Description
| Product ID: | 9780755639083 |
| Product Form: | Hardback |
| Country of Manufacture: | GB |
| Series: | Early and Medieval Islamic World |
| Title: | The School of Hillah and the Formation of Twelver Shi‘i Islamic Tradition |
| Authors: | Author: Aun Hasan Ali |
| Page Count: | 304 |
| Subjects: | History, Early history: c 500 to c 1450/1500, History, Islamic life and practice, Social groups: religious groups and communities, Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700, Islamic life & practice, Islamic studies, c 500 CE to c 1000 CE, c 1000 CE to c 1500, c 1500 to c 1600, c 1600 to c 1700 |
| Description: | Against the background of long-standing narratives in which Twelver Shi‘ism is viewed as fundamentally authoritarian, The School of Hillah and the Formation of Twelver Shi‘i Islamic Tradition builds upon recent scholarship in the fields of Religious Studies, Anthropology, and History to argue that Twelver Shi‘ism is better understood as a discursive tradition. At a conceptual level, this solves the basic problem of how to integrate the extraordinary diversity of Twelver Shi‘ism across time and space into a single historical category without engaging in a normative assessment of its underlying essence. Furthermore, in light of this conception of tradition, the School of Hillah stands out as a seminal period in the archive of Twelver Shi‘ism, though it has seldom been recognized as such in European-language scholarship. Insofar as it gave birth to a conversation that would prove capable of encompassing the dynamism of Twelver Shi‘ism, the School of Hillah should be considered the formative period of Twelver Shi‘i tradition. Moreover, when the tradition is conceptualized in this manner, it is a bulwark against the very authoritarianism by which Twelver Shi‘ism has been characterized for so long. Against the background of long-standing narratives in which Twelver Shi‘ism is viewed as fundamentally authoritarian, The School of Hillah and the Formation of Twelver Shi‘i Islamic Tradition builds upon recent scholarship in the fields of Religious Studies, Anthropology, and History to argue that Twelver Shi‘ism is better understood as a discursive tradition. At a conceptual level, this solves the basic problem of how to integrate the extraordinary diversity of Twelver Shi‘ism across time and space into a single historical category without engaging in a normative assessment of its underlying essence. Furthermore, in light of this conception of tradition, the School of Hillah stands out as a seminal period in the archive of Twelver Shi‘ism, though it has seldom been recognized as such in European-language scholarship. Insofar as it gave birth to a conversation that would prove capable of encompassing the dynamism of Twelver Shi‘ism, the School of Hillah should be considered the formative period of Twelver Shi‘i tradition. Moreover, when the tradition is conceptualized in this manner, it is a bulwark against the very authoritarianism by which Twelver Shi‘ism has been characterized for so long. |
| Imprint Name: | I.B. Tauris |
| Publisher Name: | Bloomsbury Publishing PLC |
| Country of Publication: | GB |
| Publishing Date: | 2023-07-13 |
