When You Hear Hoofbeats Think of a Zebra


Shems Friedlander - 1987
    Here he presents ancient Sufi teaching stories rooted in the Islamic tradition. With common sense and insightful wit, he addresses questions and problems of contemporary life and awakens our attention to the often overlooked moments that give importance and meaning to our lives. Through the re-telling of classical stories and his own commentary, a pattern unfolds that helps to distinguish knowledge from information, reality from imagination, and makes what seems to lie beyond our perception - understanding and brief - accessible. Our spiritual potential as human beings is realised in "When You Hear Hoofbeats Think of a Zebra".

Quran: The Final Testament, Authorized English Version With Arabic Text, Revised Edition Iv


Rashad Khalifa - 1989
    The Book is, without a doubt, a revelation from the Lord of the Universe. The Final Testament comes with built-in physical evidence that it is God's message to you; it is mathematically composed beyond human capability. This proves that God is the Truth, and that He revives the dead, and that He is Omnipotent. Our Salvation in the hereafter lies on upholding The Quran. The Quran is God's Final Testament to the world. Unlike any other book, the Quran is taught by God (55:1-2); He teaches us what we need at the time we need it. This is why we read the Quran hundreds of times without getting bored. We can read a novel, for example, only once. But the Quran can be read an infinite number of times, and we derive new and valuable information from it every time. Since the Quran is God's message to all the people, regardless of their language, the Quran is accessible to the believers, regardless of their language (41:44). This explains a profound phenomenon: the believers who do not know Arabic know the Quran better than the Arabic speaking unbelievers. Because of the invisible forces serving the Quran, it is readily and enjoyably accessible to the sincere believers, and utterly inaccessible to the unbelievers (17:45, 18:57, 56:79).

Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources


Martin Lings - 1983
    Based on the sira, the eighth- and ninth-century Arabic biographies that recount numerous events in the prophet’s life, it contains original English translations of many important passages that reveal the words of men and women who heard Muhammad speak and witnessed the events of his life.Scrupulous and exhaustive in its fidelity to its sources, Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources is presented in a narrative style that is easily comprehensible, yet authentic and inspiring in its use of language, reflecting both the simplicity and grandeur of the story it tells. This revised edition includes new sections detailing the prophet’s expanding influence and his spreading of the message of Islam into Syria and its neighboring states. It represents the final updates made to the text before the author’s death in 2005. The book has been published in 12 languages and has received numerous awards, including acknowledgment as best biography of the prophet in English at the National Seerate Conference in Islamabad.

The Heart of Islam: Enduring Values for Humanity


Seyyed Hossein Nasr - 2002
    In the case of Islam, there has been much recent confusion in the Western world centered on distorted portrayals of its core values. Born of ignorance, such confusion feeds the very problem at hand.In The Heart of Islam one of the great intellectual figures in Islamic history offers a timely presentation of the core spiritual and social values of Islam: peace, compassion, social justice, and respect for the other. Seizing this unique moment in history to reflect on the essence of his tradition, Seyyed Hossein Nasr seeks to "open a spiritual and intellectual space for mutual understanding." Exploring Islamic values in scripture, traditional sources, and history, he also shows their clear counterparts in the Jewish and Christian traditions, revealing the common ground of the Abrahamic faiths.Nasr challenges members of the world's civilizations to stop demonizing others while identifying themselves with pure goodness and to turn instead to a deeper understanding of those shared values that can solve the acute problems facing humanity today. "Muslims must ask themselves what went wrong within their own societies," he writes, "but the West must also pose the same question about itself . . . whether we are Muslims, Jews, Christians, or even secularists, whether we live in the Islamic world or in the West, we are in need of meaning in our lives, of ethical norms to guide our actions, of a vision that would allow us to live at peace with each other and with the rest of God's creation." Such help, he believes, lies at the heart of every religion and can lead the followers of the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) as well as other religious and spiritual traditions to a new future of mutual respect and common global purpose.The Heart of Islam is a landmark presentation of enduring value that offers hope to humanity, and a compelling portrait of the beauty and appeal of the faith of 1.2 billion people.

القرآن الكريم


Anonymous
    The Quran is composed of verses (Ayat) that make up 114 chapters (suras) of unequal length which are classified either as Meccan (المكية) or Medinan (المدنية) depending upon the place and time of their claimed revelation. Muslims believe the Quran to be verbally revealed through the angel Jibrīl (Gabriel) from God to Muhammad gradually over a period of approximately 23 years beginning on 22 December 609 CE, when Muhammad was 40, and concluding in 632 CE, the year of his death.Muslims regard the Quran as the main miracle of Muhammad, the proof of his prophethood and the culmination of a series of divine messages that started with the messages revealed to Adam, regarded in Islam as the first prophet, and continued with Suhuf Ibrahim (Scrolls of Abraham), the Tawrat (Torah or Pentateuch) of Moses, the Zabur (Tehillim or Book of Psalms) of David, and the Injil (Gospel) of Jesus. The Quran assumes familiarity with major narratives recounted in Jewish and Christian scriptures, summarizing some, dwelling at length on others and in some cases presenting alternative accounts and interpretations of events. The Quran describes itself as a book of guidance, sometimes offering detailed accounts of specific historical events, and often emphasizing the moral significance of an event over its narrative sequence.

The Essential Rumi


Rumi
    This revised and expanded edition of The Essential Rumi includes a new introduction by Coleman Barks and more than 80 never-before-published poems.Through his lyrical translations, Coleman Barks has been instrumental in bringing this exquisite literature to a remarkably wide range of readers, making the ecstatic, spiritual poetry of thirteenth-century Sufi Mystic Rumi more popular than ever.The Essential Rumi continues to be the bestselling of all Rumi books, and the definitive selection of his beautiful, mystical poetry.

Divine Speech


Nouman Ali Khan
    Since its inception, the power of the Quran has derived not only from its message, but also from the inimitable literary style and rhetorical impact that the Arabic scripture has on its audiences. Divine Speech: Exploring the Quran as Literature attempts to make some of the most recent Arabic and European-language scholarship on its literary features accessible to a wider, English-speaking audience. These features include its language and word choice, its use of figures of speech and other rhetorical devices, its manner of narrating parables and stories, and the structure, coherence, and the order of its "chapters"-aspects that typically remain mysterious to readers of English translations of the text. Divine Speech furnishes its readers with a better appreciation of the Quran from a literary perspective, and in the process stimulates interest in, and provides tools and resources for, further study of the scripture.

"Believing Women" in Islam: Unreading Patriarchal Interpretations of the Qur'an


Asma Barlas - 2002
    Taking a wholly different view, Asma Barlas develops a believer's reading of the Qur'an that demonstrates the radically egalitarian and antipatriarchal nature of its teachings.Beginning with a historical analysis of religious authority and knowledge, Barlas shows how Muslims came to read inequality and patriarchy into the Qur'an to justify existing religious and social structures and demonstrates that the patriarchal meanings ascribed to the Qur'an are a function of who has read it, how, and in what contexts. She goes on to reread the Qur'an's position on a variety of issues in order to argue that its teachings do not support patriarchy. To the contrary, Barlas convincingly asserts that the Qur'an affirms the complete equality of the sexes, thereby offering an opportunity to theorize radical sexual equality from within the framework of its teachings. This new view takes readers into the heart of Islamic teachings on women, gender, and patriarchy, allowing them to understand Islam through its most sacred scripture, rather than through Muslim cultural practices or Western media stereotypes.

Qur'an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Woman's Perspective


Amina Wadud - 1992
    A pro-faith attempt by a Muslim woman to present a comprehensive, female-inclusive reading of the Qur'an, the sacred Islamic text.

History of Islam (3 Volumes)


Akbar Shah Khan Najeebabadi - 2000
    At a time, when there is tough competition among the nations of the world to excel one another, the Muslim, despite having the most glorious history, appear to be detached and careless as regards their history. This book presents the true Islamic events and their actual causes before the English readers because the other books in the English language found on the Islamic history have been written by such authors and compilers who did no justice in presenting the true picture of Islamic Era but their prejudice prevented them from doing so. Publishers Note We are presenting before you the third volume of the book History of Islam. This book was originally written in the Urdu language in 1922 (1343 AH) by Akbar Shah Khan Najeebabadi. This was the time about 25 years before the partition of Indian Subcontinent into Pakistan and India. For the purpose of brevity, the compiler has presented the authentic events in concise form from the famous histories of Islam written in the Arabic and Persian languages by the great Muslim historians like Tabari, Ibn Athir, Mas'udi, Abul-Fida', Ibn Khaldun and Suyuti, apart from getting benefited from the authentic books of Ahadith for the compilation of the part about the biography of the Prophet Muhammad . So, this compilation is actually the extract of the works of the famous Muslim historians. In the first volume, starting with the introduction of the history as a subject, the country, people and conditions of Arabia prior to the advent of Islam were discussed, and an account of the life of Prophet Muhammad was presented including the hardships and opposition he faced while propagating the message of Islam, and the details of migration and the period after it until his death. After that the description of Rightly Guided Caliphate was also discussed in its full perspective. In this second volume, starting with the Caliphate of Banu Umayyah, the martyrdom of Imam Husain (R) and the Caliphate of the Abbasids, all areas have been covered as far as the expansion of Islam was. This third volume begins with the description of the conditions of Spain before and after the rule of Muslims and the role played by Umayyad, Abbasid, Almoravid and Almohad Caliphs there and their encounters with the Christian Armies. Then some mention of the conquest of Morocco and North Africa has been given along with the details of Idrisia and Aghlabs rule there. After that detailed accounts of Ganghisid Mongols, Turks and Tartar Mangols have been produced. After that Islamic history of Persia is described giving the accounts of Saffariah, Samanid, Delmid, Gharnavid, Seljuk, Ghourid and Muluk Dynasties with the periods of Khwarizm Shah, Atabeks and Sistan Kings rule there. Then the Islamic history of Egypt and Syria is covered describing the Ubaidullah, Ayyubid and Mamluk Dynasties, and the rule of Atabek and Abbasid Caliphs. In the end, something about the Ottoman Dynasty and its Empire is discussed including the description of the conquest of Constantinople. We hope that the readers will find this volume also of great help in the study of Islamic history. The famous scholar Safi-ur-Rahman Mubarakpuri has revised the Urdu edition before its translation to check the authenticity aspect. The translation was done by the Translation Department of Darussalam, and every care has been taken to reproduce the events and the names of the persons and places as accurately as possible. We thank all the persons who have cooperated with us to complete this task and produce it before you into a presentable form. May Allah accept our humble efforts in this regard and send His peace and blessings on our Prophet Muhammad, his Companions and his followers.-Amin! Abdul Malik Mujahid General Manager, Darussalam

Agenda to Change Our Condition


Hamza Yusuf - 2007
    With an emphasis on Taqwa (God-consciousness) and Ikhlas (sincerity), Agenda To Change Our Condition is an indispensable handbook for all Muslims striving for excellence in character and self-refinement. Topics covered include: Taqwa: Its Definition and Its Benefits, The Heart and its Treatment, Practical Steps to Change Our Condition, a series of exercises for achieving Taqwa as well as three new appendices.In this updated for 2008 new edition of "Agenda to Change Our Condition," Shaykh Hamza Yusuf chalks out a program for all Muslims who want to rectify their current state of apathy and heedlessness of Allah's commands. The book includes sections on Practical Steps to Change Our Condition, Taqwa: Its Definition and its Benefits, The Heart and its Treatment (by Qadi Abu Bakr ibn al-`Arabi), culminating with a series of exercises on how to attain taqwa.

Release the Sun: The Story of the Bab, Prophet Herald of the Baha'i Faith, and the Extraordinary Time in Which He Lived


William Sears - 1960
    While Christians anticipated the return of Jesus Christ, a wave of expectation swept through Islam that the "Lord of the Age" would soon appear. In Persia, this reached a dramatic climax on May 23, 1844, when a twenty-five-year-old merchant from Shiraz named Siyyid 'Ali-Muhammad, later title "The Bab," announced that He was the bearer of a divine Revelation destined to transform the spiritual life of the human race. Furthermore, He claimed that He was but the Herald of another Messenger, who would soon bring a far greater Revelation that would usher in an age of universal peace. Against a backdrop of wide-scale moral decay in Persian society, this declaration aroused hope and excitement among all classes. The Bab quickly attracted tens of thousands of followers, including influential members of the clergy--and the brutal hand of a fearful government bent on destroying this movement that threatened to rock the established order.

Love Thy Neighbor: A Muslim Doctor's Struggle for Home in Rural America


Ayaz Virji - 2019
    But in 2016, this decision was tested when the reliably blue, working-class county swung for Donald Trump. Virji watched in horror as his children faced anti-Muslim remarks at school and some of his most loyal patients began questioning whether he belonged in the community.Virji wanted out. But in 2017, just as he was lining up a job in Dubai, a local pastor invited him to speak at her church and address misconceptions about what Muslims practice and believe. That invitation has grown into a well-attended lecture series that has changed hearts and minds across the state, while giving Virji a new vocation that he never would have expected.In Love Thy Neighbor, Virji relates this story in a gripping, unforgettable narrative that shows the human consequences of our toxic politics, the power of faith and personal conviction, and the potential for a renewal of understanding in America's heartland.

Riyad-us-Saliheen


Yahya ibn Sharaf al Nawawi - 1999
    Commentaries on the Ahadith have been added by Hafiz Salahuddin Yusuf of Pakistan who had originally executed them for the Urdu edition of this book. The English translation of the book and the - commentaries was performed by Dr. Muhammad Amin and Abu Usamah Al-Arabi bin Razduq who have performed their task with utmost care and profound interest.

From My Sisters' Lips


Na'ima B. Robert - 2005
    Feelings of shock, horror, repulsion, pity or even fear are not uncommon. But have you ever wondered who it is behind the veil and what makes her tick? Ever wondered what her life is really like and whether her dreams, hopes and aspirations differ from yours? From My Sisters' Lips offers a rare glimpse into the lives of a community of women, most of whom are converts to Islam, and invites you to share their joys, sorrows, convictions and faith. When Na'ima B Robert abandoned her western lifestyle and embraced Islam six years ago, it was not a decision taken lightly. Yet soon after she took her first tentative steps towards covering, she felt empowered; no longer judged on physical appearances alone, no longer seeking the approval to feel beautiful — or using her looks to wield power over men — the experience effected her greatly. Before long she grew in confidence and courage. As she says, "Something just clicked." I thought, "Good, don't look; don't compare me with your latest squeeze, don't try and guess my measurements - my body is my own business!"' From My Sisters' Lips offers a glimpse into the lives of just some of the extraordinary women who, like herself, have chosen to live behind the veil. What emerges is a vivid and intimate portrait of a sisterhood; as they speak candidly and with conviction on a diverse range of subjects ranging from marriage to motherhood, stereotypes, submission and self-image, we hear the strong, proud voices of those who are seldom heard.