Islam Rediscovered

Preface T he theme of this book is evident from its title: Islam Rediscovered: Discovering Islam from its Original Sources. Its purpose is to present Islam as it is, drawing on its original sources rather than judging it by the later day interpretations and commentaries or the practices of present-day Muslims in different parts of the world. A distinction is made between Islam as presented by Prophet Muhammad, may peace be upon him, and his companions (information about which is available to us in the Quran and the sunnah) and Islam as represented by later Muslim generations—both in theory and practice. This is what we call the scientific approach. We are living in the age of the media. Before the advent of the modern media there were large numbers of people in the world who knew nothing of Islam. With the invention of the printing press and now the electronic media it is difficult to find today a single person who is unaware of it. But there is a clear-cut difference. In previous ages it happened that wherever Islam spread people were so impressed with it that most of them accepted it as their religion. That is why today we find more than one billion