Book Reviews 349

North India or Delhi possess the same mystique as Sayyid Sufis from the Prophet’s
land as lands they migrate to acquire the other dimension of layered ‘pre-eminent’
peripheries. The North then becomes equalled to the Prophet’s land for the Deccanı̄
Sufis or the Sultanate—whether real or unreal, but definitely a political claim about
Islamic purity and power.
In conclusion, I would say that this book is an informative primary text, providing
an important translation for readers who already have some rudimentary knowledge of
Islam, Sufis and Sufism in North India along with all its academic debates, while having
no access to Persian. The book allows readers to understand the association between
the plethora of shrines in the Deccan and the linkage between of a large networked
web of Deccanı̄ Sufis, a topic that is hitherto un-researched.

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References
Deak, D. (2005) ‘Maharashtra Saints and the Sufi Tradition: Eknāth, Chānd Bodhle and the

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Datta Sampradaya’, Deccan Studies, 3(2): 22–47.

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Digby, S. (1986) ‘The Sufi Shaikh as a Source of Authority in Medieval India’. In M. Gaborieau

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(Ed.), Islam et Societe en Asie du Sud (pp. 57–77). Paris: Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences
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Sociales.
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Green, N. (2006) Indian Sufism since the Seventeenth Century: Saints Books and Empire in the
Muslim Deccan. London: Routledge.
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——— (2011) Bombay Islam: The Religious Economy of the West Indian Ocean, 1840–1915.
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New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

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——— (2012a) Making Space: Sufis and Settlers in Early Modern India. New Delhi: Oxford
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University Press.
——— (2012b) Sufism: A Global History. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.
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Sirriyeh, E. (1999) Sufis and Anti-Sufis: The Defence, Rethinking and Rejection of Sufism in the
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Modern World. London: Routledge Curzon.

Van der Veer, P. (1992) ‘Praying or Playing: A Sufi Saint’s Day in Surat’, The Journal of Asian
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Studies, 51(3): 545–64.

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Deepra Dandekar
Max-Planck-Institute for Human Development
Berlin, Germany

Shahab Ahmed, What is Islam? The Importance of Being Islamic (Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press, 2016), xvii + 609 pp.
DOI: 10.1177/0262728017725657

This is a pioneering work, written by a brilliant scholar, the late Shahab Ahmed,
embarking upon the daunting tasks of providing a re-conceptualisation of ‘Islam’.
Clearly dissatisfied with prevailing discourses that often disregard the ‘capaciousness,

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350 South Asia Research Vol. 37(3): 335–362

complexity and, often, outright contradictions’ (p. 6, italics in the original) of the
historical practices of Islam, Ahmed adopts an approach that accounts for the
rich textures of both ‘Islam as theoretical object or analytical category and Islam
as real historical phenomenon’ (p. 6). The book takes as its primary objective the
conceptualisation of Islam in a manner capable of cohering its multiplicity of
meanings, with particular emphasis on the human and historical phenomenon of
Islam. Throughout history, Muslim societies have used Islam to give meaning to their
behaviour and practices, even when such practices seem to directly oppose the tenets
of Islamic religious doctrine. A concept of Islam, Ahmed contends, must be attuned
not only to objective categories deduced from textual sources but also to the often
contradictory historical treatments of, and meanings associated with, Islam.
A theme running throughout the book is the notion of Islam as a human and
historical phenomenon, which does not mean that it is any lesser form of religion.

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To support his approach, Ahmed introduces the Balkans-to-Bengal complex
signifying ‘a common paradigm of Islamic life and thought’ (p. 75) by Muslims

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across a vast geographic expanse. From the Balkans to Bengal (and beyond), Muslims

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from the mid-thirteenth to mid-nineteenth century asserted expressions of Islamic

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behaviour in ‘explorative, creative, and contrary trajectories’ (p. 81), representing
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an overarching attitude of plurality of ‘what it meant to be Muslim’ (p. 81). These
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historical experiences represent a largely overlooked historical paradigm in Islam,

since by the thirteenth century the major Islamic theological debates had already
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been settled. Moreover, the Balkans-to-Bengal complex specifically constitutes a

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paradigm of Islam rather than some regional variation, since diverse peoples engaged
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in a plurality of human activities onto which they ascribed meanings as Muslims

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and, in turn, through which they expressed their Muslim identity. This paradigm
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helps prepare the reader for Ahmed’s eventual re-conceptualisation of Islam as

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hermeneutical engagement through a ‘shared language by and in which people express

themselves so as to communicate meaningfully in all their variety’ (p. 323). Islam
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is thus not only embedded within constellations of textual sources and categories,
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but also within the social textures of different societies.

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The book is divided into three parts (‘Questions’, ‘Conceptualizations’ and

‘Reconceptualizations’, containing six chapters. The first chapter constitutes Part I and
is based around six core questions that seek to destabilise dominant understandings of
what it means to be ‘Islamic’. For example, Ahmed asks what is specifically Islamic about
Islamic philosophy, Islamic art or Islamic poetry? Most unexpected yet compelling is the
example of wine drinking, where Ahmed introduces a wide range of historical evidence
to show that ‘[w]ine-drinking was a collective and normative group practice’ (p. 62).
Ahmed presents instances of wine cups with Qur’anic engravings, poems celebrating
wine and faith, and the overall ‘normalcy of wine-consumption to the life-ways of
Muslims of the Balkans to Bengal complex’ (p. 67). One revealing example concerns
the Great Mughal Jahangir, whose gold-minted coin depicts him with a wine-cup
in one hand and a book (which Ahmed alludes to as the Qur’an) in the other. The
Book Reviews 351

chapter destabilises prevailing conceptions of Islam that fail to adequately account for
contradictory historical practices pursued by people who ‘thought and lived as Muslims’
(p. 81), without viewing their behaviour as a transgression of their Islamic faith.
Part II consists of three chapters in which Ahmed attacks some of the prevailing
conceptualisations of Islam as they ‘privilege a particular register or trajectory
of statements as constitutive of Islam’ (p. 113), thereby creating categories that
inadequately capture the plenitude of the historical phenomenon of Islam. Chapter
2 focuses on the prominence given to law in identifying the normative content of
Islam. Law is fundamental in the organisation of modern society in ways unparalleled
in human history. In pre-modern eras, ‘law was plainly not “a world-view that defined
both Muslim identity and even Islam itself ”’ (p. 122). Instead, the Balkans-to-Bengal
complex involved a much richer and wider normative space where Islam was expressed
in terms that may explicitly counter Islamic legal doctrine (such as wine-drinking).

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A ‘legal-supremacist’ conception of Islam thus inhibits one from recognising that
the human and historical phenomenon of Islam may involve norms that go beyond

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the legal realm. Chapters 3 and 4 cover the religious (versus secular) and cultural

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conceptualisations of Islam, respectively, and similarly detail their inadequacies.

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Having thoroughly disposed of prevailing treatments of Islam, Ahmed dedicates
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the two chapters in part III to his own re-conceptualisation of Islam. To account for
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the variant narratives associated with dynamic historical phenomena, Islam should be
conceived as hermeneutic engagement. Chapter 5 provides an intriguing elaboration of
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this concept whereby an actor engages in ‘the process of truth-making and meaning-
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making from a source’ (p. 345), thus turning attention to ‘the features that together
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are constitutive of the structure and dynamic of human and historical Islam’ (p. 345).
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A conception that turns on hermeneutical engagement is not predisposed to particular

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object-meanings but rather seeks to track those sources that produce meaning, even
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if located in contradictory historical narratives. The reference to ‘source’ invokes not

only textural scriptures (like the Qur’an) but also the ‘Pre-Text’, or unseen realities
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and truths that lie beyond the text, ‘and upon which the act, Text and truth of Revelation
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are contingent’ (p. 346), as well as the ‘Con-Text’ or the full panoply or ‘lexicon of
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means and meanings of Islam that has been historically generated and recorded up
to any given moment’ (p. 357). This conceptualisation facilitates an engagement
with multiple sources of meaning that may ‘necessarily generate not only different,
but outrightly contradictory truth-meanings as Islam’ (p. 365). Chapter 6 applies
this new conceptualisation of Islam to the six questions raised in Chapter 1, thereby
demonstrating its ability to consolidate Islam as simultaneously objective category
and historical phenomenon.
This massive book stands at the apex of fine scholarship, as Ahmed bases all of his
assertions on a very detailed and thorough consideration of historical patterns, while
also covering a wide breadth of disciplinary grounds (including history, Islamic studies,
law and anthropology). While he writes in a lucid and engaging manner, parts of the
book may be difficult for a non-specialist, as his writing assumes a basic understanding

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352 South Asia Research Vol. 37(3): 335–362

of Islamic discourses. However, this in no way detracts from its overall contribution
to Islamic studies scholarship. Indeed, the book’s academic rigour and bold assertions
are likely to create reverberations in the field for years to come. Ahmed succeeds in
proposing a novel, coherent, compelling and non-essentialist re-conceptualisation of
Islam capable of grappling with the human and historical phenomenon of Islam with
all of its seeming inconsistencies and contradictions.

Nafay Choudhury
Dickson Poon School of Law, King’s College London, UK

Altaf Qadir, Sayyid Ahmad Barailvi: His Movement and Legacy from the Pukhtun
Perspective (New Delhi: SAGE Publications, 2015), xxv + 224 pp.

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DOI: 10.1177/0262728017725658

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This book provides rich historical and sociopolitical insights woven around Sayyid

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Ahmad Barailvi (1786–1831, hereafter SAB), widely known for first propagating

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and leading a jihad movement during the nineteenth century in what was then the
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North-West Frontier area. This reformist movement, directed against the British and
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the Sikhs, in alliance with the Pukhtun tribe in that region, primarily sought to bring
about purification of what it meant to be a Muslim. The key term jihad has, however,
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not been used in the title of the book and the author appears somehow confident
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that readers will decipher its various meanings. However, current developments,
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globally and in South Asia, suggest that widespread loose usage of this term today,
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alluding to terrorist activities on religious grounds, and its association with words like
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‘fundamentalism’, ‘terrorism’, ‘Mujahidin’ and ‘Wahabism’, require some comment.

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Jihad as a controversial concept has many layers of meaning. Some define it as a holy
war; some stratify it into greater and lesser jihad. This involves an understanding that
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the struggle with(in) oneself to become a better human being and a better Muslim is
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the greater jihad, whereas fighting the outer world for the common good of humanity
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is the lesser jihad. Similarly, as an Islamic term ‘Mujahidin’ signifies generally those
who strive for the cause of God. This strife assumes various forms, including armed
conflict with those who pose a threat to the lives, property and religious faith of
Muslims. It does not mean murdering anyone who disagrees with you, but is widely
taken to signify just that today.
Qadir does not address jihad until Chapter 3, however, and even then he neither
explores its multiple meanings nor discusses its transitions. Using the term ‘as it is’ puts
a rather heavy onus of interpretation on readers and their imagination. In addition,
SAB’s movement was known as the Wahabi movement in British records. In the
modern history of Islam in South Asia, ‘Mujahidin’ refers also to the followers of SAB,
and their struggle is called the ‘Mujahidin Movement’. However, this movement of
Mujahidin led by SAB in pre-independence India was quite different from the Indian