Freinds of God :Islamic Images of Piety, Commitment, & Servanthood
Paperback - 368 pages, 6 x 9 inches, 30 b/w photographs
Description : Prophets, saints, martyrs, sages, and seers--one of the richest repositories of lore about such exemplary religious figures belongs to the world's approximately 1.3 billion Muslims. Illuminating  some of the most delightful tales in world religious literature, this engaging book is the first truly global overview of Islamic hagiography. John Renard tells of the characters beyond the Qur'an and Hadith, whose stories of piety and service to God and humanity have captured hearts and minds for nearly fourteen hundred years. Renard's thematic approach to the major characters, narratives, social and cultural contexts, and theoretical concepts of this remarkable treasury of tales, based on material ranging from the eighth to the twentieth centuries and from countries ranging from Morocco to Malaysia, provides insight into the ways in which these stories have functioned in the lives of Muslims from diverse cultural, social, economic, and political backgrounds. The book also serves as a useful and evocative tool for approaching the vast geographical and chronological sweep of Islamic civilisation.
Contents :
List of Illustrations
Preface
Introduction: An Overview of Islamic Hagiography
I. STAGES IN THE LIVES OF GOD'S FRIENDS
1. Beginnings Both Humble and Spectacular
2.Conversion and Asceticism on the Road to Sanctity
3. Dreams and Visions, Visitors and Voices: God in Touch with His Friends
4. Miracles and Marvels: God Working through His Friends
5. Mere Mortals: Friends and the Human Condition
II. FRIENDS OF GOD IN CONTEXT
6. Friends and Their People: Society and Service to Communities
7. Founding Friends: Authority, Institutions, and the Economics of Intentional Community
8. Where God's Friends Walked: Revered Sites and Ritual Settings
9. Friends in Our World
III. FRIENDS IN THEORY: UNDERSTANDING THE STORIES
10. Literary Dimensions: Genre, Function, and Hermeneutics
11. Theological Dimensions: Hagiography, Faith, and Controversy
Notes
Index
"I know of no other work in Western scholarship and pedagogy of Islamic studies with the scope and depth of Friends of God. Renard does not only provide well organised, richly detailed, absorbing, and delightful coverage of the best known literature on Muslim saints and sainthood, but he also brings the reader into modern and contemporary contexts where the subject continues to be of considerable personal and communal spiritual importance. This book is new and urgently needed in today's world, whether in the university or across the global landscape of adult reflection on Islam and Muslims. "--- Frederick Mathewson Denny, author of An Introduction to Islam and Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies at the University of Colorado, at Boulder
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