Renovatio: The Podcast
31 episodes - English - Latest episode: 6 months ago - ★★★★★ - 108 ratingsA multimedia, multi-faith publication about the ideas that shape the modern world from the first Muslim liberal arts college in the United States, Zaytuna College.
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Episodes
The Ancient Roots of Transhumanist Thinking
October 24, 2023 13:49 - 35 minutes - 82.3 MBLenn E. Goodman, an expert on Jewish and Islamic metaphysics, joins Esme Partridge to discuss the philosophical heritage of AI (artificial intelligence)—which he locates in the medieval and renaissance study of alchemy, which ultimately sought to create man from matter—and the implications of our rapid embrace of AI.
"Is a Great Books Education for Everyone" with Thomas Hibbs
March 15, 2023 23:14 - 42 minutes - 58.7 MB"One thing that is true of [the Great Books] list is that you cannot… think that it is a unified, monolithic view of the truth. Hobbes and Machiavelli disagree vehemently with Plato, right? There's some continuity there, but Aquinas does not agree with David Hume, who is an atheist. So, at a minimum, an honest reading of that tradition is an introduction not to a monolithic unified conception of what the truth is, but to a series of important debates."—Thomas Hibbs Philosopher Thom...
"The Knowledge that Transcends the Empirical World" with Hasan Spiker
March 15, 2023 23:09 - 42 minutes - 59 MB"The empirical in the traditional notion of reason is only one component in the uncovering of our knowledge. But knowledge really involves uncovering the intelligible object. So what that means is the intelligible object is not there in the empirical world—that actually means transcending the empirical world to make contact with this intelligible essence." Zaytuna lecturer Hasan Spiker identifies the true ground of objectivity in a conversation with Esme Partridge.
"The Decline of Morality Amidst the Celebration of the Self" with Chris Hedges
March 15, 2023 23:04 - 43 minutes - 40 MB“If your ultimate concern is yourself, if you have spent your life building a monument to yourself, then in biblical terms, that’s idolatry. I think we live in an idolatrous society… I think it is extremely difficult for people to achieve a moral life without a community.” Chris Hedges speaks to Renovatio editor Safir Ahmed about what fuels our contemporary narcissism and prevents us fulfilling our moral obligations to our selves and to society. Recommended Read: “How the Cult...
Sculpting the Self with Muhammad U. Faruque and Esmé Partridge
April 08, 2022 16:06 - 47 minutes - 108 MBIn this podcast, Muhammad U. Faruque speaks with Esme Partridge on his recently published book, Sculpting the Self: Islam, Selfhood, and Human Flourishing, which examine notions of selfhood and subjectivity before and in the modern period. Muhammad U. Faruque is Inayat Malik Assistant Professor at the University of Cincinnati. Esmé L. K. Partridge is a writer on Islamic thought and the dynamics between tradition and modernity in a secular age.
What, Other Than God, Do We Worship?
March 30, 2022 18:45 - 44 minutes - 61.4 MBListen and read show notes on Renovatio: https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/media/what-other-than-god-do-we-worship
Protection from Power
December 10, 2021 17:22 - 58 minutes - 79.8 MBListen and read show notes on Renovatio: https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/media/protection-from-power
Protection from Power with Mohammad Fadel and Lawrence Jannuzzi
December 10, 2021 17:22 - 58 minutes - 79.8 MBListen and read show notes on Renovatio: https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/media/protection-from-power
What Is the Nature of Being Alone? (Stephen A. Gregg and Asad Tarsin)
November 05, 2021 02:38 - 46 minutes - 105 MBListen and read show notes on Renovatio: https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/media/what-is-the-nature-of-being-alone
Why Beauty Is Not Optional with Oludamini Oggunaike and Ubaydullah Evans
October 13, 2021 15:32 - 51 minutes - 46.9 MBWhat better topic for discussion than beauty, muses Oludamini Ogunnaike, a regular contributor to Renovatio and a scholar of Islam in north and west Africa. Beauty is inseparable from truth, goodness, and justice, yet reference to it is missing from many of our most important discussions on those matters. The neglect of beauty has been detrimental to communities everywhere, notes Ogunnaike; it’s often seen as superfluous, compartmentalized from other values, or reserved for the elit...
Graceful Giving and Grateful Receiving
August 30, 2021 16:00 - 41 minutes - 95.8 MBAsad Tarsin, author of Being Muslim: A Practical Guide, speaks with Joshua Lee Harris, a specialist on the work of Thomas Aquinas, on his article for Renovatio, “The Human Arts of Graceful Giving and Grateful Receiving.” In their conversation, Harris explains how his desire to understand gratitude grew from wanting to inculcate gratefulness in his own life and also from encountering people who affirmed gratitude despite facing extreme adversity. This experience, as well as his philo...
Power to the People?
August 19, 2021 03:11 - 1 hour - 141 MBIn this episode, scholars Caner Dagli and Andrew March discuss theories of democracy and their relationship to modern Islamic thought, how modern Muslims grapple with democracy’s promise as well as its baggage, and whether metaphysics can (or should) be untangled from politics. (While March raises Tunisia as an example of a succeeding Muslim democracy, please note that this podcast was recorded before the suspension of parliament and the dismissal of the prime minister.)
Cultivating the Life Skill of Writing
July 28, 2021 16:44 - 30 minutes - 69.3 MBThe mere act of writing for one’s self tends to reveal the fact that each one of us contains multitudes. When we write in our diaries or journals, we employ rhetorical devices even though our audience is within us. Scott Crider and Sarah Barnette—both are teachers and scholars committed to the craft of writing—discuss how conversing with one’s self through writing treats the self like the other in a useful way, giving us liberal room to persuade or represent ourselves. The end resul...
Are Believers a Political Tribe? (Asma T. Uddin and Caner K. Dagli)
July 12, 2021 14:14 - 53 minutes - 123 MBAsma T. Uddin litigated issues of religious liberty for years, but it wasn’t until Burwell v. Hobby Lobby—the US Supreme Court case about whether the Affordable Care Act required Christian owners of a private company to offer contraception as part of their employee health coverage—that she felt thrust into an arena where religious freedom was understood through a stark political lens. In this episode, Caner K. Dagli, professor of religious studies at College of the Holy Cross, speak...
Equality in the Ancient World with Juan Cole and Ubaydullah Evans
June 05, 2021 23:13 - 40 minutes - 56.2 MBWhat kind of equality could be universal? A scan of history shows that our modern ideal of equality is more fiction than fact. In this episode, Ubaydullah Evans interviews the historian Juan Cole on his forthcoming article for Renovatio that addresses the issue of equality by examining the text and context of the Qur’an. The two discuss how equality is one of the great unquestioned values of our time, one that has always existed as an area of great concern throughout history. They t...
What Makes a Book "Great"? Fr. Francisco Nahoe and Sarah Barnette
June 02, 2021 17:14 - 41 minutes - 75.5 MBSarah Barnette, a scholar of Victorian literature, speaks with Fr. Francisco Nahoe on great books and the pleasure of reading. Fr. Francisco, a Roman Catholic priest and Franciscan friar, is a scholar of Renaissance literature currently teaching courses in rhetoric and philosophy at Zaytuna College. The writers Barnette reads, such as the Brontë sisters, were inspired by Renaissance works like those Fr. Francisco reads—works Barnette is less familiar with. She wonders, and asks as m...
From Fanaticism to Faith: Joram van Klaveren and Ubaydullah Evans
May 08, 2021 20:04 - 37 minutes - 34.3 MBIn the Netherlands, the political climate was toxic with anti-Islam bigotry when Joram van Klaveren made a name for himself as a prominent and ambitious politician. He helped to lead the Party for Freedom, with its central platform hostile to Islam and Muslims in the Netherlands. When he set out to write a book that would ground his rhetoric against Islam, he would discover that he neither knew much about Islam nor was convinced of the basic tenets of Christianity, the religion he w...
The Decline of Language and the Rise of Nothing (Hamza Yusuf and Thomas Hibbs)
March 17, 2021 05:16 - 37 minutes - 69.1 MBHamza Yusuf interviews President Thomas Hibbs, former president of the University of Dallas, on the importance of rekindling a love of language so we might better articulate ourselves and possess the words to describe our experience of the world. Hamza Yusuf and Thomas Hibbs discuss, among other topics, how the silos created by our culture leave us unable to negotiate the inevitable friction that comes with living in a diverse society. For Yusuf and Hibbs, nihilism’s push toward mean...
The Decline of Language and the Rise of Nothing: Hamza Yusuf and Thomas Hibbs
March 17, 2021 05:16 - 37 minutes - 69.1 MBHamza Yusuf interviews President Thomas Hibbs, former president of the University of Dallas, on the importance of rekindling a love of language so we might better articulate ourselves and possess the words to describe our experience of the world. Hamza Yusuf and Thomas Hibbs discuss, among other topics, how the silos created by our culture leave us unable to negotiate the inevitable friction that comes with living in a diverse society. For Yusuf and Hibbs, nihilism’s push toward mea...
Philosophy without God (David Bentley Hart and Caner Dagli)
February 26, 2021 17:10 - 1 hour - 117 MBHow should religious philosophers understand the methods and goals of modern philosophy? In this episode, Caner Dagli interviews David Bentley Hart on the state of philosophy and whether the believer can be hopeful about its future. They take on the fragmentation of science, philosophy, and art and discuss the consequences of the humanities being crowded out from intellectual life in pursuit of nearsighted economic ends. Caner K. Dagli is an associate professor of religious studie...
Why Are Muslims Seen as a Race? (Khalil Abdur-Rashid and Caner Dagli)
January 21, 2021 18:50 - 1 hour - 183 MBIn this episode, Caner Dagli and Khalil Abdur-Rashid explore racialization and religion, using Dagli’s article for Renovatio, “Muslims Are Not a Race,” as a point of departure to examine whether the lens of race obscures actual motivations behind Islamophobia—be they sectarianism, dehumanization caused by war, or political disputes—or helps defang them. Dagli and Abdur-Rashid seek precision and clarity on these matters, invoking foundational concepts in Islam, such as the value of i...
The Qur’an, the Prophet, and a Forgotten History - Juan Cole in conversation with Hamza Yusuf
September 18, 2019 20:22 - 1 hour - 55.5 MBJuan Cole's Muhammad: Prophet of Peace Amid the Clash of Empires (2018) retells the history of the prophetic period in seventh-century Arabia through the context of a brutal war between the Iranian Sassanian Empire and the Roman Empire in the Near East. In this conversation, Juan Cole and Hamza Yusuf reflect on how a new understanding of the historical period can give us sharper insights into the prophetic mission and the message of the Qur'an.
Conversing with a National Treasure: Wisdom and Wit with Eva Brann
April 25, 2019 02:26 - 42 minutes - 38.8 MBHamza Yusuf, President of Zaytuna College, converses with Eva Brann, the sagely long time educator and author of St. Johns College in Annapolis Maryland about philosophy, wisdom, and wit.
The Art And Artifice Of Poetry (Scott Crider & Hamza Yusuf)
July 02, 2018 21:39 - 1 hour - 97.4 MBScott Crider and Hamza Yusuf discuss the art and artifice of poetry. https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/authors/scott-crider https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/authors/hamza-yusuf ____________________________________ Moon Landing – W. H. Auden It’s natural the Boys should whoop it up for so huge a phallic triumph, an adventure it would not have occurred to women to think worth while, made possible only because we like huddling in gangs and knowing the exact time: yes, our sex may in fairnes...
The Art and Artifice of Poetry (Scott Crider & Hamza Yusuf)
July 02, 2018 21:39 - 1 hour - 97.4 MBScott Crider and Hamza Yusuf discuss the art and artifice of poetry. https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/authors/scott-crider https://renovatio.zaytuna.edu/authors/hamza-yusuf ____________________________________ Moon Landing – W. H. Auden It’s natural the Boys should whoop it up for so huge a phallic triumph, an adventure it would not have occurred to women to think worth while, made possible only because we like huddling in gangs and knowing the exact time: yes, our sex may in fairness ...
What Conservatism Really Means (Roger Scruton & Hamza Yusuf)
June 28, 2018 17:48 - 1 hour - 80 MBIn modern educated circles, the philosophy of Conservatism doesn’t usually enjoy a good opinion. Liberalism being the default philosophy of the educated classes. The conversation we present today presents conservatism divorced from politics, as a philosophy of conserving only what is good of the past, and might challenge you to reconsider your opinion on the subject. Roger Scruton is philosopher of politics and aesthetics. He has authored more than fifty books on culture, philosophy...
The Secret of the Morality Tale
June 04, 2018 19:54 - 33 minutes - 46 MBRenovatio's Editor Safir Ahmed sits down with Cyrus Ali Zargar for a chat about his research into the role of storytelling in Islam's ethical tradition. Cyrus Ali Zargar is an assosiate professor of religion at Augustana College who recently published a book entitled The Polished Mirror: Storytelling and the Pursuit of Virtue in Islamic Philosophy and Sufism. Cyrus Zargar wrote an article for Renovatio entitled The Secret of the Morality Tale: Sa'di on What It Means to Be Human, whi...
What the Hadith Tradition Reveals About Religion in Academia
March 30, 2018 17:59 - 39 minutes - 54.1 MBThe study of Hadith is a subject which is often misunderstood. We asked Jonathan Brown to help clarify some of the most common misconceptions about the study of Hadith from different perspectives. Jonathan Brown is an American scholar of Islamic studies. He is an associate professor at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service where he also holds the Alwaleed bin Talal Chair of Islamic Civilization. He has authored several books including Misquoting Muhammad: The Challenges ...
The Silent Theology of Islamic Art
February 25, 2018 22:32 - 1 hour - 161 MBTo many, the silent theology of Islamic art can speak more profoundly and clearly than the most scholarly works, and its beauty can be more evident and persuasive than the strongest of arguments. The Qur’an is not a set of syllogisms or prosaic rational proofs but a recitation of unmatched linguistic beauty, filled with symbols, stories, metaphors, and poetic phrasing. It was the beauty in artistic expression which inspired many of the earliest conversions to Islam. Read Oludamini O...
Can Religion Be Studied Impartially? (Caner Dagli)
January 16, 2018 17:06 - 1 hour - 61.5 MBA wide ranging interview about the study of Islam with Caner Dagli. Dagli is an associate professor of religious studies at College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts, specializing in Qur'anic studies, interfaith dialogue, and philosophy. An editor of The Study Quran, he was among the 138 Muslim signatories of the 2007 letter “A Common Word Between Us and You,” an appeal to Christian world leaders for peace and cooperation between Christians and Muslims.
The Roots of Our Crises (Hamza Yusuf)
June 07, 2017 16:14 - 31 minutes - 28.4 MBHamza Yusuf at the inaugural Renovatio event on May 14th, 2017 at Zaytuna College