…during most of the 1400 years since Mohammed’s time Muslims have enjoyed such total control in North Africa and the Middle East that few people ever dared ask them to justify anything. Times are different now, and Muslims are trying to develop apologetic skills. But they have yet to encounter the full weight of critical investigation of which free Western minds are capable. In other words, the ground has just begun to heat up under Islam’s feet.
Don Richardson, Secrets of the Koran, p. 35
Regal, 2003
2 comments:
I think Richardson goes beyond himself in this work. I suppose one could make an argument, relatively speaking, for not "encounter[ing] the full weight of critical investigation," but the first 2 sentences in the quote above demonstrate a clear unfamiliarity with Islamic history and sources.
Hi Charles,
Perhaps his statement is too strong, but I think generally speaking (and I know a lot of other folks in the Middle East would agree with me on this) Islam has been given a free ride. And when books were written addressing faults in it, they were extremely hard to publish or circulate. No longer the case. Something different is indeed going on these days.
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