Islam and the Devotional Object
eBook - PDF

Islam and the Devotional Object

Seeing Religion in Egypt and Syria

  1. English
  2. PDF
  3. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

Islam and the Devotional Object

Seeing Religion in Egypt and Syria

About this book

In this book, Richard J. A. McGregor offers a history of Islamic practice through the aesthetic reception of medieval religious objects. Elaborate parades in Cairo and Damascus included decorated objects of great value, destined for Mecca and Medina. Among these were the precious dress sewn yearly for the Ka'ba, and large colorful sedans mounted on camels, which mysteriously completed the Hajj without carrying a single passenger. Along with the brisk trade in Islamic relics, these objects and the variety of contested meanings attached to them, constituted material practices of religion that persisted into the colonial era, but were suppressed in the twentieth century. McGregor here recovers the biographies of religious objects, including relics, banners, public texts, and coverings for the Ka'ba. Reconstructing the premodern visual culture of Islamic Egypt and Syria, he follows the shifting meanings attached to objects of devotion, as well as the contingent nature of religious practice and experience.

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Yes, you can access Islam and the Devotional Object by Richard J. A. McGregor in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Theology & Religion & Islamic Theology. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Half-title
  3. Title page
  4. Copyright information
  5. Contents
  6. List of Illustrations
  7. Preface
  8. Acknowledgments
  9. Note on Transliteration and Dates
  10. Introduction
  11. One Objects over Distance
  12. Two An Exuberant and Elusive Palanquin
  13. Three Processions, Banners, and the Religious Spectacle
  14. Four The Relic and Its Witness
  15. Five Religious Topography and the Relic
  16. Six Defacing and Displacing
  17. Epilogue
  18. Notes
  19. Bibliography
  20. Index