ME AND MAULANA: A PERSONAL RECOLLECTION OF WAHIDUDDIN KHAN - John M. Butt

maturation of Khan’s own distinct understanding of Islam and of its place and role in the modern world”. In 2006, Prof. Irfan A. Omar (Associate Professor, Theology Department, Marquette University, USA) contributed a chapter to Ibrahim Abu-Rabi’s The Blackwell Companion to Contemporary Islamic Thought in which he described MWK as “a leading scholar of Islamic thought among Indian Muslims today”, who “combines knowledge of traditional religious sciences (‘ulum al-din) with the cultural, sociopolitical, and ethical discourse of his times”. Dr Muhammad Seedat (Institute for Social and Health Sciences, University of South Africa), has evaluated MWK’s works on peace and peace-making/building as a “representative of a socio-normative approach to social justice” in his research on MWK’s conception of Peace and its relevance in contemporary Islamic thought (published in South African Journal of Psychology, 2006). Prof. Dietrich Reetz (Free University Berlin, Germany) in his research on “Muslim Grassroots Leaders in India” (published in NBAR’s Who Speaks for Islam, 2010) mentions that MWK “preaches a non-sectarian combination of Islamic scholarship, Sufi traditions, and New Age influences, especially by networking through his journal Al-Risala”. Prof. M. A. Muqtedar Khan (University of Delaware, USA) in an encyclopaedia entry on MWK (in Oxford Encyclopaedia of Islam and Politics, 2014, I: 691-92) writes: “In spite of [all the] controversy surrounding his thought and politics, Maulana Wahiduddin has for decades enjoyed a reputation