ABSTRACT

This chapter discusses the ways in which it engage with queer pedagogies and its strategic approach to teaching comparative theology by drawing on bell hooks' idea of "whole self". It explores an approach to teaching tawhid or the principle of divine unicity in Arabic, a theological concept, by modeling a way for students to bring themselves into theological conversation with many different historic and present scholars. The chapter begins with an overview of the early history as shaped by both academic scholarship and hagio-graphical accounts, which shifts into a broader survey of modern Muslim practice. Tawhid operates as the principle of divine unicity in Islam. The affirmation of tawhid is therefore a basic requirement for membership in the Muslim ummah or community. Tawhid in general means assessing honestly the alienation, violence, egotism, and hypocrisy that are the major obstacles that keep people fragmented and keep societies unjust.