The Quest for ‘Disenchantment’ and the Modernization of Magic

The initial premise of this article is that the lasting influence of nineteenth-century Protestant liberalism on the modern conceptualization of religion has confined our understanding of a variety of traditions to a narrow evolutionary scope in which purer religious forms in line with scientific ra...

Full description

Saved in:  
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Islam and Christian-Muslim relations
Main Author: Eneborg, Yusuf Muslim (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
Check availability: HBZ Gateway
Journals Online & Print:
Drawer...
Fernleihe:Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste
Published: Taylor & Francis [2014]
In: Islam and Christian-Muslim relations
RelBib Classification:AG Religious life; material religion
BJ Islam
Further subjects:B incantations (ruqya)
B Health
B Modernity
B Science
B Qur'an
B religion and magic
Online Access: Volltext (Verlag)
Description
Summary:The initial premise of this article is that the lasting influence of nineteenth-century Protestant liberalism on the modern conceptualization of religion has confined our understanding of a variety of traditions to a narrow evolutionary scope in which purer religious forms in line with scientific rationalism are seen as arising out of earlier impure systems akin to magic. The article presents the instrumentality of the Qur'an as an alternative lens through which to acknowledge what has often been labelled as “magic” in Islam. Recognizing that this modern conceptualization of religion has been appropriated as an ideal by Muslim modernist reformists, the article particularly intends to show that, through the use of this alternative analytical instrument, the modernist project of emancipatory “disenchantment” can be viewed as an instance of the modernization of magic just as easily as it can be seen as religious purification, the intention of this exercise being to further problematize our current distinction between religion and magic.
ISSN:1469-9311
Contains:Enthalten in: Islam and Christian-Muslim relations
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1080/09596410.2014.890847