Ebrahim Moosa

Ebrahim Moosa

Ebrahim E.I. Moosa is Professor of Islamic Studies in Duke University's Department of Religion. His scholarly interests span both classical and modern Islamic thought with a special focus on Islamic law, history, ethics and theology. Professor Moosa is the author of Ghazali and the Poetics of Imagination, winner of the American Academy of Religion's Best First Book in the History of Religions (2006) and editor of the last manuscript of the late Professor Fazlur Rahman, Revival and Reform in Islam: A Study of Islamic Fundamentalism. Most recently he edited with Shamil Jeppie & Richard Roberts. Muslim Family Law in Sub-Saharan Africa: Colonial Legacies and Post-Colonial Challenges. Amsterdam University Press, Spring, 2010). He was named Carnegie Scholar in 2005 to pursue research on the madrasas, Islamic seminaries of South Asia.

Born in South Africa, Dr. Moosa earned his MA (1989) and PhD (1995) from the University of Cape Town. Prior to that he took the `alimiyya degree in Islamic and Arabic studies from Darul Ulum Nadwatul `Ulama, one of India's foremost Islamic seminaries in the city of Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh. He also has a BA degree from Kanpur University, and a postgraduate diploma in journalism from the City University in London. Previously he taught at the University of Cape Town's Department of Religious Studies in South Africa till 1998 and was visiting professor at Stanford University 1998-2001 prior to joining Duke University. As a journalist he wrote for Arabia: The Islamic World Review, MEED (Middle East Economic Digest) and Afkar/Inquiry magazines in Britain, and later became political writer for the Cape Times in South Africa. He contributes regularly to the op-ed pages of the New York Times, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Boston Review and several international publications and is frequently invited to comment on global Islamic affairs.

Currently he is completing a book titled What is a Madrasa? Also under construction are two books on ethics: Muslim Self Revived: Ethics, Rights and Technology after Empire and another title, Between Right and Wrong: Debating Muslim Ethics (Wiley). In these writings Moosa explores some of the major challenges that confront a tradition-in-the making such as Islam within a rapidly changing world. Moosa examines the way religious traditions encounter modernity and in the process generating new conceptions of history, culture and ethics.

Professor Moosa serves on several distinguished international advisory boards and is associated with some of the foremost thinkers, activists and role-players in the Muslim world and beyond. He advised the first independent South African government after apartheid on Islamic affairs and serves on committees of the Organization of Islamic Conference in addition to others. He also has extensive experience in human rights activities. He has received grants from the Ford Foundation to research contemporary Muslim ethics and issues of philanthropy in the Muslim world. For further details and access to research materials please visit Professor Moosa’s website ebrahimmoosa.com

Professor Moosa's unique approach is to combine the best of traditional Islamic studies with the latest theories of interpretation. This is quite visible in his book, Ghazali and the Poetics of Imagination. At Duke University, he teaches classes on topics that range from Islamic law and ethics to hermeneutical methodology to specialized seminars on Muslim thinkers (such as Ghazali and Muhammad Iqbal). Professor Moosa spoke at the Postmodernism, Culture, and Religion III conference on "The Politics of Love," alongside some key figures in contemporary critical thought, in April 2009. His topic was "Decolonizing the Empire of Love."