Abstractabstract:The present article examines the utopian and theological politics of the Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ (Brethren of Purity). I focus on the Ikhwān’s elusive “virtuous city,” a harmonious and righteous community situated on a wondrous island, where residents work in unison toward salvation by deferring to one creed. This city’s imagery is intimately tied to principal theological dimensions of their work. Through the virtuous city, the Ikhwān utilize the imagery of estrangement to elucidate their theological position on the soul’s imprisonment in the (...) body. But there is another, subtler dimension to their utopianism. I argue that the Ikhwānian utopia serves as a juxtaposition to their Muslim society, which they thought was afflicted by credal divisions. Accordingly, their utopia seam-lessly weaves together a synthetic narrative about eschatology (i.e., the afterlife) and an empirical critique of their contemporary society. Additionally, this paper contributes to the development of scholarship on medieval Islamic utopianism. (shrink)

On the way of life according to teachings of Islam according to Ahmadiyya sect..

Suhrawardī has presented arguments to support the existence of wājib al-wujūd in many of his works. One of the most fundamental of these arguments, which also has a forward-looking feature, is the one he presents in his books al-Talwīḥāt and Ḥikmah al-Ishrāq. To prove the existence of God, Suhrawardī devised three arguments in al-Talwīḥāt and one argument in Ḥikmah al-Ishrāq, all of which are interpretations of the ṣiddīqīn argument. In this article four of Suhrawardī’s arguments, three of them in al-Talwīḥāt (...) and one of them in Ḥikmah al-Ishrāq are reviewed. the main aim of this study is to analyze and explain Suhrawardī’s arguments, due to their importance in philosophy and theology, with the descriptive-analytical method and using library-based collecting data. The arguments presented in the al-Talwīḥāt are succinct, and what made these claims essential was the evaluation of their robustness and content. The significance of his first and third arguments in this book is that they do not require the denial of the vicious circle as a precondition, and by assuming the likelihood of both the vicious circle and infinite regress, the necessity of existence is demonstrated. On the other hand, his argument in Ḥikmah al-Ishrāq, which, like his second argument, is based on the refutation of the vicious circle and infinite regress, includes innovative features and should be investigated thoroughly. (shrink)

The corona pandemic altered many traditional and historical norms of society and law. COVID-19 created a humanitarian crisis in some parts of globe, while pandemic privacy and civil liberties were under threat all over world. To combat the deadly virus, individual liberty and equality were compromised. This paper focuses on how India’s health problem has compromised people’s right to privacy. It will highlight how strict executive policies led to the creation of a massive surveillance system in the name of combating (...) the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as how the absence of any policy or legal framework led to the exclusion of individuals and their families who were suspected of having the virus or caring for those who were infected with the deadly virus. The paper uses case studies and data collected from primary as well as secondary sources. The authors will also point out how the absence of privacy regulation puts millions of citizens’ private information at risk of being compromised or exploited against their will. (shrink)

This study was carried out to investigate the roles of epistemic beliefs and writing self-efficacy in predicting second language writing anxiety among learners of English as a foreign language. To this end, three validated scales were distributed among 240 EFL students. They were asked to complete the questionnaires during their regular courses. A structural equation modeling approach was utilized to analyze the hypothesized SEM model and the causal paths among the constructs. The direct and indirect path analyses of the hypothesized (...) model indicated that EBs and WSE accounted for 43% of the variance in L2WA. Although both constructs had a significant effect on L2WA, EBs turned out to be a robust predictor of increasing L2WA. Notably, it was revealed that learners’ EBs directly and significantly influenced their L2WA. Besides, the results indicated that WSE had a unique effect in reducing L2WA. More precisely, students who had a higher level of EBs seemed to have a greater L2WA, and those who had a higher level of WSE experienced less L2WA. The findings of this explanatory study suggest that L2 teachers and material developers should pay serious attention to the Students’ cognitive and affective variables as they were known to be significant factors in influencing L2WA. (shrink)

Business Ethics, the Environment & Responsibility, Volume 31, Issue 2, Page 398-418, April 2022.

The present study used quantitative and qualitative measures to examine Iranian applied linguists’ (mis-) conceptions of ethical issues in research. For this purpose, one hundred and twelve applied linguists completed a research ethics questionnaire constructed and validated by the researchers. In the follow-up qualitative phase, 15 applied linguists who were faculty members participated in semi-instructed interviews. Data were analyzed using exploratory factors analyses for the first phase and theme analyses for the second phase. Quantitative results showed that the most important (...) misconceptions among Iranian applied linguists lingered on working with data (data collection and data analyses). For example, removing an outlier was a prevalent act conducted by applied linguists in the present study. Teachers using their students as participants of their own research as well as how they treated those students after a study were other controversial issues. The qualitative results revealed several themes including _lack of knowledge, conflict with real-world practices, a product-oriented approach to education and a publish or perish mentality_ as the reasons for misconceptions of ethics in applied linguistics among Iranian researchers. On general terms, there was an implicit agreement regarding the lack of training on research ethics among Iranian applied linguists. (shrink)

The purpose of this study was to know the relationship between student perception towards mathematics teacher with mathematics academic performace. The population of the study were all students of class VIII SMPN 8 Cirebon in the academic year 2014/2015, with the number of students 287 people. The sampling technique used proportional random sampling, and the sample size was 56 students. Data collection techniques used: 1) Questionnaire of Perceptions towards Mathematics teacher, and 2) The results of student mathematics learning test. The (...) result of correlation analysis show no significant correlation between students perception towards teacher and academic performance (r= .155, p= .254). (shrink)

This paper engages Alex Dubilet’s _The Self-Emptying Subject: Kenosis and Immanence, Medieval to Modern_ and his account of immanence and kenosis as exhibited in his reading of Hegel’s concept of _Entäußerung_ [externalization]. Specifically, I focus on the “problematic of desubjectivation” that centers Dubilet’s critique of transcendence and its relationship to subjection and subjectivity. I reconsider the relationship made between this problematic, the ethics of kenosis, and the concept of immanence so as to demonstrate the ways in which Dubilet attempts to (...) depart from transcendence, subjectivity, and their concomitant ethics. In particular, I consider his reading of Hegel’s concept of _Entäußerung_ and its similarities to the Young Hegelians’ understanding of this concept. My reading of Dubilet suggests that while he seeks to depart from transcendence, he reintroduces transcendence through the “problematic of desubjectivation” and its relationship to kenosis. In conclusion, I question the philosophical import of immanence in contemporary critical inquiry and why its conceptualization is often positioned in opposition to transcendence. (shrink)

This study investigates whether financial performance is affected by corporate violations of laws and regulations. In a sample of 128 publicly traded banks that were subject to enforcement actions by US regulatory authorities over a 20-year period, we observed a significant negative market reaction pursuant to the violations. However, the market reaction did not vary meaningfully in accordance with the severity or repetitiveness of the violation. The results of this study are in conformity with previous research on industries other than (...) banking, notably with regard to negative market reaction. This confirms that shareholders in the banking industry react in a manner considerably similar to their counterparts in other industries. (shrink)

This study linked background TV and socioeconomic status to minority children’s Persian vocabulary development. To this end, 80 Iranian preschool children from two minority groups of Arabs and Turks were selected using stratified random sampling. They were simultaneous bilinguals, i.e., their mother tongue was either Arabic or Azari and their first language was Persian. Language sample analysis was used to measure vocabulary development through a 15-min interview by language experts. The LSA measures included total number of utterances, total number of (...) words, total number of new words, and mean length of utterance. A series of independent-samples t test, paired-samples t test, and repeated measures MANOVA tests were ran to examine data. Results showed significant improvements in children’s vocabulary scores from pretest to posttest for all children. In addition, high-SES children scored higher on the vocabulary measures in pretest and posttest. Moreover, background TV was associated with higher means in the TNW and the NDW in groups. The researchers concluded that background TV may be related to higher vocabulary scores in low-SES families as it may compensate for some linguistics gaps in these families including lower amount of child-parent interaction, play, and parents’ level of literacy. (shrink)

Islamic political thought has long been concerned with the abuses of tyranny. To contemporary Islamists, the tyrant is the ruler who adopts foreign ideas opposed to the original values of Islam. This sentiment is sometimes coupled with calls for revolutionary violence, a view popularized by the Egyptian Islamist Sayyid Qutb.1 While to some modern Islamists tyrannical rule signifies encroaching Western hegemony, its premodern use was less geographically specific. The Prophet Muhammad had simply stipulated that the "best struggle is a word (...) of truth [spoken] to a tyrannical [or unjust] ruler".2 This maxim alone does not describe the tyrant's cultural and religious... (shrink)

ABSTRACT Malaysia’s 13th general election in 2013 was the final election where the longest-serving elected government in the world, Barisan Nasional, regained power, before it was ousted after over six decades of authoritarian rule in 2018. In a country that practises parliamentary democracy but simultaneously observed close cooperation between the then ruling coalition and the mainstream press, this paper shows the micro-politics of the driving force of the coalition, United Malays National Organisation – specifically, how anxiety regarding the maintenance of (...) their privileged and empowered Malay position dominated the national narrative during the GE13 campaign. Focusing on editorial journalistic genres in four paid-for Malay-language newspapers, I illustrate the typical politics of fear that characterises much of Malaysian right-wing rhetoric – the ways in which racial and religion issues are provoked. The in-depth representational analysis, via the Discourse-historical Approach’s nomination and predication strategies, also suggests the normalisation of nationalistic and racist rhetoric, which primarily works with ‘fear’: fear of change, of loss of privilege, of the future, of other races; in principle, almost anything can be constructed as a threat to ‘Us’, an imagined homogenous people inside a well-protected territory through the discursive construction of such in-groups and out-groups. (shrink)

La "technologie" est au coeur de notre vie sans que souvent nous en ayons conscience. D'où la question de l'unité de cette technologie à travers de multiples disciplines. C'est à cette interrogation que tentent de répondre les échanges internationaux organisés par l'Université libano-française de Tripoli. Trois notions-clefs sont au coeur du débat : la reconnaissance de la sphère technique dans la culture ; l'existence de mécanismes de classification et normalisation d'un savoir et d'un langage spécifique grâce à la culture et (...) la validité d'un modèle "mondialiste" ou systématique contemporain. On s'interroge sur le Sens des parts mécanique, théorique et pratique de notre civilisation ainsi que sur les moyens dont elle dispose pour créer une nouveauté qui préserve les intérêts de tous. Tel est l'objet de cet ouvrage : aider un individu aujourd'hui et demain à mieux s'adapter à cet ordre "technologique" dont les implications culturelles sont immenses, abordées ici sans préjugés, de manière plurielle, rationnelle et démocratique. (shrink)

This article examines ḥikma as it was practiced by Ṣadr al-Dīn Shīrāzī, or Mullā Ṣadrā (d. 1640), in explaining the connection between the divine names and the attributes of God. This is done via a translation of the fourth part of his al-Maẓāhir al-ilāhiyya fī asrār al-ʿulūm al-kamāliyya [The loci of divine manifestations in the secrets of the knowledge of perfection]. Ḥikma, philosophy, as it is defined here, is the combination of rational demonstrations and spiritual unveiling. Shīrāzī’s philosophy is a (...) synthesis of Ibn ʿArabī’s school of metaphysical unveiling, the Ishrāqī school led by Suhrawardī, and the rational school of the Peripatetics. The text is translated here for the first time, and includes annotations. (shrink)

This article examines ḥikma as it was practiced by Ṣadr al-Dīn Shīrāzī, or Mullā Ṣadrā (d. 1640), in explaining the connection between the divine names and the attributes of God. This is done via a translation of the fourth part of his al-Maẓāhir al-ilāhiyya fī asrār al-ʿulūm al-kamāliyya [The loci of divine manifestations in the secrets of the knowledge of perfection]. Ḥikma, philosophy, as it is defined here, is the combination of rational demonstrations and spiritual unveiling. Shīrāzī’s philosophy is a (...) synthesis of Ibn ʿArabī’s school of metaphysical unveiling, the Ishrāqī school led by Suhrawardī, and the rational school of the Peripatetics. The text is translated here for the first time, and includes annotations. (shrink)

Collected articles on spiritual life based on the life of Bābu Rāṇapurā, mystic-saint poet from Gujarat; previously published in Kacchamitra, a Gujarati daily.

This article examines the relationship between religion, tradition and identity as seen from the myth about eclipses in a village in Central Java. Javanese people in rural areas still hold beliefs passed down from their ancestors about eclipses, both lunar and solar eclipses. Using a qualitative approach, the results of the study showed that the villagers believe that eclipses occur because of evil giants called buto named Batara Kala who try to devour the sun or the moon. This natural phenomenon (...) is believed to bring disaster to pregnant women and livestock. To fight the disaster, they must perform certain ceremonies or rituals. Based on ethnographic studies, this research provides an overview of eclipse mythology for Javanese locals and analyses it from identity theory. This shows that mythical rituals reflect a continuous identity formation. Although the traditions associated with these myths to some extent transcend the boundaries of the Islamic religion, they remain unchallenged. CONTRIBUTION: This research suggests that myths play an important role in the life and identity of the people who believe in them and perform the rituals associated with them. (shrink)

This paper aims to provide insights into the Malaysian newspaper reports on apostasy cases in the country. Being a Muslim country with multi-religions, apostasy is highly sensitive hence any issues related to apostasy need to be carefully managed. Four keywords were used to identify newspaper reports for the analysis. Two newspaper reports met the selection criteria and were analysed using a discourse analysis approach focusing on Grammatical Analysis, Macrostructures, and Rhetorical Structures. The analysis reveals that the report in New Straits (...) Times, which is the right-wing newspaper, carries the voice of anti-apostate and disapproves the act of renouncing Islam. On the other hand, the report in The Malay Mail, which is the left-wing newspaper, carries the voice of pro-apostate. By deconstructing the newspaper reports, this paper contributes to the understanding of the agendas that have been subtly set in the news. This paper concludes that the two reports have been strategically constructed to serve the interests and promote the ideology of the two competing groups in the country, thus creating a balance in the multi-religious context. (shrink)

Islamic ethics - Early works to 20th century.

Collected articles on spiritual life based on Bābubhāī Raṇapurā, 1940, Hindu saint; previously published in Kacchamitra, a Gujarati daily.

Articles on moral and ethics according to Islamic teachings.

In graph theory, the concept of domination is essential in a variety of domains. It has broad applications in diverse fields such as coding theory, computer net work models, and school bus routing and facility lo cation problems. If a fuzzy graph fails to obtain acceptable results, neutrosophic sets and neutrosophic graphs can be used to model uncertainty correlated with indeterminate and inconsistent information in arbitrary real-world scenario. In this study, we consider the concept of domination as it relates to (...) single-valued neutrosophic incidence graphs (SVNIGs). Given the importance of domination and its utilization in numerous fields, we propose the application of dominating sets in SVNIG with valid edges. We present some relevant definitions such as those of valid edges, cardinality, and isolated vertices in SVNIG along with some examples. Furthermore, we also show a few significant sets connected to the dominating set in an SVNIG such as independent and irredundant sets. We also investigate a relationship between the concepts of dominating sets and domination numbers as well as irredundant and independence sets in SVNIGs. Finally, a real-life deployment of domination in SVNIGsis investigated in relation to COVID-19 vaccination locations as a practical application. (shrink)

In this article, we propose an initial formal model of computationalism based on mathematical relations between cognition and computation. More specifically, based on a set of cognitive constituents as a domain, and a set of computational implementations as a range, we define two relations of transformation over these sets. Moreover, we define the principles of implementability, describability, and phenomena correspondence, and we conjecture that full computationalism does not hold since these principles are not fulfilled. Particularly, many cognitively-tied phenomena fail to (...) respect the describability principle which is necessary for representing a cognitive state by a computational state. (shrink)

This study empirically examines the relationship between wide-ranging board diversity and the quality of corporate social responsibility disclosure variables in Malaysia. We extend prior literature covering broader dimensions of board diversity and their impact on CSR after controlling for board and audit committee characteristics. Using 200 listed firms in Bursa Malaysia during 2009–2013 and applying both OLS and 2SLS instrumental variables approaches, we document significant positive effect of board education level and board tenure diversity on the quality of CSR disclosure. (...) Further analysis using robust regression also shows positive association between gender diversity and CSR disclosure. Our findings also demonstrate that the quality of CSR disclosure is significantly negatively associated with board age and nationality diversity. These results remain consistent with using alternative measures for board diversity, and characteristics for board of director and audit committees as well as split samples between large and small firms. Additional tests exhibit complementary relationship of education level and nationality with gender, while substitutive relationship of age and tenure with gender in influencing CSR. These findings provide useful insights into the policy makers in setting regulations in respect of board diversity in Malaysia and other emerging economies in the Asian region. Our evidence is also useful for listed companies in setting the criteria to identify directors who can support their strategic decisions. (shrink)

This study concerned validating academic integrity survey, a measure developed in 2010 to investigate academic integrity practices in a Malaysian university. It also examined the usefulness of the measure across gender and nationality of the participants. The sample size comprised 450 students selected via quota sampling technique. The findings supported the multidimensionality of academic dishonesty. Also, strong evidence of convergent and discriminant validity, and construct reliability were generated for the revised AIS. The testing of moderating effects yielded two outcomes. While (...) the gender invariant analysis produced evidence that the three-dimensional model was not moderated by gender; the nationality effect was inconclusive, probably due to a noticeable imbalance in respondent distribution for the nationality group. The significance of this study lies not only in the rigorous statistical methods deployed to validate the dimension and psychometric properties of the AIS; but establishing the gender invariance of the model. It is understood from the findings that although male and female students may vary in their academic misconducts, the underlying factors for these conducts are the same and can be addressed effectively using a non-discriminating approach. (shrink)

A number of advocates for TQM contend that firms who embrace TQM will automatically and naturally act in ethically sound ways (Roth, 1993; Pace, 1999; Steeples, 1994). This claim is a strong one. This paper assesses its truth. We consider the many ways in which quality initiatives, if undertaken in good faith, can foster sound ethics. We explore the various ways in which TQM presupposes, and thus cannot engender, ethical behavior. And, finally, we identify some of the ethical blind spots (...) in quality initiatives and TQM. We propose that if TQM is undertaken by thoughtful people who take steps to correct its ethical blind spots and who understand the need for an ethical underpinning, then TQM and ethics will prove mutually reinforcing. (shrink)

Although the integrative memory model proposed by Bastin et al. is interesting, particularly for Alzheimer's disease, it may benefit from incorporating the subjective experience of recollection. We therefore offer complementary lines of interpretation to explain how recollection and familiarity in Alzheimer's disease can be dissociated based not only on accounts of their neural correlates but, critically, on the subjective experience of memory in patients.

Erwin Panofsky explicitly states that the first half of the opening chapter of Studies in Iconology—his landmark American publication of 1939—contains ‘the revised content of a methodological article published by the writer in 1932’, which is now translated for the first time in this issue of Critical Inquiry.1 That article, published in the philosophical journal Logos, is among his most important works. First, it marks the apogee of his series of philosophically reflective essays on how to do art history,2 that (...) reach back, via a couple of major pieces on Alois Riegl, to the 1915 essay on Heinrich Wölfflin.3 Under the influence of his colleague at Hamburg Ernst Cassirer, the principal interpreter of Kant in the 1920s, Panofsky from 1915 on exhibits in his work ever more Kantian thinking and language.4 But Logos was not an art-historical review or one dedicated to aesthetics but a principal mainstream journal of the philosophy of culture. So ‘On the Problem of Describing and Interpreting Works of the Visual Arts’ has a good claim to be the culmination of Panofsky's philosophical thinking in his German period under the Weimar Republic. · 1. Erwin Panofsky, Studies in Iconology: Humanistic Themes in the Art of the Renaissance , p. xv; hereafter abbreviated SI. See Panofsky, ‘Zum Problem der Beschreibung und Inhaltsdeutung von Werken der bildenden Kunst’, Logos 21 : 103–19; trans. Jaś Elsner and Katharina Lorenz under the title ‘On the Problem of Describing and Interpreting Works of the Visual Arts’, Critical Inquiry 38 : 467–82; hereafter abbreviated ‘P’.· 2. See the discussion in Carlo Ginzburg, ‘From Aby Warburg to E. H. Gombrich: A Problem of Method’, Myths, Emblems, Clues, trans. John and Anne C. Tedeschi , pp. 17–59, esp. pp. 36–41.· 3. See Panofsky, ‘Das Problem des Stils in der bildenden Kunst’, Deutschsprachige Aufsätze, ed. Karen Michels and Martin Warnke, 2 vols. , 2:1009–18; ‘Der Begriff des Kunstwollens’,Deutschsprachige Aufsätze, 2:1019–34, trans. Kenneth J. Northcott and Joel Snyder under the title ‘The Concept of Artistic Volition’, Critical Inquiry 8 : 17–33; and ‘Über das Verhältnis der Kunstgeschichte zur Kunsttheorie: Ein Beitrag zu der Erörterung über die Möglichkeit kunstwissenschaftlicher Grundbegriffe’, Deutschsprachige Aufsätze, 2: 1035–63, trans. Lorenz and Elsner under the title ‘On the Relationship of Art History and Art Theory: Towards the Possibility of a Fundamental System of Concepts for a Science of Art’, Critical Inquiry 35 : 43–71.· 4. On neo-Kantianism in pre-Nazi Germany, see Michael Friedman, A Parting of the Ways: Carnap, Cassirer, and Heidegger , pp. 25–37; Éric Dufour and T. Z. R. Créteil, ‘Le Statue du singulier: Kant et le néokantisme de l’École de Marbourg', Kantstudien 93 : 324–50; Edward Skidelsky, Ernst Cassirer: The Last Philosopher of Culture , pp. 22–51; and Peter E. Gordon, Continental Divide: Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos , pp. 52–86. Specifically on the Cassirerian Kantianism of Panofsky, see Michael Podro, The Critical Historians of Art , pp. 181–82; Michael Ann Holly, Panofsky and the Foundations of Art History , pp. 91–92, 147–52; Silvia Ferretti, Cassirer, Panofsky, and Warburg: Symbol, Art, and History, trans. Richard Pierce , pp. 174–77, 182–84; David Summers, ‘Meaning in the Visual Arts as a Humanistic Discipline’, in Meaning in the Visual Arts: Views from the Outside, ed. Irving Lavin , pp. 9–24; Mark A. Cheetham, Kant, Art, and Art History: Moments of Discipline , pp. 68–77; Paul Crowther, The Transhistorical Image: Philosophizing Art and Its History , pp. 70–73; Allister Neher, ‘“The Concept of Kunstwollen”, Neo-Kantianism, and Erwin Panofsky's Early Art Theoretical Essays', Word and Image 20 : 41–51; Georges Didi-Huberman,Confronting Images: Questioning the Ends of a Certain History of Art, trans. John Goodman , pp. 4–6, 90–138; and Lorenz and Elsner, ‘Translators’ Introduction', Critical Inquiry35 : 33–42, esp. pp. 38, 40–42. (shrink)