“By virtue of your knowledge”: Scientific materialism and thefatwās of Rashīd Riḍā

What is it about?

This article examines several legal responsa (fatwās) by the important Muslim reformer Muḥammad Rashīd Riḍā. It treats these responsa as part of a broader Arabic debate on “materialism” at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. In this context, Riḍā's responsa on materialism illustrate the changing nature of Islamic religious authority in this period, as new kinds of knowledge became available to new kinds of readers.

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