Conference Reports 157 

Beacon of Knowledge: Conference in Honor 

of Seyyed Hossein Nasr 

Beacon of Knowledge: Conference in Honor of Seyyed Hossein Nasr was 
held November 2-3, 2001 at the George Washington University, Washing­

ton, DC. The conference featured eight panels, thirty-six speakers, an 
exhibit of caJiigraphy and paintings, poetry recitation, and a concert of clas­
sical Persian music. The conference drew a crowd of around two hundred 
people. 

The Beacon of Knowledge conference was convened to honor Professor 
Seyyed Hossein Nasr and his contributions to the field oflslamic and Iranian 
studies, perennial philosophy, and the relations between Islam and the West. 
In his opening remarks, Stephen J. Trachtenberg, president of the George 

Washington University, underlined the importance of the scholarly career of 
Dr. Nasr in bridging the gaps between the sciences and humanities on the 

one hand, and Islam and the West, on the other. He also noted that the 
approach Dr. Nasr advocates in the fields of culture and civilization has 

gained further importance in the wake of the September l J'h attacks on 
America. 

The keynote speech was delivered by Keith Critchlow of the Visual 

Islamic and Traditional Arts Department (V1TA) of the Prince of Wales' 
Foundation, London, UK. As an old friend and colleague of Dr. Nasr, 
Critchlow emphasized Dr. Nasr's contributions to the revival of the study of 
traditional arts and the establishment of the VITA while at the same time 

providing insights into the personal friendship between him and Dr. Nasr 
over the last thirty years . Dr. Critchlow also made a wonderful presentation 
of the activities of VITA with slides and showed some remarkable examples 
of the works of the students studying at VITA. 

The first panel of the conference was devoted to the personal testi­
monies of some friends and students of Dr. Nasr. N. Assar; S. Nemitz; P. 

Felsenthal; A. al-Hibri; D. Burrell; and M. Shirazi talked about their friend­
ships with Dr. Nasr, some of which go back to the 1940s and 1950s (before