Tag Archive for: Seyyed Hossein Nasr
SEYYED HOSSEIN NASR – Muhammad U. Faruque
Abstract:
This article provides an overview of the substantive contribution from Dr. Seyyed Hossein Nasr, a contemporary Islamic philosopher with global influence. Dr. Nasr’s oeuvre covers an extended field from the perennial philosophy, which dominates his philosophical worldview, to religion, science, environmental studies, education, and the arts with particular attention to Islamic and comparative studies, as well as criticism of modernism. Grounded in Islamic tradition, Nasr’s far-reaching ideas have been acknowledged by the global scholarly community. Nasr is perhaps most famous for being one of the first people to predict, diagnose, and provide a response to the ecological crisis, having spoken out on the topic as early as 1966. He is considered the father of “Islamic environmentalism,” which is now gaining momentum in the Muslim world.
Keywords: order of the sacred; eco-philosophy; Islamic science; Islamic art; spirituality, religion and modernity
The Sufi Path of Light Translated by Khalid Williams & Yousef Casewit
Abstract:
“Our Lord is Light; our holy Prophet is Light; our unswerving Islamic faith is Light; our Holy Qurʾān is Light; and our prayer is Light. Why then do you wish to live in darkness? Why do you aloofly imagine, with your delimited and narrow mind, that the Light is merely an abstract concept that cannot be seen?” inquires Shaykh Mohamed Faouzi al-Karkari. Divine Light, luminous vision (mushāhada), and mystical experience are central to the Qurʾānic revelation, the Hadith corpus, and the Sufi tradition. In this major contemporary treatise on Islamic spirituality, Shaykh al-Karkari provides a detailed esoteric commentary on the Light Verse (āyat al-nūr) as well as other verses concerning Light in the Qurʾān. He then highlights the centrality of luminous vision in the teachings of renowned Sufis of the Shādhiliyya order and beyond, including Abū Madyan and Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī. The book concludes with a commentary on Ibn ʿAṭāʾ Illāh al-Iskandarī’s aphorisms on luminous vision. Throughout the treatise, the Shaykh identifies popular questions pertaining to contemporary Sufi practice and invites us to consider the challenges we face along the spiritual path. He proclaims, “You know Islam with your bodily idol, yet your spirit does not recognize it, for you are absent from witnessing the Lights of the Real and the Lights of His holy Messenger. You say, “I bear witness,” yet your insight is blotted out, your heart blind, and your inner heart rusted over. Your testimony is mere speech, not witnessing. Come with me, then, upon a voyage into the depths of pure meaning. Let us travel from one verse to another, until you come to know that the road has been one from the Messenger of God until today-the road named the Radiant Path, whose night is as bright as its day, from which none stray but those bound for”
By Mohammed Rustom (translator)
“Caring for the Ill” – Kristin Zahra Sands
Abstract:
“God will say on the Day of Resurrection, “O child of Adam, I was sick but you did not visit me.” [The child of Adam] says, “My Lord, how could I visit you when you are the Lord of all beings?” God says, “But didn’t you know that my servant so-and-so was sick and yet you did not visit him? Did you not know that if you had visited him, you would have found me present with him? O son of Adam, I asked you for food but you did not feed me.” [The child of Adam] says, “My Lord, how could I feed you when you are the Lord of all beings?” God says, “Didn’t you know that my servant so-and-so asked you for food and you did not feed him? If you had given him food, you would have found that in my presence. O son of Adam, I was thirsty but you did not give me water.” [The child of Adam] says, “My Lord, how could I give you water when you are the Lord of all beings?” He says, “My servant so-and-so asked you for water but you did not give it to him. If you had given him water, you would have found that in my presence.”
Sands_Caring For The IllFrom the Divine to the Human: New Perspectives on Evil, Suffering, and the Global Pandemic Program – Jun 28-30, 2022
From_the_Divine_to_the_Human_New_Perspec
Details including registration can be found at:
Qur’anic terminology, translation, and the Islamic conception of religion – Maria M Dakake
Abstract:
“A key question in the field of religious studies is the extent to which ‘religion’ as a concept ‘translates’ in various cultural contexts, with some arguing that it is a purely Western and academic construct. In this article, I argue that the Islamic understanding of religion as a universal category of human experience with various, distinct manifestations is similar to the concept of religion widely operative in the academic discipline of comparative religion; for this reason, Islamic terms related to religion can easily be translated into terminology broadly found in the study of religion, including the term ‘religion’ itself. I argue, however, that the apparent ease with which one can translate Islamic religious terminology may obscure some important nuances in the Islamic conception of religion that make it both distinct and internally coherent with its broader view of human nature and of its own particular religious system relative to others. Attentiveness to the semantic range and usage of some key terms in Qur’anic and Islamic terminology regarding religion yields a distinctly Islamic conception of religion that is independent of Western, academic theories of religion”
Quranic_terminology_translation_and_the