Islam and Muslim Psyche: Reason, Modernity and Orthodoxy

With the dawn of Islam in the Arabian Peninsula during the seventh century, a new civilization was born. It represented a culture of enlightenment emulating a universal human brotherhood, a life of peace with justice and truth, and a constant striving to eradicate oppression, bigotry and inequalities among human beings. The acquisition of knowledge or the quest for truth became a noble pursuit with an unyielding spirit of inquiry to unravel the secrets of the universe. The main purpose of the book is to highlight the endeavors of the Muslim scholars who kept the light of erudition aflame for centuries during the Middle Ages and beyond until the beginning of the European Renaissance. They were the torch bearers of reason, scientific thinking and creative expression. Their erudite contributions encompassed a great variety of disciplines as they wrote multi-volume works of original nature. They also assimilated notable works of the scholars of Greece, India and other countries and disseminated them through translations and commentaries. The impact of the Islamic civilization during its centuries of glory and enlightenment could be felt in its social and political institutions. Following the edicts of Islam, political authority was generally exercised with prudence being mindful of the demands of impartial justice, public welfare, and a strict code of legal protections for the people of non-Muslim affiliations. A recurrent theme of the book is that peace on earth could be established only by a fervent commitment to justice by every nation of the world. The book also calls to attention the concordance between Islam and modernity with the presumption that the Islamic doctrine can be successfully adapted to the exigencies of the changing times. The concluding sections of the book contain a narrative of the state of Muslim nations of the world presently faced with internal dissentions and a negative portrayal of Islam in the West. The lag of knowledge and predominance of e

The author has two master?s degrees, one in education and the other in history. He also has a Ph.D. degree in education with specialization in school counseling that he obtained from Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana. He has spent most of his life in academic pursuits. He has taught at the various levels of education for almost four decades including 27 years at the graduate level mostly teaching core courses in teacher education and specialized courses in educational guidance and counseling. He has authored and coauthored several articles in the field of education. He has also co-authored a book in the area of guidance and counseling. Additionally, he has published a book entitled Islam: Religion of Peace and Justice in 2003 of which he is the sole author. He does not presume any substantial knowledge of Islam for the reader to grasp the essence of his new book. His research activities have encompassed a comparative study of different religions, the various dimensions of the Islamic faith, the political structures of selected Islamic countries and the state of Muslims around the world at the present time. A keen observer of world events, he has witnessed with anguish the internal strife within the Muslim communities and the misperceptions about Islam in the Western countries. By his lectures and writings, he has endeavored to present Islam as a universal message of peace with its core values of human dignity, human rights, impartial justice, compassion, respect for all the doctrines of faith and a fervent pursuit of reason and authentic knowledge. His plea to his fellow Muslims is to embrace these essentials of the Islamic faith and undertake an introspective journey that leads toward a blissful and productive life promoting the cause of peace in the world.