Islam: A Guide for Jews and Christians - Electric Scotland

INTRODUCTION t xiii
always appear so, least of all to the millions of Sephardic Jews and
Eastern Christians who lived out their lives in Muslim lands, spoke
Arabic, Persian, Turkish, and were largely indistinguishable from
their Muslim compatriots. And perhaps it will not appear so to the
reader at the end of these pages.
The enterprise is delicate, to be sure, to explain Islam in terms
that are familiar to a Jew or Christian—“practicing” is not terribly
much to the point here—and are at the same time faithful to the
historical givens of Islam. As the Christians once did regarding the
Jews, Muslims of the modern era have invested enormous energy
in fighting their way clear of what they too now perceive as their
Western siblings. This book, in any event, has not been written
from the perspective of a Muslim but from that of a student of
Islam (and of Judaism and Christianity). Nor is it a Jewish or
Christian critique of Islam or a rationalist’s take on that religion. I
have tried to present the matter in an intellectually rigorous and
yet accessible manner, and I have done my best to avoid what has
been called, in a somewhat different context, “parallelomania.”
The book is what it says it is: a guide for Jews and Christians to the
beliefs and practices of their fellow monotheists, their siblings and
rivals for the affection of the Father, the Muslims.