Al-Ma'mûn, the Inquisition, and the Quest for Caliphal Authority ISBN: by John Abdallah Nawas 9781937040550 (pb) 9781937040567 (pdf) DESCRIPTION: The "inquisition" (Mihnah) unleashed by the seventh Abbasid caliph, 'Abdallah al-Ma'mun (r. 813- PRICE: 833), has long attracted the attention of modern scholars of the intellectual, political, and religious $45.00 (pb) history of the early Abbasid era. Because this event, which began in 820 and stretched through the $36.00 (pdf) reigns of two of al-Ma'mun's successors, appears at a convergence of prominent currents in systematic theology, rationalist thought, theocratic politics, and nascent trends in Shiism and PUBLICATION DATE: Sunnism, historians have seen it as the key to a wide array of puzzles and problems in early Islamic 01 November 2015 (pb) history. In this incisive study, John Nawas subjects the various proposed explanations of these 15 November 2015 (pdf) events to a sober and searching analysis and, in the process, presents a new interpretation of al- Ma'mun's political and religious policies, contextualized against the background of early Abbasid BINDING: intellectual and social history. Paperback & PDF eBook Appended to the volume is a reprint edition of Walter M. Patton's Ahmed ibn Hanbal and the Mihna (Leiden 1897), which still has much that is useful for modern scholarship, including one enormous SIZE: additional benefit; it contains most of the relevant passages in from the primary sources. 7 x10

TABLE OF CONTENTS: PAGES: Series Editors' Preface 356 Foreword Author's Preface PUBLISHER: Acknowledgments Lockwood Press

Chapter 1: Introduction IMPRINT: 1.1 Aim of This Study Lockwood Press 1.2. Previous Explanations of al-Ma'mun's Motives 1.3 The Approach of This Study SERIES: 1.4 Sources Resources in Arabic and 1.5 The 1.6 The Sunnites and the Shi'ites 1.7 The Mu'tazilites READER INTERESTS: 1.8 The Doctrine of the Createdness of the Qur'an Islamic Studies 1.9 The Mihna Middle Eastern Studies

Chapter 2: 'Abdallah al-Aa'mun: His Life and Reign 2.1 Early Life 2.2 The Civil War 2.3 Al-Ma'mun's Reign

Chapter 3: The Mu'tazilism, the Shi'ism, and the 'Alid Hypotheses 3.1 The Mu'tazilism Hypothesis 3.2 The Shi'ism Hypothesis 3.3 The 'Alid Hypothesis

Chapter 4: The Caliphal Authority Hypothesis 4.1 Modern Scholars' Formulations of This Hypothesis 4.2 The Argument of This Study 4.3. Al'Ma'mun's Vision of the 4.4. The Mihna Letters 4.5. The Timing of the Mihna 4.6. The Strategic Value of the Doctrine of the Createdness of the Qur'an 4.7. Interrogated Individuals

Chapter 5: Conclusion Appendix 1: Chronological Information, by Genre, on the Compilers of the Sources Used Appendix 2: Information on Those Interrogated Appendix 3: Timetable of Key Events during al-Ma'mun's Reign Bibliography Index William Patton, Ahmed ibn Hanbal and the Mihna (1897)

CONTRIBUTORS BIOGRAPHIES: John Nawas is Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies in the Department of Near Eastern Studies at the University of Leuven, Belgium. His research centers on the religio-political and social history of classical , with a focus on the caliphate and on religious scholars. With Monique Bernards he has co-edited Patronate and Patronage in Early and Classical Islam (Brill, 2005), and is the editor of 'Abbasid Studies II (2010). He was Assistant Editor of the Encyclopaedia of the Qur'an (2002-6), is an Executive Editor of the Encyclopaedia of Islam, 3rd edition (2010-), and is a Director of the School of Abbasid Studies.