Violence in Islamic Thought from the Qur'an to the Mongols

by Gleave, Robert; Kristó-Nagy, István

• ISBN13: 9780748694235
• ISBN10: 0748694234
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2015-05-01
• Publisher: Edinburgh University Press

Summary

How was violence justified in early Islam? What role did violent actions play in the formation and maintenance of the Muslim political order? How did Muslim thinkers view the origins and acceptability of violence? These questions are addressed by an international range of eminent authors through both general accounts of types of violence and detailed case studies of violent acts drawn from the early Islamic sources. Violence is understood widely, to include jihad, state repressions and rebellions, and also more personally directed violence against victims (women, animals, children, slaves) and criminals. By understanding the early development of Muslim thinking around violence, our understanding of subsequent trends in Islamic thought, during the medieval period and up to the modern day, become clearer.

About the series: Legitimate and Illegitimate Violence in Islamic Thought explores how violence has been legitimized, normalized or censured by Muslim writers, tracing the history of the argumentation across time and between regions and traditions.

Author Biography

Robert Gleave was Director of the Legitimate and Illegitimate Violence Project 2010-2013, and is Professor of Arabic Studies at the University of Exeter. He specializes in Islamic legal theory (u'ul al-fiqh) and Shi'i legal thought. His most recent publications include Islam and Literalism: Literal Meaning and Interpretation in Islamic Legal Theory (EUP, 2012).

István Kristó-Nagy completed his PhD in Toulouse and Budapest. Prior to his Lectureship at Exeter, he held fellowships in Berkeley, Oxford and Madrid. He studied extensively the oeuvre of Ibn al-Muqaffa', a key author of Arabic literature and Islamicate thought. Using a comparative and interdisciplinary approach, he has also been exploring the biological and social reasons behind cultural phenomena, such as the struggle between monotheism and dualism, and myths about God and the Devil.

Table of Contents

1. Violence, Our Inherent Heritage: Introduction, Istvan T. Kristo-Nagy and Robert Gleave

Section I. Jihaad and Conquest: Attitudes to Violence against the External Enemies of the Muslim Community
2. The Question of Divine Help in the Jihad, Dominique Urvoy
3. Reading the Qur'an on jihad: two early exegetical texts, Andrew Rippin
4. Ibn al-Mubarak's Kitab al-Jihad and early renunciant literature, Christopher Melchert
5. Shaping Memory of the Conquests: The Case of Tustar, Sarah Bowen Savant

Section II. The Challenged Establishment: Attitudes to Violence against the State and in its Defence within the Muslim Community
6. Who Instigated Violence: A Rebelling Devil or a Vengeful God?, Istvan T. Kristo-Nagy
7. Attitudes to the use of fire in executions in late antiquity and early Islam: the burning of heretics and rebels in late Umayyad Iraq, Andrew Marsham
8. 'Abbasid State Violence and the Execution of Ibn 'A'isha, John A. Nawas
9. The Sultan and the Defiant Prince in Hunting Competition: Questions of legitimacy in hunting episodes of Tabaristan, Miklos Sarkozy

Section III. Lust and Flesh: Attitudes to Violence against the Defenceless, Intra-Communitarian Violence by Non-State Actors
10. Violence against Women in Andalusi Historical Sources (third/ninth-seventh/thirteenth centuries), Maribel Fierro
11. Sexual Violence in Verse: The Case of Ji'thin, al-Farazdaq's sister, Geert Jan van Gelder
12. Bandits, Michael Cooperson
13. Eating People Is Wrong: Some Eyewitness Accounts of Cannibalism in Arabic Sources, Zoltan Szombathy
14. Animals Would Follow Shafi'ism: Legitimate and illegitimate violence to animals in Medieval Islamic Thought, Sarra Tlili

Bibliography
Index