Sayyid Amjad H. Shah Naqavi

Sayyid Amjad H. Shah Naqavi
Occupation(s)	Scholar and translator
Academic background
Education	University of Edinburgh (PhD)
Doctoral advisor	I. K. A. Howard
Academic work
Discipline	Arabic and Islamic studies, translation, philosophy, theology, literature
Institutions	The Shīʿah Institute (Dean)
Notable works	The Exalted Qurʾān: A New English Translation Nahj al-Balāghah: The Word of ʿAlī Foundations of Jurisprudence: An Introduction to Imāmī Shīʿī Legal Theory The Mystery of Prayer: The Ascension of the Wayfarers and the Prayer of the Gnostics

Sayyid Amjad H. Shah Naqavi is a scholar and translator. Naqavi holds a PhD in Islamic Jurisprudence from the University of Edinburgh, which he completed in 1999, supervised by I. K. A. Howard and externally examined by Wilferd Madelung. In 1433/2012, he founded the Shīʿah Institute in Bloomsbury, London, in order to facilitate veritable scholarship on Twelver Shia Islam and promulgate the timeless and universal teachings of the Ahl al-Bayt. He has taught at the University of Bristol and the University of London and given guest lectures across the globe. From 2019 to 2021, (2019, 2020, 2021), Naqavi was listed in The Muslim 500: The World’s Most Influential Muslims.

The Shīʿah Institute, founded in 2012 by Sayyid Amjad H. Shah Naqavi

For the last twenty years, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah Naqavi has been working on an Arabic critical edition and English literary translation of Nahj al-Balāghah by ʿAlī b. Abī Ṭālib, in the renowned version compiled by great Shia scholar al-Sharīf al-Raḍī (d. 406/1016). Naqavi's edition and translation, entitled Nahj al-Balāghah: The Word of ʿAlī, is due to be published in 2025. Naqavi's Nahj al-Balāghah: The Word of ʿAlī will be followed by The Way of Eloquence and the Path of Wisdom: A Companion to Nahj al-Balāghah: The Word of ʿAlī (forthcoming).

As the Dean of The Shīʿah Institute, Dr Sayyid Amjad H. Shah Naqavi has organised three international conferences, launched the first module focussed on the study of Shia Islam at a British university at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), established a fellowship of more than 70 academics at distinguished research institutions around the world, and led the publication of many books as general editor, editor, or translator. Dr Sayyid Amjad H. Shah Naqavi has also established two book series with Brill, the Classical Shīʿah Library and the Modern Shīʿah Library, as well as four book series published by the Shīʿah Institute Press: the Shīʿah Library, the Shīʿah Institute Symposia Series, the ʿĀshūrāʾ Literature Series, and the Shīʿah Heritage of South Asia Series.

Works

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, trans. The Exalted Qurʾān: A New English Translation (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, 2024).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, ed. and trans. Nahj al-Balāghah: The Word of ʿAlī (forthcoming).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah. The Way of Eloquence and the Path of Wisdom: A Companion to Nahj al-Balāghah: The Word of ʿAlī (forthcoming).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, ed. and trans. Theology Abstracted, an Arabic critical edition and English translation of Naṣīr al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī's Tajrid al-Iʿtiqād (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, 2025).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, ed. and trans. The Grand Armour: A Commentary on the Divine Names, an explication and translation of Hādī Sabzavārī's, Sharḥ al-Asmāʾ wa Sharḥ Duʿāʾ al-Jawshan al-Kabīr (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, 2024).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, ed. and trans. The Orison and the Observance: The Spiritual Instruction of the Prophet Muḥammad and his Noble Descendants, a parallel English–Arabic text (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, 2024).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, ed. and trans. Sacred Illuminations: A Garland of Wisdom, an explication and translation of selected philosophical, mystical, and theological treatises and poems (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, 2024).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, trans. The Light of the Way: Attributed to Imām Jaʿfar al-Ṣādiq, an explication and translation of Miṣbāḥ al-Sharīʿah wa Miftāḥ al-Ḥaqīqah (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, forthcoming).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, The Supreme Sacrifice: The Events of the Eve and Day of ʿĀshūrāʾ , a translation of Mawsūʿat Kalimāt al-Imām al-Ḥusayn (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, forthcoming).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, trans. Faith and Practice: On Matters of Truth, Guidance, and the Path of Salvation, an explication and translation of Muḥammad Bāqir al-Majlisī's al-ʿItiqād (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, forthcoming).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, trans. Ontology and Theology, an explication and translation of Mullā Ṣadrā's Kitāb al-Mashāʿir (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, forthcoming).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, trans. The Metaphysics of Sabzavārī On Theology: An Islamic Philosophical Inquiry and a Commentary on a Didactic Poem, an explication and translation Hādī Sabzavārī's Sharḥ Ghurar al-Farāʾid or Sharḥ al-Manẓūmah (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, forthcoming).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, trans. The Pursuit of Philosophy: A Comprehensive Text on Metaphysics, Ontology, and Theology, an explication and translation of Sayyid Muḥammad Ḥusayn Ṭabāṭabāʾī's Nihāyat al-Ḥikmah (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, forthcoming).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, ed. and trans. Foundations of Jurisprudence: An Introduction to Imāmī Shīʿī Legal Theory, an Arabic critical edition and English translation (with a 50,000-word introduction) of al-ʿAllāmah al-Ḥillī's Mabādiʾ al-Wuṣūl ilā ʿIlm al-Uṣūl (Leiden: Brill, 2016).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, The Mystery of Prayer: The Ascension of the Wayfarers and the Prayer of the Gnostics, a critical edition and English translation of Ayatollah Khomeini's Sirr al-Ṣalāt (Leiden: Brill, 2016).

Naqavi, Sayyid Amjad H. Shah, The Call of the Free, an adaptation of Riḍā al-Khafājī's Ṣawt al-Ḥurr al-Riyāḥī (London: The Shīʿah Institute Press, 2016).