Globalism in Paul of Antioch’s Letter to a Muslim Friend and Its Refutation by Ibn Taymiyya
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Najlaa R. Aldeeb
Abstract
Paul of Antioch, an Arab Christian theologian (ca. 1200), wrote treatises that were well known by the Christians and Muslims of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. At that time, the Arab Christian Middle East was treated only peripherally by European Christians since the term ‘Arab’ was regarded as the synonym of ‘Muslim.’ Therefore, Paul’s letters were buried in the manuscript repositories of Europe and the Middle East. His narrative entitled Letter to aMuslim Friend was rediscovered in the twentieth century through the reexamination of the works of the controversial medieval Muslim theologian Ibn Taymiyya, who had been wrongly accused of being a strong advocate of jihad. Paul sent his letter to a Muslim friend who wanted to know what the learned Byzantines thought of Mohammad and Islam. In 1316, an anonymous Arabic-speaking Christian apologist in Cyprus edited Paul’s letter and re-wrote it in the form of a dialogue focusing on the major themes that had attracted the attention of earlier Arabic-speaking Christian thinkers. This edited version was sent to the Muslim theologian Ibn Taymiyya, who in turn wrote a refutation in his book AlJawābAṣṢaḥīḥ [The Right Answer]. Shihab Ud-Dīn Al-Qarafī and Mohammad Ibn Abī Ṭālib Al-Ansarī criticized Paul’s use of the Qurʾān for apologetic purposes. In this paper, I argue that Paul of Antioch’s letter and its refutation by Ibn Taymiyya are examples of medieval globalism because they circulated across many countries, reflected the authors’ intellectual and fairly tolerant cultural milieus, and anticipated the rationality of the interreligious dialogue adopted by twenty-first-century academicians.
Abstract
Paul of Antioch, an Arab Christian theologian (ca. 1200), wrote treatises that were well known by the Christians and Muslims of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. At that time, the Arab Christian Middle East was treated only peripherally by European Christians since the term ‘Arab’ was regarded as the synonym of ‘Muslim.’ Therefore, Paul’s letters were buried in the manuscript repositories of Europe and the Middle East. His narrative entitled Letter to aMuslim Friend was rediscovered in the twentieth century through the reexamination of the works of the controversial medieval Muslim theologian Ibn Taymiyya, who had been wrongly accused of being a strong advocate of jihad. Paul sent his letter to a Muslim friend who wanted to know what the learned Byzantines thought of Mohammad and Islam. In 1316, an anonymous Arabic-speaking Christian apologist in Cyprus edited Paul’s letter and re-wrote it in the form of a dialogue focusing on the major themes that had attracted the attention of earlier Arabic-speaking Christian thinkers. This edited version was sent to the Muslim theologian Ibn Taymiyya, who in turn wrote a refutation in his book AlJawābAṣṢaḥīḥ [The Right Answer]. Shihab Ud-Dīn Al-Qarafī and Mohammad Ibn Abī Ṭālib Al-Ansarī criticized Paul’s use of the Qurʾān for apologetic purposes. In this paper, I argue that Paul of Antioch’s letter and its refutation by Ibn Taymiyya are examples of medieval globalism because they circulated across many countries, reflected the authors’ intellectual and fairly tolerant cultural milieus, and anticipated the rationality of the interreligious dialogue adopted by twenty-first-century academicians.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Globalism in the Pre-Modern World? Questions, Challenges, and the Emergence of a New Approach to the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Age 1
- Global Inferno: Medieval Giants, Monsters, and the Breaching of the Great Barrier 99
- Swords as Medieval Icons and Early “Global Brands” 147
- Ecce! A Ninth-Century Isidorean T-O Map Labeled in Arabic 189
- Going Rogue Across the Globe: International Vagrants, Outlaws, Bandits, and Tricksters from Medieval Europe, Asia, and the Middle East 221
- Modifying Ancestral Memories in Post-Carolingian West Francia and Post-Tang Wuyue China 247
- Scalping Saint Peter’s Head: An Interreligious Controversy over a Punishment from Baghdad to Rome (Eighth to Twelfth Centuries) 273
- A Global Dialogue in al-Kindī’s “A Short Treatise on the Soul” 293
- Globalism in Paul of Antioch’s Letter to a Muslim Friend and Its Refutation by Ibn Taymiyya 315
- The Global Fable in the Middle Ages 351
- Globalism in the Late Middle Ages: The Low German Niederrheinische Orientbericht as a Significant Outpost of a Paradigm Shift. The Move Away from Traditional Eurocentrism 381
- The Germanic Translations of Lanfranc’s Surgical Works as Example of Global Circulation of Knowledge 407
- Brick by Brick: Constructing Identity at Don Lope Fernández de Luna’s Parroquieta at La Seo 445
- Quello assalto di Otranto fu cagione di assai male. First Results of a Study of the Globalization in the Neapolitan Army in the 1480s 463
- The Diplomat and the Public House: Ioannes Dantiscus (1485–1548) and His Use of the Inns, Taverns, and Alehouses of Europe 485
- Globalism During the Reign of Queen Elizabeth I 509
- Between East and West: John Pory’s Translation of Leo Africanus’s Description of Africa 537
- The Old and the New – Pepper, Bezoar, and Other Exotic Substances in Bohemian Narratives about Distant Lands from the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period (up to the 1560s) 553
- John Dee and the Creation of the British Empire 581
- Eberhard Werner Happel: A Seventeenth-Century Cosmographer and Cosmopolitan 595
- Globalism Before Modern Globalism 613
- List of Illustrations 623
- Biographies of the Contributors 627
- Index 635
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Contents V
- Globalism in the Pre-Modern World? Questions, Challenges, and the Emergence of a New Approach to the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Age 1
- Global Inferno: Medieval Giants, Monsters, and the Breaching of the Great Barrier 99
- Swords as Medieval Icons and Early “Global Brands” 147
- Ecce! A Ninth-Century Isidorean T-O Map Labeled in Arabic 189
- Going Rogue Across the Globe: International Vagrants, Outlaws, Bandits, and Tricksters from Medieval Europe, Asia, and the Middle East 221
- Modifying Ancestral Memories in Post-Carolingian West Francia and Post-Tang Wuyue China 247
- Scalping Saint Peter’s Head: An Interreligious Controversy over a Punishment from Baghdad to Rome (Eighth to Twelfth Centuries) 273
- A Global Dialogue in al-Kindī’s “A Short Treatise on the Soul” 293
- Globalism in Paul of Antioch’s Letter to a Muslim Friend and Its Refutation by Ibn Taymiyya 315
- The Global Fable in the Middle Ages 351
- Globalism in the Late Middle Ages: The Low German Niederrheinische Orientbericht as a Significant Outpost of a Paradigm Shift. The Move Away from Traditional Eurocentrism 381
- The Germanic Translations of Lanfranc’s Surgical Works as Example of Global Circulation of Knowledge 407
- Brick by Brick: Constructing Identity at Don Lope Fernández de Luna’s Parroquieta at La Seo 445
- Quello assalto di Otranto fu cagione di assai male. First Results of a Study of the Globalization in the Neapolitan Army in the 1480s 463
- The Diplomat and the Public House: Ioannes Dantiscus (1485–1548) and His Use of the Inns, Taverns, and Alehouses of Europe 485
- Globalism During the Reign of Queen Elizabeth I 509
- Between East and West: John Pory’s Translation of Leo Africanus’s Description of Africa 537
- The Old and the New – Pepper, Bezoar, and Other Exotic Substances in Bohemian Narratives about Distant Lands from the Middle Ages and Early Modern Period (up to the 1560s) 553
- John Dee and the Creation of the British Empire 581
- Eberhard Werner Happel: A Seventeenth-Century Cosmographer and Cosmopolitan 595
- Globalism Before Modern Globalism 613
- List of Illustrations 623
- Biographies of the Contributors 627
- Index 635
