Download or read book The Theological Thought of Fazlur Rahman written by Ahad M. Ahmed and published by . This book was released on 2019-05-23 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fazlur Rahman was one of the most influential Muslim thinkers of the 20th Century. His encyclopedic understanding of both the Islamic and Western traditions rendered him as most suited for the task of tajdid ul-din (intellectual and academic revivification, reformism and modernism). As a pragmatist he believed that 'social change' could not be translated into reality without an active, positive and vital engagement with the present world which stood as the élan of Islamic morality and ethics. The present work attempts to critically analyze and deconstruct Fazlur Rahman's thought in order to ascertain the key principles that govern the oeuvre of his work. Further, the author has provided a 'bridge' to facilitate an empathetic introduction to Fazlur Rahman's life, person and thought which are essential for understanding him and his work. Also, the prejudice he faced from the orthodox ulama' and political Islam activists in Pakistan foreshowed a biased misrepresentation of his work qua Orientalism and Western Imperialist agenda.As a representative of modern Islam it seems plausible that serious attention must be given to 'reconstruct' kalām whilst standing in the midst of Western theology in a postmodern time and kalām in its post-medieval phase. Thus, Fazlur Rahman was not simply a falsafi which the majority hold him to be but also a mutakallim in the full-blooded sense.
Download or read book Islam Modernity written by Fazlur Rahman and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2017-07-21 with total page 183 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "As Professor Fazlur Rahman shows in the latest of a series of important contributions to Islamic intellectual history, the characteristic problems of the Muslim modernists—the adaptation to the needs of the contemporary situation of a holy book which draws its specific examples from the conditions of the seventh century and earlier—are by no means new. . . . In Professor Rahman's view the intellectual and therefore the social development of Islam has been impeded and distorted by two interrelated errors. The first was committed by those who, in reading the Koran, failed to recognize the differences between general principles and specific responses to 'concrete and particular historical situations.' . . . This very rigidity gave rise to the second major error, that of the secularists. By teaching and interpreting the Koran in such a way as to admit of no change or development, the dogmatists had created a situation in which Muslim societies, faced with the imperative need to educate their people for life in the modern world, were forced to make a painful and self-defeating choice—either to abandon Koranic Islam, or to turn their backs on the modern world."—Bernard Lewis, New York Review of Books "In this work, Professor Fazlur Rahman presents a positively ambitious blueprint for the transformation of the intellectual tradition of Islam: theology, ethics, philosophy and jurisprudence. Over the voices advocating a return to Islam or the reestablishment of the Sharia, the guide for action, he astutely and soberly asks: What and which Islam? More importantly, how does one get to 'normative' Islam? The author counsels, and passionately demonstrates, that for Islam to be actually what Muslims claim it to be—comprehensive in scope and efficacious for every age and place—Muslim scholars and educationists must reevaluate their methodology and hermeneutics. In spelling out the necessary and sound methodology, he is at once courageous, serious and profound."—Wadi Z. Haddad, American-Arab Affairs
Download or read book The Philosophy of Mull adr adr al D n al Shir z written by Fazlur Rahman and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 1976-06-30 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mullā Ṣadrā Shirāzī emerges as an original philosopher who had a sure understanding of his Greek and Islamic predecessors. He is worthy of study by scholars concerned with the development of Islamic philosophy because of his attempt to reconcile various currents of Islamic philosophical thought, particularly the peripatetic tradition of Ibn ʿArabī. Modern existentialists will be interested in his basic concern with the reality of existence and the unreality of essences or general notions.
Download or read book Major Themes of the Qur an written by Fazlur Rahman and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2009-06-15 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this introduction to the Qur'an, Fazlur Rahman unravels its complexities on themes such as God, society, revelation, and prophecy.
Download or read book Qur an of the Oppressed written by Shadaab Rahemtulla and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study analyses the commentaries of four Muslim intellectuals who have turned to scripture as a liberating text to confront an array of problems, from patriarchy, racism, and empire to poverty and interreligious communal violence. Shadaab Rahemtulla considers the exegeses of the South African Farid Esack (b. 1956), the Indian Asghar Ali Engineer (1939-2013), the African American Amina Wadud (b. 1952), and the Pakistani-American Asma Barlas (b. 1950). The authors considered all proritise the Qur'an over the hadith. Rahemtulla considers this an essential move for a Muslim liberation theology and concludes with proposals with a new construal of what a politically radical Islam might mean, sharply differentitated from Islamism. This work provides a rich analysis of the thought-ways of specific Muslim intellectuals, it substantiates a broadly framed school of thought. Rahemtulla draws out their specific and general importance without displaying an uncritical sympathy. He sheds light on the impact of modern exegetical commentary which is more self-conciously concerned with historical context and present realities. In a mutally reinforcing way, this work thus illuminates both the role of agency and heremnetucal approaches in Modern Islamic thought.
Download or read book Revival and Reform in Islam written by Fazlur Rahman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2021-01-21 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This authoritative book argues that what is considered today to be Islamic fundamentalism is inconsistent with the true meaning of this faith. Rahman demonstrates that the true roots of Islamic teachings advocate adaptability, creativity, and innovation.
Download or read book Reading the Qur an in the Twenty First Century written by Abdullah Saeed and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-12-04 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reading the Qur’an in the Twenty-First Century considers the development of Qur’anic interpretation and highlights modern debates around new approaches to interpretation. It explores how Muslims from various theological, legal, socio-political and philosophical backgrounds think about the meaning and relevance of the Qur’an, and how their ideas apply in the contemporary world. The book: reflects on one of the most dominant approaches to interpretation in the pre-modern period, textualism, and the reaction to that in Muslim feminist readings of the Qur’an today. covers issues such as identifying the hierarchical nature of Qur’anic values, the criteria for the use of hadith in interpretation, fluidity of meaning and ways of ensuring a degree of stability in interpretation. examines key Qur'anic passages and compares pre-modern and modern interpretations to show the evolving nature of interpretation. Examples discussed include: the authority of men over women, the death of Jesus, shura and democracy, and riba and interest. Abdullah Saeed provides a practical guide for interpretation and presents the principal ideas of a contextualist approach, which situates the original message of the Qur’an in its wider social, political, cultural, economic and intellectual context. He advocates a more flexible method of interpretation that gives due recognition to earlier interpretations of the Qur’an while also being aware of changing conditions and the need to approach the Qur’an afresh today.
Download or read book Islamic Fundamentalism and Modernity RLE Politics of Islam written by William Montgomery Watt and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-06-03 with total page 169 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Islam is a burning topic in modern scholarship and contemporary world affairs. It is a subject poorly understood by Western observers, and in this book Professor Montgomery Watt takes a significant step towards its demystification. Montgomery Watt examines the crucial questions of traditional world-view and self-image which dominate the thinking of Muslims today. This traditional self-image causes them to perceive world events in a different perspective from Westerners – a fact not always appreciated by the foreign ministries of Western powers. Professor Watt presents a brilliant and critical analysis of the traditional Islamic self-image, showing how it distorts Western modernism and restricts Muslims to a peripheral role in world affairs. In a scholarly and incisive way, he traces this harmful image to its origins in the medieval period and then to the traumatic exposure of Muslims to the West in modern times. He argues that Muslim culture is suffering from a dangerous introspection, and in his closing chapters presents a constructive criticism of contemporary Islam, aimed at contributing to a truer, more realistic Islamic self-image for today. First published in 1988.
Download or read book Islamic Thought written by Abdullah Saeed and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2006-11-22 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Islamic Thought is a fresh and contemporary introduction to the philosophies and doctrines of Islam. Abdullah Saeed, a distinguished Muslim scholar, traces the development of religious knowledge in Islam, from the pre-modern to the modern period. The book focuses on Muslim thought, as well as the development, production and transmission of religious knowledge, and the trends, schools and movements that have contributed to the production of this knowledge. Key topics in Islamic culture are explored, including the development of the Islamic intellectual tradition, the two foundation texts, the Qur’an and Hadith, legal thought, theological thought, mystical thought, Islamic Art, philosophical thought, political thought, and renewal, reform and rethinking today. Through this rich and varied discussion, Saeed presents a fascinating depiction of how Islam was lived in the past and how its adherents practise it in the present. Islamic Thought is essential reading for students beginning the study of Islam but will also interest anyone seeking to learn more about one of the world’s great religions.
Download or read book Modern Sufis and the State written by Katherine Pratt Ewing and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2020-08-25 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sufism is typically thought of as the mystical side of Islam. In recent years, it has been held up as a supposedly peaceful alternative to the spread of forms of Islam associated with violence, an embodiment of democratic ideals of tolerance and pluralism. Are Sufis in fact as otherworldy and apolitical as this stereotype suggests? Modern Sufis and the State brings together a range of scholars, including anthropologists, historians, and religious-studies specialists, to challenge common assumptions that are made about Sufism today. Focusing on India and Pakistan within a broader global context, this book provides locally grounded accounts of how Sufis in South Asia have engaged in politics from the colonial period to the present. Contributors foreground the effects and unintended consequences of efforts to link Sufism with the spread of democracy and consider what roles scholars and governments have played in the making of twenty-first-century Sufism. They critique the belief that Salafism and Sufism are antithetical, offering nuanced analyses of the diversity, multivalence, and local embeddedness of Sufi political engagements and self-representations in Pakistan and India. Essays question the portrayal of Sufi shrines as sites of toleration, peace, and harmony, exploring cases of tension and conflict. A wide-ranging interdisciplinary collection, Modern Sufis and the State is a timely call to think critically about the role of public discourse in shaping perceptions of Sufism.
Download or read book The Canonization of Islamic Law written by Ahmed El Shamsy and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-10-21 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ahmed El Shamsy's The Canonization of Islamic Law is a detailed history of the birth of classical Islamic law. It shows how Islamic law and its institutions emerged out of the canonization of the sacred sources of Quran and Sunna (prophetic practice) in the eighth and ninth centuries CE. The book focuses on the ideas and influence of the jurist al-Shāfiʿī (d. 820 CE), who inaugurated the process of canonization, and it paints a rich picture of the intellectual engagements, political turbulence, and social changes that formed the context of his and his followers' careers.
Download or read book New Thinking in Islam written by Katajun Amirpur and published by Gingko Library. This book was released on 2016-11-15 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Rethinking Islam, Katajun Amirpur argues that the West’s impression of Islam as a backward-looking faith, resistant to post-Enlightenment thinking, is misleading and—due to its effects on political discourse—damaging. Introducing readers to key thinkers and activists—such as Abu Zaid, a free-thinking Egyptian Qur’an scholar; Abdolkarim Soroush, an academic and former member of Khomeini’s Cultural Revolution Committee; and Amina Wadud, an American feminist who was the first woman to lead the faithful in Friday Prayer—Amirpur reveals a powerful yet lesser-known tradition of inquiry and dissent within Islam, one that is committed to democracy and human rights. By examining these and many other similar figures’ ideas, she reveals the many ways they reject fundamentalist assertions and instead call for a diversity of opinion, greater freedom, and equality of the sexes.
Download or read book The Construction of Belief written by Aziz Esmail and published by Saqi. This book was released on 2013-02-01 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mohammed Arkoun was one of the most prominent and influential Arab intellectuals of his day. During a career spanning more than thirty years, he was revered as an outstanding research scholar, a bold critic of the theoretical tensions embedded within Islamic Studies and an outspoken public figure, upholding political, social and cultural modernism. This Festschrift honours Arkoun's scholarship, bringing together the contributions of eleven distinguished scholars of history, religious studies and philosophy. It offers a comprehensive selection of critical engagements with Arkoun's work, reflecting on his considerable influence on contemporary thinking about Islam and its ideological, philosophical and theological dimensions. The authoritative reference study on the work of Mohammed Arkoun, The Construction of Belief is essential reading for students and scholars of Islam, Muslim societies and cultures, modernity, religious studies, philosophy and semanti.
Download or read book The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam written by Sir Muhammad Iqbal and published by . This book was released on 2022 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Islam in Pakistan written by Muhammad Qasim Zaman and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-08-04 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first book to explore the modern history of Islam in South Asia The first modern state to be founded in the name of Islam, Pakistan was the largest Muslim country in the world at the time of its establishment in 1947. Today it is the second-most populous, after Indonesia. Islam in Pakistan is the first comprehensive book to explore Islam's evolution in this region over the past century and a half, from the British colonial era to the present day. Muhammad Qasim Zaman presents a rich historical account of this major Muslim nation, insights into the rise and gradual decline of Islamic modernist thought in the South Asian region, and an understanding of how Islam has fared in the contemporary world. Much attention has been given to Pakistan's role in sustaining the Afghan struggle against the Soviet occupation in the 1980s, in the growth of the Taliban in the 1990s, and in the War on Terror after 9/11. But as Zaman shows, the nation's significance in matters relating to Islam has much deeper roots. Since the late nineteenth century, South Asia has witnessed important initiatives toward rethinking core Islamic texts and traditions in the interest of their compatibility with the imperatives of modern life. Traditionalist scholars and their institutions, too, have had a prominent presence in the region, as have Islamism and Sufism. Pakistan did not merely inherit these and other aspects of Islam. Rather, it has been and remains a site of intense contestation over Islam's public place, meaning, and interpretation. Examining how facets of Islam have been pivotal in Pakistani history, Islam in Pakistan offers sweeping perspectives on what constitutes an Islamic state.
Download or read book Defenders of Reason in Islam written by Richard C. Martin and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-03-03 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This clearly written text explores the rational theology of Islam, the conflict between the "defenders of God" and the "defenders of reason", and the controversy's historical roots.
Download or read book Prophecy in Islam written by F Rahman and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-02-01 with total page 122 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1958. This volume brings into focus an area of Islamic religio-philosophical thought to which relatively little attention has been paid by modern scholars of Muslim thought. The importance of the subject lies in the fact that it constitutes a central point at the confrontation of the traditional Islamic and Hellenic thought currents.
