This seminar will discuss the main characteristics of the preaching of Muhammad in Mecca. The main aim is to see how he understood his ministry and how he presented it. Prof. Saleh will also attempt to offer a new understanding of the main preaching stories of Muhammad, what is called the Punishment Stories: the narratives about previous communities that were sent a prophet only for them to refuse him and then suffer a genocidal punishment. The final aim is to speculate about the audience of his preaching. Who was he preaching to?
Walid Saleh is currently fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study at CEU, Budapest and Professor of Islamic Studies at the University of Toronto. He is a specialist on the Qur’an, the history of its interpretation and the gloss tradition in medieval Islam. He is author of two books, including The Formation of the Classical Tafsir Tradition (Brill, 2004). He is also the author of several articles on the Qur’an and the intellectual history of Islam. He was a recipient of Konrad Adenauer Fellowship from the Humboldt Foundation, and of New Directions Mellon Foundation Fellowship. He is currently working on a history of the Qur’an commentary tradition.
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