Instructor: Mariam Sheibani
Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111) is known as “The Proof of Islam” and is widely considered to be the most influential philosopher, theologian, and mystic in Sunni Islam. This course will serve as an inquiry into al-Ghazālī’s synthetic understanding and approach to Islam and its legal, theological, cosmological, ethical, spiritual, political, sociological, and metaphysical dimensions. To this end, we will study al-Ghazālī’s writings focusing on the following areas: epistemology, scriptural hermeneutics, classification of knowledge, the Divine names and attributes, prophetology, the Qurʾān, religious psychology, political and social dimensions of religion and religious practice, and heresiography. The course teaches a method of close textual reading, and proposes an interpretation of al-Ghazālī’s methods that spans his corpus and his diverse writings across disciplines. Additionally, the course will study the reception al-Ghazālī and his works in the later Islamic tradition.
Prerequisite: Three years of Arabic or equivalent. Many of the texts we will be studying are also available in English translation, so students without the Arabic prerequisite should contact the instructor. Jointly offered in Harvard Divinity School as HDS 3169.