This is not the place to review the history of Christian-Muslim relations. This history may now be read in the erudite works of Norman Daniel. The reading is sad and agonizing. The conclusion which may be safely drawn from this history is that Christianity’s involvement with the Muslim World was so full of misunderstanding, prejudice, and hostility that it has warped the Western Christian’s will and consciousness. “Would to God Christianity had never met Islam!” will reverberate in the mind of any student patient enough to peruse that history. On the other side, Muslim-Christian relations have been determined by the Qur’an. Doctrinally, therefore, these relations have seen no change. Throughout their history, and despite the political hostilities, the Muslims revered Jesus as a great prophet and his faith as divine religion.

As for the Christians, the Muslims argued with them in the manner of the Qur’an. But when it came to political action, they gave them the benefit of the doubt as to whether they followed the Christianity of Jesus or of the Church. Muhammad and ‘Umar’s wager for a Christian victory over the Zoroastrians, the Meccan Muslim’s choice of, welcome and protection by Christian Abyssinia and Muhammad’s personal waiting upon the Christian Abyssinian delegates to Madinah, the Prophet’s covenant with the Christians of Najran, ‘Umar’s convenant with the Archbishop of Jerusalem and his refusal to hold prayer on the premises of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre lest later Muslims might claim the place, the total cooperation of the Umawis and ‘Abbasis with their Christian subjects, and of the Umawis of Cordova with Christians who were not their subjects-all these are landmarks in a record of cooperation and mutual esteem hardly paralleled in any other history. Some persecution, some conversion under influences of all sorts, some aggression, some doctrinal attacks going beyond the limits defined by the Qur’an, there were, without a doubt. The Muslims in all places and times were not all angels! But such were scattered cases whose value falls to the ground when compared with the overwhelming spread of history which has remained true to this Qur’anic position.

Mehr …

The great task facing Muslim intellectuals and leaders is to recast the whole legacy of human knowledge from the standpoint of Islam. The vision of Islam would not be a vision unless it is a vision of something, namely, life, reality, and the world. That vision is the object of study of various disciplines. To recast knowledge as Islam relates to it, is to Islamize it, i.e., to redefine and reorder the parameters and the data, to rethink the reasoning and interrelationships of the data, to reevaluate the conclusions, to re-project the goals, and to do so in such a way as to make the reconstituted disciplines enrich the vision and the serve the cause of Islam.

To this end, the methodological categories or methodologically-relevant principles of Islam, namely, the unity of truth, the unity of knowledge, the unity of humanity, the unity of life, the telic [ed., purposeful] character of creation, and the subservience of creation to man and of man to Allah (SWT), must replace the Western categories and determine the perception and ordering of reality. So too, the values of Islam should replace Western values and direct the learning activity in every field. These values, especially the usefulness of knowledge for man’s felicity, the blossoming of man’s faculties, and the remolding of creation so as to concretize the divine patterns, should be manifested in the building of culture and civilization and in human models of knowledge and wisdom, heroism and virtue, and pietism and saintliness.

While avoiding the pitfalls and shortcomings of traditional methodology, Islamization of knowledge ought to observe a number of principles that constitute the essence of Islam. To recast disciplines or categories of knowledge, both in scope and internal coherence, under the framework of Islam means subjection of their theory and method, and their principles and goals, to the Oneness of Allah (subhanahu wa ta’ala) and to four derivative unities.

Mehr …

Scouring the World Wide Web, we came across this news article from 1986 archives reporting the murder of Dr. Faruqi and his wife on the day it happened. Truly, it was a sad day when this unfortunate incident happened. May Dr. Faruqi and his wife be received into His Jannah for their service to Islam, insha’allah.

AROUND THE NATION; Islamic Scholar and Wife Slain in Pennsylvania
Published: May 28, 1986

An Islamic scholar and his wife were stabbed to death early today and their daughter was seriously wounded.

Ismail al Faruqi, a 65-year-old professor at Temple University, and his 59-year-old wife, Lois, an art scholar, were found dead with multiple stab wounds in their home in this suburb of Philadelphia, the police said. Their 27-year-old daughter was stabbed in the chest and arms.

The weapon apparently was ”a 15-inch survival-type knife” found near the body of Professor al Faruqi, said Lieut. Robert Krauser of the Cheltenham Township police.

Sgt. Alan Butan said the Federal Bureau of Investigation was providing technical assistance to the police ”because of al Faruqi’s prominence in the Islamic world.” — AP