Ebook: Ghazali: the Revival of Islam

This fascinating work profiles Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (1058-1111), the foremost Islamic scholar and mystic of the medieval period. Attracting the patronage of the vizier Nizam al-Mulk early in his career, he was appointed head of the Nizamiyyah College at Baghdad, and attracted audiences from across the Islamic world, who sought his teachings on Islamic philosophy and jurisprudence. Eventually renouncing his position due to a spiritual crisis, he went into self-imposed exile, during which he wrote the Sufi masterpiece, Revival of the Sciences of Religion. Concise and lucid, this is a perfect.;Cover; Title page; Copyright page; Contents; Preface; Abbreviations; Names and terms; Chronology; INTRODUCTION; Sufism; The Isma'ilis; Philosophy (Falsafa); Ash'ari and the Three Brothers; The Mu'tazili Factor; The Notion of Kalam; The "Schools" of Law; The Seljuqs; 1 THE RISE TO RENOWN; The Temptations of Prestige; Ghazali at Court; The Patronage of the Powerful; Juwayni; Early Studies: Sufi Masters and Theologians; The Stages of his Career; A Child of Khorasan; 2 DEVOTION TO THE LAW; Fidelity to the Law; Shafi'i: the Beloved Model; The Indolence of the Learned.