Monks by Night and Knights by Day

Ḥasan al-Bannāʾ,Tarbīya, and the embodied ethics of the early Muslim Brotherhood

Bibliographic Data

ID4299285
AuthorsSam Houston (0000-0001-5005-3248, corresponding author)
Year2018
Volume12
Issue7
Publication date2018-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueReligion Compass (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1749-8171 • E-ISSN: 1749-8171
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/rec3.12266
OpenAlexW2803751742
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited21

In this article, I trace and analyze the manifold ways in which Ḥasan al-Bannāʾ (d. 1949), founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, appropriated Ṣūfī thought and practice in the creation of Brotherhood doctrine and institutional structures, with a particular focus on his model of ethico-spiritual formation (tarbīya). For al-Bannāʾ, Ṣūfī discursive and embodied practices and the virtues they produced were required not only for individual flourishing, but as the necessary precondition for socio-political activism. Such a recognition of the embodied nature of ethical formation stands in contrast to Salafī epistemologies predicated on a scriptural positivism and an exoteric focus on law, and sheds further light on the early Muslim Brotherhood's Ṣūfī origins. Moreover, this ethical paradigm, which entails a "sharīʿa-minded" Ṣūfism placed in an activist framework, not only challenges those narratives which perpetuate an inherent Salafī-Ṣūfī divide; it also creates avenues for exploring the relationship between practical reasoning, virtue formation, and public engagement, thus further contributing to an "engaged Ṣūfism" advocated by some today

Doctrine · Embodied cognition · Epistemology · Flourishing · Islam · Narrative · Political science · Politics · Positivism · Sociology · Theology · Virtue · Education and Islamic Studies · Islamic Finance and Banking Studies · Islamic Studies and History · Law · Philosophy · Psychology · Religious studies · Social Psychology

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