Al-Ṣafadī, his Critics, and the Drag of Philological Time

Talib, Adam

Abstract

Philology was more than a scholarly tool in the system of classical Arabo-Islamic writing; it was a cognitive model. This cognitive model was embodied by scholars and repeatedly performed by them in oral and written expression. It can be understood as a habitus. This article takes seriously pre-modern critiques of a revisionist darling al-Ṣafadī’s masterful commentary al-Ghayth al-musajjam fī sharḥ «Lāmiyyat al-ʿAjam» to consider the cognitive logic of this philological habitus and the ways in which modern scholarly agendas manipulate the chronological plane of Arabic literary history.

Citation

Talib, A. (2019). Al-Ṣafadī, his Critics, and the Drag of Philological Time. Philological Encounters, 4(1-2), 109-134. https://doi.org/10.1163/24519197-12340062

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Aug 10, 2018
• Online Publication Date: Dec 13, 2019
• Publication Date: Dec 31, 2019
• Deposit Date: Aug 10, 2018
• Publicly Available Date: Dec 13, 2021
• Journal: Philological encounters.
• Print ISSN: 2451-9189
• Electronic ISSN: 2451-9197
• Publisher: Brill Academic Publishers
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 4
• Issue: 1-2
• Pages: 109-134
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/24519197-12340062
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1323681