Islamists, civil rights, and civility: the contribution of the brotherhood siras
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Islamists, civil rights, and civility : the contribution of the brotherhood siras. / pnj946, pnj946.
In: Contemporary Islam, Vol. 18, 2024, p. 243–255.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Islamists, civil rights, and civility
T2 - the contribution of the brotherhood siras
AU - pnj946, pnj946
PY - 2024
Y1 - 2024
N2 - From the 1980s, revisionist Sunni Islamist thinkers have engaged in a hermeneutical effort to argue for the full acceptance of non-Muslims as equal political participants and citizens in an Islamic polity. A key text in their argument is the so-called Constitution of Medina, regulating the interaction between the newly arrived followers of Muhammad and the existing tribes in Medina who were either polytheists or Jews. This paper investigates the sira literature of Muslim Brotherhood in order to gauge the degree to which the life of the Prophet has been reinterpreted to enable such novel readings. It analyzes three popular Muslim Brotherhood siras, by the Syrian Mustafa al-Sibai (1960s), the Egyptian Muhammad al-Ghazzali (1980s), and the Libyan Ali al-Sallabi (2000s). The paper detects important developments in these siras’ treatments of Muhammad’s engagement with non-Muslims—including their interpretations of the Constitution of Medina. These developments, however, do not reflect the radical rethinking of civil society and civility found in the abovementioned revisionist Islamist literature; rather, they evince a more classical Islamist interest in the Prophet as a propagator of Islam as a law and system. That said, this sira literature should be viewed as a genre aiming at the ideological education of brotherhood members, rather than the theoretical exploration of political theory.
AB - From the 1980s, revisionist Sunni Islamist thinkers have engaged in a hermeneutical effort to argue for the full acceptance of non-Muslims as equal political participants and citizens in an Islamic polity. A key text in their argument is the so-called Constitution of Medina, regulating the interaction between the newly arrived followers of Muhammad and the existing tribes in Medina who were either polytheists or Jews. This paper investigates the sira literature of Muslim Brotherhood in order to gauge the degree to which the life of the Prophet has been reinterpreted to enable such novel readings. It analyzes three popular Muslim Brotherhood siras, by the Syrian Mustafa al-Sibai (1960s), the Egyptian Muhammad al-Ghazzali (1980s), and the Libyan Ali al-Sallabi (2000s). The paper detects important developments in these siras’ treatments of Muhammad’s engagement with non-Muslims—including their interpretations of the Constitution of Medina. These developments, however, do not reflect the radical rethinking of civil society and civility found in the abovementioned revisionist Islamist literature; rather, they evince a more classical Islamist interest in the Prophet as a propagator of Islam as a law and system. That said, this sira literature should be viewed as a genre aiming at the ideological education of brotherhood members, rather than the theoretical exploration of political theory.
KW - Faculty of Humanities
KW - Sira
KW - Muslim Brotherhood
KW - Prophet Muhammad
KW - Islamism
KW - Constitution of Medina
U2 - 10.1007/s11562-023-00535-8
DO - 10.1007/s11562-023-00535-8
M3 - Journal article
VL - 18
SP - 243
EP - 255
JO - Contemporary Islam
JF - Contemporary Islam
SN - 1872-0218
ER -
ID: 360871365