Description
A fascinating journey into Islam's diverse history of ideas, making an argument for an "Islamic Enlightenment" todayIn Reopening Muslim Minds , Mustafa Akyol, senior fellow at the Cato Institute and opinion writer for The New York Times , both diagnoses “the crisis of Islam” in the modern world, and offers a way forward. Diving deeply into Islamic theology, and also sharing lessons from his own life story, he reveals how Muslims lost the universalism that made them a great civilization in their earlier centuries. He especially demonstrates how values often associated with Western Enlightenment ― freedom, reason, tolerance, and an appreciation of science ― had Islamic counterparts, which sadly were cast aside in favor of more dogmatic views, often for political ends.Elucidating complex ideas with engaging prose and storytelling, Reopening Muslim Minds borrows lost visions from medieval Muslim thinkers such as Ibn Rushd (aka Averroes), to offer a new Muslim worldview on a range of sensitive human rights, equality for women, freedom of religion, or freedom from religion. While frankly acknowledging the problems in the world of Islam today, Akyol offers a clear and hopeful vision for its future.
About the Author
“Mr Akyol shares with writers like Karen Armstrong and Reza Aslan an aptitude for writing in an engaging way about arcane theology.” — The Economist
Mustafa Akyol is a Turkish journalist, author, and public speaker. He is the author of "Reopening Muslim Minds: A Return to Reason, Freedom, and Tolerance" (2021), "The Islamic Jesus: How the King of the Jews Became a Prophet of the Muslims" (2017), and Islam without Extremes: A Muslim Case for Liberty (2011).
Akyol worked for more than a decade as an opinion columnist for two Turkish newspapers, Hurriyet Daily News and Star. Since 2013, he has also been a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times, covering politics and religion in the Muslim world. In 2018, he joined the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C, as a senior fellow focusing on the intersection of public policy, Islam, and modernity.
Since the early 2000 s Akyol s articles have appeared in a wide range of other publications, including the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, The Atlantic, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Newsweek, Al-?Monitor, First Things, The Forward, the Weekly Standard, the Financial Times, the London Times, The Guardian, the Washington Times, and Pakistan’s The Dawn. He has appeared frequently on CNN, BBC, NPR, and Al-?Jazeera English and on prominent TV shows such as Fareed Zakaria GPS and HARDtalk. His TED talk on “Faith versus Tradition in Islam” has been watched by more than 1.2 million viewers.
He is married — as not only the husband to a most amazing wife, but also the father of three lovely boys. He thanks God for them.
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