Category Archives: Muhammad

No Honor among Election thieves

Gender and Sexuality, Iran, Muhammad, Terrorism Issue

The instant forms of communication that cyberspace creates may spell the demise of rule by dictatorship. Had there been no email, youtube or twitter, the events unfolding in Iran after the rigged election of Ahmadinejad would largely go unnoticed. But instead the brutality of the police and armed vigilantes against ordinary Iranians are being seen around the world. There is a gallery of images, some quite graphic, compiled by the Boston Herald. Whatever the ruling mullahs decide, the deep divisions within Iranian society are exposed to the world. The Islamic Republic is now more clearly seen as an Islamic Dictatorship, increasingly out of touch with the youth and educated members of the society.

Consider the two pictures here of men taunting and manhandling Iranian women. It goes to show that in Iran there is no honor among election thieves. Has anyone stopped to ask: WWMD (What would Muhammad do?)

Re-Writing Muslim Political History

India, Muhammad, Qur'an, Scholars, Terrorism Issue

Based in New Delhi, Maulana Waris Mazhari is a leading Indian Deobandi scholar. He is a graduate of the Dar ul-Uloom at Deoband, and is the editor of Tarjuman Dar ul-Uloom, the official organ of the Deoband Madrasa’s Graduates’ Association.

In this interview with Yoginder Sikand, Maulana Mazhari talks about his views on Islam, historiography and politics.

Q: Muslim history has generally been written in the form of a series of battles and a succession of rulers and military generals. This, in turn, has had a deep impact on the way Muslims imagine their past and their identity and on the way they relate to people of other faiths. What do you feel about this way of presenting Muslim history?

A: I have major problems with the traditional approach, including the traditional way of presenting the sirat, the history of the Prophet Muhammad, who Muslims consider as the model for all humankind. Typically, sirat-writing has taken the form of a narration of events that focus mainly on the maghazis or military confrontations and victories of the Prophet. This tradition goes back to early times. In fact, one of the first available sirat texts that we have, by Ibn Ishaq, is also known as Maghazi Ibn Ishaq. This is a reflection of how Ibn Ishaq portrayed the Prophet’s life. Ibn Ishaq was by no means an isolated case. In fact, many other sirat writers followed in that mode, and still continue to do so. Continue reading Re-Writing Muslim Political History →

Islamophobia 101, A call to analyse

Apocalypse Watch, Gender and Sexuality, Humor and Satire, Islam and Christianity, Islam in America, Islam in Europe, Islamophobia, Islamophobia 101, Journalism and Media, Muhammad, Orientalism, Orientalist Art, Teaching Resources, Terrorism Issue, YouTube Watch

[Webshaykh’s Note: This is the start of a new blog thread dedicated to energizing scholarly and pedagogical attempts to combat, or at least mitigate, the ongoing volume of Islamophobia in the media, especially on the Internet. The question is simple: what can be done to respond to Islamophobia in the media by our efforts in the blogosphere, formal media outlets, classroom, community and scholarly forums? I invite fellow scholars, professors and teachers and anyone concerned with this issue to contribute to the discussion here at Tabsir.]

People of any particular religious faith are understandably offended when someone or something they hold to be sacred is dragged through the media-made mud of ridicule. There is no way to completely stop desecration, even when hate crime laws are in place. As long as there are synagogues with walls and anti-Semites with paint, swatstikas will be painted. As long as there are artists who stretch their creative energies to the limit of tolerance, animal dung will adorn the body of the Madonna. And as long as so many individuals in Western societies fear Islam through the veil of their own ignorance and historically constructed disdain, the Prophet Muhammad will be pictured as a profligate. The Danish cartoon controversy was only the tip of the iceberg, one that created a titanic rift in the Muslim community worldwide. The irony is that portraying Muhammad in any form is considered wrong in Islam, so that placing a stud missile in the turban of a caricatured Mahound (to drop a literary motif of the same controversial dimension) glosses over the level of misunderstanding motivating those who made and appreciated the cartoon images.

So what is the proper response to the volume of prophet bashing out there, not only in the case of Islam. Here are a few suggestions to jumpstart the process of analysis so that we as scholars can mitigate the paralysis created by an Islamophobia that is only a mouse click away.

• Identify resources (books, relevant articles, websites, speakers) which provide a scholarly and objective-as-possible perspective on Islamophobia
• Discuss the merits of whether or not to provide examples of Islamophobic writing, art and videos that are admittedly offensive to many Muslims
• Provide lesson and project ideas to encourage students to critically assess the Islamophobia in specific examples they are likely to find in the media and on the Internet
• Engage with fellow scholars and concerned Muslims about the most effective and least offensive ways to combat and mitigate Islamophobic writing and art
• Link examples of Islamophobia to other forms of verbal and artistic ridicule of sacred materials.
• Expose Islamophobic rhetoric by politicians, celebrities and other people in the news.

Having set out the goals, I invite colleagues contribute comments, commentaries and examples for and against Islamophobia for this series, please email the webshakh at daniel.m.varisco@hofstra.edu. I will post the first commentary tomorrow.

Daniel Martin Varisco

Jerusalem Prosopography Project

Islamic History, Islamic Texts, Muhammad, Teaching Resources


Michael Lecker, Professor of Arabic Language and Literature at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem

[Editor’s Note: The Jerusalem Prosopography Project (JPP) was created by Michael Lecker, Professor of Arabic Language and Literature at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. This online resource will be a valuable tool for all scholars working on the formation of Islam and the early Islamic community.]

The Prosopography of Early Islamic Administration (PEIA) aims at recording judiciously all the biographical evidence available in Arabic primary sources about those who played a role in the state apparatus during the early Islamic period (ca. 622-800).

It is part of the Jerusalem Prosopography Project (JPP) that aims at recording the biographical evidence available in the Arabic primary sources about several well-defined groups of people who flourished during the first two centuries of Islam.

Future projects within the JPP include the CPM or The Companions of the Prophet Muḥammad, the JEA of The Jews of Early Islam, the MSP or The Muslim Settlers in Palestine and the TOH or The Transmitters of Ḥadīth.

Although the PEIA is still far from completion, it was felt that colleagues around the world might find it useful even at its present form. It is being updated on a daily basis. Continue reading Jerusalem Prosopography Project →

Muhammad in and out of the Academy

Islam in Europe, Muhammad


Muhammad Sven Kalisch


Islamic Theologian’s Theory: It’s Likely the Prophet Muhammad Never Existed
By ANDREW HIGGINS, The Wall Street Journal, November 15, 2008

MÃœNSTER, Germany — Muhammad Sven Kalisch, a Muslim convert and Germany’s first professor of Islamic theology, fasts during the Muslim holy month, doesn’t like to shake hands with Muslim women and has spent years studying Islamic scripture. Islam, he says, guides his life.

So it came as something of a surprise when Prof. Kalisch announced the fruit of his theological research. His conclusion: The Prophet Muhammad probably never existed.

Muslims, not surprisingly, are outraged. Even Danish cartoonists who triggered global protests a couple of years ago didn’t portray the Prophet as fictional. German police, worried about a violent backlash, told the professor to move his religious-studies center to more-secure premises.

“We had no idea he would have ideas like this,” says Thomas Bauer, a fellow academic at Münster University who sat on a committee that appointed Prof. Kalisch. “I’m a more orthodox Muslim than he is, and I’m not a Muslim.” Continue reading Muhammad in and out of the Academy →

Googling the Life of Muhammad

Architecture, Islamic History, Muhammad, Saudi Arabia, Teaching Resources

Google Earth provides a virtual geography for anyone with access to the internet. Now, thanks to Thameen Darby, you can examine over 100 places in the life of the Prophet Muhammad close up. To access the site, click here. Here are the particulars.

This is a flyover depicting the life of the prophet of Islam, Prophet Muhammad.

Islam is the second largest religion in the world; Prophet Muhammad who was born in a town in the Arabian Peninsula, Mecca. He lived for 63 years (570-633 AD). During his lifetime, he founded the third monotheistic religion, established the core of the Muslim empire, and started a new era in Human history with its own distinctive civilization that is still alive today. Continue reading Googling the Life of Muhammad →

Muhammad the Profit: Commerce, Play, and Entertainment in the Neoliberal Imperium

Animals, Danish Cartoon Controversy, Islamophobia, Muhammad, Sudan

Following a link on the website www.korans.com can take you to the website www.teddybearmuhammad.com, which hawks the cute and cuddly namesake of Islam’s prophet. As the site explains, the bear commemorates the Sudanese government recently accusing 54-year old British schoolteacher Gillian Gibbons of blasphemy for “allowing” her class of 7-year old students at Khartoum’s Unity High School to choose what some considered the wrong name for the class stuffed animal. (The children named the bear after a popular classmate, not directly for the Prophet). The incident provided Sudanese politicians with an opportunity for local pandering, geopolitical bluster and a demonstration of sovereignty in reaction to international condemnation of the genocide in Darfur.

Cultural sensitivities about divine names and images are real, even when in particular instances they are feigned, exaggerated, or used as weapons in military or political conflicts. This reality is what gives their manipulation its potential power, although it also lays such manipulations open to exposure, derision, and failure. Continue reading Muhammad the Profit: Commerce, Play, and Entertainment in the Neoliberal Imperium →

What Makes a A Muslim Laugh?

Arabic Cartoons, Danish Cartoon Controversy, Humor and Satire, Islam in Europe, Islamophobia, Journalism and Media, Muhammad

Today’s BBC News has a story with the headline “Does Islam have a sense of humour?” This is the kind of question that makes me want to cry. “Islam”, like any religion, will “have” whatever people read into it. For a Christian or Hindu apologist just about everything that Muslims do is “funny” in the sense of being different and looked down upon, although it is not funny to non-Muslim fundamentalists when Muslims practice their faith in ways that are dismissed as violent or antagonistic. Muslims do not generally take their own faith as a joke, unless they are in the Enlightenment-mentored mode of rationalizing away whatever fixed dogma demands about the power of Allah. Islam is not inherently funny, especially to those who practice it, but neither is it opposed to laughter. Humor is a pan-human trait and it is highly contextual. Yes, there are Muslims who have a sense of humor and those who do not. In the real world how could it be otherwise?

The article’s hook-line teaser notes: “Muslims are often depicted as people who can’t take a joke. But as a stand-up comedy tour showcasing Islamic talent arrives in the UK, is that fair?” There is something quite different about looking for a sense of humor in an entire religious tradition compared to observing what individual Muslims do. Continue reading What Makes a A Muslim Laugh? →