Muslim Contributions to the History of Religions

Abstract

History of Religions in the West
A universal, comparative history of the study of religions is still far from
being written. Indeed, such a history is even hr from being conceived, because
its components among the legacies of non-Western scholars have hardly been
discovered. One such component, perhaps the most significant one, is the
contributions made by Muslim scholars during the Middle Ages to this
discipline. What is generally known and what has been documented in this
field consists entirely of the contribution of Westdm scholars of religion.
Even these Western scholars belong to the post-Enlightenment era of Wstern
history.
There is little work dealing with the history of religions which does not
claim the middle of the nineteenth century CE as the beginning of this
discipline. This may not be due only to the zeitgeist of the modem Wst
that entails aversion, downgrading, and undermining of everything stemming
from the Middie Ages; its justification may also be found in the intellectual
poverty of the Christian West (Muslim Spain excluded) that spans that historical
period.
Although most works dealing with this field include some incidental
references, paragraphs, pages, or short chapters on the contribution of the
past, according to each author’s estimation, all of these studies are categorized
under one of the two approaches to religion: philosophical or cubic. All of
the reflective, speculative, philosophical, psychological, historical, and
ethnological theories of the Greeks about the nature of the gods and goddesses
and their origins, about the nature of humanity’s religion, its mison dsttre,
and its function in society are described as philosophical quests for truth.
It is maintained that the Greeks’ contribution to the study of religion showed
their openness of mind and their curiosity about other religions and cultures ...