Apologetics is not Objective History | Islam: A Short History (Modern Library Chronicles)

Meh ... | Islam: A Short History (Modern Library Chronicles) | Karen Armstrong

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	• Islam: A Short History (Modern Library Chronicles) Karen Armstrong Modern Library, 2002 - 272 pages average customer review:based on 153 reviews view larger image
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Superb and masterfully written book

This is a superb and masterfully written book that thoroughly describes the history of Islam from Muhammed to the 911 Twin Towers. This is written at a collegiate or graduate student level.
Those that are looking for the simplied, 8th grade level of less inclusive writing need to look elsewhere, but will lose a wonderful and almost minimally necessary description of Islam's
unfolding in history. After reading this book, I ordered additional copies to give to my friends.

Apologetics is not Objective History

Religious apologetics have a long history: from defense of, say, Judaism against Christianity, to Protestants against Catholics and the other way around, to (today) Wiccans -- or witches -- against mainstream religion.

Armstrong's book is an apologia for Islam in the same sense: that is, not to convert anybody to Islam, but to deny what she considers to be unjust accusations or stereotypes about it. Jews (or Wiccans) don't drink the blood of babies, contrary rumors notwithstanding -- and, no, Ajeeb the tire salesman down the street does not have secret plans to slit your throat, just because Abu Bakr's second cousin's brother's son said something about hating non-Muslims in 714 AD.

Inasmuch as she tries to alert the reader to Islamic civilization, Islamic science, Islamic achievements, etc., her work is commendable. The problem is when the apologetics become absurd. The crusades, for instance, are seen as nothing more than christian aggression for no reason -- ignoring the hundreds of years of similarly-violent Islamic expansion.

Showing Islam's good side while hiding and excusing its bad side and calling this "history" instead of "apologetics" does the reader no favors. It gives him a distorted picture, as distorted (in the opposite way) as the "Americans wake up, Islam is taking over your country!" books.

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Meh ...

This is a decent book for anyone seeking an overall picture of Islamic history. I have one problem with the book, however: The author doesn't cite any external sources within the text to justify the history. While I am sure that everything she says is correct, proper citations would have given me a sense of academic rigor. In the back of the book, she does have a list of suggested readings. I suppose that is where she gathered her information.

No religion in the modern world is as feared and misunderstood as Islam. It haunts the popular imagination as an extreme faith that promotes terrorism, authoritarian government, female oppression, and civil war. In a vital revision of this narrow view of Islam and a distillation of years of thinking and writing about the subject, Karen Armstrong?s short history demonstrates that the world?s fastest-growing faith is a much more complex phenomenon than its modern fundamentalist strain might suggest.

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