Essays in Islamic Philology, History, and Philosophy

Die Studien zur Geschichte und Kultur des Vorderen Orients erscheinen als Supplement der Zeitschrift Der Islam, gegründet 1910 von Carl Heinrich Becker, einem der Väter der modernen Islamwissenschaft. Ganz im Sinne Beckers ist das Ziel der Studien die Erforschung der vergangenen Gesellschaften des Vorderen Orients, ihrer Glaubenssysteme und der zugrundeliegenden sozialen und ökonomischen Verhältnisse, von der Iberischen Halbinsel bis nach Zentralasien, von den ukrainischen Steppen zum Hochland des Jemen.
Über die grundlegende philologische Arbeit an der literarischen Überlieferung hinaus nutzen die Studien die archivalischen, sowie materiellen und archäologischen Überlieferungen als Quelle für die gesamte Bandbreite der historisch arbeitenden Geistes- und Sozialwissenschaften.

Studies in the History and Culture of the Middle East are published as supplement to Der Islam which was founded in 1910 by Carl Heinrich Becker, an early practitioner of the modern study of Islam. The mission of the series is the study of past societies of the Middle East, their belief systems, and their underlying social and economic relations—in their aim to cover the entire spectrum of the historically oriented humanities and social sciences.

The articles in this volume are dedicated to Professor Ahmad Mahdavi Damghani for the breadth and depth of his interests and his influence on those interests. They attest to the fact that his fervor and rigorously surgical attention to detail have found fertile ground in a wide variety of disciplines, including (among others) Persian literature and philology; Islamic history and historiography; Arabic literature and philology; and Islamic philosophy and jurisprudence. The volume has brought together some of the most respected scholars in the fields of Islamic studies and Islamic literatures, all his prior students, to contribute with articles that touch on the fields Professor Mahdavi Damghani has so permanently touched with his astonishing scholarship and attention to detail.