Miroku Nemeth’s Reviews > Crucible of Light: Islam and the Forging of European Civilization > Status Update

Drayson is at her strongest when tracing the movement of ideas, art, architecture, and knowledge from the Muslim world into Europe, and the book has given me some genuinely fascinating connections to pursue. Unfortunately, her treatment of Islam itself—particularly early Islamic history, Qur’anic terminology, and Islamic law—is often startlingly unreliable, with sweeping generalizations and egregious basic errors.