Author: Rian Thum Publisher: Harvard University Press ISBN: 067496702X Category : History Languages : en Pages : 332
Book Description
For 250 years, the Turkic Muslims of Altishahr—the vast desert region to the northwest of Tibet—have led an uneasy existence under Chinese rule. Today they call themselves Uyghurs, and they have cultivated a sense of history and identity that challenges Beijing’s official national narrative. Rian Thum argues that the roots of this history run deeper than recent conflicts, to a time when manuscripts and pilgrimage dominated understandings of the past. Beyond broadening our knowledge of tensions between the Uyghurs and the Chinese government, this meditation on the very concept of history probes the limits of human interaction with the past. Uyghur historical practice emerged from the circulation of books and people during the Qing Dynasty, when crowds of pilgrims listened to history readings at the tombs of Islamic saints. Over time, amid long journeys and moving rituals, at oasis markets and desert shrines, ordinary readers adapted community-authored manuscripts to their own needs. In the process they created a window into a forgotten Islam, shaped by the veneration of local saints. Partly insulated from the rest of the Islamic world, the Uyghurs constructed a local history that is at once unique and assimilates elements of Semitic, Iranic, Turkic, and Indic traditions—the cultural imports of Silk Road travelers. Through both ethnographic and historical analysis, The Sacred Routes of Uyghur History offers a new understanding of Uyghur historical practices, detailing the remarkable means by which this people reckons with its past and confronts its nationalist aspirations in the present day.
Author: Jamil Effarah Publisher: AuthorHouse ISBN: 1524614491 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 252
Book Description
Historians agree that Nazarenes or Al-Nassarah in Arabic, similar to Judaism, was a source for knowledge and religious thoughts for the Arabs of Hijaz. The Arab of Hijaz and specially Arab of Mecca had a tremendous knowledge in the Nazarene doctrines and sect and their opinion of Christs Birth, His message and His crucifixion. It was natural that such talks created a feedback in their knowledge, minds and dogma. The only religion known to the Quran is the religion of Moses (Moussa) and Jesus (Isa), as one religion that was carried by the Nazarenes. It is very important to remember that in history before Islam the term Nusrani and Nassarah, the Nazarenes never used to represent the Christians and Christianity wherever they lived throughout their history. The Nazarenes is the name confined to a sect of Beni Israel who believed in the coming of Christ, and deflected from the main streams of Christianity since the first Council of the Churches that took place in Jerusalem in 49 AD. Christians refer to them as the Shiites in relation to their Sunni Christianity, in faith and in dogma. With their presence in Mecca and Hijaz, the name Nazarene prevailed, as they had monopolized the Gospel. The best proof is the Raheb Gregarious Buheira of Basra Ash-sham who was labeled, in Al-Sira Al-Nabawiah, the caretaker of Isa on His religion, and to whom Waraka Bin Nofal belonged. Waraka Ben Nofal, the Bishop of Nazarenes in Mecca, was translating the Book and the Gospel of Mathews Hebrew in Aramaic to Arabic in the presence of Muhammad. Dr. Effarahs intention is to discuss in short that such important fact that deserves in depth study and research, especially the Quran never used the term Christianity and Christians. The only reference was to Jesus, as Isa Bin Mariam, and to the Nazarenes all the time. Therefore any translation from Arabic into English for the Holy Quran is misleading if Isa is considered a presentation for Jesus Christ, or any reference to the Nazarenes as Christians. The Holy Quran can be looked at as a continuous dialogue with the people of the Book from Jews and Nazarenes. The positions of testimony by the Nazarenes and their support to the Quranic call, and their affiliations to that mission, does not mean in the Quran, except the Nazarenes of Beni Israel due to the Qurans position, similar to their position, from the trinity and the divinity of Christ. The Arab Prophet direction is to follow the believers state of affairs Those are the ones to whom We have given the Book, along with Discretion and Prophet hood Such are the ones whom God has guided, so copy their guidance, as stated in Sura Al-Enaam, 6: verses 89-90. This book, What are the sacred roots of Islam, verifies how monotheism was spread in Arabia through the teaching of the Book and the Gospel through the Nazarenes Arab tribes who accepted the Prophet Mohammad as their leader and helped in setting the foundation for the Arab tribes in the Arabian Peninsula to unite and to spread out into an Islamic Empire. The current assumed Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) does not represent the true concept of the sacred roots of Islam that created the Islamic Empire in the past. Today, ISIL is nothing more than a group of terrorists hiding behind a form of Islam of their own brutal imagination. This book is written to those intellectuals who believe in the renewal, innovation and knowledge production that makes that make the contemporary Arab mentality open to global, psychological, social and human interactions and that Democracy is the solution and not Islam that ISIL is calling for by slaughtering humanity and its antiquities.
Author: Matthew Gordon Publisher: Watkins Publishing ISBN: 9781907486166 Category : Islam Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
In a thoughtful exploration of Islam's history, beliefs, and practices, this enlightening book corrects many common misconceptions. Issues such as political Islam, Islam and Israel, and Islamic fundamentalism are addressed with intelligence, skill, and sensitivity.
Author: Ghālib ibn ʻAwaḍ Quʻayṭī (al-Sulṭān.) Publisher: ISBN: Category : History Languages : en Pages : 752
Book Description
Mecca and Medina, the world's most forbidden cities, have long been a symbol of mystery and fascination to outsiders...In this unique, ground-breaking book, one of the world's leading experts in Arabian history investigates the colourful, often astonishing story of these two great cities. Carefully sifting fact from legend, Sultan Ghalib describes their architecture, religious life, society, and politics, and shows how they have played a pivotal role in the history of Islam. All those with an interest in Islamic civilization, religion, and current affairs, will find this volume an indispensable resource. - T.J. Winter, Professor of Islamic Studies, Cambridge University
Author: Ibn Warraq Publisher: Prometheus Books ISBN: 161592146X Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 416
Book Description
Scholars of Islam are familiar with the Koran's many errors and contradictions, but these have rarely been revealed to a wider public. THE ORIGINS OF THE KORAN is an attempt to remedy this deficiency by bringing together classic critical essays which raise key issues surrounding Islam's holy book. Indispensable to scholars and all those interested in the textual underpinning of one of the fastest growing religions in the world.
Author: A. Azfar Moin Publisher: Columbia University Press ISBN: 0231504713 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 365
Book Description
At the end of the sixteenth century and the turn of the first Islamic millennium, the powerful Mughal emperor Akbar declared himself the most sacred being on earth. The holiest of all saints and above the distinctions of religion, he styled himself as the messiah reborn. Yet the Mughal emperor was not alone in doing so. In this field-changing study, A. Azfar Moin explores why Muslim sovereigns in this period began to imitate the exalted nature of Sufi saints. Uncovering a startling yet widespread phenomenon, he shows how the charismatic pull of sainthood (wilayat)—rather than the draw of religious law (sharia) or holy war (jihad)—inspired a new style of sovereignty in Islam. A work of history richly informed by the anthropology of religion and art, The Millennial Sovereign traces how royal dynastic cults and shrine-centered Sufism came together in the imperial cultures of Timurid Central Asia, Safavid Iran, and Mughal India. By juxtaposing imperial chronicles, paintings, and architecture with theories of sainthood, apocalyptic treatises, and manuals on astrology and magic, Moin uncovers a pattern of Islamic politics shaped by Sufi and millennial motifs. He shows how alchemical symbols and astrological rituals enveloped the body of the monarch, casting him as both spiritual guide and material lord. Ultimately, Moin offers a striking new perspective on the history of Islam and the religious and political developments linking South Asia and Iran in early-modern times.
Author: Ziauddin Sardar Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA ISBN: 1620402688 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 449
Book Description
Mecca is, for many, the heart of Islam. It is the birthplace of Muhammad, the direction to which Muslims turn when they pray, and the site of pilgrimage that annually draws some three million Muslims from all corners of the world. Yet the significance of Mecca is more than purely religious. What happens in Mecca and how Muslims think about the political and cultural history of Mecca has had and continues to have a profound influence on world events to this day. In this insighful book, Ziauddin Sardar unravels the meaning and significance of Mecca. Tracing its history, from its origins as a “barren valley” in the desert to its evolution as a trading town and sudden emergence as the religious center of a world empire, Sardar examines the religious struggles and rebellions in Mecca that have significantly shaped Muslim culture. An illuminative, lyrical, and witty blend of history, reportage, and memoir, Mecca reflects all that is profound and enlightening, curious and amusing about Mecca and takes us behind the closed doors to one of the most important places in the world today.
Author: Hugh Chisholm Publisher: ISBN: Category : Encyclopedias and dictionaries Languages : en Pages : 1090
Book Description
This eleventh edition was developed during the encyclopaedia's transition from a British to an American publication. Some of its articles were written by the best-known scholars of the time and it is considered to be a landmark encyclopaedia for scholarship and literary style.
Author: Karen Armstrong Publisher: Anchor ISBN: 0307272923 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 433
Book Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A nuanced exploration of the role of religion in our lives, drawing on insights of the past to build a faith for our dangerously polarized age—from the New York Times bestselling author of The History of God Moving from the Paleolithic age to the present, Karen Armstrong details the great lengths to which humankind has gone in order to experience a sacred reality that it called by many names, such as God, Brahman, Nirvana, Allah, or Dao. Focusing especially on Christianity but including Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Chinese spiritualities, Armstrong examines the diminished impulse toward religion in our own time, when a significant number of people either want nothing to do with God or question the efficacy of faith. Why has God become unbelievable? Why is it that atheists and theists alike now think and speak about God in a way that veers so profoundly from the thinking of our ancestors? Answering these questions with the same depth of knowledge and profound insight that have marked all her acclaimed books, Armstrong makes clear how the changing face of the world has necessarily changed the importance of religion at both the societal and the individual level. Yet she cautions us that religion was never supposed to provide answers that lie within the competence of human reason; that, she says, is the role of logos. The task of religion is “to help us live creatively, peacefully, and even joyously with realities for which there are no easy explanations.” She emphasizes, too, that religion will not work automatically. It is, she says, a practical discipline: its insights are derived not from abstract speculation but from “dedicated intellectual endeavor” and a “compassionate lifestyle that enables us to break out of the prism of selfhood.”
Author: Karine V. Walther Publisher: UNC Press Books ISBN: 1469625407 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 474
Book Description
Throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, as Americans increasingly came into contact with the Islamic world, U.S. diplomatic, cultural, political, and religious beliefs about Islam began to shape their responses to world events. In Sacred Interests, Karine V. Walther excavates the deep history of American Islamophobia, showing how negative perceptions of Islam and Muslims shaped U.S. foreign relations from the Early Republic to the end of World War I. Beginning with the Greek War of Independence in 1821, Walther illuminates reactions to and involvement in the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, the efforts to protect Jews from Muslim authorities in Morocco, American colonial policies in the Philippines, and American attempts to aid Christians during the Armenian Genocide. Walther examines the American role in the peace negotiations after World War I, support for the Balfour Declaration, and the establishment of the mandate system in the Middle East. The result is a vital exploration of the crucial role the United States played in the Islamic world during the long nineteenth century--an interaction that shaped a historical legacy that remains with us today.
Author: Rian Thum
Author: Jamil Effarah
Author: Matthew Gordon
Author: Ghālib ibn ʻAwaḍ Quʻayṭī (al-Sulṭān.)
Author: Ibn Warraq
Author: A. Azfar Moin
Author: Ziauddin Sardar
Author: Hugh Chisholm
Author: Karen Armstrong
Author: Karine V. Walther