Dawat-e-Islami. (DI) is a worldwide Islamic movement based in Karachi, Pakistan. Its mission statement, "I must strive to reform myself and people of the entire world", points to an emphasis on individual reform which can lead to a broader social reform. This reform is to be achieved through tableegh, eschewing what are considered to be 'contemporary forms of politics' and calling for a revival of core Islamic traditions of akhlaq, huqooq-ul-ibaad, and ilm-e-deen. Allamah Muhammad Ilyas Qadri, the ameer ofDI, cites Imam Ahmed Raza Khan (1856-1921), a preeminent Islamic scholar considered by many to be the mujaddid of his time, to be a singular source of guidance and inspiration in his mission. In this study, I will seek to understand how this connection manifests itself in the development of Dl's reformist mission. I argue that the work of Imam Ahmed Raza has been used to construct a discourse of social reform aimed at bringing to fruition an Islamic revival which DI understands to have been at the heart of the Imam's intellectual and spiritual legacy. Through an analysis of framing processes, I will examine how DI's mission of social reform has been shaped by the work ofImam Ahmed Raza, with a particular focus on how the religious discourse which constitutes the Imam's scholarly corpus has been used to develop collective action frames aimed at addressing social issues. Using written and multimedia texts, I will explore how these frames have been articulated and amplified in a social context and why these 'transformed' frames have resonated with audiences where conventional religious discourse has not.

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This research is about the development of Islamic political thought in relation to the West during the mid-twentieth century. It utilizes the ideas and writings of the Islamic thinkers Sayyid Qutb of Egypt, Ali Shariati of Iran, and Jalal Al-e Ahmad of Iran to illustrate this development. These figures reacted severely to Westernization (argued to constitute colonialism, materialism, and secularism) as they saw it. This research will argue that their reaction was due to the fatally corrosive effects each figure believed this was having upon Islamic civil society and the Islamic moral economy, both in their respective home homelands and throughout the greater global Ummah. Their perspective is unique because they were critiquing the West based upon their experiences while in the West, and using Western intellectual ideas to do so. This was done, this research contends, in reaction to aspects of Edward Said's Orientalism discourse. Qutb, Shariati, and Al-e Ahmad's reaction to the West, this research also argues, displays aspects of Friedrich Nietzsche's thought, namely that when an entity (in this case, Islam) encounters the West, God is lost in that encounter. Additionally, this research argues that Qutb, Shariati, and Al-e Ahmad sought to counter the loss of God in Islamic civil society and halt the influence of Westernization as they saw it via the political realm through the use of the Quran as law and government, thereby permanently restoring God to Islamic civil society and salvaging the Islamic moral economy.

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The Muslim philosophers al-Kindī and Avicenna founded their metaphysical system largely on concepts that they inherited from Aristotle Of primary importance among these concepts is that of substance, which the Muslim philosophers defined as that which exists by itself. Thus it may be seen that a substance is always a self-subsisting entity. Opposed to this view is the concept of accident, or property which may accrue to a substance at any one moment, and which does not affect its substantial existence. In as much as the concept of substance is fundamental to al- Kindī and Avicenna, so their definitions and classifications of it are important. For, ‘substance' embraces, material objects, souls, and intellects. On the definition of the material substance al- Kindī and Avicenna differed widely. They were, however, agreed in applying the term 'substance’ to every material body, and their disagreement is seen to be merely a technical one. al- Kindī and Avicenna believed in the existence of the soul, and attempted to prove its substantiality. More difficult to discern is their view of the facilities of the soul. Other problems to be raised are whether all souls may be united into one soul after death. The intellect is also a candidate for consideration as a substance. Some intellects are merely a faculty of soul, and neither thinker regards these as substances. Each, however, considers there to be substantial intellects: one only for al- Kindī but many for Avicenna, which he called pure intellects. The substantiality of God is a religious question, and one of importance since Plato. The attributed of God are limited to a few Neo-platonic concepts in the eyes of Muslim philosophers, and neither the Aristotelian substance, nor the Neo-Platonic hypostasis comes among these. Thus on religious issues they are finally compelled to reject Aristotelianism which supplied the foundations of their metaphysics.

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This thesis investigates the representations of Islam and of Muslims in English writing during the early modern period, with particular focus on the influence of the contents of the sub-genre of the polemic biography of Muhammad as a template for the construction of these representations. I will argue that the distorted representations of the figure of Muhammad contained in these biographies functioned as a prototype for the production of a series of essentialising views of Muslim identity which were then replicated throughout the textual production on Islam during the period. The study identifies the recurring themes of deception, gender and sexuality, and violence in the representations of Muhammad contained in the polemic biographies and then seeks to trace the recurrence of these thematic areas in the wider body of textual production on Islam during the period, with the aim of identifying the contents of the polemic biographies as a hermeneutical tool in the interpretation of Islam and Muslims. In examining the influence of the polemic biographies of Muhammad in the construction of Muslim identities in early modern English writing the thesis analyses examples of these biographies which occur in texts from in a wide variety of generic backgrounds over hundreds of years, including religious tracts, histories and travelers' accounts of the 'Islamic world' and will then examine the echoes of these thematic areas of representation contained in the polemic biographies in other areas of literary production, and in particular within the series of 'Turk plays' produced on the early modern stage. This thesis also examines the availability of materials on Islam in Britain during the early modern period and investigates the series of ideological and theological positions which informed the approaches to the subject of Islam in English texts. There are also six appendices which deal in more detail with issues important to the overall thesis, a discussion of which, in the main body of the work, would have interrupted the argument. The reader is referred to these when relevant.

This research examines two prominent theologians of the Assyrian Church of the East who responded to Islam’s perennial objections to the Christian Trinity and Christology. The theologians in question are Abū al-Faraj ʽAbd Allāh Ibn al-Ṭayyib (d. 1043/434) and Bishop Iliyyā of Nisibis (d. 1046/437). Both men were characterized by a remarkable literary production marking them out among the intellectual elite of their day as polymaths. The research discusses the two theologians as examples of Christian theological response in the Arab Muslim milieu. Ibn al-Ṭayyib, though recognized as an exegete, has not been noted for his contribution to Muslim-Christian discourse. The thesis identifies his response in his theological treatises. Though he did not engage with a specific dialogue partner nor even mention Islam explicitly, the questions he considered correspond unmistakably to the themes of the Muslim-Christian interface. The research features this implicit defence of divine unity in Ibn al-Ṭayyib’s theological formulations. Iliyyā of Nisibis, on the other hand, enjoyed a productive dialogue with the Shi’īte Vizier (Minister of State) of the Marwanid Dynasty (located in eastern Syria and Western Turkey today). The research highlights the ‘agnostic inquisitiveness’ of Abū al-Qāsim in tandem with the tawḥīd rhetoric of Iliyyā which occasioned one of the most promising examples of Muslim-Christian discourse of the medieval period known as The Sessions. Other works of Iliyyā are also considered. Both theologians dealt with critical questions posed by Muslim intellectuals concerning the Christian definition of divine unity in light of their Trinitarian and Christological formulations. The Christians claim divine unity (tawḥīd) as a correct descriptor of their view as they seek to secure the inclusion of their community in the fold of monotheism. Key questions include the definition of the Trinitarian hypostases and their relation to the divine essence (How can God be one and three?). The nature of the union of divinity and humanity in Christ is equally critical given that Muslims viewed the incarnation as an egregious example of shirk (associating the Creator with the created — polytheism). The two theologians borrowed from and developed the theological constructs of their predecessors as demonstrated by the thesis. Other topics include: the shaping of theological constructs by the Muslim milieu, lexical amendments due to Arabic and Islamic terminology, the duality of the hypostases in Christ proffered by the Church of the East (‘Nestorian’) and social and political implications of Christian adherence to divine unity. The research concludes with a discussion of implications of divine Trinitarian unity in today’s Arab Muslim world.

This thesis examines the composition of the Bustan us-Salatin by Nuruddin ar-Raniri using internal evidence to establish the aims of the author and the nature of the work. This analysis shows that the Bustan us-Salatin displays far greater planning and organization of material than has hitherto been recognized. It is suggested that Chapters 11, 12 and 13 of Book II were not part of the work as envisaged by Nuruddin ar-Raniri. An edition of Book IV of the bustan us-Salatin and a translation of the text is presented. The edition is accompanied by textual notes and lists of proper names and unusual words. An examination of the Arabic sources of the stories of Book IV has been undertaken with special emphasis on the works of al-Ghazzali and the Rawd at-rayahin of al-Yati'i and shows the selectivity with which Nuruddin ar-Raniri used materials from such sources. Parallel themes in Malay Literature have been examined concentrating especially on those within the Malay Taj us-Salatin and Ilikayut Bakhtiar.

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