Windows on the House of Islam: Muslim Sources on Spirituality and Religious Life

John Renard

Paperback, 431 pages

9780520210868

Over the centuries and across the globe, Muslim authors and artists have given moving testimony to their experience of being members of the Islamic community. Their many vantage points come together in this collection, one that represents major Islamic groups from the past through the present and covers a range of themes essential to understanding Islamic spiritually and religious life.

Windows on the House of Islam integrates a full range of literary and visual primary sources, representing major Islamic societies and communities from the past through the present, from Arabia to the United States, and covering a broad spectrum of themes essential to an understanding of Islamic spirituality and religious life. John Renard has united over seventy translations originating from a dozen languages, including Arabic, Persian, Chinese, and Indonesian - and contributed by over thirty of the world’s top Islam scholars. In addition, more than five dozen illustrations thematically document a full range of artistic forms and historical periods, from ritual objects and architecture to manuscripts of religious texts.

A companion volume to Seven Doors to Islam, Windows on the House of Islam is the first book of its kind to integrate such a wide range of literary and visual forms. It serves as both an introduction to Islamic religious primary sources as well as a supplement to general works on Islamic religion, spirituality, and culture.

Contents

1 - Foundations: Prophetic Revelation

2 - Devotion: Ritual and Personal Prayer

3 - Inspiration: Edification and Ethics

4 - Aesthetics: From Allegory to Arabesque

5 - Community: Society, Institutions, and Patronage

6 - Pedagogy: Fanning Spark Into Flame

7 - Experience: Testimony, Paradigm, and Critique