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Divine Sovereignty—Some Reflections

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 December 2021

MUHAMMAD QASIM ZAMAN
MUHAMMAD QASIM ZAMAN*
Affiliation:
Princeton [email protected]
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Abstract

I offer some reflections here on the set of articles gathered in this special issue on divine sovereignty and further develop some thoughts first adumbrated in a piece published in JRAS 25/3 (2015).

Keywords

GodsovereigntyMawdudijahiliyya
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 32 , Special Issue 2: Divine Sovereignty, Morality and the State: Maududi and His Influence , April 2022 , pp. 377 - 386
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Royal Asiatic Society

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Footnotes

I am grateful to Humeira Iqtidar and Oliver Scharbrodt for organising the workshop that has led to this special issue and for their comments on this piece.

References

2 For references to Mawdudi's writings on this score, see Zaman, Muhammad Qasim, “The Sovereignty of God in Modern Islamic Thought,” JRAS, 25/3 (2015), pp. 389-418Google Scholar, especially pp. 394-395. Also see Sayyid Abu'l-A`la Mawdudi, “Mansib-i tajdid ki haqiqat awr tarikh-i tajdid main hazrat Shah Wali Allah ka maqam,’ al-Furqan (Bareilly), vol. 7, nos. 9-12 (1940), pp. 41-98, especially p. 52.

3 Mawdudi, “Mansib-i tajdid, p. 52.

4 Ibid., p. 55.

5 See Zaman, “Sovereignty of God”.

6 Nasir al-din Tusi, Akhlaq-i Nasiri, (ed.) Mujtaba Minawi and `Ali Riza Haydari (Tehran, 1982), esp. pp. 305 (on the king's justice), pp. 205-244 (on the household); G. M. Wickens, translation, The Nasirean ethics (London, 1964), pp. 230, 153-184. On this work and its influence, see W. Madelung, “Nasir ad-din Tusi's ethics between philosophy, Shi`ism, and Sufism,” in Richard G. Hovannisian, (ed.), Ethics in Islam (Malibu, 1985), pp. 85-101; Marlow, Louise, Hierarchy and egalitarianism in Islamic thought (Cambridge, 1997)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ahmed, Shahab, What is Islam? The importance of being Islamic (Princeton, 2016), especially pp. 211-216, 463-467Google Scholar.

7 Sayyid Abu'l-Hasan `Ali Nadwi, `Asr-i hazir main din ki tafhim wa tashrih (Karachi, n.d.), pp. 85-91.

8 See, for example, Mawdudi, “Mansib-i tajdid,” pp. 96, 98.

9 Sayyid Abu'l-A`la Mawdudi, Islam ka nazariyya-i siyasi (Lahore, 1955; first published in 1939), pp. 35, 41-42.

10 Shah Wali Allah, Musaffa [and] Musawwa (Delhi, 1876), i, p. 330. For some other discussions of this distinction, see Shah Wali Allah, Hujjat Allah al-baligha, (ed.) Sa`id Ahmad Palanpuri (Karachi, 2010), i, pp. 363-371; translation Hermansen, Marcia K., The Conclusive Argument from God (Islamabad, 2003), pp. 376-382Google Scholar; and Shah Wali Allah, Anfas al-`arifin, (ed.) Muhammad `Abd al-Ahad (Delhi, 1917), pp. 80-81.

11 Wali Allah, Hujjat Allah, i, pp. 365-367; Hermansen, Conclusive Argument, pp. 377-379. On maslaha in pre-modern juristic thought, see Opwis, Felicitas, Maslaha and the purpose of the law (Leiden, 2010)Google Scholar. For a discussion of maslaha with reference to Tusi and subsequent writers in the ethical tradition, see Ahmed, What is Islam?, pp. 466-471, 478-486, 492-505. Ahmed's focus is on the ruler's law-making authority, as the medieval ethicists envisaged it; and he does not discuss Wali Allah.

12 See, for instance, Wali Allah, Hujjat Allah, i, pp. 294, 337; Hermansen, Conclusive Argument, pp. 297-298, 341-342.

13 Wali Allah, Hujjat Allah, i, p. 209; Hermansen, Conclusive Argument, pp. 210-211.

14 Shah `Abd al-`Aziz, Tafsir-i `Azizi (Delhi, 1894), p. 6. (This volume comprises exegesis of the first two chapters of the Qur'an, till Q 2.184.)

15 Tusi, Akhlaq-i Nasiri, p. 79; Wickens, Nasirean Ethics, pp. 58-59.

16 Tusi, Akhlaq-i Nasiri, p. 253; Wickens, Nasirean ethics, p. 192. I am guided in my understanding of the “moderns” as Muslim philosophers by Madelung, “Nasir ad-din Tusi's ethics,” p. 94.

17 Jalal al-din Dawani, Akhlaq-i Jalali, (ed.) `Abdallah Mas`udi Arani (Tehran, 2012), p. 222. See ibid., p. 223, on the ruler's obligation to uphold the shari`a while exercising his authority in particulars, which he does in light of maslaha and in accordance with the shari`a's general principles. This point is absent in Tusi. For a translation and discussion of this passage, see Ahmed, What is Islam?, pp. 467-471.

18 Sayyid Abu'l-A`la Mawdudi, Qur'an ki char bunyadi istilahen (Lahore, 2000; first published in 1941), pp. 36-37. The echo of the malik ala'l-itlaq of Tusi and Dawani is worth noting here.

19 Mawdudi, “Mansib-i tajdid”. This article was subsequently published in the form of a small book: Sayyid Abu'l-A`la Mawdudi, Tajdid wa ihya-i din, 5th edition, (Lahore, 1952; first published in 1940). An English translation was published in 1963: A short history of the revivalist movement in Islam, trans. al-Ash`ari (Lahore, 1963). The 5th edition of the book in Urdu, and subsequent re-printings, contain some modifications in light of the criticism that had been directed at this work as well as an appendix clarifying some of Mawdudi's views. A systematic review of those modifications and clarifications would be illuminating, though I have not attempted it here. My references are to the original version, published in al-Furqan. For a brief discussion of this work, see Hartung, Jan-Peter, A System of Life: Mawdudi and the Ideologisation of Islam (New York, 2014), pp. 78-83CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20 Mawdudi, “Mansib-i tajdid,” pp. 89, 91. At this and other points, Mawdudi's discussion of Wali Allah does not reveal any deep familiarity with the latter's writings.

21 Ibid., p. 80. See ibid., p. 80, n. 1, for the editor's rejoinder to this statement. The editor of al-Furqan, in which this article was published, was Muhammad Manzur Nu`mani. On him, see the article by Fuchs. The remark about un-Islamic practices in Wali Allah's household was quietly omitted in the 5th and subsequent editions of the book: cf. Mawdudi, Tajdid, p. 100 (for the place where that remark would have been expected to occur).

22 Mawdudi, “Mansib-i tajdid,” p. 96.

23 Ibid., pp. 96-98.

24 Ibid., p. 98.

25 Ibid., p. 61.

26 Ibid., p. 98.

27 Ibid., p. 98.