CILE Seminar: Wilaya and Islamic Ethics

21 February, 2023
CILE Seminar: Wilaya and Islamic Ethics
The concept of wilāya is central to the Islamic tradition. It is, simultaneously, a political concept, a legal category, and a spiritual ideal. The three speakers will each address different aspects of the ethical duties that arise out of the concept of wilāya in the Islamic tradition: wilāya as part of the ethical commitments of Islamic political thought; how ethical duties constitute and define the idea of wilāya in the domain of law (fiqh); and wilāya as a kind of ethical practice representing moral aspiration in Sufism.

Online Public lecture: The Ethical duties of wilāya in the Islamic Tradition

Abstract

The concept of wilāya is central to the Islamic tradition. It is, simultaneously, a political concept, a legal category, and a spiritual ideal. The three speakers will each address different aspects of the ethical duties that arise out of the concept of wilāya in the Islamic tradition: wilāya as part of the ethical commitments of Islamic political thought; how ethical duties constitute and define the idea of wilāya in the domain of law (fiqh); and wilāya as a kind of ethical practice representing moral aspiration in Sufism

 

The lecture will be hosted online via Webex on the following link:

shorturl.at/nGKT2

Password: CILE2023

 

Download Reports

 

Speakers
Yasmeen Daifallah
Aiyub Palmer
Javad Fakhkhar Toosi
Mohammad Fadel
Flyer
CILE poster-1.pdf

Public Lecture        Tuesday February 21, 2023

19:00 – 21:00       The ethical duties of wilāya in the Islamic Tradition

  • Yasmeen Daifallah, University of California, Santa Cruz
  • Aiyub Palmer, University of Kentucky
  • Javad Fakhkhar Toosi, University of Toronto  
  • Mohammad Fadel, University of Toronto (Moderator)

 

Day 1

 

Thursday February 23, 2023

 

20:00 - 20:30

Opening and Orientation 

  • Recep Senturk (CIS Dean)
  • Mohammad Fadel (University of Toronto) 
  • Mohammad Ghaly (CILE Acting Director)

20:30 - 21:00

The Ethical Turn in Politics and Islamic Conceptions of Wilāya

  • Yasmeen Daifallah, University of California, Santa Cruz

21:00 - 21:10

Break

21:10 - 22:00

Response & Discussion

Respondent: Andrew March, UMass-Amherst

22:00-22:10

Break

22:10 – 22:40

Walāya in Medieval Khurasani Sufism 

  • Jason Welle, Pontifical Institute for Arabic and Islamic Studies, Rome

22:40 – 23:30

Response and Discussion

Respondent: Azfar Moin, University of Texas, Austin

23:30- 23:40

Break

23:40 – 00:10 

Wīlaya, Enjoining the Good and Forbidding the Evil and the Quranic Ethic of Gender Reciprocity

  • F. Redhwan Karim, Markfield Institute Higher Education

00:10 – 01:00 

Response and Discussion

Respondent: Mohammad Fadel, University of Toronto Faculty of Law

 

Day 2

 

Friday February 24, 2023

 

20:00- 20:10

Opening 

  • Mohammed Ghaly

20:10 – 20:40

The Ethicality of Wālī and Wilāya and the Mechanisms Provided in Jurisprudence to Ensure the Observance of Ethics in Wilāya 

  • Javad Fakhkhar Toosi, University of Toronto  

20:40 – 21:30

Response and Discussion

Respondent: Mohammad Fadel, University of Toronto Faculty of Law

21:30-21:40

Break

21:40 – 22:10

Al-Wilāya in the Political Thought of al-Ghazālī

  • Vanessa Breidy

22:10 – 23:00

Response and Discussion

Respondent: Mohammad Fadel, University of Toronto Faculty of Law

23:00-23:10

Break

23:10 – 23:40

Grounding Sufi wilāya in Islamicate Authority, al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī’s Solution to the Problem of Power  

  • Aiyub Palmer, University of Kentucky

23:40 – 00:30

Response and Discussion

Respondent: Ovamir Anjum, University of Toledo

00:30 - 01:00

Concluding Remarks and Publication Plan