Al-Ghazali on Invocations and Supplications: Book IX of the Revival of the Religious Sciences (Ihya’ ‘Ulum al-Din)

DescriptionA revised edition of Kojiro Nakamura’s acclaimed translation into English of Book IX of The Revival of the Religious Sciences (Ihya’ ‘Ulum al-Din). Although prayerfulness and the remembrance of God suffuse all the formal practices of Islam, there are times when the Muslim simply ‘sits alone with his Lord’ to repeat formulas drawn from the Qur’an and the sayings of the Prophet, seeking remission of his sins and the purification of his heart.The present volume, Book IX of the Revival of the Religious Sciences, volume is probably the most widely read compendium of such material, popular not only for its comprehensiveness and beauty, but also for the analytical approach of its author, who explores the psychological and spiritual effects of prayer and the celebration of God’s name. The original translation by Kojiro Nakamura, now Head of the Islamic Studies Department at the University of Tokyo, has been substantially revised and augmented with hadith identification.Authors BiographyAbu Hamid Muhammad Al-Ghazali (1058-111), theologian, logician, jurist and mystic, was born and died in Tus in Central Asia, but spent much of his life lecturing at Baghdad or leading the life of a wandering dervish. His most celebrated work, Revival of the Religious Sciences, has exercised a profound influence on Muslim intellectual history by exploring the mystical significance of the practices and beliefs of Islamic orthodoxy, earning him the title of Hujjat-al-Islam, the Proof of Islam.Kojiro Nakamura recently retired from the University of Tokyo, where he was the Head of the Islamic Studies Department.