Arabic prose and the intellectual development of Islamic culture

The article examines the formation and historical development of Arabic prose within a broad scholarly and theoretical context. It considers the examples of the oral prose from the pre-Islamic period (Jahiliyyah) period, the renewal of prose in terms of ideas and content following the advent of Islam, as well as the stages of genre, stylistic, and functional development of prose during the Umayyad and the Abbasid periods. The scholarly article is devoted to a systematic and historical-theoretical investigation of the stages of formation and evolution of Arabic prose. The role of Arabic prose in the formation of not only artistic, but also scientific, philosophical and historical thought is given special attention.The study refers to the scientific views of both Western orientalists and classical and modern Arab literary critics. The presented article is distinguished by its study of the formation and evolution of Arabic prose based on a staged, discursive and functional development model, in contrast to the classical approaches of literary criticism. In particular, the role played by Arabic prose in the formation of religious, scientific, philosophical and historical discourse is substantiated. The study systematically analyzes Arabic prose not only in chronological order, but also as a product of socio-cultural, religious and intellectual transformations, which is a rare approach in the existing scientific literature.