Introduction to the Special Issue on Death, Graves and the Hereafter in Islam

BRONISLAV OSTŘANSKÝ, PhD, is a research fellow at the Oriental Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague. He graduated from Charles University, Prague, specialising in the Arabic language and the history and culture of Islamic countries (PhD in 2005). His research focuses mainly on medieval Islamic thought, especially mysticism (Sufism). He is author and co-author of several monographs devoted to Islamic society – e.g., Dokonalý člověk a jeho svět v zrcadle islámské mystiky (The Perfect Man and His World in the Mirror of Islamic Mysticism, in Czech), Praha 2004. He has also translated an anthology of Sufi writings into Czech – Hledání skrytého pokladu (The Quest for the Hidden Treasure), Praha 2008, and selected chapters from al-Maqrīzī’s work Popsání pozoruhodností Egypta (The Description of Sights of Egypt), Praha 2012. Currently, he is focusing on the so called “Sufi psychology of the Path,” as depicted in various medieval treatises.

MIROSLAV MELČÁK, PhD, is a research fellow at the Oriental Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague. He obtained his PhD degree in 2009 at the Department of the Middle East and Africa, Charles University, Prague – doctoral dissertation, in Czech: “Vývoj vnímání waif v egyptské společnosti, 1805–1953” (Changing Perceptions of waqf in Egyptian Society, 1805–1953). His areas of interests cover social and cultural history of the Middle East. He has authored articles on awqāf in Syria and Egypt (12th–20th c.) and Islamic urbanism in northern Mesopotamia (10th–15th c.). He is currently a research team member of the projects “Monuments of Mosul in Danger” and “Medieval Urban Landscape in Northeastern Mesopotamia.”