The aim of this paper is to explore the effectiveness of critical thinking for improving the writing skill of undergraduate Arab students who study English Literature at Saudi universities under lockdown circumstances due to the COVID-19 pandemic. At the same time, it explores the impact of implementing Facebook as an online Constructivist tool to improve this skill. A general overview of the status of English language education in Saudi Arabia is briefly presented to shed light on the ongoing English language (...) challenges in learning writing for undergraduate students in the English language and literature departments, which got more manifested due to the current status of education mode with the emergence of the pandemic. Two-group posttest-only randomized experiment was employed to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed model, using the infusion and constructivism approaches. A total of 40 students enrolled in a literature course at a private university in Saudi Arabia participated in the experiment. The treatment was conducted through utilizing Facebook. The results demonstrated that students’ improvement in English writing was due to the combination of the infusion of a set of critical skills and the constructivist teaching and learning mode. (shrink)

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is a subset of artificial intelligence (AI) that can generate content such as texts, images, videos, sounds, etc. While GenAI tools have been utilized in various contexts, their utilization in the academic context is still a controversial topic. Scholars observed that many universities have banned GenAI due to the potential for unethical usage. In this opinion article, we promote the utilization of GenAI tools as feedback agents to alleviate challenges in conventional feedback provision. Feedback is a (...) valuable learning source, especially in writing instructions. However, conventional feedback provision is challenging due to the increase in teacher’s workload and social irritation issues in peer feedback. Utilized ethically, GenAI tools can alleviate these challenges. A few critical considerations are briefly presented. (shrink)

On religious life in Islam; conduct of life for Muslims and on Islamic ethics.

The contemporary Qur’anic studies have been marked by amazing development. Various methods and approaches to understand the Qur’an are offered by the scholars. One of the prominent figures in this field is Nashr Hamid Abu Zayd. Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd (1943–2010 M) is a highly controversial contemporary thinker. He is an Egyptian scholar who is accused of being apostate, because of his theory of qur’anic hermeneutic (the textual of Qur’an). This is reflected in his stances towards contemporary religious discourse and (...) the approach to reading religious texts, especially the Quran, which requires reading according to a hermeneutic mechanism. His books ‘Naqd al-Khitab al-Dini (Criticism of Religious Discourse)’ and ‘Al-Takfir fi Zaman al-Takfir (Thinking in the Time of Atonement)’ caused a great uproar in the early nineties of the last century. Abu Zayd was accused of criticising atheists because of their stances on the text. Therefore, this study aimed to discuss Abu Zayd’s position on contemporary religious discourse and his new approach to reading religious texts, and also aims to discuss why Abu Zayd’s theory has been string up Islamic world and ending by his expulsive from his native country. To deal with this problem, this article discusses Abd Zayd’s biography and some cultural framework of his people. The methodology of Qur’anic hermeneutic is the least his. Having examined the topic, the author finds that Abu Zayd believes that modem literary theory and criticism denote the way to understand and interpret the Qur’an ‘objectively’. The contribution of this research is discussing Abu Zayd’s contemporary religious discourse and his new approach to reading religious texts. Contribution: The contribution of this research is discussing Abu Zayd’s contemporary religious discourse and his new approach to reading religious texts. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Der Islam Jahrgang: 92 Heft: 1 Seiten: 124-147.

Farabi defines “Ilm al-Hiyal” in Ihsa al-Ulum as “knowing a way by which, human can adjust all of the concepts that have been proved in mathematics with verification to exotic objects, and helps their states in exotic objects to be carried”. He believes this will be recognized and be attained by craft. This was the common view in Islamic wisdom and philosophy in third and fourth Hijra centuries. Researchers believe that the unique emphasis on parallelism between theoretical science and practical (...) work is an important feature of Baghdad school and affected Islamic visual culture. Baghdad school had been affected by translation. In this way, Ikhwan-al-Safa, whom wrote the first encyclopedia of science in Islamic culture, had a very efficient role. They devised geometry into intellectual and sensual ones in the second part of their book, al-Rasa-el, and considered intellectual geometry as one of the middle philosophy and recognition and understanding factor for meaning of sensual geometry evidences. They insisted on basic situation of intellectual geometry in guidance of whom, want to learn intellectual things from sensual ones. They knew intellectual geometry as the factor for requiring skill in scientific crafts, and sensual geometry as the factor of practical crafts, and made a vast relation between them. They also defined end of intellectual geometry understanding the base of all sciences and the main factor of wise, essence of self. Important feature of Ikhwan-al-Safa’s wisdom is omitting the gap between theory and practice, making a vast relation between them, which affected the meaning of crafts in Islamic culture, and rendered a spiritual feature to crafts and arts. It seems this relation has created the concept of traditional arts, and integrating wisdom and crafts in Iranian-Islamic culture constructed all of the Fotowat-Nam e. This article reviews the concept, which affiliates theory and practice in third and fourth centuries and has a deep effect on recognition of art and craft in Islamic culture. (shrink)

The temple is a pivotal event in the religious life of the different cultures. In the article some aspects of the experience of the temple as sacred space are addressed. Qualitative dimensions of sacred space in Christianity and Islam as their directionality, hierarchy and dynamics are analyzed. In this perspective, it attempts to shed light on the genesis and the different meaning of the bell tower and the minaret as specific configurations of the sacred architecture of Christianity and Islam.Key words: (...) sacred architecture, space of the temple, bell tower, minaret. (shrink)

Women’s bodies, states Benhabib (Dignity in adversity: human rights in troubled times, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011: 168), have become the site of symbolic confrontations between a re-essentialized understanding of religious and cultural differences and the forces of state power, whether in their civic-republican, liberal-democratic or multicultural form. One of the main reasons for the emergence of these confrontations or public debates, says Benhabib (2011: 169), is because of the actual location of ‘political theology’. She asserts that within the context (...) of globalization, the concept of ‘political theology’ is complicated by its unstable location between religion and the public square; between the private and official; and between individual rights to freedom of religion versus state security and public well-being. Ultimately, therefore, the nature of the tension between religion as a political theology and the forces of state power can at best be described as a clash between identities of a collective nature (as envisaged by the nation-state) and identities of an individual nature (as manifested in different religions and cultures). Ongoing attempts to counter the ascendancy of religion, and as will be discussed in this article, specifically the ascendancy and visibility of Islamic identity as practiced by Muslim women, has brought into serious debate the notion of a (post) secular society and its implications for religious rights. What emerges from the state’s insistence that individuals not be allowed to enter the public discourse as religious beings, are, on the one hand, the constraints imposed on Muslim women by liberal democracies, and on the other hand, that Islam, as represented by Muslim women, is not constitutive of democratic citizenship. Will the inclusion and recognition of Muslim women, therefore, necessarily augment a democratic citizenship agenda, and will it lead to an alleviation of the conflict? Then, in exploring a re-articulation of an inclusive citizenship—one which is held accountable by its minimization of social inequality—what ought to be the parameters of inclusion and how should it unfold differently to what is already happening in liberal democracies? (shrink)

Half a century has passed since the time of the Second Vatican Council - half a century for which a significant part of the world has unrecognizably changed - many-sided and trivial global processes have unfolded; new outlines of world civilization have emerged, geographic boundaries and demographic scales of religions have changed - but because of this, the Roman Catholic Church by the mouths of its head and the highest spiritual pastor of Pope Benedict XVI defines the Second Vatican Council (...) as "the most important ecclesiastical event of the 20th century". (shrink)