In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Islamic Disputation Theory: The Uses & Rules of Argument in Medieval Islam by Larry Benjamin MillerKhaled El-RouayhebLarry Benjamin Miller. Islamic Disputation Theory: The Uses & Rules of Argument in Medieval Islam. Logic, Argumentation and Reasoning 21. Cham: Springer 2020. Pp. xviii + 143. Hardback, €77.99.Very few unpublished PhD dissertations have had a formative influence on a field. One of the precious few (...) is Larry Miller's Princeton dissertation from 1984 on Islamic disputation theory. It proposed an original and compelling account of the development of the discipline, from the earliest extant Arabic works in the tenth century to the composition of classic madrasa handbooks in the late thirteenth century. It has been cited regularly in the past decades and has served as the starting point for all later studies of Arabic/Islamic dialectics in European languages. The fact that it has finally been published is a fitting tribute to a study that is even more admirable for having been written when many of the primary sources were still only available as manuscripts.Part of the explanation for why the dissertation was not published sooner may be that its author did not pursue an academic career. And as he states in a short preface, he has not kept abreast of all relevant studies and editions that have appeared since his dissertation. A thorough revision and update has therefore not been possible. Though some minor corrections and revisions have been made, the book is still by and large the influential 1984 dissertation, now made available with a short introduction by Walter Young, one of the leading younger scholars in the field, along with helpful indices of proper names and subjects.Miller's narrative begins with Arabic works on disputation (jadal) by a number of theologians from the late ninth and tenth centuries, such as Ibn al-Rāwandī (d. 911), [End Page 518] al-Ash'arī (d. 935), and the Karaite Jewish scholar al-Qirqisānī (d. ca. 960). The basic assumption was that a questioner (sā'il) would ask a claimant (mu'allil) (i) what his view is; (ii) what the ground or reason ('illa) for that view is; (iii) the appropriateness of the ground/reason for the view; and (iv) to verify the ground/reason by showing it to be commensurate with the view. The ground/reason for the theological dialecticians was standardly an entity or property, not a premise. The reasoning tended to be informal and analogical, as opposed to explicitly making syllogistic deductions from quantified premises.Parallel to this theological tradition of jadal, there was an Arabic Aristotelian tradition that took its point of departure from Aristotle's Topics, translated into Arabic more than once in the period from the late eighth to the early tenth centuries. Though also often referred to as jadal, this tradition, represented by the writings of al-Farabi (d. 950), Avicenna (d. 1037), and Averroes (d. 1198), retained distinct features. It tended to deny any epistemic value to dialectics, instead seeing it as useful only insofar as it provided logical training. For the Aristotelian/Neoplatonic philosophers, the pursuit of truth was the preserve of demonstrative syllogism (burhān). Whereas the theological dialecticians envisaged a claimant (mu'allil) and a questioner (sā'il), with the burden of proof on the former, the philosophical tradition had a questioner (sā'il) seek, in the manner of Socratic elenchus, to elicit from a respondent (mujῑb) a series of answers that would allow the construction of a syllogism whose conclusion contradicted the respondent's initial position.From the time of al-Ghazali (d. 1111), Islamic theologians tended to take over the syllogistic ideal of reasoning from the philosophers, perhaps explaining why theological writings on jadal trail off after the eleventh century. The informal, analogical jadal tradition continued, however, in the writings of Islamic jurists. From the eleventh century, scholars such as Abū Isḥāq al-Shīrāzī (d. 1083) and al-Juwaynī (d. 1085) wrote works on jadal in which the examples are disputes about questions of Islamic law and the disputants are partisans of the various legal schools. This tradition of what Miller calls "juristic dialectics" (74, 95) later adopted some... (shrink)

The Dialectical Forge identifies dialectical disputation as a primary formative dynamic in the evolution of pre-modern Islamic legal systems, promoting dialectic from relative obscurity to a more appropriate position at the forefront of Islamic legal studies. The author introduces and develops a dialectics-based analytical method for the study of pre-modern Islamic legal argumentation, examines parallels and divergences between Aristotelian dialectic and early juridical jadal-theory, and proposes a multi-component paradigm—the Dialectical Forge Model—to account for the power (...) of jadal in shaping Islamic law and legal theory.In addition to overviews of current evolutionary narratives for Islamic legal theory and dialectic, and expositions on key texts, this work shines an analytical light upon the considerably sophisticated “proto-system” of juridical dialectical teaching and practice evident in Islam’s second century, several generations before the first “full-system” treatises of legal and dialectical theory were composed. This proto-system is revealed from analyses of dialectical sequences in the 2nd/8th century Kitāb Ikhtilāf al-ʿIrāqiyyīn / ʿIrāqiyyayn through a lens molded from 5th/11th century jadal-theory treatises. Specific features thus uncovered inform the elaboration of a Dialectical Forge Model, whose more general components and functions are explored in closing chapters. (shrink)

This paper aims at helping trainees to overcome the difficulties they face when dealing with Arduino platform by describing the design of a desktop based intelligent tutoring system. The main idea of this system is a systematic introduction into the concept of Arduino platform. The system shows the circuit boards of Arduino that can be purchased at low cost or assembled from freely-available plans; and an open-source development environment and library for writing code to control the board topic of Arduino (...) platform. The system is adaptive with the trainee’s individual progress. The system functions as a special tutor who deals with trainees according to their levels and skills. Evaluation of the system has been applied on professional and unprofessional trainees in this field and the results were good. (shrink)

Relativistic mean field theory with mesons σ, ω, π and ρ mediating interactions and nucleons as basic fermions has been very successful in describing nuclear matter and finite nuclei. However, in heavy-ion collisions, where the c. m. energy of two colliding nucleons will be in the hundreds of GeV region, nucleons are not expected to behave as point-like particles. Analyses of elastic pp and ¯pp scattering data in the relevant c. m. energy range show that the nucleon is a (...) composite object—a topological soliton or Skyrmion embedded in a condensed quark-antiquark ground state. Against this backdrop, we formulate an effective field theory model of nuclear matter based on the gauged linear σ-model where quarks are the basic fermions, but the mesons still mediate the interactions. The model describes the nucleon as a Skyrmion and produces a q¯q ground state analogous to a superconducting ground state. Quarks are quasi-particles in this ground state. When the temperature exceeds a critical value, the scalar field in the ground state vanishes, quarks become massless, and a chiral phase transition occurs leading to chiral symmetry restoration. We explore the possibility of a first order phase transition in this model by introducing suitable self-interactions of the scalar field. Internal structures of the Skyrmions are ignored, and they are treated as point-like fermions. (shrink)

Some aspects of the Schrödinger equation in quantum field theory are considered in this article. The emphasis is on the Schrödinger functional equation for Yang-Mills theory, arising mainly out of Feynman's work on (2+1)-dimensional Yang-Mills theory, which he studied with a view to explaining the confinement of gluons. The author extended Feynman's work in two earlier papers, and the present article is partly a review of Feynman's and the author's work and some further extension of the latter. (...) The primary motivation of this article is to suggest that considering the Schrödinger functional equation in the context of Yang-Mills theory may contribute significantly to the solution of the confinement and related problems, an aspect which, in the author's opinion, has not received the attention it deserves. The relation of this problem with certain others such as those of quarks, superconductivity, and quantum gravity is considered briefly, together with certain basic aspects of the formalism that may be of interest in their own right, especially for the beginner. (shrink)

This paper analyzes the reception of decolonial and neo-Marxist thought in a jihadist critique of the modern state. The author argues that a study of Abū Qatāda al-Filisṭīnī, a prominent theorist of modern Jihadism and Salafism, reveals his nuanced interaction with theories of hegemony, ideology, and decolonization. An examination of Abū Qatāda’s critique of modern state institutions and ideology shows that he engages with philosophical critiques of sovereignty, hegemony, capitalism, and the nation-state and utilizes both neo-Marxist and decolonial thought. This (...) paper explores how Abū Qatāda theorizes the modern state as a colonial project, leading him to rationalize jihad, or violent resistance, as the only solution to realize paradigmatic change. It further shows how Abū Qatāda justifies opposition to the modern state and hegemony with seamless deployment of scripture and Islamic jurisprudence and insists that his political project builds on premodern Islamic theories of knowledge and government necessary for decolonization, albeit often without offering details. This study reveals a feature of jihadist thought that has remained largely unnoticed in the literature and is the first to explore the interactions between Salafism and critiques of the modern state. (shrink)

Abstract. Environmental ethicists ask several questions about global climate change; especially on the moral justification of the problem of non-compliance; i.e., why agents do not comply with their climatic responsibilities. It is evident that some developed countries have been perpetuating the climate change crisis by not following their climatic responsibilities (i.e., mitigation, adaptation, and compensation) or even more surprisingly a few of those states have been denying the climate change facts. This paper focuses on comparing two forward-looking approaches to climate (...) justice; namely, the Ability to Pay Principle (APP) and the Power/Responsibility Principle (PRP) and seeks an answer whether any of these principles enable a response to the problem of non-compliance. Scrutinizing a few analogical examples and analysing contemporary debates on this issue, this paper then shows the APP does not enable a response to the problem of non-compliance whereas one possible distribution of duties according to the PRP does so and concludes that the relevant agents’ willingness to comply with climatic responsibilities seems to be the key factor to avoid harm in the context of climate change crisis. (shrink)

The general mission of feminist philosophy is to correct whatever male biases may exist in the mainstream philosophical traditions. Thus western feminist philosophers investigate and challenge the ways in which western traditions have so long been participating in subordinating women or in rationalizing their subordination. By questioning the gender insensitivity of ethics and philosophy, feminism attempts to reveal various forms of subjugation of women operating through laws, institutions, customs, social theories, and cultural values. Feminism aims at coming up with a (...) better design for society, based on a thorough review and rethinking of gendered positioning of human beings. (shrink)

This article examines the ethical framing of employment in contemporary human resource management (HRM). Using Axel Honneth's theory of recognition and classical critical notions of reification, I contrast recognition and reifying stances on labor. The recognition approach embeds work in its emotive and social particularity, positively affirming the basic dignity of social actors. Reifying views, by contrast, exhibit a forgetfulness of recognition, removing action from its existential and social moorings, and imagining workers as bundles of discrete resources or capacities. (...) After discussing why reification is a problem, I stress that recognition and reification embody different ethical standpoints with regards to organizational practices. Thus, I argue paradoxically that many current HRM best practices can be maintained while cultivating an attitude of recognition. If reification is a type of forgetting, cultivating a recognition attitude involves processes of "remembering" to foster work relations that reinforce employee dignity. (shrink)

Organisational citizenship behaviour towards the environment (OCBE) aids in both environmental protection and in harnessing sustainable competitive organisational advantage. This study proposed a conceptual research model which investigated managerial perceptions of the relationship between OCBE and economic cost performance (ECP) in the UAE hospitality sector, with green innovative behaviour (GIB) mediating and green training moderating the relationship. Drawing on the theory of planned behaviour and abilities motivation opportunity theory, the study administered 479 structured questionnaires to hotel managers in (...) the UAE using purposive and snowball sampling techniques. Partial least squares structural equation modelling was applied to test the hypotheses in SmartPLS3.3. Findings showed that OCBE had a direct and significant impact on ECP, with GIB emerging both as a direct and mediating predictor. Additionally, green training directly and significantly moderated the OCBE–cost performance relationship. These results evince the integration of sustainable philosophies with innovative mindsets to encourage green innovative endeavours among hotel managers. (shrink)

We provide two programmatic frameworks for integrating philosophical research on understanding with complementary work in computer science, psychology, and neuroscience. First, philosophical theories of understanding have consequences about how agents should reason if they are to understand that can then be evaluated empirically by their concordance with findings in scientific studies of reasoning. Second, these studies use a multitude of explanations, and a philosophical theory of understanding is well suited to integrating these explanations in illuminating ways.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the nature of rhetoric and rhetorical strategies that are implicit in the standalone sustainability reporting of the top 24 companies of the Fortune 500 Global. We adopt Bormann’s :396–407, 1972) SCT framework to study the rhetorical situation and how corporate sustainability reporting messages can be communicated to the audience. The SCT concepts in the sustainability reporting’s communication are subject to different types of legitimacy strategies that are used by corporations as a validity (...) and legitimacy claim in the reports. A content analysis has been conducted and structural coding schemes have been developed based on the literature. The schemes are applied to the SCT model which recognizes the symbolic convergent processes of fantasy among communicators in a Society. The study reveals that most of the sample companies communicate fantasy type and rhetorical vision in their corporate sustainability reporting. However, the disclosure or messages are different across locations and other taxonomies of the SCT framework. This study contributes to the current CSR literature about how symbolic or fantasy understandings can be interpreted by the users. It also discusses the persuasion styles that are adopted by the companies for communication purposes. This study is the theoretical extension of the SCT. Researchers may be interested in further investigating other online communication paths, such as human rights reports and director’s reports. (shrink)

The increasing global demand for energy necessitates devoted attention to the formulation and exploration of mechanisms of thermal heat exchangers to explore and save heat energy. Thus, innovative thermal transport fluids require to boost thermal conductivity and heat flow features to upsurge convection heat rate, and nanofluids have been effectively employed as standard heat transfer fluids. With such intention, herein, we formulated and developed the constitutive flow laws by utilizing the Rossland diffusion approximation and Stephen’s law along with the MHD (...) effect. The mathematical formulation is based on boundary layer theory pioneered by Prandtl. Governing nonlinear partial differential flow equations are changed to ODEs via the implementation of the similarity variables. A well-known computational algorithm BVPh2 has been utilized for the solution of the nonlinear system of ODEs. The consequence of innumerable physical parameters on flow field, thermal distribution, and solutal field, such as magnetic field, Lewis number, velocity parameter, Prandtl number, drag force, Nusselt number, and Sherwood number, is plotted via graphs. Finally, numerical consequences are compared with the homotopic solution as a limiting case, and an exceptional agreement is found. (shrink)

RésuméEst-il possible d'inventer une science qui définit les règles d'un débat éthique, logique et efficace? Shams al-Dīn al-Samarqandī, un logicien et juriste Ḥanafite, a jugé une telle entreprise possible. Il a assumé la tâche de développer une théorie générale de la discussion scientifique qui a eu un énorme succès dans les cercles d’études dans le monde musulman. Il a appelé la nouvelle discipline Ādāb al-baḥth wa-al-munāẓara, un ensemble de principes éthiques et logiques, empruntés à la logique aristotélicienne et à la (...) dialectique juridique musulmane. Son traité majeur, Risālat Ādāb al-baḥth, a initié une nouvelle discipline dans laquelle des douzaines de traités et de commentaires ont été rédigés. Dans cet article, il s'agit de mettre en lumière cette science négligée, de décrire sa structure, d'exposer ses fonctions et de souligner son importance pour le développement des débats et des dialogues intellectuels dans l'Islam médiéval tardif. (shrink)

The current study proposes a novel conceptual model in which Islamic work ethics has a mediating role in the relationship between servant leadership and employees’ life satisfaction within Pakistan’s banking sector. The model draws on the theory of leader-member exchange. Data from a sample of 240 were evaluated using structural equation modeling using SmartPLS 3.2.7 software. The findings indicate that servant leadership significantly impacts employees’ life satisfaction. Furthermore, Islamic work ethics mediated this effect. This study introduces ground-breaking (...) bank inputs by creating a new integrated model based on LMX theory. While the impact of several dimensions of Islamic work ethics on employees’ life satisfaction has been widely investigated, the present study is the first to explore the roles of servant leadership and Islamic work ethics in leveraging bank employees’ life satisfaction. The results suggest that bank managers should enact servant leadership in their business and serve their employees ethically to improve their life satisfaction. Additionally, this study provides key theoretical contributions to the literature on Islamic banking. (shrink)

Nūr Muḥammad is one of the teachings in Sufism that studies the beginning of the creation of the universe. The Sufis discussed Nūr Muḥammad through God's tajallī (manifestation), and they believed that only Insan Kamil (Perfect Humans) possessed the perfection of His tajallī. This Sufi theory can be comprehended through the dhawqi approach. This research will deal with Nūr Muḥammad's theory of Sufism through the perspective of Tijaniyah Tarekat. The data for this study was obtained through library research (...) utilizing a documentary technique. The collected data will be analyzed using the descriptive analysis method. This study finds that the Tijaniyah Tarekat is a Sufism institution that bases its teachings and practices on the concept of Nūr Muḥammad in the form of ṣalawāt al-fātiḥ and ṣalawāt jawharah al-kamāl. This Tarekat's elucidation of Nūr Muḥammad is also built on and consistent with the explication of authoritative Sufis in Islam's intellectual and spiritual tradition. (shrink)

Numerous organizations have faced substantial environmental performance challenges resulting from more than a half-century of worldwide industrialization. Grounded in social learning theory and recourse-based view theory, this study explores environmental performance and its impact on employees and industry outcomes. Drawing on a cross-sectional online survey of 500 full-time employees working in the chemical industry in Lahore, Pakistan. The results revealed a significant positive influence of Green HRM practices on employees’ Green innovation as well as on environmental performance. Additionally, (...) significant influences of study variables were recorded on outcomes such as green compensation and reward, green performance management and appraisal, green training and development, and green recruitment and selection. Several key policy insights related to consumer resistance to innovation in low income societies and future research directions are suggested, along with theoretical and practical implications. (shrink)

Online social networks are highly dynamic and sparse. One of the main problems in analyzing these networks is the problem of predicting the existence of links between users on these networks: the link prediction problem. Many studies have been conducted to predict links using a variety of techniques like the decision tree and the logistic regression approaches. In this work, we will illustrate the use of the rough set theory in predicting links over the Facebook social network based on (...) homophilic features. Other supervised learning algorithms are also employed in our experiments and compared with the rough set classifier, such as naive Bayes, J48 decision tree, support vector machine, logistic regression, and multilayer perceptron neural network. Moreover, we studied the influence of the “common groups” and “common page likes” homophilic features on predicting friendship between users of Facebook, and also studied the effect of using the Jaccard coefficient in measuring the similarity between users’ homophilic attributes compared with using the overlap coefficient. We conducted our experiments on two different datasets obtained from the Facebook online social network, where users in each dataset live within the same geographical region. The results showed that the rough set classifier significantly outperformed the other classifiers in all experiments. The results also demonstrated that the common groups and the common page likes features have a significant influence on predicting the friendship between users of Facebook. Finally, the results revealed that using the overlap coefficient homophilic features provided better results than that of the Jaccard coefficient features. (shrink)

Ḥanafī jurist Burhān al-Dīn al-Nasafī is one of the most prominent names in the history of the ʿilm al-naẓar’ (Islamic Disputation Theory) particularly due to his seminal work entitled al-Fuṣūl. We have located a manuscript which we will call an Opponent-al-Fuṣūl written by a Shāfiʿī scholar. This manuscript is titled al-Risāla fī qawāʿid ʿilm al-naẓar and it highlights the importance of al-Nasafī’s al-Fuṣūl. The scribe of the manuscript attributes this Opponent-al-Fuṣūl to the famous logician Najm al-Dīn al-Kātibī. (...) Although no mention of such a book belonging to al-Kātibī has been discovered thus far, in this article we will try to demonstrate that the book does indeed belong to him. In addition, we will undertake a comparison of both works, al-Fuṣūl and the Opponent-al-Fuṣūl, with a particular focus on the concepts of talāzum (implication), tanāfī (incompatibility) and dawarān (concomitance). A critical edition of the Opponent-al-Fuṣūl is appended to the article. (shrink)

Ḥanafī jurist Burhān al-Dīn al-Nasafī is one of the most prominent names in the history of the ʿilm al-naẓar’ (Islamic Disputation Theory) particularly due to his seminal work entitled al-Fuṣūl. We have located a manuscript which we will call an Opponent-al-Fuṣūl written by a Shāfiʿī scholar. This manuscript is titled al-Risāla fī qawāʿid ʿilm al-naẓar and it highlights the importance of al-Nasafī’s al-Fuṣūl. The scribe of the manuscript attributes this Opponent-al-Fuṣūl to the famous logician Najm al-Dīn al-Kātibī. (...) Although no mention of such a book belonging to al-Kātibī has been discovered thus far, in this article we will try to demonstrate that the book does indeed belong to him. In addition, we will undertake a comparison of both works, al-Fuṣūl and the Opponent-al-Fuṣūl, with a particular focus on the concepts of talāzum (implication), tanāfī (incompatibility) and dawarān (concomitance). A critical edition of the Opponent-al-Fuṣūl is appended to the article. (shrink)

Qiyās, or “correlational inference” (often glossed as “analogy”), comprises a primary set of methodological tools recognized by a majority of premodern Sunnī jurists. Its elements, valid modes, and proper applications were the focus of continual argument and refinement. A particular area of debate was the methodology of determining or justifying the ʿilla: the legal cause (or occasioning factor, or ratio legis) giving rise to a ruling in God’s Law. This was most often discussed (and disputed) under the rubric of “the (...) modes of causal justification” (masālik al-taʿlīl). Among these modes was the much debated test of dawarān (concomitance of presumed cause and effect). In brief, proponents of dawarān employed it to justify claims that a property (waṣf) occasioned the ruling (ḥukm) in an authoritative source-case (aṣl). In concert with other considerations, the demonstrated co-presence (ṭard) and co-absence (ʿaks) of property and ruling—that is, their concomitance “in existence” (wujūdan) and “in nonexistence” (ʿadaman)— was taken as an indication that the property was the ruling’s ʿilla. Delving further into dawarān and causation (ʿilliyya), the current study interprets “in existence” and “in nonexistence” not as a kind of metaphor for true and false (within the framework of a classical truth-functional formal semantics), but as an accurate terminology vis-à-vis the meaning of causality statements, fully compatible with dominant Islamicate views on causal agency. In brief, a deeper logical and linguistic analysis of the different existential modes of dawarān strongly suggests that we should distinguish property (or phenomenon) and ruling (or effect) as types (concepts or propositions linguistically expressed by a sentence) as opposed to tokens (instantiations of the type; the real, ontological events that verify the proposition). Our reading of dawarān as shaped by a finer-grained structure not only allows us to identify the efficient occasioning process as a function which takes some particular token of the ʿilla (arguably, the property or properties which provide the ruling’s material cause) and renders a token of the general ruling type, but it allows us to elucidate the role of taʿlīl (causal justification) in shaping an epistemological theory of argument to the best explanation: a sophisticated, premodern manifestation of abductive reasoning. (shrink)

Building upon an ethnographic exploration of the pedagogy and alternative dispute resolution activities of an Islamic feminist movement in India called the Indian Muslim Women’s Movement, this article speaks to the tension between Saba Mahmood’s influential account of religion and gendered agency, and a liberal feminist conception of gender equality. Anthropological explorations of Muslim women’s pious commitments as well as liberal feminist engagements with religion and culture are premised upon a presumed dichotomy between ethical engagements with religion, and a (...) commitment to gender equality. Yet there is little analysis in existing scholarship of how gender equality is constituted by social movements premised on a religious identity, such as Islamic feminist movements. This article moves beyond thinking about gender equality merely as an abstract liberal normative good to explore how the discourse of gender equality is constituted in a movement that brings together everyday ethical commitments inspired by notions of piety and concerted everyday struggles against social and legal inequality. The ethnographic vignettes show how gender equality connotes social and legal equality between men and women premised on their equal spiritual status as God’s creations, their equal pious obligations irrespective of gender and the equal imperative of ethical conduct on both men and women based on Quranic values of compassion and justice. The pursuit of gender equality also entails reinterpretation of social norms in the light of ethical conduct, and an ethical commitment to collective struggle against gender discrimination in state and non-state forums. (shrink)

The problem of human freedom have been addressed by al-Mutakallimūn (Islamic theologians) in the context of human acts and discussed from the point of view its relation with the will and other elements. At this point, whether the human has will and power in his own act, the limits of his will and power, the role of human in the act and his responsibilities have prompted to different debates. The theory of tawlīd put forward by Mu‘tazila is very (...) crucial in terms of determining the scope and limits of the freedom of human in acts. Mu‘tazila’s tawlīd theory defenses based on two important reasons. The first is to present the nature and limits of the acts that man did them outside himself. The other is to explain the relationship of human with such acts with regards to moral responsibility. Because both issues are very important in the principle of justice of Mu‘tazila. The effort to put the cause-effect relationship of human with his acts in terms of tawhīd and justice on the rational and moral ground is the reason for emergence of the theory. In this respect, the purpose of this theory which enables establishing a causality relationship between the human act and nature is aimed at the justification of freedom and responsibility between agent (fā‘il) and act.In this study, firstly, the definition of the concept of tawlīd and its meaning area have been presented and tackled the discussions about the agent of indirect acts. And then it has been discoursed upon the criticisms of Ahl al-Sunna about the subject of tawlīd. The subject has been outlined in the context of the intellectual discussion between Ahl al-Sunna and Mu‘tazila which constitute the dominant part of theological dispute tradition. In this respect, the main purpose of the study is to reveal how the limits of indirect actions belonging to human by force of freedom and moral responsibility are drawn and understood.Although they did not have a uniform thought about the topic, Mu‘tazila theologians who accepted semi-determinism in the theory of tawlīd acknowledged the existence of natures in the substances. Those who admitted the reason as a means of the act did not approve this. By accepting the continuity of the accidents in the acts, they twisted together the voluntary acts and the natural acts, and accepted that directly acts were realized through the human will and the other according to the principle of necessity. According to Mu‘tazila, causes are only means. Hence, the act emerging as a result of the means is the act of the agent who used this means to reach the result, not the means. Therefore, man is the agent of engendered acts and responsible for all kinds of acts that arise as a reflection of the will and their consequences. While Ahl al-Sunna has directly associated the action of man and all its consequences with the power of Allah, Mu‘tazila has based these actions on the power of man, which Allah has created in man and has been the source of the acts. Contrary to Mu‘tazila, the continuance of power which are not a constant accident is not possible for a second act from the point of Ahl al-Sunna since they have accepted the idea that the accidents will not be continuous. In this respect, according to Ahl al-Sunna, there is no compulsory relationship between the agent that caused the formation of the acts and the result supervening from them. They did not accept the idea of tawlīd, which its meaning is that accident gives birth to accident, because it would oblige the relationship between cause and effect. Because this relationship, which Mu‘tazila gives the name of tawlīd in human acts, is made up for that Allah has created His laws right after the orientation of human to the cause. In this respect, Ahl al-Sunna thinkers rejected tawlīd because it would mean attributing an act to an inanimate being and require a mandatory relationship between cause and effect in the functioning of the universe. Although the result does not occur with his own act when the person applies to the cause, he is responsible for his act because it is related to the person who did it. Māturīdī tradition did not accept the acts that emerged as a result of tawlīd as the production of man, but they tried to establish a balance by holding the person responsible because he is the reason for the outcome that emerged. As for the Ash‘arites, they avoided giving a real effect of the will and power to the causes by considering that created will and power is only a locus in the emergence of the act. The person has no effect on his act except for directing his will to that act and his behavior which will make the person responsible is based on this will. (shrink)

Qiyās, or “correlational inference”, comprises a primary set of methodological tools recognized by a majority of premodern Sunnī jurists. Its elements, valid modes, and proper applications were the focus of continual argument and refinement. A particular area of debate was the methodology of determining or justifying the ʿilla: the legal cause giving rise to a ruling in God’s Law. This was most often discussed under the rubric of “the modes of causal justification”. Among these modes was the much debated test (...) of dawarān. In brief, proponents of dawarān employed it to justify claims that a property occasioned the ruling in an authoritative source-case. In concert with other considerations, the demonstrated co-presence and co-absence of property and ruling—that is, their concomitance “in existence” and “in nonexistence” — was taken as an indication that the property was the ruling’s ʿilla. Delving further into dawarān and causation, the current study interprets “in existence” and “in nonexistence” not as a kind of metaphor for true and false, but as an accurate terminology vis-à-vis the meaning of causality statements, fully compatible with dominant Islamicate views on causal agency. In brief, a deeper logical and linguistic analysis of the different existential modes of dawarān strongly suggests that we should distinguish property and ruling as types as opposed to tokens. Our reading of dawarān as shaped by a finer-grained structure not only allows us to identify the efficient occasioning process as a function which takes some particular token of the ʿilla and renders a token of the general ruling type, but it allows us to elucidate the role of taʿlīl in shaping an epistemological theory of argument to the best explanation: a sophisticated, premodern manifestation of abductive reasoning. (shrink)

This article presents an analysis of a short treatise entitled Ādāb al-Baḥth wa al-Munāẓarah (The art of discussion and disputation) by the celebrated Ottoman scholar Abu al-Khayr ‘Iṣām al-Dīn Aḥmad ibn Muṣṭafā ibn Khalīl Ṭāshkubrīzādah or Ṭaşköprüzade (d. 968 AH/ 1561 CE). An overview of the nomenclature and a brief introduction about the author and his work will be presented along with an annotated English translation of the text in order to highlight Ṭaşköprüzade’s contribution to this nearly forgotten discipline.

First Words, Last Words charts an intense "pamphlet war" that took place in sixteenth-century South India. The book explores this controversy as a case study in the dynamics of innovation in early modern India, a time of great intellectual innovation. This debate took place within the traditional discourses of Vedic Hermeneutics, or Mīmāṃsā, and its increasingly influential sibling discipline of Vedānta, and its proponents among the leading intellectuals and public figures of the period. At the heart of this dispute lies (...) the role of sequence in the cognitive processing of textual information, especially of a scriptural nature. Vyāsatīrtha and his grand-pupil Vijayīndratīrtha, writers belonging to the camp of Dualist Vedānta, purported to uphold the radical view of their founding father, Madhva, who believed, against a long tradition of Mīmāṃsā interpreters, that the closing portion of a scriptural passage should govern the interpretation of its opening. By contrast, the Nondualist Appayya Dikshita ostensibly defended this tradition's preference for the opening. But, as the book shows, the debaters gradually converged on a profoundly novel hermeneutic-cognitive theory in which sequence played little role, if any. In fact, they knowingly broke new ground, and only postured as traditionalists. First Words, Last Words explores the nature of theoretical innovation in this debate and sets it against the background of comparative examples from other major scriptural interpretive traditions. The book briefly surveys the use of sequence in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic hermeneutics and also seeks out parallel cases of covert innovation in these traditions. (shrink)

Child Custody in Islamic Law: Theory and Practice in Egypt since the Sixteenth Century. By Ahmed Fekry Ibrahim. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. Pp. ix + 266. $99.99, £75.

The post-classical (or post-Avicennan, post-Rāzian) genre of the “protocols for dialectical inquiry and disputation” (ādāb al-baḥth wa-l-munāẓara) has its more proximate origins in the famed Risāla of Shams al-Dīn al-Samarqandī (d. 722/1322). The greater part of his conceptions and methodology, however, consists in a streamlining and universalizing of the more strictly juristic dialectic (jadal / khilāf) of his teacher Burhān al-Dīn al-Nasafī (d. 687/1288); and this in turn draws on the highly logicized dialectic of Rukn al-Dīn al-ʿAmīdī (d. 615/1218) (...) and his teacher Raḍī al-Dīn al-Nīsābūrī (d. 617/1220). At the heart of methods in this lineage, and carried forward by al-Samarqandī into the universal ādāb al-baḥth, are three truth-preserving logical relationships critical to the truth-seeking enterprise of dialectic: entailment (talāzum / mulāzama), mutual negation or exclusion (tanāfin / munāfā), and causal concomitance (dawarān). The practical elaboration of these relations reveals a logic in action—a premodern dialogical logic for living disputation praxis. In fact, so critical were these to the dialectical enterprise that al-Samarqandī devoted a specialized treatise entirely to summarizing their defining features and rules, aptly naming it the ʿAyn al-Naẓar, or “Wellspring of Rational Investigation.” In this article, and drawing upon a recently published digital critical edition, I will present an analytical outline of these core logical relations as presented in the ʿAyn al-Naẓar. Then I will address a number of points of interest in this text, grouped under six themes: the potential for cross-disciplinary advancement; notions in discursive development; significant or uniquely contributive formulations; peculiarities of content; signs of an evolving, universalist agenda; and evidence that the ʿAyn al-Naẓar was designed as an aide-mémoire for the active disputant. (shrink)

Al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān, The Disagreements of the Jurists: A Manual of Islamic Legal Theory. Edited and translated by Devin J. Stewart. Library of Arabic Literature. New York: New York University Press, 2015. Pp. xxxviii + 405. $40.

The Islamic psychology (IP) community in Europe has recently witnessed a heated debate about the credentials required to participate in the theoretical substantiation of IP and Islamically integrated psychotherapy and counseling. This debate has provided convenient circumstances for Muslim psychologists and Islamic scholars alike to rethink their roles within the flourishing movement. Specifically, the discussions hint toward the importance of adopting a collaborative research methodology for IP, in particular for basic research. The methodology of choice will need to (...) define the necessary qualifications and responsibilities of scholars and psychologists in a collaborative research process (personal collaboration) and evince its capability to appropriately marry knowledge and data, diverging research methods, and perspectives, concepts, and theories from Islamic studies and contemporary psychology (content‐related collaboration). Here, we devise and offer a case illustration of an Islamic Psychology Basic Research Framework (coined the SALAAM Framework). This framework uses the Institute for Interdisciplinary Studies (IIS) Model of Interdisciplinary Research, developed by the IIS at the University of Amsterdam. Our first aim is to appropriate the IIS model for the IP literature by applying the model's research process phases and technique for the integration of disparate bodies of knowledge—that is, the identification of common ground—to methodological approaches in the contemporary IP literature. Our second aim is to exemplify the devised SALAAM Framework using the relatively unexplored area of Islamic cognitive theories (ICTs), which remain underdeveloped in contemporary psychological literature, primarily because of a lack of commensurability with the nomenclature of contemporary psychology. We thus provide a primer on the potential scope of ICTs. Toward the end of this article, we discuss the potential of the project of interdisciplinary construction of Islamic psychological theory, and the ability of the SALAAM Framework to establish a research program in IP that centers on cognition. We finally offer our reflections on the distinctiveness of Islamic psychologies in comparison to mainstream and Christian psychology. (shrink)

Ḥanafī jurist Burhān al-Dīn al-Nasafī is one of the most prominent names in the history of the ʿilm al-naẓar’ particularly due to his seminal work entitled al-Fuṣūl. We have located a manuscript which we will call an Opponent-al-Fuṣūl written by a Shāfiʿī scholar. This manuscript is titled al-Risāla fī qawāʿid ʿilm al-naẓar and it highlights the importance of al-Nasafī’s al-Fuṣūl. The scribe of the manuscript attributes this Opponent-al-Fuṣūl to the famous logician Najm al-Dīn al-Kātibī. Although no mention of such a (...) book belonging to al-Kātibī has been discovered thus far, in this article we will try to demonstrate that the book does indeed belong to him. In addition, we will undertake a comparison of both works, al-Fuṣūl and the Opponent-al-Fuṣūl, with a particular focus on the concepts of talāzum, tanāfī and dawarān. A critical edition of the Opponent-al-Fuṣūl is appended to the article. (shrink)

The Economy of Certainty: An Introduction to the Typology of Islamic Legal Theory. By Aron Zysow. Resources in Arabic and Islamic Studies, vol. 2. Atlanta: Lockwood Press, 2013. Pp. xxviii + 330. $32.95.

Islam and Literalism: Literal Meaning and Interpretation in Islamic Legal Theory. By Robert Gleave. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2012. Pp. xii + 212. $120, £75 ; $39.95, £24.99.

I RELIGION AND POLITICS: THE LAW Islam, like Judaism and Christianity, believes in the divine origin of government. It follows, therefore, that political ...

La insistencia de Ibn Hazm en la interpretación literal del Corán y la Sunna ha llevado frecuentemente a los investigadores modernos a concluir que él es un pensador conservador o dogmático. En realidad, no es ninguna de las dos cosas. El zahirismo de Ibn Hazm enfatiza el alcance limitado de la ley religiosa islámica, e intenta reducir las pretensiones de los juristas musulmanes de hablar en nombre de la ley de Dios. Esta metodología le lleva a apoyar el racionalismo, el (...) individualismo y el anticlericalismo. Ibn Hazm argumenta con consistencia a favor de estos principios en sus trabajos sobre teoría legal islámica, entre los que se incluye el texto al-Nubdha al-kafiya fi usul ahkam al-din que traducimos aquí. Esta propuesta implica socavar todo el sistema del madhhab, lo que explica la reacción negativa que recibió del sistema religioso establecido. En lugar del madhhab, Ibn Hazm intenta hacer valer la responsabilidad individual de cada musulmán en la obediencia a la ley de Dios, tal y como se revela claramente en el texto sagrado del Islam. (shrink)

La insistencia de Ibn Hazm en la interpretación literal del Corán y la Sunna ha llevado frecuentemente a los investigadores modernos a concluir que él es un pensador conservador o dogmático. En realidad, no es ninguna de las dos cosas. El zahirismo de Ibn Hazm enfatiza el alcance limitado de la ley religiosa islámica, e intenta reducir las pretensiones de los juristas musulmanes de hablar en nombre de la ley de Dios. Esta metodología le lleva a apoyar el racionalismo, el (...) individualismo y el anticlericalismo. Ibn Hazm argumenta con consistencia a favor de estos principios en sus trabajos sobre teoría legal islámica, entre los que se incluye el texto al-Nubdha al-kafiya fi usul ahkam al-din que traducimos aquí. Esta propuesta implica socavar todo el sistema del madhhab, lo que explica la reacción negativa que recibió del sistema religioso establecido. En lugar del madhhab, Ibn Hazm intenta hacer valer la responsabilidad individual de cada musulmán en la obediencia a la ley de Dios, tal y como se revela claramente en el texto sagrado del Islam. (shrink)

The primary aim of a theory of consciousness is to articulate existence conditions for conscious states, i.e. the conditions under which a mental state is conscious rather than unconscious. There are two main broad approaches: The Higher-Order approach and the First-Order approach. Higher-Order theories claim that a mental state is conscious only if it is the object of a suitable state of higher-order awareness. First-Order theories reject this necessary condition. However, both sides make the following claim: for any mental (...) state M of a subject S, M is conscious if there is something it is like for S to be in M. This is the Nagelian Conception of consciousness. Taking the Nagelian Conception as a starting point, I contend that the best rationalizing explanation for the ways in which Higher-Order and First-Order theorists contribute to their dispute is to see those contributions as consistent responses to two distinct questions. (shrink)

According to the theory theory of metalinguistic disputes, disagreements in metalinguistic disputes are based on diverging underlying theories, opinions, or world views. An adequate description of metalinguistic disagreement needs to consider the compatibility and topics of such theories. Although topic continuity can be spelled out in terms of measurement operations, it is argued that even metalinguistic disputes about a term used in different, mutually compatible theories can be substantive because the dispute is indirectly about the virtues of the (...) underlying theories. The account is defended against externalist and holist objections. (shrink)

This article presents two short but complete treatises on legal theory. The first was written by Ibn Surayj as an addendum to his compendium on Shāfiʿī law, al-Wadāʾiʿ, and the second by Abū Bakr al-Khaffāf, who included it as an introduction to his legal text al-Aqsām wa-l-khiṣāl. An analysis of these texts reveals the existence of a self-conscious legal-theoretical discourse around the turn of the fourth/tenth century that connects al-Shāfiʿī’s Risāla with the so-called mature uṣūl tradition known from the (...) late fourth/tenth century onward. The analysis also sheds considerable light on developments in legal theory in this period, such as the emergence of the term ʿilla, the parallel rise of legal dialectics, the consequences of adopting the idea of waḍʿ, and generally the inclusion of theological concerns in legal theory. (shrink)

In jails, the prisoners are often maltreated by the jail authorities.They are abused, and, their fundamental rights as human beings are frequentlyviolated. Although laws upholding the rights of prisoners are plenty,unfortunately, these seem ineffective in preventing the abuse of prisonersin jails. This paper examines the problems of jailed prisoners in general andhighlights their violations of human rights. In particular, this paper discussessexual abuse of prisoners, their mental and physical tortures, and enforcement ofprison labour laws. The paper also focuses on overcrowding (...) in jails, inadequateeducational facilities for prisoners and poor health care facilities. This articleanalyses these issues from the perspectives of Islamic Law and attempts toprovide a conceptual frame work of solutions. An analytical approach isemployed in this study. (shrink)

The post-classical genre of the “protocols for dialectical inquiry and disputation” has its more proximate origins in the famed Risāla of Shams al-Dīn al-Samarqandī. The greater part of his conceptions and methodology, however, consists in a streamlining and universalizing of the more strictly juristic dialectic of his teacher Burhān al-Dīn al-Nasafī ; and this in turn draws on the highly logicized dialectic of Rukn al-Dīn al-ʿAmīdī and his teacher Raḍī al-Dīn al-Nīsābūrī. At the heart of methods in this lineage, (...) and carried forward by al-Samarqandī into the universal ādāb al-baḥth, are three truth-preserving logical relationships critical to the truth-seeking enterprise of dialectic: entailment, mutual negation or exclusion, and causal concomitance. The practical elaboration of these relations reveals a logic in action—a premodern dialogical logic for living disputation praxis. In fact, so critical were these to the dialectical enterprise that al-Samarqandī devoted a specialized treatise entirely to summarizing their defining features and rules, aptly naming it the ʿAyn al-Naẓar, or “Wellspring of Rational Investigation.” In this article, and drawing upon a recently published digital critical edition, I will present an analytical outline of these core logical relations as presented in the ʿAyn al-Naẓar. Then I will address a number of points of interest in this text, grouped under six themes: the potential for cross-disciplinary advancement; notions in discursive development; significant or uniquely contributive formulations; peculiarities of content; signs of an evolving, universalist agenda; and evidence that the ʿAyn al-Naẓar was designed as an aide-mémoire for the active disputant. (shrink)

Classical Arabic poetry, which constitutes an important aspect of Islamic Civilization, has an important function in understanding Islamic texts, especially the Qur'an and hadith. In this context, the poetry of Jahiliyyah, which is the source of the Qur'an's style and expressive power (expression/utterance), is important in terms of having the mentioned function.The work, which was introduced, fills a significant gap in the field by referring to the contacted function of the poem of Jahiliyyah in a theoretical and practical (...) sense. The work analyzes selected eulogies from the poems of important poets of the Jahiliyyah period in a deep way, taking into account the morphological and syntactic functions of the language. The work, which refers to the elements that should be considered in the analysis of poetry through the texts, draws attention with its didactic and dialectical style, on which the taste for language is based. (shrink)