Customer Reviews

A Bad Beginning: The Path to Islam

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Someone had mentioned in his review that this book is "90% beginning and 10% path". After reading the entire book, my estimate is that probably about 5% or less of the book is devoted on Gai Eaton's path to Islam. The rest, more or less, is devoted to the first 40 years of his life, which is dominated by relationships and affairs.

Impressed by the author's prior two latest books, "Islam and the Destiny of Man" and "Remembrance of God", which had attracted thoughtful readership, I, as one of such readers, had eagerly awaited the publication of this new title so I could satisfy my curiosity about how Eaton had come to appreciate Islam, only to be disappointed at the end. Despite having no interest in knowing about another man's love affairs and incidentals of life, I had continued reading the book with the hope that perhaps he would change the theme and get into the "path to Islam". My reading - an un-enjoyed one - eventually ended, but not my disappointment.

As I finished half the book and continued on, I had wondered about the reason that motivated Eaton to disclose all these unbecoming details of his life, especially when he was aware that it is discouraged - certainly in Islam - to disclose one's sinful past. While I did not find a clear answer, it appeared, from the epilogue of the book, that all that he wrote in his diaries since childhood was a burden on him until he finally published them.

Certainly, everyone's life is full of incidents and thus an epic in itself. Does that mean that everyone should feel the burden to publish his biography, irrespective of whether it will be of any benefit, or even of interest, to others?

But a man's life can be interesting and his account inspirational. I am reminded of another book, "Road to Mecca" by Muhammad Asad (formerly Leopold Weiss), that describes a European jew's journey into Islam. A classic by now, this captivating book is a superb account of a man's life as well as his gradual evolution into a Muslim. Eaton's last book, unfortunately, met neither of these expectations.

I read one of Eaton's books on Islam and was interested in reading his life story. He was raised as an upper class British agnostic and became a Muslim at the age of 30. While his life was fairly unique, I can't say I found it terribly fascinating. The book is about 90% "bad beginning" and only 10% "path to Islam" which was disappointing as I was more interested in how he came to be a Muslim. Not the worst read I've ever engaged in, but certainly not the best either.

I had hoped that this autobiographical book would have been about the mental reasoning as to why this Brit abandoned his Christian heritage to convert to Islam (as that was my subject of interest). As another reviewer noted about 90% of this book is about the author recounting his upbringing and his disillusionment with humanity due to the high casualty figures of World War II that he lived through. Like many WWII Europeans, after having witnessed the vulgarities of that war, many lost their faith that a Western God existed - how could a God allow so many innocent civilians to be so brutally killed? Still wanting to believe that there `is a purpose to life', the author of this book encountered mystical Sufism - which allowed him some hope in the existence of a God - in this case the God of the Islamic prophet Mohammed. The author really doesn't go into much detail as to why he thought Mohammed's God (Allah) was any more `real' than the European Judeo-Christian God. So, I was disappointed in the author's `straight path' in finding Allah (p.247) - it really meandered, with not much reflection or understanding of Islam. Apparently, the author has another book that might answer more of my questions about his conversion: `Remembering God: Reflections on Islam" - which I haven't read yet. This book, as the author admits, is more about his life before finding Allah - a young man becoming interested in women, wine and enjoying life (but not terribly exciting) - only to be shattered by WWII. Ever so hidden in the `background' of this book is the author's struggle with sex, liking women, but seeing some conflict between the easy approachability of western women verses the cloistered world of the protected Moslem woman. The author has a very enjoyable writing style: smooth.