A few nights ago, 4.19.07, I was watching a PBS broadcast of Crossroads In America and there was an excellent episode "Faith Without Fear; Struggle for the Soul of Islam." It was brilliant and as a westerner, as an American, I realize all along that what I had grown up appreciating about Islam in the first place came out its accomplishments -- like in the Alhambra in Spain, through "idjihad" It was based on reason and critique rather than tribalism and warfare. It was that culture that gave the world the tools of algebra, early chemistry (alchemy), and medicine. I remember myself as a starry eyed young reader of imagining Scherezade's 1001 Tales, rapt in the romance of it all. I can understand Muslims who want the practice of "idjihad" to come back in this modern era. But, then I've always been an ecumenical soul anyway. But still, wouldn't a little extra tolerance be nice these days?
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