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Journey Into Islam: The Crisis of Globalization by Ahmed Akbar

Akbar Ahmed is one of the world’s most respected Islamic scholars. He holds a chair in the US but his daughter, Dr Amineh Hoti, is the Director of the world’s first Centre for the Study of Muslim-Jewish Relations, based in Cambridge. The whole family is at the centre of modern efforts to bridge the gulf in understanding between the Islamic world and the West.

This latest book, therefore, must be taken seriously by policy makers, even if some of the truths in it seem unpalatable. In a journey of Koranic proportions, Ahmed led a team of young assistants travelling across the Muslim world with the aim of finding out what is really going on.

The Islamic world, faced with the phenomenon of globalisation that it associates with a lack of compassion, is returning to its roots, he writes. Early on, we get a feel for the tangled complexities. Ahmed describes both Muslim and non-Muslim presidents of nations around the world who ‘behave as if they are recklessly marching towards Armageddon.’

For members of Muslim and Christian faiths, signs of ‘the end times’ are at hand. Ahmed writes: ‘While Christian Evangelists talk fervently of the Second Coming of Jesus and the final battle between good and evil (in which it is implied that Muslims will be cast as the anti-Christ), most Muslim Shia await the return of the Hidden Imam who will lead them in a similar conflict. To complicate matters, Muslims believe Jesus will be on their side in the battle against evil and that they will triumph.’

Ahmed interviewed a number of Muslim and other world leaders. He describes how President Pervez Musharraf ‘sat up excitedly’ as he discussed the military campaigns of his hero, Napoleon Bonaparte. Everywhere he and his team went, they faced ‘a barrage of anti-Americanism’ and equally strong anti-Semitism.

He helpfully unpicks the differences between the main Islamic sects and groups. And he offers hope with his insight into those advocating reason and understanding of the West within Islam. The ‘sleeping giant of the East’ is stirring, he writes. The world needs to take notice.

Once More With Feeling: A Book of Classic Hymns & Carols Selected by Rupert Christiansen Buy the book

Just when the anti-religionists look to be gaining ascendancy, along comes Christmas again, and Britain’s national love affair with hard pews, stained glass, Perpendicular Gothic and roaring hymn tunes takes over and drowns out the atheists in song. Christiansen, in this charmingly eccentric collection of hymns and commentary, includes for good measure William Cowper’s warning that ‘Blind unbelief is sure to err.’

On William Blake’s Jerusalem, he exults in ‘the spine-tingling magnificence of its mystical imagery.’ He notes how, because of its origins in Celtic legend and its nationalistic associations, ‘several Anglican hymn-books pointedly exclude it.’

Within this little red book lies the secret Richard Dawkins must understand if he wishes us all to convert to his creed. He needs to employ some musicians, and get himself a few good tunes for his atheistic hymns. It is amusing to speculate on how many years it would be before the Anglican Church put his hymns in its new songbooks, all in the name of inclusion.

Censored Messiah: The Truth About Jesus Christ by Peter Cresswell Buy the book

The Case for the Real Jesus by Lee Strobel Buy the book

Who was Jesus? by Kamal S Salibi Buy the book

Any book about Jesus with the word “truth” in the title is bound to evoke a sigh in the seasoned consumer of religious literature. Nevertheless, Cresswell’s emphasis on the Jewishness of Jesus, and the Pauline roots of modern Christianity, is laudable, if not particularly new. Lee Strobel, former sceptic, takes the opposite tack, responding to modern attacks on traditional Christianity with a subjective but readable argument for faith. But it is Kamal Salibi, a historian and Christian, who has produced the most interesting book for the serious enquirer. Although a Christian, he is not frightened to apply the rigours of scholarship to the story of Jesus. He too recognises Christianity’s long-neglected Semitic heritage. As a historian, he acknowledges that a purely historical approach to Jesus would not get a Christian much further in their journey of faith. But Christianity is not history, but a religion. It relates to matters beyond the limits of empirical deduction, to the matter of grace. And that is precisley why, when it comes to questions about the identity of Jesus, the "truth" is so hard to find.