The Essential Seyyed Hossein Nasr

by William C. Chittick

Overview

Seyyed Hossein Nasr is University Professor of Islamic Studies at the George Washington University, president of the Foundation for Traditional Studies, and editor of its journal, Sophia. He is a world-renowned scholar on Islam, Sufism, and the Perennial Philosophy, and is the author of over fifty books and five hundred articles on topics ranging from comparative religion to traditional Islamic philosophy, cosmology, art, ecology, and mysticism. A volume in the prestigious Library of Living Philosophers series is also dedicated to his thought. The Essential Seyyed Hossein Nasr is an anthology of 21 of his most representative essays, including several rare articles which have not been easily available in the U.S., carefully selected and edited by William C. Chittick, a former student of Nasr and leading scholar of Islam and Sufism.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781933316802
Publisher:	World Wisdom
Publication date:	06/01/2007
Series:	Perennial Philosophy Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272
Sales rank:	705,953
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Seyyed Hossein Nasr is University Professor of Islamic Studies at the George Washington University, president of the Foundation for Traditional Studies, and editor of its journal, Sophia. He is a world-renowned scholar on Islam, Sufism, and the Perennial Philosophy, and is the author of over fifty books and five hundred articles on topics ranging from comparative religion to traditional Islamic philosophy, cosmology, art, ecology, and mysticism.

William C. Chittick is a professor in the Department of Comparative Studies at the State University of New York, Stony Brook. Professor Chittick is one the world’s leading translators and interpreters of the mystical poetry of Jalaluddin Rumi and the author of the award-winning book, The Sufi Doctrine of Rumi: Illustrated Edition.

Table of Contents

Foreword   Huston Smith     vii
Introduction   William C. Chittick     ix
Religion
Living in a Multi-Religious World     3
The Traditionalist Approach to Religion     21
Religion and the Environmental Crisis     29
Islam
One God     43
Many Prophets     53
The Nature of Man     65
The Integration of the Soul     73
The Throne of the All-Merciful     85
The Role of Philosophy     97
Suhrawardi     111
Mulla Sadra     115
Existence and Quiddity     119
Tradition
Scientia Sacra     131
Renaissance Humanism     139
God as Reality     153
Time and Eternity     159
Pontifical and Promethean Man     171
The Cosmos as Theophany     189
Traditional Art     203
The Wisdom of the Body     215
In the Beginning was Consciousness     223
Sources     231
Selected Bibliography     233
Biographical Notes     237
Index     239

Editorial Reviews

Nasr is not only a highly regarded and influential Islamic scholar (George Washington Univ.); he is also an extremely prolific writer who has produced more than 50 books (e.g., Religion and the Order of Nature) and 500 articles. For this reason, creating a book from his writings that accurately portrays his most important ideas is a major challenge. Editor Chittick (Sufism: A Beginner's Guide) meets this challenge in an exceptional way. After his informative introduction and a helpful foreword by Huston Smith (The Soul of Christianity: Restoring the Great Tradition), Chittick divides Nasr's key ideas into the categories of religion, Islam, and tradition. There are three chapters under the first category and nine chapters under each of the latter two categories. Considered as a whole, the book reveals Nasr as a major Islamic scholar who is also very knowledgeable about other world religions and with philosophy in general. With this broad intellectual background, he is able to write insightfully about myriad topics relating to religion. Highly recommended for academic and public libraries.
—John Jaeger

Library Journal