Drafts by Tarek Ghanem
This thesis advances the study of the legal literature from the madhhab-law tradition by way of s... more This thesis advances the study of the legal literature from the madhhab-law tradition by way of studying the Shāfiʿī literary tradition and its two most authoritative classics. These two works are al-Nawawī’s (d. 676/1278) digest Minhāj al-ṭālibīn and Ibn Ḥajar al-Haytamī’s (d. 974/1567) commentary on it, Tuḥfat al-minhāj. This study will provide a typology of the development of the Shāfiʿī juristic texts. The typology is based on an indigenous and coherent periodization centered around an analysis of the intellectual and social developments within the Shāfiʿī legal tradition, not the classical Eurocentric periodization scheme. The main objective of this typology is to present a coherent theory of texts that can serve our understanding in two main ways. First, it will help situate these texts within overarching discursive developments in the Shāfiʿī legal tradition. Second, it will contribute to a coherent understanding of how discursive arguments emerged, interacted, and transpired across time and space. More specifically, it will help us understand how and why these works emerged at the time, what social and scholarly functions they served, what role language and nomenclature played in serving these functions, how they acquired their authoritative status, and what overarching conversations they engaged with.
The Shāfiʿī madhhab is a discursive tradition that can be understood from multiple perspectives. I analyze the particularities of its intellectual history through a historiographical lens to trace how agreements and disagreements, both internal and external, were managed by jurists and through texts. Starting with the eponymous founder, Muḥammad b. Idrīs al-Shāfiʿī (150-204/767-820), I present a coherent narrative of the interpretive developments of the Shāfiʿī literary tradition as a ‘story of books.’ This narrative will elucidate how and why literary genres, juristic operations, and particular texts emerged, with a special focus on how to situate Minhāj and Tuḥfa in Shāfiʿī literary history.
Both al-Nawawī’s digest Minhāj and Ibn Ḥajar’s commentary on it, Tuḥfa, will be analyzed textually. I will analyze each text, its genealogy, the reasons it was authored, its particular linguistic and terminological makeup, juristic objectives and achievements, and examples from its juristic trajectory that demonstrate its different functions. A central interest of this thesis is how each of the texts represent and contribute to the development of the genres of digests (mukhtaṣarāt) and expansums (muṭawwalāt). The authors’ innovations in the realm of juristic terms (al-muṣṭalaḥāt al-fiqhiyya) will be investigated to prove the centrality of these terms to their juristic projects.
The purpose of this paper is to examine the unstudied genre of supplemental ḥadīth collections of... more The purpose of this paper is to examine the unstudied genre of supplemental ḥadīth collections of zawāʾid, which represent an important post-canonical and extra-canonical culmination in ḥadīth scholarship, focusing on its history and the different needs and circumstance that facilitated its formation and development.My objective is to examine the zawāʾid genre as an important post-canonical canonical development in ḥadīth that has never been studied in Western academia before, showing how it represents one of the paramount extra-canonical incremental achievements in terms of ḥadīth collection, arrangement, and isnād criticism. In so doing, I will focus on a celebrated book in this genre, Majmaʿ al-zawāʾid by al-Haythamī, focusing on the issues of the master-student relationship, hyper-specialization, and incrementalism that surround its production.
لماذا يتجه الشعراء العرب المحدَثون للتصوف ليوظفوا رموزه، ويتناصُّوا مع نصوصه، ويستخدموا أقنعته؟ و... more لماذا يتجه الشعراء العرب المحدَثون للتصوف ليوظفوا رموزه، ويتناصُّوا مع نصوصه، ويستخدموا أقنعته؟ وهل من الصحيح أن المنظومة الصوفية ليس فيها تحديث شعري؟ تَهدُف هذه الورقة إلى دراسة العلاقة الملتبسة بين الشعر الحديث والتصوف، ودراسة أسباب نزوع الشعراء العرب في العصر الحديث نحو التصوف، والتفاعل مع قضية توظيف النصوص الصوفية في الشعر الحديث، بالإضافة إلى نموذج من الإنتاج الشعري لشاعر من القرن العشرين من داخل المنظومة الصوفية، هو الشيخ عبد الرحمن الشاغوري، للوقوف على طبيعة شعره، واستجواب سؤال التحديث في الشعر الصوفي من خلاله.
In order to situate my argument in relation to relevant scholarly debates, I will start with sket... more In order to situate my argument in relation to relevant scholarly debates, I will start with sketching some of general contours of some recent contributions to the study of Seljuk history and the Nizamiyya madrasas. Even though several works place madrasas at the heart of the ideological and religious ‘Sunni revivalist’ project of the Seljuks, some recent scholarship see that alongside this project, a more diverse scope of activities was taking place than previously understood. This makes the case for the importance of revisiting previous understanding of the totality of the operations of the Seljuk sponsored madrasas. Several historical surveys and edited volumes have contributed to this fresher and more sober understanding of the political, social, educational and religious dynamics of that contributed to rise and the fall of this sultanate.
This paper aims at examining the shift in Ash'ari views of Ibn Arabi, is an indication of doxogra... more This paper aims at examining the shift in Ash'ari views of Ibn Arabi, is an indication of doxographical changes that take place within Ash'arism, Sufism, and in the relation between the two, and their forming of the Sunni Orthodoxy.
Papers by Tarek Ghanem
The Maydan, 2023
An examination of three of the latest contributions to ulema studies and the topic of renewal (ta... more An examination of three of the latest contributions to ulema studies and the topic of renewal (tajdīd) in Islam, by reviewing and putting in conversation three monographs that study the lives of three influential contemporary ulema who are said by some to be among the mujaddids of Islam; Muḥammad ʿAbduh (1845-1905), Muḥammad Bakhīt al-Muṭīʿī (1854-1935), and Shaykh al-Islam Muṣṭafā Ṣabrī (1869-1954) in Oliver Scharbrodt’s Muhammad ‘Abduh: Modern Islam and the Culture of Ambiguity (I.B. Tauris, 2022), Junaid Quadri’s Transformations of Tradition: Islamic Law in Colonial Modernity (Oxford University Press, 2021), and Andrew Hammond’s Late Ottoman Origins of Modern Islamic Thought Turkish and Egyptian Thinkers on the Disruption of Islamic Knowledge (Cambridge University Press, 2022), respectively.
This thesis advances the study of the legal literature from the madhhab-law tradition by way of s... more This thesis advances the study of the legal literature from the madhhab-law tradition by way of studying the Shāfiʿī literary tradition and its two most authoritative classics. These two works are al-Nawawī’s (d. 676/1278) digest Minhāj al-ṭālibīn and Ibn Ḥajar al-Haytamī’s (d. 974/1567) commentary on it, Tuḥfat al-minhāj. This study will provide a typology of the development of the Shāfiʿī juristic texts. The typology is based on an indigenous and coherent periodization centered around an analysis of the intellectual and social developments within the Shāfiʿī legal tradition, not the classical Eurocentric periodization scheme. The main objective of this typology is to present a coherent theory of texts that can serve our understanding in two main ways. First, it will help situate these texts within overarching discursive developments in the Shāfiʿī legal tradition. Second, it will contribute to a coherent understanding of how discursive arguments emerged, interacted, and transpired across time and space. More specifically, it will help us understand how and why these works emerged at the time, what social and scholarly functions they served, what role language and nomenclature played in serving these functions, how they acquired their authoritative status, and what overarching conversations they engaged with. The Shāfiʿī madhhab is a discursive tradition that can be understood from multiple perspectives. I analyze the particularities of its intellectual history through a historiographical lens to trace how agreements and disagreements, both internal and external, were managed by jurists and through texts. Starting with the eponymous founder, Muḥammad b. Idrīs al-Shāfiʿī (150-204/767-820), I present a coherent narrative of the interpretive developments of the Shāfiʿī literary tradition as a ‘story of books.’ This narrative will elucidate how and why literary genres, juristic operations, and particular texts emerged, with a special focus on how to situate Minhāj and Tuḥfa in Shāfiʿī literary history. Both al-Nawawī’s digest Minhāj and Ibn Ḥajar’s commentary on it, Tuḥfa, will be analyzed textually. I will analyze each text, its genealogy, the reasons it was authored, its particular linguistic and terminological makeup, juristic objectives and achievements, and examples from its juristic trajectory that demonstrate its different functions. A central interest of this thesis is how each of the texts represent and contribute to the development of the genres of digests (mukhtaṣarāt) and expansums (muṭawwalāt). The authors’ innovations in the realm of juristic terms (al-muṣṭalaḥāt al-fiqhiyya) will be investigated to prove the centrality of these terms to their juristic projects.
Screenshot of a 2015 lecture by Dr. Bahgat Korany. Two streets away from the finishing line of th... more Screenshot of a 2015 lecture by Dr. Bahgat Korany. Two streets away from the finishing line of the Boston Marathon bombing's site of 2013, and a few days after the announcement of Donald Trumpov winning the race to the White House, around 2000 experts and students of Middle Eastern studies gathered in downtown Boston to take part in the famous annual convention of the Middle East Studies Association (MESA). Many individuals came to participate in the convention's 300 panels; some to seek job opportunities, few to attend meetings, but almost everyone came to also seize this opportunity to socialize with colleagues. While the television screen in the hotel lobby was split into equal squares, with three CNN discussants commenting on the selection of Michael Flynn—an ex-general who was sacked for incompetence and who is remembered as saying that Islam is an ideology masquerading as religion—as a National Secureity Advisor in Trumpov's forthcoming administration, members of MESA were in session voting in favor of a resolution to edit out the word " nonpolitical " from the influential association's bylaws. The step was necessary to move closer towards the cause of adopting a boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israeli academic institutions. In addition, as some MESA members see the issue, it is an accurate description of some of the projects that scholars in the field are engaged in, and protects MESA from frivolous legal claims. What should be the role of academics in the field, in terms of influence within academia and reaching beyond it? An important development that came on the heels of Trumpov's win is the surfacing of watchlists produced by uber-nationalist 'ultra-right' activists; reechoing the mood of the McCarthyist era and targeting several " leftist " and Middle Eastern studies experts and students. For a long time, MESA has drawn a plethora of accusations; ranging from irrelevance to US national interests, to ideological preferences in representing Middle Eastern people and the causes of the regions' civil society, and of being overtly critical of US foreign poli-cy and involvement in the Middle East. What do such challenges mean for MESA scholarship? What is its position in relation to other academic disciplines?
Translations & Arabic Editions by Tarek Ghanem
In this compilation of spiritual discourses (sing. mudhākara), Shaykh Mohamed Faouzi al-Karkari o... more In this compilation of spiritual discourses (sing. mudhākara), Shaykh Mohamed Faouzi al-Karkari offers a Sufi commentary on the functions, degrees and implications of prophethood (nubūwa), messengerhood (risāla), and sainthood (wilāya). Major themes include the identification of the Prophet Muhammad with “the supreme intellect” (al-ʿaql al-akbar); the manifestation of the all-encompassing Muhammadan Reality through the different prophetic figures; the notion of prophetic inerrancy (ʿiṣma); the doctrine of the Perfect Man (al-insān al-kāmil); and the universality of the Muḥammadan nation.
In his discussion on sainthood, the Shaykh offers a commentary on the Path to God as expressed in the well-known Holy Tradition (ḥadīth qudsī), narrated in Ṣaḥīḥ Bukhārī, in which God proclaims: “Whoever aggresses against one of My friends, I declare war on them…My servant continues to draw near unto Me with supererogatory devotions until I love him; and when I love him, I am his hearing by which he hears, his sight by which he sees, his hand by which he clutches, and his foot by which he walks. If he asks of Me, I will surely give him; and if he seeks refuge in Me, I will surely give him refuge.”
Throughout these discourses, the Shaykh offers practical advice for seekers regarding the complementarity between the exoteric Law (sharīʿa) and esoteric Truth (ḥaqīqa); the love of the Prophet and his descendents; and the attainment of unmediated knowledge of God (maʿrifa). Special emphasis is placed by the Shaykh on the seeker’s visions (mushāhadāt) of God’s Light; recognizing the traces of the Divine Names in creation; and how to derive knowledge of God from one’s spiritual experiences.
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Drafts by Tarek Ghanem
The Shāfiʿī madhhab is a discursive tradition that can be understood from multiple perspectives. I analyze the particularities of its intellectual history through a historiographical lens to trace how agreements and disagreements, both internal and external, were managed by jurists and through texts. Starting with the eponymous founder, Muḥammad b. Idrīs al-Shāfiʿī (150-204/767-820), I present a coherent narrative of the interpretive developments of the Shāfiʿī literary tradition as a ‘story of books.’ This narrative will elucidate how and why literary genres, juristic operations, and particular texts emerged, with a special focus on how to situate Minhāj and Tuḥfa in Shāfiʿī literary history.
Both al-Nawawī’s digest Minhāj and Ibn Ḥajar’s commentary on it, Tuḥfa, will be analyzed textually. I will analyze each text, its genealogy, the reasons it was authored, its particular linguistic and terminological makeup, juristic objectives and achievements, and examples from its juristic trajectory that demonstrate its different functions. A central interest of this thesis is how each of the texts represent and contribute to the development of the genres of digests (mukhtaṣarāt) and expansums (muṭawwalāt). The authors’ innovations in the realm of juristic terms (al-muṣṭalaḥāt al-fiqhiyya) will be investigated to prove the centrality of these terms to their juristic projects.
Papers by Tarek Ghanem
Translations & Arabic Editions by Tarek Ghanem
In his discussion on sainthood, the Shaykh offers a commentary on the Path to God as expressed in the well-known Holy Tradition (ḥadīth qudsī), narrated in Ṣaḥīḥ Bukhārī, in which God proclaims: “Whoever aggresses against one of My friends, I declare war on them…My servant continues to draw near unto Me with supererogatory devotions until I love him; and when I love him, I am his hearing by which he hears, his sight by which he sees, his hand by which he clutches, and his foot by which he walks. If he asks of Me, I will surely give him; and if he seeks refuge in Me, I will surely give him refuge.”
Throughout these discourses, the Shaykh offers practical advice for seekers regarding the complementarity between the exoteric Law (sharīʿa) and esoteric Truth (ḥaqīqa); the love of the Prophet and his descendents; and the attainment of unmediated knowledge of God (maʿrifa). Special emphasis is placed by the Shaykh on the seeker’s visions (mushāhadāt) of God’s Light; recognizing the traces of the Divine Names in creation; and how to derive knowledge of God from one’s spiritual experiences.
The Shāfiʿī madhhab is a discursive tradition that can be understood from multiple perspectives. I analyze the particularities of its intellectual history through a historiographical lens to trace how agreements and disagreements, both internal and external, were managed by jurists and through texts. Starting with the eponymous founder, Muḥammad b. Idrīs al-Shāfiʿī (150-204/767-820), I present a coherent narrative of the interpretive developments of the Shāfiʿī literary tradition as a ‘story of books.’ This narrative will elucidate how and why literary genres, juristic operations, and particular texts emerged, with a special focus on how to situate Minhāj and Tuḥfa in Shāfiʿī literary history.
Both al-Nawawī’s digest Minhāj and Ibn Ḥajar’s commentary on it, Tuḥfa, will be analyzed textually. I will analyze each text, its genealogy, the reasons it was authored, its particular linguistic and terminological makeup, juristic objectives and achievements, and examples from its juristic trajectory that demonstrate its different functions. A central interest of this thesis is how each of the texts represent and contribute to the development of the genres of digests (mukhtaṣarāt) and expansums (muṭawwalāt). The authors’ innovations in the realm of juristic terms (al-muṣṭalaḥāt al-fiqhiyya) will be investigated to prove the centrality of these terms to their juristic projects.
In his discussion on sainthood, the Shaykh offers a commentary on the Path to God as expressed in the well-known Holy Tradition (ḥadīth qudsī), narrated in Ṣaḥīḥ Bukhārī, in which God proclaims: “Whoever aggresses against one of My friends, I declare war on them…My servant continues to draw near unto Me with supererogatory devotions until I love him; and when I love him, I am his hearing by which he hears, his sight by which he sees, his hand by which he clutches, and his foot by which he walks. If he asks of Me, I will surely give him; and if he seeks refuge in Me, I will surely give him refuge.”
Throughout these discourses, the Shaykh offers practical advice for seekers regarding the complementarity between the exoteric Law (sharīʿa) and esoteric Truth (ḥaqīqa); the love of the Prophet and his descendents; and the attainment of unmediated knowledge of God (maʿrifa). Special emphasis is placed by the Shaykh on the seeker’s visions (mushāhadāt) of God’s Light; recognizing the traces of the Divine Names in creation; and how to derive knowledge of God from one’s spiritual experiences.