Learning Outcomes
Students will be able to understand and deepen to the formation of early Islam, mainly the formative period, and the continuation of the new religion within the frame of late antiquity. They will also to be able to understand the contemporary and modern political and religious use of the early Islamic period and to follow the formation of multiple religious and political narratives and trends of thought and action, as well as the contemporary Muslim Understandings.
Course Content (Syllabus)
Formative period of Islam until 11th century. Main schools of Law and religious thought. The debate between human reason and the "Law of God". The creation of Islamic religious terminology and the different appreciations on the creation or not of the Qur'an, the Free Will (Qadar), the oneness of God (Tawhid) and the notions of 'singer,' 'hypocrite,' 'faithful' and 'unfaithful'.
Students will be able to understand the formative Period of early Islam and the continuation of the 'new' religion within the frame of late antiquity. They will also to be able to understand the contemporary and modern political and religious use of the early Islamic history and theology, and follow the formation of the multiple religious and political narratives. The path of how "Kalam", the Muslim theology is born, will help the students to detect how the pre-existing theological system of thought and proof, embodied in the philosophical discourse of antiquity, was framed and reshaped by Islam. Participants will understand how reason is put at the service of faith, when a meeting place is created between religion and philosophy, but also a space of competition between human discourse and divine revelation. The struggle between human reason and faith, religion and philosophy observed in the religious and philosophical spheres, it extends to the realm of politics. Alongside
with the above, the students will also get to know the historical course of early Islam, from its beginnings until the end of the 11th century, when the so-called formative period was completed with the establishment of the main schools of interpretation of Islamic law and thought.
Course Bibliography (Eudoxus)
1. Αγγελική Ζιάκα, (2016), Το Καλάμ και τα ισλαμικά ρεύματα σκέψης, ΠΑΜΑΚ Θεσσαλονίκη
2. Γεράσιμος Μακρής, (2012), Ισλάμ, πεποιθήσεις και πρακτικές, Πατάκη, Αθήνα