Islam: A Short History Return to Book Review Page Return to Home Page

By Karen Armstrong

Modern Library, 2002

To a Muslim wishing to know more about the world’s fastest-growing major religion, this book is likely to be a valuable historical reference. To others, it is likely to provide more detail about the historical leaders of the Islamic faith than they need to know. At the same time, the book serves up some enticing challenges to learn more about Islam, most notably:

· The faith, with a few challenges along the way, spread with amazing speed from the Prophet Muhammad and his immediate family to great stretches of Africa, parts or Europe, most of the Middle East and into south and southeast Asia. While Karen Armstrong discusses the leaders of Islam and their various styles, a reader would be hard pressed not to want to know more details about its rapid spread once the faith had blossomed.

· Armstrong focuses mostly on the faith, its leaders and its religious underpinnings. But before the European Renaissance, the Islamic world far outstripped Europe in technology and scholarship. What was the relationship between the faith and these achievements?

Portions of the book that describe early Islam’s tolerance for other religions may change attitudes of non-Muslims about the followers of the Qaran.