Karen Armstrong, author of “Muhammad: Prophet For Our Time,” has a piece worthy of a gander the London Financial Times. Too much of it is quoatable so I’ll just start it here:

Balancing the Prophet
By Karen Armstrong

Ever since the Crusades, people in the west have seen the prophet Muhammad as a sinister figure. During the 12th century, Christians were fighting brutal holy wars against Muslims, even though Jesus had told his followers to love their enemies, not to exterminate them. The scholar monks of Europe stigmatised Muhammad as a cruel warlord who established the false religion of Islam by the sword. They also, with ill-concealed envy, berated him as a lecher and sexual pervert at a time when the popes were attempting to impose celibacy on the reluctant clergy. Our Islamophobia became entwined with our chronic anti-Semitism; Jews and Muslims, the victims of the crusaders, became the shadow self of Europe, the enemies of decent civilisation and the opposite of ”us”.

For an excerpt from her book, “Muhammad: A Prophet for Our Time,” Check out this page at NPR. Well worth the read and for setting historical record right.

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