This hybrid event takes place from 16:00 to 18:30 GMT, at the Aga KhanA title granted by the Shah of Persia to the then Ismaili Imam in 1818 and inherited by each of his successors to the Imamate. Centre, London, and online.
The Institute of Ismaili Studies (IIS) will host a book launch and discussion marking the publication of Illuminating Scriptural Connections: A Qur’anic Commentary on the Torah by Rick Sopher and Dr Abdulla Galadari.
Bringing the Torah and the Qur’anMuslims believe that the Holy Qur’an contains divine revelations to the Prophet Muhammed received in Mecca and Medina over a period of 23 years in the early 7th century CE. More into conversation, the book explores the connections, differences and shared narratives between two foundational scriptures of Judaism and Islam. It considers each of the Torah’s fifty-four weekly portions alongside passages from the Qur’an, examining common stories, prophetic figures and themes including creation, law, covenant and divine mercy.
The authors also explore the complex history of interaction between Jewish and Islamic scriptural traditions, including connections with rabbinic literature and passages that have sometimes been understood as sources of tension between Judaism and Islam. In doing so, the book seeks to open new possibilities for scriptural study and Jewish-Muslim dialogue.
Co-authors Rick Sopher and Abdalla Galadari will engage in conversation with Dr Karen Bauer of the Institute of Ismaili Studies, and Prof Shari Lowin of Stonehill College.
Speakers
Rick Sopher
Fellow of the Woolf Institute
Rick Sopher is a Fellow of the Woolf Institute in Cambridge. He is active in interfaith scriptural dialogue and in initiatives that build relations between Jewish and Muslim communities. In 2007, France named him a Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur for his contribution to religious education.
Abdulla Galadari
Associate Professor
Dr Abdulla Galadari is Associate Professor of Islamic Studies at Khalifa University of Science and Technology, Abu Dhabi. His publications include Qur’anic Hermeneutics: Between Science, History, and the Bible and Metaphors of Death and Resurrection in the Qur’an: An Intertextual Approach with Biblical and Rabbinic Literature.
Discussants
Shari Lowin
Professor of Religious Studies & Theology
Professor Shari Lowin is Professor of Islamic and Jewish Studies in the Religious Studies Department at Stonehill College, Massachusetts. Her research explores the interplay between Islamic and Jewish texts in the early Islamic period. She is the author of The Making of a Forefather: Abraham in Islamic and Jewish Exegetical Narratives.
Dr Karen Bauer
Associate Professor
Dr Karen Bauer (PhD, Princeton) is an Associate Professor in the Qur’anic Studies Unit at the IIS. Dr Bauer’s research centres on the Qur’an and its reception history, the history of emotions in Islam, and gender in Islamic history and thought. Dr Bauer’s publications include Women, Households, and the Hereafter in the Qur’an: a Patronage of Piety (2023, with Feras Hamza), An Anthology of Qur’anic Commentaries, Vol II: On Women (2021, with Feras Hamza), Gender Hierarchy in the Qur’an: Medieval Interpretations, Modern Responses (2015), Aims, Methods, and Contexts of Qur’anic Exegesis (2013), and numerous articles.
