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Sajjad Rizvi

University of Exeter, Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, Faculty Member

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Broadly speaking, I work on Islamic intellectual history, specialising in the Safavid-Mughal period. My second main area of interest is Qurʾanic exegesis and textual hermeneutics.I also run a philosophy blog that has my various musings on philosophy both Islamic and otherwise as well as notes on manuscript research and related critical editions - mullasadra.blogspot.com
Phone: +44 (0)1392 724037

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Books by Sajjad Rizvi

The Spirit and the Letter

a collected volume on esoteric approaches to Qurʾanic exegesis edited with Annabel Keeler Part ... more a collected volume on esoteric approaches to Qurʾanic exegesis edited with Annabel Keeler

Part I: Comparative Hermeneutics

1: The Countless Faces of Understanding: On Istinbat, Mystical Listening and Sufi Exegesis, Sara Sviri

2: The Interpretation of the Arabic Letters in Early Sufism: Sulami s Sharh ma'ani al-huruf, Gerhard Böwering

3: Towards a Prophetology of Love: The Figure of Jacob in Sufi Commentaries on Surat Yusuf, Annabel Keeler

4: Making it Plain: Sufi Commentaries in English in the Twentieth Century, Kristin Zahra Sands

Part II: Commentators and Texts in Focus

5: Outlines of Early Ismaili-Fatimid Qur'an Exegesis, Meir M. Bar-Asher

6: Ibn Sina's Qur'anic Hermeneutics, Peter Heath

7: Qushayri's Exegetical Encounter with the Mi'raj, Martin Nguyen

8: Shahrastani's Mafatih al-Asrar: A Medieval Ismaili System of Hermeneutics?, Toby Mayer

9: Qunawi's Scriptural Hermeneutics, Richard Todd

10: Eschatology and Hermeneutics in Kashani's Ta'wilat al-Qur'an, Pierre Lory

11: Simnani and Hermeneutics, Paul Ballanfat

12: Speech, Book, and Healing Knowledge: The Qur'anic Hermeneutics of Mulla Sadra, Janis Esots

13: Aspects of Mystical Hermeneutics and the Theory of the Oneness of Being (wahdat al-wujud) in the work of 'Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulusi (d. 1143/1731), Bakri Aladdin

14: The Sufi Hermeneutics of Ibn 'Ajiba (d. 1224/1809): A Study of Some Eschatological Verses of the Qur'an, Mahmut Ay

15: Beyond the Letter: Explanation (tafsir) versus Adaptation (tatbiq) in Tabataba'i s al-Mizan, Amin Ehteshami and Sajjad Rizvi

Mulla Sadra Shirazi

An Anthology of Qur'anic Commentaries

Introductions Contextualising the Quranic Commentaries, Alan Jones The Anthology: the Rationale,... more Introductions
Contextualising the Quranic Commentaries, Alan Jones
The Anthology: the Rationale, the Choice of Commentaries and Verses, Feras Hamza and Sajjad Rizvi
Introduction to the commentators and their commentaries, Feras Hamza and Sajjad Rizvi
Map of Tafsír Traditions: Illustrative Overview of the Genre and its Representatives
I. Q. 2:115 'To God belong the East and the West'
II. Q 2:255 'His throne comprises the heavens and the earth'
III. Q. 6:12 'He has prescribed mercy for Himself'
IV. Q. 24:35 'God is the Light of the heavens and the earth'
V. Q. 54:49 'Every thing We have created according to a measure'
VI. Q. 112:1-2 'Say: "He is God, One, God, the Everlasting Refuge"'

Mulla Sadra and Metaphysics

Mulla Sadra is one of the most important Islamic philosophers after Avicenna. In this exploration... more Mulla Sadra is one of the most important Islamic philosophers after Avicenna. In this exploration of his philosophy, Sajjad H. Rizvi examines the central doctrine of the modulation of being, and contextualises his work within the intellectual history of philosophical traditions in the Islamic East.

Reading and critiquing the works of Mulla Sadra from an analytical perspective, this book pays particular attention to his text the Asfar, a work which, due to its complexity, is often overlooked. Looking at the concept of philosophy as a way of life and a therapeutic practice, this book explores the paradigm of the modulation of being in the philosophical method and metaphysics of Mulla Sadra and considers its different manifestations. Rizvi relates his philosophy to larger trends and provides a review of the field, charting and critiquing the discussion on the topic to date and exploring recent thought in this direction, to show how Sadrian thought was addressed well into the 19th and 20th centuries.

This major contribution to the study of Mulla Sadra and the intellectual life of the Safavid period fills an important gap in the field of Sadra studies and Islamic philosophy, and is indispensable to students of philosophy, religion and Islamic studies, and Islamic philosophy in particular.

Papers by Sajjad Rizvi

Some Reflections on the Narrative of Job From Muslim Traditions

The Maghreb Review

Inscribing Persian in the Arabic Cosmopolis

Australian Journal of Islamic Studies

Scholarly discourse on the Persianate tends to focus on the influence of Persian in Iran and furt... more Scholarly discourse on the Persianate tends to focus on the influence of Persian in Iran and further east, and often occludes the way in which the Persian language is inflected and present in the Arabic cosmopolis further west. Similarly, the formation of ‘Islamic classics’ and scholarly genres including exegesis tends to ignore the role of Persian works (and texts produced in a Persianate context). Through a case study of Qur’ānic exegesis in Persian and its reception west of Iran, we demonstrate how Persian is inscribed into the Arabic cosmopolis such that the development of post-classical exegesis should place these works alongside the major Arabic classics of al-Ṭabarī, al-Thaʿlabī and al-Basīṭ; in effect, we contend the study of Qur’ānic exegesis cannot ignore the study of Persian exegesis. Through examining rare manuscripts, we show how scholars read, copied and promoted Persian tafsir in Arabophone contexts. Not only does this study follow up on and test some earlier scholarl...

5 A Sufi Theology Fit for a Shī'ī King: The Gawhar-i Murād of 'Abd al-Razzāq Lāhījī (d. 1072/1661–2)

Sufism and Theology

The Challenge of Evil in Islamic Thought: A Brief Survey

Oriens, 2021

The challenge of evil to rational Abrahamic religions has clearly been articulated in modern phil... more The challenge of evil to rational Abrahamic religions has clearly been articulated in modern philosophy of religion predicated on the incompatibility of the omnipotence, omnibenevolence, and omniscience of God with the existence of evils. Even within the Islamic theological and philosophical traditions, there is a venerable history of theodicies and defences of a good God and the efficacy of human free will. That is the context in which we wish to locate the contributions in this special issue that examine the ways in which evil is considered in Islamic philosophical accounts (particularly of the Šiʿi traditions) from the classical period to the present.

Being (wujd) and sanctity (wilåya): two poles of intellectual and mystical enquiry in Qajar Iran

‘Seeking the Face of God’: The Safawid Ḥikmat Tradition’s Conceptualisation of Walāya Takwīniyya

The Making of a Marjaʿ: Sīstānī and Shiʿi Religious Authority in the Contemporary Age

Sociology of Islam, 2018

Anyone considering the question of religious authority among the contemporary Shiʿa not least in ... more Anyone considering the question of religious authority among the contemporary Shiʿa not least in Iraq will recognize the paramount significance of Ayatollah Sīstānī, described as the most important marjaʿ in the world. This paper examines the phenomenon of marjaʿiyya, considers how one becomes a marjaʿ, and traces the rise of Sīstānī to the pre-eminent position that he now holds and juxtaposes his model of leadership with other modern Shiʿi models of religious authority articulated by Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran and Bāqir al-Ṣadr in Iraq. Marjaʿiyya is a multivocal and in many ways a quintessentially modern institution that has proved to be highly resilient and adaptable in the face of challenges coming from globalizing modernity. In Iraq and in the region, Sīstānī has proven to be the most effective non-state wielder of authority and influence not just among believers but more widely in society and constitutes the most successful example of the Shiʿi marjaʿiyya in modern times.

Authority in Absence? Shi‘i Politics of Salvation from the Classical Period to Modern Republicanism

Studies in Christian Ethics, 2016

Shi‘i Islam is often considered to be political per se because of its emergence historically as a... more Shi‘i Islam is often considered to be political per se because of its emergence historically as a movement with a strong position on authority and legitimacy in governance. This piece demonstrates how the politics of salvation in the tradition tie together one’s loyalty to the divine person of the Imam to one’s final destination, and how that relationship is complicated in the physical absence of the Imam. Such a politics guards against a sacralisation of everyday politics and recognises that sanctity arises from the person of the Imam and not the office of his delegate.

Authority, Governance, Legitimacy, Representation: Some Thoughts from the Muslim Margins

Studies in Christian Ethics, 2016

The study of political theology has never been a neutral exercise in excavating the theoretical o... more The study of political theology has never been a neutral exercise in excavating the theoretical origins of sovereignty. The political contexts in which questions arise are instructive. In this paper, I argue that the very language of representation and legitimacy articulated for Muslims in the contemporary world may occlude the political challenges that obviate their possibility. Biopolitics, the construction of tradition, the possibility of a ‘philosophical religion’ and the challenge of rationality, and the incompleteness of the critique of political theology make the actuality of a critical and theoretical encounter with representation difficult at best, elusive at worst.

Between Hegel and Rumi: Iqbal’s Contrapuntal Encounters with the Islamic Philosophical Traditions

Muhammad Iqbal, 2017

This chapter discusses Muhamad Iqbal's place in South Asian thought through his interaction w... more This chapter discusses Muhamad Iqbal's place in South Asian thought through his interaction with contemporary Muslim and European ideas and thinkers. Iqbal transcends all attempts to limit his philosophy to a particular school or influence. Thus, Iqbal becomes one of the few South Asian intellectuals who reassessed their heritage and sought for it a space within European thought. The chapter then divides Iqbal's intellectual history into three phases: early Indian, middle European, and late Indian. In each phase, it contrasts Iqbal with particular individuals and schools to show that Iqbal neither returned to religious tradition nor completely embraced modernity, but may be described best as a Muslim existentialist in light of his doctrines of khudi, free creative power, and open possibility.

God, Life, and the Cosmos: Christian and Islamic Perspectives * Edited by TED PETERS, MUZAFFAR IQBAL and SYED NOMANUL HAQ (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002). 404 pp. Price HB 57.75. ISBN 0-754-60883-2

Journal of Islamic Studies, 2006

... Ibrahim Moosa examines bioethics and the Islamic jurists&amp;amp;#x27; approach to the hu... more

An Avicennian Engagement with and Appropriation of Mullā Ṣadrā Šīrāzī (d. 1045/1636)

Oriens, 2020

Recent scholarship on Avicenna and Avicennism has tended to focus on the spread and dissemination... more Recent scholarship on Avicenna and Avicennism has tended to focus on the spread and dissemination of his ideas in the early centuries. However, the later readings and contestations of Avicennism especially from the Safavid period onwards have been broadly neglected. In this paper on the most important philosopher of eighteenth-century Iran, Mahdī Narāqī, I provide a case study of the enduring significance of Avicennism, but one which has been transformed by Mullā Ṣadrā’s critical reading of Avicenna. Narāqī demonstrates how Avicenna had been transformed and how the metaphysical debates between Avicennism and Mullā Ṣadrā had led to new synthetical positions.

Reversing the Gaze? Or Decolonizing the Study of the Qurʾan

Method & Theory in the Study of Religion

Taking as the starting point, Majid Daneshgar’s Studying the Qurʾan in the Muslim Academy, I argu... more Taking as the starting point, Majid Daneshgar’s Studying the Qurʾan in the Muslim Academy, I argue that the political and intellectual contexts for the study of Islam and indeed the Qur’an cannot be ignored whether the study is conducted in the “Western” or the “Muslim” academy. The construction of the categories of religion and scripture arise out of practices of colonialist knowledge; positionality of the author cannot be eliminated from the interrogative gaze. Beginning with that critique, I suggest some possible ways in which we can decolonize the study of the Muslim scripture and its experience for Muslims.

Considering Divine Providence in Mullā Ṣadrā Šīrāzī (d. 1045/1636): The Problem of Evil, Theodicy, and the Divine Eros

Oriens

Despite the extensive work on the Safavid thinker Mullā Ṣadrā Šīrāzī (d. 1045/1636) nowadays in m... more Despite the extensive work on the Safavid thinker Mullā Ṣadrā Šīrāzī (d. 1045/1636) nowadays in metropolitan academia, certain areas of philosophical and theological concern remain understudied, if studied at all – and even then, there is little attempt to consider his work in the light of philosophical analysis. We know of a venerable philosophical tradition of analysing the question of providence as a means for examining questions of creation (ex nihilo or otherwise), the problem of evil, determinism and free will, and the larger question of theodicy (and whether this world that we inhabit is indeed the ‘best of all possible worlds’). I propose to examine these questions through an analysis of a section of the theology in al-Asfār al-arbaʿa (The Four Journeys) of Mullā Ṣadrā (mawqif VIII of safar III) and juxtapose it with passages from his other works, all the while contextualising it within the longer Neoplatonic tradition of providence and evil. The section of the Asfār plays a...

Mirror for the Muslim Prince

American Journal of Islam and Society

Everyone seems to be interested in Islamic political thought these days, nodoubt as a result of t... more Everyone seems to be interested in Islamic political thought these days, nodoubt as a result of the rise and fall of Islamisms/post-Islamisms and othercontemporary configurations of Islam and politics. And then there are the claimants for a new caliphate. However, most concerns with political thought– with the exception of the large Princeton Encyclopaedia edited by PatriciaCrone and Gerhard Bowering – tend to focus their attention on either the earlyand classical debates on the imamate (e.g., Crone), classical philosophy andthe “Arabic context” for Platonopolis (e.g., Nelly Lahoud), or the medievalakhlāq literature (e.g., Linda Darling and Muzaffar Alam), or even modernpermutations (far too many examples to mention). It is a rare work indeedthat tries to bring a range of perspectives in a diachronic analysis over space,time, and political theologies into a single volume. The success and achievementof Boroujerdi’s volume is to do precisely that and to collate contributionsfrom some ...

Epistles of the Brethren of Purity. On the Natural Sciences

American Journal of Islam and Society

One does not need to repeat the oft-stated observation that editing and translatingthe epistles o... more One does not need to repeat the oft-stated observation that editing and translatingthe epistles of the Brethren of Purity (Ikhwan al-Safa’) will greatly enhanceour understanding of the pre-Avicennan period’s intellectual history ofthe philosophical sciences. Carmela Baffioni, senior research fellow at the Instituteof Ismaili Studies, which sponsors this project, is a leading specialiston the Brethren, having spent an illustrious career at Naples – twenty-fiveitems in the bibliography constitute her major contributions, alongside the editionsand translations she has contributed to this series. She has already editedand translated the epistles on logic in an earlier volume of this series – thoseepistles come immediately before the seven that are published here (out ofthe seventeen epistles that comprise the second section on the natural sciences)and are the culmination of the first section on the mathematical sciences. Thevolume immediately after on epistle 22 on animals has been publ...

The Spirit and the Letter

a collected volume on esoteric approaches to Qurʾanic exegesis edited with Annabel Keeler Part ... more a collected volume on esoteric approaches to Qurʾanic exegesis edited with Annabel Keeler

Part I: Comparative Hermeneutics

1: The Countless Faces of Understanding: On Istinbat, Mystical Listening and Sufi Exegesis, Sara Sviri

2: The Interpretation of the Arabic Letters in Early Sufism: Sulami s Sharh ma'ani al-huruf, Gerhard Böwering

3: Towards a Prophetology of Love: The Figure of Jacob in Sufi Commentaries on Surat Yusuf, Annabel Keeler

4: Making it Plain: Sufi Commentaries in English in the Twentieth Century, Kristin Zahra Sands

Part II: Commentators and Texts in Focus

5: Outlines of Early Ismaili-Fatimid Qur'an Exegesis, Meir M. Bar-Asher

6: Ibn Sina's Qur'anic Hermeneutics, Peter Heath

7: Qushayri's Exegetical Encounter with the Mi'raj, Martin Nguyen

8: Shahrastani's Mafatih al-Asrar: A Medieval Ismaili System of Hermeneutics?, Toby Mayer

9: Qunawi's Scriptural Hermeneutics, Richard Todd

10: Eschatology and Hermeneutics in Kashani's Ta'wilat al-Qur'an, Pierre Lory

11: Simnani and Hermeneutics, Paul Ballanfat

12: Speech, Book, and Healing Knowledge: The Qur'anic Hermeneutics of Mulla Sadra, Janis Esots

13: Aspects of Mystical Hermeneutics and the Theory of the Oneness of Being (wahdat al-wujud) in the work of 'Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulusi (d. 1143/1731), Bakri Aladdin

14: The Sufi Hermeneutics of Ibn 'Ajiba (d. 1224/1809): A Study of Some Eschatological Verses of the Qur'an, Mahmut Ay

15: Beyond the Letter: Explanation (tafsir) versus Adaptation (tatbiq) in Tabataba'i s al-Mizan, Amin Ehteshami and Sajjad Rizvi

Mulla Sadra Shirazi

An Anthology of Qur'anic Commentaries

Introductions Contextualising the Quranic Commentaries, Alan Jones The Anthology: the Rationale,... more Introductions
Contextualising the Quranic Commentaries, Alan Jones
The Anthology: the Rationale, the Choice of Commentaries and Verses, Feras Hamza and Sajjad Rizvi
Introduction to the commentators and their commentaries, Feras Hamza and Sajjad Rizvi
Map of Tafsír Traditions: Illustrative Overview of the Genre and its Representatives
I. Q. 2:115 'To God belong the East and the West'
II. Q 2:255 'His throne comprises the heavens and the earth'
III. Q. 6:12 'He has prescribed mercy for Himself'
IV. Q. 24:35 'God is the Light of the heavens and the earth'
V. Q. 54:49 'Every thing We have created according to a measure'
VI. Q. 112:1-2 'Say: "He is God, One, God, the Everlasting Refuge"'

Mulla Sadra and Metaphysics

Mulla Sadra is one of the most important Islamic philosophers after Avicenna. In this exploration... more Mulla Sadra is one of the most important Islamic philosophers after Avicenna. In this exploration of his philosophy, Sajjad H. Rizvi examines the central doctrine of the modulation of being, and contextualises his work within the intellectual history of philosophical traditions in the Islamic East.

Reading and critiquing the works of Mulla Sadra from an analytical perspective, this book pays particular attention to his text the Asfar, a work which, due to its complexity, is often overlooked. Looking at the concept of philosophy as a way of life and a therapeutic practice, this book explores the paradigm of the modulation of being in the philosophical method and metaphysics of Mulla Sadra and considers its different manifestations. Rizvi relates his philosophy to larger trends and provides a review of the field, charting and critiquing the discussion on the topic to date and exploring recent thought in this direction, to show how Sadrian thought was addressed well into the 19th and 20th centuries.

This major contribution to the study of Mulla Sadra and the intellectual life of the Safavid period fills an important gap in the field of Sadra studies and Islamic philosophy, and is indispensable to students of philosophy, religion and Islamic studies, and Islamic philosophy in particular.

Some Reflections on the Narrative of Job From Muslim Traditions

The Maghreb Review

Inscribing Persian in the Arabic Cosmopolis

Australian Journal of Islamic Studies

Scholarly discourse on the Persianate tends to focus on the influence of Persian in Iran and furt... more Scholarly discourse on the Persianate tends to focus on the influence of Persian in Iran and further east, and often occludes the way in which the Persian language is inflected and present in the Arabic cosmopolis further west. Similarly, the formation of ‘Islamic classics’ and scholarly genres including exegesis tends to ignore the role of Persian works (and texts produced in a Persianate context). Through a case study of Qur’ānic exegesis in Persian and its reception west of Iran, we demonstrate how Persian is inscribed into the Arabic cosmopolis such that the development of post-classical exegesis should place these works alongside the major Arabic classics of al-Ṭabarī, al-Thaʿlabī and al-Basīṭ; in effect, we contend the study of Qur’ānic exegesis cannot ignore the study of Persian exegesis. Through examining rare manuscripts, we show how scholars read, copied and promoted Persian tafsir in Arabophone contexts. Not only does this study follow up on and test some earlier scholarl...

5 A Sufi Theology Fit for a Shī'ī King: The Gawhar-i Murād of 'Abd al-Razzāq Lāhījī (d. 1072/1661–2)

Sufism and Theology

The Challenge of Evil in Islamic Thought: A Brief Survey

Oriens, 2021

The challenge of evil to rational Abrahamic religions has clearly been articulated in modern phil... more The challenge of evil to rational Abrahamic religions has clearly been articulated in modern philosophy of religion predicated on the incompatibility of the omnipotence, omnibenevolence, and omniscience of God with the existence of evils. Even within the Islamic theological and philosophical traditions, there is a venerable history of theodicies and defences of a good God and the efficacy of human free will. That is the context in which we wish to locate the contributions in this special issue that examine the ways in which evil is considered in Islamic philosophical accounts (particularly of the Šiʿi traditions) from the classical period to the present.

Being (wujd) and sanctity (wilåya): two poles of intellectual and mystical enquiry in Qajar Iran

‘Seeking the Face of God’: The Safawid Ḥikmat Tradition’s Conceptualisation of Walāya Takwīniyya

The Making of a Marjaʿ: Sīstānī and Shiʿi Religious Authority in the Contemporary Age

Sociology of Islam, 2018

Anyone considering the question of religious authority among the contemporary Shiʿa not least in ... more Anyone considering the question of religious authority among the contemporary Shiʿa not least in Iraq will recognize the paramount significance of Ayatollah Sīstānī, described as the most important marjaʿ in the world. This paper examines the phenomenon of marjaʿiyya, considers how one becomes a marjaʿ, and traces the rise of Sīstānī to the pre-eminent position that he now holds and juxtaposes his model of leadership with other modern Shiʿi models of religious authority articulated by Ayatollah Khomeini in Iran and Bāqir al-Ṣadr in Iraq. Marjaʿiyya is a multivocal and in many ways a quintessentially modern institution that has proved to be highly resilient and adaptable in the face of challenges coming from globalizing modernity. In Iraq and in the region, Sīstānī has proven to be the most effective non-state wielder of authority and influence not just among believers but more widely in society and constitutes the most successful example of the Shiʿi marjaʿiyya in modern times.

Authority in Absence? Shi‘i Politics of Salvation from the Classical Period to Modern Republicanism

Studies in Christian Ethics, 2016

Shi‘i Islam is often considered to be political per se because of its emergence historically as a... more Shi‘i Islam is often considered to be political per se because of its emergence historically as a movement with a strong position on authority and legitimacy in governance. This piece demonstrates how the politics of salvation in the tradition tie together one’s loyalty to the divine person of the Imam to one’s final destination, and how that relationship is complicated in the physical absence of the Imam. Such a politics guards against a sacralisation of everyday politics and recognises that sanctity arises from the person of the Imam and not the office of his delegate.

Authority, Governance, Legitimacy, Representation: Some Thoughts from the Muslim Margins

Studies in Christian Ethics, 2016

The study of political theology has never been a neutral exercise in excavating the theoretical o... more The study of political theology has never been a neutral exercise in excavating the theoretical origins of sovereignty. The political contexts in which questions arise are instructive. In this paper, I argue that the very language of representation and legitimacy articulated for Muslims in the contemporary world may occlude the political challenges that obviate their possibility. Biopolitics, the construction of tradition, the possibility of a ‘philosophical religion’ and the challenge of rationality, and the incompleteness of the critique of political theology make the actuality of a critical and theoretical encounter with representation difficult at best, elusive at worst.

Between Hegel and Rumi: Iqbal’s Contrapuntal Encounters with the Islamic Philosophical Traditions

Muhammad Iqbal, 2017

This chapter discusses Muhamad Iqbal's place in South Asian thought through his interaction w... more This chapter discusses Muhamad Iqbal's place in South Asian thought through his interaction with contemporary Muslim and European ideas and thinkers. Iqbal transcends all attempts to limit his philosophy to a particular school or influence. Thus, Iqbal becomes one of the few South Asian intellectuals who reassessed their heritage and sought for it a space within European thought. The chapter then divides Iqbal's intellectual history into three phases: early Indian, middle European, and late Indian. In each phase, it contrasts Iqbal with particular individuals and schools to show that Iqbal neither returned to religious tradition nor completely embraced modernity, but may be described best as a Muslim existentialist in light of his doctrines of khudi, free creative power, and open possibility.

God, Life, and the Cosmos: Christian and Islamic Perspectives * Edited by TED PETERS, MUZAFFAR IQBAL and SYED NOMANUL HAQ (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002). 404 pp. Price HB 57.75. ISBN 0-754-60883-2

Journal of Islamic Studies, 2006

... Ibrahim Moosa examines bioethics and the Islamic jurists&amp;amp;#x27; approach to the hu... more

An Avicennian Engagement with and Appropriation of Mullā Ṣadrā Šīrāzī (d. 1045/1636)

Oriens, 2020

Recent scholarship on Avicenna and Avicennism has tended to focus on the spread and dissemination... more Recent scholarship on Avicenna and Avicennism has tended to focus on the spread and dissemination of his ideas in the early centuries. However, the later readings and contestations of Avicennism especially from the Safavid period onwards have been broadly neglected. In this paper on the most important philosopher of eighteenth-century Iran, Mahdī Narāqī, I provide a case study of the enduring significance of Avicennism, but one which has been transformed by Mullā Ṣadrā’s critical reading of Avicenna. Narāqī demonstrates how Avicenna had been transformed and how the metaphysical debates between Avicennism and Mullā Ṣadrā had led to new synthetical positions.

Reversing the Gaze? Or Decolonizing the Study of the Qurʾan

Method & Theory in the Study of Religion

Taking as the starting point, Majid Daneshgar’s Studying the Qurʾan in the Muslim Academy, I argu... more Taking as the starting point, Majid Daneshgar’s Studying the Qurʾan in the Muslim Academy, I argue that the political and intellectual contexts for the study of Islam and indeed the Qur’an cannot be ignored whether the study is conducted in the “Western” or the “Muslim” academy. The construction of the categories of religion and scripture arise out of practices of colonialist knowledge; positionality of the author cannot be eliminated from the interrogative gaze. Beginning with that critique, I suggest some possible ways in which we can decolonize the study of the Muslim scripture and its experience for Muslims.

Considering Divine Providence in Mullā Ṣadrā Šīrāzī (d. 1045/1636): The Problem of Evil, Theodicy, and the Divine Eros

Oriens

Despite the extensive work on the Safavid thinker Mullā Ṣadrā Šīrāzī (d. 1045/1636) nowadays in m... more Despite the extensive work on the Safavid thinker Mullā Ṣadrā Šīrāzī (d. 1045/1636) nowadays in metropolitan academia, certain areas of philosophical and theological concern remain understudied, if studied at all – and even then, there is little attempt to consider his work in the light of philosophical analysis. We know of a venerable philosophical tradition of analysing the question of providence as a means for examining questions of creation (ex nihilo or otherwise), the problem of evil, determinism and free will, and the larger question of theodicy (and whether this world that we inhabit is indeed the ‘best of all possible worlds’). I propose to examine these questions through an analysis of a section of the theology in al-Asfār al-arbaʿa (The Four Journeys) of Mullā Ṣadrā (mawqif VIII of safar III) and juxtapose it with passages from his other works, all the while contextualising it within the longer Neoplatonic tradition of providence and evil. The section of the Asfār plays a...

Mirror for the Muslim Prince

American Journal of Islam and Society

Everyone seems to be interested in Islamic political thought these days, nodoubt as a result of t... more Everyone seems to be interested in Islamic political thought these days, nodoubt as a result of the rise and fall of Islamisms/post-Islamisms and othercontemporary configurations of Islam and politics. And then there are the claimants for a new caliphate. However, most concerns with political thought– with the exception of the large Princeton Encyclopaedia edited by PatriciaCrone and Gerhard Bowering – tend to focus their attention on either the earlyand classical debates on the imamate (e.g., Crone), classical philosophy andthe “Arabic context” for Platonopolis (e.g., Nelly Lahoud), or the medievalakhlāq literature (e.g., Linda Darling and Muzaffar Alam), or even modernpermutations (far too many examples to mention). It is a rare work indeedthat tries to bring a range of perspectives in a diachronic analysis over space,time, and political theologies into a single volume. The success and achievementof Boroujerdi’s volume is to do precisely that and to collate contributionsfrom some ...

Epistles of the Brethren of Purity. On the Natural Sciences

American Journal of Islam and Society

One does not need to repeat the oft-stated observation that editing and translatingthe epistles o... more One does not need to repeat the oft-stated observation that editing and translatingthe epistles of the Brethren of Purity (Ikhwan al-Safa’) will greatly enhanceour understanding of the pre-Avicennan period’s intellectual history ofthe philosophical sciences. Carmela Baffioni, senior research fellow at the Instituteof Ismaili Studies, which sponsors this project, is a leading specialiston the Brethren, having spent an illustrious career at Naples – twenty-fiveitems in the bibliography constitute her major contributions, alongside the editionsand translations she has contributed to this series. She has already editedand translated the epistles on logic in an earlier volume of this series – thoseepistles come immediately before the seven that are published here (out ofthe seventeen epistles that comprise the second section on the natural sciences)and are the culmination of the first section on the mathematical sciences. Thevolume immediately after on epistle 22 on animals has been publ...

Controversies in Formative Shiʿi Islam

American Journal of Islam and Society

Research into the formative period of Shiʿi Islam has come a long way inthe last couple of decade... more Research into the formative period of Shiʿi Islam has come a long way inthe last couple of decades. This welcome development has been inspired,in particular, by the work of Mohammad Ali Amir-Moezzi, whose main insighthas been to posit that “ancient” Shiʿism is marked precisely by thosedoctrines and positions that the later rationalizing tradition rejected as “extreme”(ghulūw). This particular form of heretication and othering made sense once the communities had been established; were seeking officialrecognition by the Abbasid and other royal courts; and developed the institutionsof learning, as well as structures and hierarchies, visible in otherMuslim confessions.Nevertheless, there remained the questions of what made Shiʿi Islamdistinct, how one could differentiate among those tendencies that definedthemselves as Shiʿi, and what sort of construction was “extremism” (I recognizethat this is a highly inadequate rendition of ghulūw). Amir-Moezzi’scontribution is further complicated b...

Introduction: Framing Bedil, Arguing the Indo-Persian Self

Journal of South Asian Intellectual History

The Routledge Companion to Islamic Philosophy. Richard C. Taylor, Luis Xavier López-Farjeat (eds.)

Nazariyat İslam Felsefe ve Bilim Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi (Journal for the History of Islamic Philosophy and Sciences), Nov 15, 2017

Whatever Happened to the School of Isfahan?

Oxford Scholarship Online

Since much of the literature on the history of 18th-century Iran is animated by a notion of decli... more Since much of the literature on the history of 18th-century Iran is animated by a notion of decline, including in the cultural and intellectual fields, it is not surprising that philosophical trends are also seen in such terms: philosophy was killed off by a mixture of the chauvinism and hostility of the late Safavid milieu and the Afghan sack and occupation of Isfahan. However, this article argues that, in the midst of these challenges, philosophy grew, prospered, and became widely disseminated, taking advantage of the new patronage of the emerging regional centres of Qom, Mashhad, and the Iraqi shrine cities. After a consideration of the sources and contexts that we have in the period, the chapter takes a biographical approach analysing the contributions of five philosophers and Sufis in the course of philosophy in 18th-century Iran.

Review of Gutas festschrift

my review of the Gutas festschrift published in JAOS 135, 2015

Polemics and Persecution at the Mughal Court: a Shiʿi Debate at the Time of Akbar

Much of the literature on the time of Akbar is characterized by praise for his latitudinarian app... more Much of the literature on the time of Akbar is characterized by praise for his latitudinarian approach to different religious confessions: let a thousand flowers bloom in the gardens of Hindustan so to speak! In particular, this religious policy has been linked to the notion of sulḥ-i kull or universal peace (or perhaps peace towards all confessions), that an earlier generation argued was the ethical instrumentalisation of the Sufi doctrine of monism (waḥdat al-wujūd) as adopted by the Chishtī order; 1 however, more recently Azfar Moin has countered that the notion began with Akbar and was central to his self-realisation as a 'millennial sovereign', underpinned by the ideological formulation of Abu-l-Fażl in the Akbarnāma. 2 Besides, certain acts of persecution of Shiʿa notables and divines in this period do seem to raise questions about the efficacy of sulḥ-i kull. 3 Broadly speaking this policy, of placing the Mughal Emperor about the petty confessionalism of elements of the court, was then further developed under Jahāngīr. One of the main arguments seems to be that the plurality of confessions at court (including prominent Iranian notables who were Shiʿi) required a policy of tolerance of religions. 4 But the question then arises: how can we understand the role of Shiʿism at court in this period? How do we make sense of the execution of the Iranian theologian Sayyid Nūrullāh Shūshtarī in 1610 on the orders of Jahāngīr? Was India immune to the 'sectarian' turn of the early modern period as exemplified in the Ottoman-Safavid conflict, an imperial conflagration that replaced the earlier Timurid tendency of 'confessional ambiguity' or even tashayyuʿ-yi ḥasan? 5

Shiʿi Islamic Intellectual History: New Perspectives

by Ahab Bdaiwi and Sajjad Rizvi

"Shiʿi Intellectual History: New Perspectives", a co-edited special volume will appear in the new... more "Shiʿi Intellectual History: New Perspectives", a co-edited special volume will appear in the newly-established Global Intellectual History Journal.

The compendium of writings is intended to shed light on the insufficiently studied themes and topics in Shiʿi intellectual history as well as to foster debate and discussion on the state of the art and the place of Shiʿi intellectual history in the broader framework of Islamic studies. The idea is to incorporate writings on Twelver and non-Twelver Shiʿism, and to give importance to perspectives that cover philosophy, theology, mysticism, and legal theory, among other things.