I have just came back from a reception for my supervisor, Professor Carole Hillenbrand, in honour of her receiving the King Faisal Prize for Islamic Studies. Excerpt from King Faisal Foundation's website reads the following:
Professor Hillenbrand’s revolutionary approach to the largely one-sided subject of The Crusades has sought to redress several of the misconceptions shrouding them. Employing objectivity, preciseness and clarity of thinking, she has located several original texts, written in different languages and previously un-translated, in support of her refreshing examination of the many stereotypes that have pervaded western literature on this subject. “The Crusades: Islamic Perspectives”, the culmination of her relentless endeavors, has been the first work of its kind to address this era through Muslim eyes, thereby making it possible for history to be viewed from a more balanced and impartial perspective. Professor Hillenbrand is currently Professor of Islamic History at the University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom.
In her brief speech, she expressed her happiness for being the first non-Muslim lady won this prestigious award. In my opinion, she deserves it for her hard work and great efforts irrespective of her being a non-Muslim and a lady. The contribution that matters. It is very unfortunate, however, since many Muslims still fail to emulate the Orientalists in their meticulousness, brevity and willingness to spend years of laborious research on old manuscripts and untranslated works. For the Orientalists, Islamic manuscripts of hundreds or more than a thousand year are priceless, such as the one by Rashid al-Din (707 AH, 1307 AD) on Tarikh al-Alam (History of the World) which was on display at the Edinburgh Main Library recently, in conjunction with the World Book Day. According to Professor Robert Hillenbrand, he expected it to cost about ten to twenty millions pound sterling. They scrutinise the manuscripts, translate them and interpret them in the manner they understood, while the Muslims are merely the end-users most of the time. It is certainly a matter of regret that this kind of research not very much welcome in Muslim countries, which in fact signifies aberrations of thought in Muslim academia in comparison to that of the Orientalists'. Worse than that for many Muslim governments, Islamic manuscripts which actually preserve the pure Islamic teachings unfortunately, are not worthy a penny and would rather prefer spending the money on physical developments such as skyscraper builidings!
