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Muslim Perceptions and Receptions of the Bible: Texts and Studies
By Camilla Adang and Sabine Schmidtke
 
The articles brought together in this volume deal with Muslim perceptions and uses of the Bible in its wider sense, including the Hebrew Bible or Old Testament as well as the New Testament, albeit with an emphasis on the former scripture. While Muslims consider the earlier revelations to the People of the Book to have been altered to some extent by the Jews and the Christians and abrogated by the Qurʾān, God's final dispensation to humankind, the Bible is at the same time venerated in view of its divine origin, and questioning this divine origin is tantamount to unbelief. Muslim scholars approached and used the Bible for a variety of purposes and in different ways. Thus Muslim historians regularly relied on biblical materials as their primary source for the pre-Islamic period when discussing the creation as well as the history of the Israelites and the prophets preceding Muḥammad. Authors seeking to polemicize against Jews and Christians were primarily interested in the presumed biblical annunciations of Muḥammad and his religion and / or in perceived contradictions and cases of internal abrogation in the Bible. These various concerns resulted from and had an impact on the ways in which Muslim authors accessed the scriptures.
 
Reviews:
"This collection … shows that Adang’s and Schmidtke’s work is still fresh and crucial for the ongoing conversation on Jewish–Muslim relations. The first three chapters are surveys that provide the reader with sufficient background material on the ‘Torah’ in the Qur’an and early traditional Muslim views of the ‘corruption’ (taḥrīf) of the Hebrew Bible and of Judaism itself. These chapters would offer graduate students a sound guide for entry into this field. An extensive and impressive bibliography of all the works previously listed in the individual articles has been assembled with both primary and secondary sources, providing researchers with an excellent resource to begin or continue their own work in this field."—David D. Grafton, Hartford International University, in Islam and Christian–Muslim Relations 33:2, 193–195; DOI: 10.1080/09596410.2022.2038957.

Muslim Perceptions and Receptions of the Bible: Texts and Studies

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    RAIS vol. 11

    496 pages

    7 x 10 inches

    978-1-948488-20-4 (paperback)

    978-1-948488-21-1 (PDF)

    August 2019

  • Table of Contents

    Series Editors’ Preface

    Preface

     

    Surveys

     

    1. Torah C. Adang


    2. Medieval Muslim Polemics against the Jewish Scriptures C. Adang

    3. Muslim-Jewish Polemics C. Adang and S. Schmidtke

     

    The Sunnī Tradition

     

    
4. The Muslim Reception of Biblical Materials: Ibn Qutayba and His Aʿlām al-Nubuwwa S. Schmidtke

    5. Some Hitherto Neglected Biblical Material in the Work of Ibn Ḥazm

    C. Adang

    6. A Jewish Reply to Ibn Ḥazm: Solomon b. Adret’s Polemic against Islam C. Adang

    7. Abū l-Ḥusayn al-Baṣrī and His Transmission of Biblical Materials from Kitāb
al-Dīn wa-l-Dawla by Ibn Rabban al-Ṭabarī: The Evidence from Faḫr al-Dīn
al-Rāzī’s Mafātīḥ al-Gayb S. Schmidtke

    8. Abū l-Ḥusayn al-Baṣrī on the Torah and Its Abrogation S. Schmidtke

    9. The Muslim Reception of the Bible: Al-Māwardī and His Kitāb Aʿlām

    al-Nubuwwa S. Schmidtke

    10. A Fourth/Tenth Century Tunisian Muftī on the Sanctity of the Torah of Moses C. Adang

     

    The Šīʿī Tradition

     

    11. The Chronology of the Israelites according to Ḥamza al-Iṣfahānī C.Adang

    12. A Rare Case of Biblical “Testimonies” to the Prophet Muḥammad in Muʿtazilī Literature: Quotations from Ibn Rabban al-Ṭabarī’s Kitāb al-Dīn 
wa-l-Dawla in Abu l-Ḥusayn al-Baṣrī’s Ġurar al-Adilla, as Preserved in a Work by al-Ḥimmaṣī al-Rāzī C. Adang

    13. Muʿtazilī Discussions of the Abrogation of the Torah: Ibn Ḫallād (Fourth/
Tenth Century) and His Commentators C. Adang and S. Schmidtke

    14. Biblical Predictions of the Prophet Muḥammad among the Zaydīs of Iran
 S. Schmidtke

    15. Biblical Predictions of the Prophet Muḥammad among the Zaydīs of Yemen (Sixth/Twelfth and Seventh/Thirteenth Centuries) S. Schmidtke

    16. An Arabic Translation of the Pentateuch in the Library of the Twelver Šīʿī 
Scholar Raḍī al-Dīn ʿAlī b. Mūsā Ibn Ṭāwūs (d. 664/1266) S. Schmidtke

     

    The Ottoman World

    


    17. The Rightly Guiding Epistle (al-Risāla al-Hādiya) by ʿAbd al-Salām al-Muhtadī al-Muḥammadī: A Critical Edition S. Schmidtke

    18. Guided to Islam by the Torah: The Risāla al-Hādiya by ʿAbd al-Salām
al-Muhtadī al-Muḥammadī C. Adang

    19. Aḥmad b. Muṣṭafā Ṭāškubrīzāde’s (d.968/1561) Polemical Tract against 
Judaism C. Adang and S. Schmidtke

    20. A Polemic against Judaism by a Convert to Islam from the Ottoman Period: Risālat Ilzām al-Yahūd fīmā zaʿamū fī l-Tawrāt min qibal ʿilm al-kalām C. Adang

    21. Epistle Forcing the Jews [to Admit Their Error] with Regard to What They
 Contend about the Torah, by Dialectic Reasoning (Risālat ilzām al-yahūd fīmā
zaʿamū fī l-tawrāt min qibal ʿilm al-kalām) by al-Salām ʿAbd al-ʿAllām: A Criti
cal Edition S. Schmidtke

     

    Bibliography

    Index of Personal and Group Names

    Index of Book Titles

    Index of Place Names

    Index of Manuscripts

    Index of Scriptural Passages

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