Islam (Opposing Viewpoints) [Paperback]

Jennifer A. Hurley (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2000

Political analysts, Islamic scholars, and media commentators provide opposing views on the whether Islamic and Western values are in conflict, the status of women under Islam, whether Islam promotes terrorism, and what policies the United States should take toward Islamic. Chapters include: Are the Values of Islam and the West in Conflict? What Is the Status of Women Under Islam? Does Islam Promote Terrorism? What Policies Should the U.S. Take Toward Islam? (20020801)

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Gr 8 Up-This well-prepared, up-to-date text offers 20 differing opinions on Islam, organized into four categories-values, the status of women, terrorism, and U.S. policy. The book includes discussion questions and an extensive list of organizations, complete with addresses and Web sites. The opinions are extremely diverse, and there are apparent contradictions, which this series strives to point out. Unfortunately, attempting to read, understand, and analyze this information can lead to frustration on the part of teen readers. The print is clear and readable; however, the vocabulary is challenging and the glossary contains only select words related to Islam, and some differ in spelling from the text. There are several typos, and there is no map identifying Islamic nations referred to in the articles. Overall, though, this is a useful, thought-provoking collection that will spark much debate.-Ann W. Moore, Schenectady County Public Library, NY

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

"Long-standing series about controversial contemporary issues continue(s) to turn out exceptional titles. Greenhaven's Opposing Viewpoints presents multiple perspectives on hot topics such as abortion, the death penalty, and censorship through excerpts from primary materials ranging from speeches to cartoons."
-- Booklist (October 2001) (Booklist 20020601)

"The format and approach are identical to other titles in the series; both sides of a particular issue are explored in depth. Each essay is prefaced by questions that will help students focus their reading and each chapter concludes with suggestions for further reading and research. Students will find the articles helpful in examining these controversial and often emotional issues."
-- School Library Journal (August 2002) (School Library Journal 20020501)

"As usual for books in this series, there are plenty of follow-up sources for students to pursue."
-- Booklist (June 2002) (Booklist 20020501)

"The language is understandable but not simplistic, the pieces are clearly titles for easy identification, and a few cartoons and charts break up the dense text. This unbiased collection is a welcome resource for researchers and debaters."
-- School Library Journal (June 2002) (School Library Journal 20020415)

"Written by educators, scientists, journalists, doctors, veterinarians, members of the clergy and advocates. This excellent volume will elicit group discussion and help to develop critical thinking and analysis of sensitive issues."
-- School Library Journal (May 2002) (School Library Journal 20020401)

"This supplemental reader is perfect for getting students involved in discussion. The resulting debates are sure to reinforce any primary readings and will breathe life into any standard lecture oriented course. This supplement is a useful tool for instructors to get students involved."
-- Crime and Justive International (May 2002) (UNKNOWN 20020401)

"As always in the Opposing Viewpoints series, there are voices from many sides of the debate."
-- Booklist (April 2002) (Booklist 20020401)

"Most present clear, fact-supported points that readers will find valuable for speeches and reports. Editorial cartoons, anectdotes, and statistics break up the essays, make reading easier. This is a well-balanced approach to the issues, argued with studied analysis rather than bind emotion."
-- Booklist (April 2002) (Booklist 20020215)

"This series is invaluable for preparing students for debates, classes, or research assignments. Opposing Viewpoints books help prepare high school students for critical thinking and make them aware of issues that affect society today. Recommended."
-- The Book Report (March-April 2002) (Book Report 20010915)

"Most useful in schools with religion and/or philosophy courses, but should also appeal to general readers."
-- School Library Journal (April 2002) (School Library Journal 20041001)

"Well-balanced collection of essays. Sometimes complementary, sometimes contradictory, the many views clearly articulated here make this volume an excellent starting place for any thoughtful discussion."
-- Booklist (Febraury 2002) (Booklist 20041101)

"This Opposing Viewpoints selection uses essays that swing wildly toward extremes to cover the topic. The writing becomes even more heated in the following sections...The shocking arguments and sometimes-blatant absurdity makes nearly all the essays compelling reading, wth students needing only a glimpse at an article's title to determine tone and subjectivity of the author. Most essays are short, get right to the core of their arguments, and blast readers with examples that fit the emotional topic."
-- Booklist (September 2001) (Booklist )

"This timely entry in the Opposing Viewpoints series offers a variety of perspectives on many questions about Islam. Does Islam present an obstacle to democracy? Does Islam oppress women? How ought Muslims and non-Muslims confront radical, jihadist Islamists? And, for that matter, what does jihad mean, anyway? Dudley has collected articles from newspapers, magazines, and book excerpts responding to a variety of such questions, with, for instance, a religion professor arguing that Islam promotes terrorism followed by a journalist maintaining that it does not. Most of the selections will be accessible to good readers, .. As with other titles in the series, students will find their beliefs alternately challenged and reinforced, which will surely stimulate discussion."
--Booklist, (October 2004) (Booklist )

"Overall, however, this is a practical addition for libraries needing more up-to-date material on this topic."
--School Library Journal (November 2004) (School Library Journal )

Product Details

• Paperback: 170 pages
• Publisher: Greenhaven Press; 1 edition (September 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0737705132
• ISBN-13: 978-0737705133
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.3 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,184,258 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #99 in Books > Teens > Religion & Spirituality > Islam

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Catalyst for discussion and reflection, November 1, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Islam (Opposing Viewpoints) (Paperback)

This is a great tool to start thinking about Islam and some of the current issues regarding Islam and its relationship with the West. A chapter on terrorism is helpful but dated considering the events of 9/11. Still the book is useful in the broad range of opinions that it presents. Also has a handy "for further reading" list in each chapter if you want to dig deeper.

Perhaps the book should be updated post 9/11 since so much more has been written and said about the subject.

1 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Islam: respect and hate, December 19, 2005

By 

Jeff Siddiqui (Seattle WA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Islam (Opposing Viewpoints) (Paperback)

I first saw this book in my daughter's High School Library.
In theory, the book presented an intellectual inquiry into Islam from (alternating chapters) opposing viewpoints, a commendable task that can only enhance the understanding of any subject so undertaken. Indeed the "Opposing Viewpoints" series included books on American Foreign Policy, the Mid-East, Human Rights, Terrorism and some more...all subjects whose understanding can be deepened by such viewpoints. I could not help but notice that while the other topics for "Opposing Viewpoints" books were quite varied, none of them dealt with religion...except for Islam. Hesitantly but with certainty of experience, I delved into the book.

There is nothing wrong with an examination of a religion from opposing viewpoints and people may even make categorical statements that they distrust a faith (Islam) and that too, is acceptable. If someone makes a clear statement about Islam, even stating just how awful, deceitful and murderous it is based on this verse or that chapter in the Quran or on some event in history, they have my full support in making those statements. My problem begins when the "facts" they cite are clearly wrong or so twisted out of shape and so far taken out of context that they are unrecognizable for anything but a fantasy of a hate-monger. regrettably, every one of the "Opposing Viewpoints" were penned by people who seem to have more invested in self-promotion and hate-mongering than in an effort to discover a new perspective. Learned people like John Esposito, Robin Wright, Edward Said, Robert Fisk and Ali Mazrui were "balanced" by writers like Srdja Trefkovic, Daniel Pipes, Raphael Israeli and Martin Kramer.

While the first group consisted of people (Muslims and non-Muslim) who knew what they were talking about and people like Robert Fisk who has not been known to kiss up to anyone, the second group was distinguished by people who loved Israel and promoted hate against Arabs and Muslims in many of their writings elsewhere and people like Trefkovic who clearly was still smarting by the knowledge that not every Muslim had been slaughtered in the Balkans' genocidal war.

It made me want to question Jennifer Hurley, the editor.
I wanted to ask her what prompted this inquiry into faith and what made her look to Islam for this singular honor.
I wanted to ask her when she would be editing a similar "Opposing Viewpoints" book into Christianity, Judaism or Blacks in America?
For example, would she be doing a book on Judaism anytime soon?
Would it have excerpts from the "Protocols of the Meetings of the Learned Elders of Zion"? After all, this is scholarly inquiry we are looking into.
Maybe include an article about how the Jews were behind the World Trade Center Bombings? Surely an article from a Nazi who would "prove" definitively how evil, murderous and deceitful Jews are?
What an enhancement to scholarly inquiry that would be! I can hardly wait to see how tolerantly the intellectuals of America incorporate such a book into its libraries and schools!

How about one studying the Blacks and their culture in America? I am sure there is plenty of room to include works by great White Supremist leaders from the US, South Africa, Germany and Britain.
This is what Intellectual freedom must mean! Examine opposing viewpoints and to Hell with the prime question as to whether the writers are being truthful or not.

Examining Islam is not like examining American Foreign Policy (also one book in the series) where there can be opposing opinions on the subject. While there can be opposing opinions on Islam, there can NOT be any difference in the facts of what is written in the Quran; it is either there or it is not. One can however, take a fragment of a verse or sentence, twist it to "illustrate" a view out of context and present it as fact. This would be similar to taking the Article of Faith of Islam ("There is no God but One God and Mohammed is His prophet"), taking the first four words ("There is no God") and saying, "See! Islam says there is not God!".

The anti-Islam authors did better; not only did they take quotes out of context, they took statements by violent fanatics and presented them as representing Islam and "therefore it is proven just how murderous and intolerant Islam is" Q.E.D. ("As demonstrated").

I would love to find out from Mountlake Terrace High School or the Edmonds School system, just how this title got selected and if it was donated, by whom and how this happened. I cannot say more to them because then every detractor of Islam will have a platform to point and show how these bug-eyed, foaming Muslims are demanding censorship.
I believe this title should remain on the shelves just to show how bigoted some books can be, how easy it is to insert them in the minds of impressionable youths and how gullible our academic, intellectual and political "leaders" can get...or how easily they can be cowed into silence.

A few highlights:

The series' editors David Bender and Bruno Leone present a lofty foreword with a quote from Jefferson, "...difference of opinion leads to inquiry and inquiry to truth".. How wonderful! I would have supposed that differences of opinions presented would at least not be based on deliberate misrepresentation that would be easy to spot for someone who knows better but not for someone (young student) who believes everything in print to be the truth.

The introduction, presumably put together by the editor Jennifer Hurley, presented such a skeletal and ambiguous outline of Islam so as to make it applicable to almost any of the works of fiction by people like Trefkovic, Pipes and Israeli et al. She has no hesitation in noting atrocities carried out by Muslim extremists and making the connection to Islam but she seems not to note any similar or worst atrocities carried out by Jewish or Christian extremists...after all, this book is not about them, it is about ISLAM! Checkmate.

The first chapter is by Trefkovic, a Serb who probably still can't get over the fact that not all Muslims were exterminated out of former Yugoslavia. He begins by a story of an event that I have never heard of but let us give him that one just for argument's sake. He goes on to mention the killings of the Bani Qurayzah in such twisted and deceptive terms that I had a hard time believing it was the same event. This was the execution of the Jewish tribe of Bani Qurayzay who had broken their treaty with the besieged Muslims in Medina and almost succeeded in have the entire Muslim population exterminated. The judgment was passed by a judge chosen by the Bani Qurayzah for his sympathy towards the tribe. Notable is the fact that after this event, there were still several Jewish tribes that continued to live un Medina along with Muslims. they kept their side of the treaty of peace and were never bothered by Muslims.
His quotes form the Quran are false and partial, his definition of Jihad is false, his description of the non-Muslims living under Muslim rule is unrecognizable even by history books written by Jews or Christians. His quotes from modern authors include other Muslim-Haters like Bat Yeor and he makes an easy connection of some of the acts of the Ottoman Empire, as representing Islam.

The third chapter is by Martin Kramer, Director of the Moshe Dayan Center for M-E and African Studies at Tel Aviv Univ.
It is indeed unfortunate that so many Jews and Jewish organizations should make the connection that to defend Israel REQUIRES spreading hate against Arabs and Islam; Kramer is no exception. He quotes Pipes (one bigot lending credence to another), twists the definition of Sharia to Quran status, takes actions and statements by Muslim extremists and Bingo! we have an evil, untrustworthy Islam! Q.E.D. again.

The fifth chapter is by Daniel Pipes, the darling of Jewish institutions that wish to promote hate and suspicion against Islam and Arabs under the veneer of intellectual discourse. What can anyone say about Pipes that hasn't already been said? According to him, "militant Islam" is the bane of "Judeo-Christian" Western values and must be eradicated; he also said that I (yes, moi) am "the face of militant Islam" because I once strongly protested the invitation to him by the Jewish Federation of Seattle. He in turn, lends credence to Stephen Emerson, the noted "expert on Terrorism" who once emphatically stated on national TV that the Oklahoma bombing was the work of Muslims because "see how many mosques there are in Oklahoma City".
Pipes went on to decry how intimidating atmosphere is created by Muslims against any contrarian views of Islam...I could not help but recall his organization, "Campus Watch" that intimidates and persecutes any teacher or professor who is seem as being anti-Israel. According to Pipes, CAIR is a Terrorist-sympathizing organization that aggressively protects ("terrorist") Hamas and also promotes hate towards Jews. Having followed CAIR information briefs for years, I have YET to see any that could even be stretched to conform to such slanderous twists.

The book goes on and on but by now, I am sure readers get the picture.

I am sure the books "proving" the inferiority of the Black Man in South Africa and the books "proving" the viciousness of the Jew could not have been put together in better form than this book. Lots of people have fallen for the theories in those "works", I am certain lots more will fall for this book.