of Philosophy</i> of Angelo Solomon Rappaport</a> (1871-1950, first published in London in 1904) in the translation of Aḥmad al-Amīn (1886-1954), a professor of literature at the University. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">And he also starting reading Avicennian logic in a primer by ʿAbduh Khayr al-Dīn. At school, because at the time philosophy was studied alongside psychology (and this was the case in many places and an influence perhaps of the 'American' school), his teacher was Shafīq al-ʿĀṣī who obtained his doctorate from Vienna University in 1930 and hence was the conduit for the first interests in German philosophy. He also in that period began to read some Islamic philosophy, with works such as <a href="http://www.maktabah.org/en/item/931-maqasid-al-falasifah-aims-of-the-philosophers---by-imam-ghazali"><i>Maqāṣid al-falāsifa</i> of Ghazālī </a>(d. 1111) and <i>al-Najāt</i> of <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ibn-sina/">Avicenna</a> (d. 1037) but as he himself acknowledged, these did not inspire an interest in Islamic philosophy as such. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">He did his BA in Philosophy at the Faculty of Letters from 1934 to 1938 developing knowledge of French as well as Latin. He mentioned other teachers such as Amīn al-Khulī (1895-1966) famous for his literary approach to the Qurʾan (and later an influence on the reformist thinker <a href="https://english.alaraby.co.uk/english/blog/2015/7/7/remembering-the-radical-thought-of-nasr-hamid-abu-zayd">Naṣr Ḥāmid Abū Zayd</a> (1943-2010), but he singled out Ṭāhā Ḥusayn's classes especially on pre-Islamic poetry. He also began classes in Avicennian logic with Shaykh Muṣṭafā ʿAbd al-Rāziq (1885-1947), the brother of ʿAlī ʿAbd al-Rāziq (1888-1966) and student of Muḥammad ʿAbduh (1849-1905). ʿAbd al-Rāziq had been Shaykh al-Azhar and then took up a chair in philosophy at the University. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">One of the logic texts that he studied was <i><a href="https://archive.org/details/BasayerMantiqNew/mode/2up">al-Baṣāʾir al-Naṣīrīya</a></i> of <a href="https://www.bookdepository.com/Three-Logical-philosophical-Treatises-Umar-b-Sahlan-Sawi/9783940762146">ʿUmar b. Sahlān al-Sāwī </a>(d. c. 1143), a text that ʿAbduh had also been fond of teaching and whose critical approach to Avicenna influenced Suhrawardī (d. 1191) and maybe even Ibn Taymīya (d. 1328).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">ʿAbd al-Rāziq also taught the <a href="https://asadullahali.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/ibn_khaldun-al_muqaddimah.pdf"><i>Muqaddima</i> of Ibn Khaldūn</a> (1332-1406). Badawī extensively discusses the deep and extended commentary that he provided in his classes; at the same time he became aware of critiques of Islamic philosophy and its 'decadence' articulated by Ernest Renan (1823-1892) and others. Rather unusually in Sufism, ʿAbd al-Rāziq signalled his distaste for monistic Sufism by teaching <i><a href="https://www.quranicthought.com/books/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B5%D9%88%D9%81%D9%8A%D8%A9-%D9%88%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%81%D9%82%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%A1-%D9%84%D8%A7%D8%A8%D9%86-%D8%AA%D9%8A%D9%85%D9%8A%D8%A9/">al-Ṣūfīya waʾl-fuqarāʾ</a></i> of Ibn Taymīya. In 1937, he made way as chair of the department to André Lalande (1867-1963) and in the following year became Minister of Religious Endowments. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">In 1936, <a href="https://reviews.ophen.org/tag/alexandre-koyre/">Alexandre Koyré</a> (1892-1964) came to Cairo on a sabbatical from Paris [he had previously come in 1932], and Badawī attended his classes first on the history of medieval philosophy, so that he became acquainted with the work of the neo-Thomist (although he himself denied that label) Étienne Gilson (1988–1978), </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">and later on the history of modern philosophy after Kant. Koyré also taught a class on the history of science taking in the likes of Galileo, Kepler and Copernicus. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Other European philosophers teaching in Cairo at the time whose classes Badawī attended included Émile Bréhier (1876-1952), a Neoplatonist who wrote his PhD on <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/philo/">Philo of Alexandria</a> and who later succeeded Henri Bergson (1859-1941) to his chair at the Collège de France in Paris in 1945, and Louis Rougier (1889-1982) who taught epistemology and history of philosophy in Cairo from 1931 to 1936. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">In 1937, encouraged by Ḥusayn and Paul Kraus (1904-1944), who was then Professor of Semitic Languages, he went to Europe on a 'grand tour' taking in Italy, German and France.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Koyré left for New York in 1938 and so after graduation, Badawī did his MA with Lalande (who primarily taught methodology) in metaphysics eventually writing on the problem of death in existentialism entitled <i>Le Problème de la mort dans la philosophie existentielle</i> in 1939, but not published until 1964. For his doctorate, once Koyré returned to Cairo in October 1940, he took over his supervision; although Badawī credited Lalande with his training in methodological rigour. All the while he had worked since 1938 ad a lecturer in the department. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Koyré had a lasting impression: it was not only his rigour in the study of philosophy of science and his metaphysics, but also his work on the Protestant mysticism of <a href="http://jacobboehmeonline.com/home">Jakob Böhme</a> (1575-1624) published by Vrin in Paris in 1929 as <i><a href="https://www.edition-originale.com/en/literature/first-and-precious-books/koyre-la-philosophie-de-jacob-boehme-1929-29529">La philosophie de Jacob Boehme</a></i>. Koyré was his main conduit for German philosophy and especially phenomenology as he had studied at Göttingen from 1908 to 1911 with <a href="https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/husserl/">Edmund Husserl</a> (1859-1938) and the mathematician David Hilbert (1862-1943).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">[</span>Husserl did not think much of his dissertation so he did not get a doctorate and instead moved to Paris to study with Bergson and Lalande, and later obtained his doctorate and later doctorat d'état in 1922 from the Sorbonne. He was later reacquainted with Husserl when he gave his lectures in Paris in 1929 on what became his <i>Cartesian Meditations</i>.<span style="font-size: x-large;">]</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Koyré was to write a preface to his published dissertation but he left in March 1941 for New York. Badawī complains that his dissertation and its publication was held up because of the envy of his peers and seniors since it would have been his third book. He eventually defended his dissertation in May 1944 and Ṭāhā Ḥusayn famously remarked that this was an event that heralded the birth of modern Arab philosophy - as reported in al-Ahram on 30 May 1944. His dissertation was on the notion of existential time (<i>al-zamān al-wujūdī</i>) that, influenced by Koyré brought together Heidegger's <i>Dasein</i> (that he rendered as <i>annīya</i>) with the Sufi notion of the Perfect human (<i>al-insān al-kāmil</i>) in the search for a subjectivity of the individual person and the quest for cultural authenticity. This was followed by a series of studies in existentialism as well as initial works on Sufism in the 1940s.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">His first works were introductions to philosophers and philosophy which like his works in Heideggerian existentialism and Sufism was all published by Dār al-nahḍa al-Miṣrīya. The first publication in 1939 was a book on Friedrich Nietzsche followed by books on Schopenhauer in 1942, Plato in 1943 and Aristotle in 1944 as well as studies of the Greek intellectual heritage in Arabic in 1940 and on the Arabic translation movement (<i>Rabīʿ al-fikr al-yūnānī</i>) in 1943 and the spirit of Islamic thought on classical philosophy in 1949. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">He was appointed to a position at ʿAyn Shams University, eventually becoming the chair of philosophy in 1959. In the interim he spent 1956-1958 as cultural attaché in Switzerland. Although he was involved in drafting the 1952 constitution, he later became disillusioned by Nasser, moving to teach in Paris in 1967, followed by six years in Benghazi, an interim year 1973-1974 in Tehran and a productive 1974-1982 at Kuwait University.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">The Benghazi years are discussed in this work:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">It was in Tehran that he encountered the circle of Henry Corbin - with whom he had been acquainted through his teacher in Cairo in the 1930s already since Bréhier, Massignon and others were mutual acquaintances. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">From then until his just before his death he lived and taught in Paris. On his return to Cairo in 2002, he lasted a few months. Much of the above account is taken from his memoirs published in 2000, which while at times are acerbic, are an essential guide to modern Arab intellectual history and the engagement with European thought. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">There is little doubt of the influence of Badawī - not just in the field of the study of the Greek intellectual heritage to which we will devote part II of this post - but also in the early stages of the reception of Heidegger in Arabic and of that metaphysical strand of existentialist phenomenology and its concern for being authentic. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">A small addendum. There are some useful studies of Badawī:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-large;">1) Elements of <a href="https://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/N/bo27527421.html">Yoav Di-Capua</a>'s excellent study of Arab existentialism basically defines him as a founding figure. Here is a good <a href="https://ageofrevolutions.com/2018/07/09/revolution-and-arab-existentialism-in-the-era-of-decolonization-an-interview-with-yoav-di-capua/">interview</a> with him. And a <a href="https://themaydan.com/2018/10/book-review-yoav-di-capua-no-exit-arab-existentialism-jean-paul-sartre-decolonization-reviewed-harald-viersen/">good review</a> of that book by Harald Viersen at FU Berlin. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">2) There is a useful <a href="https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-fau/frontdoor/index/index/docId/852">Erlangen PhD dissertation</a> from 2009 on him and on the concept of alienation that characterises his early political memoir <i>Humūm al-shabāb </i>published in 1946<i>. </i></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">3) There is also an excellent article in the volume on <i><a href="https://www.rowmaninternational.com/book/heidegger_in_the_islamicate_world/3-156-a8db6ac8-0d57-4f42-8063-6b9e1571e92e">Heidegger in the Islamicate world</a></i> by Sevinç Yasargil. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Addendum II:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-large;">Here is a video from Arabiya TV programme Hādhā huwa from 1993: </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">Another video from a few years ago from Nile Cultural channel with Gehan Seif al-din in conversation with two philosophers on him:</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">And one more useful video in memoriam from 2015:</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><br /></span>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-8773728455670649512020-02-03T09:28:00.001-08:002020-02-03T13:10:56.219-08:00Translating Religion, Affective Communities in Search of a Discursive Tradition<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;">Talal Asad's work has for some time been essential reading for those trying to make sense of Islam in the present, as a 'religion' and within the construction of the modern post-Enlightenment construction of that term, as a set of practices, as identities, and as most importantly a discursive tradition. And the need to engage with his work is evident even among those most critical of him - one thinks of <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691164182/what-is-islam">Shahab Ahmed</a> (for a critical response, see Zareena Grewal <a href="https://marginalia.lareviewofbooks.org/problem-islamic-definitional-theoretical-limits-legacies-zareena-grewal/">here</a>) and his rather misconstrued understanding of the discursive tradition and more recently <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/gb/academic/subjects/religion/islam/lived-islam-colloquial-religion-cosmopolitan-tradition?format=HB&isbn=9781108483278">Kevin Reinhart's</a> rather unusual take on the big, cosmopolitan tradition of Islam swiping at the anthropologists. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;">Asad’s latest work, <i><a href="http://cup.columbia.edu/book/secular-translations/9780231189873">Secular Translations</a></i>, is a continuation of his engagement with the anthropological and philosophical process of ‘translation’ combined with his major work in the last two decades of tracing the parallel and connected genealogies of the concepts of the secular and the religious. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;">It is arguably also his most explicit engagement with the canon of modern European philosophy – and especially liberal thought – deployed to decentre the narratives about the rise of the liberal, secular self in the exclusive space of modern Europe. In this sense, we can connect his work to other attempts at decolonising epistemology in metropolitan academia and especially rethinking liberalism. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;">Each of the three chapters – originally the first set of Ruth Benedict lectures delivered at the Department of Anthropology at Columbia University in 2017 – reflects continuities with his previous work: the first chapter on ‘Secular equality and religious language’ recalls </span><i style="font-family: "Minion Tra", serif;">Formations of the Secular</i><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;"> (Stanford University Press, 2003), the second chapter on ‘Translation and the sensible body’ engages with </span><i style="font-family: "Minion Tra", serif;">Genealogies of Religion</i><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;"> (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993) and his </span><i style="font-family: "Minion Tra", serif;">On an Anthropology of Islam</i><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;"> (DC, 1986), and the third chapter ‘Masks, security and on the language of numbers’ is reminiscent of the controversies over his </span><i style="font-family: "Minion Tra", serif;">On Suicide Bombing</i><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;"> (Columbia University Press, 2007). </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;">Perhaps his most striking insight – and this demonstrates both the optimism and the pessimism of the work – is not just the Wittgensteinian turn to language games and forms of like in order to understand ‘sensibilities’ such as religion and secularity (one thinks of the late <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/language-and-solitude/6763E3D640DBD82F9C9164B6FF74E745">Ernest Gellner</a> taking his own turn to the Austrian late in life) but that the rise of calculative reason – or what Heidegger would have called technology – is expressive of our selfhood as well as denying its agency. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;">Translation as an expression of the body is similarly affective. Asad thus seems to replace the tyranny of (liberal, universalising) reason with ‘sensibility’, a notion of an inner conviction that one’s experience preponderates over any reasoned argument that might be presented. Thus we live in an age of ‘sensibility’ and not of reason despite all the rhetoric of the ‘end of history’ with the triumph of the liberal, individual self (as Fukuyama and Seidel would have it), a fact of the vacuum of moral language and understanding that MacIntyre condemned as ‘emotivism’ in </span><i style="font-family: "Minion Tra", serif;">After Virtue</i><span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;">(Duckworth, 1981). <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Chapter one begins with Robert Skidelsky’s affirmation of liberal moral values and secularization as ‘Christianity’s gift to the world’ based on the notion of ‘equal liberty’. Of course, since Skidelsky is citing Siedentrop one could easily to make the point about Christian claims to equality being exclusive by also quoting Siedentrop’s identification of the enemy of the liberal self and its hard-fought liberties – Islam. There follows an extensive, broad consideration of philosophical arguments about liberty from Mill, Kant and Rawls through to Benjamin and Habermas. One of the key issues is legal equality and the notion of sovereignty; the double-edged nature of this could be well explained by Giorgio Agamben’s conception of <i>homo sacer</i> and the state of exception and it is somewhat surprising that Asad does not go there. Or to cite Derrida’s famous iterative sense of being equal ‘before the law’. Similarly liberalism collusion with cruelty in the name of equality is mentioned – one could quite easily extend that to the intimate relationship between liberalism, religious suppression and imperialism (on a side note, one is reminded on liberalism of the excellent recent volume edited by Faisal Devji and Zaheer Kazmi on <i><a href="https://www.hurstpublishers.com/book/islam-after-liberalism/">Islam after Liberalism</a></i>, Hurst, 2017). Asad finally notes the failure of Habermas’ notion of translating religious language into secular and cites the problems posed by aspects of Muslim women’s veiling in Europe. One could equally – no pun intended – cite the problem of agency in equality by considering some of the arguments posed by religious communities concerning dignity and the right to religious liberties against civil liberties which are coming to the fore in ‘secular vs religious’ clashes on matters of morality such as LGBTQ+ issues in the public sphere. Throughout this book I keep thinking of Agamben – and it really would be interesting to see Asad’s engagement with the Italian philosopher and exegete’s work. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The second chapter begins with the late Christian theologian Lammin Sanneh’s reflection on the nature of the mission in Africa and the relative success of Christian translation as opposed to Muslim resistance to translate the word of God based on some form of theological ‘inlibration’. Asad questions the basic of untranslatability with its concomitant assumption that if that is the case then true cultural plurality in Islam is somehow inauthentic. This allows him to open a question on the relationship between the exoteric and the esoteric and the apparent and allegorical in Qurʾanic language (and the uses of our embodied existence). He moves onto discuss elements of Islamic legal practice and notions of human dualism via Ghazālī. The privileging of Qurʾanic language – and this is an interesting insight – reflects a concern about secularisation and not the chauvinistic privileging of Arabic over other languages. One might also point out – in addition to Asad – that the hadith that talk about the heavenly language being Syriac or something other than Arabic would tend to suggest that there is no special status to Arabic as such. Qurʾanic language is the performative action of the body, a ritual form of life (again Wittgenstein). Here again the discussion of intention and action recalls his <i>Genealogies of Religion</i>. He also juxtaposes a number of concepts: intention vs will, the authenticity of the ‘true self’ against that of the tradition. He ends up reverting to his notion of a discursive tradition. But the key point is to critique any sense of the privilege of Christian religious language over others by using a discursive, critical genealogical approach. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The final chapter concerns power and politics, involving a critique of the nation state, more explicitly starting with a reflection on Mauss on masks. Our public personhood is a matter of affecting masks and presenting meaning in the public sphere. However, the act of research into the public sphere is not a mere facility of reading. Conventions and structures act as masks of subjugation and securitisation, indeed even the ritualization of public life. At the heart of this chapter there seems to be a concern with selfhood and its emergence but it is not fully developed – not even as a critique of Eurocentric accounts including Skinner et al (again one thinks of Agamben – but also of Richard Sorabji’s wonderful monograph on the Self). The state’s distrust of those masks is a reason for the reinforcement of security. He ends with the problem of numbers and democratic nation states – and here one thinks of Appadurai. The calculation of the modern democratic nation state leads to a secular logic and thus he returns to Skidelsky cited already in chapter 1. Islamophobia is merely a result of this calculus. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "minion tra" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The epilogue reiterates why these lectures are continuous with Asad’s previous work on language, thought, religion, secularity and politics, not least the privileging of the ‘Christian’ and the ‘secular’ in modern nation states – and one might also link this with another endeavour with Butler, Mahmood and others on the possibilities of ‘secular’ and ‘religious’ critique and reason. The concern with a sort of decolonisation of thought seems to be clear: religion, secularity, Christianity, security, power and a whole set of concepts needs a radical rethink using some reflections on Islamic texts but also of the critical elements of Euro-American thought as well – somewhat like Chakrabarty on ‘provincializing Europe’, expect taking religious texts and their ‘intentions’ more seriously. This is linked to his sense of the failure of the modern will, of the modern democratic nation-state, of epistemology not least because as he puts it those structures are even ignorant of that fact that they have failed, they have not produced a collective form of life that is radically different – even from the liberal end of history signalled in a previous generation. His only solution – and it seems the next step of the decolonisation – is to take the Qurʾanic injunction of ‘<i>amr biʾl-maʿrūf</i>’ more seriously as a collective form of life, of mutuality, of a means for unthinking the way in which we conceive of sovereignty. In that sense his solution is both pessimistic – about the possibilities and scope of decolonisation – and optimistic that despite our intuitions and evils that humans may still bear within themselves the capacity to produce a conducive collective form of life. That conundrum – and its hope – in one sense is a very serious contribution and suggestion for contemporary Islamic thought. One hopes that people will engage with Asad – especially when they might disagree (since not everyone accepts the failures of which he talks). Asad remains essential reading - and by extension his school. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-19832607937902516932020-01-18T13:26:00.002-08:002020-01-18T13:26:27.220-08:00Once more on the origins of Islam - and the role of 'ordinary believers' <div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Brill Roman, sans-serif;">In recent years, the study of early Islam has become quite a vibrant field, first moving towards the consensus on treating Islam as a ‘late antique’ religion and as part of the Near Eastern oecumene on matters ranging from the relationship between religion and violence to the perpetuation of monotheism (and henotheism), and then considering that the ‘standard’ narratives of the coming of imperial Islam in the region has tended to overemphasise the uniformity of the development of doctrine and practice and to marginalise the roles of non-Sunni-jamāʿī elites in that process. More even than that, a thorough double movement decolonisation of the study of early Islam is required: a critical appraisal of the sources and methods of orientalists, as well as provincialisation not just of those methods but also of the hegemonic assumptions of what constitutes (in a singular manner) the 'Islamic tradition'. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691179094/the-making-of-the-medieval-middle-east" style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;">Jack Tannous</a><span style="font-family: Brill Roman, sans-serif;">’ study furthers the process of considering early Islam within its wider pluralistic late antique context by arguing for the role of ‘simple believers’, the illiterate and agrarian Christians who broadly constituted the majority of the inhabitants in the Near East for some centuries after the advent of the message of Muḥammad in the Ḥijāz. The proper development of the spread of Islam can be gauged by the slow rate of conversion and 'Islamisation'/'Arabisation'. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Brill Roman, sans-serif;">In the preface, Tannous tells us that the study is motivated by two questions. First, what does it mean for someone relatively illiterate and theologically uninformed to belong to a church in late antiquity, especially where confessional identity might be defined by conciliar creeds that deploy sophisticated theological concepts that are not exactly quotidian? Second, how did the Middle East become transformed from being the cradle of Christianity and a Christian space to one in which Christianity was a minority? The two questions are closely linked. One cannot understand the process of conversion purely through the prism of elite transformation and power strategies. Rather, if one wants to gauge how things may have changed one ought to consider the ‘simple believer’, however difficult it may be to establish and define. It is worth stressing that his approach is not a rather dismissive attitude to equating simple with simple-minded; rather by ‘simple’ he intends a lay category of agrarian, mostly illiterate and uninitiated into theological inquiry and debate. The culture of learned theologians – both Muslim and Christian of various confessions – tell us something about intellectual history but not much necessarily in themselves about the processes of social history. Tannous also offers another angle on the debates about Islam in the early period. He contends that if we wish to appreciate what Islam brought and changed we first need to understand what it might have meant to be a Christian and the nature of intra-Christian debate and polemic in Arabic, Syriac and Aramaic – it is those religious attitudes that need to be engaged to understand that world. That much of what was happening focused on intra-Christian debates and conflicts is already apparent from a number of the early Christian (Syriac and Greek) sources which spend much time of questions of heresy, orthodoxy and the relationship with various centres such as Constantinople. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The argument ranges over four parts, one interlude and two historiographically important appendices. Part one introduces us to the simple and the nature of the fractures between Christians in the world into which Islam emerged. Part two engages the intra-Christian debates and arguments between the council of Chalcedon in 451 (and the splits between the official imperial and dissent doctrines and the important distinction over Christology) and the emergence of Islam in the 7<sup>th</sup> century. The interlude considers some evidence for continuity through these periods into the 9<sup>th</sup> century by examining the evidence of the Syriac sources. Part three looks at what ‘Christian’ and ‘Muslim’ may have meant in that period from the 7<sup>th</sup> to the 9<sup>th</sup> centuries and introduces broadly the notion of the simple Muslim believer as well in terms of the converts. It is useful that the main focus is not on the socio-political and economic benefits – and even the realisation that conversion in the early period may not have led to a sharp demarcation in doctrine and practice (some of the evidence from the Syriac writings from Qatar suggest that Church authorities were rather worried about the social and even liturgical mixing of Christians and converts). </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Similarly, it is important for us not to project our contemporary notions about religion, belief and conversion to the lives of people in late antiquity. But what did conversion mean and entail? – and we have the paradox from both Muslim and Christian sources over the anxiety of overlapping beliefs and practices as well as the desire to differentiate and draw up boundaries. This is significant also in the light of the recent thesis of Fred Donner on the believers’ movement and the debate over the exact point at which ‘Islam’ becomes an exclusive and highly distinct identity – Tannous criticises that thesis in chapter 12. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">It seems that one of the elements in the process that paved the way for conversion was that violence, disagreement, confessional chaos and the contestations over truth following Chalcedon made the simple believers perhaps somewhat sceptical of exclusive claims and more adaptable to holding positions and practices that may to the theologian seem to be contradictory – clearly such phenomena were visible in ‘exclusively’ Muslim contexts as well as we see especially from some of the historical and heresiographical literature. This is also a section that troubles – if belief was a spectrum, why would someone convert? And why then would someone apostasise (the subject of a recent volume by Christian Sahner)? </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Tannous is correct to point out the weaknesses in the method of some who have written on conversion: for example, Bulliet’s study of genealogies and the use of ‘Muslim’ names is clearly problematic – the former can be forged and the latter – at least insofar as Arabic –adopted even when their bearers were avowedly Christian. Conversion relied about structural continuities – holy men and the realm of the sacred, and the mosque taking the place of the church. This, Tannous argues, is expressed in the anxiety in the Muslim sources about influence from Christians – the prohibitions (or not) about quoting from the Christians and their scriptures, knowledge of Syriac, of traditions and so forth. Part four focuses on the shared world and reintegrates the simple Christian believers into the social history of Islam and recovers their voices. The social interaction and everyday life – not the written theological text – seems to be the place to search for the gradual processes of transformation – multi-causal as they were. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Brill Roman, sans-serif;">The appendices then turn to the methodological issues of source criticism – since there is no explicit methodological preliminary to the study. Appendix II is relatively modest and argues that it is proper – if we pay attention to the Syriac sources – to refer to the conquests as ‘Arab’. Appendix I is, on the other hand, an interesting essay on the sources that may be profitable for a class on Islamic history. In the debate between the radical sceptics and the ‘gullible’, Tannous places himself somewhere in the middle suggesting that while ‘literary analysis’ (beloved of the sceptics) is a valuable tool, literary Pyrrhonism as he calls it is a dead end if one wishes to write social history. A reflective source-critical approach that engages the sources (not necessarily with a heightened hermeneutics of suspicion) is probably emerging as the consensus of the field. His case study is an element in the canons of Jacob of Edessa that he uses to shed light on the nature of the Christian sources – and then on the Islamic ones – taking into consideration the positions of Abbott, Motzki and Schoeler juxtaposing them with Goldziher and Schacht. It seems clear that he broadly concurs with the position of Schoeler. The more radical positions of Shoemaker and others are absent – but to be fair in good measure, since the function of the short appendix is to shed light on his own method and not write a monograph on </span><i style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;">Quellenkritik</i><span style="font-family: Brill Roman, sans-serif;">. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The scope of the study is 500 to 1000, so there is a sense in which it parallels and acts as a foil to <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691158532/before-and-after-muhammad">Garth Fowden’s <i>Before and After Muhammad</i></a>. From the perspective of someone like Aziz al-Azmeh, his notion of Islam and ‘paleo-Islam’ and his monograph <i><a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/emergence-of-islam-in-late-antiquity/692341BFC371335E30404EF3B726AE6D">The Emergence of Islam</a></i>, Tannous’ work will probably seem to be hopefully old-fashioned and orientalist no least for decentering the Arabic from our accounts of the Middle East after Islam. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">But instead of locating his work within the Crone paradigm of understanding Islam beyond the Arabic sources due to the hermeneutics of suspicion, Tannous argues for something that is more in vogue among historians: connected histories, and in this case connected ‘transconfessional’ histories of the Middle East. Just as connected histories forgo the historiography of nation-state, so too should transconfessional histories dismiss the projection of the ‘millet’ system’s religious balkanisation on an earlier period of history. Non-Muslims as imperial competitors and as shared inhabitants of the world had a part to play in the formation of Islam as much as those who claimed to be from within the traditions. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Has Tannous convinced? As he suggests in the conclusion, in some ways the monograph is an experiment in what might happen if we change our assumptions about early Islam and the region prior to that and turn our attention away from the privileging of the learned culture of a few key garrison towns such as Baghdad, Kufa, Basra, Wasit and Fustat. If we assume that the conquests – and the link between religion and violence discussed by the late Thomas Sizgorich – were part of the late antique norm, and that the rise in literary and theological works in Syriac and Arabic tell us rather little about the numbers on the grounds being instead indicators of the transmission and reception of Hellenic learning, then it is perfectly plausible to consider that the majority of the Near East up until the 10<sup>th</sup> century may well have constituted simple believers who identified themselves as Christian. The social history of the region is not necessarily contiguous with the intellectual history of early and classical Islamdom. He makes a strong case for considering the simple believer – a history of early Islam from below perhaps in a connect transconfessional manner that accords with my own taste for a ‘decolonised’ approach to Islamic history. But, given his rather fluid approach to identity (which is not unreasonable), whether he explains how the region transformed and how simple Christians became Muslim is another matter. </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-38148406540807885562019-07-24T08:01:00.000-07:002019-07-24T08:01:49.696-07:00Sources on the North Indian Shiʿi Hierocracy VI: Tarājim mashāhīr ʿulamāʾ al-Hind<span style="font-size: large;">Like the <i>Warathat al-anbiyāʾ </i>of Sayyid Aḥmad al-Hindī (d. 1947, discussed in the <a href="http://mullasadra.blogspot.com/2014/05/sources-on-north-indian-shii-hierocracy.html">first of this series of blogposts</a>), this text written by his kinsman Sayyid ʿAlī Naqī Naqavī (d. 1988), known as Naqqan ṣāḥib, in Najaf is a useful source for the ʿulamāʾ of North Indian not least from three lineages that I have already discussed on my blog in the context of the ʿulamāʾ of Avadh - the family of Sayyid Dildār ʿAlī (d. 1820), the lineage of Mīr Ḥāmid Ḥusayn Mūsawī (d. 1888), and the family of Muftī Sayyid Muḥammad ʿAbbās Shushtarī (d. 1889). </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">I had been trying to get a hold of the text for some time so it was a matter of serendipity that I came across a reference to its publication in Karbala a few years ago via a survey of recent articles in a journal printed by the shrine of Ḥażrat ʿAbbās. I am grateful to my friend Mehdi Hamza for sourcing a copy for me. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Naqqan ṣāḥib is a well known figure for those familiar with Shiʿi Islam in North India, the subject of a <a href="https://search.lib.virginia.edu/catalog/sq87bt81x">Virginia PhD dissertation</a> in 2011 by <a href="https://www.davidson.edu/people/syed-rizwan-zamir">Rizwan Zamir</a> and a recent article in the <i><a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-the-royal-asiatic-society/article/shiism-humanity-and-revolution-in-twentiethcentury-india-selfhood-and-politics-in-the-husainology-of-ali-naqi-naqvi/78E1197385DBD1CBD8E52329407CB602">Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society</a></i> by <a href="https://www.theology.ox.ac.uk/people/professor-justin-jones">Justin Jones</a>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">He was also a well known <i>khaṭīb</i> during the Muḥarram season. Here is a video from among the many of his speeches. </span><br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/H3lqLVGN220/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/H3lqLVGN220?feature=player_embedded" width="320"></iframe></div>
<span style="font-size: large;">[Most of these videos have been ripped from old VHS tapes and hence are rather poor in quality - 40 years old...]</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The text in question was completed in Najaf on 17 Shaʿbān 1347/29 January 1929 and contains notices on 32 ʿulamāʾ divided into six successive generations from Sayyid Dildār ʿAlī to the time of the author. The first and longest entry is on his illustrious ancestor Sayyid Dildār ʿAlī. Other important entries include Mīrzā Muḥammad 'Kāmil' Dihlavī (d. 1235/1820) the first Shiʿi polemicist to respond to the <i>Tuḥfa-yi isnāʿashariyya</i> of Shāh ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz, and Sayyid ʿAlī al-Ḥāʾirī, the exegete who settled in Lahore. The editors - who are not named - do a useful job of supplementing material by cross-referring to other accounts of these ʿulamāʾ. Compared to other works, it has a far more extensive discussion and listing of the scholarly works of these ʿulamāʾ and of their connections to the hierocracy in Najaf and Karbala. The editors also provide a very lengthy introduction to the author - far longer than the text itself as well as detailed appendices and a facsimile of some pages of the lithograph of the text that first appeared in 1350/1932 in Najaf (which actually mentions 53 figures discussed in the text). </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-65142403699826132392019-06-28T04:39:00.002-07:002019-06-29T10:08:58.984-07:00The Multicultural Middle Ages? <div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;">Not just a genuflection to contemporary identity, what can we mean by a multicultural middle ages and in particular multicultural medieval philosophy (or philosophies)? Clearly this volume is trying to do something beyond the classic reader for students wanting some background in medieval thought before they move onto the more serious (!) work of Descartes, Locke, Hume and Kant - and beyond to the questions that we ask. On the one hand, the analytic tradition has become co-opted into a whiggish notion of intellectual progress, of hard won liberties, a tradition of imperial triumphalism in which the rationalities and intellectual traditions are not terribly significant. On the other hand, such a conception would be a travesty for the analytic tradition since some of the best thinkers working towards global philosophy and the dialogues between cultural traditions come from that training (one thinks of Jay Garfield, Jonardon Ganeri and others). But there is a sense of the analytic tradition that is in the background of the conception of this volume. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;">What is it seeking to include and what is the very conception of philosophy at its heart? There are plenty of existing readers on medieval philosophy and for some time such works have included the Jewish and Islamic philosophical traditions (this was already the case with </span><a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Philosophy-Middle-Ages-Christian-Traditions/dp/160384208X" style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;">Hyman and Mahdi</a><span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"> back in the 1960s). Hyman et al (currently in its third iteration) was more geared towards use in analytic departments but it still included pseudo-Dionysius. Other works have presented us with readers specifically on Islam (one thinks of <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/gb/academic/subjects/philosophy/philosophy-texts/medieval-islamic-philosophical-writings?format=PB">Muhammad Ali Khalidi</a>'s volume for Cambridge University Press that like this volume is primarily selections from existing published translations, and the late <a href="https://www.hackettpublishing.com/classical-arabic-philosophy">David Reisman and Jon McGinnis</a>' Hackett volume). </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;">What sets this new volume published by </span><a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/medieval-philosophy-9781472580399/" style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;">Bloomsbury</a><span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"> apart from previous attempts? </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">First, let us consider what the eminent specialist of Aquinas’ thought and of medieval philosophy <a href="https://divinity.uchicago.edu/bernard-mcginn">Bernard McGinn</a> says in his preface and <a href="https://www.eckerd.edu/philosophy/faculty/foltz/">Bruce Foltz</a>, the general editor, in his introduction, and then consider the practice of the volume. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">McGinn points to three contributions of the volume. First, the ‘postmodern’ turn allows us to reconsider the significance of medieval philosophy within the history of philosophy and indeed within our contemporary philosophical concerns within a global context. Therefore, one needs to go beyond the simple confines of the Latin tradition (well represented in the historical and textual volumes of readers edited by <a href="https://www.colorado.edu/philosophy/people/faculty/robert-pasnau">Robert Pasnau</a> and others for Cambridge University Press) and include the Eastern Byzantine tradition (<i>pace </i><a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/cambridge-intellectual-history-of-byzantium/intellectual-exchanges-with-the-arab-world/88E9CE7916DD5E07BC4215B2A075267E">Dimitri Gutas’</a> recent denial of any ‘actual’ philosophy in that tradition in the <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/cambridge-intellectual-history-of-byzantium/893E5F5CC4E5943B110569F940F380BD">Cambridge Intellectual History of Byzantium</a>), the Jewish and the Islamic traditions. Second, the definition of philosophy assumed takes us back to the very word and the notion – made especially popular by the late <a href="https://www.iep.utm.edu/hadot/">Pierre Hadot</a> – of philosophy as ‘a way of life’ and a love of wisdom. That necessarily takes us beyond the narrowly ratiocinative and embraces the ‘mystical’. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;">Third, the medieval thinkers presented are considered on their own terms embracing but modifying Neoplatonism and not just as adapters of the ancient rationalists. In this sense, one might consider much of the volume to constitute medieval Abrahamic Neoplatonisms. And it deliberately marginalises the ‘analyticisation’ of medieval philosophy – which may constitute an obstacle for some to adopt this text. While it is possible to rehabilitate Neoplatonism for analytic philosophers - one thinks of the work of Lloyd Gerson, the late Anthony Lloyd, and Christopher Martin - it seems that the conceptualisation of the volume assumes an opposition between the analytic and the Neoplatonic. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Foltz gives the ‘innovative’ approach more precision. History is important even for philosophy and one needs to engage medieval philosophy for its philosophical questions and not as mere antiquarian artefacts. Descartes after all did not emerge <i>ex nihilo </i>(and his debt to Augustine in particular is well documented in an excellent monograph by <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/descartes-and-augustine/BCBD67CEA3700A0C9BC173ED5D4494DA">Stephen Menn</a>). </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The volume covers four traditions: the Latin West, the Greek East, the Jewish and the Islamic. The addition of the Byzantine is significant – and seen in the light of the separate embrace of it in Peter Adamson’s influential <i><a href="https://historyofphilosophy.net/">History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps</a> </i>podcast timely. These traditions are considered on their own terms and not as satellites of Latin scholasticism, and hence what is important for them is paramount; for example, Ibn Rushd or Averroes is a pivotal figure for Latin Aristotelianism but not so for the Islamic medieval tradition and hence, unlike other readers, does not take up too much space. Mystics are also included – and since the sense of wisdom or its pursuit in these four traditions tends to embrace them, that is perfectly reasonable. Besides, one may already query the neat distinction that us moderns make between the rational and the mystical since what counts is the nature of discourse and argument and not merely the mode of language or particular logical form of argument. Knowledge is thus linked to spiritual exercise and practice. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Foltz goes on to emphasise four points. First, one needs to reintegrate the religious into the philosophical. Denying religion makes it difficult to follow the motivations, contexts and even content of various types of argument. Second, theistic philosophy in the middle period followed Neoplatonisms in its pursuit of spiritual exercises and, ways of life and care of the self – Foltz explicitly cites the importance of Hadot and Foucault for this process (and one cannot help feel that <a href="http://www.nupress.northwestern.edu/content/foucaults-askesis-0">McGushin</a>’s excellent study of <i>askesis </i>in Foucault would be a useful prop to this point). </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Third, by multicultural the editors indicate the present context and realise that the four traditions are indeed living ones and not merely historical epochs superseded by modernist concerns. Decolonisation – not explicitly cited – seems to be part of the reason too in the general editor’s disavowal of the Western model of ‘cultural assimilation’. Or perhaps my decolonising assumption are reading too much in. What is required is position recognition without condescension and analysis of theistic thought without the secular bias. And whether one can use the colonisers' language and categories to decolonise (finding a new philosophical lexicon on the terms of the texts themselves can be a task since they already use the paradigms and concepts of the Aristotelian tradition even when avowedly anti-Aristotelian). Finally, the editors seek readers who are not just philosophers or historians of philosophy but also practitioners of the four traditions which in the light of the modern academic study of the field is realistic and preferable. After all, we tend to think about how we can take academic research beyond the narrow confines of the academy and consider carefully the identity of the ‘general reader’. In these terms, these are laudable intentions and ones that are consistent with the shift towards global philosophy that radically decentres the hegemony of the Anglo-American analytic tradition and proclaims a decolonisation of the field. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The practice of the volume is divided into five parts. While quibbling about lacunae is not always that important, I will mention passages and works that are important for the themes outlined. The first is on the ancient with the emphasis on the ‘spiritual’ which explains the Platonic and Neoplatonic (Plotinus and Proclus). Godlikeness or <i>theosis </i>is a major theme and aim of philosophy but the relevant passages in the <i>Theaetetus</i>, <i>Timaeus</i>or <i>Phaedrus </i>are not included. Nor is the account of the doffing metaphor of <i>Enneads </i>IV.8.1 of Plotinus, much beloved of mystics included. Pythagoras’ <i>Golden Verses </i>and their commentary by Iamblichus are similarly absent (in fact any work of Iamblichus). Given the importance of the <i>Theologia Aristotelis </i>and <i>Liber de Causis </i>(from the Plotinian and Proclean <i>corpora</i>) in Arabic and then in Latin, the absence of any corresponding passages is somewhat unfortunate. Aristotle remains critical but <i>De Anima III </i>and <i>Metaphysics Lambda </i>(again textual pericopes with a major influence on the medieval) are similarly lacunae. Nevertheless, the Stoic sense of the inner citadel and the practice of philosophy and the Neoplatonic metaphysics of emanation are well covered. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Part two on the Greek Christian tradition is far more adequate and covers pretty much all that one expects – and would be well supported in a class by the volumes on early Christian philosophy by <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/philosophy-of-early-christianity/1F018ACA43BC7C894F836469FFB73AFD">George Karamanolis</a> and on Byzantine philosophy by <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/byzantine-philosophy-and-its-ancient-sources-9780199269716">Katrina Ierodiakonou</a>. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">In particular, the passages selected demonstrate how theological language and mystical insight are significant for philosophy in that tradition. This part in itself is a major contribution to any reader in medieval philosophy. Part three on the Latin tradition is more predictable – the inclusion of Marguerite Porete, Nicholas of Cusa and Meister Eckhart essential. Perhaps some Julian of Norwich or the Cloud of Unknowing and maybe even some Pseudo-Dionisius might have been salient? Part four on the Jewish tradition adds some Talmudic, Rabbinic and Midrashic material to the standard canon: but again, no Nahmanides, no David Maimonides, no Joseph Albo and no Hasday Crescas. Furthermore, it is odd that the category of Jewish philosophy still alludes those who wrote in Arabic like the Karaite authors, Abūʾl-Barakāt al-Baghdādī and Ibn Kammūna. The final part on the Islamic tradition does exactly what it should – start with the Theologia Aristotelis and its doffing metaphor and include Ibn Ṭufayl, Ibn ʿArabī and Mullā Ṣadrā. Averroes is appropriately marginalised – although one would wish to see passages from the commentary on the <i>Rhetoric </i>and the <i>Metaphysics </i>which was salient. For Avicenna, I would have also included latter parts of <i>Remarks and Admonitions (al-Ishārāt waʾl-tanbīhāt) </i>often called the ‘mysticism’. The final testament of the <i>Philosophy of Illumination (Ḥikmat al-ishrāq) </i>of Suhrawardī similarly on the practice of following a sage and on the spiritual practice of philosophy would be essential. Since the selections are based on existing translations, some of these lacunae are understandable but that does not hold for all of them. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The volume on the whole is to be recommended. It is reader friendly and one could easily design an undergraduate course with this as the main text – and then complement it with surveys and relevant histories. However, if one accepts the provincialisation of European cultural hegemony and even of periodisation – and reads medieval as a shorthand for the pre-modern – than maybe the absence of a more thorough going multicultural approach is telling. Why should one restrict philosophy to the Abrahamic traditions and the reception and development of ‘philosophia’ even if taken in the more expansive sense that embraces the theological and the mystical? Why not include African, Chinese, Indian and other philosophical traditions? Similarly, one wonders why a more thematic approach is not taken in order to juxtapose and bring the traditions into more of a conversation. As it stands the volume has five self-contained sections that could easily be taught in isolation, not necessarily in pursuit of comparative philosophy (which is not an avowed aim) but at least to allow us to consider how the arguments and discourse in this volume constitute the philosophical. At one level that is asking too much – and given the existing extent of translated materials unreasonable especially when it comes to Islamic thought. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman" , sans-serif;">The volume that I would like to see would engage these questions – and do more than that in introducing the categories of the philosophical, the spiritual and the medieval. One also wonders whether one can have a volume that satisfies the Hadotians as well as the analytic philosophers since the material of interest to the latter is rather limited. But that is not the book before me – and this particular publication still has much to commend itself, to be read, used and enjoyed. So adopt it as a text in classes. Unless you are in an analytic department in which the selection on the whole will seem rather crazy. It seems that the culture wars on what constitutes philosophy - and even how those in related fields conceive of philosophy - will remain ongoing for the foreseeable future. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-59080403043945600402019-06-28T04:00:00.002-07:002019-06-28T04:00:43.367-07:00The Fātimids again - and more material for the 'decolonising Islamic studies' dossier<div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Institute of Ismaili Studies has not only developed and accelerated academic research into Ismaili studies but has also it seems perfected a way of presenting Ismaili thought in an accessible manner (no doubt partly motivated by the desire to address their confessional community). In this light, two recent works have appeared from the Institute of Ismaili Studies that bring our attention back to the Fatimids, one through a volume located within the Ismaili heritage series and the other a first volume in a new series of accessible introduction in a small paperback format. In both volumes the diversity of Islam is stressed, and it is not surprising since the modern Ismaili focus has been to stress diversity to find a place for their traditions within Islam. Nevertheless, it does indicate an important insight that all theological affiliations and confessions within Islamic history always consider themselves as definitive and constitutive of the Islamic tradition. The language of sects and sectarianism thus in that sense is terribly impoverished and inadequate because it fails to understand the way in which an interpreter and religious entrepreneur considers their own agency and activity. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The short volume on the <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/the-fatimids-9781786731746/">Fatimids</a> by <a href="https://iis.ac.uk/people/dr-shainool-jiwa">Shainool Jiwa</a> (which is to be followed with another short introduction to the main Fatimid Imam-caliphs) is divided into five chapters that takes the story from the death of Muḥammad to the foundation of Cairo as the seat of the Fatimid caliphs. It is designed to be accessible: fluently written with copious citations of primary texts in translation, minimal endnotes, very simplified transliteration and an attempt to contextualise and link the study to its Mediterranean context and wider trends in the study of pre-modern empires (although perhaps because it is accessible, there is little consideration of the use of empire to describe the Fatimids and others). There are plenty of colour pictures of high quality which are great to see in a book that is priced also in a very accessible manner. Figures tabulate and explain relations such as the descent of the differing lines of Imams from Muḥammad, timelines and so forth. A useful glossary explains key phrases and a guide to further reading helps the potential student take their interests forward. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">In the introduction, Jiwa makes it clear how she sees the function of history: it helps us to grasp what it is that we share as part of the common human concern and it helps foster mutual understanding. This is very much history deployed for didactic and inter-subjective ethical ends. The global concern with Islam means that we need to appreciate the rich diversity of Islam of which the Fatimids were an element – a lasting empire in North Africa reaching into the Levant, at times Andalus and Sicily with a rich intellectual heritage. Chapter 1 on origins considers the narrative from the conflict at the death of Muḥammad, the development of Shiʿi lineages, the beginnings of the Ismaili mission with the grandson of Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq and the development of that mission among the Berbers and others in North Africa leading to the establishment of the rule of al-Mahdī at the beginning of the 10<sup>th</sup>century, the so-called Shiʿi century. The next chapter looks at the Mediterranean context and the development of the new state and establishes one key feature and theme: the constant problems of rebellions and the need to establish the legitimacy and authority of those who were confessionally a small minority in the context. It also shows the universal ambitions of the Fatimids, extending their rule to Sicily and their mission to Andalus and even to Sind. Jiwa is the best authority on these developments having translated the relevant section of Idrīs ʿImād al-Dīn and al-Maqrīzī’s general histories on the early establishment of the Fatimids. This chapter ends with the death of al-Mahdī in 934. Chapter 3 takes up the state in transition and the consolidation under al-Qāʾim and the key role of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān in establishing the theology and jurisprudence of the state. Chapter 4 is the intellectual core and looks at the development from al-Muʿizz, the composition of <i>al-Īḍāḥ </i>and <i>Daʿāʾim al-Islām </i>as key works of the tradition, the function of the <i>majālis al-ḥikma </i>to impart doctrine and spread the doctrine of the <i>walāya </i>of the Imam-caliphs, and the further expansions. The final chapter takes the story through to the foundation of Cairo as the centre of the empire. At each level, the relevant sources for our understanding are indicated – although perhaps the problems that one might face in analysing them elided. The uneasy relation with the Kutama Berbers is acknowledged but the relations with non-Ismailis examined in the last chapter through the guarantee of safety after the conquest of Cairo. The question remains how the Fatimids dealt with their Sunni, other Shiʿi, Jewish, Christian and other subjects. As an accessible work, it is a successful introduction to the establishment of the Fatimids and their doctrine and public rituals. There are some indications of their role in the diversity – but not much in the main text after the introduction. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Jiwa and Daftary volume on the <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/the-fatimid-caliphate-9781788311335/">Fatimid caliphate</a> is a collection of seven essays that originated in Fatimid panels at the annual MESA conference. As such they are loosely connected, although apart from the first chapter, they broadly concern the ways in which Fatimids engaged with others. The first chapter is a short and useful ‘official’ account of the Fatimids’ rise to power and their lineage back to the Prophet and early Islam. Jiwa’s chapter draws upon the well-known early attack on the claims to ʿAlid lineage of the Fatimids but refers to the common manifestoes of the 11<sup>th</sup>century in which the ʿAbbasid authorities drew upon Sunni and Shiʿi notables in Baghdad to delegitimise the Fatimids, and in the case of al-Sharīf al-Raḍī, to balance his own claims to authority and independence from the ʿAbbasids without an element of positivity towards the Fatimids. Jiwa shows that the manifesto of 402/1011 and 444/1052 tell us more about unrest in ʿAbbasid Iraq and concern for combatting the Fatimid threat. They also indicate ways in which states attempted to begin the process of regularity claims to lineage that later results in the institutions that verified ʿAlid descent in the middle period. Walker’s piece is like a short note on the meaning of the vizierate of Badr al-Jamālī (d. 487/1094) and seems to be here primarily because of his eminence as a Fatimid specialist. Calderini examines al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s position on women leading the prayer, inspired by contemporary debates on this issue nowadays and along the way she shows how Fatimid law is related to other Muslim schools. The conclusions are not terribly exciting or unexpected and underscore the importance of the development of Fatimid in relation to Sunni schools and a shift from earlier ‘pan-Shiʿi appeals’. Fierro’s learned study of the Mālikī critique of the Fatimids’ legal thought and structures by al-Ṭurṭūshī (d. 451/1059) tells us something about the Sunnis who are often neglected in the study of the Fatimid period. Most of the paper is a study of <i>al-Ḥawādith wa-l-bidaʿ </i>as a ‘covert critique’ of the Fatimids. Cortese extends this by studying Sunni female scholarship, re-inscribing women into history, and their role in Alexandria and Cairo. But this piece seems to be entirely divorced from any consideration of the Fatimid context – I would have wanted to know more about the women associated with court and whether there were famous missionaries. The final chapter is Beben’s study of the modern Nizārī usage of the legacy of the Fatimids. He argues that prior to the post-Safavid Nizārī emergence (especially through Nādir Shāh’s patronage of ʿAlī Ḥasan), the Nizārī referred primarily to the Alamūt period and remained firmly in <i>taqīya</i>. But with the modern period, the recognition of the importance of the Imam’s followers in Khurasan and India (that prompted the transfer of the imamate to Kirmān), the Imams began to draw upon the Fatimid heritage – one could add that the modern invocation and stress upon the Fatimids by modern Nizārī institutions such as the Institute of Ismaili Studies is a continuation of that process. As such, it recalls the notion of the Fatimids as representing a pan-Shiʿism and even a sort of pan-Islamism that is strategically useful in the modern world. In this sense, the Fatimids are imagined as the primary signifiers and embracers of diversity in Islam. <a href="https://iis.ac.uk/publication/first-aga-khan-memoirs-46th-ismaili-imam">Beben’s recent edition and translation of <i>ʿIbrat-afzā </i>is an important event</a> – although one needs to read it in terms of internal debates and critiques among followers and critics of the Agha Khan in Iran and India that so far has only really been a study of the British archive (by <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674066397">Teena Purohit</a> and others), and the sources in Persian, Gujarati and other languages broadly neglected. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Brill Roman", sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">These two books are quite different in their approach, presentation and content. But they both represent well the way in which modern Ismaili institutions and thought embraces and promotes the issue of diversity as a strategy for marking out a space for Ismaili activity within the context of Islam in the modern world. They demonstrate not only a strategy of survival and claims for inclusion but also the way in which different confessions make claims upon the Islamic traditions - and in that sense further the exigency to decolonise thoroughly Islamic studies. Some of the chapters of the volume may be of interest to specialists and the short introduction can be productively used in introductory courses and classes and may be of interest to the general reader. </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-51159092453462074892019-06-28T03:43:00.000-07:002019-06-28T03:43:28.536-07:00Early Ismaili Hermeneutics <div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">As I try to complete an old commission editing a volume of papers on Ismaili thought and thinkers (which hopefully should appear with Tauris/Bloomsbury and the IIS in the new year), I seem to move again back to an examination of different periods in the development of Ismaili doctrine and confessions. I have also recently supervised an excellent dissertation on Qāḍī Nuʿmān's hadith methodology that throws up much interesting methodological insights on understanding the development of Fāṭimid doctrines and genres of writing. </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">As most people in the study of Islam know, the Ismailis represent an esoteric approach to scripture and symbols of the faith and are particularly associated with a hermeneutics of <i>taʾwīl </i>par excellence as a means for establishing a dynamic and unfolding understanding of the faith. Despite this reputation, already articulated in studies by Corbin, Ivanow, and De Smet, the nature and purpose of <i>taʾwīl </i>as an allegoresis of scriptural exegesis is little understood and studied. <i>Taʾwīl </i>was essential to the early Ismaili <i>kerygma</i>/mission (<i>daʿwa</i>) and the means for the dissemination of the notion of salvation history and of salvific knowledge itself. The unconventional modes of this interpretation often led to the characterization of the Ismailis as socially radical and transgressive in their esotericism by particularly Sunni authorities such as, in perhaps the most famous case, al-Ghazālī (d. 1111) in his <i>Calumnies of the Esotericists </i>(<i>Faḍāʾiḥ al-bāṭinīya</i>). <a href="https://religion.uoregon.edu/profile/dbh/">David Hollenberg</a>'s monograph <i><a href="https://www.sc.edu/uscpress/books/2016/7678.html">Beyond the Qurʾān</a></i> focuses on the early Ismaili period in which the mission was active, dynamic, militant and sectarian in a conflictual manner and perhaps by implication an interesting question is when that the mission’s approach come to an end or radically transfigure after the Fāṭimid perod into the current notions of pluralism that dominate especially the modern Nizārī tradition. He presents a tightly argued five chapters and an epilogue (in a relatively short book) that attempts to reconsider how we make sense of <i>taʾwīl</i>by refocusing on three themes: the sectarianism of the dynamics of the mission, the apocaplyticism of it (especially in the pre-official Fāṭimid period), and the sources of allegoresis and the objectives of the mission. The main thrust is to argue that <i>taʾwīl </i>constitutes a ‘cognitive re-training’ and habituation into a sectarian identity. Recent research and publication of texts has tended to focus on the Fāṭimid and post-Fāṭimid period (especially in terms of the publications of the Institute of Ismaili Studies in London) and hence the early period has been somewhat neglected. Hollenberg attempts to rectify that and locates his study within the study of esotericisms and knowledge systems of hermeneutics in the study of religion in his preface; elsewhere he also draws on sociological theories. A more thorough introduction would have been useful to locate his contribution within Ismaili and Shiʿi studies more properly especially since he provides a number of correctives and objections to existing norms in Ismaili studies. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">[For other reviews of the same work, see</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.academia.edu/35872127/Review_Beyond_the_Qur%C4%81n_Early_Isma%CA%BF%C4%ABl%C4%AB_Ta%CA%BEw%C4%ABl_and_the_Secrets_of_the_Prophets_by_David_Hollenberg_Islam_and_Christian_Muslim_Relations"><span style="font-size: large;">Khalil Andani</span></a></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://brill.com/abstract/journals/ssr/3/1-2/article-p305_11.xml">Lisa Alexandrin</a>]</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Chapter one on competing islands of salvation distinguishes the Fāṭimid polity’s campaign and mission from the early Ismaili mission and locates the latter in a pan-ʿAlid rhetorical strategy aimed at converts (especially from Twelver Shiʿa and from Zaydīs as we know from some early works by Ibn al-Ḥaytham, Ibn al-Ḥawshab, and Jaʿfar b. Manṣūr al-Yaman). In a sense this is a literature review chapter that covers the development of Ismailism and criticizes the positions of a number of experts such as Daftary and Hodgson on sectarianism, Sanders and Bierman on Fāṭimid material culture and its integration into the mission, and Brett on the role of the Imam in the mission. He begins with a consideration of what is meant by the term <i>daʿwa </i>and how it ought to be associated with sectarian identity and often beliefs in esotericism, imminent messianism, gnosticism, and eschatology. Hollenberg presents the mission as a new religious movement. The focus on <i>taʾwīl</i> and the nature of the <i>daʿwa </i>helps to explain the different stages of splits within the ranks and attempts to change the direction of the <i>daʿwa </i>first under the Fāṭimids and then later with the two new branches of the Ṭayyibī and Nizārī missions. The early <i>daʿwa</i>’s broader appeal and its somewhat distant relationship to the Imam gave way to a narrower sectarianism. This, however, still begs the question – which we may not be able to answer in the absence of sources – of how that mission functioned and the absence of the active role of the Imam in articulating the learned culture of the Fāṭimids does not tell us what may have been happening before then. Furthermore it would be useful to show how the sectarianism and inculcation of the mission was similar to other sectarian movements including proto-Sunnism. It would be unfortunate if some readers took away from the study the idea of a new re-entrenched idea of the Ismailis as sectarians going against some developing Sunni normativity. In that sense, the formative world of Islam was the venue for competing islands of salvation, orthodoxy and apostasy. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Chapter two moves onto the <i>daʿwa </i>literature and its focus on <i>taʾwīl</i>. This literature is not really an esoteric hermeneutics of the Qurʾan but rather uses the scripture as a set of prompts to establish a more radical, gnostic doctrine that claims revealed status. As such <i>taʾwīl </i>should not – and this is contrary to the earlier work of Strothmann, Steigerwald and Bar-Asher – be assimilated into the general study of Qurʾanic exegesis or <i>tafsīr </i>but rather associated with the privileged knowledge of the Imams as bearers of truth, as the holders and professors of <i>taʾwīl</i> as opposed to the Prophet’s role as bearer of the revelation (<i>tanzīl</i>). It is that esoteric truth revealed by the Imams that is deployed in <i>taʾwīl</i>. Thus <i>taʾwīl </i>is not the esoteric other of <i>tafsīr </i>but of <i>tanzīl </i>and brings to mind the narration famous in Shiʿi circles in which the Prophet addressed ʿAlī stating that just as he fought for the revelation so will ʿAlī fight for the <i>taʾwīl</i>. It is then the role of the missionaries to use rhetoric including devices of <i>taʾwīl </i>to disseminate that esoteric truth. Hollenberg then considers the sources that he is using and acknowledges the problem of ascertaining authorship partly because so little is known about the authors of what the later Ṭayyibī tradition calls <i>ḥaqāʾiq </i>literature. His periodization into pre- and Fāṭimid works makes sense; however, it is not clear how he establishes and authenticates the attribution of a text, not least because of uncertain manuscript provenances and the relatively modern copying and survival of codices. For example, the <i>Kitāb al-kashf </i>and other works that are highly lettrist and occult in content are allocated to the pre-Fāṭimid period and unlike the previous specialists are anonymized and not attributed to Jaʿfar al-Manṣūr al-Yaman (although no strong reason is given for rejecting the previous attribution). What is interesting about the early <i>taʾwīl </i>texts is that there is a strong overlap with Nuṣayrī and similar material which begs the question of how we understand the milieu whence the Ismailis emerged. Hollenberg notes this connection but does not take it further. In that sense, it would be useful to compare his findings with recent work in that tradition by <a href="https://brill.com/view/title/15250?lang=en">Yaron Friedman</a>, <a href="https://dataspace.princeton.edu/jspui/handle/88435/dsp01nc580m69v">Bella Tendler</a> and <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/in/controversies-in-formative-shii-islam-9781786732026/">Mushegh Asatryan</a>. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Chapter three examines the ways in which <i>taʾwīl </i>constitutes a cognitive re-training through symbols, patterns, and logics of that material. The ‘rearing’ of acolytes is through the appeal to these elements in the work of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān and Jaʿfar b. Manṣūr al-Yaman. This process undergoes stages: the first is the recognition of the Imam in a series of <i>anagnorisis</i> events (briefly studied before by <a href="https://as.nyu.edu/content/nyu-as/as/faculty/philip-kennedy.html">Philip Kennedy</a> with respect to the work of Ibn Ḥawshab); the second is the pledging of allegiance as the rebirth of the acolyte; the third is the imparting of the knowledge of the <i>daʿwa</i>; the fourth is the repetition and inculcation of that knowledge through training in the symbols; the final one is the rearing in the logic of the <i>daʿwa</i>. This is then followed by some examples of the prophets. One thinks of cognate examples in the exegesis of al-Shahrastānī (d. 1153) which deals with binary pairs: the one that ends this chapter is the coupling of the familiar with the obscure, that partly accounts for the early Ismaili embrace of Neoplatonism as a rhetorical strategy. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Chapter four moves on to the practice of Jaʿfar b. Manṣūr al-Yaman in his <i>taʾwīl </i>of prophecy in the Qurʾan and beyond it. This chapters engages the enunciator prophets and the establishment of laws and religious dispensations. The difference to some other forms of esotericism in Islam is that the composition of those religious dispensations and laws is tied to the agency of the Prophet and not just something given in revelation. Hollenberg also makes an interesting observation about the incorporation of philosophical elements into the work of Jaʿfar b. Manṣūr as part of a strategy of debating in the East and critiquing some of the missionaries there who remained with the old mission (<i>contra </i>the Fāṭimids); the example given is the creation of Adam and its assimilation to the theory of emanation. The examples of Noah, Moses, Jesus and Muḥammad are also considered. The key point is that this articulation of the law and those who oppose it is a critique of those who failed to recognise the Fāṭimid Imam and hence rejected the previous prophets. Previous religious dispensations are abrogated and the corrupted scriptures recovered through the skill of the Imam to ascertain the esoteric truths. The final chapter continues the examination of the hermeneutics of Jaʿfar b. Manṣūr al-Yaman and this time considers the Biblical and Israelite material to establish types and anti-types. What Hollenberg shows – and I would contend that this was true generally of Shiʿi strategies of the text – was that the usage of the Torah was not merely the extrapolation of Israelite materials in order to gloss and fill in the narratives of the Biblical prophets (as was often the case in Sunni exegetical contexts), but constituted an act of <i>taʾwīl </i>in which the Torah was used just like the Qurʾan. The notion of cyclical time and the repetition of types and anti-types suggested that in the Torah were plenty of examples that spoke to the nature of a <i>daʿwa</i>, the role of an enunciating Prophet and Imam and the ways in which their mission was obstructed and thwarted and even their scriptures tampered. It was the role of <i>taʾwīl </i>to bring out the significance of those account and ascertain the truth. As Hollenberg correctly notes, this could be possible because that strategy was already used by Imāmī authors in Kufa and elsewhere before the Fāṭimid <i>daʿwa</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">The short final epilogue raises an interesting connection between the <i>daʿwa</i>, apocalypticism and imperialism. He connects his findings on the Ismaili mission and its transformation from an ‘imminent’ apocalypticism to an ‘immanent’ and otherworldly (one might say routinized and institutionalized) apocolypticism to recent scholarship on the ʿAbbasids and indeed on the early modern messianic empires of the Timurids, Ottomans and Safavids. In doing so, he suggests that we need to go beyond our archetypes of scholars of the past with whom we are primarily concerned, with the jurists, the belles-lettrists, the philosophers and the Sufis and consider a critical fifth category of politically and socially active thinker and esotericist the <i>dāʿī</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;">Hollenberg presents us, in this rather brief argument, with a radically distinct approach to the Ismaili </span><i style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;">kerygma</i><span style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;"> that forces us not to fall back onto platitudes such as defining it as esotericist, counter-cultural or occult but actually demands of us the need to ask: esoteric in what sense, or glossing the text in what way? That is indeed the very question - and defining the esoteric almost by definition is wrought with problems and hermeneutical problems.The absence of the texts and a clear notion of their provenance for the early period makes this difficult to understand. What is clear is that he presents us with certain starting points, and from there we need to locate this early <i>kerygma</i> within other esoteric and Shiʿi strategies in the early period that will help us to distinguish between Imāmīs, Ismailis and Nuṣayrīs. In that sense, </span><i style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;">Beyond the Qurʾan </i><span style="font-family: Brill, sans-serif;">is really one of the best recent contributions, from the perspective of the study of religion with its strengths and weaknesses, of early Shiʿi intellectual history. <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-88075343917356065092018-09-30T10:18:00.001-07:002018-09-30T10:45:09.876-07:00Open to Reason? The Critical Intellectual Tradition of Islam <span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://french.columbia.edu/content/souleymane-bachir-diagne">Souleymane Bachir Diagne</a>, a Muslim philosopher at Columbia University, has just published a short work on what it means to philosophise in Islam, tracing the intellectual history of Muslim critical engagement with texts and ideas both within and without the traditions of Islam. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><i><a href="https://cup.columbia.edu/book/open-to-reason/9780231185462">Open to Reason</a></i> is a short work comprising ten chapters on contemporary philosophy that draws upon an expansive notion of what philosophy is by including Sufi and theological themes. It also engages in history for the present, to make sense of why we should study the history of philosophy not as an antiquarian enterprise but as a way to make sense of our language of the problematics and to find paths and methods of untying the knots, the aporiai of the present. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Diagne has already written quite a bit on the modern Muslim existentialist (and arguably personalist following Henri Bergson) Muḥammad Iqbāl. His work on <a href="https://livre.fnac.com/a1145698/Souleymane-Bachir-Diagne-Islam-et-societe-ouverte">Iqbāl and the open society</a> and on Iqbāl and Senghor as postcolonial deployments of Bergson have been around for a while. This present work is a translation of <i>Comment philosopher en islam?</i> which came out first around ten years ago. Another comparative recent work in French looks at the philosophical enterprise in Islam and Christianity, and he is also very much at the forefront of the study of African philosophy and how artistic expression can be philosophical. Peter Adamson's now famous podcast will be interviewing him soon and the series on <a href="https://historyofphilosophy.net/subsaharan-islam">Africana philosophy</a> seems quite influenced by him. I'm very much looking forward to that, especially since Ousmane Kane's <i><a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674050822">Beyond Timbuktu</a></i> was just so very disappointing as an intellectual history. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The chapters are broadly historical but with a clear view to understanding the central relationship between religion and philosophy, between the person and society, between the rational and the mystical, between the individual and the state among others. To an extent, I can see how it might be useful to read this in conversation with Sari Nusseibeh's recent book <i><a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=23071">The Story of Reason in Islam</a></i>, even while the approach is quite different, perhaps at one level that continental versus the analytic tradition, to be quite grossly simplistic about it. The first chapter begins with the passing of the Prophet (and perhaps the simple idea of the passing of unquestioning authority) and finding the role of reason in the nascent religious tradition. He sees in Muʿtazilism a desire to make sense of the cosmos, to find a universal rational grammar (as one finds in the famous debate between Ṣīrāfī and Abū Bishr on logic versus grammar), and to enthrone the God of reason. He then sees in Ashʿarism a desire to dethrone the purely rational God in favour of a spiritual and more personal deity. The key point is that the debate on reason still resonates with us today - although he does not use the language of competing rationalities and is broadly not concerned with the language of relativism either. The next chapter looks at the Ṣīrafi and Abū Bishr debate in more detail and sees a tension between the need to keep open the exigencies and possibilities of reason against a desire for closure and completion. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The third chapter turns to Avicenna, in whom Diagne correctly in my opinion sees the first coming to age of Islamic philosophy and understanding what makes philosophy Islamic. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">As one expects, the next chapter looks at the response - although it is somewhat disappointing for Diagne to continue the narrative of a Ghazālī opposed to philosophical reasoning. But Ghazālī as a pluralist is there in his <i>Fayṣal al-tafriqa</i> to which he returns in the final chapter and there is a certain paradox in the philosophical rejection of a certain type of speculative metaphysics. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">He next turns to ecology and Ibn Ṭufayl and the famous question of how one might encounter truth and whether one can know philosophical and moral truths isolated from the social context of our embodiment. Ibn Rushd is used to indicate the potential obligation to philosophise and while Diagne recognises that his death does not usher in the end of philosophy, he is somewhat wrong in the old fashioned idea that philosophy only continues in the Iranian - and Shiʿi - East because it is wedded to imamology. Indeed the creativity of the poles of <i>wujūd</i> and <i>walāya</i> are central to that later Eastern tradition. But it would be wrong to ignore the persistence of traditions of rationality in the Sunni East, especially in India at the same time. But Diagne's work does demonstrate once again how it is difficult if not impossible to write a non-sectarian history.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Diagne then skips to ʿAbduh and Afghānī as an enlightenment turn back to reason, in response to refute Renan. The oblivion of what happens between Ibn Rushd and Afghānī is a problem. He sees in ʿAbduh a certain type of reformist modernity: an embrace of modernity but not as a narrowly European modernity but an alternative modernity, sees modernity as 'the daughter of Islam', and searches for a reconstruction of the meaning of religion. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The penultimate chapter is on Iqbāl, a thinker whom he has engaged already and the final chapter on pluralism as the contemporary moment and space of Islamic philosophy open to reason and possibility, drawing upon Ghazālī and Sufi traditions of West Africa. What is perhaps disappointing is that there is little explicit explanation of what sorts of contemporary encounters Islamic philosophy needs in the present. Should one engage on the ground of the person or of existentialism? Or the analytic method? Or poesis? Or mysticism? How does one see philosophy in the modern world? He sees his book as a prompt to thinking about how one might do philosophy in the present Muslim world. However, there is a certain limitation in what is being proposed. Francophone African Muslim countries inherited the role of the teaching of philosophy in schools - not the case in the anglophone. And maybe this indicates the impossibility of the universal label of an Islamic philosophy in the present. That is precisely the point. Instead of our desire at times to find our Kant, our Wittgenstein, our Aristotle, we need to embrace a proper pluralism in which we recognise that philosophising is always made in the image of the seeker and we are different persons across the globe. History consists of the moments of understanding whence possibilities arise and which options were taken and might not have. The future of Islamic philosophy therefore will rest with Islamic philosophies. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-50954653660560634512018-09-29T05:06:00.003-07:002018-09-29T05:06:51.375-07:00Polemics and Rational Discourse: Sayyid Nūr Allāh Shūshtarī (d. 1610) in Iran and India<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Earlier in the week, I was speaking in Leiden on Qāḍī Nūr Allāh Shūshtarī (exe. 1610), the famous theologian from the Iraqi borderlands (and relative of the late <i>marjaʿ </i>Sayyid Shihāb al-Dīn Marʿashī who edited his works). </span><div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">My argument was to show that his polemics defending Shiʿi beliefs - and responding to some particularly harsh anti-Shiʿi polemics produced in the Ottoman and Central Asian lands - was designed to console believers, defend the faith and decisively defeat opponents, all while speaking truth to power. Once again it shows that the nature of religious polemics are to demonstrate that they address the co-religionists as much as the opponents. It also demonstrates that we should not consider polemics to be the other of rational discourse; rather, philosophical and theological formations often involve the articulation of one's ideas through their opposition to the other. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The Ottoman-Safavid conflict that was part of the fabric of the disintegrating Timurid dispensations in Persianate lands in the sixteenth century led to a new round of quite bitter religious polemics as a discursive consolation and prop to the clashes of weapons on the battlefield. This round of the battle of words was harshly initiated by fatwās issued in Ottoman lands and in the Uzbek Shībanid khanate anathemising the Shiʿa as dangerous heretics whose blood was licit. Perhaps the most significant theologian to respond on the Shiʿi side, and one who looked across the history of such polemics and wrote three voluminous, practically decisive, defensive polemics to support his fellow believers and attack Sunni polemicists was Sayyid Nūr Allāh Shūshtarī (exe. 1610). A scion of an eminent sayyid scholarly lineage from the borderlands of the Ottoman and Safavid Empires in southern Iraq, his training brought together a thorough grounding in Shiʿi systematic theology, philosophy, law and legal theory, nurtured by teachers whose intellectual lineage traced back to the philosophers of Shiraz. His life was punctuated by the conflict in the West and in the East. He moved to the Safavid courts from lands precariously close to Ottoman control and when in Mashhad was acutely aware of the threat from the Uzbeks. The instability of the period after the death of Shah Ṭāhmasb convinced him of the need to flee to India where he attained the favour of the Mughal ruler Akbar and was appointed as a judge in Agra and then Lahore. </span><div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Importantly, Shūshtarī rejected the practice of <i>taqīya</i> in his time and recognised the freedom that he has at the court of Akbar. In a letter to his friend - and Shaykh al-Islām of Isfahan - Bahāʾ al-Dīn al-ʿĀmilī, he wrote: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">After traversing long distances and undergoing considerable pains and agony, I reached the Indian capital. There, fortune favoured me, and I obtained an opportunity to benefit from the luminous sun and found repose under the shadow of the great Sultan, Akbar…</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">Through divine grace and blessings, I obtained a lofty position and the honour of the companionship of the emperor…[whose] patronage and favours increase daily. In fact my success is due to divine munificence and the benevolence of the Prophet and the friend of God, ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib. The high position and nearness to the Emperor did not, however, make me forgetful of myself. I was always conscious of the hereafter and of the ultimate end of mortal beings. In refuting the arguments and the rationale of the <i>Nawāṣib</i>[anti-Shiʿi Sunnis], I was guided by the holy traditions of my ancestors. In these circumstances, I came to the conclusion that in India, <i>taqiyya </i>was a great calamity. It would expel out children from the Imāmīya faith and make them embrace the false Ashʿarī or Mātūrīdi faiths. Reinforced by the kindness and the bounty of the Sultan, I cast off the mantle of <i>taqīya</i>from my shoulders and, taking with me an army of arguments, I plunged myself into <i>jihād</i>against the Sunni ʿulamāʾ of this country. I was convinced that active religious polemics and discussions against the Sunni ʿulamāʾ was the <i>jihād </i>which would make the best provision for the world hereafter. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">First of all, I wrote <i>Maṣāʾib al-nawāṣib </i>which refutes the <i>Nawāqiḍ al-rawāfiḍ</i>. My arguments in that book smeared the beard of the author of the <i>Nawāqiḍ </i>with filth. Then I wrote <i>al-Ṣawārim al-muhriqa</i>. Because of my book the bitter attacks by the author of the <i>Sawāʾiq </i>on the Shīʿīs rebounded upon him and reduced the <i>Sawāʾiq</i>, which claimed to be lightening to ashes. God also gave me the strength to perform other deeds.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">And he did write other works, not least the voluminous <i>Iḥqāq al-ḥaqq wa-izhāq al-bāṭil</i>, which critiqued not only Sunnī attacks on Shiʿi imamology but also positions in theology such as divine agency and human responsibility, the problem of prophetic inerrancy, and other questions in theological metaphysics and epistemology. However, the situation was changing and the death of his friends at court and of Akbar, and the uncertainty of the early years of Jahangir's reign made his situation precarious. Already in 1603, he again wrote to his friend Bahāʾ al-Dīn:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">For some time, fortune has deprived me of its favours. The mean and wretched India has caused me unbearable pain and shock. Not only has the Sultan ended his patronage and benevolence towards me, but he has closed the doors of my departure to Khurāsān and Iraq. When the tyranny and oppressions against me began to mount and the sufferings and anguish stepped up I began to imagine India (Hind) was the same Hind (bint ʿUtba) who ate the liver of my great uncle Ḥamza (ibn Muṭṭalib)</span></div>
Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-78041770943982185372018-09-29T04:35:00.000-07:002018-09-29T08:33:31.605-07:00Philosophy after Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī: The Case of Dabīrān Kātibī Qazwīnī (d. 1277)<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.idefix.com/kitap/fahreddin-razi-sonrasi-metafizik-dusunce-katibi-ornegi/mustakim-arici/felsefe/felsefe-bilimi/urunno=0000000666443">Mustakim Arici</a>, on the faculty at Theology in Marmara University in Istanbul, has written a highly useful study of philosophy in the middle period with a focus on the work of Najm al-Dīn Abū-l-Ḥasan ʿAlī b. ʿUmar Dabīrān Kātibī Qazwīnī (d. 675/1277), perhaps best known for his logical primer,<i> al-Risāla al-Shamsīya</i>. On a visit to Istanbul a couple of years ago, I was pleasantly surprised by the author who presented me a copy. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The work is divided into five chapters. The first is a life and works, and an intellectual history of the philosopher. Kātibī's main teacher was the prominent Avicennian Athīr al-Dīn al-Abharī (d. 663/1264), author of the influential <i>Hidāyat al-Ḥikma</i> (commented by Mīr Ḥusayn Maybudī and Mullā Ṣadrā and copiously glossed especially in India). His <i>Zubdat al-ḥaqāʾiq</i> has yet to be published - there is an excellent manuscript in Oxford. Kātibī lived in arguably a golden age of Islamic philosophy: his contemporaries included the logician Afḍal al-Dīn al-Khunajī (d. 646/1248) author of <i><a href="https://scholar.harvard.edu/khaled_elrouayheb/publications/kashf-al-asrar-ghawamid-al-afkar-afdal-al-din-al-khunaji-d1248">Kashf al-asrār</a></i>, Sirāj al-Dīn Urmawī (d. 682/1283) author of <i>Laṭāʾif al-ḥikma</i>, the polymath Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī (d. 672/1274), perhaps the main conduit for a majoritarian reading of Avicennian metaphysics, <a href="http://www.mazdapublishers.com/book/science-of-the-cosmos-and-the-soul">Shams al-Dīn Samarqandī</a> (d. 702/1303) whose <i>Qisṭās al-afkār </i>and <i>Ishkāl al-taʾsīs</i> have been published recently, and <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=3OppTioUPy4C&pg=PA7&lpg=PA7&dq=schmidtke+and+pourjavady+ibn+kammuna&source=bl&ots=VIUCeCteUi&sig=8ornwuAjw4VVEnIMptr8MsCW7vk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi25KHzh-DdAhUGeMAKHbh6B5AQ6AEwAHoECAUQAQ#v=onepage&q=schmidtke%20and%20pourjavady%20ibn%20kammuna&f=false">Ibn Kammūna</a> (d. 683/1284), a rather independent minded thinker who glossed the works of Suhrawardī. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Kātibī's students included major thinkers of the next generation such as Quṭb al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī (d. 710/1311), best known for his commentary on <i>Ḥikmat al-ishrāq</i> of Suhrawardī, and the Imāmī theologian Ibn al-Muṭahhar al-Ḥillī (d. 726/1325), whose <i>Kashf al-murād</i> was a major commentary on Ṭūsī's influential theological primer <i>Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād, </i>and author of a critical gloss on the <i>Shamsīya</i> as well as an original work on a cycle of philosophy entitled <i>al-Asrār al-khafīya</i>. Kātibī wrote a number of works in logic but the best known is his <i>Risāla Shamsīya</i> (although he also wrote a gloss on his teacher's <i>Kashf al-asrār </i>-MS Carullah 1418). <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=asBLDQAAQBAJ&pg=PT519&lpg=PT519&dq=tony+street+transaltion+of+shamsiyya&source=bl&ots=iRWg1u3dpX&sig=aoccY4m8yPEuzVKP1yFi5ImlKD0&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi_iIDYieDdAhVIAsAKHa6_COsQ6AEwBXoECAQQAQ#v=onepage&q=tony%20street%20transaltion%20of%20shamsiyya&f=false">Tony Street</a> at Cambridge has a translation of the text (there is also a classical one by <a href="https://www.academia.edu/9369715/Sprengers_translation_of_the_Shamsiyya">Aloys Sprenger</a>). In philosophy, Kātibī's best known work is <i>Ḥikmat al-ʿayn</i>, divided into two sections on metaphysics and natural philosophy (like the <i>Hidāyat al-ḥikma</i>). He also wrote two commentaries on works of Rāzī: <i>al-Munaṣṣaṣ fī sharḥ al-mulakhkhaṣ </i>(he refers to MS Şehit Ali Paşa 1680), and <i>al-Mufaṣṣal fī sharḥ al-muḥaṣṣal </i>(MS Suleymaniye 782). Another work is his commentary on Abharī's <i>Kashf al-ḥaqāʾiq </i>(MS Carullah 1351). There are a number of commentaries and glosses on <i>Ḥikmat al-ʿayn</i> beginning with <i>Kitāb al-fawāʾid fī sharḥ Ḥikmat ʿayn al-qawāʿid </i>of Quṭb al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī (a good manuscript is Veliyuddin Efendi 3399 in Istanbul), <i>Īḍāh al-maqāṣid min ḥikmat ʿayn al-qawāʿid</i> of al-Ḥillī (edited by ʿAlī-Naqī Munzavī and published in Tehran in 1959), and <i>Sharḥ Ḥikmat al-ʿayn</i> of Mīrak b. Mubārak Shāh Bukhārī (fl. 784/1382, ed. Jaʿfar Zāhidī and published in Mashhad in 1976), on whose commentary there are plenty of important glosses by al-Sharīf ʿAlī al-Jurjānī (d. 816/1413), Shams al-Dīn Khafrī (d. 957/1550), Ghiyāth al-Dīn Dashtakī (d. 949/1542), Mirzājān Bāghnawī Shīrāzī (d. 994/1586 - his gloss on the metaphysics has been edited by ʿAlī Ḥaydarī Yusāvilī and published in Qum by Majmaʿ-yi zakhāʾir-i islāmī in 2012) and ʿAbd al-Ḥakīm Siyālkutī (d. 1067/1656) (as well as many other Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal philosophers). Most of the later 'super-glosses' are on Jurjānī, Khafrī, and Bāghnawī.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Arinci provides this useful picture to show Kātibī and his connections: </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The second is an analysis of what it means to argue that metaphysics is a science and how it relates to logic. It includes an analysis of the different structures of philosophical works. Again Arinci provides two useful comparative tables on works of Avicenna and after:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The third chapter is a study of the ontology (<i>umūr ʿāmma</i>) and considers particular issues such as the nature of being (<i>wujūd</i>, varlik in Turkish), of essence (<i>māhīya</i>), unity and multiplicity, necessity and possibility (the modalities), creation and eternity (<i>ḥudūth</i>, <i>qidam</i>), and the nature of causality (<i>ʿillīya</i>). Here he has a comparative table on the contents of ontology:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The fourth chapter considers divine agency and the problem of the creation of the cosmos (and whether it is eternal - the theory of emanation). The final chapter analyses the human self and the rational soul. The main point to gauge is the extent to which Kātibī's positions are influenced by Rāzī and respond to Ṭusī. There is then an appendix on two important cycles of works initiated by Kātibī: the <i>Shamsīya</i>, and the <i>Ḥikmat al-ʿayn</i>. </span></div>
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-3309501537530636732018-07-17T16:09:00.000-07:002018-07-17T16:13:28.060-07:00The life of the mind in contemporary Iran<span style="font-size: large;">Read alongside the recent interventions in modern Iranian intellectual history by <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520254473/who-is-knowledgeable-is-strong">Cyrus Schayegh</a>, <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/titles/11335.html">Alireza Doostdar</a> on the metaphysical and the occult, and <a href="https://www.sc.edu/uscpress/books/2017/7808.html">Ata Anzali</a> on the rise of the category of the 'mystical' (which I had the pleasure of reading for the press and endorsing in a blurb), Hossein Kamaly's new book <i><a href="https://cup.columbia.edu/book/god-and-man-in-tehran/9780231176828">God and Man in Tehran</a></i> represents a major event that should be and can be read profitably by those wishing to make sense of the intellectual roots of modern Iran as well as working through the dynamics and complexities of the Safavid period. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large; text-align: start;">What is at stake is making sense of the visions of theology in the modern period, along the spectrum from atheologies to the most forthright political theology of absolutist notions of sovereignty. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">In seven chapters, Kamaly takes us along this spectrum from the Qajar period to revolutionary Iran, considering the impact of the sciences upon 'mediatory theology', the teaching of philosophy within and without the madraseh, the transformations in Sufism (both of the more official orders and informal networks and apparatuses), and a whole range of reformist thought within Islam. Along this journey, Kamaly introduces many an intellectual to us, unknown on the whole expect to those who read the sources and understand the more intellectual milieu in Persian well. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">That it is centred on Tehran is significant, because it is the city and the centre that since the Qajar period has taken over from Isfahan as the intellectual core of Iran and the central place in Iranian intellectual history. Chapter 3, although not actually on Khomeini, nevertheless helps us to understand Khomeini far better than much of what is published on him. Chapter 4 explains the lasting allure of uṣūlī Shiʿism. Chapter 5 analyses the reasons why madraseh philosophy embraced Mullā Ṣadrā and promoted his thought. In that chapter, Hādī Najmābādī (d. 1902) is discussed, a figure who would be worth a dissertation - perhaps alongside his contemporary, a real mover and shaker of the seminary (and a leading beneficiary of financial corruption within it) Āqā Najafī. This chapter also shows some of the keys links between the seminary and the study of philosophy in the new Tehran University (and it is no accident that the old Sepahsalar madraseh was at least for a time the theology and philosophy faculty of the new university). Chapter 6 deals with the Sufis orders and <i>ʿerfān</i> - the only element that could take the argument further would be the ways in which the latter is contested in post-revolutionary Iran in the public and private spheres associated with the legacies of Ṭabāṭabāʾī and others in his circle. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The final chapter hints at the links between skepticism and the reformists and winks at the older tradition of the <i>rind</i> in Ḥāfeẓ - but it is far too short. If it is a conclusion, one would want more. The book on the whole is a series of wonderful vignettes that in effect table a whole gamut of research questions that eager graduate students should take forward. This does not detract from its value as a snapshot of the various modes of understanding 'theologies' in modern Iran centred on Tehran. As a work it is also an expression of the culture of modern Tehran, at once at home with poetry and the literary greats as well as the philosophy and theology of Persian Islam. </span></div>
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Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-44798671958878902562018-07-17T15:08:00.000-07:002018-07-17T15:16:18.557-07:00Whatever happened to the school of Isfahan? <span style="font-size: large;">I do not normally like using the concept of the school of Isfahan, not least because as I have argued in my entry on the subject in the <i><a href="http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/isfahan-school-of-philosophy">Encyclopaedia Iranica</a> </i>there was no such thing. However, the question of what happened to the study of philosophy in Isfahan after the supposed persecution of the late Safavid period and then the Afghan sack and occupation remains worthy of study, especially as many including myself have written about the revival of the <a href="https://brill.com/view/title/39352?format=HC">study of philosophy in Qajar Iran</a> with Mullā ʿAlī Nūrī (d. 1831), as I have discussed in a forthcoming article in a volume on Qajar philosophy edited by Reza Pourjavady, and with Mullā Hādī Sabzavārī (d. 1873), as I discussed in an article in <i><a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00210862.2011.569327">Iranian Studies</a></i> that is ultimately based on research I did over two decades ago. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">I attempt to fill in some of this gap in a new article that is out in a volume entitled <i><a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/crisis-collapse-militarism-and-civil-war-9780190250324?cc=gb&lang=en&">Crisis, Collapse, Militarism & Civil War: The History & Historiography of 18th Century Iran</a></i>, edited by my friend and colleague <a href="https://socialsciences.exeter.ac.uk/iais/staff/axworthy">Michael Axworthy</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">In this piece, I argue that this period, far from being devoid of philosophical inquiry and study, was flush with new centres for its study and new tendencies, perhaps not the best philosophers but ones who were critical with respect to the work of Mullā Ṣadrā. It took most of the century for people to contest his key metaphysical doctrines of the ontological priority of existence in reality (<i>aṣālat al-wujūd</i>), of the notion of flux in existence through the idea of motion in the category of substance (<i>ḥaraka jawharīya</i>), and the attempt to reconcile unity and multiplicity through the dynamic idea of the modulation of existence (<i>tashkīk al-wujūd</i>).</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Other insights from the study of the period include:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">1) The Avicennian school was one that took on the reading of Mīr Dāmād (d. 1631), such that his doctrine of perpetual creation (<i>ḥudūth dahrī</i>) became the dominant Avicennian approach to the question of the incipience of the cosmos.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">2) The interaction of Sufi metaphysics, especially the monism of the school of Ibn ʿArabī, and philosophy was creative: not only was <i>waḥdat al-wujūd</i> one of the most contested doctrines in the period, but the debates on the meaning of 'absolute existence' (<i>wujūd muṭlaq</i>) and the semantic range of existence (<i>wujūd</i>) continued into the modern period and extended the earlier debates that at least in their nascent form took place between Ṣadr al-Dīn al-Qūnawī and Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī in the 13th century. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">3) The shrine cities of Iraq were major centres for philosophical and mystical speculation - that may surprise those familiar with their more recent intellectual history. A fuller study of philosophy and mysticism in the shrine cities in the Safavid period and beyond is a clear desideratum and would make an excellent topic of research.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">4) The vogue of studying philosophy - or claiming to study and teach the <i>Metaphysics</i> of Avicenna for example of which there are at least 12 major sets of marginalia in the late 17th and 18th centuries - continued uncontested and unhindered and a further study of the memorials of ʿulema confirms that. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">5) Perhaps the thinkers of this period were not major ones who would necessarily enter into the canon of philosophy. Nevertheless, they were the ones who debated Avicenna and Mullā Ṣadrā and played a key role in producing the modern hegemony of Mullā Ṣadrā, about whom Hossein Kamaly argues in his recent book (about which more later) that it was MS's thought that was instrumentalised by philosophers and theologians as a defensible form of rational theology in the favour of the criticism of Christian missionaries and others in the intellectually divisive Qajar period - as Kamaly mentions (as I do in my Nūrī article forthcoming), Nūrī in his refutation of Henry Martyn (entitled significantly <i>Ḥujjat al-Islām</i>) makes much of the superior rationality of Islam with respect to the philosophical frailties of Christian missionaries. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-80440125445932782692018-02-04T12:15:00.001-08:002018-02-04T12:15:21.990-08:00The Ueberweg <span style="font-size: large;">In this age of handbooks, companions and encyclopaedias, the Ueberweg - or to give it its proper title <i><a href="https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grundriss_der_Geschichte_der_Philosophie">Grundriss der Geschichte der Philosophie</a></i> - is something quite different, a monument to slow, careful and 'objective' research. It is designed to be definitive, magisterial, authoritative and unbiased and to stand the test of time - and given the fact that we still do not have a good sense of the full course of the intellectual history of philosophy in the world of Islam, it will end up defining for a generation at least the outline of that story.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Four volumes are planned to cover the history of Islamic philosophy of which the first volume on the early period before Avicenna has appeared in <a href="http://shop.schwabe.ch/produktdetails/philosophie-in-der-islamischen-welt-4216/?cHash=3eac73faeb15ca41cf6428b312a5458e">German</a> as well as in <a href="http://www.brill.com/products/reference-work/philosophy-islamic-world">English</a> translation. There will also be online versions that may well be more comprehensive and updated by the authors. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The four volumes are:</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">1) 8th to 10th Century - already out </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">2) 10th to 12th Century - this will cover the critical period of Avicenna and includes the various initial responses including Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī - currently in final stages of editing </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">3) 13th to 18th Century - the high point of the post-classical period with a long (multi-authored) chapter on the 13th to the 15th century, a ground breaking piece on the history of logic by Khaled el-Rouayheb, philosophy in Shiraz from Jurjānī to Sammākī by Reza Pourjavady, myself on Safavid philosophy (Mīr Dāmād and his students, Mullā Ṣadrā and his students, Rajab ʿAlī Tabrīzī and his students, the Avicennian tradition, and the reception of Mullā Ṣadrā up to and including Mahdī Narāqī), Asad Ahmed and Renate Wursch on India, Sait Ozervali on Ottoman philosophy and so forth; this volume will probably not appear for around 5 years</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">4) 1800 to the present - this is the modern volume; I have a chapter on Avicennians and the critique of Mullā Ṣadrā in this volume - this is also in the editing stage</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">This will supplement and act as the foundation for students for some time to come adding to the existing resources that are critically important such as the <i>Cambridge Companion to Arabic Philosophy</i>, the <i>Oxford Handbook of Islamic Philosophy</i>, and the volume on Philosophy in the Islamic World as part of Peter Adamson's <i>the History of Philosophy without any gaps</i> podcast transcripts. </span><br />
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Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-49484271665141098702018-01-09T16:58:00.001-08:002018-01-09T17:00:19.131-08:00Mullā Ṣadrā on the esoteric <span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: large;">Not surprisingly, Mullā Ṣadrā has plenty to say about the practice of esotericism, about taʾwīl and the proper attitude one needs to take on the Qurʾan and how one ought to use one's sense perception and intellect to grasp realities. Consider the following:</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Know that the Qurʾan like the human is divided into what is enunciated (ʿalan) and what is held secret (sirr), and all of it has an exoteric and an esoteric aspect and the esoteric has a further esoteric aspect and so forth until the point where only God knows: ‘no one knows its meaning (taʾwīl) except God’ (Q. III.7. It is also related in the ḥādīth that ‘the Qurʾan has an exoteric and an esoteric aspect and its esoteric has another seven levels of esotericism’, which are like the levels that are esoteric in the human such as the soul (al-nafs), the heart (al-qalb), the intellect (al-ʿaql), the spirit (al-rūḥ), the secret (al-sirr), the hidden (al-khafī) and the most hidden (al-akhfā). </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">What is manifest from what is enunciated (ẓāhir ʿalanihi) is the sensible and tactile artifact and the rolled up scroll that is held, but what is hidden from what is enunciated is what the esoteric sense (al-ḥiss al-bāṭin) perceives and resembles what the reciters and the memorisers store from their perceptions in their imagination and its like. The inner sense cannot perceive the pure meaning but as it is mixed with corporeal accidents even if it seems to be devoid of the sensible. Estimation and imagination like the exoteric sense are not present in the absolutely pure esoteric meaning such as the absolute meaning of humanity but rather in a sense that is mixed in extra-mental reality with accretions and veils such as [the categories] of quantity and quality and place and position. If either of the two [estimation and imagination] attempted to picture the absolute meaning of humanity without an extrinsic element, they would not be able to do so but rather all they could do is affirm a limited form with attachments drawn from the external senses…</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">These two levels of the Qurʾan are earthly and evident to every human that perceives. However, its esoteric aspect and its secret are two levels for the afterlife and each of them has degrees:</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The first of the two is what the human spirit perceives through constituting it from the conception of meaning through definition and its essence, shorn of extrinsic properties, grasped by intelligible principles, such that it may be true of many, uniting in it opposites in unity. An example of this is that the human spirit cannot perceive what has not been stripped away from the stage of creation and shorn away the dust of the senses and not ascended to the stage of the command, since it is not a property of the sensible insofar as it is sensible to intellect just as it is not the property of the intellect to sense through a corporeal instrument. What is pictured through the senses is limited and specific to a place and a space and a time and a quantity and a quality. The intelligible essence cannot rest in what is discerned through the senses. The human spirit, rather, encounters true knowledge through an intelligible substance located in the world of the command, not located in a body, nor pictured through something internal to a sense or through estimation. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The senses and what pertains to them deploy themselves in the world of creation (ʿālam al-khalq) and the intellect deploys what is in it in the world of command (ʿālam al-amr) and what is above both creation and command is most beloved to them both. God the exalted said: It is a dignifying Qurʾan in a hidden book that none may touch save the purified, a revelation from the Lord of the worlds’ (Q. LVI.77–80). Remember that it has properties that have stages and stations, the highest of which is dignity with God, and the lowest is descended in the world. There is no doubt that the word of God qua his word before its descent to the world of command, that is the preserved table (al-lawḥ al-maḥfūẓ) and before its descent to the world of the heavens of the earth, and that is the tablet of effacement and affirmation (lawḥ al-maḥw wa-l-ithbāt) and the world of creation and determination (ʿālam al-khalq wa-l-taqdīr), has a degree that is above all stages that none of the prophets may perceive except in the station of union, by forgoing these two states of being and by reaching the ‘two bows length or less’ and setting aside the two worlds of creation and command. As the most excellent of the prophets, peace be with him and his progeny: I have a moment with my Lord to which none can attain, neither an angel brought close (malak muqarrab) nor a messenger commissioned (nabī mursal). </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The possessors of this stage is chosen to encounter the Qurʾan with respect to this stage, alluding to this stage in His word, the exalted: None knows its meaning save God and those rooted in knowledge (Q. III.7), and his saying: As for one whose heart God has expanded for submission, such that he is a light from his Lord (Q. XXXIX.22). And in the narration: There is a form of knowledge that is like a hidden thing that none know except the knowers of God. God alluded to the station of the heart and of the esoteric sense in his saying: Verily in that is a reminder to one who possesses a heart or harkens while he witnesses (Q. L.37), and in his saying: Had we listened or had we thought we would not be of the people of the blazing fire (Q. LXVII.10), and in his saying: Shelter him until he hears the word of God (Q. IX.6), and in his saying: There is none among us save that he has a known station (Q. XXXVII.164), alluding to the stations of knowers in the degrees of knowledge, as he said: We raise in degrees whom we will and above every possessor of knowledge is a knower (Q. XII.76), and his saying: Those are the messengers, we favoured some over others (Q. II.253), and his saying: God privileged some of you over others in sustenance (Q. XVI.71).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">In sum, the Qurʾan has degrees and levels just as the human has stages and stations. The lowest stage of the Qurʾan like the lowest stage for the human lies in its binding and cover just as the lowest degree of the human lies in its being a creature and passive. Every degree of it (the Qurʾan) has its bearers who memorise it and write it and they do not touch it except after purifying themselves from filth or from their incipience (ḥadathihim aw ḥudūthihim) and they sanctify it above attachment to their location or to their contingency (makānihim aw imkānihim). The husk of the human only pertains to the ink of the Qurʾan and its sensible form. The human of the exoteric husk cannot perceive but the outer meanings of the husk. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The spirit of the Qurʾan and its core and its secret can only be discerned by those who discern, and it cannot be grasped by knowledge acquired by learning and reflecting, but rather by knowledge from him (al-ʿulūm al-ladunnīya), and we aim to explain these forms of knowledge and establish them by demonstrations God willing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><br />The reality of wisdom can only come from knowledge that is from him, and if the soul does not reach that stage it cannot be wise since wisdom is a gift from God the exalted: ‘he gives wisdom to whom he wills and whoever has been given wisdom has been given a great good’ (Q. II.269), and they are the ones who have arrived at this stage.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><br />Know that since revelation (waḥī) has come to an end and the gate of messengership been closed, people no longer need messengers and the promulgation of the mission after the confirmation of the proof and the completion of the religion as God the exalted said: This day have I perfected for you your religion’ (Q. V.3).</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">The gate to inspiration is not closed and the support by the light of guidance has not been cut off since people – drowning as they are in these devilish whisperings – need warning and reminding but God has closed the gate to revelation (waḥī) and opened the gate to inspiration (ilhām) as a mercy from him to his creatures.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Mullā Ṣadrā, Mafātīḥ al-ghayb, I, 65-69.</span></div>
Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-80045311392032813092018-01-07T15:29:00.001-08:002018-01-07T15:29:32.368-08:00Conceptualising Theology in Islam: Beyond kalām<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">There is little doubt that Islamic intellectual history is enjoying quite a vogue at the moment and areas such as the historical study of Qurʾanic exegesis, philosophical traditions, mysticisms and even theological traditions are flourishing in academia. Recent and contemporary interest in what exactly Islam is (partly inspired by Shahab Ahmed's posthumous monograph <i>What is Islam?</i>), its diverse historical and contemporary manifestations and the problem of understanding what sort of category Islam is and how meaningful the notion of the islamic is, are all central to academic concerns of those in the study of religion and contemporary thought. There is a sense in which the study of Islam is being dragged into a number of important current debates in method in various disciplines, and it is no longer the cases that articles and works on Islam are confined to the ghetto of Islamic studies or area studies journals and publication series alone. </span></span></span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">The appetite for students to consume some of these ideas - partly no doubt intrigued by the ubiquity of Islam-talk in the public sphere - has also led to the need to provide materials that will provide nourishment for that curiosity. There is a perennial need for textbooks and aids for the the ubiquitous Introduction to Islam classes in metropolitan academia. Hence the recent proliferation of handbooks, companions, encyclopaedias and other sourcebooks that can be profitably used in the classroom. </span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";"><i><a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-islamic-theology-9780199696703?cc=us&lang=en&">The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology</a></i> is precisely one of these aids for the student available on the market - and in most cases probably accessible in e-book format through university libraries. Thinking in terms of possible rivals, it is difficult to come up with a comparable volume. Despite the recent flourishing on studies on <i>kalām</i>, especially on particular thinkers and sub-traditions, and the many texts now available to us, there is no </span></span></span><span style="font-family: "brill roman"; font-size: large;">decent single volume introduction to Islamic theology on the market. The older volumes by Tritton, Anawati and Gardet, Watt and others are rather outdated and tend to focus on the narrow 'formative' period. The formidable achievement of Josef van Ess' <i>Theologie und Gessellschaft I'm 2. und 3. Jahrhundert Hidschra</i>, now appearing in English translation with <a href="http://www.brill.com/products/book/theology-and-society-second-and-third-century-hijra-volume-1">Brill</a> with three volumes published so far, is focused on the early period and far too specialised for that sort of readership. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman"; font-size: large;">There is also plenty of new material on contemporary thought - with an emphasis often on violence, politics (Islamisms in particular) and gender - but little that is joined up to provide us with a useful textbook for the classroom. Notable volumes on contemporary theology including the pioneering <i><a href="https://oneworld-publications.com/progressive-muslims-pb.html">Progressive Islam</a></i> volume edited by Omid Safi and the recent volume <i><a href="http://www.musawah.org/knowledge-building/men-in-charge">Men in Charge</a></i> which is a significant contribution on the range of feminist theology (there are of course many other monographs including the influential earlier one by <a href="https://oneworld-publications.com/inside-the-gender-jihad-pb.html">Amina Wadud</a> and more recently <a href="https://oneworld-publications.com/sexual-ethics-and-islam-pb.html">Kecia Ali</a>). What some of these contemporary studies demonstrate is that the line between legal, ethical and theological reasoning is at times difficult to discern as the three fields often explicitly overlap - the legal renders the ethical and expresses the theological to put it in one way. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman"; font-size: large;">Having taught an undergraduate module on Islamic theological traditions for well over a decade, I have always struggled to find a singular work that I could set for my students as an introductory text. My interest - and that of my students - is not merely historical but also theological in itself trying to make sense of what we understand as theological reasoning in Islam and to what end such discourses are articulated. From next year, this handbook will become a core element of the reading list for that class.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">Handbooks
of this type tend to be either fêted or damned, the former through affiliations
and excessive praise, and the latter through picking on lacunae and the choice
of selections. The former can also be somewhat tedious - one thinks of other recent volumes which are praised beyond reason to stress the paradigm shifting nature of the questions asked, although on closer scrutiny neither the questions asked nor the insights offered are actually that exciting. What cannot be denied is that this handbook is a very solid volume that
brings together the various research interests of people working on </span><i style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">kalām</i><span style="font-family: "brill roman";"> in Islamic thought, primarily from
the perspective of intellectual history with a singular nod or two to the
modern and contemporary period. Rich in detail and historically organized, the
volume is divided into five sections: Islamic theologies in the early periods
concerned with the formation of schools, four case studies of interactions with
pre-Islamic thought and different disciplines such as logic, Islamic theologies
in the middle and early modern periods or the scholastic age, the interaction
of political and social history with theology (partly a study in types of contextualism),
and Islamic theological thought in the modern period. If you want to know who
is working on what in Islamic intellectual history focused on theology, this is
the place to check – and if you’re looking for an excellent bibliography of </span><i style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">kalām</i><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">, you need go nowhere else.
However, this may also be a significant weakness as it does point to the rather
indexical nature of much of the content. <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">The
introduction is divided into two sections – the former attempts a rather vague
and somewhat inadequate definition of theology in Islam that is reduced to </span><i style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">ʿilm al-kalām</i><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">, and the latter presents a
useful historical overview of the historiography on that field of inquiry. If
you ever wanted to teach a history of the academic study of </span><i style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">kalām</i><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">, the bibliography is here in that
section. The first section narrows onto two particular concerns of <i>kalām</i>: the nature of God and the nature of her agency and begins with a consideration of a normative set of statements about the central belief in God and her attributes in the Qurʾan. Historically - and a diachronic study of elements of <i>kalām</i> discourse - may well demonstrate the sound nature of such an approach. But does this render what one might mean when one asks the historical and normative questions about the nature of theologies in Islam? What is also conceded is that the Qurʾanic approach to the presentation of divine agency brings into detail the fallibility of creation and in particular the human. The Qurʾan in that sense is as much the story of humanity, its whence, where and whither. But that of course is also true of theology that historically and certainly through a presentist prism of inquiry focuses upon the inter-subjectivity of humans with respect to God and the cosmos. </span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">The introduction does not take up issues of theoretical approach: it
does not address the central question of hermeneutics, the exoteric and
esoteric approaches to texts, the kataphatic and apophatic discourses of the
nature of the divine, or the relationship between </span><i style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">kalām</i><span style="font-family: "brill roman";"> and other disciplines such as Qurʾanic exegesis, philosophy,
and mysticism. Some of these interdisciplinary concerns find their way into
chapters by Pink, El-Rouayheb and Nguyen – at least there is recognition that
mystical reasoning in Islam constitutes a form of theology but even here there
is all too brief mention of the school of Ibn ʿArabī and no systematic
consideration of apophasis (the subject incidentally of an excellent
forthcoming monograph by <a href="http://profiles.arts.monash.edu.au/aydogan-kars/">Aydogan Kars</a>). Nevertheless, there is a sense that the
basic dichotomy of considering theology through the lens of rationalism and
traditionalism remains a paramount organizing principle. The absence of a more
engaged consideration of what we mean by </span><i style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">kalām</i><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">
and theology means that the bounds of the discourses are not clear – nor is the
very notion of theology problematized; after all, far too much of our language
of the study of religion and especially one such as Islam arises from the
desire to apply comparative language and categories that are usually derived
and defined from the normative case of the study of the Church. Thus we tend to
talk of theology, of orthodoxy, of creeds, of clashes between reason and
revelation, of the structure and ecclesiology of authority, of magisteria and
political theology. <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "brill roman";"><span style="font-size: large;">Are the
generic boundaries heuristically useful? We notice that the lines between the
issues discussed in philosophy (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ḥikma</i>),
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i>, exegesis and mystical texts
seems to blur in the later period – and one way of lumping them together is to
consider them to be a unity that we might call the rational humanities or the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">maʿqūlāt</i>. But does that mean that the
practitioners themselves felt that the generic boundaries were meaningless? Consider
two historically divergent definitions, one that distinguishes <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i> from philosophy and the other that
distinguishes philosophy from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i>
and mysticism. The Avicennian philosopher and (soft) Ashʿarī theologian Mīr Ḥusayn
Maybudī (d. 1504) in his widely glossed commentary on the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Hidāyat al-ḥikma</i> of al-Abharī (d. 1265) examines the definition of
philosophy and at one point discusses whether philosophy and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i> are the same ‘science’ because so
many of the issues overlap but then decides that there is a meaningful distinction:
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i> discusses no doubt ontological,
epistemological and cosmological views alongside the nature of God but it does
so within the parameters of the law and ethos of Islam (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">qānūn al-islām</i>). Strictly speaking, philosophy is not so
constrained. But one wonders about that in practice: Avicenna famously
postulated an onto-cosmological proof for the existence of God and tied it – in
a self-described philosophical work – to an exegesis of a verse of the Qurʾan,
and elsewhere in his psychology he linked his theory of the stages of the
rational soul with an exegesis on the light verse in the Qurʾan. In the later
period, especially from the Safavid, the concept of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ḥikma</i> takes on a life of its own and cannot be divorced from
onto-theology even if the claim is that the metaphysical study of being <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">qua</i> being or of the absolute mode of
being is not reducible to God as its primary referent. The modern Iranian Shiʿi
mystically inclined political theologian Ayatollah Khomeini (d. 1989) in a
number of his early works on the school of Ibn ʿArabī similarly tried to
differentiate philosophy from mysticism and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i>
by considering the subject matter, a classic way of defining and bounding a
‘science’. From the classical period, a science was defined as an inquiry that
studied the essential accidents of its subject matter and within that,
philosophy studied the essential accidents of being <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">qua</i> being (namely, issues such as modalities, unity and
multiplicity, causality and other issues that pertained to things that obtain
in extra-mental reality but are not considered insofar as they are physical
objects or creatures of a God). Khomeini opined that the absolute mode of being
(<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">al-wujūd al-muṭlaq</i>) when considered
in philosophy was abstract and included a study of God, but for the theologian,
it was precisely how God was understood, and for the mystic, the absolute mode
of being was exclusively for God because nothing exists save God. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "brill roman";"><span style="font-size: large;">Perhaps
such distinctions are somewhat scholastic – but there is little doubting that
their articulators took them seriously. Another sense in which the definition
of theology postulated in this volume is perhaps too narrow is to take more
seriously other disciplines in Islamic learned culture that rendered
theological reasoning. The most obvious broad lacuna in the volume is the
theology of the legal theorists and hermeneuts who engaged with scriptural
texts and the dictates of reason in order to derive the law and effect moral
agency. On the more practical side, the narrowing of theology to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i> misses a whole area of practical,
applied and pastoral theologies that are highly pertinent today in which, while
the older forms of rational and natural theology relating to proving the
existence of God and the possibility of the immaterial as well as justifying
beliefs in revelation and so forth still hold, contemporary thinkers are far
more focused on theology as a set of inter-subjective relations and
perspectives that arise in the human sphere and within the cosmos as
sacralised, enchanted faces of the divine – as one set of theological
engagements in the present put it, one does not need to defend God but rather one
ough to focus on issues of justice, diversity, equality and ethics among humans
and others in the cosmos. Even the life cycle of the Muslim experience, the
range of ritual practices, the texture of life in quotidian living as well as
extraordinary acts of pilgrimage, is largely unconsidered. A further lacuna
relates to the occult and the link between <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i>
and science that was central to the middle period. </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">This points to the second
organizational principle of the volume – it is a collectivity of schools and
school positions. It is not a thematic or problem based approach to the study
of theology that could be highly useful, drawing upon the range of persuasions
and confessional affiliations that defined themselves as within Islam to
address issues. In that way, the stark distinction between the pre-modern and
the modern could be resolved. Thus we have a historical survey, beginning with
the Qadariyya and the Jahmiyya, moving onto the Muʿtazila and the Ashāʿira,
continuing into their scholastic periods and their later manifestations in
Sunni and Shiʿi schools as well as alternative trajectories with the Ibāḍiyya
and the Ismailis, then the geographical spread of these schools followed by a
final consideration albeit too brief on modern developments. Themes are raised within chapters and if one wishes to trace how ideas on free will and determinism developed, one would select a certain path of reading through the volume. The emphasis on thinkers and texts tends to obscure that or even miss the larger trends; for example, within the study of Imāmī theology, if one wished to see how sets of doctrinal positions and arguments that were often condemned in the formative rationalising period as 'extremist' (<i>ghulūw</i>) became normalised certainly by the Safavid period as core to Imāmī theology, how would one set about understanding that process? If the Safavid period was indeed formative for Imāmī (political) theology in the present, then without simply following a whiggish method, how might one interrogate that? How diachronically did the notions of <i>walāya</i> develop, and can one discern distinct traditions overlapping, debating and opposing each other into the present? Perhaps a short reading guide at the end, or even at the beginning, could help readers negotiate that. </span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">Along the way,
there are two sections of case studies: one on some intriguing theological
concepts such as occasionalism, the theory of ‘states’, ethical value and the
relationship of theology and law, and the other on historical events such as
the </span><i style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">miḥna</i><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">, the rivalry of Sunni
theologies in the middle period, and the religious policy of the Almohads. In
the latter section of cases studies, I do not see why these discussions could
not have been subsumed into other chapters – but then with handbooks often it
is not a simple case of rational organisation. Whenever we put together a collected volume, we often have the ideal structure and arrangement in mind, but that ideal cannot always be mapped onto the possible or even the practicable. In the former section, one wonders what
happened to these debates or are they merely mentioned for antiquarian reasons?
For example, Rudolph’s masterful piece on occasionalism is an excellent entry
to the topic but various questions come to mind: what is the relationship
between atomism and occasionalism, did not Avicennism render occasionalism obsolete,
what do we make of the neo-Ashʿarī, neo-occasionalists of today in the Arab and
Turkish Sunni world? Similarly the piece on states by Thiele is a solid analysis
of the reception of Abū Hāshim in Ashʿarī circles, and as such an interesting
case study of doctrines and positions in schools that bleed across boundaries,
but it does not say anything about the later Muʿtazilī reception of the theory
and why it failed to provide a solution to the nominalist and eternalist
problems of the divine attributes. The only contribution in that section that
brings us close to our time is El-Rouayheb on logic but even then the question
of the permissibility and use of logic within theology remains a live debate in
various circles today. <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "brill roman";"><span style="font-size: large;">There is
still plenty in the volume that demonstrates the best in research on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i> and why we should take theology in
Islam seriously in any study. Treiger’s piece on the origins of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i> is a good mix of the state of
research on the Christian dialectical context and the early debates on the
nature of the Qurʾan. The two excurses of the first part are similarly
important: Griffith on the early development of what we call Christian <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i> – and one cannot help but think
that the language of Yaḥyā b. ʿAdī and Ḥunayn and others in Baghdad was central
to the development of arguments on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tawḥīd</i>
in early Islam – and Crone on why we should not take the march of monotheism to
have been uncontested by dualists and others. In fact, taken together they
represent a good way of problematizing <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tawḥīd</i>
– both from Christians and especially from dualists. It was precisely the
commonality and divergence on the issue of monotheism that one could see as a
central theme in early Islamic theologies. However, and not without some irony,
I am more skeptical about taking the sources at face value on these forms of
alternative cosmologies in early Islam and certainly I would question attempts
to project atheisms in particular back to this period. And one small quibble –
it might seem neat to translate <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">khulliṭa</i>
as ‘became unhinged’ (page 123) but surely the more literal is more accurate.
The Imāmī sources used it to describe people who became ‘confused’ through
their debates with the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">zanādiqa</i> and
hence mixed up correct with incorrect beliefs. The third excursus by Schwarb is
a further excellent example of how the boundaries of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">kalām</i> are not so straightforward and we should consider it to be a
type of discourse that could be tied to the defence or postulation of different
theological confessions. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">To my
mind, the very best contributions are in fact the last two by Wielandt and Pink
on modern developments. The Wielandt chapter is certainly something that could
be profitably set for a course – a dizzingly diverse approach to modes of
modernist thought that takes into consideration different genealogies of the
present, across Sunni and Shiʿi contexts from the 19</span><sup style="font-family: "Brill Roman";">th</sup><span style="font-family: "brill roman";"> century to
the current Iranian reformers. It raises the critical question of what theology
is and can mean today. Pink similarly shows the continuities and
discontinuities of current Qurʾanic exegeses. She briefly discusses feminist
approaches within the category of purposive exegesis. But this signals perhaps
the last major lacuna of the volume that I wish to highlight: the complete
absence of feminist and other types of intersectional critique in contemporary
Islamic theologies. Given that this is becoming a rich area of research and
activism with numerous publications and some of the most vivid and virulent
debates in the contemporary study of Islam and in Islamic studies, it is
somewhat surprising that it is absent from the volume. Some of the other Oxford
handbooks relating to Islam do have a greater assessment of feminisms. But the
absence here is disappointing because for too long, feminist approaches have
been dismissed as ‘inadequately theological’ but it is difficult to justify
such a position on the work of Barlas, Wadud, Chaudhury, Ali, Mir-Hosseini and
many others. Similarly there are other geographical absences – Africa,
especially West Africa, and South East Asia in particular come to mind: if a
study on Ashʿarī theology in the Islamic West, then why not in South-East Asia
where it arguably was a more lasting and significant influence? And what of the
growing forms of Islamic theologies in North America and Europe, not least
through strange experiments with governmental interventions in social policy
and religious engineering? It is perhaps unfair to focus on these lacunae - one is after all disappointed with not finding the volume one would have liked to see in print. Ultimately it is the choice of the editor and that is where the questions need to be posed. The historiographical health of the field depends on rigorous debate and disagreement based on methods, approaches, textual rigour, and creative readings and misreadings of texts. <o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<!--StartFragment-->
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "brill roman";"><span style="font-size: large;">One can see how students and those interested in
theology in Islam can use the volume profitably and it will certainly become
the main resource for that. As I said before, it cannot see it being absent for reading lists on courses on Islamic theology. But perhaps because of that utility, that
comprehensive survey and that indexicality, it is unlikely to enthuse readers
with a desire to study theology in Islam. But to be fair, that was not the
remit.</span></span><!--EndFragment-->
<br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "brill roman";"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "brill roman";"><span style="font-size: large;">But then I should say something about what I would like a volume on Islamic theology to do (thinking quickly off the top of my head):</span></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "brill roman";"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span>
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">1) An introduction that explains what one means, normatively speaking, by theologies in Islam and how one might define them, study them, and relate them to their historical contexts and to their intellectual contexts by examining the other related disciplines and humanities associated with them</span></span></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";"><br /></span></span></span>
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">2) An analysis of initial issues and themes of debate - the origins question but also about the formulation of a theological language and its possibilities and the nature of that form of communication as a sets of terms exchanged within a certain language game bounded by reference to Islam or beyond as well</span></span></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";"><br /></span></span></span>
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">3) An examination of the sources that one would use to study theologies and their generic manifestations and the porous nature at times of the boundaries of these genres; the importance of the post-classical compendia would be critical here </span></span></span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "brill roman";">4) Diachronic studies of particular themes in their different </span></span></span><span style="font-family: "brill roman"; font-size: large;">contexts such as the reality of divine attributes, the problem of free will, the presence of evils, the possibilities of theology, the status of the Qurʾan, reward and punishment, authority and sovereign and so forth</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman"; font-size: large;">5) Tracing in broad terms how particular theological confessions have developed since the classical period and their trajectories in the present</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman"; font-size: large;">6) The nature of the epistemological shifts ushered with modernity and the new assumptions about the reality that we inhabit - whither theologies in Islam in a post-Kantian, post-Einstein/Heisenberg, post-Derridean, post-analytical, post-Beauvoir/Butler/Irigaray/Jantzen world? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "brill roman"; font-size: large;">This is a tough ask - and perhaps can only be done through a rigorous and massively collaborative new set of historically informed systematic theological accounts in the present. Nevertheless, there remains a distinction between academically informed systematic theologies and the historical critical study of theologies and their intellectual development in contexts. Is the exigency of the age a new <i>kalām</i> or a new way of conceptualising theology? </span>Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3144085099410879413.post-68263360624757377192017-12-19T03:53:00.002-08:002017-12-19T04:05:26.161-08:00An important Safavid text of the masāʾil genre <span style="font-size: large;">I have previously written a <a href="https://mullasadra.blogspot.co.uk/2014/05/mulla-shamsa-gilani-much-neglected.html">blog post</a> on the significance of the Safavid thinker Mullā Shamsā Gīlānī (d. c. 1064/1654), student of Mīr Dāmād (d. 1040/1631) and friend of Mullā Ṣadrā (d. 1045/1636). One of the works of his that is worth examining is his <i>Investigations into the States of Beings</i>, recently published by Mazda in California. I have previously mentioned it as forthcoming. I will later upload my introduction to it onto academia.edu as well.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgorxs6NuvQhpZWj9Q4YfwFFCzEHLohCNl8C3FCnsdkq_K4H-nc7nqwQHuRoHoSoDy2PijEukaZCSuCnQHkfo6O7OkN_RAyNEsu26S6sfZkN8GwwSAwT2zVlQtS4KSTiSk-OX2Za8w3g7Tb/s1600/82964685-0c20-45b1-85d2-ad6380f9fc06.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" data-original-height="529" data-original-width="364" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgorxs6NuvQhpZWj9Q4YfwFFCzEHLohCNl8C3FCnsdkq_K4H-nc7nqwQHuRoHoSoDy2PijEukaZCSuCnQHkfo6O7OkN_RAyNEsu26S6sfZkN8GwwSAwT2zVlQtS4KSTiSk-OX2Za8w3g7Tb/s320/82964685-0c20-45b1-85d2-ad6380f9fc06.png" width="220" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">You can find details about this from the Mazda website <a href="http://www.mazdapublishers.com/book/investigations-explication-the-states-of-existants">here</a>. I also wrote the introduction which attempted to locate it within the philosophical corpora of the Safavid period. There is a slightly earlier edition of this text published by the Bunyād-e Mullā Ṣadrā based on the same collection of manuscripts although this edition includes one codex from Āstān-i quds-i rażavī in Mashhad. The Bunyād edition focuses on what distinguishes it from Mullā Ṣadrā and divides up the text into sections such as ontology, eschatology, the properties of bodies (physics), the problem of ontology primacy in contingents, and a final brief section on philosophical theology. It also names 18 questions - the Mazda edition names 20.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">There are the following:</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">1) an epistemological preliminary on the distinction between self-evidence and acquired knowledge</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">2) on the nature of perception</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">3) on the intensionality of being</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">4) on the concept of being (being <i>qua</i> being or <i>wujūd muṭlaq</i>)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">5) on the nature of causality - the rehearsal of the Avicennian proof for the existence of God</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">6) on the existence-essence distinction in contingents</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">7) on the simplicity of God</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">8) a critique of the notion of mental existence (which is unusual as the Avicennian tradition usually embraces the notion)</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">9) Fārābī and Mīr Dāmād on the being of contingents as beings of reason</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">10) on being super-added to essence in the mind</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">11) being is ontologically prior in contingents but as a conceptual priority</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">12) on the soul as separable substance and distinct from the body</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">13) on Avicenna's suspended person thought experiment</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">14) on the possibility of the return of the non-existent</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">15) on the impossibility of atomism</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">16) on the impossibility of infinite regress in matter</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">17) on the impossibility of the actual infinite</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">18) on contingent beings as beings of reason - another approach</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">19) on the denial that being is a universal</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;">20) on the definition of a science</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">The Mazda edition is more faithful to the approach of Mullā Shamsā since it shows his adherence to the Mīr Dāmād reading of Avicenna in which the focus is upon being of contingents as purely posited in the mind and conceptually prior in the mind to essences. However, like Mīr Dāmād, he suggests that essences are produced by God in the causal chain of emanation and it is essences that are in extra-mental reality since only God truly is worthy of the title 'being'. So in terms of the formulations of Mullā Ṣadrā, only God is worthy of 'being', contingents possess the ontological priority of essence (<i>aṣālat al-māhīya</i>) in extra-mental reality and it is essences that are produced by God in the chain of emanation (<i>majʿūlīyat al-māhīya</i>). Mullā Ṣadrā compensates by going the opposite direction in asserting that only being is emanated and essences do not exist in extra-mental reality at all, and that the relationship between God and the cosmos through being is expressed in his principle of the simple reality encompassing all things (<i>basīṭu l-ḥaqīqa kullu l-ashyāʾ</i>).</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">As a witness to this particular reading of Avicenna that redefined the Avicennian tradition in the Safavid period and continued to have an impact until the Qajar period, this work is an essential read. One sees him debating with issues in the Sadrian reading of Avicenna. It also shows him responding to key questions - and in that way it resembles the <i>Taʿlīqāt</i> and <i>Mubāḥathāt</i> of Avicenna - and also deeply engaging with the Avicennian traditions not only the works of Avicenna himself but also with his commentators such as Ṭūsī (d. 674/1274) through his commentary on <i>al-Ishārāt wa-l-tanbīhāt</i> and his <i>Tajrīd al-iʿtiqād </i>and subsequent glossators such as al-ʿAllāma al-Ḥillī (d. 725/1325), al-Sharīf al-Jurjānī (d. 816/1414), and Jalāl al-Dīn Davānī (d. 908/1502). Thus we can see how the Mīr Dāmād and Mullā Ṣadrā readings of Avicenna competed for supremacy in the later Safavid period and beyond, with the latter emerging as victorious by the time of Mahdī Narāqī (d. 1795) and ʿAlī Nūrī (d. 1831). </span><br />
<br />Mulla Sadrahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15449567584480729082noreply@blogger.com0