The History of the Bible in the Islamic Religious Imagination
is Associate professor of Religion at the University of Toronto. He studied Arabic language and literature at the American University of Beirut and received his Ph.D. in Religious Studies from Yale University. He specializes in the Qur’an and the history of its interpretation (tafsir). His first book, The Formation of the Classical Tafsir Tradition: The Qur’an Commentary of al-Tha’labi (D. 427/1035), was published by Brill in 2004. His second book, In Defense of the Bible: A Critical Edition and an Introduction to al-Biqa’i’s Bible Treatise, came out in 2008 and was also published by Brill.
Saleh’s new project is a study of the history of the Bible in the Islamic religious imagination. Saleh is interested in charting the development of Islamic religious intellectual history by using tafsir and the study of the Qur’an as the guide to such a history. Another area Saleh is interested in is the apocalyptic literature written in Mamluk and early Ottoman Arab lands.
