In traditional Islam, Adam is the first human created. Eve, or Hawa, was created to be his mate and she was made from Adam’s uppermost left rib. There has been a move to argue that Eve and Adam were created simultaneously. I will argue that, because of the negative patriarchal and misogynistic imagery that has been attached to Islam, some feminist Muslim thinkers are attempting to move Islam into a realm where they believe is revolutionary enough to make a new statement in the modern world. These feminist Muslims are making strides to make the Qur'an the sole authority in Islam, while simultaneously dismissing all traditional accounts that have historically been used to assist in interpreting the Qur’an. Although their conclusions are interesting, their methods will be the focus of my thesis. What these feminists are attempting is a method of interpretation that has never been widely accepted in Islam.

The purpose of the paper is to reconstruct Smith's view not only of human being but also of the economic system basing on his action, so as to show in what way Amartya Sen constructs his moral economic account on these presuppositions and how he conceptualizes some specific Smithian principles, reintegrating them in economic theorising. Sen's model of behavior but also his holistic views on the economy and human development, which have accumulated in the well known capability approach, is inspired by the philosophical work of Adam Smith. In fact, there are more similarities between the two economists than one might think. (...) (author´s abstract) / Series: Working Papers / Institut für Sozialpolitik

Abstract Adam Smith is one of the mostly widely read eighteenth-century thinkers, enjoying a scholar reputation among economist, social scientists, political theorists, as well as philosophers. It is frequently believed that the great eighteenth-century Scottish moral philosophy Adam Smith was an extreme dogmatic defender of laissez-faire. It seems clear that Adam Smith has undergone an ideologically based reinterpretation. Smith¡¦s ¡¨invisible hand¡¨ , the most famous metaphor in economics and social science, has been identical with the automatic equilibrating mechanism of the competitive market. Free-market exchanges can unintentionally produce economic well-being, but only under certain specific conditions. Smith¡¦s thesis is that the invisible hand works because, and only when, people operate with restrains self-interest in cooperation with others under the precepts of justice. I found that public spirit, or civic virtue was, for Smith, a vitally important aspect of political economy. I noted that for Smith all constitutions must be judged by the happiness of the people who live under them. Thus, government plays the read role in securing the common good in society.

Texte légèrement remanié de: Dissertation--Frankfurt am Main--Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität, 2005/2006. / Bibliogr. des oeuvres de Glafey p. 311-318. Bibliogr. p. 318-347.

Zugl.: Hamburg, Univ., Diss., 2006

Thesis (M.A.)--Catholic Theological Union, 2002. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 103-106).

Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses created a major controversy when published in 1988, much like the controversy that Nikos Kazantzakis's novel The Last Temptation of Christ caused in 1951. Kazantzakis's work upset many Christians due to the controversial characterization of Jesus, who in the novel engages in sexual activities and other behaviors that many Christians find offensive. The Satanic Verses caused a similar uproar in the Umma, or Muslim community, resulting in book burnings, death threats, and even a murder. Most of the controversy focused on some the problematic characterizations of the Prophet Muhammad and his wives, such as using their names for a pimp and twelve prostitutes living in a brothel. Another offense was that Ibrahim was called "bastard" for abandoning Hagar and Ismail (Ishmael), in the desert. In The Satanic Verses, Rushdie pulls on the historical threads of Pre-Islamic Arabia and uses them to insinuate that Islam, rather than being a total breach from the Pre-Islamic traditions, was not an immediate break from the past but a slow process of change from the former belief system. By re-imagining these historical threads, Rushdie suggests that there is a plurality of possibilities that canonical Islam does not accept. The plurality that Rushdie suggests is anathema to the normative view of Islam, which is a monolithic Islam. These possibilities cast doubt on the purity of the Prophet, which some fear can cause ordinary Muslims to doubt the truth claims of Islam. These doubts can damage the faith of the believers and the unity of the Umma. These and other Islamic themes in the novel remain unexplored in contemporary scholarship of the novel, particularly the theme of struggle between good and evil. Gibreel Farishta, the co-protagonist in the novel, will be the center of this inquiry. I will explore the notion that the plight of Gibreel Farishta in The Satanic Verses is similar to the suffering of Iblis in Sufi Islam.

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The Chronicle of the thirteenth-century Franciscan friar Salimbene de Adam is filled with an abundance of self-referential passages. At almost every step of his narrative we are made extremely aware of Salimbene’s presence, as an author, a compiler of texts and anecdotes, a commentator and as an eye-witness to his age. Due to his ubiquitous ‘I’, Salimbene’s Cronica is often thought to be a subjective, biased and an ahistorical manifestation of traditional medieval universal histories. His supposed inappropriate self-interest has caused modern historians to mark both writer and text as a curiosity which defies any sort of logical definition. This mind-set has served not only to disconnect Salimbene and his Cronica from the historiographical, religious and social influences which pervaded his age, but importantly from the integral context provided by his work as a Franciscan friar. This thesis departs from treating Salimbene’s Cronica as a document to be mined for information about his world, an approach that largely eschews traditional methodologies associated with the study of chronicles. This thesis establishes the terms and boundaries of Salimbene’s authorship and contextualises them thoroughly with the performances associated with his duties as a Franciscan in the spiritual and social world of thirteenth-century Italy. Salimbene was primarily priest and preacher as he so often tells us. Viewing Salimbene’s authorial presence through the lens of his performances as an historian, preacher, confessor and priest reveals that his Franciscan ‘Experience’ informed and shaped noticeable narrative strategies which are associated with his efforts to establish and exercise authority both in his text and the world in which he lived. Rather than being a curious exception, Salimbene’s strong authorial persona was connected intricately to the changes in the social and spiritual milieus that irrevocably impacted upon the writing of history during the thirteenth century.