Prof. Dr. Jonathan Brockopp
September - December 2024
Research Project: Manuscripts and Trade Routes to Kairouan
My project focuses on the Kairouan collection of Arabic manuscripts, an unusually old collection, largely produced during the heyday of this city, from 800 to 1057, when Kairouan helped shape the politics, economics, and intellectual history of the central Mediterranean. Like their counterparts in the rest of the Islamic Empire, Kairouani scholars travelled in search of knowledge, and students from both Andalusia and Egypt (also Syria and Iraq) came to Kairouan. The manuscripts hold clues to these travels, including examples of imported paper and student notes in the margins. I will compare analysis of this material and paratextual evidence with historical accounts to better understand the economic, material, and political contexts that made this city such a successful example of Islamication.
My broader goal for this research is to write a history of the Kairouan manuscript collection that includes the larger social worlds that intersected with these manuscripts in their production, study, and preservation. Manuscripts are far more than bearers of text. When they carry knowledge to Kairouan from Iraq, the ḥijāz, and Egypt, they participate in a program of signification that I believe would have been familiar to both Byzantine and Umayyad leaders. My hypothesis is that the rise of major Muslim and Jewish scholarly centers in Kairouan aided and benefited from its growth as an economic and political power, and that similar combinations of scholarly, economic, and political power were found in both Cordova and Constantinople.
Profile
Prof. Dr. Jonathan Brockoop is Professor of History, Religious Studies, and Philosophy at the Pennsylvania State University, where he offers courses in classical Islamic civilization, Islamic law, and comparative religious ethics. A specialist on early Muslim scholarly communities, he has worked on the Kairouan collection of manuscripts for over thirty years, co-founding the Kairouan Manuscript Project (KMP) with Dr. Asma Helali in 2018. Also with Dr. Helali, Brockopp co-directs a new book series, Maghribi Manuscripts, with Penn State Press.
Brockopp is author or editor of five books and co-author of a sixth. He has published almost forty articles and book chapters as well as numerous encyclopedia articles and reviews. His work has been supported by the Fulbright Scholar Program, the US National Endowment for the Humanities, the German Academic Exchange Program, the American Centers of Overseas Research and many other organizations, including generous research support from the Pennsylvania State University.
Trained in Religious Studies at Yale University under Prof. Dr. Gerhard Böwering, Brockopp considers himself a historian of religion, using the material remains of Muslim civilizations to understand the social worlds of scholars. Heavily influenced by Prof. Dr. Jacob Neusner, he developed a theory of the charismatic authority of the Muslim scholar that continues to animate his research. While analysis of primary sources forms the essential foundation of his work, he depends on theory, comparative analysis, and interdisciplinary collaboration to make sense of those sources.
CV
Selected Publications
Brockopp, Jonathan E./ Helali, Asma eds. (forthcoming), Kairouan Manuscript Cultures / Cultures des manuscrits à Kairouan.
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (forthcoming), “Senegalese Responses to Climate Change, an Ethical Analysis” in: Sami al-Daghistani, ed, Recovering Sustainable Traditions: Environment, Economic Thought, and Islamic Ethics, Leiden: E.J. Brill.
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (2024), “Early Mālikī Manuscripts: A Retrospective”, Études Asiatiques - Asiatischen Studien 78, 3-18.
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (2022), “A Tenth-Century Islamic Manuscript from Kairouan, Tunisia”, MAVCOR [Material and Visual Cultures of Religion] journal. https://mavcor.yale.edu/mavcor-journal/object-narratives/tenth-century-islamic-manuscript-kairouan-tunisia
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (2021), “Constructing Muslim Charisma”, in: J.P. Zuquete ed., Routledge International Handbook of Charisma, New York: Routledge, 163-174.
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (2020), “MS Chester Beatty 3001 and the Apotheosis of Malik b. Anas (d. 179/795),” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 49, 249-275.
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (2019) “The Rise of Islam in a Judaeo-Christian Context”, in: Jamal Elias and Bilal Orfali, eds., Light upon Light: Essays in Islamic Thought and History in Honor of Gerhard Bowering (Studies in Islamic History and Civilization), Leiden: E.J. Brill, 24-44.
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (2017), Muhammad's Heirs: The Rise of Muslim Scholarly Communities, 622-950, Studies in Islamic Civilization, Cambridge University Press.
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (2016), “Islamic Origins and Incidental Normativity,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 84.1, 28-43.
Brockopp, Jonathan E. (2015), “Interpreting Material Evidence: Religion at the ‘Origins of Islam’,” History of Religions, 55, 121-147.
