14 Alina Kokoschka and Birgit Krawietz
Ibn Taymiyya has fuelled the imagination of so many observers. His
biography seems to follow familiar scripts, and appears as if it were des-
tined for film. The ensuing oversimplifications and shortcut interpreta-
tions of his multifaceted writings have been criticised;^51 hence there are
various differentiated readings in the realm of academia. Michael Cook
emphasizes that albeit “his notorious disposition to rock the boat”, Ibn
Taymiyya made “no attempt to cultivate street-power”.^52
3. The Paradigm of the Eternal Pupil
Against the backdrop of the histrionic life of his master, the biography of
Ibn al-Qayyim (and, indeed, that of any other scholar) looks much less
spectacular, more so as Ibn Taymiyya is “so eccentric, charismatic, origi-
nal, and captivating, and his writings so voluminous, that next to him a
person with a more gentle profile like Ibn Qayyim al-Ǧawziyyah runs
the risk of looking dull.”^53 This impression unfolds on various levels and
it applies to the person as much as to the oeuvre. There is no need to
replicate here the distinctive but intertwined biographical trajectories of
both authors. Suffice it to mention that, unlike Ibn Taymiyya, his pupil
Ibn al-Qayyim did not spend his life fighting on several fronts. The
latter’s inquisitorial experience in and outside prison (miḥna)^54 and the
fierce criticism he encountered for issuing fatwas and defending theo-
logical stances in line with his famous teacher also elevated him – in the
eyes of admirers – to the ranks of heroic resistance and moral courage.
Taken as a whole, however, his life is very much a life of writing. Ibn
al-Qayyim is described as being well aware of the shortness of man’s
lifetime; he therefore worked incessantly, even when separated from
his private hometown library.^55 Instead of revisiting their entangled life
51 The call for a painstakingly close reading has notably been made by Yahya
Michot; compare, for instance, his: Ibn Taymiyya’s “New Mardin Fatwa.” Is
Genetically Modified Islam Carcinogenic?, in: The Muslim World 101 (2011),
pp. 130–181.
52 Cook, Michael: Commanding Right and Forbidding Wrong in Islamic Thought,
Cambridge 2000, pp. 149–150. See the chapter by Abdessamad Belhaj in the
present volume.
53 Bori and Holtzman, Introduction, p. 16.
54 Krawietz, Birgit: Ibn Qayyim al-Jawzīyah. His Life and Works, in: Mamlūk
Studies Review 10 (2006), pp. 19–64, here p. 24.
55 Al-Baqrī, Aḥmad Maḥmūd: Ibn al-Qayyim min āthārihi al-ʿilmiyya, Beirut
1404/1984, p. 142.
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