Hichem Djaït

Hichem Djait (; December 6, 1935 – June 1, 2021), also known as Hichem Jaiet, was a prominent historian and scholar of Islam.

Biography Djait was born in 1935 in Tunis, Tunisia to a conservative upper-middle-class family. His father and some of his uncles and relatives were Islamic sages (or sheikhs), which made the name of the Djait family become traditionally associated with the Zeytouna Mosque as well as with Islamic Fiqh and Iftah (or jurisprudence). He completed his secondary education at Sadiki College, where he studied French, world literature, Western philosophy, Arabic, and Islamic Studies. This training made him discover Enlightenment thinkers and the ideals of the Renaissance and the Reformation, which were different from the teachings of his family's conservative milieu. Djait later travelled to France, where he received the "Aggregation" diploma in History in 1962. His completed his doctoral defense in Arts and Humanities in Paris in 1981.

He became an emeritus Professor at the University of Tunis. He was also a visiting professor at the McGill University and the University of California at Berkeley. In addition to the numerous honorary titles and awards he received, Djait was member of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts and was appointed president of the Tunisian Academy of Sciences, Letters, and Arts on February 17, 2012.

He was a specialist in Medieval Islamic history and member of the International Scientific Institute for the General History of Africa edited by the UNESCO. In the many books he published in Tunisia and France, he mainly deals with subjects related to Arab-Islamic culture, history, and philosophy, as well as to the relationship between Islam and modernity and the place of Islam in the contemporary world.

Awards and honours 1989: Tunisian National Humanities Award (Tunis) 1996: Commander of the Order of the Republic of Tunisia 2006: Al Owais Award (Dubai) 2016: Arab Book Award (Beirut) 2017: Tunisia's Comar d'Or Prize (Tunis) 2018: Tunisian University Medal (Tunis) 2018: Medal of the Arab World Institute (Paris) 2019: Grand Officier of the Order of the Republic of Tunisia 2023: Ibn Khaldun Award in Humanities (granted posthumously; Tunis)

Main publications In English

Europe and Islam : Cultures and Modernity, Berkeley, ed. University of California Press, 1985 Islamic Culture in Crisis : A Reflection on Civilizations in History, New Jersey, ed. Transaction Publishers, 2011 The Life of Muhammad, 3 vols, Carthage, ed. Beït El Hikma, 2012

In French

Histoire générale de la Tunisie. t. II : Le Moyen Âge, (with Mohamed Talbi), Tunis, ed. Société tunisienne de diffusion, 1965 Rêver de la Tunisie, Paris, ed. Vilo, 1971 La Personnalité et le devenir arabo-islamique, Paris, ed. Le Seuil, 1974 L'Europe et l'Islam, Paris, ed. Le Seuil, 1978 Al-Kūfa, naissance de la ville islamique, Paris, ed. Maisonneuve et Larose, 1986 La Grande Discorde : religion et politique dans l'islam des origines, Paris, ed. Gallimard, 1989 Connaissance de l'Islam, (with Mohamed Arkoun), Paris, ed. Syros-Alternatives, 1992 La Vie de Muhammad. vol. I : Révélation et prophétie, Paris, ed. Fayard, 2001 La Crise de la culture islamique, Paris, ed. Fayard, 2004 La Fondation du Maghreb islamique, Tunis, ed. Amal, 2004 La Vie de Muhammad. vol. II : La Prédication prophétique à La Mecque, Paris, ed. Fayard, 2008 La Vie de Muhammad. t. III : Le parcours du Prophète à Médine et le triomphe de l'Islam, Paris, Fayard, 2012 Penser l'Histoire, penser la Religion, Tunis, ed. Cérès, 2021