Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 8 no. 3 (2022) 

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 8 no. 3 (2022) 

In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 8, no.3), Devin J. Stewart (Emory University) reviews George Archer, A Place Between Two Places: The Qurʾānic Barzakh (Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias, 2017).

placeIn the review, Stewart writes “In A Place between Two Places: The Qurʾānic Barzakh, George Archer addresses the term barzakh and the associated conception of an intermediate state between life and death, or life and the afterlife, in Late Antiquity, the Qurʾān, and early Islamic literature. One way to look at this work is as a response to an interpretive problem presented by the term, which occurs in three qurʾānic passages. In the first two passages, Q al-Nūr 25:53 and al-Raḥmān 55:19–20, barzakh designates a barrier—somewhat mystifying to human observers—between fresh and salt water. That the term indicates a barrier is clear from the fact that the two bodies of water are said to meet but remain separate, constituting one of the many signs of God manifested in the wondrous features of the natural world. The setting in the third passage, Q al-Muʾminūn 23:99–100, is entirely different. Here, barzakh also denotes a barrier; a dead man’s request to be returned to the world to rectify his former deeds is categorically denied, and this is declared impossible on account of the barzakh: “A barzakh stands behind such people until the day when they are resurrected.” The barrier in this case separates the realm of the dead from the realm of the living…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2022. All rights reserved. 

NEW Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 8 no. 1 (2022) 

In the first installment of Volume 8 of IQSA’s Review of Qur’anic Research (2022), Saqib Hussain (University of Oxford) reviews Martin Whittingham’s A History of Muslim Views of the Bible: The First Four Centuries (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2021).

Picture1In the review, Hussain writes “In this compact book, Martin Whittingham presents the historical beginnings of Muslim attitudes to the Bible. Billed as the first of two volumes, this installment takes us from the Qurʾān and its position on the scriptures of the “People of the Book” to the turn of the fifth century AH / eleventh century CE, i.e., up to and including the writings of Ibn Ḥazm (d. 456/1064) and some of his contemporaries, whom Whittingham sees as marking a watershed in the way Muslims have viewed and approached the Bible. The planned second volume will continue the story to the present day. While previous studies have focused on key Muslim thinkers or specific aspects of Muslim scholarly use and/or critique of the Bible, the present work ranges far broader in its scope, seeking to present a chronology of evolving attitudes toward the Bible across a wide variety of literary genres. These attitudes are gauged both through explicit statements about the Bible from Muslim scholars, and through what may be implicitly gleaned about such attitudes from the way the Bible is utilized or discussed. The scope of the book is thus both impressive and unique, and Whittingham has produced a work that will surely be required reading for anyone interested in this field…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2022. All rights reserved. 

 

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 7 no. 5 (2021)

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In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 7, no.5), Holger Zellentin (Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen) reviews Zishan Ahmad Ghaffar’s Der Koran in seinem religions- und weltgeschichtlichen Kontext: Eschatologie und Apokalyptik in den mittelmekkanischen Suren (Leiden: Ferdinand Schöningh / Brill, 2020).

rqr 7 5 bookIn the review, Zellentin writes “In Ghaffar’s view, the Qurʾān retells and transforms many of the historical and eschatological narratives circulating at its time, and especially those suggesting or even explicating the messianic role of Byzantine Emperor Heraclius, who ruled 610–641 CE. Instead of prevalent messianic and apocalyptic imperial ideologies, according to Ghaffar, the middle Meccan sūrahs – in arguable contrast to the later Medinan ones – offer a theology of individual piety and divine mercy that portrays the only relevant eschatological battle between good and evil as occurring within each individual, rather than on the world stage…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2021. All rights reserved.

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 7 no. 2 (2021)

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In the second installment of this year’s the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 7 no.2), Mona Siddiqui (University of Edinburgh) reviews Carlos A. Segovia’s The Quranic Jesus: A New Interpretation (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2020).

quranicjesusIn the review, Siddiqui writes “Using a style and lens similar to “The Quranic Noah” (2015), this book is Carlos A. Segovia’s most recent contribution to the literature on the Qurʾān and its relationship to late antique Judaism and Christianity. The book also belongs to the same series, which aims to bring Judaism, Christianity, and Islam into interdisciplinary conversations about the reception and mediation of ideas within these religions. Segovia’s main purpose in this book is to “reread the Jesus passages in light of the Christological developments contemporary with the composition of the quranic corpus” (23). The author’s main concern is that in the modern study of the qurʾānic Jesus, scholars have basically moved in a single direction which is thematic and descriptive and focuses primarily on biographical episodes of Jesus and select verses which create a qurʾānic counter-Christology. This approach overlooks the multi-layered, polyvalent, and “highly complex Christology” (1) contained in the Qurʾān…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2021. All rights reserved.

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 6 no. 6 (2020)

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In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 6, no.6), Ilkka Lindstedt (University of Helsinki) reviews Nicolai Sinai’s Rain-Giver, Bone-Breaker, Score-Settler: Allāh in Pre-Quranic Poetry (New Haven, CT: American Oriental Society, 2019).

raingiverIn his review, Ilkka writes “Nicolai Sinai’s small book, or essay, is a very welcome contribution to the study of the deity Allāh and the religious map of Arabia on the eve of Islam based on the jāhiliyyah (pre-Islamic) poetry. The work is available as an open-access e-book. Sinai’s study is rich in methodological considerations and lucid in style. The argumentation is easy to follow. In short, the essay is a joy to read. What I find especially significant is his integrated use of different source sets: in addition to Arabic poetry, he employs the Qurʾān and ancient Arabian epigraphic evidence as comparative materials (while eschewing Arabic prose literature). The picture that he puts forward is credible and well documented…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2020. All rights reserved.

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 5 no. 7 (2019)

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In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 5, no.7), Maria De Cillis (The Institute of Ismaili Studies) reviews Seyfeddin Kara’s In Search of ʿAlī Ibn Abī Ṭālib’s Codex: History and Traditions of the Earliest Copy of the Qurʾān (Berlin: Gerlach Press, 2018).

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In her review, Cillis writes “In his new volume, In Search of ʿAlī Ibn Abī Ṭālib’s Codex: History and Traditions of the Earliest Copy of the Qurʾān, Seyfeddin Kara takes into account how the Shiʿi claim—that the fourth caliph and first Shiʿi Imam carried out the compilation of the Qurʾān before anyone else—has frequently been perceived as politicised bias. This, our author observes, as many scholars have done before him, has contributed to the crystallization of a negative attitude in Western academia towards the study of Shiʿi ḥadīth compilations. What is admirable and innovative in this new work is Kara’s goal of refusing to espouse any distorted, standardized preconception, and his yearning to shatter any sectarianized perspective…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2019. All rights reserved.

New Benefits: IQSA Institutional Membership

The International Qur’anic Studies Association is pleased to announce the addition of new benefits for IQSA’s Institutional Members. Institutions can now provide collective access to the Review of Qur’anic Research in addition to IQSA’s flagship Journal of the International Qur’anic Studies Association by becoming IQSA institutional members. Access to these resources for institutions is the result of collaboration with IQSA’s affiliate publisher, Lockwood Press.

Institutional Membership is $400 USD annually and includes the following benefits:
– Automatic access/subscription to all paid individual member benefits (JIQSA online, RQR online & Membership database)
– Discounts on Lockwood publications
– One free advertisement annually (program book, JIQSA, online or mailing list)
– Discounted registration for designated individual at IQSA’s Annual Meeting

To enable collective access to IQSA’s resources, institutions must provide IP ranges to Lockwood Press. Institutional partners can register for membership HERE. Questions or concerns? Email contact@iqsaweb.org! We hope you join us soon to start enjoying these new benefits!

 

© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2019. All rights reserved.

 

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 5 no. 3 (2019)

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In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 5, no.3), Gabriel Said Reynolds (University of Notre Dame) reviews Francisco del Río Sánchez (ed.), Jewish Christianity and the Origins of Islam (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2018).

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In his review, Reynolds writes “While the volume under review is dedicated to the Qurʾān’s relationship to Jewish Christianity, a number of its contributions call into question the very usefulness of this category. Accordingly, the work is more than a consideration of the relationship between supposedly Jewish Christian groups such as the Ebionites, or supposedly Jewish Christian scriptures such as the Pseudo-Clementines, and the Qurʾān. It offers a broad consideration of the nature of Judaism and Christianity in late antiquity and the ways in which the Qurʾān engages with this sectarian milieu. The volume, which emerged from an ASMEA panel in 2015, is a significant contribution to the study of the Qurʾān in its late antique context…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2019. All rights reserved.

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 5 no. 2 (2019)

In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 5, no.2), Ayman S. Ibrahim (Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) reviews Juan Cole’s Muhammad: Prophet of Peace Amid the Clash of Empires (New York: Nation Books, 2018).

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In his review, Ibrahim writes “In recent years, the field of Islamic Studies has witnessed a growing trend centered on reinterpreting early Islam. The reinterpretation concerns historical episodes, events, or figures, and stands in a clear dissonance with traditional narratives depicted by classical Muslim historians…Juan Cole’s ‘Muhammad: Prophet of Peace Amid the Clash of Empires’ is a recent representation of this trend. The author attempts to reinterpret early Islam, particularly in relation to the image of the Muslim prophet. Following Fred M. Donner’s footsteps in ‘Muhammad and the Believers,’ Cole’s Muhammad “puts forward a reinterpretation of early Islam as a movement strongly inflected with values of peacemaking” (1). If Donner’s reinterpretation portrayed early Islam as an ecumenical movement (a community of believers, not Muslims), Cole’s book emphasizes Muḥammad as a “prophet of peace” who led a peacemaking community…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2019. All rights reserved.

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 4 no. 9 (2018)

In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 4, no.9), Johanna Pink (Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg) reviews  Kristian Petersen’s Interpreting Islam in China: Pilgrimage, Scripture, & Language in the Han Kitab (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017).

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In her review, Pink writes… “Some readers of the Review of Qurʾanic Research might wonder whether a book on Islam in China is worth their attention. It most definitely is, especially if their interest transcends the Qurʾānic text itself and extends to Muslims’ engagement with their sacred scripture. As the author of Interpreting Islam in China, Kristian Petersen, rightfully criticizes, “much of Western scholarship has associated Islam very closely, and at times even exclusively, with Arab Muslims in the Middle East—often establishing essentialized orientations of the center and the periphery” (3)… It is therefore highly advisable especially for scholars who have no expertise on Islam in China to take his book seriously as a contribution to our understanding of how the Qurʾān was read and interpreted by Muslims throughout history, across space and language divides…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2018. All rights reserved.

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 4 no. 8 (2018)

In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 4, no.8), Gabriel Said Reynolds (University of Notre Dame) reviews Youssouf T. Sangaré’s Le scellement de la prophétie en Islam: Khatm al-nubuwwa (Paris: Geuthner, 2018).

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In his review, Reynolds writes… “Le scellement de la prophétie en Islam is a learned and well-argued study of the qurʾānichapax legomenon khātam al-nabiyyīn (seal of the prophets; Q Aḥzāb 33:40) and more generally of the notion of the cessation of prophecy in Islam…Along the way Youssouf Sangaré illustrates the complications surrounding the notion of the sealing of prophecy and amplifies those voices in Islamic tradition which resist the idea that God went silent with the death of Muḥammad…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2018. All rights reserved.

 

Review of Qur’anic Research, Vol. 4 no. 7 (2018)

In the latest installment of the Review of Qur’anic Research (Vol. 4, no.7), W. Richard Oakes, Jr. (Independent Scholar) reviews Nevin Reda’s The al-Baqara Crescendo: Understanding the Qur’an’s Style, Narrative Structure, and Running Themes (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2017).

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In his review, Oakes writes… “In The al-Baqara Crescendo, Nevin Reda does an exceptional job of describing the Qur’ān in the vocabulary of art, aesthetics, acoustics, chanting, song, music, the rhythms and rhymes of orally-recited poetry, poetic-like rhetorical devices, and German terminology. Her emotive vocabulary and accessible writing style lures the reader into a feeling that her approach is holistic and that Sūrat al-Baqarah is coherent…”

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© International Qur’anic Studies Association, 2018. All rights reserved.