The First Muslims History And Memory.Pdf Download

The First Muslims History And Memory By Asma Afsaruddin

About the Book

The First Muslims is really a fascinating and important discussion.

After surfacing periodically early in the book, it emerges as the focus of the final chapters, on conflicting attempts by “Islamists” and “modernists” in the contemporary world to invoke the example of the salaf ‘to support their very different understandings of Islam, and in particular of four issues:

the character and necessity of an Islamic state,the force and pliability of the shari’a, the status of women, and the nature of jihad.

Her characterization of the competing lessons which Islamists such as Mawdudi and Sayyid Qutb and modernists such as Muhammad ‘Abduh and Muhammad Shahrour would draw from accounts of the salafwill not surprise most specialists in the field, but will serve as an important reminder to others of the diversity of interpretation within the Muslim tradition.

Afsaruddin’s own evaluation of this debate will be reassuring to those who are likely to read this book. Her basic argument is that the Islamists’ interpretation of the salaf and early Muslim practice is ahistorical.

Their arguments are based on relatively late sources, in particular certain historians and jurists from the Mamluk period (1250-1517) such as Ibn Hajar al-‘Asqalani and ibn Taymiyya, whose views were distorted by the contingencies and prejudices of the world in which they lived.