Revelation in Islam

Among the world's religions, Islam has one of the most fully developed understandings of the notion of revelation. It views the whole of the created order as a revelation and, accordingly, considers religious revelation in the form of Scripture as an integral feature of the human condition. It is within this context that Muhammad's own revelatory experiences must be considered. These are well‐attested in the Hadith literature. Islam recognises three distinct grades of revelation. Muhammad's was the highest of these which, as the ahadith make clear, is a “passing into the deep sleep state in full consciousness ...”. The explicit nature of these traditional accounts of prophecy in action, as well as Islam's universalism, sheds light upon revelation in all religious traditions.     

Islam and suicide

Suicide and homicide rates of a sample of 72 nations were associated with a cluster of social variables related to economic development but not with a cluster related to the proportion of Islamic adherents.     

Documentation: Islam and the West

This speech was given on Wednesday 27 October 1993 in the Sheldonian Theatre, Oxford, on the occasion of the Prince of Wales' visit to the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies.     

Islam and the Health of the Elderly

When there is any talk of action for the health care of the aged in the light of the teachings of Islam, we will naturally have to keep in view basically all those aspects of Islamic society which are related to the family system, self respect, and economy. Not only this, but we will also have to take into account all those Islamic concepts which are related to human dignity and which explicitly demand that man should be considered as a man and should be loved. We will adopt the same line of thought in this article.     

明清之际伊斯兰教中国化的“以儒诠经”模式

明清之际的以儒诠经,内涵之中历史地出现了一个特殊知识群体,自然地包含有四个目的、两大手段和三种具体作为,用话语表述,该文化创造模式可以解释为:明清之际我国伊斯兰教的以儒诠经,是回儒这个文化兼通的特殊知识群体,立足中国,采用汉语,在本土社会语境中,对该宗教经义所做出的再诠释,过程中于公的目的是兴教、明道和补足百家之不足,于私的目的是立个人不朽之言,因而针对本土元素展开了批判(为先),继而有选择地加以借用和融会贯通,同时为伊斯兰教正本清源,再通过以文会友,最终收获了针对外教的释疑并取得某种认同,从而为伊斯兰教适应本土社会赢得了有利机会和条件。     

Islam and the Sermon on the Mount

The theme of Islam and the Sermon on the Mount belongs to a lively, controversial field of discourse, in which representatives of the major monotheistic religions conflict in their claims to truth, and it has formed a central point in their encounters. For example, representatives of the Salafiyya saw in the Sermon a barrier to the secular order. Through their criticisms, they tended even to appropriate the Sermon for the purposes of Islam. However, the ethical message of the Sermon has usually not been interrogated as such. Form-critical, symbolic, structural and intentional similarities in Muslim remarks point to this appreciation. Nevertheless, Muslims seem much more concerned with the specific contextual meaning of the Sermon and its historicity rather than considering its principle of love for enemies or its legislative nature. Thus, positive receptions of the Sermon, such as al-Ghazzālī's or the recognition discourse of Sayyid Ahmad Khan, if not forgotten, have fallen into the background. In the atmosphere of Christian missionary and colonial experience and the post-colonial aftermath, this reception history and its semantic transformations are certainly understandable. However, they first offer a fertile ground for inter-religious dialogue when the mutual understanding processes are revealed and the discursively produced internal and external allocations, so rich with meaning, are exposed.