A Faith for All Seasons: Islam and the Challenge of the Modern World (And Behavioral Science) by Shabbir Akhtar-Paperback – February
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After the Salman Rushdie affair, is it possible for a Muslim to criticize his own faith? Or have the leaders of Islam impressed a new intellectual paralysis on the followers of their religion?
In A Faith for All Seasons, Shabbir Akhtar challenges his fellow Muslims to recognize that they live in a secular world of religious pluralism. He calls on them to show their critics that Islam is a progressive and responsive faith. In the course of his argument, Mr. Akhtar offers a remarkably clear and concise explanation of Islam's basic religious tenets.
"Modern Muslims are, as a group of people, embarrassingly unreflective," Mr. Akhtar writes. "After developing a great rational philosophical tradition, the adherents of Islam have lapsed into an intellectual lethargy that has already lasted half a millennium."
A Faith for All Seasons considers the origins and fundamental philosophy of Islam, describes its confrontation with the religious skepticism of the modern world, and suggests a course of action that would acknowledge the rivalry of Christianity, Marxism, and secular liberalism as ideologies that also claim the allegiance of modern man. Mr. Akhtar shows how believers can cultivate a reverent yet penetrating skepticism that teaches the ignorant, disturbs the orthodox, and agitates the indifferent.
Shabbir Akhtar was born in Pakistan but has long been settled in Bradford, England, where his writings have attracted the attention of Graham Greene and other British authors. His first book, Be Careful with Muhammad!, about the Rushdie affair, was widely praised by British reviewers as the most perceptive and evenhanded account of the imbroglio. Mr. Akhtar is a philosophy graduate of Cambridge University with a doctorate in comparative religion.
Product details
Publisher : Ivan R. Dee; Elephant Paperbacks edition (February 1, 1991)
