Editing Al-Ghazali (section)

== Biography ==
Al-Ghazali was born in {{Circa|1058}} in [[Tus, Iran|Tus]].<ref name="Griffel-2009">{{cite book |last=Griffel |first=Frank |title=Al-Ghazālī's Philosophical Theology |year=2009 |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |location=Oxford |isbn=9780195331622}}</ref> He was a Muslim scholar, law specialist, rationalist, and spiritualist of [[Persians|Persian]] descent.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Foundation |first=Encyclopaedia Iranica |title=Welcome to Encyclopaedia Iranica |url=https://iranicaonline.org/ |access-date=2024-03-07 |website=iranicaonline.org |language=en-US|quote=A man of Persian descent, Ḡazālī (variant name Ḡazzālī; Med. Latin form, Algazel; honorific title, Ḥojjat-al-Eslām"The Proof of Islam”), was born at Ṭūs in Khorasan in 450/1058 and grew up as an orphan together with his younger brother Aḥmad Ḡazālī (d. 520/1126; q.v.).}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Rahman |first=Yucel |date=2016 |title=The Mujaddid of His Age}}</ref> He was born in Tabaran, a town in the district of [[Tus, Iran|Tus]], [[Greater Khorasan|Khorasan]],<ref name="Griffel-2009" /> not long after [[Seljuk dynasty|Seljuks]] entered [[Baghdad]] and ended [[Buyid dynasty|Shia Buyid]] [[Amir al-umara]]s. This marked the start of Seljuk influence over Caliphate. While the [[Seljuk Turks|Seljuk dynasty]]'s influence grew, [[Chaghri Beg|Abu Suleiman Dawud Chaghri Beg]] married his daughter, Arslan Khatun Khadija<ref>{{cite book |chapter=The Political and Dynastic History of the Iranian World |first=C. E. |last=Bosworth |title=The Cambridge History of Iran |volume=5 |editor-first=J. A. |editor-last=Boyle |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |year=1968 |page=48}}</ref> to caliph [[al-Qa'im (Abbasid caliph at Baghdad)|al-Qa'im]] in 1056.<ref>{{cite journal |title=Dailamīs in Central Iran: The Kākūyids of Jibāl and Yazd |first=C. E. |last=Bosworth |journal=[[Iran: Journal of the British Institute of Persian Studies|Iran]] |volume=8 |issue=1 |year=1970 |pages=73–95 [p. 86] |doi=10.2307/4299634 |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/05786967.1970.11834791|url-access=subscription |jstor=4299634}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Smith |first1=Margaret |year=1936 |title=The Forerunner of Al-Ghazali |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25182038 |journal=The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland |volume=68 |issue=1 |pages=65–78 |doi=10.1017/S0035869X00076358 |jstor=25182038 |s2cid=163151146}}</ref><ref name="www.ghazali.org"/>

A posthumous tradition, the authenticity of which has been questioned in recent scholarship, is that his father died in poverty and left the young al-Ghazali and his brother [[Ahmad Ghazali|Ahmad]] to the care of a [[Sufi]]. Al-Ghazali's contemporary and first biographer, [[Abd al-Ghafir al-Farsi|'Abd al-Ghafir al-Farisi]], records merely that al-Ghazali began to receive instruction in ''[[fiqh]]'' (Islamic jurisprudence) from Ahmad al-Radhakani, a local teacher and [[Abu ali Farmadi]], a [[Naqshbandi]] sufi from Tus.<ref name="Griffel-2009" />{{rp|26–27}} He later studied under [[al-Juwayni]], the distinguished jurist and theologian and "the most outstanding Muslim scholar of his time,"<ref name="Griffel-2009" /> in [[Nishapur]],<ref name="Meri"/>{{rp|292}} perhaps after a period of study in [[Gurgan]]. After al-Juwayni's death in 1085, al-Ghazali departed from [[Nishapur]] and joined the court of [[Nizam al-Mulk]], the powerful vizier of the [[Seljuk dynasty|Seljuk]] empire, which was likely centered in [[Isfahan]]. After bestowing upon him the titles of "Brilliance of the Religion" and "Eminence among the Religious Leaders", Nizam al-Mulk advanced al-Ghazali in July 1091 to the "most prestigious and most challenging" professorial position at the time: the [[Nizamiyya]] madrasa in [[Baghdad]].<ref name="Griffel-2009" />

He underwent a spiritual crisis in 1095, which some speculate was brought on by clinical [[hysteria]],<ref>Abū Ḥāmid b. Muḥammad b. Muḥammad b. Muḥammad al-Ghazzālī, "al-Munqidh min al-Ḍalāl" in ''Majmūʿa Rasāʾil al-Imām al-Ghazzālī''. Ed. by Aḥmad Shams al-Dīn (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 1988), 29, 60</ref><ref>Jacques Lacan, "Some Reflections on the Ego" in ''The International Journal of Psychoanalysis'', 1953, No. 34, 13. (presentation, the British Psycho-Analytical Society, London, May 2nd, 1951)</ref><ref>Ovidio Salazar, ''Al-Ghazali: The Alchemist of Happiness'' (2004; London: Matmedia Productions, 2006), DVD.</ref> abandoned his career and left Baghdad on the pretext of going on pilgrimage to [[Mecca]]. Making arrangements for his family, he disposed of his wealth and adopted an [[Asceticism|ascetic]] lifestyle. According to biographer Duncan B. Macdonald, the purpose of abstaining from scholastic work was to confront the spiritual experience and more ordinary understanding of "the Word and the Traditions."<ref>Nicholson, Reynold Alleyne. (1966). "A literary history of the Arabs." London: Cambridge University Press. p. 382.</ref> After some time in [[Damascus]] and [[Jerusalem]], with a visit to [[Medina]] and Mecca in 1096, he returned to Tus to spend the next several years in ''uzla'' (seclusion). The seclusion consisted in abstaining from teaching at state-sponsored institutions, but he continued to publish, receive visitors and teach in the [[zawiya (institution)|zawiya]] (private madrasa) and [[khanqah]] (Sufi lodge) that he had built.

[[Fakhr al-Mulk (Seljuk vizier)|Fakhr al-Mulk]], grand vizier to [[Ahmad Sanjar]], pressed al-Ghazali to return to the Nizamiyya in Nishapur. Al-Ghazali reluctantly capitulated in 1106, fearing rightly that he and his teachings would meet with resistance and controversy.<ref name="Griffel-2009" /> He later returned to Tus and declined an invitation in 1110 from the grand vizier of the Seljuq Sultan [[Muhammad I (Seljuq sultan)|Muhammad I]] to return to Baghdad. He died on 19 December 1111. According to 'Abd al-Ghafir al-Farisi, he had several daughters but no sons.<ref name="Griffel-2009" />