SOAS Research Online

Abstract

The object of this Thesis is to investigate the views and teachings of Ibn Taimiya, so far as they can be determined from his works. For convenience of handling, the material is grouped in six chapters, which deal successively with his activities as exegete, traditionist, jurist, social reformer, theologian and philosopher. In each chapter, after a list of the available treatises of his relevant to the subject, his methods of treatment and doctrinal conclusions are examined, and typical examples adduced. In a final chapter the general character and direction of his teachings are summed up, and a list of his extant works and of the books ascribed to him is added in an appendix. Although several writers have touched upon Ibn Taimiya's activities as a precursor of the Wahhabi revival, no systematic examination of his work has previously been made, and the present thesis modifies in several respects the views hitherto expressed as to his doctrines and his position as so. Islamic reformer.