Transcript Sufism&Judiasm - Naqshbandiya Foundation For Islamic Education

ISLAM AND JUDAISM
Ahmed Mirza M.D
Naqshbandiya Foundation For
Islamic Education(NFIE)
Abraham:Father of
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Jews,Christians&Muslims
Abraham means "Father of Many
Nations.“He believed in One God
Jews know this one God as Yahweh or
Yehovah, the self-Existent or Eternal.
Jehovah, the Lord.
Muslims know this God as Allah. They
say there is "No god, but God."
Christians know the Sacred One first in
Matthew 1:23 as Emanuel, "God with Us."
Prophet Abraham in Islam
Faith, sacrifice, commitment and patience
Salam (peace) be upon Abraham! Quran
(37:109).
In Islam, Prophet Ibrahim/Abraham is the
friend of God and the father of Prophets
(Ismail/Ishmael and Ishaq/Isaac and the
grandfather of Prophet Yaqub/Jacob). He
is also one of the ancestors of the Prophet
Muhammad.Peace&Blessings be upon
them
Abrahamic Faiths
Abraham
Isaac
Ishmael
Moses
Jesus
Muhammad
Judaism
Christianity
Islam
Law
Way
Law+Way
Prophet Abraham in Islam
• Salat-Prayer: Muslims must ask God to send His
blessings upon Prophet Ibrahim/Abraham&his Family
during five daily prayers&face towards Kaaba in Makkah
built by Abraham&Ishmael
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• Hajj-Pilgrimage:“You must adhere to the traditions and
rituals (of Hajj), for these have come down to you from
(your forefather) Ibrahim in heritage”Hadith (Tirmidhi).
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• Eid-ul-Adha: The sacrifice is offeredin commemoration
of the supreme act and spirit of sacrifice offered by
Prophet Abraham in lieu of his son Ismail/Ishmael.
O God! Send blessings upon
Muhammad and upon the House of
Muhammad as You sent blessings upon
Abraham and upon the House of
Abraham; indeed, You are praiseworthy
and glorious. O God! Bless Muhammad
and the House of Muhammad as You
blessed Abraham and the House of
Abraham; indeed, You are praiseworthy
and glorious
Abraham in Judaism&Christianity
• Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your
country and your kindred and your father's
house to the land that I will show you. I will
make of you a great nation, and I will bless
you, and make your name great, so that you
will be a blessing. I will bless those who
bless you, and the one who curses you I will
curse; and in you all the families of he earth
shall be blessed
Genesis 12:1-3 (NRSV)
THE JEWISH CHRISTIAN MUSLIM SYMBIOSIS:
The Golden Age of Jewry in Muslim Spain(711-1496)
In the 13th century, nearly 90% of the world’s
Jewry lived under Muslim rule. Jews read and
wrote in Arabic, worked hand in hand with
Muslims at commercial projects, and even
studied the Koran in the schools known as
madrassas. Once introduced to the great Sufi
thinkers, many of the more mystically inclined
Jews responded to the deep piety of their
spiritual cousins and ingested their ideas
Reviving the Model of
Muslim Spain
“I believe there are three reasons that learning
about Al-Andalus is crucial to the world today:
1.The level of civilization that Al-Andalus
achieved. At a time when the rest of Europe was
shrouded in the Dark Ages, the Muslim city of
Cordoba in Al-Andalus was the most advanced
city on the entire European Continent. In
philosophy, architecture, mathematics,
astronomy, medicine, poetry, theology, and
numerous other fields of human endeavor,
medieval Islam was the world's most advanced
civilization”.Three wise men:Averroes,Maimonides,Thomas Aquinas.
Jacob Bender
Reviving the Model of
Muslim Spain
• 2.Al-Andalus in particular, and Islamic
civilization in general, served as both the
repository of ancient Greek knowledge
and science, and the transmission point in
its journey to the Christian-dominated
West.
Three wise men:Averroes,Maimonides,Thomas Aquinas.
Jacob Bender
Reviving the Model of
Muslim Spain
• 3.The culture of Al-Andalus is now justly
celebrated for the extent that religious pluralism
and tolerance were hallmarks of this most
glorious age, as manifested in Islam's respect
for ahl al-kitab, the "People of the Book."
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Three wise men: Averroes,Maimonides, and Thomas Aquinas, Bender
Mosque,Cathedral,Cordoba
THE JEWISH CHRISTIAN MUSLIM SYMBIOSIS:
The Golden Age of Jewry in Muslim Spain(711-1496)
Mosque
Synagogue
THE THREE WISE MEN OF THE
MIDDLE AGES
• Averoes, Maimonides, and Aquinas lived during
a time of unprecedented and reciprocal spiritual
intellectual and cultural exchange between
Islam, Judaism, and Christianity, specially during
the so called Golden Age of Muslim Spain that
continues to inspire, both by its high level of
civilization and its tolerance.
Three wise men: Averroes.
Ibn Rushd,Averroe‘s, was born in Cordoba,
Spain in1126 and died in 1198. He is without
question the greatest mind produced by Islamic
civilization in Al-Andalus. As a young man, Ibn
Rushd already excelled in theology, religious
law, astronomy, literature, mathematics, music,
zoology, medicine and philosophy.
Three wise men: Averroes, Moses Maimonides, and Thomas Aquinas.
Jacob Bender
Three wise men: Averroes
It is in the field of philosophy, however, that Ibn
Rushd left an indelible mark upon the intellectual
history of Western civilization. In the year 1169,
Ibn Rushd was asked by the Caliph to undertake
new and up-to-date Arabic translations and
commentaries of the works of Aristotle. Ibn
Rushd's commentaries on Aristotle have had an
immense impact upon both Christian and Jewish
philosophy for hundreds of years.
Three wise men: Averroes, Moses Maimonides, and Thomas Aquinas.
Jacob Bender
Moses Maimonides (1135-1204)
• Visionary thinker’Prolific author,Wrote on topics
ranging from physics to Jewish Law, theology to
politics, psychology to Biblical exegesis, and from
philosophy to medicine. Rich and complex in their
own right, Maimonides' writings must, however, be
understood within their 12th-13th century Spanish
Muslim context,of the works of three of the most
well-known Islamic thinkers, al-Farabi (ca. 870-950),
Avicenna (Ibn Sina) (980-1037) and Averroes (Ibn
Rushd) (1126-1198).
• The Influence of Islamic Thought on Maimonides:
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:Jun 30, 2005;
Moses Maimonides & Ibn Rushd
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Born 12 years after Ibn Rushd.
Most important Jewish thinker in the last 2,000
Both were born in Cordoba in Al-Andalus
Both became philosopher/theologians
Both became interpreters of Aristotle
Both harmonized the reason with the revelations
Both became jurists of Shariah&Halakhah
Both lived part of their lives in Fez in Morocco
Both became court physicians, Ibn Rushd to the
Caliph of Cordoba, Rabbi Musa to the great Salahah-Din in Egypt.
Moses Maimonides
• Shining example of the Muslim-ChristianJewish symbiosis that went on for 800
years and was ultimately extinguished by
the Spanish Inquisition in 1478. Jews at
that time fled to the only country that
would allow them an asylum, the Ottoman
Empire where they celebrated 500 years
of prosperity
Moses Maimonides
13 principles of faith
God’s Existence
God's unity
God'sSpirituality and Incorporeality
God's Eternity
God alone should be the object of worship
Relevation through God's Prophets
The preeminence of Moses among the
Prophets
God's law given on Mount Sinai
The immutability of theTorah as God's Law
God's foreknowledge of human actions
Reward of good and retribution of evil
The coming of the Jewish Messiah
The Resurrection of the dead
Three Wise Men:Thomas Aquinas
• Born near Naples,Italy in1225,is the most
important and influential Christian philosopher of
the Middle Ages. His masterpiece, the Summa
Theologiae, is widely considered the most
comprehensive exploration of philosophy and
theology in the entire history of Christianity. And
like Ibn Rushd and Rabbi Musa before him, as
was primarily concerned with finding a way of
incorporating Aristotle's rationalism into Christian
theology.
Three wise men: Averroes,Maimonides,Thomas Aquinas.
Jacob Bender
Rabbi Abraham Maimonides
(1186-1237)
• Eminent exponent of the
medieval Jewish-Sufi
synthesis,compiled
treatise Kifayat ul-'Abidin
[the compendium for
those who serve God]
advocated an ideal of
sublime piety based on a
discipline of mystical
communion,recommende
d Sufi practices, solitary
contemplation and dhikr,
repetitions of the divine
names.
• Sources:Eliezer Segal
Rabbi Abraham Maimonides
(1186-1237)
• Abraham grew up in a truly multi-cultural world, where
Moslems, Jews and even Christians interacted in one of
the most accepting societies in the history of man. Unlike
our current epoch, when the voices of hatred speak far
louder than those of friendship, medieval Egypt was a
place of mutual respect, protective laws and surprisingly
strong and positive relations between the religions. It
was also a time and place rife with Sufis and Sufi
thought - and Jewish libraries often contained books by
such masters as al-Ghazali, as-Suhrawardi and al-Hallaj,
all dutifully transcribed into the blocky Hebrew script of
the local Jewish population. Sufis and Jews knew each
other, read each other's books and even compared
notes on spirituality and the quest for divine union with
God. Tom Block
Kifayat ul-'Abidin
[the compendium for those who serve God]
Abraham Maimonides
• Mystical masterpiece,2500-pages, first three chapters rehashing his father's thought and laws ,fourth section
spelled out in minute detail the tariqa,the Sufi Path,
including sincerity, mercy, generosity, gentleness,
humility, faith, contentedness, abstinence, mortification
and solitude. He also mentions that upon successful
completion of the "path" and the achievement of divine
union with God,the seeker is to wear the Sufi garb. He
himself, wore Sufi Khirqah implying that he had not only
followed the Sufi Way, but had completed it!The Kifaya,
had already spread to distant lands in his own lifetime,
taking with it his ideas on Sufism tomblock.com
Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (1058-1111)
• al Ghazali played a similar role to Islam
as did Maimonides to Judaism: aligning
mystical and more orthodox streams,
allowing these two impulses to coexist
within the same religion. Quoted time and
again in Jewish tracts,his treatises have
been found copied out into Hebrew in
medieval Jewish libraries, and his ideas
are sprinkled throughout medieval Jewish
texts.
Abu Hamid al-Ghazali (1058-1111)
• Al-Ghazali’s influence on Jewish mysticism was far
reaching,Jewish mystics,Moses Maimonides (12th
century), Abraham he-Hasid (13th century), Obadyah
Maimonides (13th century), Judah Halevi (12th century),
Abraham Ibn Hasdai (13th century) up to the Kabbalist
Abraham Gavison of Tlemcen (17th century) specifically
quoted the Sufi master in their own exegesis of Jewish
life and law.Rabbi Gavison stated “I have translated the
poetry of this sage, for even though he be not of the
children of Israel, it is accepted that the pious of the
gentiles have a share in the world to come and surely
heaven will not withhold from him the reward of his faith.”
Solomon Ibn Gabirol (b.1020).
Personified the
interweaving of Judaism
and Islam.He assimilated
ideas from Sufis Ikhwan
as-Safa, to such an
extent that after the
Bible,it was his primary
source of inspiration!He
also followed the
teachings of Sufi mystic
Ibn Masarra (883-931),
who had introduced
Sufism to Spain.
MEDITATION
Three things remind me of
You,
the heavens
who are a witness to Your
name
the earth
which expands my thought
and is the thing on which I
stand
and the musing of my heart
when I look within.
Statue of Solomon Ibn Gabirol
in a park in Málaga, Spain
Muhyiddin Ibn Arabi
(1165-1240)
Ibn Arabi&Ibn Gabirol,were the two great
followers of Sufi mystic Ibn Masarra (883931) . Where al-Ghazali was known as the
“Renovator of Islam,” Ibn Arabi was the
“Distiller,” taking 500 fertile years of Sufi
thought,and creating a unified vision of
Islamic mysticism, influencing virtually all
of Islamic spirituality that postdated his
fertile life span and much of Jewish
mysticism, as well.
Abraham Abulafia(1240-1291)
• “In addition to Abulafia’s belief in the ability to commune
completely with God, he borrowed much of what is today
commonly thought of as particularly Jewish mystical
prayer from the Muslim mystics called the “Science of
the Letters.” This system, based in a complicated series
of chants, breathing techniques, movements of the head,
and special clothing, had very little to do with the
traditional laws of Judaism. Many of these same ideas
and rites, however, could be found in the Sufi practice of
that time.Abulafia imported the emotional aspects of
Sufism into Kabbalistic practice” Shalom/Salaam, Tom Block
Abraham Abulafia
• The gentle melding of Sufism with Judaism produced a
period of tremendous fertility in the Jewish religion –
some have even claimed it to be the most productive
and creative epoch in the entire history of Jewish
mysticism. After the Sufi influence was digested, a few
hundred years after Abraham Abulafia’s death, the face
of Jewish worship itself had changed, with
reverberations reaching deep into the inner sanctum of
the Jewish Kabbalah and down to the Baal Shem Tov’s
Hasidism. Even today, contemporary Jewish adepts in
Jerusalem, Europe and even Brooklyn worship in ways
that are more reminiscent of Sufism than earlier, premedieval Jewish spirituality
Shalom/Salaam,Tom Block
A Sufi-Jewish Dialogue
Philosophy and Mysticism in Bahya ibn Paquda's
Duties of the Heart
Diana Lobel
• Written in eleventh-century Muslim Spain , Bahya Ibn
Paquda's Duties of the Heart is a profound guidebook of
Jewish spirituality.Diana Lobel explores the full extent to
which Duties of the Heart marks the flowering of the
"Jewish-Muslim symbiosis,"
Bahya a maverick who integrated abstract negative
theology, devotion to the inner life, and an intimate
relationship with a personal God,steeped in Islamic
traditions represents a genuine bridge between religious
cultures. He brings together, as well, a rationalist,
philosophical approach and a strain of Sufi mysticism,
paving the way for the integration of philosophy and
spirituality in the thought of Moses Maimonides.
Kitab al-hidayah ila fara’id al-qulub
(Guidance to the Duties of the Heart)
Bahya Ibn Paquda's
Ten Principles
1.Sincere profession of the oneness of God (ikhlas al-tawhid)
2.Consideration for all created beings (al-i'tibar bilmakhluqin)
3.Obedience to God (ta'at Allah),
4.Abandonment(tamakkul,the principle of giving oneself entirely to Him)
5.Sincerity of action (ikhlas)
6.Humility (tawadu')
7.Repentance (tawba)
8.Constant examination of one's conscience (muhasaba),
9.Abstinence and asceticism (zuhd)
10.Love of God (mahabba)
Kabbalah
Jewish mysticism,
developing during 12th to 17th AD
The Zohar (Book of Splendor)
a mystical interpretation of the Torah
God as ultimate reality,
God as the Boundless is En Sof,
transcendent,beyond all human
comprehension
Ten emanations (sefirot) come from En Sof,
Ten forms of God's presence in creation
Kabbalah
– Divine Will generates
Wisdom and Intelligence
– Wisdom and Intelligence
generates Grace/Love
and Power
– the union of Grace/Love
and Power produces
Beauty
– from Grace, Power,
Beauty springs the
natural world
– other emanations:
Sovereignty,
Glory/Presence or
Shekina, Community
or Knessetl, human
beings are imbued
with something from
all of God's
emanations
TREE OF LIFE
Daniel Pearl Foundation
The Daniel Pearl Foundation was formed in
memory of journalist Daniel Pearl to
further the ideals that inspired Daniel's life
and work. The foundation's mission is to
promote cross-cultural understanding
through journalism, music, and innovative
communications
The Daniel Pearl Foundation
Judea Pearl
“We hope our impact would take effect on both the
symbolic and substantive dimensions. Symbolically, we
wish to demonstrate that even the hardest issues
underlying Jewish-Muslim tensions could be discussed
in a civil, friendly and respectful manner. Substantively,
we wish to remind people of the common principles that
underlie the two Abrahamic traditions, to understand the
mechanism of the golden age when the two societies
thrived as friendly neighbors and, most importantly, to
explore how these commonalities can help us shape a
future of peace and understanding. Fostering MuslimJewish Dialogue”
Judea Pearl and Akbar Ahmed discuss their message of
reconciliation at Duke University, February 25, 2005
The Daniel Pearl Foundation
Akbar Ahmed
“I hope that what sticks with them is the common
humanity that binds us, transcends all other loyalties,
ethnic, political, ideological. Our roots go back to a
common idea, to the patriarch Abraham. The number
one idea Muslims and Jews share is that there is an
omnipotent God. They both have Holy Books; they
believe in an afterlife, in doing good and avoiding evil
and that the 10 commandments guide society. This is a
very, very strong common base, unfortunately, it isn't
often known. Fostering Muslim-Jewish Dialogue”
Judea Pearl and Akbar Ahmed discuss their message of
reconciliation at Duke University, February 25, 2005
Conclusion:Three Wise Men
Jacob Bender
• “I believe that some eight hundred years after
they lived, Ibn Rushd the Muslim, Rabbi Musa
the Jew, and Thomas Aquinas the Christian can
still all enter both our hearts and minds if we let
them. Their words, and their life stories, can both
inform and inspire us about some of the greatest
issues confronting us at the beginning of this
new century: the relationship between religion
and the state, between faith and science,
between reason and revelation; the dangers of
political extremism; and the courage it often
takes to oppose injustice and search for truth
Conclusion:Three Wise Men
Jacob Bender
By reading and interpreting their writings,
we can discover that we, Muslims, Jews
and Christians, are all Ibnu Ibrahim, the
children of Abraham, PBUH. We can
discover that in the struggle to create a
more just and peaceful world, we may
perhaps have more in common with those
in other traditions who share our values of
justice than with the more extreme
followers within our own religious families”.
Three wise men: Averroes, Moses Maimonides,
and Thomas Aquinas.
Jacob Bender
• Just as our three wise men were not afraid to challenge prevailing
opinion within their own religious community in the Middle Ages, so
today I believe we must also be willing to openly criticize our coreligionists when they engage in extremism and intolerance. Thus
Muslim religious leaders around the world condemned the Taliban's
destruction of the ancient Buddhist statues in Afghanistan and the
9/11 terror attacks by Al-Qaeda. Thus many Christian ministers in
the US denounced the bigoted attacks on Islam by Reverends Pat
Robertson, Jerry Fallwell and Franklin Graham And thus many
Jews, like myself, have for decades supported the right of the
Palestinian people to an independent state and condemned Israel's
brutal occupation with its assassinations, house demolitions,
closures, and illegal settlement policy
Three wise men: Averroes, Moses Maimonides, and Thomas Aquinas.
Jacob Bender