The Place of Tolerance in Islam
by Khaled Abou El Fadl
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Khaled Abou El Fadl, a prominent critic of Islamic puritanism, leads off this lively debate by arguing that Islam is a deeply tolerant religion. Injunctions to violence against nonbelievers stem from misreadings of the Qur'an, he claims, and even jihad, or so-called holy war, has no basis in Qur'anic text or Muslim theology but instead grew out of social and political conflict. Many of Abou El Fadl's respondents think differently. Some contend that his brand of Islam will only appeal to show more Westerners and students in "liberal divinity schools" and that serious religious dialogue in the Muslim world requires dramatic political reforms. Other respondents argue that theological debates are irrelevant and that our focus should be on Western sabotage of such reforms. Still others argue that calls for Islamic "tolerance" betray the Qur'anic injunction for Muslims to struggle against their oppressors. The debate underscores an enduring challenge posed by religious morality in a pluralistic age- how can we preserve deep religious conviction while participating in what Abou El Fadl calls "a collective enterprise of goodness" that cuts across confessional differences? With contributions from Tariq Ali, Milton Viorst, and John Esposito, and others. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
I really enjoyed this short book of essays on the place of tolerance in Islam post-9/11. A few of the essays seemed to get off topic, but others were very strong and they all enriched my understanding of either Islam or how different people and groups in the world view Islam and its practitioners. If you read this, ask someone else to do so as well so that you can talk about it - my mom's going to read it soon so that we can share our thoughts.
This was our first book for the Ill Fated Muslim Book Club. It is a nice collection of essays by the big guns of Muslim intelligensia around the topic of tolerance.
There are enough different opinions expressed in this book that we thought it would make a great discussion: readers could champion the essayist whose opinion was closest to their own.
What we didn't know at the time is that Muslims don't read - especially Muslim men. As a friend of ours in the publishing industry said, "When age matched for education and income with their non-Muslim peers, Muslims do not read as much." So if you are a Muslim here on librarything.com, know that you are, indeed, a very rare bird.
Our book club was co-ed, and we did find that the women would read show more the book. The idea was to have families get together, pot-luck dinner followed by the kids playing in the basement or second floor while the adults talked about the book.
The women read the book but said very little. The men didn't read the book, but gave their opinions freely. At least for the first session we had a good turn-out, which could probably be explained by mere curiousity, like the freak show at the circus. This gave my husband and I the very false hope that something like this could actually work. Little did we know..... show less
There are enough different opinions expressed in this book that we thought it would make a great discussion: readers could champion the essayist whose opinion was closest to their own.
What we didn't know at the time is that Muslims don't read - especially Muslim men. As a friend of ours in the publishing industry said, "When age matched for education and income with their non-Muslim peers, Muslims do not read as much." So if you are a Muslim here on librarything.com, know that you are, indeed, a very rare bird.
Our book club was co-ed, and we did find that the women would read show more the book. The idea was to have families get together, pot-luck dinner followed by the kids playing in the basement or second floor while the adults talked about the book.
The women read the book but said very little. The men didn't read the book, but gave their opinions freely. At least for the first session we had a good turn-out, which could probably be explained by mere curiousity, like the freak show at the circus. This gave my husband and I the very false hope that something like this could actually work. Little did we know..... show less
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Author Information
27+ Works 626 Members
Khaled Abou El Fadl is the Omar and Azmeralda Alfi Distinguished Professor in Islamic Law at the University of California, Los Angeles, School of Law, where he is also chair of the Islamic Studies program. He received the University of Oslo Human Rights Award, was named a Carnegie Scholar in Islamic Law, and has served on the board of directors show more for Human Rights Watch, among other honors. He is the author of numerous books, including The Great Theft and The Search for Beauty in Islam. show less
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