EP027 Dr. Aaron Tugendhaft on philosopher al-Fārābī (d. 951CE), ISIS and Iconoclasm
Release Date: 04/17/2021
💧EP054 GUEST EPISDODE (8/8) The Great Valens Aqueduct of Constantinople/ Istanbul
Abbasid History Podcast
The longest aqueduct of the ancient world, the Valens aqueduct brought water to the capital of the eastern Roman empire: Byzantium or Constantinople, today known as Istanbul. Monumental sections of the aqueduct bridge still majestically stride across the city. In this episode we talk about the reasons for embarking on this colossal project, its development, decline and adaptation, and its place in the cultural heritage of today’s Turkey. Speaker: Mariëtte Verhoeven. Interviewer: Edmund Hayes. Mariëtte Verhoeven is university lecturer and researcher at Radboud University specialising...
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Abbasid History Podcast
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💧EP052 GUEST EPISDODE (6/8) Water and the White Monastery: Water Management at a Single Site
Abbasid History Podcast
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💧EP051 GUEST EPISODE (5/8) Toilets and Waste in Andalusia
Abbasid History Podcast
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💧EP050 GUEST EPISODE (4/8) The City on The Tigris: Baghdad, Drinking and Water Transport
Abbasid History Podcast
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💧EP049 GUEST EPISODE (3/8) The Beginnings of the Bathhouse in the Middle East, from Rome to Early Islam
Abbasid History Podcast
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💧EP048 GUEST EPISODE (2/8) Mesopotamia: Taming the Euphrates
Abbasid History Podcast
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Abbasid History Podcast
This episode was produced by Edmund Hayes and Jouke Heringa. Ep1. Water History and the Pre-Modern Middle East The cities of the medieval Middle East were some of the largest in the world, dwarfing the major cities of western Europe, for example. So how did they support large populations in relatively arid conditions? In this episode we provide an overview of the kinds of hydraulic infrastructure and social institutions that allowed pre-modern Middle Eastern cities to function. Speakers: Maaike van Berkel and Josephine van den Bent. Interviewer: Edmund Hayes. This episode, and this series on...
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🕸EP046 Prof. Hayrettin Yücesoy on his new book "Disenchanting the Caliphate"
Abbasid History Podcast
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🖋EP045 Nasim Hassani on an illustrated manuscript of al-Maqāmāt by Abū Muḥammad al-Ḥarīrī (d.1122CE)
Abbasid History Podcast
Abū Muḥammad al-Ḥarīrī was an Arab poet, scholar and Seljuk government official who died in 1122CE aged 68 years old. His work al-Maqāmāt, a compilation of 50 highly-stylised comic anecdotes about the exploits of trickster Abū Zayd, received widespread renown in his time across the Muslim world and is regarded as a high point of Arabic literature. We are pleased to be joined by Nasim Hassani in Tehran. Ms. Hasani hold a master's degree in Islamic Studies from Shahid Beheshti University,Tehran, Iran, where her dissertation was an Analysis of Mary and Jesus' Birth and Early Life in...
info_outlineIn February 2015, the former Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) released a video showing their destruction of Mesopotamian antiquities at the museum of Mosul. Although perhaps ironic that images are used to show the destruction of images, a video intended to shock can be turned against its makers when analysed thoughtfully.
Our guest this episode, Dr. Aaron Tugendhaft, argues in his latest book "The Idols of ISIS: From Assyria to the Internet" that iconoclasm at heart is a political manifesto a matter understood by Abbasid philosopher Abū Naṣr al-Farābī (d.951CE).
Dr. Tugendhaft received his PhD from the Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University in 2012 and also holds degrees in Art History and Social Thought from the University of Chicago. In 2013, he received the Jonas Greenfield Prize for Younger Semitists from the American Oriental Society. He currently teaches at Bard College Berlin.
Timestamps
00.00 Introduction
02.40 Abū Naṣr al-Farābī (ca. 870–950) thought deeply about the relation
between images and politics. He adapted the insights of ancient political philosophers—especially Plato and Aristotle—to make sense of prophetic religion. How do his political treatises shed light on Abraham's iconoclasm that ISIS claimed to uphold?
06.30 Where ISIS spoke of the need to cleanse the world of idols, their critics refer to a moral and legal imperative to protect cultural heritage. How do we see Al-Farābī's thesis play out in our contemporary context?
10.20 You also mention in your book how once archaeologists commonly removed so-called late levels—that is, medieval and modern Islamic remains—without recording them to get to the ancient layers underneath eliding the Islamic Middle East as though only the West beholds antiquity’s beauty today. What is called the "secular" can also have their idols, right?
13.30 Your book ends creatively employing al-Farābī's thoughts on images and politics in the age of video games. How would the philosopher have advised Trump?
22.55 Your book "The Idols of ISIS: From Assyria to the Internet" is published by University of Chicago Press. What are other current projects that listeners can anticipate?
Dr. Tugendhaft, Thank you for being a guest on the Abbasid History Podcast!
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