The academic world can be a procrustean one.
Loyola Marymount University theology professor Amir Hussain in his new book, Muslims and the Making of America, argues that Islam was an inherent part of America's founding.
“To be clear, Jefferson was no fan of Islam,” Hussain writes, and Sale’s Quran offers reasons why. Sale’s introductory essay describes Islam as “so manifest a forgery” that has motivated “calamities brought on so many nations by the conquests of the Arabians.”
Hussain also notes President Jefferson’s campaigns against North Africa’s Muslim Barbary pirates; thus the “founding of the modern American Navy is connected to the Muslim world.”
Any connection is a good connection, I suppose.
Loyola Marymount University theology professor Amir Hussain in his new book, Muslims and the Making of America, argues that Islam was an inherent part of America's founding.
Hussain writes that Founding Father Thomas Jefferson’s “owning a copy of the Qur’an and reading it is crucial to my argument that Islam is part of the history of America.” Jefferson “began learning Arabic in the 1770s, after he purchased a translation of the Qur’an in 1765,” namely the 1734 English translation of the Quranic Arabic by English Orientalist George Sale. “It was this Qur’an that Keith Ellison used when he was sworn in as the first Muslim member of Congress in 2007,” Hussain enthuses.
Hussain also notes President Jefferson’s campaigns against North Africa’s Muslim Barbary pirates; thus the “founding of the modern American Navy is connected to the Muslim world.”
Any connection is a good connection, I suppose.
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