Islam
a short history
by Karen Armstrong · first published 2000
100% recommend
"No religion in the modern world is as feared and misunderstood as Islam. It haunts the popular Western imagination as an extreme faith that promoted authoritarian government, female oppression, civil war, and terrorism. Karen Armstrong's short history offers a vital corrective to this narrow view. The distillation of years of thinking and writing about Islam, it demonstrates that the world's fastest-growing faith is a much richer and more complex phenomenon than its modern fundamentalist strain might suggest."--BOOK JACKET.
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…of the thoughts in the first few chapters of Letters from the Desert hit me hard. - The Quran A wonderfully phrased book that captures its times very well. Ideally to be read alongside something like Islam: A Short History or Muhammad: A Biography of the Prophet, both by Karen Armstrong, to provide the context. As an aside the Qu'ran is available for free online in audio format both as interlinear English/Arabic…
on “Ask HN: What book changed your life?” ↗And for Islam, I recommend Karen Armstrong’s “Islam: A Short History”. This book gives context to Muhammad as a Man in addition to the influential religion he adapted/created (for most major religions are adaptations,…
on “Ask HN: What's the Best Book on Religion” ↗…useless. I wouldn't want to perform surgery on myself. I recently read "A History of God" by Karen Armstrong, which covers the evolution of religion and various mystical traditions in Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. It's a really interesting book and one of the points she brings up is that there are many historical examples of attempts at mystical experimentation that end in madness. The…
on “Mindfulness and meditation can worsen depression and anxiety” ↗