This collection of essays focuses on the relation between European and Islamic thought and culture from the late eighteenth to the twentieth century. Albert Hourani explores the development of ideas about Islam in European thought and discusses the individual writers who played an important part in informing and communicating an image of Islamic history and civilisation. He also examines some of the reactions of the Islamic world to the powerful new ideas of European civilization including the first Arabic encyclopedia and translation of Homer.
Albert Hourani was born the son of immigrants from South Lebanon. He studied Philosophy, Politics, Economics and History (with an emphasis on international relations)at the Magdalen College in Oxford. He graduated first in his class in 1936. During World War II, he worked at the Royal Institute of International Affairs and in the office of the British Minister of State in Cairo. After the war he helped prepare the Arab case for the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry.
In 1948 he started teaching at Magdalen College, St. Antony's College, the start of an academic career which would last the rest of his life. He also taught at the American University of Beirut, the University of Chicago, the University of Pennsylvania, and Harvard, ending his academic career as Fellow of St. Antony's College and Reader in the History of the Modern Middle East at Oxford. Many of the academic historians we find in Universities all over the world today where his students.
As an adult, Hourani converted to Christianity. He married Christine Mary Odile Wegg-Prosser in 1955. He died in Oxford at the age of 77 and was buried at Wolvercote Cemetery in Oxford.
This is another wonderful intellectual history of the Muslim world by Albert Hourani. A compendium of essays on several different European thinkers interactions with Islam (mostly in the early modern period) the book also segues into some time capsules of life in Arab Muslim and late-Ottoman society that are really priceless for their novelty and historical value. There are many beautiful vignettes, including that of Louis Massignon's experience in the Muslim world, as well as an examination of the themes of Marshall Hodgson's history of Islam.
As one could expect there are many beautiful turns of phrase and philosophical insights that pepper Hourani's writing in this book. His work is always enjoyable not only for its incredibly edifying contents but also because it is clearly a reflection of a cultivated and thoughtful mind at work. There are many passages to highlight and save, and many insights not only into the world of Islam but also the perceptions of that world from those on the outside.
Given the times, this book is a also good reminder of the historical depth and complexity of the relationship between European thinkers and Muslims, as well as the relationship between Muslims and non-Muslims in the region we call the Middle East today. Neither relationship has historically been as fraught or inevitably hostile as we make it out to be today, and in fact it has often been quite the opposite. For many it long it did - and perhaps can again - entail mutual respect, cultural collaboration and a sense of shared destiny.
Like "Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age" this book is an intellectual history that is priceless in its value. Through beautiful prose and deep (yet effortlessly conveyed) research, it offers a window into a past that has vanished but whose lasting effects are still felt around us today.
Buku ini merupakan himpunan beberapa esei oleh Albert Hourani mengenai Islam pada mata ilmuwan Eropah. Penulis memetik tiga definisi Orientalisme menurut Edward Said iaitu; i) Sebuah disiplin akademik, ii) Cara fikir (style of thought) dan iii) Institusi korporat untuk menguasai Timur.
Penulis banyak menyorot ilmuwan dan pengkaji terawal Eropah mengenai Islam seperti H. R. Gibb (1895-1971) yang mempercayai bahawa sejarah hakiki Islam itu bukan terletak pada jatuh-bangun pucuk pimpinan di seluruh dunia, bahkan ianya terletak pada pertumbuhan dan pemeliharaan tradisi kebudayaan yang mengalir daripada guru kepada anak murid melalui jalur “isnad” yang tidak terputus selain ilmuwan seperti Ignaz Goldziher (1850-1921) yang pernah belajar di al-Azhar dan Snouck Hurgronje (1857-1936) yang pernah menetap di Mekah dan kemudiaannya Indonesia.
Menurut penulis, buku sejarah yang paling asli, holistik dan signifikan dalam membahaskan sejarah Islam adalah buku “The Venture of Islam” oleh Marshall Hodgson (1922-1968) dan “A History of Islamic Societes” oleh Ira Lapidus (1937-now). Lapidus merupakan anak murid Gibb manakala Hodgson walaupun bukan anak murid Gibb, tetapi beliau banyak terkesan dengan karya-karya Gibb.
*Ilustrasi pada kulit buku ini menggambarkan Masjid Sultan Hassan pada abad ke-19. Masjid ini juga dikenali sebagai Masjid Empat Mazhab kerana terdapat empat sudut di dalamnya yang pernah diajarkan keempat-empat mazhab (Hanafi, Maliki, Syafi’i dan Hanbali). Sekitar 2013-2019 dahulu, Dr. Heba Raouf pernah mengajar kitab Muqaddimah Ibn Khaldun di sini. Syeikh Usamah al-Azhari (kini Menteri Wakaf Mesir) juga pernah mengajar dan memberikan khutbah di sini pada waktu tersebut.
Membaca buku ini akan mirip isinya dengan Orientalisme Said. Namun tentunya buku ini sedikit lebih "aman" karena tidak "sekontroversial" Said. Paparan mengenai studi Orientalisme di Eropa lengkap dengan Mazhab dan tokoh yang menjadi figur sentral bagi perkembangan studi itu.
Memahamkan orang akan asal usul pandangan/prasangka orang Eropa terhadap Islam, juga perkembangan kesarjanaan Eropa dalam bidang Islamic Studies alias Orientalisme. Cukup bagus bagi yang orang berminat terhadap sejarah Islam, mungkin juga bagi yang berminat terhadap studi poskolonial.