Nicholas of Cusa and Islam: Polemic and Dialogue in the Late Middle Ages ed. by Ian Christopher Levy, Rita George-Tvrtković, and Donald Duclow (review)

Nicholas of Cusa was an important and influential fifteenth-century theologian, an erudite humanist, and a key member of the conciliar movement. He also wrote two works dealing with Islam: in De pace fidei, composed in the wake of the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople (1453), he imagines a debate among sages of different religions, a dialogue between the world’s wise men who can agree to the essential unity of their creeds and accept a diversity of practice. His Cribratio Alchorani (Sifting the Qur’an, 1461) is a close reading of the Qur’an in an attempt to find in the Muslim holy text the confirmation of Christian truth while explaining away its rejection of such essential Christian doctrines as the Incarnation or Resurrection. Together, these two unusual works make Nicholas into a rare and thoughtful voice in fifteenth-century Latin writings about Islam.

This volume assesses the importance of Nicholas’s engagement with Islam and places it in various contexts, through fifteen essays written by specialists in Christian and Islamic theology and philosophy. With the notable exception of Thomas Burman (author of the excellent preface), none of the authors is a specialist of Christian-Muslim relations, and several of the authors are unfamiliar with key works in the field: Tamara Albertini, for example, is unaware of important recent work on one of the two Muslim authors she examines, Ibn Hazm; several authors who refer to Robert Ketton’s twelfth-century translation of the Quran are also unfamiliar with recent scholarship in the field.

Part 1 contains six essays on “Cusanus and Islam.” There is some overlap, since several authors describe the contents of the two key works. Readers may find particularly useful Pim Valkenberg’s essay on the context of the two works in Cusa’s development of the notion of the essential unity of the object of religion within a variety of rites. Part 2, “Historical Perspectives,” consists of four essays comparing Cusa’s works with those of other medieval Christian writers on Islam. Rita George-Tvrtković provides a thoughtful comparison of three medieval authors (Alan of Lille, Riccoldo da Montecroce, and Cusa) on the bathing rituals of Jews (mikveh) and Muslims (wudu) compared with Christian baptism: through this concrete example we see how Cusa attempts to downplay differences in rite in an attempt to affirm their fundamental compatibility with Christianity. Finally, part 3 consists of four essays dealing with “Muslim Responses to Christianity.” Although these essays for the most part cover well-trodden ground, they offer useful and thoughtful introductions for those who are not familiar with the Muslim Jesus or with the key notion of tahrif (the idea that Jews and Christians have corrupted, willingly or not, the scriptures that God revealed to them).

This volume contains the work of top scholars in the field and constitutes a major contribution to several fields: Cusanus studies, medieval Christian theology, and the history of Christian-Muslim relations. It is a pity that, as usual, Brill has priced it far beyond the budget of most individuals who might be interested in buying it.