Ethics and the Self in Islam
Historical and Contemporary Conversations
- World Religions
- Publisher: Fortress Press (Augsburg Fortress)
- Published: 2026
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Publisher's Description
This collection of essays examines the evolving relationship between ethical values and conceptions of individual identity throughout the history of Islamic thought. The authors trace the transformations and new directions of ethics as the individual "self" has been reconceptualized in light of shifting cultural, religious, political, and scientific norms. With chapters ranging from the Qur'an to modern laypeople and scholars--and from Morocco to Pakistan--this volume illustrates how Muslims' notions of "the individual" and "the ethical" have been in close conversation in both ancient and contemporary contexts.
Endorsements (2)
“This is an outstanding collection and a must-read for serious students of Islam. The unifying dialectic of loss and recovery that runs through the volume is both compelling and refreshing. This book authoritatively shows that Islamic discourses on the self and ethics have never been rigid or static, but instead historically contingent and richly dynamic.”
“This is a welcome and much-needed contribution at the intersection of two important turns in the study of Islam: the emphasis on ethics and the growing interest in the question of the self and personhood. The volume brings together experts in a wide range of disciplines to examine this complex set of concepts from the perspectives of exegetical, jurisprudential, philosophical, mystical, and postcolonial studies. In doing so, it simultaneously deepens our understanding of the relation between ethics and the self in Islamic intellectual traditions and situates the Islamic approaches to those notions within the humanities more broadly.”
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