| Islam and the Challenge of Civilization Contributor(s): Meddeb, Abdelwahab (Author), Kuntz, Jane (Translator) |
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ISBN: 082326436X ISBN-13: 9780823264360 Publisher: Fordham University Press OUR PRICE: $26.60 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: July 2015 |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Religion | Islam - General - History | Middle East - General - Political Science |
| Dewey: 297 |
| Physical Information: 0.6" H x 5.6" W x 8.7" (0.55 lbs) 192 pages |
| Themes: - Cultural Region - Middle East - Religious Orientation - Islamic |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: Meddeb wages a war of interpretations in this book demonstrating that Muslims cannot join the concert of nations unless they set aside outmoded notions such as jihad, and realize that the feuding among monotheisms must give way to the more important issue of what it means to be a citizen in today's post-religious global setting. Abdelwahab Meddeb makes an urgent case for an Islamic reformation, located squarely in Western Europe, now home to millions of Muslims, where Christianity and Judaism have come to coexist with secular humanism and positivist law. He is not advocating moderate Islam, which he characterizes as thinly disguised Wahabism, but rather an Islam inspired by the great Sufi thinkers, whose practice of religion was not bound by doctrine. To accomplish this, Meddeb returns to the doctrinal question of the text as transcription of the uncreated word of God and calls upon Muslims to distinguish between Islam's spiritual message and the temporal, material, and historically grounded origins of its founding scriptures. He contrasts periods of Islamic history--when philosophers and theologians engaged in lively dialogue with other faiths and civilizations and contributed to transmitting the Hellenistic tradition to early modern Europe--with modern Islam's collective amnesia of this past. |
Contributor Bio(s): Meddeb, Abdelwahab: - Abdelwahab Meddeb (1946-2014) was novelist and poet who taught comparative literature at the Université Paris X (Nanterre). Meddeb published more than twenty books in French. His La maladie de l'islam, winner of the Prix François Mauriac, has been translated into English as The Malady of Islam.Kuntz, Jane: - Jane Kuntz has a doctorate in French from the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign and has translated eight works of contemporary French fiction for Dalkey Archive Press. |