"Is practicing Islam in the American Diaspora identical to its practice in other countries, or must a new Islamic jurisprudence be developed that takes into account the culture, customs and laws of this country?" This is the central question around which world-renowned Islamic scholar Dr. Azizah al-Hibri bases her analysis of Islamic Jurisprudence. This book revisits traditional Islamic jurisprudence to develop a modern understanding of Islam with respect to gender, marriage, family, and governance.

This is a carefully reasoned, positive, and largely reflective work. Looking back at the various stages of Islamic historical development, AbuSulayman puts forward a thesis that focuses on the recovery of what is termed the Qur’anic worldview. By this is meant an ethical, monotheistic, and purposeful perspective on the world and those within it. Our faith will only be complete when we have become utterly sincere in our love for God, a love expressed in a pure, passionate love for goodness and truth in this world. It was the strict internalization of this perspective and close adherence to the principles of the Qur’an which AbuSulayman contends, played a key factor in galvanizing the devout and intensely God-conscious followers of fledgling Islam to achieve the successes that they once did, the profound historical and global impact of which is still the subject of much study and admiration today. The rebirth of Islamic identity through this Qur’anic worldview is the key requirement of our times and a prerequisite for any future healthy and viable development of Muslim societies.

"In this ... book, three .. historians bring tio life the complex and tumultuous relations between Genoans and Tunisians, Alexandrians and the people of Constantinople, Catalans and Maghrebis - the myriad groups and individuals whose stories reflect the common cultural and religious heritage of Europe and Islam. Since the seventh century, when the armies of Constantinople and the Medina fought for control of Syria and Palestine, there has been ongoing contact between the Muslim world and the West. This sweeping history recounts the wars and the crusades, the alliances and diplomacy, commerce and the slave trade, technology transfers, and the intellectual and artistic exchanges. [Readers] are given an ... introduction to key periods and events, including the Muslim conquests, the collapse of the Byzantine Empire, the commercial revolution of the medieval Mediterranean, the intellectual and cultural achievements of Muslim Spain, the crusades and Spanish reconquista, the rise of the Ottomans and their conquest of a third of Europe, European colonization and decolonization, and the challenges and promises of this entwined legacy today. ..."--Jacket.

Islamic anthropology is relatively seldom treated as a particular concern even though much of the contemporary debate on the modernisation of Islam, its acceptance of human rights and democracy, makes implicit assumptions about the way Muslims conceive of the human being. This book explores how the spread of evolutionary theory has affected the beliefs of contemporary Muslims regarding human identity, capacity and destiny. In his systematic treatment of the impact of evolutionary ideas on modern Islam, Damian Howard surveys several branches of Muslim thought. Muslim responses to the crisis of the religious imagination presented by the evolutionary worldview fall into four different forms, incorporating traditional and modern notions. The book evaluates the content, influence and success of these four forms, asking how Muslims might now proceed to address the profound challenges which evolutionary theory poses to the effective reconstruction of their religious thought. Drawing fascinating parallels with developments in the world of Christian theology which will help understanding between people of the two religions, the author reflects on the question of how Muslims can come to terms with the modern world. A valuable addition to the literature on contemporary Islamic thought, this book will also interest students and scholars of religion and modernity, the history and philosophy of science, and evolutionary theory.

el-Aswad introduces the concepts of worldviews/cosmologies of Muslims, explaining that the different types of worldviews are not constructed solely by religious scholars or intellectual elite, but are latent in Islamic tradition, embedded in popular imagination, and triggered through people's everyday interaction in various countries and communities. He draws from a number of sources including in-depth interviews and participant observation as well as government documents and oral history. Through the perspectives of ethno-cosmology, emic interpretation of sacred tradition, modernity, folklore, geography, dream, imagination, hybridity, and identity transformation, he examines how culturally and religiously constructed images of the world influence the daily actions of people in various Muslim communities. The worldviews of Sunnis, Shi'as, and Sufis are covered in turn, and Muslims in the UAE, Egypt, Bahrain, and suburban Detroit are the focus. el-Aswad also discusses the effects of Western attempts at imposing its essentially secular worldview through the process of globalization and how cyberspace has promoted connectivity among Muslim communities and, especially in the United States, opened up unlimited options and new possibilities.