Imam al-Bajuri and the Archetypal Scholar | Shaykh Jamaal Diwan: The Majlis - July 13 2025

YouTube Video:

https://www.youtube.com/live/kTFAy-NlELU?si=MB9c7vUWwLFNF9ve

Biography:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibrahim_al-Bajuri

Amazon: Introduction to Islamic Creed: Imam Ibrahim al-Bajuri , Rashad Jameer (Translator)

https://www.amazon.com/amz-books/store

As a response to a request, Imam al-Bajuri outlines the core beliefs of the orthodox Sunni doctrine (aqidah) that must be known by every Muslim. Designed to be studied with a teacher or read on one's own, this text will equip the student with sufficient knowledge of the essentials of Muslim theology to be able to distinguish truth from falsehood, orthodox from heterodox, Ahl al-Sunna wa al-Jama'a or Sunni Islam from other than it. It is hoped that by including the facing, vocalized Arabic script that 1) students of Sacred Knowledge will be aided in learning the language of the Qur’an, the Prophet (saws), and the ulama, 2) it will serve as a teaching aid for the ulama when teaching this text to reference the original work and 3) to preserve the actual words of Imam al-Bajuri.

Amazon:

The Archetypal Sunnī Scholar: Law, Theology, and Mysticism in the Synthesis of al-Bājūri - Aaron Spevack

https://www.amazon.com/Archetypal-Sunni-Scholar-Mysticism-Synthesis/dp/143845371X

This is a rare study of a late premodern Islamic thinker, Ibrahim al- Bājūrī, a nineteenth-century scholar and rector of Cairo's al-Azhar University. Aaron Spevack explores al- Bājūrī's legal, theological, and mystical thought, highlighting its originality and vibrancy in relation to the millennium of scholarship that preceded and informed it, and also detailing its continuing legacy. The book makes a case for the normativity of the Gabrielian Paradigm, the study of law, rational theology, and Sufism, in the person of al- Bājūrī. Soon after his death in 1860, this typical pattern of scholarship would face significant challenges from modernists, reformers, and fundamentalists. Spevack challenges beliefs that rational theology, syllogistic logic, and Sufism were not part of the predominant conception of orthodox scholarship and shows this scholarly archetype has not disappeared as an ideal. In addition, the book contests prevailing beliefs in academic and Muslim circles about intellectual decline from the thirteenth through nineteenth centuries.