SOCINIANISM, ISLAM AND THE RADICAL USES OF ARABIC SCHOLARSHIP (original) (raw)
Related papers
2024
Résumé Catégoriser, discriminer ou encore délimiter semblent inévitables pour saisir le monde qui nous entoure. Cependant, au-delà de l’aspect éphémère de toute classification, lorsqu’il s’agit de domaines aussi vastes que l’islamologie ou même du soufisme dont les objets d’études font appel à de nombreuses disciplines et relèvent d’aires culturelles hétérogènes, projeter une périodisation ou une catégorisation propre `a la recherche académique occidentale, qui met le plus souvent l’accent sur les ruptures plutôt que sur les continuités, se révèle parfois problématique. C’est ainsi que pour de nombreux savants musulmans modernes, de telles ruptures n’ont pas lieu d’être ; ces savants se réclament souvent d’une longue tradition et font fi de ces distinctions aussi bien historiographiques que disciplinaires. On observe alors un véritable décalage entre la manière dont ces auteurs conçoivent leur histoire et leur héritage et la manière dont ils sont étudiés en Occident. C’est pourquoi de plus en plus de chercheurs évoluant au sein des sphères académiques occidentales tentent de s’affranchir de ces cloisonnements disciplinaires et/ou temporels. On pourra ainsi se reporter, entre autres, aux travaux de Shahab Ahmed (m. 2015) sur l’Islam en général, de Khaled El-Rouayheb pour les mondes arabe et ottoman, d’Ousmane Kane et de Fabienne Samson pour l’islam d’Afrique ou encore par exemple, `a ceux d’Alexander Knysh en ce qui concerne le soufisme. Il s’agit là de quelques exemples d’auteurs ayant tenté de dépasser les catégories d’analyse occidentales et/ou de souligner les continuités existantes entre les périodes classiques et modernes. A la suite de cette démarche, cet atelier souhaite dépasser les binarités de périodisation entre période ”classique” et ”moderne”, mais aussi, par exemple, l’opposition entre pensée philosophique et pensée soufie. Cela pourra se faire : en nous intéressant d’abord à des auteurs modernes et/ou contemporains, ainsi qu’aux lectures des savants classiques ou postclassiques qu’ils délivrent ; en examinant l’impact des savants musulmans de la période classique sur le contemporain ainsi que les diverses lectures, interprétations et réinterprétations que leurs travaux ont inspirées ; en étudiant la manière dont ces auteurs contemporains conçoivent eux-mêmes la relation entre pensée philosophique et pensée mystique; enfin, dans la mesure où ils représentent notamment un chaînon manquant de l’histoire intellectuelle musulmane, en portant notre attention sur des auteurs soufis de la période postclassique tardive (entre les 15e et 17e siècles). Abstract Philosophical thought and mystical thought in Islam, beyond binarities Categorising, discriminating and delimiting seem inevitable if we are to grasp the world around us. However, beyond the ephemeral aspect of any classification, when it comes to fields as vast as Islamology or even Sufism, whose subjects of study call on many disciplines and fall within heterogeneous cultural areas, projecting a periodisation or categorisation specific to Western academic research, which more often than not emphasises ruptures rather than continuities, sometimes proves problematic. For many modern Muslim scholars, there is no need for such ruptures; these scholars often claim a long tradition and disregard both historiographical and disciplinary distinctions. As a result, there is a real gap between the way in which these authors conceive of their history and heritage and the way in which they are studied in the West. This is why more and more researchers in Western academic circles are trying to break down these disciplinary and/or temporal barriers. These include the work of Shahab Ahmed (d. 2015) on Islam in general, Khaled El Rouayheb on the Arab and Ottoman worlds, Ousmane Kane and Fabienne Samson on African Islam, and Alexander Knysh on Sufism. These are just a few examples of authors who have attempted to go beyond Western categories of analysis and/or to highlight the continuities that exist between the classical and modern periods. Following on from this approach, this working group aims to go beyond the binary periodisation between ’classical’ and ’modern’ periods, and also, for example, the opposition between philosophical thought and Sufi thought. This can be done : by looking first at modern and/or contemporary authors, as well as the readings of classical or post-classical scholars that they deliver; by examining the impact of Muslim scholars of the classical period on the contemporary, as well as the various readings, interpretations and reinterpretations that their work has inspired ; by studying the way in which these contemporary authors themselves conceive the relationship between philosophical thought and mystical thought; and finally, insofar as they represent a missing link in Muslim intellectual history, by turning our attention to Sufi authors of the late post-classical period (between the 15th and 17th centuries). Bibliographie indicative Ahmed, Shahab. What is Islam? The Importance of Being Islamic, Princeton University Press, 2016. Bauer, Thomas, et al. A Culture of Ambiguity: An Alternative History of Islam. Columbia University Press, 2021. Kane, Ousmane. Muslim Modernity in Postcolonial Nigeria. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2003. Knysh, Alexander. Sufism: A New History of Islamic Mysticism (English Edition). Princeton University Press, 2017 Rouayheb (el-), Khaled. Islamic Intellectual History in the Seventeenth-Century: Scholarly Currents in the Ottoman Empire and the Maghreb, Cambridge University Press, 2015. Samson, Fabienne (Dir.). L’islam au-del`a des cat´egories, Cahiers d’´etudes africaines, n◦206/207, EHESS, 2012. Shamsy (el-), Ahmed, Rediscovering the Islamic Classics. How Editors and Print Culture Transformed an Intellectual Tradition, Princeton, NJ, Princeton University Press, 2020. Steinberg, Leif; Wood, Philip (Ed.). What Is Islamic Studies? European and North American Approaches to a Contested Field, Edinburgh university press, 2022. Mots-Clés: Conceptualisation de l’islam, Civilisation islamique, Frontières, Catégories, Soufisme.
Artuklu Akademi/Artuklu Academia, 2023
In this study, it’s emphasized on the subject that the different religious traditions could state their opinions from theology to ethics throughout Islamic thought and cultural history. In this context, it’s to be touched that the culture of criticism and tolerance is a dominant approach in Islamic history by giving an example. Hereby, it will be dealt with a discussion that takes place in the palace of Marwānid, one of the powerful states of the 11th century. The Marwānid wazīr Abū’l-Qāsim al-Maghribī argued with Elias of Nisibis, the Metropolitan of Nisibis, on so many subjects regarding Muslim-Christian theology. The debate between Elias and al-Maghribī constitutes an important example of mutual debate ethics. The Kitāb al-Majālis, which Elias of Nisibis composed all sessions between 1026-1027 in different times in Arabic, is one of the concrete examples of the open-minded Islamic thought tradition. As a matter of fact, in these sessions, which have no record in any other text, it’s seen that many issues that come into contact with theology, from the presence of God to the Spirit, from the Trinity to the nature of Jesus Christ are clearly and freely discussed. Moreover, Elias, while proving the basic principles of Christian thought, for example, the Trinity, gives place to the conceptual infrastructure of the Islamic thought tradition. He uses Arabic jawhar for the substance of God, aʻrād/accidents, and essence/Zāt and divine adjective/s̱ıfat to prove Trinity. Also, he deals with the hypostasis in the Trinity through the relationship between essence and divine adjective (Zāt-s̱ıfat) in Islamic theology. It’s referred to that Elias transforms the conceptual framework of Islamic thought into a practice of producing an answer at the point of confirming Christian theology. This is manifested in the way the Syriac philosophers describe their thoughts in Arabic. It is so interesting to note that while Elias was responding to the questions of Abū’l-Qāsim in these sessions, he claimed that the belief of the Trinity was a monotheistic/tawhid discourse by reinterpreting Quranic verses. As regards him, there are different groups among Christians that can be called the people of tawhid and polytheism, and the Qur'an refers to them. In fact, Elias applies Islamic terminology in his critical discourse and tries to prove his claims based on some tafsir methods and some commentators/mufassers of the Quran like Tabarī, Mujāhid and Suddī. But, if it’s look in detail, it can be seen Elias takes advantage of Qur’anic verses to support his claims. This discussion environment, which continued for more than a year, is not obstructed in any way and the parties continue to discuss without leaving the courtesy. This case can be traced through the text of Elias itself. Here, the cultural structure of the period that is open to criticism will be examined in the context of Kitāb al-Majālis, which conveys this discussion environment to us. The content of this text, which has survived in the context of the records of Elias, and the geography in which it was written, reveals that the followers of different religious traditions of the 11th century lived together with cultural diversity.
'Averroes, Islam, and Heterodoxy in the Spanish Chapel Triumph of St Thomas Aquinas',
Interfaces: A Journal of Medieval European Literatures, 2019
This article examines Andrea di Bonaiuto’s image of Averroes in the Triumph of St Thomas Aquinas (Spanish Chapel, Florence: 1365–69), explored alongside Bonaiuto’s primary visual source, Lippo Memmi’s panel painting, Triumph of St Thom- as Aquinas (Pisa, c. 1323–30), and Dante’s Commedia. I argue that Bonaiuto’s iconography, developed within a Dominican context, is unique to the Spanish Chapel Triumph because it propagates Averroes as both a heterodox philosopher and a heretical Muslim precisely at a time when the Arab philosopher was acclaimed as the Great Commentator. Through comparative analysis, I demonstrate that Bonaiuto makes signicant modifications to Memmi’s Triumph, the panel painting which first establishes an Aquinas-Averroes iconographic formula created to uphold the orthodoxy of Thomistic Aristotelianism by casting Averroes into a contemptible position, a formula also utilised by Benozzo Gozzoli in a later Triumph of St Thomas Aquinas (Pisa, c. 1470–75). I argue that Memmi’s image of Averroes can be read as a Dominican comment on the heterodoxy of Arabic Aristotelianism in spite of its widespread reception into Latin scholasticism. This feature is further developed by Bonaiuto who presents Averroes as an indolent philosopher and in a departure from Memmi’s formula, as a heretical Muslim. Such a reading is further elucidated when Bonaiuto’s Triumph is considered alongside Dante’s literary treatment of Arabic philosophers, the Prophet Muhammad, and Christian heresy in the Commedia, ultimately revealing that the reception of Arabic philosophers is entangled with Islam in a far more complex and ambiguous manner than once considered.
Book Review - The Formation of Post‐Classical Philosophy in Islam
The Muslim World, 2022
Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī's accomplishments in theology and Qurʾān commentary were built upon his thorough engagement with philosophy and the method he developed therein" (29). This passage from Griffel's book underlines the heights of Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī's (d. 1210) intellectual enterprise. With a clear narrative, the book provides evidence that the philosophical system of Avicenna (d. 1037) maintained itself through a long-standing and modified commitment during the sixth/twelfth-century scholarship among the Muslim thinkers. The most prominent figure in this scholarship was Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī. Educated in a variety of scholarly subjects, he mastered an avant-garde genre of ḥikma 1 , which advocated that God is a Necessary Being and this world's origin traces back in past-eternity, without attempting to theologize his philosophical corollaries. This marks a contradictory position to what he lays down in his theological books that advocate for God's free will and the temporal origination of the world. Griffel employs a double-source approach in his methodological argument. First, the master narrative of the book relies on the course of historical evidence to shed light on what has been misrepresented in some academic works as a philosophical stagnation in the Muslim territories. Griffel argues that this assumption relies on weak evidence. He relates the notion of the "decline" of Islam due to the "decline" of its philosophical activity to the realities of colonialism and intellectual currents influenced by the Western idea of the Enlightenment with (1-6). Second, once the historical and political evidence becomes visible to the reader, the author refers to key figures of the relevant period. Griffel's portrayal of Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī's intellectual charisma presents a prudent thinker who prioritizes meticulous investigation. Griffel surveys the landscape throughout the sixth/twelfth century based on the intellectual pluralism embedded in Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī's rationalistic inquiry on God and existence. His analysis throughout the book looks over the adoption of al-Rāzī's double-truth theory (471-478). 2 The madrasa system in major cities like Baghdad, Nishapur, and Damascus was the only officially state-sponsored method for training scholars and fostering the dynamism of intellectual thought. Griffel presents this rich landscape within the political context of the
Entangled Religions 11, Nr. 4 (Behaving Like Heathens. Polemical Comparisons and Pre-Modern Discourses of Religious Diversity from an Interdisciplinary Perspective), 2020
Comparison figures prominently in the polemics of the Muslim, Christian, and Jewish inhabitants of the Iberian Peninsula in premodern and early modern times. Its pervasiveness as a figure of thought in their sources raises the question of variety in regard to comparison-that is, the multiple expressions of comparison as well as its numerous uses-particularly in the field of polemics. This paper discusses the functions of comparison in polemics as a necessary first step to advance current knowledge of comparison as a historical practice in the making of one's identity and the definition of groups and individuals. The discussion will focus on writings by Muslims who lived in Christian Iberia. It will focus particularly on two anti-Christian polemics: that by the Tunisian author Muḥammad al-Qaysī in an as-yet unstudied Aljamiado copy (Spanish in Arabic characters); and the Tratado de los dos caminos (Treatise of the Two Roads), an early seventeenth-century work of Islamic doctrine by the so-called "Refugee in Tunisia". The analysis of these two works will address the most important common points and differences between their respective polemical comparisons.