Islam
Europe and the Islamic World, by John Tolan, Gilles Veinstein, and Henry Laurens
Europe and the Islamic World is a grandly ambitious attempt to sketch the interaction of faiths and regions from the seventh century to the present.
reviewed by Philip Jenkins
Two ascension stories
When the Ascension coincides with Lailat al-Mi‘rāj, perhaps Christians and Muslims can spare a sidelong glance.
Holy terror
Secularists from Voltaire to Richard Dawkins have attacked religion for its connection to violence. Karen Armstrong flatly rejects the idea.
The inhumane humans of ISIS
With an authorization looming in Congress for our ongoing war against the so-called Islamic State, a muddled conversation has sprung up about the group’s relationship to mainstream Islam, its relationship to American and European policy in the region, and the military and political measures needed to counter it. Graeme Wood interviewed scholars and activists to shed light on what ISIS is trying to accomplish and why. His resulting story—a long tour through the theology, history, and practice of this particularly brutal offshoot of Salafist Islam—is alarming, not least to Wood himself.
What the Chapel Hill murders reveal about the place of Muslims in American society
(RNS) Deah Barakat took my class “Islam in the Modern World” at North Carolina State University a few years ago. He was curious about Islamic history and contemporary spiritual and political movements, and he was great in class discussions. I’ve taught thousands of students in the last 11 years here, but Deah stood out for his enthusiasm, kindness, calm demeanor, and obvious charisma.
Deah Barakat, Yusor Abu-Salha, and Razan Abu-Salha were the very best of people.
An uncomfortable time to be Muslim in France
The vast majority of Muslims in France hail from former colonies in Africa. Of all of the relationships, the one with Algeria is the most fraught.
Why the Charlie Hebdo attack is not about images or free speech
(RNS) Ostensibly, the horrific attack against Charlie Hebdo in Paris was because of the publication’s satirical images of the Prophet Muhammad.
But to view the assault as simply about images of Muhammad is to accept a long-standing narrative about Muslim sensitivity to portrayals of Muhammad, which plays into conceptions of Muslims as superstitious savages.
The other woman
Hagar’s story has often been read as if it explains some inevitable animosity among the Abrahamic faiths. We should try reading it differently.
by Debbie Blue
The New Arabs, by Juan Cole
Juan Cole tells the backstory of the revolutions in North Africa, exploring events in the context of their cultural setting. His conclusions are optimistic yet grounded in realism.
reviewed by Paul-Gordon Chandler
Sects without tradition
The story of Pentecostalism and social change is now familiar. What's surprising is how closely it echoes trends in modern Islam.
Hidden in Timbuktu: An Islamic legacy protected from jihadists
Before the jihadists fled Timbuktu in February, they burned the city's ancient manuscripts. Except all the ones the residents hid.
text and photographs by Paul Jeffrey
Islam and democracy
The prospects for genuine democracy in Egypt are more remote than ever. But there are other models of Islamic politics in the region.
Actually, I would like to know how Reza Aslan's faith informs his book
I agree with everyone everywhere: Fox News's "why would a Muslim write about Jesus???" interview of Reza Aslan was pretty lousy stuff, yet he handled himself quite well, and good for him for selling more books because of it. All correct.
Yet I'm puzzled by what both Aslan's on-air defense and many subsequent commentators imply: that academic/professional credentials inform a person's writing to the exclusion of personal convictions.
The clash that wasn’t
Somehow, newspapers never publish banner headlines announcing "World's Largest Muslim State Fails to Persecute Christians."
How to Read the Qur’an, by Carl W. Ernst
In the decade since 9/11, it seems as though every trade publisher and university press has brought forth a guide to the Qur’an for the perplexed. Carl Ernst eschews the usual method for books of this sort.
reviewed by Steven Young
The "we" of women's rights
It is difficult to know what to say in response to Mona Eltahawy’s explosive article on the experience of women in Middle Eastern countries. She writes about a level of institutionalized brutality that demands that readers pay attention.
At the same time, she doesn’t say anything new, nothing that wasn’t already made too vividly clear during the Arab Spring.