{"id":43551,"date":"2015-02-23T00:24:49","date_gmt":"2015-02-23T00:24:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=43551"},"modified":"2015-02-23T00:34:07","modified_gmt":"2015-02-23T00:34:07","slug":"definitely-my-best-book-of-2014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=43551","title":{"rendered":"Definitely my &#8220;Best Book&#8221; of 2014"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>[ by <strong>Charles Cameron<\/strong> &#8212; I&#8217;m posting this not just to recommend Brown&#8217;s book, but also to make a significant excerpt from it readily available on the net ]<br \/>\n.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/Misquoting-Muhammad-cover.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/Misquoting-Muhammad-cover.jpg\" alt=\"Misquoting Muhammad cover\" width=\"329\" height=\"500\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-43557\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/Misquoting-Muhammad-cover.jpg 329w, https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/Misquoting-Muhammad-cover-197x300.jpg 197w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 329px) 100vw, 329px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p>One book I received this year has given me a greater depth of understanding than any other by a wide margin. That book is Professor <strong>Jonathan AC Brown<\/strong>&#8216;s book, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Misquoting-Muhammad-Challenge-Interpreting-Prophets\/dp\/178074420X\">Misquoting Muhammad: The Challenge and Choices of Interpreting the Prophet&#8217;s Legacy<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Brown is a Muslim, a professor at Georgetown, and author of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/1851686630\/\">Hadith: Muhammad&#8217;s Legacy in the Medieval and Modern World<\/a>. His book <strong>Misquoting Muhammad<\/strong> &#8212; not his choice of title, btw &#8212; lays open the varieties of interpretive possibility in dealing with the Qur&#8217;an and ahadith with comprehensive scholarship and clarity. In light of the upsurge in interest in Islamic and Islamist religious teachings occasioned by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theatlantic.com\/features\/archive\/2015\/02\/what-isis-really-wants\/384980\/\"><strong>Graeme Wood<\/strong>&#8216;s recent <em>Atlantic <\/em>article<\/a>, I asked Prof. Brown&#8217;s permission to reproduce here the section of his book dealing with abrogation and the rules of war. <\/p>\n<p>Here then, with his permission, is an <a href=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/Extract-from-Misquoting-Muhammad.pdf\">extract from <strong>Misquoting Muhammad<\/strong><\/a>. I hope it will prove of use both here and to others beyond the circle of <strong>Zenpundit <\/strong>readers. Spread the word!<\/p>\n<p>The whole book is worth reading, the whole of this extract is worth reading &#8212; but the section within the extract that I particularly recommend is the passage which begins with &#8220;Abrogation brought into sharp contrast&#8221; (p.100) and ends with &#8220;but were those who died not also my servants?&#8221; (p. 103).<\/p>\n<p>**<\/p>\n<p>By way of a bonus, here&#8217;s a related <strong>DoubleQuote<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/SPEC-DQ-hadith-midrash1.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/SPEC-DQ-hadith-midrash1.png\" alt=\"SPEC DQ hadith &amp; midrash\" width=\"602\" height=\"632\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-43567\" srcset=\"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/SPEC-DQ-hadith-midrash1.png 602w, https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/SPEC-DQ-hadith-midrash1-286x300.png 286w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 602px) 100vw, 602px\" \/><\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>Midrash Source:<\/strong><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<li>Rabbi David Levi, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jtsa.edu\/Conservative_Judaism\/JTS_Torah_Commentary\/Bo_Between_5772.xml\">JTS Torah Commentary<\/a><\/li>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[ by Charles Cameron &#8212; I&#8217;m posting this not just to recommend Brown&#8217;s book, but also to make a significant excerpt from it readily available on the net ] . ** One book I received this year has given me a greater depth of understanding than any other by a wide margin. That book is [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[133,526,627,753,717,19,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book","category-charles-cameron","category-doublequotes","category-islam","category-judaism","category-recommended-reading","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=43551"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43551\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43568,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43551\/revisions\/43568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=43551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=43551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=43551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}