This is another book on Islam which is quite fascinating at times. One may refrain from adding adjectives such as “well timed,” “ill-timed,” “relevant,” and “irrelevant” because all could be true depending upon one’s perspective, background, political, ideological, and even epistemological orientations. Many concepts in the book are either taken for granted without a thorough examination such as treating “Islam” as a block, even though the author is careful about indicating that Islam is not monolithic. Yet, the book’s title suggests just that.
The title is itself a political program, even though it is a scholarly work. The list of references is impressive in length and variety, yet one cannot but note a glaring absence of Arab authors and their Arabic writings. This is not to say that the author has shun away from Arab references, but he did rely mainly on translations rather than original works. Hence, one may...
University of California Press