5 comments about Living Religions (7th Edition) (Paperback) (MyReligionKit Series).

1. While Living Religions is a good source of information, it was incredibly difficult to read. It was like reading an encyclopedia. I did not like the authors gender bias.



2. An excellent introduction to the world's primary religious and wisdom traditions: their origins, major tenets, peculiarities and similarities across the spectrum, and contemporary manifestations. Along with the companion book, An Anthology of Living Religions, this text offers a solid study in the world's religions.



3. This book is one of the most interesting text book i have come across. It gives enough details of every well known religion. there are also photographs giveen to show you what the tevt is explaining.



4. I really enjoyed reading this book. It was easy to understand and well organized. I was able to learn a lot about Eastern Religions with this book that I got an 'A' in my Religions class. Yay!



5. The book is in really good condition, and the vendor was out of town but he sent an email apologizing for the delay. After that I got it right away.

5 comments about The Qur'an (Oxford World's Classics).

1. Most readable, easy flowing accurate to the largest possible extent. I unse it all the time. Highly recommended.



2. No other translation of the Qur'an is as accurate, elegant, or readable. Behind this translation, I would choose the Yusuf Ali translation, although the language style is archaic in that it imitates the King James Bible; this makes it rather tough to read through, although it is still pretty accurate and beautiful. This translation, however, is far superior, in my opinion. The notes and introduction are both extremely helpful, although it is not as complete as a full commentary would be. Before I read this translation, I had a strong contempt for Islam and its teachings. But after reading Haleem's English rendition of the religious text, I have developed an understanding and even a respect for Islam that I had not before. I highly recommend this translation to all English speakers who wish to learn about the Qur'an.



3. If you are looking to learn about Islam and the book that guides it, I recommend this translation. Written in straight-forward contemporary English, this translation is easy to read, more like a book than a religious text. The introduction is very good and I strongly urge you to read it before starting in on the Qur'an itself. It starts with a historical background; compilation, structure, and style of the Qur'an; interpretation of the Qur'an; and a short history of English translations. Only within this framework can the reader truly understand and appreciate the meaning of this complex work.



4. I have not read this all the way through, but what I have read is a clear, crisp and easily digestible translation. The type and font size is perfect in my opinion. This would make a good introductory book for reading the Quran or Koran in English.



5. This translation is among the best translations of the Qur'an i have read... The verses of the noble Qur'an are translated in a very clear and easy to understand vocabularies that anyone with an adequate background in english can benefit from it.. Most of the translation of the Qur'an are very hard to get the concept due the the translators' usage of obscure and archaic english but this translation is quite clear and manifest for anyone wanting to get the most out of it... I strongly recommend this translation..

5 comments about Understanding Muhammad.

1. I had anxiously awaited this book for some time, being a huge fan of Ali Sina from his website, Faithfreedom.org, as well as from his contributions to Islam-watch.org. His writings are always well-researched, insightful, illuminating, and fascinating. He combines a deep understanding of the human soul and mind with a deep understanding of Islam, the Muslim mind, and the cultural factors involved in the Muslim world. He is never apologetic, and is often accused of being a liar simply for telling the ignorant what they really need to know. This book is quite an ambitious project, but a necessary one, and Ali Sina is the perfect person to undertake it, as he is ever-able to combine his deep-rooted regard for the truth about Islam, which is almost invariably quite ugly, with an unabashed compassion for Muslims, since he believes that we must never sink to their level, but rather, always abide by the Golden Rule, love our neighbors, and hope that one day they will come to understand that what they believe is evil through and through, that Islam is not a religion, but rather a nihilistic Nazi death-cult and a totalitarian, colonialist political movement. I like to agree with him and believe that Muslims are good people, who are victims of inhumane circumstance, and who simply need deprogramming and a solid dose of the truth.
   
   This book should be required reading in schools. Sina goes beyond Robert Spencer's "The Truth About Muhammad," which is also fantastic book and should also be required reading, but Sina seeks to answer the question "so what was wrong with Muhammad?" As it turns out, lots. He takes into account his childhood, which was unstable, and during which he alternately experienced undue adulation and a complete lack of love, resulting in one of the most extreme cases of malignant narcissism the world has ever seen. Combine these experiences with a medieval Bedouin culture which is actually quite similar to Arab culture today, in that it is a "shame" culture, like that of the Nazis and the Shintos, which substitutes honor for morality. It is a culture in which one does not take pride in hard work, one does not admit one's faults, accept blame, or ever, under any circumstancs, acknowledge, let alone confront, societal, familial, and personal problems. The truth, like hard work and empathy, was never highly valued in the Arab world.
   
   It is important to understand Muhammad because 1.2 billion people follow his narcissistic, immoral/amoral example, to this day behaving and thinking in a clannish manner, never even conveiving of the Golden Rule, the ultimate moral compass, the basis of morality. Instead, they are forced to be OCD about the number of times they wipe their butts, bring "religion" into the bedroom, and have every behavior and aspect of life dictated to them, including which foot to put one's weight on while on the toilet, the proper showering procedure, and of course, every aspect of one's sex life. Muhammad was not only OCD. He was also a necrophiliac who reveled in zombifying people, if only by force. Cult leaders do this, and the more difficult the travails of one's "faith," the more inclined they are to believe it. After all, they've put forth too much effort for it to possibly be untrue, right? A million crazy rules serve as a substitute for morality in Islam because Muhammad was a power-hungry opportunist. There is no "thou shalt not kill" or "thou shalt not lie" in Islam. There is halal (permissible) and haram (forbidden). So while the Koran sanctions the rape of one's daughers and sisters (Q 2.071), lying to, stealing from, and killing unbelievers, infidel "sons of apes and pigs," one may never mortage a house, take out student loans, or enjoy a glass of wine. Islam is submission, and Muhammad was a power-hungry psychopath who needed for people to either submit to his will or die. While Muhammad was an unfathomably evil mad man, Sina manages to always portray him as human. To conceive of Muhammad as a monster is not only too easy, but also dangerous, as to do so would be denying that circumstances, people, and culture could create such a person. Sina believes that everyone is born pure and innocent. What one becomes after that is first a matter of chance, and then choice.
   
   Whereas I had always assumed that Muhammad was simply schizophrenic, what with the bells and whistles, the flashing lights, and then the all-out audio-visual hallucinations, Sina's thesis is that Muhammad actually suffered from temporal lobe epilepsy and agromegaly, which he does quite a good job at proving through historical reconstructions and psychological profiling. A schizophrenic would be unlikely to rise to power in the way that Muhammad did. This explains the visions, the fact that he often believed something had happened when in fact it had not, that he was always paranoid and extremely insecure (although malignant narcissism also explains those), which caused him to forbid anyone from marrying his wives after his death (including his 18-year-old brain-damaged widow Aisha), from ever looking directly at them, or from ever uttering an unkind word about him. We see the ramifications of this today. If someone insults "the leader" (arms straight out, zombie eyes), watch how angry Muslims become. Watch how they treat their women: they force them to wear veils which serve to deprive them of 100% of their diginity, identity, their femininity, and their sexual power; they murder their female relatives for speaking with an umarried male in public, etc., etc. This is partly because his agromegaly caused a greatly increased sex drive combined with impotence which even modern medicine is often unable to overcome. This fact, combined with his loveless upbring and abandonment by his mother, led to an extreme misogyny. Misogyny is obviously nothing more than narcissistic projection, since women are capable of doing everything that men are, plus childbearing, and most importantly here, controlling men with our sexuality. What two attributes do misygynists ascribe to women, Muhammad himself quite explicitly? Stupidity and weakness. Why? Because misogynists, even when they are intelligent enough to understand that they are being controlled, still allow themselves to fall under the spell of female sexuality, thereby making them necessarily weak, stupid, and subconsciously ashamed of that, particularly in a shame culture. So normal, natural sexual desire becomes unnatural, evil hatred. Pretty sick.
   
   The saddest part of the story of Muhammad as it has unfolded throughout history is what it does to families. By declaring that believers must love him more than their own families, generation after generation of Muslims mistreat their children, especially their daughters, who end up raising their own children without love. Children in the Muslim world undergo unspeakable horrors, not the least of which is growing up completely unloved, but also being taught to hate, female genital mutilation, general degradation, being told that they are evil, enduring sanctioned sex abuse at home, in school, and in mosques, sometimes even being turned into suicide bombers before they are old enough to understand what they are doing, and in the case of girls, being pimped away by their family at an always inappropriately young age, usually to someone much older or a cousin, always for money. Muslims have no choice but to learn to hate themselves, women, infidels, and pretty much everyone. The only people whom it is even acceptable to accept are Muslim men, and they are the oppressors, and are often child molesters, wife beaters, polygamists, pedophiles, and rapists, all of which are perfectly permissible in the Muslim world, thanks to the example set by their "prophet." Horrible, loveless childhoods, in addition to polygamy, cause the tragic, dangerous, and volatile cycle of narcissism to repeat itself over and over. Wafa Sultan, the renowned Syrian-American psychologist, once said that nobody could possibly read the Koran, believe a word of it, and maintain any semblance of mental health whatsoever. She is right. For the Koran is Islam, and Islam is Muhammad: malignantly narcissistic, incapable of love, incapable of even a basic understanding of humanity let alone empathy, completely immoral/amoral, regressive even by medieval Bedouin Arab standards, corrupt, intolerant, hateful, oppressive towards women and children, absolutely soulless, evil incarnate, and ultimately wholly political, but never divine. If this book were required reading, who knows how many millions of lives could be saved? Thank you Ali.
   
   Note to the buyer: please buy a NEW copy, if possible. Ali Sina is incredibly giving of his time and energy on Faithfreedom.org, and he does this because he wants to save lives. He finally undertook a project which will pay him. Let him get his due. Thank you. Also, these bad reviews are obviously from people who have not read the book. Ali Sina is frequently subjected to this sort of abuse for telling the truth about an evil cult. He also always manages to rise above it.



2. Prophetic Analysis from staringattheview.blogspot.com
   
   Imagine that three individuals were each commissioned to prepare the psychological profile of a self-appointed religious prophet who founded a tightly-knit community in Arizona in the mid-1800's.
   
   The prophet, soon after the death of his wife of 25 years, began having dreams about the six-year-old daughter of his best friend and persuaded the friend that God had told him to marry her. He later used the same God-told-me-so line to convince his adopted son to divorce his attractive wife so he could marry her as well. The community was polygamous, but the prophet was the only man who could have as many women as he wanted.
   
   The community had few financial resources, so the prophet developed the idea of robbing stagecoaches and trains that passed through the area. Slavery was legal within the community, and the people who were not killed on these raids were used and sold as slaves. Male members of the community had full sexual access to the female slaves.
   
   The prophet's ambitions were much larger than the few hundred converts he garnered his first few years. He fully expected all the people of the area to accept his prophethood and join the community. When some refused, he turned viciously against them. Eight hundred men were killed in one day, and the rest were driven to outlying regions. When he realized that his people did not have the agricultural and industrial resources to provide for the needs of the community, he came up with a new strategy. He again attacked the people he had recently driven away, this time allowing them to live in exchange for giving him fifty percent of their produce. Shortly before his death, he stated a new ruling that they were to be driven completely from Arizona and never allowed to return.
   
   As often happens with religious and political leaders who see themselves as chosen vessels, the prophet became more intolerant to criticism as he grew older and more powerful. Stories of the murder and assassination of his critics became increasingly common. One of his disciples bragged that he had come across a one-eyed sheep rancher who said he would never join the prophet's group. The disciple waited until the rancher fell asleep, and then thrust a sharpened stick into the rancher's good eye so hard it came out the back of his neck. The disciple next captured an associate of the rancher, tied his thumbs together, and led him to the prophet. The prophet laughed so hard at the sight, according to the disciple, that, "You could see his back teeth". The prophet blessed the disciple when he heard how he had killed the one-eyed rancher.
   
   About the same time a 100-year old poet wrote lines critical of the prophet and his followers. In reference to the many regulations the prophet had established for the community, the poet noted, "You follow someone who divides everything into `This is allowed' and `That is forbidden'." As soon as the prophet heard this, he sent someone to assassinate the old poet.
   
   A second poet, the mother of five children, was courageous enough to criticize the murder of the old man. She wrote, "I despise you people....you who obey a stranger and expect good things from him after he killed all your leaders." The prophet, realizing he was the "stranger" she was writing about, sent one of his followers to kill her. She was murdered in her bed that night with her nursing child lying by her side. Her murderer, perhaps touched with remorse by the heinousness of his crime, asked the prophet if anything bad would happen to him. The prophet replied that her death was of no more significance than two goats butting their heads together in the back yard.
   
   Some time after the prophet's death, it was discovered that the Arizona desert underneath his followers' feet contained the world's largest diamond resources. Community members became wealthy beyond their wildest dreams, and began to use their new-found riches to extend the prophet's vision that the entire world come under the influence of his teachings and principles.
   
   Now back to the first sentence, where "three individuals" are each commissioned to write a profile of the prophet. The first is a university professor who is an expert in the teachings of the prophet even though he has not joined the prophet's community. He was recently given 25 million dollars by that community to establish a university department where the teachings of the prophet are examined. He is careful to only teach a version of community history appoved by his sponsors. His students rarely learn incidents such as the deaths of the poets and the role of the community in the slave trade as noted above. They know nothing about the world-wide political aspirations of the group.
   
   The second individual is a fully-committed member of the community. She has been taught since her birth that the life of the prophet is the perfect model for all humankind to follow. She doesn't even know many of the details of that life, such as his treatment of the exiles who did not accept his message. She only knows what she was taught, one side of the story, and is not interested in learning more.
   
   The third person is an ex-member of the community. He was born and raised within it, similar to individual number two, but at a certain stage began to question the things he had always been ordered to simply believe. His questioning led to doubt, and the doubt resulted in his leaving the community. He now sees himself as free, but his former associates, including individual number two above, view him as a traitor. Even the university professor, individual number one, despises him because he is not sufficiently "academically trained", according to the professor, to critically examine the community of which he was once a part.
   
   Which of these three individuals might give the most objective profile of the prophet's life? If your answer is individual number three, I recommend this book by Ali Sina.



3. There are many biographies of Muhammad and they all look the same. Even if we compare Muhammad's biography from his first biographer Ibn Ishaq, with, say, the one from Robert Spencer (The Truth About Muhammad: Founder of the World's Most Intolerant Religion), we will not find many differencies. Basically Ishaq views Muhammad's murders, genocides and debaucheries as holy acts of Allah's Apostle worthy of emulation, while Spencer sees them as contemptible, but the content of both books is basically the same.
   
   Ali Sina writes about Muhammad from different and so far largely unexplored point of view. After recapitulation of Muhammad's life written by critical pen of ex-muslim he examines Muhammad from point of view of modern psychology, psychiatry and psychopathology. He discovers Muhammad as a cult leader of the same kind as Adolf Hitler, Josif Stalin or Jim Jones. He is quoting from psychiatric textbooks and descriptions of different cults and compares described psychopathology with Muhammad's behaviour in different situations and shows that his personality fits the profile of mentally disturbed person and cult leader like a hand in a glove.
   
   Classical martial wisdom says: know your enemy. For a practicing muslim Muhammad is a perfect model of conduct worthy od emulation in every aspect. Therefore his personality is the key to understanding of thinking of Muslims and of danger that those who really follow their prophet are posing to us - and also of unstable situation of those muslims who are living with idyllic fantasies of him. Ali Sina's book is unique and propably the best available tool which allows us to get such understanding.



4. Few people know Islam well like Ali Sina - and even less match his courage in taking such a firm stand against it.
   He is one of the few to critically analyze the root of Islam through the means of rational thinking and modern storiography - without the relativist curtain and the will of appeasing foreign cultures that is so widespread among many Western intellectuals. He is certainly the first to take the next step and analyze the psyche and mindset of its founder through the lens of modern psychology.
   
   The picture he draws is extremely disturbing - but sadly, everything that Sina argues is soundly foolproof, reliably quoted from mainstream Islamic theology.
   
   This is both the strength and the weak point of this book: many people who are not accustomed to the main points of the critic of Islam will be surprised by the harshness of words against Islam's doctrine and its founder, that is why I recommend this book only to those who are already familiar with the doctrine of Islam beyond its facade of Taqiya and political correctness.
   
   If you are a Muslim don't bother: you might even change your mind about being one after reading it.



5. Had I not taken the advice of several of the above reviewers, perhaps I would have passed up this rational and unrefuted psychological examination of Mohammad and the true explanation of what (and why) muslims think and act as they do. I've never read anything as compelling with the potential of freeing enslaved minds as well as shaking up Islamic apologists.
   
   I'll never view another news story, read another account of Islamic culture or history without appreciating and applying what I have learned. Muslims will continue to threaten Ali Sina with hell. Nothing in this work dissuades a person from a belief in God but I imagine readers will never again be able to keep a serious face when someone says Mohammad's Allah is God Almighty, creator of the universe. No question Islam is a house of cards and will soon collapse.
   
   Buy the book, buy it new, I imagine his security costs are high. You'll benefit by acquiring one more degree of understanding above these cultists that may in time be used to help them and all of civilization.

5 comments about God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe, 570-1215.

1. The author writes from a strong political and social perspective of portraying the occupiers of Andalus as a peaceful and sophisticated civilisation and the Europeans and Christians as coarse and brutish. Handle this book with care. It's a good read but the historical analysis is questionable.
   
   I'll quote from a review by By Tim Rutten, Los Angeles Times - "Lewis sets out to show that the failure of what he calls "the jihad east of the Pyrenees" is "one of the most significant losses in world history." He argues that the ... In other words, the West would be better off if it had been incorporated into an all-conquering Islamic empire in the early Middle Ages.
   
   OK.
   
   Still, it's fair to wonder why, if that's true, the West ended up with the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution and the Scientific Revolution and the Islamic world got chronic underdevelopment, a pervasive religious obscurantism, Al Qaeda and the trust fund states of the Arabian peninsula? It's also fair to point out that both the Muslim philosopher Averros and the Jewish philosopher-physician Maimonides were sent fleeing for their lives by Islamic fundamentalists and not the Christian Reconquista. Moreover, the Carolingian incursion into Spain -- over which Lewis frets so forcefully -- was undertaken in response to an invitation by Saracen grandees fearful of Abd al-Rahman's expanding hegemony.
   
   Moreover, Lewis isn't the first "big picture" thinker to go down this road. As the formidable historian of fascism Stanley G. Payne pointed out in his recent study of wartime relations between Spain and Germany, Hitler mused that Europe would have been much better off if the Muslims had won at Poitiers because a German state possessed of a "warrior" ideology, like Islam, rather than a crippling Christianity would have conquered the world long before.
   
   The only thing the Fuehrer and an impeccably democratic, humane scholar like Lewis have in common is an understanding of the origins and failures of European civilization that far surpasses their knowledge of Islam Take, for example, the chronology with which Lewis begins his book. At the date 610, a reader finds: "Angel Gabriel visits Muhammad."
   
   Right.
   
   At 650: "Definitive Qur'an produced."
   
   In fact, we know comparatively little about the origins of the Koran because Islamic hostility to the kind of source criticism to which the Hebraic and Christian scriptures have long been subjected has made scholarly research into the evolution of Muslim scriptures -- and they evolved as surely as the Bible did -- physically dangerous. Even today, efforts by German scholars to produce a critical edition of the Koran proceed almost in secret out of fear of reprisal.
   
   Somehow, that ought to be factored into Lewis' reckoning of what flowed from the Frankish victory at Poitiers."
   
   And look at the review in the New York Times - google it - by Eric Ormsby who write " Occasionally he goes even farther astray; in discussing the Prophet's views on women, he writes, "Muhammad's comparatively enlightened ideas (as explained by Allah) about gender roles positively distinguished the Koran from its misogynistic Mosaic and Pauline analogues." It's hard to know what disturbs more here, the factual inaccuracies or the personal opinions inserted under cover of jargon."
   
   And look at the review by Ed Voves in the Californian Literary Review. - google it
   
   And a centrpiece of the book is that the Chanson de Roland - epic poem or oral history - was falsified to portray Roland as killed by forces of the Caliph of Cordoba instead of being killed by Basques. However "according to the thirteenth century Arab historian Ibn al-Athir, Charlemagne came to Spain upon the request of the "Governor of Saragossa", Sulayman al-Arabi, to aid him in a revolt against the caliph of Cordoba. Arriving at Saragossa and finding that al-Arabi had had a change of heart, Charlemagne attacked the city and took al-Arabi prisoner. At Roncevaux Pass, al-Arabi's sons collaborated with the Basques to ambush Charlemagne's troops and rescue their father."
   
   I have no problems with opinions, it's part of the clash of ideas and civilisations. But read this not as an impartial history, read this in the knowledge that it will be a political narrative from the perspective of 'the West and Christianity are bad/doomed/failed/never any good'.
   
   IMHO all the civilisations of that era were bloodthirsty and there's no black and white as this book attempts to portray.



2. The key to understanding the problems with David Levering Lewis is in the following paragraph:
   
   "Had 'Abd al-Rahman's men prevailed that October day, the post-Roman Occident would probably have been incorporated into a cosmopolitan, Muslim regnum unobstructed by borders, as they hypothesize - one devoid of a priestly caste, animated by the dogma of equality of the faithful, and respectful of all religious faiths. Curiously, such speculation has a French pedigree. Forty years ago, two historians, Jean-Henri Roy and Jean Deviosse enumerated the benefits of a Muslim triumph at Poitiers: astronomy; trigonometry; Arabic numerals; the corpus of Greek philosophy. 'We [Europe] would have gained 267 years,' according to their calculations. 'We might have been spared the wars of religion.' To press the logic of this disconcerting analysis, the victory of Charles the Hammer must be seen as greatly contributing to the creation of an economically retarded, balkanized, fratricidal Europe that, in defining itself in opposition to Islam, made virtues out of religious persecution, cultural particularism, and hereditary aristocracy."
   
   There are crucial errors:
   
   1. "Muslim regnum unobstructed by borders". There is no historical basis for this. Anyone that studies Islamic history knows that not long after the 732 AD the Islamic world broke into regions that fought with each other for centuries.
   
   2. "One devoid of a priestly caste, animated by the dogma of equality of the faithful". If Lewis is referring to the equality of the Islamic faithful then this has a modicum of truth, but most of the Islamic world after the initial conquests were populated by Christians and Jews, and Islam has a dogmatic policy inscribed in the Koran and Hadiths to treat them as second class citizens. Unless you come from an Orthodox Christian or Jewish family that lived in the Middle East you can't imagine the horror of the daily life of being non-Muslim in an Islamic controlled society (still true today). A society devoid of a priestly caste? What is he thinking of? The Imams are not a priestly caste? With a few sentences David Levering Lewis shows he is either very ignorant or practicing anti-Western deceit.
   
   3. "Respectful of all religious faiths". This is the opposite of the historical actuality. Islam is not respectful of any religious faith other than its own. It oppresses Christians and Jews (a daily living hell), and all others (such as Zoroastrians) that must convert or be killed. Note that the greatest mass murder in all of human history was committed by the Islamic armies in India; 80 million were massacred. There are many other examples: 1.5 million Armenians, 1 million Assyrians, and others. No Islamic authority has ever apologized for any of this. The Koran and Hadiths justify mass murder so the Imams can't apologize.
   
   If the Islamic armies had won the field in 732 AD then Europe would have become a cultural back water like the Middle East. Islamic societies only thrive while there is a high percentage of subject Christians and Jews, but after Islamic oppression has dissipated those communities then the Islamic majority society shows itself to be uncreative, backward, and turns inward against itself. Don't waste your money on this book.



3. This book is a fresh look at a dimly viewed time between the fall of Rome and a time before this Renaissance. 37 pages of notes/references. 8 page glossary, 14 pages combined between genealogies and bibliography.
   
   To the negative reviewers of this book, your reviews remind me the authors description of Ibn Rushd's and Musa ibm Maymum's detractors, "As men of culture and principles, they came to be regarded as liabilities at best and dangerous subversives at worst."
   
   The author goes into the key points of the founding of Islam, it's spread, particularly into the Iberian Peninsula and it's halting at the Pyrenees. Then he covers the years of Islam's control of what is now Spain, the infighting, the palace intrique and finally the losing of their grip of control on this piece of ground. The result of this still effects the world today.
   
   Keep a dictionary handy as Mr. Lewis has a wide and deep vocabulary and uses it.
   
   Well worth the read, but take your time as it is densely written.



4. The thesis that Europe might have been better off in the eighth century under liberal Umayyad Islam than under Charlemagne's conservative European monarchy is interesting. But Lewis points out that Al Andalus was saved, if temporarily, from being over run by the conquistadores by radical Islamic conservatives, making his point in the end unclear.
   
   The book's title says that it ends in 1215. But after about 1050, the story runs out of steam.
   
   And what is an "ideational matrix?"



5. The book is great because it brings together all of the factors that brought about Western Europe. I have however one criticism. The author tells about the Roman Catholic Church's excommunication of the followers of the Aristotelian philosophy of Averroes. Lewis implies, however, that this condemnation was scientifically backward like the condemnation of Galileo in later centuries. I would say the condemnation is the beginning of modern science since Aristotle and Averroe were being unscientific. The following quote is from the Bishop of Paris's Letter of Condemnation of 1277:
   
   "We excommunicate all those who shall have taught the said errors or any one of them, or shall have dared in any way to defend or uphold them, or even to listen to them, unless they choose to reveal themselves to us or to the chancery of Paris within seven days; in addition to which we shall proceed against them by inflicting such other penalties as the law requires according to the nature of the offense....
   25. That God has infinite power, not because He makes something out of nothing, but because He maintains infinite motion....
   66. That God could not move the heaven in a straight line, the reason being that He would then leave a vacuum.... "
   
   The Bishop of Paris and his advisers from the faculty of theology at the University of Paris knew that vacuums did not exist in nature. However, they could see no reason why vacuums could not exist. They assumed that God thought the same way they did, and concluded that vacuums were possible. In other words, they were assuming that the universe was intelligible, which is what modern science is based on. The following quote of Albert Einstein is from D. Overbye, "Einstein Letter of God Sells for $404,000," New York Times, May 17, 2008:
   
   "The most incomprehensible thing about the universe is its comprehensibility."

5 comments about Faith, Reason, and the War Against Jihadism: A Call to Action.

1. There is beginning to be a flood of books about global jihad and the threat it poses to the West. There is almost nothing about what to do about it, how to fight it and win to save the culture the West has created. This superb book by George Weigel suggests 15 steps that will help in this global struggle to keep from being subverted and inundated by a totally alien totalitarian ideology completely at odds with concepts such as the dignity and worth of each individual, the equality of women, freedom of speech, self-determination, democracy, free will, freedom of conscience and freedom of religion.



2. The Real Battleground with Jihadism
   
   George Weigel correctly locates our civilization's real battle with Jihadism's attempting to destroy our nation and other nations. The battleground is in our contrasting theological concepts and the resulting actions and emotions. Jihadists view God as being remote and requiring total submission, versus Christians' view of God as our loving heavenly Father who sent his Son. These contrasting views are contained in the history and the documents of the two faiths, the Qur'an (Koran) for Islam considered to be dictated directly, word by word to one person in about 600 AD in Arabic and so not to be translated, whereas the Bible had many writers over many years, who are believed by ecclesiastical consensus to have been directly inspired by God, but who actually used the words and language of the writers' own particular historic period to document that inspiration for all.
   
   The many confrontations with Jihadism are best understood in the context of this deep, long-term theological battle noted above. Even secular leaders and individual atheists should accept and utilize the reality of this real theological battle in their understanding and actions to be effective. Defense against the Jihadists avowed intention of eliminating non-Moslems and their culture can not be achieved by way of our military power and economic resources, as continually demonstrated by recent events. The reason for this impasse is because the battle between Jihadists and the rest of the world is asymmetric, and as per Weigel observation really theological.
   
   Minimizing the Jihadists threat to our lives and culture will not be achieved by accommodating to their complaints against western culture, as is frequently done now, since that accommodation is regarded by them as just us acknowledging our failing and weakness with regard to Islam. We must stand firm in the applications of the rule of law, freedom in individual conscience, and social structures that are built on our Judeo-Christian history and scriptures which preceded Islam many centuries. Weigel documents how Islam's interpretation of this prior common history/heritage is very distorted by them, even wrong.
   
   Weigel says that majority Moslem's within their own culture must work-around and then deny the Jihadists' cults for destruction for non-Moslems to truly join our global, pluralistic, contemporary world. Islam's own history of past success can serve as a basis for this correction. We of the Judeo-Christian heritage and persons of other religions must facilitate this possible transition by our frank and frequent public words both about history and contemporary concerns, plus our continued examples of social, political and material success. We must also show patience during the process of the Moslem main-stream's denying the Jihadists' their destructive positions toward themselves and the world.



3. While I agree with the premise and the purpose of this book I found it difficult to read and a little disjointed.I think the author could have better made his point in about half the pages.I also think the author should realize not every one has his vocabulary or the needed background in Islam to know what he is talking about.I love to read his essays in the weekly Catholic paper.



4. This book was particularly well constructed and arrives a time where it is becoming unthinkable to think. Weigel begins to examine the world in which we live, not from a "post 9/11" standpoint, but from a person who is challenging the world to think about what is happening and look with a greater objectivity to how we can work for a world of true freedom.



5. This book by Wiegel is well-written, clear and most insightful. He outlines ways of looking at the problems that I had not experienced before. We ignore the signs at our own peril.

5 comments about The Crusades Through Arab Eyes.

1. I ordered this book along with one on the Crusades from the Christian perspective (or the 'Western' perspective) hoping to get each side of the story, so to speak.
   
   In picking up both books I was a bit apprehensive wondering whether or not they would be overly one-sided. For example, I was not looking for a piece of 'slam' journalism justifying the Middle East's current ills on the invasions of Crusaders 1000 years ago. This book is certainly not that. Mr. Maalouf painstakingly takes the stories of the Crusades, written by Arab chroniclers, court attendants of the Sultans, and other historical records written during the Crusades themselves, and gives you the story of the Crusades through Arab eyes.
   
   What I found very refreshing about Mr. Maalouf's writing is that he simply didn't rely on the writings as the end all to tell the story, when it was clear that the contemporaneous writings aren't telling the whole story. At times when accounts don't seem credible, or when two accounts differ substantially (such as over the number of deaths at a battle), Mr. Maalouf looks past the hyperbole and rhetoric that can often accompany such tales and notifies the reader that the conflicts exist, or that agreement over such details has not been reached. He then generally takes the effort to research city populations, and army sizes, etc. to come to a satisfactory answer to the question posed. As you can imagine, there are accounts of "10,000" people slaughtered - when we know, now, that the town probably was not big enough to hold more than a couple thousand. Mr. Maalouf goes out of his way to bring you the truth, and not just the rhetoric of the day.
   
   Another thing I truly enjoyed about this account was that the author went out of his way to put the words and writings of the chroniclers in their proper context, which, as you can imagine, makes a big difference, especially for Westerners who may be unfamiliar with Muslims/Arab tradition and the Middle Eastern makeup of the time. For example, before, during, and after the Crusades, the Middle East was wrought with fighting not just between Muslims and Christians, but also between other Muslims (Shia vs. Sunni, Kurd v. Arab v. Persian v. Turk, etc.), and from with other non-Muslim and non-Christan foes (Arabs v. Mongols). The sultans were battling each other. The different sects were battling each other. The Turks and the Persians were encroaching on Arab lands, as were the Byzantines and the Mongols. The Crusaders were attacking Jerusalem. During some points, some Muslim groups even allied themselves with the Crusaders to fight other Muslim groups. Thus, each chronicler (the Crusades lasted hundreds of years) wrote in a different time with a different attitude towards the peoples and places. Some wrote during relative peace, when Christian and Arab coexisted, while some wrote during all-out war. Some wrote when the tensions between Muslims themselves were high, some when there was relative accord. Some chroniclers wrote during periods of Muslim domination, and some wrote during times where it seemed inevitable the Christians would control the Middle East and Islam would die out. Mr. Maalouf ably ties all of the stories together, explaining the different attitudes among chroniclers.
   
   All in all, an excellent book. It is eye-opening, not because it tells some one-sided story as interpreted by today's Muslims, but because it really gives you an understanding about how the people felt then. It truly does tell the story through their eyes - the Arabs of 1000 years ago.
   
   Oh, and it is a "quick" read. That is, nothing in this book bogs down the reader or requires you to grab other books for explanation.



2. The quality of this book speaks for itself, if it is written from the non-Western perspective of the crusades, but manages to score an average of 4,5 of 5 stars from 74 primarily US reviews prior to mine. Especially as the overall sentiment in these reviews stays virtually the same, pre 9-11, immediately post 9-11, during the Bush Crusades and after them.
   
   The book has been written in 1983 in French, translated into English in 1984 and published in the US in 1985. As such, the book would need an update, not only concerning the Bush Crusades, but also about the information that the wannabe assasin of Pope John Paul II in 1981 wasn't the Muslim Turk Mehmet Ali Agca by himself, but a ploy: The puppet master was in the Soviet polit bureau, via Bulgarian and East German secret service ploys. The author Amin Maalouf was born in Lebanon and migrated to France in 1976, during the Lebanese (religious) civil war. He's an Arab Christian.
   
   The book is not meant to inform on the European political, religious, financial and other motivations for the crusades, but starts with the troops arriving in Muslim territories. Hence, it is also not concerned with the prior Muslim conquest of the previously Christian territories. Which in turn had been European-invaded empires by the Romans and Greek, the Jews before that, then the Egyptians, prior to that the Akan and prior in turn the San (Bushmen). But even they were invading "Neanderthal" territory. So please, to anyone: Don't assume, "you" were there originally... (I left out some Asian invaders.) I hoped to find out anything at all about the Christian Nubian empires (either one or all of Nobadia, Makuria, Alwa), which were left alone till then, but got invaded by the Muslims as revenge for helping the Europeans in one of the crusades. Only Abyssinia (today's Ethiopia) remained exempted from the jihad. Not a word even of their existence. So, here's a message: There's a third perspective, one which is even more difficult to find any information of... (Please leave a comment on any known source.)
   
   The title of the book makes the non-Western perspective clear, however, it isn't entirely correct either. But then again, book titles rarely are as the authors often do not have any control over the titles, changed for commercial reasons by the publishers. The author is Arab - not Muslim -, the main sources are historic Arab historians, yet the perspective is written from non-Arab leaders as well, such as Turks, Kurds, Persians, Egyptians. But also Armenians and other local Christians. In addition, it is not about "the crusades", as that would imply all of them. "Of course", it's only about those, which were directed against the Eastern Muslim territories. Not those against Muslim territories in Iberia, not those against Christian "heretics" such as the Waldensians within Europe, not those against European Jews (which were automatic part of any crusade), not those against European "pagans", such as the original Baltic Prussians, which for political reasons some Germans adopted the name from, and not those crusades, which didn't make it to the desired Muslim destinations, such as the Shepherds Crusades and also not the Children's Crusade, as the few surviving kids who really made it to the destination, were enslaved before they could leave the ships. By reading this book's view, you won't get a feeling of "crusades" either, but of one single 200-year-war, with several reinforcements - not numerically listed - of European troops. Who are called "Franj". Referring to all of them, such as the French, Italians, Germans, English etc. The same as all Muslims are headed under "Arabs" in the English title. Differentiations were made towards the "Rum" (pronounce similar to Roome), the Byzantine Christians and of course all the local minority Christians. The German title, translated into English, is more polemic, but more precise at the same time: "The Holy War of the Barbarians".
   
   Most reviewers point out that the book is NOT polemicly subjective against Westerners in contrast to an adulation of the Muslims. I find it even intriguing that the author refrains from listing the civilizing effect on Europe, the crusades had (and earlier Muslim invasions of Iberia and later ones of Eastern and Central Europe). Before the crusades, Europeans didn't have essential items such as sugar and shoes (instead honey and rag/fur wrappings). Not to mention hygiene, which was lost after the Roman empire. The book does mention medicine and a reviewer criticizes that as arbitrary quoting by the author. However, it is historic fact that the Muslims re-introduced medicine into Europe. For one thing, it was considered heretic in Europe to dissect corpses, making it impossible for "doctors" to know, how humans look like inside. It is often said, the Muslims got sophisticated medicine originally from the Romans and Greeks. Part of it, however, all of them received medicine from ancient Black Egyptians. In fact, the latter were able to diagnose fine bone crackings/fractures, something TODAY'S Westernes (nor anybody else) haven't the faintest idea, how they did that without x-rays. Some reviewers think the mentioned cannibalism of some crusaders has to be reproduced historic Muslim propaganda. Not so. There are Western sources, by the crusaders themselves. As the leaders were not able to prevent the masses - not soldiers - travelling with them to engage in that, as they had no control over them anymore. For an elaboration read the 1957 Western book The Pursuit of the Millennium: Revolutionary Millenarians and Mystical Anarchists of the Middle Ages (Galaxy Books). I would like to note that it is amazing how little the author engages in what might be considered biased. For example, he is stating, referring to the last medievil Franj invasion of Egypt: "Never again would the Occidentals attempt to invade the land of the Nile." But in 1798, the Franj returned under Corsican Napoleon. In the 19th century, the UK occupied Egypt, in the 20th century warring resumed, with Israel. Yet, the author isn't using history for tempting more contemporary issues.



3. This was an incredible book. I enjoy reading first hand accounts of history, without the boring academic drudgery. This book is full of the accounts of arabic and middle eastern viewpoints from that time period. It increased my knowledge and respect for the non western inhabitants of outremer. There is one instance where a crusaders wife comes into Saladin's camp and begs him to give her her young daughter back. She had been captured as a non combatant and sold into slavery by Saladins warriors. The mother had lost her husband and the child was the only thing left she had. After hearing her out, Saladin began crying and gave his men silver and told one of his aides to take the woman to the slave market and buy her daughter back! Incredible.



4. The advantage of this history of the Crusades is that the author provides significant insight regarding the historical tensions within the Arab "states" or tribes during the 11th and 12th centuries and how the frequent unwillingness of those often warring factions to help each other fend off the Crusaders, and their general ineptness in doing so, contributed to the horrible successes of the Christian marauders and the massacre of tens of thousands of "non-believers," which included large numbers of Eastern Orthodox Christians. The writing (translation) is somewhat dry, but the story is very interesting.



5. A good story that portrayed the Crusades from the eyes of the people who were in defense of their nation. Going to school in America, I heard of the Crusades through European eyes and on History Channel specials (back when they used to show things about history) I seen the unbiased sides from both the Western and Islam nations. This book talks more about the politics involved in the various Islamic nations in the Middle East and the trouble it took just to rouse an army up to face this European invasion. It got a bit stale at times, but quickly got interesting which is why I give it 4 instead of 5 stars. A good read for those who are interested in Islamic history.

5 comments about Who Speaks For Islam?: What a Billion Muslims Really Think.

1. In a time of growing animosity between the West(Christianity) and Muslims world wide(Islam),this book provide us with a balanced approach to understand 'what a billion Muslims Really Think'. Most people belonging to the Christian way of life either have no interest in the Muslim way of life or have an extremely biased view of their perspectives. Ignorance and propaganda feed indignation, and indignant people will become more lenient towards subversive forces.This book should form part of prescribed literature in schools and colleges if we are serious to prevent extremism, creating a fair society and honest communication bridging the void.



2. This book nose-dived to a three and even a two as I was confronted with what appeared to be a Saudi-USA sponsored propaganda piece that did not properly consider India (largest Muslim population after Indonesia) and that addressed what Muslims thought without being explicit about US misbehavior, what I think of as Dick "Not the Virgin" Cheney's "immaculate conception" of the most amoral, costly, and destructive global war in our history. Bless him--had he not taken the Republic over a cliff and into insolvency, the two thirds of the voters who have tuned out the two party spoils system ("you pay, we'll make it legal to steal") would not be coming back into 2008 steaming mad and with both feet.
   
   However, I persisted, and ultimately this book settled at a four. What I found was a series of offerings that allow this book to be a very fine "Muslim 101 Lite" for the general public. I totally admire the reviewer that has listed more in-depth works for consideration and have urged him to edit the review to use the Amazon feature that allows links to the pages for each of those books.
   
   I also detect a real disconnect in that the book lists all Muslim countries up front, but the fine print says the survey only covered the 10 predominantly Muslim countries, and that list specifically excludes India, which has the second largest Muslim population after Indonesia, and in my mind that discredits the study by perhaps 20%.
   
   Highlight provided early on by the authors:
   
   + Muslims do not see West as monolithic (and also see distinctions between Americans, America, US Government, US military, and the bellicose presence of US forces in their countries). I found this also in a Strategic Communication survey across the 27 countries in the US Central Command Area
   
   + Muslim majority, and especially women, want jobs, development, opportunity, not jihad and certainly not US occupation or corruption
   
   + Muslim silent majority rejects attacks on civilians (but I would say the book does not do as well as it could on showing that they also feel USA "deserved" 9-11--regardless of let it happen or made it happen allegations). Today the USS Cole belligerents got a free pass and we are reminded that it was Bill Clinton that took Madeline Albright's advice to ignore the attacks on Khobar Towers (Iran), two Embassies (al-Qaeda?) and the USS Cole (al-Qaeda?).
   
   + Religious moderates are in the majority, consider democracy a FOREIGN concept, and look to find ways to accommodate faith, family, and state without their being exclusive or compartmented. One could even say moderate Muslims are pre-disposed to be holistic!
   
   + The one thing the West could do to improve relations with Muslims is to show more respect and press for more understanding (in both directions).
   
   + Majority favor religious law as a source of legislation, but do not want clerics to have a direct role in drafting the constitution (I am reminded of how Israel went too far toward extremism when it yielded to its religious extremists--and of course Israel used the tactic of terrorism against the British to good effect, and ignored Gandhi's observation that "Palestine is to the Palestinians as France is to the French.")
   
   + My valuation of this book takes a definite leap upwards as I appreciate three facts that come together:
   
   - Within the limits of prostitution toward those who pay their bills, the Gallup book does a good job--but I have BLAND in one section--of raising hard truths that those in power have no interest in, but could be helpful to voters.
   
   - Each section has little gray boxes worth a look.
   
   - Each section ends with key points summarized.
   
   + The book ultimately loses one star because it does not cite many books for context and when it does, tends to go with the discredited Fukiyama and the discredited Blair. This is an undergraduate reading that needs several more layers of study, and hence I recommend the other books suggested by an earlier reviewer.
   
   + I am totally absorbed by the book's account of how the Pope, with the best of intentions and relying on his top "experts," made many mistakes in his speech attempting to reconcile with Islam, and was so told by over 100 Muslim scholars. This drives home both the limits of experts embedded with any leadership figure, and the importance of multicultural appreciative inquiry. The three candidates for President of the USA today are out of touch with citizens and out of touch with reality because they are giving stump speeches instead of leading nation-wide conversations on the ten high level threats to humanity outlined in A More Secure World: Our Shared Responsibility--Report of the Secretary-General's High-level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change and the twelve policies that must be recovered from the special interests that hijacked them to steal from the many for the benefit of the few. See also The Global Class War: How America's Bipartisan Elite Lost Our Future - and What It Will Take to Win It Back
   
   + The book does cite Professor Pape's Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism and adds primary research to the effect that the radicalized are not poor or illiterate, but rather educated and moderately well-off. This was my own finding in 1976 when I did my first Master's thesis on the prediction of revolution. The book astounds me in noting that while only 7% of the Muslim population is radicalized, this number is NINETY ONE MILLION. The book also documents the plain fact that the primary motivation for suicidal terrorism is almost invariably FOREIGN OCCUPATION.
   
   + Page 84 lists the Muslim perceptions surveyed has of the USA, we learn that they are:
   
   - Ruthless (68%)
   
   - Scientifically & technologically advanced (68%)
   
   - Aggressive (66%)
   
   - Conceited (65%)
   
   - Morally decadent (64%)
   
   The book does a very good job of addressing how the civil rights conflict is closer to the Muslim-Christian-Jewish conflict, calling this a clash of cultures (to which I would add, a clash of economic corruption and predatory looting versus commonwealth exploitation by, of, and for indigenous peoples) and specifically discounting the clash of civilizations as the model. Readers interested in the whole question of belief systems can find the Technical Preface by Robert Garigue free online or at Information Operations: All Information, All Languages, All the Time.
   
   The book does well at portraying Muslims world-wide as feeling under siege from the USA, and concludes from its primary research that Muslim anger is based on US foreign policy and its effect on their own peace and development. This is not rocket science, but I assure you, Henry Kissinger, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Madeline Albright, Condi Rice, even Strobe Talbott--they are NEVER going to come to grips with the fact that US foreign policy today is lunatic, out of control, costly, and totally out of touch with how to wage peace at one third of the cost of war. See for example Breaking the Real Axis of Evil: How to Oust the World's Last Dictators by 2025
   
   The book ends on a note that suggests that both Muslims and Christians deeply want and need more erespect and understanding at a public diplomacy level, but the book is also quite specific in noting how US public diplomacy (and I would add, Strategic Communication) is completely out of touch with reality. You can no longer manufacture consent or use propaganda to mislead the majority of the world. As Joe Trippi points out, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: Democracy, the Internet, and the Overthrow of Everything--Trippi is a genius, but I would note that we have moved one step beyond--cell phones, not the Internet, are the primary intellectual, emotional, cultural, and asymmetric warfare tool of choice today, one reason why the National Security Agency is freaking out--they cannot build a computer that weights next to nothing, runs on almost no energy, and can do petaflop calculations per second--the human brain (these are the last three words in Jim Bamford's book, Body of Secrets: Anatomy of the Ultra-Secret National Security Agency. US intelligence is "inside out and upside down" as I explained in Forbes ASAP, and desperately needs a draconian redirection of funding from the %60B we spend on the 4% we can steal, to rebalancing the use of all national powers and especially education, rule of law, and infrastructure here at home, and public diplomacy as well as open source or public intelligence that can exploit all information in all languages all the time.
   
   I liked the details on the survey that are included in the appendix.
   
   On balance, the book does a good job within the constraints of funding, US management, and the need to pander moderately to an Administration that has no regard for reality at the White House level (our flag officers and top civil servants and some political appointees such as the Secretary of Defense have rediscovered their integrity and are fighting a holding action for all of us here at home).
   
   I would like to see two new surveys: one of all the countries they missed, and one of India alone, ideally done in partnership with the government of India. I regard India, Malaysia, and Turkey as well as Indonesia as major success stories, and the US Government does not seem to be ready to recognize that these four countries can and should be major partners in offering peace and development instead of corruption, occupation, and exploitation, to all Muslims everywhere.
   
   Three other books within my limit of ten:
   Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War, and the Roots of Terror
   The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Vintage)
   Web of Deceit: The History of Western complicity in Iraq, from Churchill to Kennedy to George W. Bush



3. I'm familiar with Georgetown University professor John Esposito's funding (Saudi Arabia) and pro-Islam bias, but 5 minutes into the book even I was surprised at his audacity in translating "Islam" as "a strong commitment to God" when most other scholars, including loud-and-proud Islam apologists (both Muslim and non-Muslim), translate it as "submission to God". Replacing the harsher, but almost universally accepted, "submission" says all you need to know about Esposito's lack of objectivity.
   
   But don't rely on my opinion. On 5/12/08 Robert Satloff published in "The Weekly Standard" (Volume 13, Issue 33, available on-line) a devastating expose of how this book is devoid of scholarship.
   
   Specifically, Mr. Satloff details how Ms. Mogahed (the coauthor) admitted to changing the definition of "radical" AFTER the data had been collected and analyzed, effectively reducing the number of radicals from the 169 million Muslims in categories 4 and 5 of a 1: "9/11 totally unjustified" to 5: "9/11 completely justified" scale, to the 91 million members of category 5 only. (Page 97 of the book also reveals that Esposito now either considers category 4 Muslims, 75% sure the 9/11 attacks were justified, as "moderates", or just ignores category 4 altogether despite it being a swing group between "moderate" and "radical" with almost the population of Germany!)
   
   In Mr. Satloff's words, "[the authors] must have shrieked in horror to find their original estimate [of radicals] on the high side of assessments made by scholars, such as Daniel Pipes, whom Esposito routinely denounces as Islamophobes... The cover-up is even worse. The full data from the 9/11 question show that, in addition to the 13.5 percent [ie categories 4 and 5], there is another 23.1 percent ---300 million Muslims--- who told pollsters the attacks were in some way justified. Esposito and Mogahed don't utter a word about the vast sea of intolerance in which the radicals operate."
   
   It would be a big mistake to read this book if you are just beginning your study of Islam, since you might miss the subtle but fairly standard techniques Esposito uses to introduce his pro-Islam bias. One well-known technique he uses throughout the book is being neutral on Jewish and Christian theology by referring to Moses and Jesus as historical figures while validating Islamic theology by referring to "the Prophet Muhammad", capital P and no qualifier (such as "the Islamic prophet").
   
   Another technique (and the first time I've seen it used) is his references to "Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition", an obvious (to me) attempt to imply that the three religions share a common value system, a fiction (at least when it comes to the Wahhabi version of Islam dominant in Esposito's sponsor Saudi Arabia) commonly promoted by political Islamists (ie non-violent but with similar goals as violent Islamists). Political Islamists' use of the term "Judeo-Christian-Islamic values" to try to ride the coattails of the well-established Judeo-Christian value system has so far failed to gain traction since even a cursory study of Wahhabi Islam shows it shares few if any major values with Christianity (I can't comment on Judaism). Specifically, Wahhabi Islam has no version of the Golden Rule, it tells its believers the exact opposite of "turn the other cheek", it considers non-Muslims inferiors who should (as revealed by God) have fewer rights than Muslims. (See Freedom House's detailed report on Saudi Arabia's government-sanctioned K-12th grade religious studies curriculum, available on-line.) Even the mandatory 2.5% to charity Wahhabi Muslims are required to contribute each year can only go to charities that benefit Muslims. (Can you imagine Mother Theresa turning away an orphan whose parents had been Hindu?!) But Esposito's term is technically correct, since the Koran incorporates a Muslim version of some Old and New Testament characters and stories, and since Jews, Christians, and Muslims coexisted for hundreds of years in the Middle East, so the three religions must share some aspect of a common "tradition". But Wahhabi Islam most certainly doesn't share common values with Christianity, which Esposito surely knows even as he hopes the reader comes away with the impression it does.
   
   To sum up, if you are going to read 5 or fewer books on Islam, this should NOT be one of them. If you are well-grounded in Islam, this book has some interesting points (such as the fact that the vast majority of Muslims want "free speech", defined as "allowing all citizens to express their opinion on the political, social, and economic issues of the day", but with no mention of any right to criticize religion (p. 47)), and is a fast read. Don't buy it though, it's not worth the $16 I spent on it. (To illustrate how little regard I hold for the sham "scholarship" this book masquerades as, this is the first book I'm throwing out instead of donating to my library. And I donate every book, even those I strongly disagree with, to my library.)



4. Review of Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think by John L. Esposito and Dalia Mogahed released March, 2008
   
   Both John Esposito and Dalia Mogahed work for the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, which claims as its mission providing data-driven analysis on the views of Muslims around the world. Esposito is known in his own right as a Sunni convert to Islam and a professor of International Affairs and Islamic Studies at Georgetown University, famous for Muslim-Christian interfaith work, some of it funded by the royal family in Saudi Arabia.
   
   This book is a very fast read based on Gallup's World Poll that seeks to address common, if biased, views of Muslims with the results of the survey claiming to represent the actual views of Muslims. Thus, it cannot be construed as representing an official Islamic viewpoint, but rather the views from a sample intended to represent 90% of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims.
   
   Some of the supposedly surprising revelations of this study are practically humorous in a sad, insulting way: one "counterintuitive discovery" is "When asked to describe their dreams for the future, Muslims don't mention fighting in a jihad, but rather getting a better job." Other similarly hardly amazing tidbits are presented in the course of five chapters: Who are Muslims?, Democracy or Theocracy?, What Makes a Radical?, What do Women Want?, and Clash or Coexistence?
   
   In the first chapter, we learn the basics of Islam, such as that "Muslims pray not only as a religious obligation, but also because it makes them feel closer to God". A gray box highlighting brief, important facts occurs on many pages throughout the book and one in this chapter tells us Islam means, "a strong commitment to God", implying that is how the Arabic translates.
   
   In the second chapter we learn results of the survey indicating views that Muslims do not want wholesale adoption of Western democracy in their countries, but at the same time, a majority of Americans don't either, saying that they want the Bible as a major source of legislation. There is an unmistakable, but overdone, effort to show that American views and Muslim views are much closer than many think.
   
   In the third chapter, we find questionable altruisms like, "The real difference between those who condone terrorist acts and all others is about politics, not piety," leaving open the possible interpretation that a truly pious person could condone terrorism. This brings to question the definition of piety employed by the authors and the survey.
   
   In the fourth chapter, we learn things such as that while Western women view the hijab as showing inferior status of women, Muslims view lack of modesty in Western women as showing their degraded status.
   
   And in the last chapter, we find out results like Muslims don't "hate us because of our freedom." The book concludes with an appendix explaining the scientific design of the poll, how it was conducted, and notes.
   
   The book also draws on numerous other poll results, news articles, and interviews. For example, it refers to a Christian Science Monitor interview of Jenan al-Ubaedy, a female member of Iraq's National Assembly, in 2005. She told the newspaper that "she supported the implementation of Sharia. However, she said that as an assembly member, she would fight for women's right for equal pay, paid maternity leave, and reduced hours for pregnant women." I doubt Ms. Al-Ubaedy would have found the use of "however" as appropriate, as if what she was fighting for in equal pay and maternity leave were in opposition to Islamic law as she understood it.
   
   While the poll itself is statistically valid and possibly even worthwhile for addressing certain misconceptions about Muslims, I struggled to think of an audience that this book would actually reach. Anyone who found the majority of the study results as enlightening is unlikely to be open-minded enough to read the book or believe the poll results, anyway. Further, the authors seem to have several questionable interpretations and views, such as a few mentioned earlier, as if they are going too far to adapt to their perceived audience. It seems to have been written too quickly and with too many questionably worded sentences, such as the one about terrorism and piety or the one about Ms. Al-Ubaedy's interview, that can allow for incorrect negative impressions about Islam that the book is supposedly aiming to dispel. Thus, the sincerity of the intent of the work is called to question.
   
   If you like reading interesting takes on statistics, such as Freakonomics by Stephen D. Levitt, there is still some enjoyment to be had in reading this book. I could now cite in a dinner conversation that 88% of Muslims polled in the survey support women's right to vote, or that 80% of Iranians say that bombing and other attacks intentionally aimed at civilians are never justified, while only 46% of Americans surveyed agreed, but that you might get a different result if you use substitute "terrorist attacks" in place of "attacks intentionally aimed at civilians."
   
   I can't help thinking that a much better book could have been written with the results from the survey than this one. Despite the academic nature of the survey, when I finished the book I felt like I had just read something only pseudo-academic, flawed, off-target for an intended audience, and with questionable intent.



5. Well, this isn't a book for hate-mongers or fear-mongers. It is, however, a book that gives a voice to the Muslim majority, which is usually not consulted by the likes of Bill O'Reilly or Michael Savage or even moderate American media. Mostly, it's a summary of the huge, lengthy Gallup survey of Muslims in various countries. There are always flaws in surveys -- for example, if someone asked you if you wanted Christianity to be a source of law in the United States, your notion of Christianity might be enormously different from the next person's notion of it -- but at least this is the first time that Americans get to see roughly what Muslims really think...rather than mindlessly take the media's (sensationalist) word for it.

5 comments about Islam: A Short History (Modern Library Chronicles).

1. This is, indeed, an elementary work, but as such, I found it enlightening. I gained a sense of the premises of the Koran and how Islam succeeded, within a century of its founding, to spread to North Africa and Spain. I hadn't known a thing about the Mongol invasions, or when Sufism arose, or how the Sunni's and Shia's actually diverged. It was interesting to read about the rise and fall of empires in the middle ages, and the strength of the Ottoman Empire into the 20th century. Reading this book was an engaging and eye-opening experience for me.



2. Wow what a great book, that educates the reader on facts most westerners don't know concerning Islam. How many westerners know that Arab businessman named Muhammad is the Prophet Muhammad and that he saw himself not as a holy man but as a leader for the left behind and forgotten amongst him?
   
   Or that Islam thru him, began because of how the Christians looked down on the Persians/Arabs, mocking them because they didn't have a holy leader like the Jews and Christians had? This alone should make people want to read the book.



3. This was a great book for trying to understand a very complicated religion. I found it easy to read and very insightful.



4. Armstrong seems to be aware of the existence of Ibn-Ishaq's text "Sirat Rasul Allah", yet she doesn't seem to have read it. Instead, she uses Qu'ranic verses to show the peaceful nature of Islam. These verses however are often dating from the Meccan period. Very poetic and often very incomprehensible without the Qu'ran commentaries. She ignores the (more militant) verses from the Medinah period. Unfortunuatly she doesn't explain why she cites so arbitrary from the Qu'ran. On a more personal note I think it's academic suicide to support your (secular) view on history with quotes from religious scriptures alone. But than, she probably doesn't have any academic pretentions.
   
   Some information she presents as 'facts' contradicts the sources we have about the formative years of Islam. These sources could be very 'wrong' since most of them were writen after Muhammad's death, but unfortunuatly she doesn't tell us why she thinks she can push them aside. That would be interesting to read. To know how she got to certain findings. But those conclusions lack footnotes and we'll have to assume she knows more about it than any other person in the world.
   
   A very apologetic book which relies more on the imagination of the writer than on what we know about Islam sofar.



5. Read the book and open your closed mind! Do NOT generalize about any culture or religion, as some of the 1 star reviewers have done. Those who generalize against any people or religion are nothing more than hypocritical BIGOTS! There is nothing complicated about it. If you look for the bad/good in any religion you will find it. What 1 star reviewers chose to focus on in this healingesque book, exposes their own misgiuded agenda.

5 comments about I Heard God Laughing: Poems of Hope and Joy.

1. This is a book of quite short poems that show great playfulness and wisdom.
   They are neither nieve or cynical but positive without shying away from the darker side of nature. Also a good translation, the poems flows nicely.



2. What my heart feels when I view a sunset or a baby giggling may differ markedly from what another feels or interprets. Ladinsky's work may leave some cold...which is okay as we all view life through self-adopted filters. But if you startled by an occasional or surprising glimpse of a numinous and swirling piece of the Divine and an unexpected and overwhelming sense of love and compassion, you'll find these poems a homecoming. The 'debate' over the 'accuracy' of Ladinsky's translation of Hafiz is distracting and, in fact, quite irrelevant. It doesn't matter if you dance with Ladinsky or Hafiz or Rabia or Mirabai...the poetry is ecstatic and the dance exquisite.



3. It is a beautiful expression of poets journey towards divine love.
   Really deep and simple at the same time



4. This is a marvelous book of poems. Almost every poem was touching. I highly
   reccomend this book.



5. I've read other translators of Hafiz, Rumi, etc. and while I do not speak the original language, I cannot imagine a more truthful and present-time translation of Hafiz totally in keeping with the spirit of his words. I am a poet myself and the good ones make meanings that transcend their own words. Ladinsky taps into Hafiz's meanings and the joy that bubbles up from it is contagious. Every single poem makes Hafiz's spirit come alive garbed in bright shiny eyes and compassionate heart -- looking right at you. It is said that in Arab countries the average person on the street can and will quote Hafiz by heart. You need crucial images to do that. A humdrum or more accurate interpretation in English will not stick to the ears nor the heart. How's this for memorable lines:
   
   "You better start kissing me -- or else!"
   
   "You don't have to act crazy anymore --
   We all know you were good at that."
   
   "The stars get clearly drunk
   And crazy at night
   And throw themselves
   Across the sky."
   
   "I know the way you can get
   When you have not had a drink of Love."
   
   "Do you know how beautiful you are?
   I think not, my dear.
   Yet Hafiz could set you upon a Stage
   And worship you forever!"
   
   "I have a thousand brilliant lies
   For the question, How are you?"
   
   And finally,
   "A poet is someone
   Who can pour Light into a spoon,
   Then raise it to nourish
   Your beautiful parched, holy mouth."
   
   If God is the Light and Hafiz is the spoon, then Daniel Ladinsky is the one holding you upright to receive the gift.

5 comments about Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy, and the West.

1. This is a wonderfully written book with clear expositions in 318 pages regarding common misinterpretations of the Koran, which does not exclude other religions that believe in the same one God. She shows us how we need to recast ourselves to promote our democracy as the way to achieve peaceful coexistence of different religious and ethnic groups, through education and cooperation in economic development. She gives a very moving account of the many difficulties she had in trying to get a real democracy in Pakistan, and the multiple blocks and attempts on her life. The scope of her book is large and analyzes the conditions in many different cultures. She ends with many reasonable solutions to some of our problems. I only hope that our legislators read this profound, very moving,and clear book!!



2. I am a US citizen of Asian descent. I knew nothing about Benazir Bhutto before reading this book besides that she was a politician of "one of those countries out there." Her story has educated me on the complicated situation between the Islamic countries and the West. Her ideas and plans make sense. I just hope that enough of our own politicians read this. Now that she's reached so many people with book and her legacy, I hope she is at peace.



3. Benazir represented the moderate face of Islam. In this book she has attempted to highlight how democracy and Islam are mutually compatible, in the light of the Holy Quran. She had a broad vision and laid down her life fighting for her ideals. This book is a sincere effort on her part to reconcile the differences between the Western and the Muslim world. She has to be commended for bringing forth the point that the rise of militancy and fundamentalism poses the greatest threat to Islam itself; to put the blame solely on US imperial policy and the Cold War is unjustified. Islam has been hijacked by the elements with political ambitions, who seek to justify violence in the name of Jihad -a very noble concept which has been misconstrued for selfish motives. This book is a testimony to Benazir's wisdom, intellect and broad vision.



4. The author portrays a sharp contrast between the
   peaceful Arabs and the extremists who seek to
   foster continued clashes with the West.
   Mrs. Bhutto provides an excellent portrayal of
   early Islamic accomplishments in the arts, sciences
   and engineering. Shamefully, this progress has been
   stultified because the radical Islamic dogma seeks
   continued war with the West on a number of important
   fronts. The 9-11 terrorist attack is seen as a Crusade
   in reverse by the extremist Arabs and potentially Al Qaeda.
   
   Mrs. Bhutto returned to large crowds during 1986 in Lahore,
   Pakistan. The author took great pains to demonstrate how
   the Quran respects women generally. Despite this, printing
   was not allowed in Muslim lands until 1727. For this
   reason, the intellectual period of Arab advancement slowed.
   
   The book is sectionalized so that there is an extensive
   discussion of the various Middle Eastern spheres of
   influence. For instance, General Zia pitted the Sh'ia
   against the Sunnis in order to halt the spread of the
   Iranian Revolution. In Pakistan's Sh'ia Northern Region,
   Sunnis joined the Afghan Mujahideen fighting the Soviets
   in Afghanistan. Anti-Sh'ia sentiment was encouraged to
   motivate Mujahideen to fight. Ultimately, the Sh'ia
   retaliated against the Sunnis.
   
   Mrs. Bhutto shows how Islam and democracy are inevitable.
   Without the extremists, Islam is about the consent of
   the governed, as well as universal participation.
   In the Quran, the election of a Chief Executive is by the
   uncoerced will of the people.
   
   Democratic institutions undermined the authority of the
   Shah of Iran. Independence did not bring economic or
   social reforms to North African nations. In 1922, Britain
   installed Hashimite King Faisal (Sunni) to rule Iraq.
   Local people viewed him as a foreigner.
   
   Afghanistan hosted both a Cold War against the Soviet Union
   and a terrorist campaign of Islamic extremists against
   the West. Hamas embraced a formal charter of violence
   aimed at creating a Palestinian State. Ultimately, the
   West Bank standard of living has exceeded Gaza.
   
   Indonesia has the greatest number of Muslims on earth.
   In August, 1990, extremists brought down the Pakistani
   government. The Nawaz administration tried to reverse
   much of Mrs. Bhutto's social programs. Toward the end
   of the volume, the author called for new ideas and a
   distinctive bold commitment.
   
   Overall, the book is a masterpiece. Every politician in
   Washington, DC should read the volume and learn from it !



5. Absolute Total Garbage. I was sent this book from a former foreign office colleague and he added a quick witted remark about how these "ruling families" take the populous as completely dumb and out of touch. The book is written in a post script voice.
   
   You will feel as though you are listening to some uninformed news reporter on CNN or any other NNs of the world. One thing that stands out is her complete misrepresentation about the Liberation war of Bangladesh.
   
   She does not mention that the Pakistani army killed three million Bangladeshies in nine short months. She does not even spell the name of the Capital Dhaka correctly. Perhaps she needed to have this book edited by someone half as credible as a 5th grader to have not made such a mistake. She goes on not mentioning her father's role in prolonging the deaths when Mr. Bhutto (the father) went to the UN to ask that India not come to the rescue of the million of Bengals the Pakistani army was killing.
   
   Her logic about clash of civilization is half baked. She does not really make a point as to what her views are in a concise manner. She tries to give her family, specially her father a nice face to history. But she neglects to point out that while her family was sitting at the ivory tower, there were millions killed in the name of "Pakistan". She does not reconcile how the cult of Jinnah and their philosophy is a complete sham and how it is responsible for the death of millions of people even before the war of 1971. Through Jinnah's work we now have two distinctly undemocratic countries in South Asia. Ms. Bhutto does not reconcile why and how Jinnah ruined the 1947 liberation movement and created this whole debacle only for personal ego and greed. She does not mention how Jinnah collaborated with the British to divide India for his personal gain and egotistical monomaniacal personality. Civilizations collide when we have leaders such as Jinnah who are easily purchased by the western influences.
   
   This book is factually incorrect and full of inaccuracies that you can't really overlook. If you want to give a charity to the Bhutto family by buying this book then go ahead. But, don't blame anyone when you feel that your intellect is being abjectly disrespected when you do start reading.
   
   This book should have been titled "IT'S NOT OUR FAULT" versus reconciliation. It blames everyone else and that's that. Very very intellectually dishonest and perhaps dishonest altogether.