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The Mosaic of Islam: A Conversation with Perry Anderson
Today, 23 percent of the global population is Muslim, but ignorance and misinformation about Islam persist. In this fascinating and useful book, the acclaimed writer Perry Anderson interviews the noted scholar of Islam Suleiman Mourad about the Qur'an and the history of the faith.Mourad elucidates the different stages in Islam's the Qur'an as scripture and the history of its codification; Muhammad and the significance of his Sunna and Hadith; the Sunni-Shi'a split and the formation of various sects; the development of jihad; the transition to modernity and the challenges of reform; and the complexities of Islam in the modern world. He also looks at Wahhabism from its inception in the eighteenth century to its present-day position as the movement that galvanized modern Salafism and gave rise to militant Islam or jihadism.The Mosaic of Islam reveals both the richness and the fissures of the faith. It speaks of the different voices claiming to represent the religion and spans peaceful groups and manifestations as well as the bloody confrontations that scar the Middle East, such as the Saudi Arabian and Iranian intervention in the Yemen and the collapse of Syria and Iraq.
178 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2016
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
August 22, 2018
This book is the result of a (written or otherwise) conversation between Perry Anderson (b. 1938) a British journalist and Suleiman Ali Mourad, an scholar of early Islam who teaches at Smith college.
In this book, Mourad talks about 'the Qur'an and Mohammad', 'Spread of Islam and Development of Jihad', then 'Shi‘ism and Sunnism', and finally about 'Salafism and Militant Islam'.
Though Mourad's discussion, as far as a short book allows, is informative, some conclusions he makes seem too hasty to me. For example, he argues:
“If the Qurʾan was a later production, it would reflect some of the bitter disputes that broke out among the faithful once the Prophet died—major theological splits and definitely political conflicts revolving around his succession. But the Qurʾan says nothing about the question of succession or any of the later schisms. So there is no reason to doubt that the Qurʾan we have today is the same as the one produced in 650 and also resembles closely the Qurʾan the Prophet Muhammad told his followers was the revelation he had received”.
Even if convincing this argument only shows that 'alteration by adding' (tahrif bi-ziada) did not occur in the Qur'an. It, however, tells logically nothing about 'alteration by removing' (tahrif bi-nuqsan) which was the main claim of some proto-Sunni and Shi‘i figures. Therefore, the conclusion he makes to the effect that we have no reason to think the current Qur'an is altered does not logically follow from the premise (the absence of later controversial discussions in the Qur'an).
All in all, this is an informative book which can be used, with some reservations, in an introductory course on Islam.
In this book, Mourad talks about 'the Qur'an and Mohammad', 'Spread of Islam and Development of Jihad', then 'Shi‘ism and Sunnism', and finally about 'Salafism and Militant Islam'.
Though Mourad's discussion, as far as a short book allows, is informative, some conclusions he makes seem too hasty to me. For example, he argues:
“If the Qurʾan was a later production, it would reflect some of the bitter disputes that broke out among the faithful once the Prophet died—major theological splits and definitely political conflicts revolving around his succession. But the Qurʾan says nothing about the question of succession or any of the later schisms. So there is no reason to doubt that the Qurʾan we have today is the same as the one produced in 650 and also resembles closely the Qurʾan the Prophet Muhammad told his followers was the revelation he had received”.
Even if convincing this argument only shows that 'alteration by adding' (tahrif bi-ziada) did not occur in the Qur'an. It, however, tells logically nothing about 'alteration by removing' (tahrif bi-nuqsan) which was the main claim of some proto-Sunni and Shi‘i figures. Therefore, the conclusion he makes to the effect that we have no reason to think the current Qur'an is altered does not logically follow from the premise (the absence of later controversial discussions in the Qur'an).
All in all, this is an informative book which can be used, with some reservations, in an introductory course on Islam.
November 19, 2017
Good stuff, though fairly standard in its treatment of what's important: the early centuries, and yesterday. I wish Mourad had said more about the rest of history. "Modern reformers have realized the limitation of the Qur'an but only after they butchered the best thing about Islam: the fascinating civilization that Muslims have created over the centuries, with its curiosity about knowledge and science, its religious pluralism, the flexibility of Shar'ia, and the great diversity that went with that."
August 30, 2021
Suleiman A. Mourad gives a comprehensive picture of the current Islamic world. Even I, as a Muslim, didn't know that many different groups exist in the Middle East and the history of Islam in that area. However, the book is written from a political perspective, focusing on the relationships between those groups and history.
I recommend the book to everyone who wants to make sense of today's Islamic world without ignorance and misinformation about Islam. When I read between the lines as a Sunni Sufi, I felt proud once again that this school of thought makes up the essence of the Islamic faith. Go ask a Sufi whenever you have more questions. :)
I recommend the book to everyone who wants to make sense of today's Islamic world without ignorance and misinformation about Islam. When I read between the lines as a Sunni Sufi, I felt proud once again that this school of thought makes up the essence of the Islamic faith. Go ask a Sufi whenever you have more questions. :)
January 22, 2024
I got this because it's a Verso book on Islam and I'm interested in leftists analysis of the Muslim world and its ideology. It didn't quite deliver on that, in the sense that Mourad doesn't bring a strong materialist perspective. He does put Islamic history in a political context, but it's a politics led more by ideas, personalities and power wrangling than economic realities. It was nevertheless a really interesting read: Mourad is a scholar and philologist and he's amazing at showing the development of various strands of Islam over time. He tells us about the development of the Qur'an as a text, the 5+ types of Shar'ia law, how much of Islam is actually responding to practical need, how untethered that is from the Qur'an (and how that's maybe Islam's strength), how the countless sects developed and what they believed. It's a great overview of a thousand different Islamic topics, loosely tied together. I learned a lot.
January 9, 2022
In one of many interesting lessons in the Mosaic of Islam, Lebanese scholar Suleiman Mourad shows how in classical times there were no less than seven accepted canonical readings of the Qur'an. In order to properly teach the Qur'an scholars would have to master all the variations, the whole field of exegesis. That all changed in the 20th century, when a committee in Egypt produced a standard Qur'an to unify the Muslim world - as Mourad says, killing off general awareness of the different readings.
In this sense Mourad is a committed classical scholar. Everywhere he is determined to highlight and understand the full variety of Islam, with all its contradictions, disagreements and divisions. Islam is characterized by its flexibility and its pluralism. This is so even from its origin, we learn, with the Prophet Muhammad whose verses from Mecca stand in contradiction with the later verses composed in Medina. For example, the Meccan verses are generally unitarian in attitude toward other religions, whereas those from Medina are aggressively hostile.
Mourad goes on to describe competing interpretations of the Qur'an throughout Islamic history, as well as the wide-ranging practices of jurisprudence and Shari'a.
Says Mourad, "the eclectic practices in the modern Islamic world are more a reflection of chaos than actual observance or clarity about what Islam is."
Or, more positively, "Modern reformers have realized the limitations of the Qur'an but only after they butchered the best thing about Islam: the fascinating civilization that Muslims have created over the centuries, with its curiosity about knowledge and science, its religious pluralism, the flexibility of Shari'a, and the great diversity that went with that."
However, the Mosaic of Islam does more than that. At times it also shows flashes of Marxist historical materialist insight, showing how Islam can be understood as coherent and sensible, rather than as simply chaotic. Mourad shows the very different pressures Muhammad faced in Mecca vs in Medina. Mecca was a city open to religious pluralism; it brought new travelers, new trade and profit, which the city's elders valued above all else. Later on in Medina, Muhammad was a proud statesman whose ideas had come under attack - thus, Muhammad's more aggressive posture toward other competing religions. His teaching changed as he responded to changing historical pressures.
Here we sense Perry Anderson's active Marxist mind at work. And these occasional flashes of historical insight are one of the important productive achievements of this conversation, the Mosaic of Islam.
In this sense Mourad is a committed classical scholar. Everywhere he is determined to highlight and understand the full variety of Islam, with all its contradictions, disagreements and divisions. Islam is characterized by its flexibility and its pluralism. This is so even from its origin, we learn, with the Prophet Muhammad whose verses from Mecca stand in contradiction with the later verses composed in Medina. For example, the Meccan verses are generally unitarian in attitude toward other religions, whereas those from Medina are aggressively hostile.
Mourad goes on to describe competing interpretations of the Qur'an throughout Islamic history, as well as the wide-ranging practices of jurisprudence and Shari'a.
Says Mourad, "the eclectic practices in the modern Islamic world are more a reflection of chaos than actual observance or clarity about what Islam is."
Or, more positively, "Modern reformers have realized the limitations of the Qur'an but only after they butchered the best thing about Islam: the fascinating civilization that Muslims have created over the centuries, with its curiosity about knowledge and science, its religious pluralism, the flexibility of Shari'a, and the great diversity that went with that."
However, the Mosaic of Islam does more than that. At times it also shows flashes of Marxist historical materialist insight, showing how Islam can be understood as coherent and sensible, rather than as simply chaotic. Mourad shows the very different pressures Muhammad faced in Mecca vs in Medina. Mecca was a city open to religious pluralism; it brought new travelers, new trade and profit, which the city's elders valued above all else. Later on in Medina, Muhammad was a proud statesman whose ideas had come under attack - thus, Muhammad's more aggressive posture toward other competing religions. His teaching changed as he responded to changing historical pressures.
Here we sense Perry Anderson's active Marxist mind at work. And these occasional flashes of historical insight are one of the important productive achievements of this conversation, the Mosaic of Islam.
July 24, 2020
a bit of a mixed bag. i appreciate mourad's attentiveness to the historical formations of Islamic phenomenon and their modern resonances. his assessments of the muslim world's psyche are often spot-on, even if he leaves a bit to be desired by way of explaining and qualifying these assessments. there are gems of insight within this book which i delighted in. there is a dynamism to this book which is shaped by interviewer perry anderson's vivid questioning framework.
that said, some expectations for anyone coming into the book: this is not a comprehensive introduction to islam. it is a targeted depiction of some flecks of the muslim world, concentrating on the geopolitical and theological underpinning of modern islam. its mentions of the period before that are passing ones, and i wish it had more to say about the possible futures of the muslim world; this coming from someone as shrewd as Mourad would be something to behold.
that said, some expectations for anyone coming into the book: this is not a comprehensive introduction to islam. it is a targeted depiction of some flecks of the muslim world, concentrating on the geopolitical and theological underpinning of modern islam. its mentions of the period before that are passing ones, and i wish it had more to say about the possible futures of the muslim world; this coming from someone as shrewd as Mourad would be something to behold.
September 13, 2016
Grâce à une interview exprimant plus de préciser que illustrer, un historien et un islamiste parlent du Coran, et les différentes explications possibles et comment el peut être la raison des divisions actuelles entre les musulmans et la base d'une folie comme l'organisation de l'Etat islamique (EI).
Attraverso un'intervista tesa piú a chiarire che ad illustrare, uno storico ed un islamista si interrogano sul corano, sulle varie e possibili spiegazioni e su come possa essere la ragione delle attuali divisioni tra i mussulmani e la base di una follia come l'ISIS.
MERCI NETGALLEY POUR L'ARC!
Attraverso un'intervista tesa piú a chiarire che ad illustrare, uno storico ed un islamista si interrogano sul corano, sulle varie e possibili spiegazioni e su come possa essere la ragione delle attuali divisioni tra i mussulmani e la base di una follia come l'ISIS.
MERCI NETGALLEY POUR L'ARC!
September 3, 2017
Good basic overview of the history of Islam, the formation of the Quran and the roots of Islamic splits and sects including the genesis and growth of Islamic Jihad, extremism, wahhabism and ultimately ISIS.
As someone who is quite ignorant about Islam I found this short book quite enlightening and would thoroughly recommend it.
As someone who is quite ignorant about Islam I found this short book quite enlightening and would thoroughly recommend it.
November 2, 2023
It's hard to say which readers the two authors had in mind when writing this odd book. The interview covers a dazzling range of questions at break-neck speed, jumping between topics such as the dating of the Quran's codification, the current scholarly debate on the aims of the early Arab conquests, and the history of modern Yemen - all in less than 100 pages. With this scattershot approach, readers who already know a thing or two about early Islamic history may still find nuggets of interesting historical details or illuminating perspectives. But ultimately, the lack of elaboration will be quite frustrating. Nor is the book an introduction to Islamic history, at least not in any traditional sense. The scope is too overwhelming, and the interview partners casually drop names like the "Ghaznavid Dynasty" or "Rashid Rida" without much in the way of explanation.
The reason for this lack of a target audience is that the book is exactly what it appears to be: a lightly edited conversation in which Perry Anderson, giddy with excitement, is pelting Suleiman Mourad with all the questions that happen to interest him. But despite its slipshod composition, I still found this book extremely interesting. Even though I squarely fall into the camp of readers in need of an introduction to the history of Islam, I actually appreciated the name-dropping of so many characters and events: they gave me ample material for accompanying Wikipedia-binges. What's more, any traditional introductory text must be far more vanilla than this probing interview. Mourad unabashedly gives his honest assessment of the very human history of the Islamic holy texts. He addresses the changing historical circumstances that shaped Muhammed's prophecies, the troubled attempts to codify and unify the Quran centuries later, and the many imperfections and contradictions that resulted from this history. Nor does Mourad shy away from bold historical interpretations of central features of Islam. One striking example is his sketch of how the real-politik interests of different dynasties directly shaped the changing notions of jihad, with momentous implications for modern extremism. This bold, argumentative approach makes the book much more engaging than any standard introduction could hope be.
The reason for this lack of a target audience is that the book is exactly what it appears to be: a lightly edited conversation in which Perry Anderson, giddy with excitement, is pelting Suleiman Mourad with all the questions that happen to interest him. But despite its slipshod composition, I still found this book extremely interesting. Even though I squarely fall into the camp of readers in need of an introduction to the history of Islam, I actually appreciated the name-dropping of so many characters and events: they gave me ample material for accompanying Wikipedia-binges. What's more, any traditional introductory text must be far more vanilla than this probing interview. Mourad unabashedly gives his honest assessment of the very human history of the Islamic holy texts. He addresses the changing historical circumstances that shaped Muhammed's prophecies, the troubled attempts to codify and unify the Quran centuries later, and the many imperfections and contradictions that resulted from this history. Nor does Mourad shy away from bold historical interpretations of central features of Islam. One striking example is his sketch of how the real-politik interests of different dynasties directly shaped the changing notions of jihad, with momentous implications for modern extremism. This bold, argumentative approach makes the book much more engaging than any standard introduction could hope be.
May 24, 2025
Interessantes Buch. Etwa die Hälfte des Buches behandelt historische Fragen: Ursprung des Islams, Entwicklung, Spaltung, Schulen, usw. Die andere Hälfte widmet sich der Analyse der neueren Geschichte bis zur Zeit der Abschrift, also ISIS und der Syrien-Krieg werden noch breit behandelt.
Viele einzelne Einsichten und einige wichtige historische Lehren über beispielsweise den Zusammenhang von Kreuzzügen, Kolonialismus, Imperialismus und der Entwicklung des Islam bzw der islamischen Sekten.
Das Buch ist geschrieben wie ein Interview. Anderson stellt fragen, Mourad gibt antworten. Daher kurzweilig zu lesen, ohne größere Abstriche zu verbuchen, was den wissenschaftlichen Gehalt angeht. Denn das Ganze wurde schriftlich erarbeitet und Mourads Wissen ist beeindruckend weit und tief.
Viele einzelne Einsichten und einige wichtige historische Lehren über beispielsweise den Zusammenhang von Kreuzzügen, Kolonialismus, Imperialismus und der Entwicklung des Islam bzw der islamischen Sekten.
Das Buch ist geschrieben wie ein Interview. Anderson stellt fragen, Mourad gibt antworten. Daher kurzweilig zu lesen, ohne größere Abstriche zu verbuchen, was den wissenschaftlichen Gehalt angeht. Denn das Ganze wurde schriftlich erarbeitet und Mourads Wissen ist beeindruckend weit und tief.
September 26, 2018
concise and fluid, the interview format flows very nicely and gives context for mourad. this book is an absolute info-dump, but it does not waste time or space and gives and great insight into cultural conflicts, material manifestations of idealism, and the fundamental splits of interpretation that cause the divides of today's islamic sects. really helpful and great to re-read!
January 28, 2020
Excelente! Claridad total para entender el mundo islamico hoy desde una perspectiva histórica y teológica.
April 16, 2021
I liked the book and I think it's pretty informative but I was surprised at the relatively very large amount of time that was spend on extremist branches of Islam.
December 4, 2020
An extremely enlightening journey-like piece.
February 28, 2017
Perry Anderson is the most brilliant intellectual on the left in Europe. His brilliant writing output - books and articles, cover, in a scholarly way, European history, the history of ideas, debates within marxism, Russia and the British national culture. He often publishes surveys on individual countries (Turkey, Brazil, Italy, Germany, to name a few).
I met him around 1980 when he taught a short course at my college entitled, "Why is there no socialism in the United States?"
He'd like to know the book that I'm now writing at age 57: "Socialism for Millenials."
The Mosaic of Islam is an interview not of Perry Anderson, but of Islamic scholar
Suleiman Mourad. It is more theology than I'm used to, but it's still good.
I met him around 1980 when he taught a short course at my college entitled, "Why is there no socialism in the United States?"
He'd like to know the book that I'm now writing at age 57: "Socialism for Millenials."
The Mosaic of Islam is an interview not of Perry Anderson, but of Islamic scholar
Suleiman Mourad. It is more theology than I'm used to, but it's still good.
December 27, 2016
Particularly enjoyed the discussion of philology...
April 17, 2017
This has been a very good read! It is certainly a good start for those who would like to understand nuances and subtleties of Islam, how it is used to legitimise certain courses of action. The book itself is not a comprehensive account of all those. However, reading this book, you will know where to go and what to seek more deep down. It can be thought of as a good road map of Islam/Islamism.
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews