Thursday, September 17, 2009

Ruminating

27 Ramadhan 1430

As the holy month draws to its conclusion I'm looking to complete my bout of Islamic-themed reading. I finished Fazlur Rahman's Revival and Reform in Islam quite quickly, a few days back. A rather technical text and I'm not sure the argument is entirely coherent in the later chapters (it's actually an unfinished work) but the early chapters were worth reading, presenting an interesting alternative to other accounts of the early years of Islam, a deeply critical one at that. I was struck by just how fundamental questions of Muslim identity were in these formative years, simply in terms of who could be classified as Muslim. This is one to re-read when I've built up more background on the period.

I followed this one with an easier text, Islamic Philosophy, A Beginner's Guide by Majiid Fahkry. This is informative but doesn't really engage with the material in terms of taking a position, unlike Fazlur Rahman, who clearly has a distinct agenda. Curiously though this is taking longer for me to read, though this may have something to do with being back at work.

The other book I've got going is The Essential Rumi. I'd previously dipped into Barks's versions of Rumi but this time I'm going for a sequential read, cover to cover. This has meant that I've been reading the poems at some speed and not stopping to re-read in order to savour individual pieces. The effect of this has been to give me a sense of the overwhelming ecstatic power of Rumi (or Barks, it's hard to tell - these poems not being translations in any traditional sense - more like Pound's versions of Chinese or Provencal verse.) Certainly Rumi comes across as far more positive than Attar does, even though they share the same thought-world. It's easy to see why Rumi/Barks has become so popular in the States, no bad thing in terms of furthering understanding between cultures.

Anyway, I'm targeting Hari Raya for the big finish on both books.

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