FALL 2025

The Relationship between Prophecy and Sanctity: The Significance of Non-Prophetic Figures in the Qur’an

FALL 2025 Lecture Series

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Seyyed Hossein Nasr

Being and Consciousness

September 5, 2025 - 12:00PM (EST) - 1 hour

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Carl Ernst

Modern Misreadings of Mystical Commentaries on Hafez

September 10, 2025 - 7:00PM (EST) - 1 hour

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Asma Afsaruddin

An Islamic Ethics of War and Peace

September 17, 2025 - 12:00PM (EST) - 1 hour

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Shawkat Toorawa

Rhyme’s Reason: Translating the Qur’an’s (Most) Important Features

September 24, 2025 - 10:00AM (EST) - 1 hour

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Abdallah Rothman

What is “Islamic” about "Islamic Psychology?

October 1, 2025 - 11:30AM (EST) - 1 hour

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Maria Dakake

The Relationship between Prophecy and Sanctity: The Significance of Non-Prophetic Figures in the Qur’an

October 8, 2025 - 12:00PM (EST) - 1 hour

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Mahmut Erol Kılıç

Multiple Degrees of Being in Sufism: An Interpretive Tool for Religious Understanding

October 15, 2025 - 12:00PM (EST) - 1 hour

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Peter Adamson

From Ibn Sina’s Necessary Existent to Fakhr al-Din al-Razi’s God

October 24, 2025 - 10:00AM (EST) - 1 hour

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What this course gives you
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A working command of the vocabulary of Islamic metaphysics — wujūd, māhiyya, the gradation of being — used precisely, not loosely.

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The capacity to read primary texts of Ibn Sīnā and Mullā Ṣadrā with comprehension rather than reverence alone.

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An understanding of why the tradition treats metaphysics as the science of realities — and what that claim asks of the knower.

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Direct exchange with Professor Nasr in open Q&A after every session — the part no book can replace.

Your instructor
Professor Maria Massi Dakake

Maria Massi Dakake is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia.