PhD project:
Comprehension theory in the Islamic intellectual heritag
A usulitic study in the light of general hermeneutics
Anthropologically the need for meaning and understanding is elementary and forms a fundamental problem in all cultures including Islam, be it with regard to the endowing, determining or conveying of meaning. Concerning Islam, it is thus justifiable to ask: How has Islamic scholarship dealt with the problem of understanding? Has there been a science or discipline that ubuiquitously deals with understanding? Which are the principles or basics of such a science? To what extent has it covered the various dimensions of the process of understanding? It is the main objective of the present project to answer these questions. Firstly, the question will be answered whether such a science or discipline has already existed in Islamic scholarship, and secondly, the basics of such a science will be outlined in the light of general hermeneutics.
A quick glance at Islamic scholarship and its specific disciplines reveals that Islamic thinking generated a great many sciences that take as their object the Islamic authoritative texts – the Koran and the Sunnah in particular – and that they do so with reference to a certain aspect of knowledge. It can also be observed that there is no specific science or art among this range of Islamic sciences that generally investigates the topic of understanding: no special science dealing with understanding in its general sense and with its methods, techniques, forms, questions, premises, etc.; no discipline or doctrine in which the rules and basic principles of understanding have no particular reference to a certain subject of the Islamic religion, namely parallel to general hermeneutics. The nonexistence of such a discipline can have a negative impact on the understanding of Islam and of Islamic thinking. The proposed study will attempt to detect, with the help of the basic problems and terminology of general hermeneutics, one or several hypothetical Islamic theories of understanding.
Understanding as a process is the study’s main object of research. It is the basic problem that will be investigated from a usulitic point of view and in the light of general hermeneutics. Among other things, the attitudes developed by the Muslim scholars in the earliest Islamic centuries towards the major elements of the process of understanding will be explored, that is, the attitudes towards the initiator of what was to be understood, towards the item to be understood itself and towards the recipient as well as towards the possible context-related circumstances, which are able to influence these three major elements. In this way, the assumptions of the Muslim scholars about the basic problems of understanding are to be identified in a broader sense and elaborated on.
Research interests:
- Islamic legal and comprehension methodology (Usul al-Fiqh & at-Tafsir)
- Dogmatic and general hermeneutics
- Transdisciplinarity and interdisciplinarity of Islamic and Arabic scholarship
- Islamic philosophy
- Modern and general linguistics
Publications:
- “Textanalyse zwischen usul al-fiqh und der Hermeneutik, eine vergleichende Studie” (master’s thesis, in German; “Text analysis between usul al-fiqh and hermeneutics. A comparative study”) Cairo 2008 (157 pages)
- “tahlil an-nusus baina at-ta´wiliyya wa Cilm usul al-fiqh, dirasa muqarina” (Arabic version of the above-mentioned German master’s thesis) Cairo 2008 (119 pages)
- “As-Sahir الساحر”: An Arabic translation of the literary compendium “New Wave” by Christian Kracht; editor of the translation: Sphinx Agency for Art und Literature, promoted by ProHelvita, Cairo 2008. (258 pages)
- “Heinrich al-masri ‘هاينريش المصري’”: A co-translation of the novel “Der ägyptische Heinrich” by Markus Werner; editor of the translation: Sphinx Agency for Art und Literature (forthcoming). (c. 40 pages)
- “Az-zaman al-makhtum الزمن المختوم”: An Arabic co-translation of “Versiegelte Zeit: Über den Stillstand in der islamischen Welt” by Dan Diner, Propyläen, Berlin 2005 (forthcoming). (c. 150 pages)
- “Wiederkehr Jesus zwischen Islam und Christentum, eine vergleichende Untersuchung” (The return of Jesus between Islam and Christianity. A comparative study): Unpublished term paper. (25 pages)
- “Die Negation im Deutschen und Arabischen, eine vergleichende Untersuchung” (Negation in German and Arabic. A comparative study): Unpublished term paper. (20 pages)
Contact
Alsayed Alrahmany M. A.Geiststraße 24-26
Room 123
D-48151 Münster
Germany
Tel.: +49 251 83-23534
Fax: +49 251 83-23500
sayedrahmany@yahoo.de
Supervisor
Prof. Dr. Thomas BauerDepartment of Arabic and Islamic Studies
Schlaunstraße 2
D-48143 Münster
Germany
Tel.: +49 251 83-24571 (Sekretariat)
Fax: +49 251 83-29932
sindibad@uni-muenster.de
