A Body Unlike Bodies:Transcendent Anthropomorphismin Ancient Semitic Tradition and Early Islam

摘要

in taking up and elaborating upon John Wansbrough's insistence that emergent Islam be seenas a continuation of the Near Eastern Semitic monotheistic tradition, I Gerald R. Hawtingmakes an important observation:That Islam is indeed related to Judaism and Christianity as part of the Middle Eastern, Abra-hamic or Semitic tradition of monotheism seems so obvious and is so often said that it might bewondered why it was thought necessary to repeat it. The reason is that although it is often said,acceptance of Islam as a representative of the monotheist religious tradition is not always accom-panied by willingness to think through the implications of the statement (emphasis added).2