Categories : Field-specific (academic)

Registration is required.

The Māḥauls of Oratory: Urdu Shi`i Khiṭābat in contemporary Karachi
In this talk, I attend to the material and the historical māḥauls within which Urdu Shiʿi khiṭābat (oratory) unfolds in Karachi. My attention to these contexts aims to move beyond a solely discursive approach to public language-use, in which much of the emphasis lies on referentiality, or what do orations mean. Instead, I foreground the physical and ideological contexts of khiṭābat to lay bare the newness of practices and concepts that undergird oratorical speech-events.
Registration required
Zoom webinar:https://utoronto.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_mV4_DL0DRNasaRxDpRT5uw

This Summer Skills Seminar introduces participants to Islamic law. The seminar is focused on developing the skill of reading Islamic legal texts as opposed to surveying Islamic legal doctrines. It is designed for beginners seeking to build their capacity to investigate Islamic law.

Professor Ali will lead participants in a methodical reading of an introduction to Islamic law. Participants will read the chapters on legal obligation (taklīf) and ritual purity (ṭahāra) in Durūs tamhīdiyya fī l-fiqh al-istidlālī by Muḥammad Bāqir al-Īrawānī (b. 1949). In addition to the text itself, the course will cover selected topics in jurisprudence (uṣūl al-fiqh) and bio-bibliography (rijāl). Topics covered include: the meanings of ʿaql; the principle qubḥ al-taklīf bi-mā lā yuṭāq; repairing weak chains of transmission; exceptions to general rules and the principle of istiṣḥāb; al-shubuhāt al-miṣdāqiyya; al-tawthīqāt al-ʿāmma; tasālum versus ijmāʿ; al-qāʿida al-mirzāʾiyya; and al-sīra al-ʿuqalāʾiyya.

Participants are required to have intermediate Arabic,* but they are not required to have a background in Islamic law. The seminar will be held via Zoom over 4 days, with two 2-hour sessions each day. At the end of the seminar, participants will have gained some of the basic tools needed to read Islamic legal texts independently.

The deadline to register is April 15.

Full information at:
https://www.mediterraneanseminar.org/overview-islamic-legal-texts-2024

The Book of Unveiling: Early Fatimid Ismaili Doctrine in the Kitab al-Kashf,
attributed to Ja’far b. Mansur al-Yaman

https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/book-of-unveiling-9780755653867/

This text is one of the earliest (if not the earliest) Ismaili sources to have reached the present day. The book consists of the first full translation of the text to a European language (English), and is accompanied with a general presentation and detailed commentary.

Also available OpenAccess here: https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/88170<

Surprising little has been written about exegesis of Surat Yusuf, the Qurʾan’s “greatest of narration” (ahsan al-qasas), and certainly the longest and most substantial narrative in the Qurʾan. The little that has been written about Shiʿi interpretations of the Surat Yusuf has generally taken as its starting point Sunni exegesis, Jewish exegesis of the Hebrew Bible, or both. This paper describes two interpretations in hitherto unpublished sources of esoteric literature: the Ismaili missionary Jaʾfar b. Mansur al-Yaman’s (d. c. 960) Kitab al-fara’id wa-hudud al-din (The Book of [inheritance] Allotments and the Limits of Religion”), and the second, al-Risala al-Yusufiyya (The Joseph Epistle) by Abu al-Fath al-Baghdadi (thrived late fourth/tenth century).

Call for Papers: Mapping Methods and Theories in Shiʿi Studies, Open Panel at the International Association for the History of Religions (IAHR) World Congress, Kraków 2025
Convenors: Mohammad Nabeel Jafri (University of Toronto), Candace Mixon (Reed College)
Abstract: The trajectory of scholarship on Shiʿism is marked by two overarching influences. First, as the early Orientalists pored over and translated myriad Arabic and Persian texts in the 19th and 20th centuries, they accepted the normative claims offered by their objects of study as fact, relegating Shiʿism outside the purview of Islam. Second, nascent attempts at a systematic study of Shiʿa traditions can be dated to the 1970’s, where much of the scholarship produced was inspired by the then current political and social contexts of Iran. Today, the dual legacies of focusing on Sunni texts and Shiʿi politics can often be arthritic, foreclosing potential and productive avenues of inquiry. Under the Congress subtheme of Mapping, we invite analyses of recent trends in the field that challenge simple binaries of Sunni/Shiʿa, Arabic/Persian, and texts/practices, opting to consider their crossways and varied intersections. We welcome papers whose archives include languages and geographies underrepresented in the field, and whose methods are sensitive to the interplay of texts, practices, and materials in Shiʿi devotion. We especially encourage papers to think through not just the limitations of the oeuvre of Orientalist textual-philological works, but also possible and potential benefits that such scholarship enables, particularly since many of the Shiʿa devotees inhabit worlds as logocentric as the ones portrayed by early European scholars.
Submission: As per the IAHR website (https://iahr2025.org/call-for-panels-papers/open-panels/), interested participants can apply directly to the conference, and choose the panel’s number (30) and title (Mapping Methods and Theories in Shiʿi Studies) in the submission system.
Deadline: The IAHR deadline for individual papers is Dec 1, 2024.
Evaluation of papers: The acceptance works at two levels. First, the IAHR congress committee accepts papers from within the submissions they’ve received. The accepted papers are then forwarded to the panel conveners who finalize the panel. Papers accepted by the IAHR committee but not by the panel conveners are still presentable at the IAHR meeting as individual papers.
For any questions, please feel free to email Mohammad Nabeel Jafri at nabeel.jafri@mail.utoronto.ca

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SEMINAR

SUNDAY 31st MARCH 2024 – 2:30 PM

VENUE – RUDOLF STEINER HOUSE

35 PARK ROAD, LONDON NW1 6XT

Opposite Mumtaz Restaurant

Tube station: Baker Street

Chair: Dr Reza Shah-Kazemi

Dr Reza Shah-Kazemi is an author in the fields of Islamic Studies and Comparative Religion; Senior Research Associate at the Institute of Ismaili Studies; and Managing Editor of Encyclopaedia Islamica. He studied International Relations and Politics at Sussex and Exeter Universities before obtaining his PhD in Comparative Religion from the University of Kent.

Gulamabbas Lakha

Imām ʿAlī (as) on self-sabotage and its remedies

Gulamabbas Lakha takes a multi-disciplinary approach to research and teaching at Oxford. His doctorate in Psychiatry investigates mental health applications of Islamic concepts and practices, including empirical work on depression in the UK Muslim population. He serves as a tutor in Psychology of Religion and leads seminars on Neuroscience of Religious Experience, including supervising medical students and postgraduates. In addition, he also lectures on Christian-Muslim relations, co-founded the Oxford Interfaith Forum, and led Bodleian Library public workshops on psychotherapy in Old Testament and Islamic psalms, having previously undertaken research on comparative neuroimaging of dhikr and secular mindfulness practices. His passion for academic research that has practical applications stems from two decades of business and community work. His first degree in Economics and Econometrics was followed by the Chartered Financial Analyst designation while working in the City, subsequently founding an investment firm at which he serves as CEO. He later completed four master’s degrees, spanning Psychology and Neuroscience, Theology, Islamic Studies, History and Arabic. Following religious training over a number of years, he was accredited as a Shaykh and has been lecturing on contemporary Islam at mosques across the UK and on Muslim TV channels over the last decade.

Farhana Mayer

Qur’anic Principles of Integral Ecology

Farhana Mayer is a published author in her field of Qur’anic Hermeneutics. Her latest publication An Introduction to Qur’anic Ecology and Resonances with Laudato Si’ compares Qur’anic principles applicable to integral ecology with the themes of Pope Francis’ ecological epistle Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home. Her earlier publications include: Spiritual Gems: The Mystical Qur’an Commentary Ascribed to Ja`far al-Sadiq and Anthology of Qur’anic Commentaries: On the Nature of the Divine with F. Hamza and S. Rizvi. Her recent research at Oxford University explores a Qur’anic perspective on the qualitative and ontological relationship between God and humankind. Farhana was formerly a lecturer in Sufism at SOAS and also at the Institute of Ismaili Studies (in Sufism and Qur’anic Exegesis), where she headed the Graduate Programme in Islamic Studies and Humanities. She is currently a Research Affiliate at the Laudato Si’ Research Institute, Campion Hall, University of Oxford.

AN OPEN INVITATION

ORGANISER & SPONSOR: THE AHMED FAMILY – C/O MUHAMMADI TRUST (020 8452 1739)