Al-Ghazali on Patience and Thankfulness (Ihya Ulumuddin Series No. 32)
Author: Imām Al-Ghazali
Translator: H. T. Littlejohn
Publisher: Islamic Texts Society
Year of Publication: 2010 (1st Ed.), 2017 (2nd Ed.)
Print Length: 360 pages
Genre: Islamic Studies / Quranic Studies; Theology, Ethics and Philosophy; Science, Reflection & Self-Development; Qur’anic Reflection, Supplication & Prayers; Non-Fiction / Religious Studies
Topic: Allah ﷻ, Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, Islam, Qur’an, Human Nature & Character, Human Psyche, Islamic Psyche, Patience & Gratitude/Thankfulness, Ethics & Morality, Spirituality
Originally written as a manual of spiritual instruction, this crucial work of medieval Islamic thought examines Sufi and mystical influences within the Muslim tradition to provide insight into the intellectual and religious history of the Muslim world. Written by one of the most famous theologian-mystics of all time, it is an in-depth discussion of two essential virtues of the religious and spiritual life: patience and thankfulness. In this new edition, the Islamic Texts Society has included a translation of Imam Ghazali’s own Introduction to the Revival of the Religious Sciences.
Table of Contents
Al-Ghazāli’s Introduction to the Revival of the Religious Sciences
Abbreviations
Preface
Introduction
Notes to Introduction
ON PATIENCE AND THANKFULNESS
Prologue
Part 1: On Patience
1. An Exposition of the Merit of Patience
2. An Exposition of the Nature and Meaning of Patience
3. An Exposition of How Patience is Half of Faith
4. An Exposition of the Terms Used for Patience in Addition to the Term Patience Itself
5. An Exposition of the Divisions of Patience According to Variations of Strength and Weakness
6. An Exposition of the Assumed Need for Patience and that the Servant Cannot Dispense with it under any Condition
7. An Exposition of Patience as a Remedy and What is Gained by Resorting to It
Part 2: On Thankfulness
— On the Essence of Thankfulness
8. An Exposition of the Merit of Thankfulness
9. An Exposition of the Definition and Nature of Thankfulness
10. An Exposition of How to Raise the Veil on the Thankfulness Due to God
11. An Exposition of the Distinction Between What God Loves and What He Hates
— The Applications of Thankfulness
12. An Exposition of the Nature of the Blessings and Their Divisions
13. An Exposition of Examples of God’s Abundant Blessings, their Inter-connectedness and that they Can Neither be Limited nor Counted
14. An Exposition of the Causes which Turn People Away from Thankfulness
— On What Patience and Thankfulness Share and What Links One with the Other
15. An Exposition of that which Unites Patience and Thankfulness
16. An Exposition of the Merit of Blessing over Tribulation
17. Exposition of which is Better: Patience or Thankfulness?
Notes
Appendix: Persons Cited in the Text
Bibliography
Index to Qur’ānic Quotations
General Index
Imām Abu Hamid al-Ghazali is a 11th century Muslim scholar. He was one of the most prominent and influential philosophers, theologians, jurists, and mystics of Sunni Islam. Al-Ghazālī was born at Ṭūs (near Mashhad in eastern Iran) and was educated there, then in Jorjān, and finally at Nishapur (Neyshābūr), where his teacher was al-Juwaynī, who earned the title of imām al-ḥaramayn (the imam of the two sacred cities of Mecca and Medina). He was active at a time when Sunni theology had just passed through its consolidation and entered a period of intense challenges from Shiite Ismâ’îlite theology and the Arabic tradition of Aristotelian philosophy (falsafa). Al-Ghazâlî understood the importance of falsafa and developed a complex response that rejected and condemned some of its teachings, while it also allowed him to accept and apply others. His great work, Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-dīn or Ihya Ulumuddin (“The Revival of the Religious Sciences”), made Sufism (Islamic mysticism) an acceptable part of orthodox Islam.
Source: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/al-ghazali/
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Henry T. Littlejohn is a retired pastor and lecturer who has devoted many years of study to both Christian and Muslim theology. He lives in Seattle.
Source: https://bookshop.rabata.org/products/al-ghazali-on-patience-and-thankfulness-book-xxxii-of-the-revival-of-the-religious-sciences-ghazali-series
More from H. T. Littlejohn in this library, click here.