What Do Muslims Believe? – the Roots and Realities of Modern Islam by Aiauddin Sardar. New York: Walker & Company, 2007. 140 pages, including glossary & index.
This Pakistani-British author gives us a positively-slanted inside view of the Quran and Islam. Nevertheless, he criticizes Islam today for being medieval, patriarchal, puritanical, antiquated, archaic and full of tyrannical despotism and oppression, all supposedly the result of theologians after Mohammed. His answer is to “reformulate the Sharia,” a very difficult proposition. He concludes that “fundamentalism…will implode due to its own viciousness” but “it will take several decades, even half a century.” We can pray that he is right, and soon. Entertaining, easy reading.
