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The investigation of Islamic archaeology in Ethiopia has until recently been neglected. Excavations at Harlaa, a large urban centre in eastern Ethiopia, are now beginning to redress this lack of research attention. By establishing occupation and material sequences, and by assessing the chronology and material markers of Islamisation, recent work provides important new insight on the presence and role of Muslims and Islamic practice at Harlaa, and in the Horn of Africa more generally. The results challenge previous assumptions of cultural homogeneity, instead indicating the development of cosmopolitanism. They also suggest a possible historical identity for Harlaa: as Hubät/Hobat, the capital of the Hārlā sultanate.

Since the inception of the \"Woman, Life, Freedom\" revolution in September 2022, following the tragic death of Mahsa Amini, universities in Iran have been at the forefront of resistance. In response, the government has attempted to silence opposition by exerting control over universities and engaging in waves of arrests and imprisonments. The latest round of attacks extended beyond students and targeted any academic who protected students from violent attacks by the regime or has criticised the state for the draconian policies they have coerced on the tertiary education sector. This study delves into the historical and institutional roots of the oppressive mechanisms employed by the Islamic Republic in Iranian universities, since the 1979 revolution and the subsequent Islamisation project. Through this lens, we analyze how the regime legitimizes its practices, enforces misogynistic policies in tertiary education, and coerces universities into submission. We argue that Iranian universities have come to resemble prisons, with academics fearing for their job security and the expression of their opinions, while regime-connected individuals monopolize opportunities such as research grants and travel prospects. Our aim is to raise awareness within the international academic community about the oppressive, misogynistic, and corrupt system that governs Iran's tertiary education sector.

Locally made ceramics from Islamic sites in Ethiopia have been neglected in most archaeological studies, which tend to privilege imported Middle Eastern and Chinese/Southeast Asian ceramics. An assemblage of the local ceramics from the important trading site of Harlaa, in eastern Ethiopia (mid-sixth and fifteenth centuries AD), is the subject of this article. The study emphasizes the value of these ceramics as chronological markers, and for understanding regional and long-distance contacts, cultural innovations, processes of Islamization, and foodways. Céramiques fabriquées localement trouvées sur les sites d’archéologie islamique en Éthiopie ont été largement négligées contrairement aux céramiques importées du Moyen-Orient, de Chine ou d’Asie du Sud-Est. Une échantillon de ces céramiques (milieu VIe et XVe siècles après JC) qui a été exhumé du site de commerce important de Harlaa, dans l'est de l'Ethiopie est le sujet de le présent article. Cette étude met l’accent sur la valeur de céramiques fabriquées localement comme marqueurs chronologiques, fournir des informations sur les échanges régionaux et de plus longue distance, innovations culturelles, processus d’islamisation et les circuits alimentaires.

In recent decades, the concept of ribāṭ and its practice have been the subject of intense debate. Recent summary papers on the eastern Mediterranean, Ifrīqiya, al-Maghrib al-Aqṣà, and al-Andalus, among others, have made it possible to compare different realities that express strong links with their local historical contexts. In this paper, we present the results of a new study that analyses the specific case of Northern Sharq al-Andalus, where the practice and institutionalisation of ribāṭ took shape from the early 9th century. There are three elements that lead us to corroborate this hypothesis: the documented presence of numerous individuals and groups voluntarily involved in the active and passive defence of the furthermost frontier of al-Andalus; the confirmation of a construction programme with homogeneous characteristics aimed at building fortified enclosures along the coast, and, lastly, the founding, in the early 9th century, of the Ribāṭ Kashkī centre at the mouth of the Ebro, a building were these practices would become centralised. In conclusion, we propose a much more complex scenario than that proposed previously, which enables us to characterise local forms of armed spirituality and sacralisation of the land that globally enriches the historical reading of ribāṭ.

This article explores the influence of Islam among the Zulu Muslims in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN). Although several studies focus on the history and experiences of the Asian diaspora or Asian Muslim community, there is a considerable lack of literature on the influence of Islam on the Zulu Muslims’ personal experiences beyond the conversion narratives. This study seeks to examine the impact of Islam on the cultural and religious identities of individuals who have converted to Islam within the Zulu community. This research article used qualitative research with a phenomenological approach conducted in several areas in KZN. The data for this study were acquired from literature, interviews and observations conducted among the Zulu Muslims in KZN. The data analysis technique employed in this work utilises a comprehensive approach, wherein all the acquired data are considered significant, and no reduction is applied.ContributionThe non-Muslim Zulus in KZN tend to stigmatise Zulu Muslim converts, perceiving them as having abandoned their cultural heritage. The Zulu Muslims who converted to Islam developed their own unique interpretation of the religion by blending Islamic principles with Zulu cultural elements. This allowed them to establish a sense of identity that they believe to be both authentically Zulu and free from colonial influences, in contrast to the Christianised Zulu population.

In Islamic thought, the economy is considered an integral part of the spiritual expression of human consciousness in the mortal world. Islamic economics, as a modern discipline, is related to the anti-colonial movement in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Scholars of the time envisioned an economic system different from that of the colonising powers and found the epistemological foundations for one in the Islamic tradition. Although Islamic banking has come far from its inception, Islamic economic philosophy has become a niche categorisation in the larger global economic order. Discourses in Islamic economics have been constructed against neoliberal economics, within the ontology and epistemology of modernity. The Islamisation of knowledge project has utilised a singular reliance on fiqh to halal-wash orthodox neoliberal economic institutions, products, and relations to assimilate them into Islamic economics in a superficial “Islamic” dressing of neoliberal economic paradigms. This paper argues that a decolonial stance in Islamic economics and a focus on epistemologies indigenous to Islamic discourse can eliminate this issue. Decoloniality in Islamic economics must counter the traditional dominance of European episteme and the financial interest in capitalist economics within the Islamic world by norm-setting entities such as the state of Saudi Arabia.

This article presents the evolution of the concepts of jihād from the minimalist and maximalist approaches. In the present article one can find two conceptions: the conception of liminality and the conception of re-Islamisation. Liminality is a form of structural crisis that appears as a result of the split within the Islamic spiritual elite and Muslim community itself. The period of liminality is characterised by political and social instability, crisis of social and individual forms of self-identification and sharp cognitive dissonance among many ordinary believers who conduct their own search for fundamentally new forms of Islamic political existence. Re-Islamisation is the post-liminality period that happens if the maximalist block of Islamic elite wins political power. The events of the Arab Spring can be seen as the result of the appearance in the Islamic ideological space of two different ideological platforms (minimalism and maximalism) around which representatives of not only the Islamic elite, but also the “popular” Islam gathered.

Archaeological evidence for a Sasanian presence in the ‘Uman region of Eastern Arabia is sparse. Recent excavations at the site of Fulayj in Oman have, however, revealed it to be a Late Sasanian fort, the only securely dated example in Arabia, or indeed on the western shores of the Indian Ocean more generally. AMS dating supports the ceramic chronology proposed for the site, demonstrating occupation until the Islamisation of South-eastern Arabia in the early seventh century AD, and also briefly into the very Early Islamic period. Fulayj fort provides new insights into Sasanian military activities during this crucial period of Arabian history.

The goal of the second constitutional amendment passed in 1974 was to excommunicate the Ahmadis and establish Pakistan as a bona fide Islamic state. The Pakistani state accomplished this goal through an extraordinary process in which the National Assembly conducted a month-long examination of Ahmadi beliefs. Conducted by the attorney general of Pakistan, who was aided by the ulema members of parliament, these proceedings were a type of heresy inquisition in which the leaders of the Ahmadi community served as defendants. This article examines the key religious issues involved in these proceedings from a longer historical perspective that includes the Mughal and Safavid eras. In doing so, it highlights how pre-modern forms of religious persecution and accommodation came to be adapted to serve the ends of a modern constitutional nation-state.

There had been a lot of debate in Pakistan over the nature of its constitution when it got independence from the British rule in 1947. Islamic parties such as JamiatUlama-i-Islam and Jamat-i-Islami demanded that the constitution of Pakistan should be an Islamic one. However, there existed ambiguity over the form of Islamic constitution as there was no pre-existing model. This article show what an Islamic constitution meant for them and how did their idea of Islamic Constitution evolve? It has taken up the Islamisation of the constitution of Pakistan in three phases i.e., period of concessions and compromises for the first constitution (1956), strategic retreat of the Islamic Parties in the second constitution (1962) and sharpening the pencils again for the third constitution (1973).