Vision of Islam (Visions of Reality. Understanding Religions)

by Sachiko Murata and William C. Chittick

Book Overview

Something is lost when Western thinkers approach Islam. They seem to see the religion in historical and cultural terms, obscuring Islam's own internal logic and its true beauty and spirituality. This... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1557785163
• Release Date: June 1998
• Publisher: Paragon House
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 1.42 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.9" x 6.0"

Customer Reviews

Many Religions one God.

I learned so much about Islam. Fascinated by the religion based on charity when you give it comes back

Inspired me to read an authentic Qur'an

This book is, by far, on of the best clear and consise overviews that works to explain the main doctrines and spirituality of the Islamic faith. It also did so without bias. It is a thick book with plenty of explanation. It gave me an understanding of the belief and practices of Islam that are based on the scriptures of the faith. After I read this I went to a mosque to pick up a Quran. Now I know never to judge a religion based on the actions of a few followers. I reverted after studying the religion. It is clear that Islam is a religion of peace and tolerance. Muslims share a brotherhood with Jews and Christians. I use Islam as a way to make my life better, positive and to affect the world in a positive way. Clearly, God is speaking, and the message is one of mercy, peace and humility. I feel like this book will help other people understand what Islam is really about. Hopefully, we Muslims can really walk the walk and talk the talk of the kindness, charity and respect for others that God commands through Islam. This book is very straight forward and the interested reader will have no problem with the format. Muslims should already know the content within this book, but if you are new to Islam and interested in exploring the faith, this book will surely challenge your pre-existing prejudices and lead you to an unbiased view of the scriptures. Thank God this book exists. If people will only read this book, I won't have to be afraid of being attacked by Islamophobic elements when walking down the street in my hijab! Perhaps if the USA leaders would read it then they would stop bombing Muslim civilians and committing genocide in the Middle East. I really wish people wouldn't draw false conclsuions of Islam because of what they see in the media. Then couldn't others draw false conclusions about Christianity if they judged it by what our Christian President Bush and the US military are doing? No one should be so simple minded as to blame a faith for the bad actions of *some* of its followers. Vision of Islam should be a requirement for every undergrad student in a comparative religions course. It is truely excellent!

The best introduction for the seriously interested

I noticed that most of the negative reviews for this book say something like "well this can't be right, or it is biased, because all I have seen of Islam is fundamentalism and terrorism." This book is not a history of Islam, or a sociological evaluation, or a critical comparison of Islam's teachings with the way Islam is practiced in reality. This book is a straight dive into the theology and philosophy of the religion of Islam from the perspective of the scholarly tradition. Almost every Muslim on the face of this planet learns about Islam from a student of the scholarly tradition (ulama) and most of them accept this tradition as the authentic lineage of Islam. This lineage could be understood as the "orthodox" heritage of Islam (as opposed to the fundamentalist and progressive heritages, which are always considered seperate from the original Islamic tradition). Unfortunately, the progressive and fundamentalist Muslims are the ones who make the most noise in the media, so most of us see Islam as a choice between extremism and total rejection of the key teachings of the religion. This is simply not the case. In this book, the key teachings of the Islamic scholars - based on the Qur'an, hadith, and philosophical tradition - are described, examined in-depth, and occasionally questioned for the sake of deeper understanding. I found the philosophy of Islam to be overwhelmingly rich, imaginative, and often convincing. There is no attempt to apologize for or interpret away the aspects of Islam that Westerners might find "barbaric." In the few places that those ideas crop up, they are merely explained as a Muslim scholar would explain them. Whether we see this vision of Islam in our daily lives or not, it is the true tradition of Islam as the majority of Muslims are taught it. Though I did not find myself agreeing with every aspect of Islam, this book did give me a much deeper and more compassionate understanding of Islam, as it truly is and not as a powerful few choose to interpret it. I recommend this book to any non-Muslim truly interested in Islam, and any Muslim who wants to know more about their own religion.

Best Introduction Available

This is quite frankly the best introduction to Islam available in english to date that i have seen. I should say that i am a more traditional muslim (hanafi fiqh, mutardi/ashari aqida) with a sufistic bent, so this book is written from the same background as i come from. I may be biased in that way but this is the Islam i know. There are a few minor points that dont quite follow the traditional understanding of Islam, but they are very minor and less than any other introduction to Islam i have seen. I think that there are some things concerning aqida with which this book could even be helpful for most muslims. I refer to it on occasion for things regarding the afterlife for example. I feel vindicated now after telling people about this book for so long as Shaykh Hamza Yusuf has just come out with a audio commentary on this book. Murata and Chittick have been really solid in all there works and this is no exception.

Simple and Complex, like life...

First let me say that I consider myself a well-informed Muslim with mixed liberal and conservative views, depending on the issue at hand. I only read parts of this book before I recommended it to an American friend of mine who asked me for a book about Islam... and she loved it. The book is both beautiful and illuminating, written in a simple and friendly style, based on a series of lectures. I have read many books about Islam and by far this one is the best (to come from a non-Muslim), although not the most comprehensive. After this I would like to attempt a reply to a confused reader who reviwed the book on August 3rd and attacked Islam and all other world religions as well. To him or her I say that religions are like any other part of our life, they can be ABUSED, and this is no fault of Islam or any other religion. In this Islam, Christianity, Budhism, etc... are not different from, say, nuclear power, or chemistry, or books... confusion, war, rape, murder, etc. are the result of a confused and stupid mind that falls victim to its own sinister desires. For most people, religion provides peace and spiritual guidance and attainment. But that doesn't come through knowing about religion, but through LIVING it. Islam is a lifestyle. Any body can claim they are religious and can commit the most horrendous crimes in the name of relgion or in the name of Marxism or Capitalism or any other creed. Islam can show you how to be a good human being, but it cannot force you to be one. One has to Strive (jihad) to be good in this world by overcoming one's own unwholesome desires. For those who vilify Islam or any other religion, I say you first need to clean your heart and mind of the athiest confused clutter in your heads. Then take a long nice walk to a mosque or a church, and sit in peace with yourself and God...Life is a mystery that we can only guess at through God's signs...And He knows best, the Absolute, the All-Knowing.

A matter of methodology

I was introduced to this book by a friend of mine who was very impressed by the book. I was told by a few that this is one of the best books written on Islam and has some very original way of explaining Islamic principles, I must agree with this assessment. Authors do an excellent job in this book. One note though on their methodology. As I was reading the book, authors methodology and overall approach kept reminding me of books written by some great Persian/Shia scholars such as Muttahary and Tabatabai. When I looked into the background of the authors, as Murata gives an account of it in her excellent book" Tao of Islam" I discovered that they had spent many years in Iran studying Islam with great scholars such Corbin, Tabatabai who was a great mystic and philosopher, Ashtyani (The great sage of Mashhad) , Mr. Homai and many more. The influence of these great scholars is very evident in the work of these authors along with other authors such as the great scholar Mr. Corbin who mentions his great learning experience of Islam while studying in Iran with late Tabatabai. Many passages of this book written by Mr. chittic resembles so very closely the passages written by these great Iranian and Shia authors. The admiration of this book and its approach and method by so many would be a credit to those authors as well as Mr. Chittic and Murata. It is sad to see that many books remains unread and unknown by majority only on the ground of being written by a Shia. Fanaticism hearts first and foremost the fanatics themselves and as Koran puts it " We were not unjust to them, but rather they were unjust to themselves".