The Reaction of Reformation Scholars in the Islamic-Arab Culture to the Effects of European Thought

Eter, Khodr Mohammed Amine (1991) The Reaction of Reformation Scholars in the Islamic-Arab Culture to the Effects of European Thought. PhD thesis, University of Glasgow.

Abstract

This thesis represents an attempt to examine, through selected materials, the reactions of Arab scholars to the problem of Western modernity upon the Arabic-speaking world. This impact was, of course, not uniform in every area of this world, or in every sphere of its activities. This thesis is concerned primarily with political reactions and only secondarily with others, religious, social or cultural. From the first half of the nineteenth century, Arab scholars were faced with a situation similar to that faced by their predecessors in the period from the ninth to the twelfth centuries. At that time the cultural influences that they confronted were diffuse, from Greece, from Persia and from India, and they arrived in a comparatively leisurely manner. Now they were concentrated, and the means by which they arrived were abrupt; confrontation was direct, with Westerners who appeared in the name of military intervention, or missionary or commercial activity. From that time onwards, there was hardly a thinker of note, in any field of intellectual activity, who had not received a Western-orientated education, without the influence of western culture, which brought with it a distaste for traditional institutions, it is difficult for the historian to see from what quarter the impetus for the revival of intellectual inquiry, and consequent desire for political reform, might have come. This scarcely requires substantiation, when we take into consideration the fact that these countries were for the most part subject to the stultifying rule of the Ottoman Empire. In what way should the tide of this Western influence be responded to? This was the question that constituted the basis of the theories formulated by the scholars.

• Item Type: Thesis (PhD)
• Qualification Level: Doctoral
• Keywords: Islamic studies, Middle Eastern history, Middle Eastern literature
• Date of Award: 1991
• Depositing User: Enlighten Team
• Unique ID: glathesis:1991-78352
• Copyright: Copyright of this thesis is held by the author.
• Date Deposited: 28 Feb 2020 12:09
• Last Modified: 28 Feb 2020 12:09
• URI: https://theses.gla.ac.uk/id/eprint/78352