“When Blaise Pascal wrote of Montaigne that he ‘felt the defects of a rigid method’, he might as well have applied the same judgment to al-Jāḥiẓ. Like Montaigne, the intellect of al-Jāḥiẓ was unencumbered by dogma and, like Montaigne, al-Jāḥiẓ found in the essay or epistle form the perfect vehicle for the free and unconventional expression of his ideas and reflections on man, nature and society. Many parallels can indeed be drawn between the 16th century French aristocrat and the 9th century Basran polymath, foremost among which one might suggest the concept of “humanism” which the editors decided to be the subtitle of this conference. Why did we make that decision, and can this concept be fruitfully retrojected from the European Renaissance back to ʿAbbasid Iraq?”
The papers gathered in this volume were originally presented at a conference entitled “al-Jāḥiẓ: A Muslim Humanist for Our Time”, held in Beirut in January 2005 and convened under the auspices of the American University of Beirut and the Orient-Institut Beirut. The authors examine diverse aspects of the intellectual range and literary achievements of al-Jāḥiẓ one of the most famous writers of classical Arabic prose, who died in 255 AH/ca. 868 CE, off ering a heretofore unmatched assessment of his works as an expression of humanism.
Arnim Heinemann, Research Associate at Orient-Institut Beirut, 2004-2008. Currently Managing Director at the Berlin Graduate School Muslim Cultures and Societies.
John L. Meloy, Associate Professor, Department of History and Archaeology, American University of Beirut.
Tarif Khalidi, Shaykh Zayid Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies, Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies, American University of Beirut.
Manfred Kropp, Professor of Semitic Languages and Islamic Studies, Mainz University. European Chair of “Éudes coraniques”, Collèe de France, 2007/08. Director of Orient-Institut Beirut, 2000-2007.
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