Islamic History

Ao se falar em viagem ao extremo oriente na idade média, todos nós nos remetemos ao viajante Marco Pólo, cujos relatos estão massivamente difundidos no ocidente. Poucos conhecem a história dos viajantes muçulmanos, mais ou menos contemporâneos a Marco Pólo. Seus relatos, ricos em detalhes e de caráter mais universal e eclético, traçam um quadro extraordinário do mundo islâmico, seus costumes, sua história, seu dia a dia. Apresentamos a última viagem de Ibn Battuta, à África Sub-Saariana, seu contato com povos de costumes estranhos e sua relação com o poder e, por fim, a importância do legado histórico de seu documento denominado “Regalo de curiosos sobre peregrinas cosas de ciudades y viajes maravillosos”.

The 28-page open letter -- which uses classical religious references and covers 24 issues such as "the killing of innocents," "killing of emissaries," "jihad," "declaring people non-Muslim," "torture," and "the caliphate" -- is a result of deliberations by dozens of experts on Islamic law and offers a point-by-point deconstruction of any claimed religious justification for ISIS's brutal actions.

In its executive summary, the letter notes that Islam forbids the killing of innocent people, including diplomats, journalists and humanitarian aid workers. It also states that any jihad may only be defensive in nature with strict rules of conduct, that it is forbidden to harm religious minorities like Christians and Yazidis, and that it is forbidden to practice slavery, destroy religious shrines or deny the rights of women.

The letter's conclusion states:

"Islam is mercy and its attributes are merciful. The Prophet (peace be upon him), who was sent as a mercy for all the worlds, summarized a Muslim's dealings with others by saying: 'He who shows no mercy, will not be shown mercy;' and: 'Have mercy and you will be shown mercy.' But, as can be seen from everything mentioned, you have misinterpreted Islam into a religion of harshness, brutality, torture and murder. As elucidated, this is a great wrong and an offence to Islam, to Muslims and to the entire world. Reconsider all your actions; desist from them; repent from them; cease harming others and return to the religion of mercy."

To read the entire letter and initial list of signatories, go to: http://lettertobaghdadi.com/index.php

Pour ne pas revenir sur des questions trop académiques, je souhaiterai d’abord faire un rapide rappel de l'histoire de l'économie, et de l'économie en général. Il faut tout d'abord préciser qu'aujourd'hui, dans la relation d'échange avec le monde développé, les pays de la périphérie, les pays sous-développés, sont nécessairement dans un rapport d'échange inégal.

Among the many burials of the necropolis of calle Mendivil in Malaga, only one of the individuals, identified as a young woman, contained a set of adornments composed by glass bangles. These artifacts were used during the peninsular Middle Ages with a prophylactic goal. This habit got some acceptance among women and girls of the three religions.

This article is a publication of facsimiles and annotated English
translations of two versions of a biographical dictionary of Siberian Islamic
scholars. The work written by ‘Abd al-Rashd Ibrhm deserves serious attention
from scholars because it opens up a world of intellectual life among the Muslims
in Western Siberia almost unknown so far. The sources provides us information on
local scholars who lived between the 18th and late 19th centuries, their interests,
education, networks and theological debates. All of this allows us to claim that an
elaborated Islamic discourse existed at that time in Siberia.

Orientalism – the idea that the standpoint of Western writers on the East greatly affected what they wrote about the East, the "Other" – applied also in Russia and the Soviet Union, where the study of the many exotic peoples incorporated into the Russian Empire, often in quite late imperial times, became a major academic industry, where, as in the West, the standpoint of writers greatly affected what they wrote. Russian/Soviet orientalism had a particularly important impact in Central Asia, where in early Soviet times new republics, later states, were created, often based on the distorted perceptions of scholars in St Petersburg and Moscow, and often cutting across previously existing political and cultural boundaries. The book explores how the Soviet orientalism academic industry influenced the creation of Central Asian nations. It discusses the content of oriental sources and discourses, considers the differences between scholars working in St Petersburg and Moscow and those working more locally in Central Asia, providing a rich picture of academic politics, and shows how academic cultural classification cemented political boundaries, often in unhelpful ways.

The edition of the one-page document which is archived as XVIII G 199 in the National Library in Prague. The document syncretizes magic squares, sufi texts and symbols and Islamic elements, and it was created probably in the Ottoman cultural area. The text and symbols are transcribed, reconstructed and interpreted.

This paper deconstructs the notion that Islam is inherently evil and is the root of terrorism by examining source texts like the Koran and Hadith as well as the charters and creeds of Hezbollah and al-Qaeda, transposing them against the University of Chicago's Project on Suicide Terrorism, all, of course, peppered with my insightful analysis and commentary.