Perceptions of Islam in European Writings

Book excerpt: This book is part of the wider study of Islam and the West: a history of European, mainly French and English, intellectual responses to Islam from the seventeenth century onwards. It focuses on the nineteenth century. Studies on Islam and the West have so far tended to be dominated by non-Muslim writers. This study, therefore, attempts to put forward a scholarly, Muslim, point of view, on a subject which has acquired increasing importance in our time. Relying on primary European and Islamic source materials, it remains firmly committed to the notion of fidelity to European thought. It paves the way to a constructive dialogue between equals, Islam and the West