POLITICAL THEOLOGY and ISLAM

FROM THE BIRTH OF EMPIRE TO THE MODERN STATE

University of Notre Dame Press Notre Dame, Indiana

Part

The book you have in your hands—or are reading on a screen—treats a big question. What is politics in Islam? I explore the question across the history of Islam, from its beginnings to the contemporary moment, on the basis of a set of case studies from Islam’s formative period (seventh through tenth centuries), classical period (eleventh through nineteenth centuries), and modern period (twentieth century until the present). I approach these cases through the lens of theology—political theology. Can theological inquiry offer insight for the study of politics in Islam? In the first part of the book, I present the argument in its general contours, spelling out the concepts and methods that inform the study of politics in Islam as a struggle for a moral order, one with varied claims to sovereignty but also a general determination to realize a righteousness that stands at the heart of the message the Prophet Muhammad conveyed to his society in seventh-century Arabia. The following parts—the second through the fifth—illustrate, again, on the basis of case studies from both the past and the present, the diverse ways in which the umma, the community of Muslims, has struggled for a moral order that recalls its prophetic message.

The question I pursue in this study cannot be exhaustively treated in a single book, even one as lengthy as this. It has been my hope in undertaking this study, now over several years, to give greater shape to a method of thinking about the history of Islam. The purpose is twofold, first, to encourage scholars of Islamic Studies to think about the history of Islam through a theological lens and, second, to make it easier for scholars of other histories and traditions—and also other fields—to consider the venture of Islam in relation to their own research and reflection. I also hope general readers will find the ideas traced in this book personally edifying.