Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind: Light and luminous being in Islamic theology
For theologians, to conceive of God in terms of light has some undeniable advantages, allowing a middle-of-the road position between the two extremes of thinking about God in terms of a purely disembodied, unfathomable, unsensible being, and of crediting Him with a body, possibly even a human(oid) b...
| Published in: | Critical research on religion |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
|
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Sage
2021
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| In: |
Critical research on religion
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| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Islamic theology
/ God
/ Light
/ Divinity
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| RelBib Classification: | AG Religious life; material religion BJ Islam NBQ Eschatology |
| Further subjects: | B
Islam
B Light B Religion B Eschatology |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (kostenfrei) |
| Summary: | For theologians, to conceive of God in terms of light has some undeniable advantages, allowing a middle-of-the road position between the two extremes of thinking about God in terms of a purely disembodied, unfathomable, unsensible being, and of crediting Him with a body, possibly even a human(oid) body. This paper first reviews the reasons why God, in early medieval Islam, was never fully theorized in terms of light. It then proceeds to discuss light-related narratives in two major, late-medieval compilations of hadiths about the afterlife, by al-Suyuti (Ash’ari, Egypt, d. 1505) and al-Majlisi (Persia, d. 1699), suggesting that eschatology was the area in which God’s light continued to shine in Islam, and the backdoor through which a theology of light, in the thought of al-Suhrawardi (Syria, d. 1191) and his followers, made a triumphant re-entry into Islamic thought. |
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| ISSN: | 2050-3040 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Critical research on religion
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1177/2050303220986975 |