List of Figures
List of Table and Charts
Acknowledgements
Note on Dates, Citation, Translations, and Transliteration
Introduction
Reconceptualising he Dunya/Akhira Divide
The Muslim Eschatological Imagination
Premodern Views of the Islamic Otherworld among Non-Muslims
Modern and Contemporary Scholarship on Paradise and Hell in Islam
Overview of Chapters and Note on Illustrations
Part I Textual Foundations: narrating the otherworld
I The Otherworld Revealed: Paradise and Hell in the Quran
Time and Space in the Quranic Otherworld
The Joys and Torments of the Quranic Paradise and Hell
The Development of Quranic Eschatology
Quranic Eschatology in Its Late Antique Context
The Originality of the Quranic Vision of Paradise and Hell
2. The Growth of the Isamic Otherworld: A History of Muslim Traditionist Eschatology
The Formative Period (ca. First-Third/Seventh-Ninth Century)
The Second Period of Expansion (ca, Fourth-Sixth/Tenth-Twelfth Century)
The Third Period of Expansion (ca. Seventh-Ninth/Thirteenth-Fifteenth Century)
Late-Medieval Developments (ca. Tenth-Thirteenth/ Sixteenth- Nineteenth Century)
3. Hope, Fear, and Entertainment: Parenetic and Popular Muslim
Literature on the Otherworld
Parenetic Works up o al-Chazali
Cultivating Hope and Fear after al-Chazali Popular Manuals
The Prophet;s Ascension and Other Prophetic Tours of the Otherworld
4. The Imagination Unbound: Two Late Medieval Musim Scholars on Paradise and Hell
A Prelude to the Otherworld
Time, Space, and Vision in the Muslim Paradise and Hell Plants, Animals, and Spiritual Beings Otherworldly Bodies
The Blessed and the Damned
Part II Discourses and Practices: Debating the otherworld
5. The Otherworld Contested: Cosmology, Soteriology, and Ontology in Sunni Theology and Philosophy
The Location, Creation, and Duration of Paradise and Hell Salvation in Sunni Theology
The Reality of the Afterlife
Imaging the Otherworld
6, Otherworlds Apart: Shi'i Visions of Paradise and Hell
The World of Image in Shi'i Thought
Traditionalism and Rationalismin Shi'i Eschatology
The Akhbari Revival of Eschatology
Isma'ili Eschatology
7. The Otherworld Within: Paradise and Hell in Islamic Mysticism
Fear and Longing in Early Sufism
Contemptus Ultramundi
The Immanentist View
Compulsory Return
Voluntary Return
8. Eschatology Now: Paradise and Hell in Muslim Topography, Architecture, and Ritual
Eutopia/Dystopia
Architectural Visions of Paradise
Otherworldly Rituals
Interfused Worlds
Epilogue
Modern Continuities and Discontinuities
The Disappearing Boundary
Primary Sources
Secondary Sources
Index of Names
Index of Terms

he Muslim afterworld, with its imagery rich in sensual promises, has shaped Western perceptions of Islam for centuries. However, to date, no single study has done justice to the full spectrum of traditions of thinking about the topic in Islamic history. The Muslim hell, in particular, remains a little studied subject. This book, which is based on a wide array of carefully selected Arabic and Persian texts, covers not only the theological and exegetical but also the philosophical, mystical, topographical, architectural and ritual aspects of the Muslim belief in paradise and hell, in both the Sunni and the Shiʿi world. By examining a broad range of sources related to the afterlife, Christian Lange shows that Muslim religious literature, against transcendentalist assumptions to the contrary, often pictures the boundary between this world and the otherworld as being remarkably thin, or even permeable.