[1] William C. Chittick’s, Science of the Cosmos, Science of the Soul The Pertinence of Islamic Cosmology in the Modern World [re-read]. [2] The Book Of Illumination Sign Of Success on the Spiritual Path by Shaykh Ahmad Ibn ‘Ata’ Allah Al-Iskandari. [3] Jamaluldeen Abdullah Ibn Hisham al-Ansari’s, Sharh Shudhur al-Dhahab; [4] Sherman Jackson’s, On the Boundaries of Theological Tolerance in Islam Abu Hamid Al Ghazali’s Faysal L Tafriqa; [5] Seyyed Nasr’s, Science and Civilization in Islam; [6] Awdhah al-Masalik ila Alfiyat Ibn Malik Ibn Hisham al-Ansari; [7] Seyyed Hossein Nasr’s, Knowledge and the Sacred [re-read]; [8] Mystical Dimensions of Islam by Annemarie Schimmel; [9] A History of Islamic Legal Theories An Introduction to Sunni Usul Al-Fiqh, by Wael B. Hallaq; [10] also by Wael B. Hallaq, The Origins And Evolution Of Islamic Law; [11] Sufi Essays from Seyyed Hossein Nasr; [12] The Sacred Foundations of Justice in Islam The Teachings of Ali Ibn Abi Talib by Reza Shah Kazemi, M Ali Lakhani, and Leonard Lewisohn; [13] The Art of Reciting the Qur’an by Kristina Nelson; [14] Muhtar Holland’s Inner Dimensions of Islamic Worship – Al Ghazali; [15] The Essential Seyyed Hossein Nasr edited by William C. Chittick; [16] Daniel Abdal Hayy Moore’s Ramadan Sonnets/Poems; [17] Al-Ghazali’s Path to Sufism; [18] Ibn Qayyim Al-Jawziyya on the Invocation of God from Al-Wabil Al-Sayyib Min Al-Kalim Al-Tayyib Muhammad Ibn Abi Bakr Ibn Qayyim Al Jawziyah; [19] Al-Ghazali’s Letter to a Disciple (Ghazali Series) Abu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazali [re-read]; [20] Mulla Sadra’s The Elixir of the Gnostics Muhammad Ibn Ibrahim Sadr Al-Din Shirazi; [21] Ebrahim Moosa’s Ghazali And The Poetics Of Imagination [continuation]; [22] The Self-Disclosure of God Principles of Ibn Al-’Arabi’s Cosmology from William Chittick; [23] also from Chittick, Fakhruddin Iraqi Divine Flashes; [24] Hadith study: Sunan Abu Dawud; [25] Ira M. Lapidus’ A History of Islamic Societies [continuation]; [26] Ibn Ishaq’s al-Sirah al-Nabawiyyah; [27] The Sufi Path of Knowledge by William Chittick; [28] The Practice of Everyday Life by Michel De Certeau; [29] After the Death of God by John D Caputo and Gianni Vattimo; [30] Tommie Shelby’s We Who Are Dark; [31] The Case for Islamo-Christian Civilization by Richard W. Bulliet; [32] Imam al-Ghazali’s Ihya’ uluwm al-Deen [Arabic version]; [33] The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State by Noah Feldman; [34] al-Ghazali on the Manners Relating to Eating Book XI of the Revival of the Religious Sciences, translation by Denys Johnson-Davies; [35] David C. Lindberg and his The Beginnings of Western Science: The European Scientific Tradition in Philosophical, Religious, and Institutional Context, Prehistory to A.D. 1450; [36] al-Ghazali’s On Disciplining the Soul and on Breaking the Two Desires Books Xxii and Xxiii of the Revival of the Religious Sciences Nakamura; [37] White by Richard Dyer [continuation]; [38] Deliverance from Error and Mystical Union With the Almighty Al-Munqidh Min Al-Dalal by al-Ghazali; [39] Martin Lings’s Muhammad His Life Based on the Earliest Sources [continuation]; [40] Hadith Qudsi; [41] The Connectors in Modern Standard Arabic by Nariman Naili Al Warraki and Ahmed Taher Hassanein [review].
And while this may seem a bit ambitious, I will do my best to wade through this impressive stack this summer. I am going to try to adhere to the order as much as possible.
May 23rd, 2008 at 9:32 am
Ambitious would be a kind word
I tried to set an aim or goal that was further than what I could normally achieve such that I can get the maximum out of it. If I really do read all these by summer’s end I might just quite my day gig and rent myself out as a walking library!
I put them in that order as I roughly felt that they related to one another as the list descends, although the Arabic texts are peppered to give me a chance to absorb them at a more diligent rate.
What are you studying in grad school? I’m hoping to take that plunge within the next year or two, in sha’ Allah.
May 23rd, 2008 at 10:31 am
Who said I was drinkin’? Maybe I’m taking a shower
May 23rd, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Baba – perhaps I can make an analogy between drinking and our jahili times as American converts.
Drinking takes stamina. And for some, who are unaccustomed, they will become inebriated even with a small amount of imbibing. But, like any tried and true drunk can tell you, you build a tolerance. The more you drink, the more you can drink, until one gets to the point that downing an entire bottle is nothing at all. The flip side is that one comes to need his or her drink more and more frequently to the point that in order to feel like you’ve drank anything at all, you must be completely inundated by it.
Such is drinking – such is reading.
May 23rd, 2008 at 12:49 pm
that is a reading list….i don’t think i have read that many books in my entire life…i guess you thought i was learned!!! good luck…i will go to sparknotes instead…
May 23rd, 2008 at 1:55 pm
That looks more like a “summer” reading list for the other side of the Arctic Circle…
May 23rd, 2008 at 3:29 pm
Wanda – http://www.islamicbookstore.com and http://www.halalco.com are both great resources for buying Islamic books online, also your local unversities have extensive libraries that you can borrow from, especially if there is a good religious studies/islamic/arabic program there.
Marc – My masters program is in peace operations. It’s sort of a hybrid of peacekeeping, international development, conflict analysis/resolution, and lots of UN stuff. InshaAllah, you’ll do fine in grad school, it many ways it’s easier than undergrad. The course of study is more focused and the schedules are more accomodating for older students who work full time.
May 23rd, 2008 at 8:50 pm
marc: please go to latoya@nyu.edu and request “Dolphin Food” reading list[ 12 years old; top 100 books, with “electees”[new books replacing one or more of the codified 100 ‘pieces’ of “Dolphin Food”. there is also a ’short version’ of Dolphin Food, “”do;phin snacks’[ 38 books for “Accelerated High-School
Students”. I hope these 2 lists will “hose ya” !
May 27th, 2008 at 12:50 am
Great list – these books will be excellent resources that you’ll go back to time and again long after the first reading. Whenever time permits you may want to see if you can locate a copy of “The History of Islamic Philosophy” by Henry Corbin – a very readable and indispensable overview of the many intersecting philosophical and theological threads that have emerged over the span of Islamic history. In the meantime, you’ve got quite a sumptuous reading feast already picked out.
May 27th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
oh, Chittick rocks, btw.
May 27th, 2008 at 1:53 pm
LOL Fairuza! I don’t think that it’s all that sophisticated. But thanks – makes it seem so much more studious than it really is.
I second your notion on professor Chittick. I greatly admire his writings.
Speaking of Chittick, I met Seyyed Houssein Nasr this weekend while photographing at ISNA. I wish I had brought a book for him to sign.
May 27th, 2008 at 3:59 pm
That’s quite a list!!! I guess I should compile my list now I’m currently reading some DH Lawrence and re-reading The Ideal Muslimah. You have inspired me to finish reading Ihya Ulum Al-Deen.
ma’a salaamah,
ha
May 27th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
Update: personal book expenses since February 2008 [excluding school books] = $1,025 and climbing. Will crest $1,300 with the new edition of Lisan al-’Arab this week. Please feel free to make donations.
May 28th, 2008 at 9:55 pm
Wow, Marc. I don’t what to say. $1025 for books? I think I might have spent that much on books for my entire BA.
You need a tip jar or something.
May 29th, 2008 at 11:43 am
That’s a great idea. I’ll have to go and get me one of those. And some card board to break dance on down on Broad and Chestnut.
I will, iA, try to get that done. It should be out sometime between Summer 2008 and Summer 3008.
July 19th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
What do you think of Lapidus’ book? I wanted to get a book that combined history with a bit of encyclopedic knowledge and was thinking of either his book or Hodgson’s “Venture of Islam”. Any recommendations?
October 24th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
[...] some of you read before, I had been doing a bit of light reading before heading off to ‘Umrah. Upon my return I decided to put aside some of the heavier bits [...]