Twenty Years of Reading the Qur’an as a Literary Text

Twenty Years of Reading the Qur’an as a Literary Text

neuwirthIn the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research 2, no. 1, Süleyman Dost reviews Angelika Neuwirth, Scripture, Poetry, and the Making of a Community: Reading the Qur’an as a Literary Text (Oxford University Press/Institute of Ismaili Studies, 2014), the first thorough collection of Angelika Neuwirth’s scholarship in English. Neuwirth, a leading scholar of Qur’anic studies at the Freie Universität Berlin, treats the Qur’an as a coherent literary corpus and grounds the text in its late antique and biblical setting with a special interest in its emergence through an ever-evolving communication process. The book under review brings together in a single volume fourteen of Neuwirth’s articles that were published in varying contexts over twenty years. Thus the book embodies the leading edges of first-tier Qur’an scholarship and in the process sheds light on pressing issues of the field today.

Full access to the Review of Qur’anic Research (RQR) is available in the members-only area of our IQSA website. Not an IQSA member? Join today to enjoy RQR and additional member benefits!

© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2016. All rights reserved.

IQSA 2015 Keynote Address Now Available!

scholars in library_maqamat haririFollowing the success of the IQSA 2015 Annual Meeting in Atlanta, we are pleased to make available on our website the Meeting’s keynote paper by Professor Reuven Firestone, entitled “The Problematic of Prophecy.” Based on qur’anic discourse in relation to preceding and subsequent scriptures and tradition, Professor Firestone offers a theory of religious emergence and the revolutionary challenge it represents to the authority of established religions. In the process, he demonstrates how our awareness of the natural tension between scriptural canonization and competing prophetic claims has value for the critical study of the Qur’an. You can access the paper HERE.

© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2016. All rights reserved.

Two Electronic Collections of Articles on the Qur’an and Qur’an Manuscripts

by Efim Rezvan*

A series of significant articles in Qur’anic studies from Russia, originally published between 1992 and 2008, have been collected into two volumes now conveniently available in English online.

Q and its WorldE. A. Rezvan. The Qur’an and Its World. Russian Academy of Sciences, Saint-Petersburg: Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (Kunstkamera), 2012. Internet resource: http://kunstkamera.ru/lib/rubrikator/02/978-5-88431-178-7

This electronic publication presents the first edition of “The Qur’an and Its World” by Efim Rezvan, published in 1996-1999 as a series of articles in Manuscripta Orientalia: International Journal for Oriental Manuscript Research.

The Russian enlarged and revised edition  [ISBN 978-5-85803-183-3] was published by “Peterburgskoe Vostokovedenie” in 2001. It is approximately one-third larger than the journal version and richly illustrated with over 100 color and black-and-white illustrations. It provides an overview of the various traditions of recitation of the Qur’an and includes the database of Qur’anic manuscripts from the Institute of Oriental Manuscripts of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The book won the National Award “Book of the Year” (Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications of Russia and the Publishers’ Association of Russia) (2001), the UNESCO diploma as the best edition making a significant contribution to the culture of peace and nonviolence and dialogue among civilizations (2001), and the National Prize “The Book of the Year” of the Islamic Republic of Iran (2002).

Q and MS traditionE. A. Rezvan and M. E. Rezvan. The Qur’an and Muslim Manuscript Tradition: Selected Articles. Saint-Petersburg: Russian Academy of Sciences, Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (Kunstkamera), 2013. Internet resource: http://kunstkamera.ru/lib/rubrikator/02/978-5-88431-236-4

This electronic publication presents 15 articles by Efim and Maryam Rezvan published in 1992-2008, mostly in Manuscripta Orientalia, and devoted to different aspects of the Qur’an’s realization in the Muslim manuscript tradition.

* Dr. Efim Rezvan is Editor-in-Chief of Manuscripta Orientalia: International Journal for Oriental Manuscript Research, and Deputy Director of Kunstkamera Museum in Saint-Petersburg, Russia.

© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2014. All rights reserved.