Elements biographiques

Actuellement Professeur d’histoire à l’académie navale des Etats Unis, Brannon wheeler s’est notamment intéressé aux prophètes bibliques du Coran. Il est un fin connaisseur du monde proche oriental. Brannon M. Wheeler reçu son doctorat en langue et civilisation proche-orientales à l’Université de Chicago en 1993. Il enseigna au Macalester College, à Earlham College, à l’Université Vanderbilt et à l’Université d’Etat de Pennsylvanie. Il a publié de nombreux ouvrages, articles sur le droit islamique, du Coran. Il a collaboré à la rédaction d’articles dans des encyclopédies, dictionnaires, et revues en Arabie saoudite, le Koweït, la Grèce et la Russie. Il a été reçu dans nombres d’universités et centres de recherche dans les pays arabes et musulmans (Koweït, Jordanie, Égypte, Oman) mais aussi en Israël.

Présentation

Nineteenth-century philologist and Biblical critic William Robertson Smith famously concluded that the sacred status of holy places derives not from their intrinsic nature but from their social character. Building upon this insight, Mecca and Eden uses Islamic exegetical and legal texts to analyze the rituals and objects associated with the sanctuary at Mecca.

Integrating Islamic examples into the comparative study of religion, Brannon Wheeler shows how the treatment of rituals, relics, and territory is related to the more general mythological depiction of the origins of Islamic civilization. Along the way, Wheeler considers the contrast between Mecca and Eden in Muslim rituals, the dispersal and collection of relics of the prophet Muhammad, their relationship to the sanctuary at Mecca, and long tombs associated with the gigantic size of certain prophets mentioned in the Quran.

(Source : http://www.press.uchicago.edu/presssite/metadata.epl?isbn=9780226888040)

Table des matières

Acknowledgments
Notes on Conventions
Introduction

• Ritual and Social Order
• Ritual, Relics, and the Meccan Sanctuary
• Chapter Outline

1. Treasure of the Ka’bah

• 1 Temple Implements and Treasure of the Ka?bah
• 2 Swords and the Origins of Islam
• Conclusions Swords and the Origins of Civilization

2. Utopia and Civilization in Islamic Rituals

• 1 Touching the Penis
• 2 Adam and Eve’s Genitals
• Conclusions Taboo and Contagion

3. Relics of the Prophet Muhammad

• 1 Relics of the Prophet Muhammad
• 2 Relics and Civilization
• Conclusions Relics and Portable Territory

4. Tombs of Giant Prophets

• 1 Long Tombs
• 2 Giants
• Conclusions Technology and Human Size

Conclusions: The Pure, the Sacred, and Civilization
Status and Power
Symbol and Agency
General Conclusions
Notes
Works Cited
Index