Product Overview
From Follett
Title from publishers bibliographic system (viewed 19 Jun 2013).;Includes bibliographical references and index.;Cover; Law and Piety in Medieval Islam; Series; Title; Copyright; Dedication; Contents; Acknowledgments; Introduction: Devotional Piety and Islamic Law; The Meaning of Devotional Piety; Concentric Circles of Piety; Biography and the Challenges of Hagiography; 1 The Persistence of Asceticism; The Meaning of Medieval Asceticism; The Case of Celibacy; Contradictions; Was Women's Piety Distinct from That of Men?; 2 "Devote Yourselves to Deeds You Can Bear": Voluntary Fasting and Bodily Piety; Features of the Islamic Fast; Part I: Difficulty and Duration; Ascetic Diets, Legal Fasts.;A Lacuna: How Much Fasting is Too Much Fasting?Motives and Benefits; Part II: The Case of the Perpetual Fast; Health and Excess; Bound and Collared; 3 Charity, Food, and the Right of Refusal; Charity and Table Fellowship; A Critique of Charity: The Glutton; Scrupulous Asceticism: Seeking the Licit; Problems of Livelihood; Juristic Ethics; God's Law vs. Substantive Law: Taxonomies of the Licit; Conclusion: The Scope of Ethical Asceticism; 4 The Devil at the Fountain: Problems of Ritual; Part I: Waswa.s and the Body; The Context; The Controversy: Shaykh al-. Ima.d and the Pitchers of Water.;Devilish WhisperingsLegal Discourse and Symbolic Purity; Was Waswa.s a H.anbali. Problem?; Part II: Waswa.s and the World; Author and Victim: The Case of al-Salla.mi.; Conclusion: Triumphant Scrupulosity; Conclusion: Beyond Transgression, Beyond sunna; Part I: Excessive Piety and Transgression; Part II: Excessive Piety and the Sunna; Glossary; Bibliography; Primary Sources; Secondary Sources; Index; Series.;eBooks on EBSCOhost All EBSCO eBooks This intimate portrayal of the devotional life in early medieval Islamic society demonstrates how Islamic law defined holy behavior.
From the Publisher
The Ayyubid and Mamluk periods were two of the most intellectually vibrant in Islamic history. Megan H. Reid's book, which traverses three centuries from 1170 to 1500, recovers the stories of medieval men and women who were renowned not only for their intellectual prowess but also for their devotional piety. Through these stories, the book examines trends in voluntary religious practice that have been largely overlooked in modern scholarship. This type of piety was distinguished by the pursuit of God's favor through additional rituals, which emphasized the body as an instrument of worship, and through the rejection of worldly pleasures, and even society itself. Using an array of sources including manuals of law, fatwa collections, chronicles, and obituaries, the book shows what it meant to be a good Muslim in the medieval period and how Islamic law helped to define holy behavior. In its concentration on personal piety, ritual, and ethics the book offers an intimate perspective on medieval Islamic society.