The Islamic Intellectual Tradition of Sudanic Africa, with Analysis of a Fifteenth-Century Timbuktu Manuscript

The chapter shows how African Muslim scholarly voices demonstrate the continent’s depth of intellectual inquiry, and an engagement with global Islamic discourses in a variety of disciplinary specializations. It shows how scholarly lineages sometimes became associated with renowned centers of learning, like Timbuktu, but more often they are dispersed as the bearers of Islam throughout sub-Saharan Africa. The textual tradition nonetheless remained a referent for the vibrancy of Islamic intellectual exchange in the region and beyond. The chapter focuses on the work of the fifteenth-century Timbuktu scholar Muḥammad al-Kābarī who left an important summary of theology, asceticism, and esotericism-“The Garden of Secrets” (Bustān al-Fawā‘id)-that offers enduring insight into the formation of African Muslim identities.