Heretic

In [b:The End of Faith|29501|The End of Faith Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason|Sam Harris|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1408542906s/29501.jpg|2399497], Sam Harris looked at the 9/11 terrorists who said they wanted to achieve paradise by killing themselves in the name of Islam, and advanced the crazy idea that maybe we should seriously consider the idea that maybe they actually believed what they said, and killed themselves to get to paradise, with the 72 virgins and all the rest.

In [b:Heretic|18669183|Heretic Why Islam Needs a Reformation Now|Ayaan Hirsi Ali|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1422810041s/18669183.jpg|26496114], Ayaan Hirsi Ali does something very similar. We in the west, and especially we liberal thinkers, human-rights advocates, and we who abhor racism and bigotry and try to get along with everyone, tend to think that yes, we're all basically the same: we want a comfortable life for ourselves and our children, we want a new iPhone or a better job. And while we practice different faiths and traditions, it's all basically the same thing with different names.

Hirsi Ali argues that no, there are significant differences between Islam as it is practiced in places like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, and religion (especially Christianity) as it is practiced worldwide, especially in first-world countries. For instance, Muslims tend to place much more importance on the afterlife than on this life; due to the way Islam developed, as both a religion and an empire, there is no inherent separation of mosque and state, no analogy to "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's". And in Islam, the time when the Prophet lived was a golden age to which all should aspire to return; this means that morality is effectively stuck in the 7th century.

The first part of the book is a presentation of aspects of Islam, and of the culture of Muslim countries, that westerners might not be familiar with. This includes an overview of several varieties of Islam, as practiced in different countries: her native Somalia, Saudi Arabia, and Kenya.

Hirsi Ali's central thesis is that Islam is due for a reformation, similar to Martin Luther's Reformation, that helped curb the abuses of the Catholic church, and shook up Christendom and allowed it to advance into the future. She spends several chapters listing aspects of Islam that need reform, such as fatalism and concentration on the afterlife; jihad; the practice of reprimanding people who stray from the straight and narrow; and others.

She uses poignant examples to make her points, many of which will already be familiar to western readers: the Charlie Hebdo shooting, Boko Haram's abduction of schoolgirls, and so on. But of course, a collection of anecdotes doesn't prove anything, so she buttresses her arguments with statistics and analyses.

Many of Hirsi Ali's detractors dismiss her as a mere Islamophobe, and this is easy to do, since she makes a lot of the same claims that Islamophobic right-wingers make, e.g., that there's something inherently wrong with Islam. But she's not: instead, she is presenting an uncomfortable truth.

Her arguments are, as far as I can tell, sound, and backed up by facts. Crucially, she never advocates for a military solution: rather, she calls for support for Muslim dissidents and voices of opposition, like Malala Yousafzai; as well as vigilance: as much as liberal westerners try to get along with other people and cultures, we need to be careful not to tolerate intolerance, either.

Ultimately, this is an optimistic book, since it argues that Islam can be reformed and taken back from the extremists; in fact, that this may already have begun.