Common Ground - Islam and Buddhism

COMMON GROUND BETWEEN ISLAM AND BUDDHISM
dence. He served as Professor of Islamic Law and Jurisprudence at
the International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM, 1985–2004);
and was Dean of the International Institute of Islamic Thought and
Civilisation (ISTAC, 2004–2006). Currently he is Senior Fellow at
the Institute of Strategic and International Studies (ISIS) Malaysia, a
Senior Fellow of the Academy of Sciences of Afghanistan, and also
Senior Fellow of the Royal Academy of Jordan. He serves on the International
Advisory Board of thirteen academic journals published
in Malaysia, the United States, Canada, Kuwait, India, Australia and
Pakistan. Professor Kamali has served as a member and sometime
Chairman of the Constitution Review Commission of Afghanistan
(2003); as a United Nations consultant on constitutional reforms in
Afghanistan, the Maldives, and Iraq; and currently advises the United
Nations on a new constitution for Somalia. His books Principles of
Islamic Jurisprudence, Freedom of Expression in Islam, A Textbook of
Hadith Studies, and Shari‘ah Law: An Introduction are standard text
books in English speaking universities worldwide.
* * *
Shaykh Hamza Yusuf was born in Walla Walla, Washington, and
adopted Islam at the age of eighteen. Subsequently, he migrated
to the Middle East, where he spent more than ten years studying
Islamic sciences on the Arabian Peninsula and in North and West
Africa. He returned to the United States and during the last twenty
years has been teaching and writing in the U.S. He is the author of
Purification of the Heart and has translated into modern English
several classical Arabic texts and poems, including The Burda: The
Poem of the Cloak and The Creed of Imam al-Tahawi. Through his
numerous lectures and media appearances, he has been active in the
ongoing public discourse about Islam, nationally and internationally.
He currently is involved in establishing Zaytuna College, the
first accredited Muslim college in America. He resides in Northern
California with his wife and five boys.
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