ABSTRACT
Nowhere in the history of religion is the danger of interpretative generalization becoming reductionist or simplistic more acute than in the study of Islamic religion. This chapter tackles one sector of the problem of generalizing about the unity and continuity of Islamic tradition as opposed to emphasizing the disparity and discontinuity of discrete "local contexts" of the Islamic past and present. It discusses a salient, if not primary, facet of what has been often characterized as a "traditionalist" bent in Islamic religion and culture, namely the foundational character, pervasiveness, and vivid elaboration of what it calls the isnad paradigm. Traditionalists in such societies, even those undergoing rapid change, understand themselves to be conservators of values and what is valued from the past. Even though no society is without elements of modernism and traditionalism, the chapter distinguishes traditional societies in which tradition plays a visibly major role from the advanced industrial societies that have cultivated "modernism" and perceive themselves as non-traditional.
