Drinking From the Firehose Again (aka fandom stuff update)

[moragmacpherson]

Bunch of quick notes because I finally feel like I'm making actual progress on my Master's report but all sorts of stuff is going on in fandom and I haven't been keeping up.

1. Reena_jenkins posted two more of my Buffy/Doctor Who stories as podfics - Impossible Things and its sequel, Sitting, Waiting, Wishing. She is made of awesome and she did a fantastic job. [Link to podfics]

2. There's a Supernatural crossover comment!fic meme going on that really needs more love: twisted_yarns. I've posted two prompts and responded to one (you can probably guess which one is me, even though I've never written that particular crossover before). Go give it love! [link to the current prompt post]

3.  I'm up to three thousand words on my help_pakistan fic and have acquired a beta for it, the lovely jjhunter .  I should be able to finish under the deadline, which is good, although I've forgotten when the deadline is, which is bad.

4.  Speaking of jj, in exchange for her work, I'm beta-ing her very interesting Batman/BtVS story and having a blast talking meta with her.  The story's YAHF, not a genre I usually enjoy, but this one's an exception and it's incredibly thoughtful while also being funny and intriguing.  Good stufff: [Link to Knight of Faith]

5.  Very excited about the author claims post going up for the Supernatural reversebigbang.  I've had good luck writing stories based on art before (see item #1) and it'll be yet another notch on my (slowly growing) single-fandom bedpost.  On the other hand: just what I needed, another thing to write.  AAAAAACCCCKKKK!

That being said, back to Arab philosophy with me.  Al-Ghazali was such a card.

Comments

[moragmacpherson]

Hmmm... reading the first sura (al-Fatiha, "The Opening") is always a good place to start. It's kind of the Islamic equivalent of the Lord's Prayer and the Nicene Creed all wrapped up in seven divinely revealed lines. God's identification as King of the Last Day/Day of Judgment is especially important because Arab pagans didn't believe in an afterlife - and as the word "Allah" could refer to either either 'god' or 'God (of Abraham),' it was vowing that they believed in the Day of Judgment that identified early converts as Muslims. You'll notice this is a recurring theme.

While reading in general: it's a good idea keep track of who God's addressing (and except in al-Fatiha, God is the narrator): sometimes He's speaking directly to Muhammad, sometimes to the community of believers, sometimes to all of humanity, and sometimes to specific groups who may or may not be clearly defined, e.g. God spends a lot of time telling Muhammad's wives what to do.

After you've read al-Fatiha, I'd try reading the suras in the order of revelation, not just because the Meccan suras tend to be shorter and less daunting, but also because the Qur'an sometimes appears to contradict itself on certain issues: in these cases, whichever ayat (verse) was revealed the latest is accepted as the best expression of God's will, a concept called 'abrogation' (see verse 2:106). The general consensus chronological order is:

Meccan Suras (suras received while Muhammad and the early believers were living under pagan oppression in Mecca between 610 and 622, when Muhammad and his companions fled to Medina in order to escape an assassination attempt by the pagan city leaders (the Quraysh*)):

96; 68; 73; 74; 1; 111; 81; 87; 92; 89; 93; 94; 103; 100; 108; 102; 107; 109; 105; 113; 114; 112; 53; 80; 97; 91; 85; 95; 106; 101; 75**; 104; 77; 50; 90; 86; 54; 38; 7; 72; 36; 25; 35; 19; 20; 56; 26; 27; 28; 17; 10; 11; 12; 15; 6; 37; 31; 34; 39; 40**; 41; 42; 43; 44; 45; 46; 51; 88; 18; 16; 71; 14; 21; 23; 32; 52; 67; 69; 70; 78; 79; 82; 84; 30; 29; 83

* - Muhammad himself was Qurayshi, from the Hashimi branch, but the tribe and Mecca were largely controlled by the 'Abd Shams branch at the time; also, as an orphan, Muhammad was denied many tribal protections his father might have provided; note: the Qurayshi didn't dare to plot an assassination until after the death of Abu Talib - Muhammad's uncle, foster-father, and head of the Hashimis - in 619.)
** 618/619 - the year of sorrow when both Abu Talib and Muhammad's first wife died, occurs between the revelation of sura 75 and sura 40. After that year, the Quraysh are more aggressive in their persecution and Muhammad begins his polygamous lifestyle.

Medinan Suras (Suras revealed after the migration (hijra) of the community to Medina in 622 until Muhammad's death in 632. During this period, Muhammad was the head not just of the community of Muslims, but also of the entire city of Medina which included non-Muslims - God starts to send very specific policy points. Also, bear in mind: until the Quraysh surrendered Mecca in 628, they were in a constant state of war with the Muslims and the revelations often reflect this (Muhammad did forgive the one Quraysh lady who ate his uncle Hamza's liver after she surrendered and converted, but was less forgiving of the Jewish tribe that tried to betray Medina during a Quraysh siege)):

2*; 8; 3; 33;60; 4; 99; 57; 47; 13; 55; 76; 65; 98; 59; 24; 22; 63; 58; 49; 66; 64; 61; 62; 48**; 5; 9***; 110

* Surat al-Baqara - the cow - longest sura in the Qur'an, primarily revealed over the course of the first two years in Medina - called "the little Qur'an" because it sums many other themes.
** Surat al-Fath - the victory - revealed upon the surrender of Meccan Quraysh in 628.
*** Surat at-Taubah - Repentence: the only sura which does NOT open with the Bismillah ("In the name of God, the most benevolent, ever-merciful") for reasons which are readily apparent - it's a sura about war - more specifically, revealed while rumors swept the peninsula that the entire Byzantine Army was coming to wipe out the fledgling Muslim community in 630 (Muhammad marched into Syria with 30,000 men but never encountered the rumored Byzantine forces; there are no extant Byzantine records that mention such an invasion) Fundamentalists, both Islamic and Christian, love this chapter because it 'proves' that Islam cannot tolerate other religions (except that it can. Read carefully.)

[jjhunter]

The library copy cannot arrive soon enough. Thank you.

[moragmacpherson]

Not a problem. This is the reason I got into this field in the first place: to spread the knowledge.