Sarah Stroumsa - Alice and Jack Ormut Professor of Arabic Studies

Publications

I. Doctoral Dissertation:

Dawud ibn Marwan al-Muqammis and his 'Ishrun Maqala (in Hebrew)
At the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. Advisor: Professor Haggai Ben-
Shammai. Degree awarded 1984, summa cum laude

II. Books:

1) Dawud ibn Marwan al-Muqammis's 'Ishrun Maqala (Etudes sur le judaisme medieval XIII, Leiden: Brill, 1989).

2) (with Daniel J. Lasker) The Polemic of Nestor the Priest: Qissat Mujadalat al-Usquf and Sefer Nestor ha-Komer, (Jerusalem: Ben Zvi Institute,1996), 2 vols. (I, Critical Edition; II, Introduction, Translations and Commentary)
[Spanish translation: El libro de Nestor el Sacerdote, tr. M. del Valle
Perez and C. del Valle Rodriguez, Madrid 1998].

3) The Beginnings of the Maimonidean Controversy in the East: Yosef Ibn Shim'on's Silencing Epistle Concerning the Resurrection of the Dead (Jerusalem: Ben Zvi Institute, 1999; in Hebrew).

4) Freethinkers of Medieval Islam: Ibn al-Rawandi, Abu Bakr al-Razi, and Their Impact on Islamic Thought (Islamic Philosophy and Theology XXXV; Leiden: Brill, 1999).
[Indonesian translation: Para Bemikir Bebas Islam: Mengenal Pemikiran Teologi Ibn ar-Rawandi dan Abu Bakr ar-Razi, LKiS, 2006].

5) (with H. Ben-Shammai, E. Batat, S. Butbul and D. Sklare), Judaeo-Arabic Manuscripts in the Firkovitch Collections: Yefet Ben 'Eli al-Basri, Commentary on Genesis, A Sample Catalogue (Jerusalem: Ben Zvi Institute, 2000; in Hebrew).

6) Maimonides in his World: Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009; Paperback edition, 2012).

III. Books Edited:

1) The Collected Works of Shlomo Pines, vol. III, Studies in the History of Arabic Philosophy, (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1996).

2) (With M. Bar-Asher, B. Chiesa and S. Hopkins), "A Word Fitly Spoken": Studies in Qur'an and Bible Exegesis, Presented to Haggai Ben-Shammai (Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute, 2007) (in Hebrew).

3) (with H. Ben-Shammai and Sh. Shaked), Excxhange and Transmission Across Cultural Boundaries: Philosophy and Science in the Mediterranean World. Proceedings of a Workshop in Memory of Professor Shlomo Pines, Jerusalem 28 February -2 March 2005 (Jerusalem: The Israel Academy of Sciences, Forthcoming).

IV. Articles:

1) "The Barahima in Early Kalam," Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 6 (1985): 229-41.

2) "The Signs of Prophecy: The Emergence and Early Development of a Theme in Arabic Theological Literature," Harvard Theological Review 78 (1985): 101-14.

3) "From Muslim Heresy to Jewish-Muslim Polemics: Ibn al-Rawandi's Kitab al- Damigh," Journal of the American Oriental Society 107.4 (1987): 767-72.

4) (with G. Stroumsa): "Aspects of Anti-Manichaean Polemics in Late Antiquity and Under Early Islam," Harvard Theological Review 81 (1988): 37-58.

5) "The Beginnings of the Mu'tazila Reconsidered," Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 13 (1990): 265-93. PDF (3.7 Mb)

6) "Conversion among Jewish Intellectuals in the Middle Ages," Pe'amim 42 (1990): 61-75 (in Hebrew).

7) "A Note on Maimonides Attitude to Joseph Ibn Sadiq," Shlomo Pines Jubilee Volume, Part II (Jerusalem Studies in Jewish Thought 8, 1990): 210-15 (in Hebrew).

8) "Shlomo Pines: le savant, le sage," Journal Asiatique 278 (1990): 205-11.

9) "Al-Farabi and Maimonides on the Christian Philosophical Tradition: a Re-evaluation," Der Islam 68 (1991): 263-87. PDF (3.5 Mb)

10) "The Impact of Syriac Tradition on Early Judaeo-Arabic Bible Exegesis," Aram 3 (1991): 83-96. PDF (2 Mb)

11) "Avicenna's Philosophical Stories: Aristotle's Poetics Reinterpreted," Arabica 39 (1992): 183-206. PDF (4.6M)

12) "'What is Man': Psalm 8:4-5 in Jewish, Christian and Muslim Exegesis in Arabic," in Blumberg et al., eds., "Open Thou Mine Eyes": Essays on Aggadah and Judaica Presented to Rabbi William G. Braude on His Eightieth Birthday and Published in His Memory (New Jersey: Ktav, 1992), pp. 295-302. PDF (1.1 Mb)

[A slightly modified version of this article appeared in Henoch 14(1992):283-91]

13) "Qissat Mujadalat al-Usquf: A Case Study in Polemical Literature," in J. Blau and S. C. Reif, eds., Genizah Research After Ninety Years: The Case of Judaeo-Arabic (Cambridge, 1992), pp. 155-59.

14) "On the Maimonidean Controversy in the East: The Role of Abu al-Barakat al-Baghdadi," in H. Ben Shammai, ed., Hebrew and Arabic Studies in Honour of Joshua Blau, Presented by Friends and Students on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday (Jerusalem, 1993), pp. 415-22 (in Hebrew).

15) "Al-Farabi and Maimonides on Medicine as Science," Arabic Sciences and Philosophy 3 (1993): 235-49.

16) "Ecritures alternatives? Tradition et autorité chez les libres penseurs en Islam médiéval," in E. Patlagean and A. Le Boulluec, eds., Les Retours aux Écritures: Fondamentalismes présents et passés (Bibliothèque de l Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, section des sciences religieuses, Vol. 99; Louvain and Paris: Peters, 1994), pp. 270-93. PDF (3.4 Mb)

17) "The Blinding Emerald: Ibn al-Rawandi's Kitab al-Zumurrud," Journal of the American Oriental Society 114 (1994):163-85.

18) "Elisha Ben Abuya and Muslim Heretics in Maimonides' Writings," Maimonidean Studies 3 (1995): 173-93.

19) "On Jewish Intellectuals who converted to Islam in the Early Middle Ages," in D. Frank, ed., The Jews of Medieval Islam: Community, Society, Identity (Leiden: Brill, 1995), pp.179-97.
[A revised translation of item No. 6] PDF (2.7 Mb)

20) "Jewish Polemics Against Islam and Christianity In the Light of Judaeo-Arabic Texts," in N. Golb, ed., Judaeo-Arabic Studies; Proceedings of the Founding Conference of the Society for Judaeo-Arabic Studies (Studies in Muslim-Jewish Relations,3; Amsterdam, 1997), pp. 241-50.

21) " 'Compassion for Wisdom:' The Attitude of Some Medieval Arab Philosophers towards the Codification of Philosophy," Bochumer Philosophisches Jahrbuch 1 (1997): 39-55. PDF (2.1 Mb)

[a revised Arabic translation was published as: "Al-shafaqa 'ala al-'ilm, mawqif ba'd al-falasifa al-arab fi al-qurun al-wusta min tadwin al-falsafa," Al-Karmil 20 (1999): 129-47].

22) "Twelfth Century Concepts of Soul and Body: The Maimonidean Controversy in Baghdad," in A. Baumgarten et al., eds., Self, Soul and Body in Religious Experience (Leiden: Brill, 1998), pp. 313-34. PDF (3.2 Mb)

23) "Habitudes religieuses et liberté intellectuelle dans la pensée arabe médiévale," in M. Abitbol et R. Assaraf, eds., Monothéismes et tolérance, (Paris: Albin Michel, 1998), pp. 57-66.

24) "'True Felicity': Paradise in the Thought of Avicenna and Maimonides," Medieval Encounters 4 (1998): 51-77. PDF (3.8 Mb)

25) "Al-Muqammas, Daud," Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy (London and New York, 1998), vol. 6, pp. 604-606.

26) "On the Usefullnes of Faulty Manuscripts for Understanding Polemical Literature," Pe'amim 75 (1998): 97-100 (in Hebrew).

27) "The Sabians of Harran and the Sabians of Maimonides: on Maimonides Theory of the History of Religions," Sefunot 22 (1999): 277-95. [A modified Hebrew version of Nos. 33 and 39].

28) "Ibn al-Rawandi's su' adab al-mujadala: the Role of Bad Manners in Medieval Disputations," in H. Lazarus-Yaffe et al., eds., The Majlis; Interreligious Encounters in Medieval Islam, (Studies in Arabic Language and Literature, Wiesbaden; Harassowitz, 1999), pp. 60-76.

29) "The Religion of the Freethinkers of Medieval Islam," in F. Niewöhner, ed., Atheismus im Mittelalter und in der Renaissance (Wolfenbüttel, 1999), pp. 45-59. PDF

30) "Citation Tradition: On Explicit and Hidden Citations in Judaeo-Arabic Philosophical Literature," in J. Blau and D. Doron, eds., Heritage and Innovation in Medieval Judaeo-Arabic Culture. Proceedings of the Sixth Conference of the Society for Judaeo-Arabic Studies (Ramat-Gan; Bar-Ilan University, 2000), pp. 167-78 (in Hebrew). PDF (1.6 Mb)

31) Saadia Gaon: A Jewish Thinker in a Mediterranean Society (Jewish Culture in Muslim Lands and Cairo Geniza Studies, Tel-Aviv University, ed. M. A. Friedmann, Tel-Aviv, 2001; in Hebrew).

32) "'Ravings': Maimonides Concept of Pseudo-Science," Aleph 1 (2001): 141-63.

33) "Entre Harran et al-Maghreb: la théorie maïmonidienne de l'histoire des religions et ses sources arabes," in M. Fierro (ed.), Judios y musulmanes en al-Andalus y el Magreb - Contactos intelectuales (Madrid: Casa de Velazquez, 2002), pp. 153-64.

34) From the Earliest Known Judaeo-Arabic Commentary on Genesis," Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 27 (2002): 375-95.

35) "Islam in the Historical Consciousness of Jewish Thinkers of the Arab Middle Ages," in N. Ilan, ed., The Intertwined Worlds of Islam; Essays in Memory of Hava Lazarus-Yafeh (Jerusalem: Ben Zvi Institute, 2002), pp. 443-58 (in Hebrew).

36) "Voiles et miroirs: visions surnaturelles en théologie judéo-arabe médiévale," in E. Chaumont and others, eds., Autour du Regard: Mélanges Gimaret (Louvain, 2003), pp. 77-96. PDF (3.8 Mb)

37) "Saadiah and Jewish kalam," in D. H. Frank and O. Leaman, eds., The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Jewish Philosophy (Cambridge, 2003), pp. 71-90.

38) "Philosopher-King or Philosopher-Courtier? Theory and Reality in the Falasifa's Place in Islamic Society," in: C. de la Puente, ed., Identidades Marginales (Madrid: CSIC, 2003), pp. 433-59.

39) "Sabéens de Harran et Sabéens de Maïmonide," in T. Lévy and R. Rashed, eds., Maimonide: philosophe et savant, (2004), pp. 335-52.

40) "Maimonides and Mediterranean Culture," in C. Cluse, ed., The Jews of Europe in the Middle Ages (Tenth to Fifteenth Centuries): Proceedings of the Internationale Symposium held at Speyer; 20 - 25. October 2002 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), pp. 95-104.

[= Europas Juden im Mittelalter, Beiträge des internationalen
Symposiums in Speyer vom 20-25 Oktober 2002, ed. Christoph
Cluse, Trier: Kliomedia, 2004, pp. 109-120].

41) "Maimonides' Auffassung vom judischen Kalam: sein Wahrheitsgehalt und seine geschichtliche Wirking," JUDAICA: Beiträge zum Verstehen des Judentums 61 (2005): 289-309.

42) "Philosophes Almohades? Averroes, Maimonides, et l'ideologie almohade" in: P. Cressier, M. Fierro and L. Molina, eds., Los Almohades: Problemas y perspectivas (Madrid: CSIC, 2005), vol. II, pp. 1137-62.

43) "The Politico-Religious Context of Maimonides," in Georges Tamer, ed., The Trias of Maimonides. Jewish, Arabic, and ancient culture of knowledge (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2005), pp. 257-65.

44) "Ibn Masarra and The Beginnings of Mystical Thought in al-Andalus," in P. Schaeffer (ed.), Mystical Approaches to God. Judaism, Christianity and Islam (Munich; Historisches Kolleg: Oldenbourg, 2006), pp. 97-112.

45) "A Literary Genre as an Historical Document: On Saadia's Introduction to his Bible Commentaries," in M. Bar-Asher et al.,"A Word Fitly Spoken:" Studies in Qur'an and Bible Exegesis, Presented to Haggai Ben-Shammai (Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute, 2007), 193-204 (in Hebrew).

46) "Soul-searching at the Dawn of Jewish Philosophy: A Hitherto Lost Fragment of al-Muqammas's Twenty Chapters," Ginzei Qedem 3 (2007):137*-161*. PDF (0.3 Mb)

47) "The Literary Corpus of Maimonides and Averroes," Maimonidean Studies 5(2008): 193-210.

48) "Maimonides: A Fundamentalist Thinker?" in Aviezer Ravitzki (ed.), Maimonides: Conservatism, Originality, Revolution (Jerusalem: Zalman Shazar Center, 2008), Vol. II, pp. 453-64 [in Hebrew].PDF

49)"Was Maimonides an Almohad Thinker?" in D. J. Lasker and H. Ben-Shammai (eds.). Alei asor: Proceeding of the tenth conferecne of the Society for Judaeo-Arabic Studies (Beer Sheba: Ben Gurion University, 2008), pp. 151-171 [Hebrew]. PDF

50) "Prophecy versus Civil Religion in Medieval Jewish Philosophy: The cases of Judah Halevi and Maimonides," in S. Klien-Braslavi , B. Abrahamov and J. Sadan (eds.), Tribute to Michael: Studies in Jewish and Muslim Thought Presented to Professor Michael Schwarz (Tel-Aviv: Tel-Aviv University, 2009), pp. 79*-102*. PDF

51) "The Muslim Context of Medieval Jewish Philosophy." in S. Nadler and T. Rudavsky (eds.), The Cambridge History of Jewish Philosophy: From Antiquity throught the Seventeenth Century (Cambridge, 2009), pp. 39-59. PDF

52) (With S. Sviri), "The Beginnings of Mystical Philosophy in al-Andalus: Ibn Masarra and his Epistle on Contemplation," Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 36 (2009), pp. 201-253. PDF

53) "Al-Andalus und Sefarad: von Bibliotheken und Gelehrten im muslicischen Spanien," Arye Maimon Vortrag an der Universitat Trier, 5. Oktober 2009 (Trier: Kliomedia, 2010). PDF

54) "Thinkers of 'This Peninsula': An Integrative Approach to the Study of Philosophy in al-Andalus", in D. Freidenreich and M. Goldstein (eds.) Beyond Religious Borders: Interaction and intellectual exchange in the medieval Islamic world (Philadelphia:University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012), pp. 44-53, 176-18. PDF

55) "Prolegomena as Historical Evidence: On Saadia's Introductions to ho Commentaries on the Bible," in Carlos Fraenkel, Jamie C. Fumo, Faith Wallis, and Robert Wisnovsky. (eds.), Prolegomena to an Intellectual History of the Middle Ages (Turnhout: Brepols; 2011), pp. 129-142 [a modified version of No. 45]. PDF

56) "Whirlpool Effects and Religious Studies: A Response to Guy G. Stroumsa", in Volkhard Krech and Marion Steinicke (eds.), Dynamics in the History of Religions between Asia and Europe: Encounters, Notions, and Comparative Perspectives (Leiden: Brill, 2012), pp. 159-162.

57) "Philosophy as Wisdom: On the Christians' Role in the Translation of Philosophical Material to Arabic," in H. Ben-Shammai, Sh. Shaked and S. Stroumsa (eds.), Exchange and Transmission Across Cultural Boundaries: Philosophy and Science in the Mediterranean World (Forthcoming).

58) " 'The Father of Many Nations': Abraham in al-Andalus." In Ryan Szpiech (ed.), "Exegesis and Religious Difference: Essays on Commentary, Conflict, and Community in the Medieval Mediterranean" (Fordham Press, forthcoming)

V. Reviews:

1) Y. Ratzaby, A Dictionary of Judaeo-Arabic in R. Sa'adya's Tafsir, (Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan, 1985), in Pe'amim, 1986, pp. 146-148 (in Hebrew).

2) B. Chiesa, Creazioni e caduta dell uomo nell esegesi giudeo-araba medievale (Studi Biblici 85, Brescia, 1989), in Bulletin critique des annales islamologiques 7 (1990), pp. 37-39.

3) D. Gimaret, La Doctrine d al-Ash'ari (Paris, 1990), in Bulletin critique des annales islamologiques 8 (1991), pp. 28-31.

4) B. Abrahamov, Al-Qasim b. Ibrahim On the Proof of God's Existence: kitab al-dalil al-kabir (Leiden: Brill, 1990) in Bulletin of the School of African and Asian Studies, 1992, pp. 320-321.

5) J. L. Kraemer, ed., Perspectives on Maimonides: Philosophical and Historical Studies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), in The Jewish Quarterly Review 86 (1995), pp. 256-258.

6) Paul E. Walker, Early philosophical Shiism; The Ismaili Neoplatonism of Abu Ya'qub al-Sijistani (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993) in Journal of the American Oriental Society 115 (1995), pp. 38-40.

7) M. Chokr, Zandaqa et zindiqs en Islam au second siècle de l'hégire (Damas; Institut francçais de Damas, 1993) in Bulletin critique des annales islamologiques 12 (1995), pp. 73-77.

8) P. Kraus, Alchemie, Ketzerei, Apokryphen im frühen Islam: Gesammelte Aufsätze. Edited, with an Introduction, by Rémi Brague (Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1994), in Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 20 (1996), pp. 282-286.

9) P. E. Walker, The Wellsprings of Wisdom; A Study of Abu Ya'qub al-Sijistani's Kitab al-Yanabi including a complete English translation with commentary and notes on the Arabic text (Salt Lake City: The University of Utah Press, 1994), in Journal of the American Oriental Society 117 (1997), pp. 186-188.

10) Moses Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed, translated into Hebrew from the Arabic by M. Schwarz, vol. I (Tel-Aviv: Tel-Aviv University, 1997), in Pe'amim 72 (1997), pp. 139-144 (in Hebrew).

11) D. Urvoy, Les penseurs libres dans l'Islam classique. L'interrogation sur la religion chez les penseurs arabes indépendants (Paris: Albin Michel, 1996), in Bulletin critique des annales islamologiques 14 (1998), pp. 97-100.

12) H. Lazarus-Yaffe, ed., Muslim Authors on Jews and Judaism: The Jews among their Muslim Neighbours (Jerusalem, 1996), in Ha-mizrah ha-hadash 41 (1998), pp. 209-210 (in Hebrew).

13) D. De Smet, Empedocles Arabus. Une lecture néoplatonicenne tardive (Brussel: Koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten [Turnhout: Brepols]), 1998), in: Journal of the American Oriental Society 122 (2002), pp. 94-97.

14) M. Marín, Mujeres en al-Ândalus (Estudios onomásticos-biográficos de al-Ândalus, XI; Madrid:CSIC, 2000), in al-Qantara 23 (2002), pp. 251-256.

15) Syrian Christians under Islam - The First Thousand Years, edited by David Thomas (Leiden, Boston and Köln: Brill, 2001), in Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 28 (2003), pp. 420-422.

16) The Medieval Hebrew Encyclopedias of Science and Philosophy Proceedings of the Bar-Ilan University Conference. Edited by Steven Harvey (Amsterdam Studies in Jewish Thought 7; Dordrecht, Boston and London: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2000), in The Journal of the American Oriental Society 123(2003), pp. 450-453.

October 2012