French Literature Reviews - 2026
Abderrazak Halloumi, “Le Livre de l’Eschiele Mahomet”, a 13th-Century Manual of Islamic Studies
Medieval and Renaissance Studies
Abderrazak Halloumi
“Le Livre de l’Eschiele Mahomet”, a 13th-Century Manual of Islamic Studies
Paris, Classiques Garnier, Cultural History series, 2024
Le Livre de l’Eschiele Mahomet, translated at the court of Alfonso X the Wise from Arabic sources into Latin and French, is to be considered one of the first manuals of Islamic studies. In this work, knowledge of the other prevails over the polemical and apologetic dimensions.
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Excerpt: "Le Livre de l’Échelle de Mahomet is a valuable and perhaps unique testament to the knowledge that the West had of an important aspect of Islam. It is an original and complex work. Beneath its apparent simplicity, this text is extremely rich. It is a veritable encyclopedia of Islam—a genuine composition that responds to the commission of King Alfonso X the Wise. It offers a nearly complete presentation of Muslim eschatology as well as an exploration of the apocalyptic imagination.
The question raised regarding the specificity of the text—whether it is a polemical work or a work aimed at understanding the other—finds its answer in the pedagogical dimension that runs through Le Livre de l’Eschiele Mahomet. It is designed to answer the questions of anyone wishing to learn more. This is why the medieval translators, first Abraham Alfaquin and then Bonaventure of Siena, structured it to provide the best answers as directly as possible. Consequently, the Book functions as a true encyclopedia for understanding the major dogmas of Islam, and more particularly its eschatology and its representation of the afterlife, in order to better know and understand them."
Commissioned during the reign of King Alfonso X the Wise, Le Livre de l’Eschiele Mahomet is a work translated from Arabic sources into Latin and French. Translated by figures such as Abraham Alfaquin and Bonaventure of Siena, the text presents traditions concerning the Islamic afterlife and apocalyptic imagination. Within the broader landscape of medieval intellectual history, such translations illustrate how European courts engaged with Islamic thought, and the work is considered one of the first manuals of Islamic studies where knowledge of the other prevails over the polemical and apologetic dimensions.
Abderrazak Halloumi studies this thirteenth-century work, which functions as an early manual designed to answer questions and present Muslim eschatology and major dogmas. Readers interested in medieval cross-cultural contact, translation history, and early European scholarship on the Near East may find this critical examination of the manuscript particularly relevant to their studies.