375 Boekbesprekingen — Islam 376 Kowanda-Yassin, U
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375 BOEKBESPREKINGEN — ISLAM 376 ISLAM KOWANDA-YASSIN, U. — Mensch und Naturverständnis im sunnitische Islam; ein Beitrag zum aktuellen Umwelt- diskurs. (Bibliotheca Academica, Reihe Orientalistik, Band 17). Ergon-Verlag, Würzburg, 2011. (24 cm, 208). ISBN 978-3-89913-815-3. ISSN 1866-5071. / 28,- In discussions about environmental issues, religion plays an important role. The monotheistic religions, notably Chris- tianity and Islam, which place man at the top of earthly cre- ation and allow him to use nature for his own benefits as he sees fit, is often put against religions such as Buddhism and Shintoism which have a very different view of creation and man’s position in nature as a whole. During the last fifty years or so it has become abundantly clear where the idea that man has the unlimited right to use and exhaust the natural world leads to. Natural resources are shamelessly plundered by those who are the best equipped and the most unscrupulous, and who strive for material gain at the cost of all other creatures, including those human beings lacking the means to counter the destruction of their natural environment and resources. Many of the people who seriously worry about these mat- ters are devout Christians and Muslims, and they take the negative views on the role of their religions very hard. So in Christian, and somewhat later also in Muslim circles there has for long been a strong tendency to look for counter argu- ments demonstrating that instead of allowing man free and 995569_Bior_2012_3-4_04_Boekbesp.indd5569_Bior_2012_3-4_04_Boekbesp.indd 343343 117/09/127/09/12 113:563:56 377 BIBLIOTHECA ORIENTALIS LXIX N° 3-4, mei-augustus 2012 378 unlimited use of nature, Islam and Christianity encourage, or is no attempt at a comprehensive treatment of the issue. even prescribe, a scrupulous and caring attitude towards Some relevant literature mentioned in the bibliography does other creatures: man not as the lord of creation but as God’s not turn up in the text, possibly because it did not fit into the caretaker of creation. framework of modern Sunni Islam (the most striking being The author of the book under review is one of those, and Alma Giese’s translation of the Case of the Animals from the in her book she attempts to bring together arguments from Rasaˆil Ikhwan aÒ-∑afaˆ, a text that I would have expected to both Christian and Muslim sources in order to demonstrate be close to the author’s heart – not orthodox enough maybe? that instead of being a handicap in fighting environmental Or have I overlooked it?). destruction, these religions can be a strong support. It is a While I can see perfectly well why the author wanted to laudable effort, and one tends to support warmly anything write a book like this, I also makes me feel a bit sad that that may provide support to religious people wrestling with within the limitations of her strict Sunni approach there is no these issues or may help to effectuate a change of attitude. room for the rich and varied views within Islam and Islamic The author is a converted Muslim herself and writes from culture that might have offered fresh ways of approach. The that perspective. She does not explicitly say so, but my Mu¨tazilites, with ¨Abd al-Jabbar’s views on compensation impression is that she converted from Christianity, and so in the hereafter, even for animals that had suffered unjustly, has had to deal with the problem in both religions. Since the in spite of the fact that they do not possess an immortal soul; Christian anthropocentric view has been under attack for Islamic philosophy with its Neoplatonic approach, seeing quite a while and discussions about countering its detrimen- creation as an organic whole, and influential far beyond the tal effects have gone on for some time, she decided to ana- time of its supposed decline; mysticism and asceticism, lyze, or rather summarize, views which were developed and advocating attitudes directly opposed to consumerism. Seyed put them to use in similar discussions about Islam. A variety Hossein Nasr (no, not a Sunni) and Sardar, both briefly men- of Christian authors are thus briefly cited, often on the basis tioned, have developed new ideas starting from those con- of secondary literature: Darwin, Teilhard de Chardin, cepts, and they are not the only ones. Augustinus, Hildegard of Bingen, Franciscus of Assisi, etc. But there is no reason why the author should not continue David Kinsley, Ecology and Religion; ecological spirituality her work on this topic and include a wider variety of ideas. in cross-cultural perspective (1995) is the source quoted on The issue is important enough, and there is ample demand their views, which are thus sometimes represented tenden- for guidance. tiously: I do not think Darwin’s views are adequately char- acterized by saying that he advocated the view that nature is Leiden, March 2012 Remke KRUK violent and that only the most aggressive and best developed forms of life survive. German literature plays an important * part in the book; Albert Schweitzer’s views are discussed in * * some extension. Various ecological movements also get attention: ecofeminism, ecoactivism, Deep Ecology. There CHIH, R., et C. MAYEUR-JAOUEN (eds.) — Le soufisme has been no attempt to expand the discussion to the wider à l’époque ottomane, XVIe-XVIIIe siècle / Soufism in issue of consumerism, although this would have been rele- the Ottoman Era, 16th-18th century. (Cahier des Annales vant for Christianity and Islam alike, and indeed also for the islamologiques, 29). Institut Français d’Archéologie wider global perspective. Orientale du Caire, Cairo 2010. (27,5 cm, VIII, 442), As the title indicates, the book deals with man and views ISBN 978-2-7247-0548-5. ISSN 0254-282X. / 40,-. of nature in Sunnite Islam. Both the concept of nature and Sufism and its paraphernalia belonged to the most striking that of Islam, even of Sunnite Islam, might have been defined aspects of Ottoman culture. The phenomenon became in fact more clearly, especially in historical perspective. As it is, all-pervading, dominating as it did literature, in particular “Islam” here is basically the Islam of modern, largely Wah- poetry, philosophical/theological writings, architecture, the habi fuelled ¨ . Koran and Ì are the main sources, da wa adith mind-set of most Ottoman Muslims – even of some non- occasionally also . The author states that only Ì tafsir adith Muslims – of all classes, and, what nowadays is called ‘life- that is considered Ò Ì Ì is used. It is thus a book written by a i style’, from rituals to dance, to music and clothing. Owing a believer for believers, and modern scholarly discussions, to the secularist reforms of Atatürk, it completely disap- for instance about the status of Ì , have no place in it. adith peared from public life and, therefore, public view in that Islamic authors cited, such as Mawdudi, are also of sound part of the Empire that had become the Republic of Turkey orthodox stamp. in the 1920s, as well as in most of the, by then, successor Arguments about Islam’s positive attitude towards nature, states of the Ottoman Empire in the Balkans, and, as far as environmental protection and the prevention of cruelty to it persisted there, went underground – to hesitantly re-emerge animals come from the sources usually mentioned in this in Turkey in recent times. context: next to Koran and Ì there are the books on adith The book here under review is a valuable contribution to Ì , controlling whether people behave according to isba the history of Ottoman Sufism in what was the richest prov- Islamic law, for instance on the market; books on Islamic ince of the Empire, Egypt, during the sixteenth through law, especially regarding ritual slaughter and rules on pro- eighteenth centuries, the era between the conquest of the tecting certain areas, for instance because they are important country by Sultan Selim I in 1517 and its invasion by Napo- because of watering and grazing, issues that have been leon in 1798. The sixteenth century has been widely brought up by Mawil Izzi Dien and Foltz. Both authors are regarded as the ‘Golden Age’ of the Ottoman Empire, and cited. A separate chapter is devoted to animals in Islam, with the following, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as a a section on the dog as a special topic, and a section on veg- period of decline. But this picture has been criticized by etarianism. All this has been treated fairly summarily; there 995569_Bior_2012_3-4_04_Boekbesp.indd5569_Bior_2012_3-4_04_Boekbesp.indd 344344 117/09/127/09/12 113:563:56 379 BOEKBESPREKINGEN — ISLAM 380 ‘revisionist’ historians. Even if the territory of the Empire during this period, this did not mean that the spiritual began to shrink after the debacle of Vienna in 1683 and aspect of Sufism went stale or that Sufism became part military defeats and economic problems shook the country, of a watered-down and superstitious religion adhered Ottoman culture, both material and immaterial, did not, as to by the masses, as it is often claimed in the older far as I can see, show signs of decay. As regards Egypt: literature. On the other hand, it may be wrong to sup- scholars traditionally regarded the whole period as one of pose that the period witnessed the rise of ‘Neo-Sufism’ decline and not really worth studying. They partly based or even the occurrence of an Islamic Enlightenment (as themselves thereby on the writings of early modern Otto- represented by the work of the Damascene scholar and man, including Egyptian, intellectuals who were already Sufi, Abd al-Ghani an-Nabulusi, d.