A Treasury of Ghazali

About Abu Hamid Al-GhazaliMustafa Abu Sway

Mustapha Abu Sway is the first holder of the Integral Chair for the Study of Imam Ghazls Work at the Aqsa Mosque and at Al-Quds University in Jerusalem Palestine. He has been Professor of Philosophy and Islamic Studies at the university since 1996. In addition to numerous academic appointments at Asian and American universities at the Aqsa Mosque he teaches al-Ghazls greatest work the Revival of the Religious Sciences dedicated to reviving the spiritual disciplines that lie at the heart of Islam. Al-Ghazali (450/1058-505/1111) was born at Tus near Mashhad in Iran in the early Seljuq era and studied theology and law at Nishapur. His formidable intellectual abilities soon won him honour and respect at the court of the famous Seljuqi Prime Minister Nizam al-Mulk and while still in his early thirties he became Professor at Madrasa Nizamiyya in Baghdad and attained great prominence there. But soon he abandoned his professorship for a decade of contemplation and study. He returned for a while to lecture at the Nizamiyya in Nishapur before his death. He wrote a large number of works which include Al-Munqidh min al-Dalal (a biographical account) Tahafut al-Falasifa; but his magnum opus remains the Ihya' Ulum al-Din in four volumes compiled during his period of retirement and contemplation.