A brilliantly observed memoir of an unprecedented and remarkable spiritual journey. While religion has fuelled the often violent conflict plaguing the Holy Land, Yossi Klein Halevi wondered whether it could be a source of unity as well. To find the answer, this religious Israeli Jew began a two–year exploration to discover a common language with his Christian and Muslim neighbours. He followed their holiday cycles, befriended Christian monastics and Islamic mystics, and joined them in prayer in monasteries and mosques in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza. At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden traces that remarkable spiritual journey. Halevi candidly reveals how he fought to reconcile his own fears and anger as a Jew to relate to Christians and Muslims as fellow spiritual seekers. He chronicles the difficulty of overcoming multiple obstacles注eological, political, historical, and psychological注at separate believers of the three monotheistic faiths. And he introduces a diverse range of people attempting to reconcile the dichotomous heart of this sacred place柠struggle central to Israel, but which resonates for us all.

M Fethullah Gulen gives his unique interpretation of Prophet Muhammad, based on a lifetime of personal study and struggle to live up to the ideal standards realised by one of the most fascinating figures ever to emerge in our midst.

Text: English (translation) Original Language: French

"German, Jew, Muslim, Gay offers an astonishing perspective on the history of modern Germany through the vantage point of a man with multiple identities who devoted his life to religious utopias, fought for homosexual rights, wrote gay fiction, converted from Judaism to Islam (one of the few of any faith to do so), and considered himself part of a spiritual elite that held the key to Germany's salvation. Born in Posen in 1880, the son of a Jewish industrialist, Hugo Marcus converted to Islam and chose the name Hamid; he became the most important convert in Germany while retaining his membership in the Jewish community. He was renamed Israel by the Nazis and sent to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in 1938, where he was in the unique position of Muslim witness to the Holocaust. The imam of his mosque gained his release and he escaped to Switzerland, where he wrote gay fiction under the pen name Hans Alienus. He died in Basel in 1966. The book challenges deeply ingrained perceptions of Muslim-Jewish relations during World War II and illuminates their interconnected histories in modern Europe. It also tells the unknown story of Marcus' orientalized Islam that, in echoing Goethe's, revitalized an essential strand of Germany's spiritual heritage"--

This is a reprint of the late professor's work on Jamal al-Din al-Afghani (1838-1879) and his well-known Egyptian discipline Muhammad 'Abduh (1849-1905), the Mufti of Egypt. These two men have generally been seen as devout Muslims who helped rejuvenate their religion which had been stagnating for many centuries. The author provides evidence which suggests that these two men were involved in Islam's small and silent atheist movement which had a subversive rather than constructive influence on mainstream Islam. He also examines Afghani's and 'Abduh's political activities in Egypt before and during 'Urabi's revolt of 1870 and in the process throws new light on Egypt's politics during this turbulent decade. He argues that Afghani could have been a Russian agent, possibly a French one and probably offered his services to the British.