One Thousand and One Nights is a collection of Middle Eastern folk tales compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age. It is often known in English as the Arabian Nights, from the first English-language edition, which rendered the title as The Arabian Nights' Entertainment.
Islamic studies refers to the academic study of Islam, and generally to academic multidisciplinary "studies" programs—programs similar to others that focus on the history, texts and theologies of other religious traditions, such as Eastern Christian Studies or Jewish Studies but also fields such as —where scholars from diverse disciplines participate and exchange ideas pertaining to the particular field of study.
Arabic epic literature encompasses epic poetry and epic fantasy in Arabic literature. Virtually all societies have developed folk tales encompassing tales of heroes. Although many of these are legends, many are based on real events and historical figures.
Antoine Galland was a French orientalist and archaeologist, most famous as the first European translator of One Thousand and One Nights, which he called Les mille et une nuits. His version of the tales appeared in twelve volumes between 1704 and 1717 and exerted a significant influence on subsequent European literature and attitudes to the Islamic world. Jorge Luis Borges has suggested that Romanticism began when his translation was first read.
Ingrid Mattson is a Canadian activist and scholar. A professor of Islamic studies, she is currently the London and Windsor Community Chair in Islamic Studies at Huron University College at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada. Mattson is a former president of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and was described as "Perhaps the most noticed figure among American Muslim women" in a 2010 New York Times article.
"Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves" is a folk tale in Arabic added to the One Thousand and One Nights in the 18th century by its French translator Antoine Galland, who heard it from Syrian storyteller Hanna Diyab. As one of the most popular Arabian Nights tales, it has been widely retold and performed in many media across the world, especially for children.
Edward William Lane was a British orientalist, translator and lexicographer. He is known for his Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians and the Arabic-English Lexicon, as well as his translations of One Thousand and One Nights and Selections from the Kur-án.
George Sale (1697–1736) was a British Orientalist scholar and practising solicitor, best known for his 1734 translation of the Quran into English. In 1748, after having read Sale's translation, Voltaire wrote his own essay "De l'Alcoran et de Mahomet".
Robert Graham Irwin is a British historian, novelist, and writer on Arabic literature.
The Hartford International University for Religion and Peace is a private theological university in Hartford, Connecticut.
Zaid Shakir is an American Muslim scholar and co-founder of Zaytuna College in Berkeley, California. He teaches courses on Arabic, law, history, and Islamic spirituality.
The Arabic–English Lexicon is an Arabic–English dictionary compiled by Edward William Lane. It was published in eight volumes during the second half of the 19th century. It consists of Arabic words defined and explained in the English language. But Lane does not use his own knowledge of Arabic to give definitions to the words. Instead, the definitions are taken from older Arabic dictionaries, primarily medieval Arabic dictionaries. Lane translates these definitions into English, and he carefully notes which dictionaries are giving which definitions.
William Henry Temple Gairdner was a British Christian missionary with the Church Missionary Society in Cairo, Egypt. His entire life was dedicated to service in Egypt as he himself commented when he was first preparing to leave. While in Cairo he partnered with his friend Douglas M. Thornton to reach educated Muslims with the gospel of Jesus Christ. This dynamic duo held many lectures in their home, Beit Arabi Pasha, and wrote a weekly magazine, Orient and Occident.
Allen Paul Wikgren was an American New Testament scholar and professor at the University of Chicago. His work centered on the text of the New Testament and New Testament manuscripts, but also included Hellenistic and biblical Greek, the deuterocanonical books (apocrypha), early Jewish literature, and work on the Revised Standard Version English translation of the Bible.
William Girdlestone Shellabear (1862–1947) was a "pioneer" scholar and missionary in British Malaya. He was known for both his appreciation of Muslim society and also his translation of the Bible into the Malay language.
Ibrahim M. Abu-Rabi' was a Professor in Islamic Studies at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada, and the Chair of the Edmonton Council of Muslim Communities. His primary areas of academic specialization were the Middle East and International Relations. He also had a special interest in the study and practice of interfaith dialogue between the Islamic and Christian religious traditions.
The Kitāb al-Fihrist is a compendium of the knowledge and literature of tenth-century Islam compiled by Ibn al-Nadim (c.998). It references approx. 10,000 books and 2,000 authors. This crucial source of medieval Arabic-Islamic literature, informed by various ancient Hellenic and Roman civilizations, preserves from his own hand the names of authors, books and accounts otherwise entirely lost. Al-Fihrist is evidence of Ibn al-Nadim's thirst for knowledge among the exciting sophisticated milieu of Baghdad's intellectual elite. As a record of civilisation transmitted through Muslim culture to the Western world, it provides unique classical material and links to other civilisations.
The translations of One Thousand and One Nights have been made into virtually every major language of the world. They include the French translation by Antoine Galland. Galland's translation was essentially based on a medieval Arabic manuscript of Syrian origins, supplemented by oral tales recorded by him in Paris from a Maronite Arab from Aleppo named Hanna Diyab.
Mahmoud M. Ayoub was a Lebanese Islamic scholar and professor of religious and inter-faith studies.
David A. Kerr was a British scholar of Christian-Muslim relations and world Christianity.
