Charles Le Gai Eaton (1921–2010)

I have never read such surreal walk-through of Islamic history, law, society and arts before. In my view, this is characteristic of most perennialist literature (for instance, Frithjof Schuon, Rene Guenon and Syeh Hussain Nasr) that it drags the reader into deep and novel meanings of common concepts and cliches otherwise taken for granted. But by any means, this is not an easy read, and though these are just about 250 odd pages, the narrative requires an extraordinary attention and careful show more reading.

The book may fail to make much impression upon post-modernist legal mind who is adamant to seek an almost Utopian authenticity in historical and social narratives; but then one wishes while reading the book that Eaton should have provided references for all the hadith and incidents that he makes use of to build an excellent exposition of what it really means to be a Muslim. show less

Like all religious works, there is much debate over what should and should not be in the text. This work includes translations and the original Arabic text, and is well-regarded. I took copious notes from the Book of Hadith , but these resonate most:
- "If anyone travels a path in search of knowledge, God will conduct him through one of the paths of Paradise" (p. 11).
- "Be in the world as though you were a stranger or a passing traveler" (p. 41).
- "Do not curse time, for God is time!" (p. show more 100).
- "Beware of envy! Envy devours good deeds just as fire devours firewood" (p. 112).
- "A person keeps saying 'Mine, mine!' But what is theirs but three things? What he's eaten and consumed, what he's worn and worn out, what he's given and that is what endures. Everything else is fleeting and must be given up eventually to others" (p. 117).
A real eye-opener. As the sheikh in Amman said to me "You must read widely, and read for yourself. Do not believe what others tell you, listen only to God". show less

"...After September 11 I analysed bin Laden’s words, his quotations, his explanations, and his mission statement which is: ‘We are at war with the West. They want to destroy Islam and we need to fight back.’ I wanted to know if all these things that bin Laden said were really in the Koran and in the Hadith. And, to my shock, they were. A lot of people say they are taken out of context, but they are completely not taken out of context. They are in context. They only thing that is out of show more context is the fact that this very old book which was put together by – well, we don’t know who the authors are, but it’s definitely more than one author – is considered to be valid in the 21st century..." (reviewed by Ayaan Hirsi Ali in FiveBooks).



The full interview is available here: http://fivebooks.com/interviews/ayaan-hirsi-ali-on-women-and-islam show less

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