SHORT BOOK

Tuesday, September 09
@Home

Just finished reading
Vartan Gregorian ISLAM: A MOSAIC, NOT A MONOLITH
Washington DC: Brookings Institution Press
2003

UP ECONOMICS LIB
DDS 35.77 G74

Gregorian is an Armenian (Christian?) from Tabriz, Iran who is/was president of Carnegie Corp., Brown University, NY Public Library & dean of FAS U. of Penn.

It is a very thin book that can be finished by a fast reader in one sitting. The author presents a balanced overview of ISLAAM & its relation to world affairs presenting it as a system though mentioning the varieties of MUSLIM interpretations... It laments widespread U.S. ignorance of not only MUSLIMS but also the variety of world cultures (Stoop...Americans would categorize Gregorian as an Arab Terrorist iwth his looks & beard HAR!!) & tries to promote dialogues among cultures & mutual understanding.

I'm surprised I am only its 3rd borrower though it is more than 1 year old already... I think it is not that very few are interested about current issues but that few are really reading books nowadays... The power of mass stoopidification...

Some highlights from book:
- borrows the term for Pan-Islaamic movements = "Green Menace"
- distinguishes ISLAAMISTs from other ISLAAMIC groups (e.g. 1979 IRAN REVOLUTION by ISLAAMISTs)
- internal struggle between modernists & traditionalists
-it was Spanish & VENETIAN forces which defeated the OTTOMAN TURKS in the BATTLE OF LEPANTO (Ask University Belt students what they know about Lepanto - where it is located & they wouldn't
answer it is off GREECE HAR HAR!)
- the GOLDEN AGE OF ISLAAMic civilization occurred under the ABBASSID CALIPHATE (750-1258)
(some 500 years)
- mentions details like Arabic origin of some English words al-kuhl, al-jabr, al-kemia
- quotes many MUSLIM thinkers & leaders reaction to WTC 911 like KHAMENEI, KHATAMI, FADLALLAH, TANTAWI,YASSIN, AMRMOUSSA, BELKEZIZ, etc
- mentions that in 1965, the Vatican recognized for the first time MUSLIMS as part of "God's salvation plan" ( I DIDN'T KNOW THIS.)
- mentions Amartya Sen's disagreement with Huntington's "Clash of Civilization"
-etcetcetc

Some quotes:
- "ISLAAM, like other religions, cannot be categorized or stereotyped because it is brimming with nuances, exceptions, divisions, contreadictions, and ambiguities."
- "...every religion asserts its own uniqueness & claims of absolute truth & even superiotrity"
- the role of a university... has always been to provide a forum for the free & open discussion of ideas & precepts
( U.S. Supreme Court in 1967 called the classroom "the marketplace of ideas")

A very informative book given its mere 150 pages.

I'm returning it today so you can ask somebody to borrow it.

TMNP