Ibn Taymiyya S Theodicy Of Perpetual Optimism

The Muslim jurist Ibn Taymiyya (d. 1328) is famous for polemic against Islamic philosophy, theology and rationalizing mysticism, but his positive theological contribution has not been well understood. This comprehensive study of Ibn Taymiyya’s theodicy helps to rectify this lack. Exposition and analysis of Ibn Taymiyya’s writings on God’s justice and wise purpose, divine determination and human agency, the problem of evil, and juristic method in theological doctrine show that he articulates a theodicy of optimism in which God in His essence perpetually wills the best possible world from eternity. This sets Ibn Taymiyya’s theodicy apart from Ashʿarī divine voluntarism, the free-will theodicy of the Muʿtazilīs, and the essentially timeless God of other optimists like Ibn Sīnā and Ibn ʿArabī.

Ibn Taymiyya (1263–1328) of Damascus was one of the most prominent and controversial religious scholars of medieval Islam. He called for jihad against the Mongol invaders of Syria, appealed to the foundational sources of Islam for reform, and battled against religious innovation. Today, he inspires such diverse movements as Global Salafism, Islamic revivalism and modernism, and violent jihadism. This volume synthesizes the latest research, discusses many little-known aspects of Ibn Taymiyya’s thought, and highlights the religious utilitarianism that pervades his activism, ethics, and theology.

Ibn Taymiyya is a thinker often associated with dogmatism, but who also valued moderation and considered himself a defender of the harmony between human reason and religious faith. By closely examining the tenets of his ethical thought, Sophia Vasalou sheds fresh light on Taymiyya's intellectual identity.

This book explores the position of Islamic theology and jurisprudence towards people with disabilities. It investigates how early and modern Muslim scholars tried to reconcile their existence with the concept of a merciful God, and also looks at how people with disabilities might live a dignified and productive life within an Islamic context. In his analysis of Islamic Theology, Ghaly pays attention to how theologians, philosophers and Sufis reflected on the purposes behind the existence of this phenomenon, and how to reconcile the existence of disability with specific divine attributes and an All-Merciful God. Simultaneously exploring the perspective of Muslim jurists, the book focuses on how people with disabilities can lead a dignified life in the financial and non-financial sense, in an extensive analysis of topics such as the human dignity of people with disabilities and the role of Greek physiognomy, their employability, medical treatment, social life with main focus on marriage-related issues, financial life and means of living. Investigating the topic of disability from early and modern Islamic perspectives, the author provides an analysis of Muslim discussions on various bioethical questions. As such, this book will be of great relevance to current heated debates on human rights of people with disabilities, as well as providing a valuable resource for courses on Multicultural bioethics, Islamic theology, Islamic law and medical anthropology.

This issue of the American Journal of Islam and Society comprises four main research articles, each shedding light on the diverse ways in which the Islamic legal and theological tradition has shaped and intersected with premodern and modern societies. To start closer to home: Sam Houston’s contribution entitled “The “Metaphysical Monster” and Muslim Theology: William James, Sherman Jackson, and the Problem of Black Suffering” places American Muslim scholar Sherman A. Jackson’s important monograph Islam and the Problem of Black Suffering in conversation with the work of American pragmatist philosopher William James and suggests that Jackson’s account parallels James’s account of religion in that it speaks of the “practical effectiveness” of the “web of beliefs” constituting Islamic doctrines of God. Our next article explores the practical engagement of the official ulama as spokespersons of the Islamic legal and theological tradition in a different field: post-2011 Egypt. In his article entitled, “Ideals and Interests in Intellectuals’ Political Deliberations: The Arab Spring and the Divergent Paths of Egypt’s Shaykh al-Azhar Ahmad al-Tayyib and Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa,” Muhammad Amasha calls into question the commonplace generalizations about the ulama as being either pro-revolution or pro-regime by examining the politics of two prominent members of the pro-establishment ulama class. Syamsuddin Arif in his “Rethinking the Concept of Fiṭra: Natural Disposition, Reason and Conscience,” turns our attention to an understudied dimension of Islamic psychology: the role of innate human nature, or fiṭra, in the motivation behind human action. Drawing on recent Western as well as Islamicate scholarship, it attends to the biological, epistemological, and ethical dimensions of this Qur’anic concept, suggesting that it be treated not only as the natural tendency for humans to act or think in a particular way, but specifically as the religious, ethical, and rational instinct. Finally, Fateh Saeidi’s “The Early Sufi Tradition in Hamadān, Nahāwand, and Abhar: Stories of Devotion, Mystical Experiences, and Sufi Texts” explores the history of the development of early Sufism in Hamadān, Nahāwand, and Abhar through an analysis of three significant but understudied early Sufi texts: Karāmāt Sheikh abī ʻalī al-Qūmsānī by Ibn Zīrak al-Nahāwandī (d. 471/1078), Ādāb al-fuqarāʼ by Bābā Jaʻfar al-Abharī (d. 428/1036), and Rawḍat al-murīdīn by Ibn Yazdānyār

This book provides a historical and comparative study of logic in Arabic in Bosnia and Herzegovina, from the first texts, 16th century, to the end of the 19th century, using authentic, completely unknown and unpublished manuscripts

The culmination of Kärkkäinen's multivolume magnum opus This fifth and final volume of Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen's ambitious five-volume systematic theology develops a constructive Christian eschatology and ecclesiology in dialogue with the Christian tradition, with contemporary theology in all its global and contextual diversity, and with other major living faiths--Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism. In Part One of the book Kärkkäinen discusses eschatology in the contexts of world faiths and natural sciences, including physical, cosmological, and neuroscientific theories. In Part Two, on ecclesiology, he adopts a deeply ecumenical approach. His proposal for greater Christian unity includes the various dimensions of the church's missional existence and a robust dialogical witness to other faith communities.

The T&T Clark Handbook of Suffering and the Problem of Evil provides an extensive exploration of the theology of theodicy, asking questions such as should all instances of suffering necessarily be understood as evil? Why would an omnipotent and benevolent God allow or perpetrate evil? Is God unable or unwilling to reduce human and non-human suffering on Earth? Does humanity have the capacity to exercise a moral evaluation of God's motives and intentions? Conventional disciplinary boundaries have tended to separate theological approaches to these questions from philosophical ones. This volume aims to overcome these boundaries by including biblical (Part I), historical (Part II), doctrinal (Part III), philosophical (Part IV), and pastoral, interreligious perspectives and alternative intersections (Part V) on theodicy. Authors include thinkers from analytic and continental traditions, multiple Christian denominations and other religions, and both established and younger scholars, providing a full variety of approaches. What unites the essays is an attempt to answer these questions from the perspective of biblical testimony, historical scholarship, modern theological and philosophical thinking about the concept of God, non-Christian religions, science and the arts. The result is a combination of in-depth analysis and breadth of scope, making this a benchmark work for further studies in the theology of suffering and evil.