The relationship between the traditional biographical material on Muḥammad (maghāzī- or sīra-material) and the narrations of his words and deeds (ḥadīth-material) has long been debated in Islamic studies. While some scholars have argued that the biographical material is fundamentally ḥadīth material arranged chronologically, others have argued the opposite: that ḥadīth material originally consists of narrative reports about the life of Muḥammad which were later deprived of their historical context to produce normative texts. This article argues that both views are untenable and that maghāzī and ḥadīth emerged as separate fields; each influenced the other but they preserved their distinctive features. While traditions that originated and were shaped in one field were sometimes transferred to the other, the transfer of traditions from one field to the other apparently did not as a rule involve any deliberate changes to the text.

This article examines how and why non-Muslim dhimmīs were employed in a variety of important posts during the ʿAbbāsid period, notably as viziers (wuzarā') and secretaries (kuttāb). One of the aims is to show that Jews and Christians were employed in the state administration to the extent that some of them were able to achieve the second highest office after the caliph: the vizier. It is argued that, despite certain legal restrictions outlined by Muslim jurists, dhimmī employment in the government had long been an established policy. The first section discusses the juristic debate on whether non-Muslims could be appointed to public office. The second examines examples of non-Muslim viziers and the nature of their political power. The final section offers possible explanations as to why non-Muslims were needed to help the caliphs administer this governmental office. The article concludes with a brief reflection on the significance of this study for the discussion of the nature of state–religion relations in early Islam.

This article provides a new edition and translation of chapter 25 of the Śāradātilaka(tantra), a compendium on mantraśāstra composed, probably in the twelfth century, by Lakṣmaṇadeśika. The chapter itself presents a type of yoga that combines elements we normally associate with different yoga systems. In particular, we find elements associated with systems usually labelled as haṭhayoga, and elements of mantra practice as well. The chapter also contains references to the methodical knowledge of the rise or predominance of the gross elements (bhūtodaya, also known as svarodaya) and its connection with the six rites of magic. The significance of chapter 25 lies in the fact that it provides us insight into the teachings on yoga in a comparatively early text.

Thinkers in the Zhànguó period of Chinese history debated intensely whether men were by nature “good” or “bad”. This debate has for many years been an important focus of sinological interest, but usually these properties were not attributed to men, but rather to so-called “human nature” (xìng 性) – thus, in effect, mirroring well-known (and problematic) “European” positions and discussions. The aim of this paper is, on the one hand, to redirect attention to the original Zhànguó positions and to explore the reasons for their variance by offering novel and close historical readings of relevant passages, and on the other, to propose a viable historical reconstruction of the common anthropological assumptions underlying these positions by blending it with the traces of a dominant cognitive image present in the texts. This calls for a systematic rethinking of the role of hearts (in the plural), desires, and behavioural patterns in their interplay and as elements of a concept of the psychological build of human beings current in early China.

qhɔ-qhô ί-kâʔ c, Lâhō t-m c.

The mountains have [springs of] water; the Lahu have proverbs. (#1012)

Proverbs are a particularly interesting type of sentential formulaic expression. This paper analyses a rich corpus of proverbs in Lahu, a language of the Central Loloish branch of Tibeto-Burman, in terms of both their syntactic structure and their semantic content. Overwhelmingly bipartite in form, these proverbs reflect cultural and moral preoccupations of the Lahu people, and are sometimes expressed in similes and metaphors that are quite obscure to the outsider. They make implicit or explicit analogies between phenomena in the outside world and aspects of the behaviour of human beings. They often use earthy, scatological imagery, which tends to be bowdlerized in Chinese translation. Many of them bear a resemblance to the cryptic Chinese folk similes known as xiēhòuyû 歇后语. The proverbs cited are compared to similar ones in other languages, revealing the universal aspects of folk wisdom. Most Lahu proverbs seem to be original creations, although some look like literal equivalents of Western or Chinese sayings. A full-scale comparative study of Sino-Tibetan proverbs would shed light on possible paths of transmission, whether via missionaries or Chinese or Indian influence.