Interpreting Islam Today: The Many Faces of Knowledge in Islam

The study of Islamic theology at German universities, follows multiple approaches ranging from historical, analytical as well as approaches attempting to critically re-construct Muslim theology for Muslim communities living in Europe and contemporary society. “Madrasas,“ the traditional Islamic seminaries also disseminate traditional teachings in theology, and remain one of the most important resources for developing knowledge of the Muslim tradition in several parts of the Muslim world. However, Islamic thought is studied at modern universities in many parts of the Muslim world too. Prof. Dr. Ebrahim Moosa, is professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Notre Dame in the USA and previously taught in his native South Africa, as well as at Stanford and Duke universities. In his recent book he illuminates the history of ideas and the politics of knowledge within madrasa educational networks. As a graduate of madrasa education in India, Prof Moosa still believes that madrasas today embody the highest aspirations and deeply felt needs of traditional Muslims. Yet, he also believes that in order to find a relevant and meaningful interpretation of Islam today, madrasa and other forms of traditional authorities will have to face the challenge of conditions and the realities of the world in which Muslims live today in order to produce a relevant and usable moral and ethical tradition. The lecture will explore the challenges to the reconstruction of religious thought in Islam today.

 

Prof. Dr. Ebrahim Moosa  is also a Co-Director of the Contending Modernities program, an interdisciplinary global education initiative. Moosa is the author of What is a Madrasa? (2015) and Ghazali and the Poetics of Imagination (2005), which won the American Academy of Religion’s Best First Book in the History of Religions Award in 2006. One of the leading scholar of contemporary Muslim thought Moosa has been named as one of the top 500 Influential Muslims in the World in 2015. 

 

Prof. Dr. Anja Middelbeck Varwick teaches Systematic Theology at the institute for Catholic Theology at Freie Universität Berlin. Her research is focused on Interreligious Dialogue, especially on Christian-Muslim relations.