Lecture—"Medieval Muslim Social Polemics Against Christians and Jews: New Texts and Implications"

Medieval Christians, Muslims, and Jews wrote numerous texts attacking one another's scriptures and doctrines. But they also wrote screeds against their religious opponents' social, economic, and political presence. This talk introduces two unpublished Arabic texts of the latter kind, which I term "social polemics," from Egypt and Syria. I will first situate them in their historical settings and literary genres and then discuss their contents and reception, showing that despite their strong connections to Muslim textual tradition and social movements, they were limited in their circulation. I will then reflect, in a more exploratory way, on the contemporary implications of such texts: how to read and discuss them most faithfully and fruitfully in the 21st century. Virulent medieval polemics have been both seized upon by present-day anti-Muslim writers and downplayed by certain Muslim and mainstream scholars. I argue for a via media, borrowing from recent academic approaches to antisemitism.

Luke Yarbrough is a scholar of early and medieval Islamic history and thought. His research interests include inter-religious relations, hadith studies, Arabic historiography, state administration, and manuscript studies. His monograph, Friends of the Emir: Non-Muslim State Officials in Islamic Thought (Cambridge University Press, 2019) explores what Muslims wrote about the many influential non-Muslims who helped run their governments. Currently his research deals with polemic, Islamic state law, and the regulation of calendars.