Reza Aslan – författare

*Ten years on from 9/11, much of the Muslim faith remains largely unknown and misunderstood in the West. *While there have been a number of successful books on the topic of Islamic history - from Karen Armstrong's Islam: A Brief History to Bernard Lewis's The Crises of Islam - there is surprisingly no book for a popular audience about Islam as a religion, let alone one by an author from an Islamic background. *No God But God fills that gap, addressing issues of belief: the difference between the Quran and the Bible, the meaning of the Hajj, the Muslim relationship with Jesus, the Muslim attitude towards Jews, equality between the sexes and more.* This revised and updated edition includes a wealth of new material and new chapters covering recent uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya; the changing face of Islam in Europe and North Africa; and a number of topics of heated debate (the veil controversy; Islam & women; Iraq War as a Jihadi recruiting agent etc).

Sifting through centuries of mythmaking, Reza Aslan sheds new light on one of history's most influential and enigmatic figures by examining Jesus within the context of the times in which he lived: the age of zealotry, an era awash in apocalyptic fervour. Balancing the Jesus of the Gospels against historical sources, Aslan describes a complex figure: a man of peace who exhorted his followers to arm themselves; an exorcist and faith healer who urged his disciples to keep his identity secret; and the seditious 'King of the Jews', whose promise of liberation from Rome went unfulfilled in his lifetime. Aslan explores why the early Church preferred to promulgate an image of Jesus as a peaceful spiritual teacher rather than a politically conscious revolutionary, and grapples with the riddle of how Jesus understood himself. Zealot provides a fresh perspective on one of the greatest stories ever told. The result is a thought-provoking, elegantly written biography with the pulse of a fast-paced novel, and a singularly brilliant portrait of a man, a time and the birth of a religion.

Vi vet inte mycket om Jesu liv, men vi vet säkert att han blev hängd och dog på korset. Och vi vet att det var ett straff som de romerska ockupanterna av Palestina reserverade för statens fiender. Det är utgångspunkten för Reza Aslans biografi över Jesus från Nasaret, mannen som efter sin död, i evangelierna, skulle bli Jesus Kristus. Aslan utgår från det vi faktiskt kan belägga om Jesus och hans tid, och beskriver sedan hur Jesu efterföljare byggde upp bilden av en Jesus som inte bara ville störta överheten utan lika mycket, eller ännu mer, sprida kärleksbudskapet. Av upprorsmakaren blev en religionsgrundare. Reza Aslan är född i Iran men bor sen länge i USA och har doktorerat i religionssociologi vid University of California. Han har flera mycket uppmärksammade böcker om religion och politik bakom sig. Han är troende muslim, men har berättat om hur han i tonåren blev helt överväldigad av berättelsen om Jesus. Hans bok blev en bästsäljare i USA direkt den kom ut sommaren 2013, bl a efter en famös intervju i den högerinriktade TV-kanalen Fox News.

Open the door to understanding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the path to peace.This is a kids’ book about Israel & Palestine. It provides context for the historical conflict, opens the door to conversation, and lays a path for understanding, peace, and compassion for a shared future.This book was made to help kids aged 5-9 understand the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Why is it happening? Is peace possible? When kids ask questions like these, grownups aren’t always prepared to answer. A Kids Book About Israel & Palestine addresses this by giving children and their carers the tools they need to unpack and learn about this divisive but important topic.A Kids Book About Israel & Palestine features: A large and bold, yet minimalist font design that allows kids freedom to imagine themselves in the words on the pages.A friendly, approachable, empowering and child-appropriate tone throughout.An incredible and diverse group of authors in the series who are experts or have first-hand experience of the topic.Tackling important discourse together! The A Kids Book About titles are best used when read together. Helping to kickstart important, challenging, and empowering conversations for kids and their grownups through beautiful and thought-provoking pages. The series supports an incredible and diverse group of authors, who are either experts in their field, or have first-hand experience on the topic. A Kids Co. is a new kind of media company enabling kids to explore big topics in a new and engaging way, with a growing series of books, podcasts and blogs made to empower. Learn more about us online by searching for A Kids Co.

What is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Why is it happening? Is peace possible? When kids ask questions like these, are grownups prepared to answer? This book was created to provide context for this conflict, open the door to conversation, and lay a path for understanding, peace, and compassion for our shared future.

An invaluable introduction for young readers to a faith that for much of the West remains shrouded in ignorance and fear. Written by Reza Aslan, an internationally acclaimed scholar of comparative religion, No god but God examines Islam: its rituals and traditions, the revelation of Muhammad as Prophet and the subsequent uprising against him, and the emergence of his successors.Engaging, accessible, and thought-provoking, No god but God is sure to stimulate discussion and encourage understanding of the Islamic faith and the people who follow it.

From the Hardcover edition.

The countries that stretch along the broad horizons of the Middle East—from Morocco to Iran, from Turkey to Pakistan—boast different cultures, different languages, and different religions. Yet the literary landscape of this dynamic part of the world has been bound together not by borders and nationalities, but by a common experience of Western imperialism. Keenly aware of the collected scars left by a legacy of colonial rule, the acclaimed writer Reza Aslan, with a team of four regional editors and seventy-seven translators, cogently demonstrates with Tablet and Pen how literature can, in fact, be used to form identity and serve as an extraordinary chronicle of the disrupted histories of the region.Acting with Words Without Borders, which fosters international exchange through translation and publication of the world’s finest literature, Aslan has purposefully situated this volume in the twentieth century, beyond the familiar confines of the Ottoman past, believing that the writers who have emerged in the last hundred years have not received their full due. This monumental collection, therefore, of nearly two hundred pieces, including short stories, novels, memoirs, essays and works of drama—many of them presented in English for the first time—features translated works from Arabic, Persian, Urdu, and Turkish. Organized chronologically, the volume spans a century of literature—from the famed Arab poet Khalil Gibran to the Nobel laureates Naguib Mahfouz and Orhan Pamuk, from the great Syrian-Lebanese poet Adonis to the grand dame of Urdu fiction, Ismat Chughtai—connected by the extraordinarily rich tradition of resplendent cultures that have been all too often ignored by the Western canon.By shifting America’s perception of the Middle Eastern world away from religion and politics, Tablet and Pen evokes the splendors of a region through the voices of its writers and poets, whose literature tells an urgent and liberating story. With a wealth of contextual information that places the writing within the historical, political, and cultural breadth of the region, Tablet & Pen is transcendent, a book to be devoured as a single sustained narrative, from the first page to the last. Creating a vital bridge between two estranged cultures, "this is that rare anthology: cohesive, affecting, and informing" (Publishers Weekly).Includes the writings of Kahlil Gibran, Tawfiq al-Hakim, Nâzim Hikmet, Ismat Chughtai, Muhammad Iqbal, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Forugh Farrokhzad, Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar, Yasar Kemal, Ghassan Kanafani, Mahmoud Darwish, Adonis, Ahmad Shamloo, Naguib Mahfouz, Orhan Pamuk, and more.

THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERIn God, Reza Aslan sheds new light on mankind’s relationship with the divine and challenges our perspective on the history of faith and the birth of religion. From the origins of spiritual thought to the concept of an active, engaged, divine presence that underlies all creation, Aslan examines how the idea of god arose in human evolution, was gradually personalized, endowed with human traits and emotions, and eventually transformed into a single Divine Personality: the God known today by such names as Yahweh, Father, and Allah.Bold, wide-ranging and provocative, God challenges everything we thought we knew about the origins of religious belief, and with it our relationship with life and death, with the natural and spiritual worlds, and our understanding of the very essence of human existence.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERNAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Good Housekeeping • Booklist • Publishers Weekly • BookishFrom the internationally bestselling author of No god but God comes a fascinating, provocative, and meticulously researched biography that challenges long-held assumptions about the man we know as Jesus of Nazareth.   Two thousand years ago, an itinerant Jewish preacher and miracle worker walked across the Galilee, gathering followers to establish what he called the “Kingdom of God.” The revolutionary movement he launched was so threatening to the established order that he was captured, tortured, and executed as a state criminal.   Within decades after his shameful death, his followers would call him God.   Sifting through centuries of mythmaking, Reza Aslan sheds new light on one of history’s most influential and enigmatic characters by examining Jesus through the lens of the tumultuous era in which he lived: first-century Palestine, an age awash in apocalyptic fervor. Scores of Jewish prophets, preachers, and would-be messiahs wandered through the Holy Land, bearing messages from God. This was the age of zealotry—a fervent nationalism that made resistance to the Roman occupation a sacred duty incumbent on all Jews. And few figures better exemplified this principle than the charismatic Galilean who defied both the imperial authorities and their allies in the Jewish religious hierarchy.   Balancing the Jesus of the Gospels against the historical sources, Aslan describes a man full of conviction and passion, yet rife with contradiction; a man of peace who exhorted his followers to arm themselves with swords; an exorcist and faith healer who urged his disciples to keep his identity a secret; and ultimately the seditious “King of the Jews” whose promise of liberation from Rome went unfulfilled in his brief lifetime. Aslan explores the reasons why the early Christian church preferred to promulgate an image of Jesus as a peaceful spiritual teacher rather than a politically conscious revolutionary. And he grapples with the riddle of how Jesus understood himself, the mystery that is at the heart of all subsequent claims about his divinity.   Zealot yields a fresh perspective on one of the greatest stories ever told even as it affirms the radical and transformative nature of Jesus of Nazareth’s life and mission. The result is a thought-provoking, elegantly written biography with the pulse of a fast-paced novel: a singularly brilliant portrait of a man, a time, and the birth of a religion.Praise for Zealot  “Riveting . . . Aslan synthesizes Scripture and scholarship to create an original account.”—The New Yorker“A lucid, intelligent page-turner.”—Los Angeles Times  “Fascinatingly and convincingly drawn . . . Aslan may come as close as one can to respecting those who revere Jesus as the peace-loving, turn-the-other-cheek, true son of God depicted in modern Christianity, even as he knocks down that image.”—The Seattle Times   “[Aslan’s] literary talent is as essential to the effect of Zealot as are his scholarly and journalistic chops. . . . A vivid, persuasive portrait.”—Salon   “This tough-minded, deeply political book does full justice to the real Jesus, and honors him in the process.”—San Francisco ChronicleFrom the Hardcover edition.

Little known in America but venerated as a martyr in Iran, Howard Baskerville was a twenty-two-year-old Christian missionary from South Dakota who traveled to Persia (modern-day Iran) in 1907 for a two-year stint teaching English and preaching the gospel. He arrived in the midst of a democratic revolution—the first of its kind in the Middle East—led by a group of brilliant young firebrands committed to transforming their country into a fully self-determining, constitutional monarchy, one with free elections and an independent parliament.The Persian students Baskerville educated in English in turn educated him about their struggle for democracy, ultimately inspiring him to leave his teaching post and join them in their fight against a tyrannical shah and his British and Russian backers. “The only difference between me and these people is the place of my birth," Baskerville declared, “and that is not a big difference.”In 1909, Baskerville was killed in battle alongside his students, but his martyrdom spurred on the revolutionaries who succeeded in removing the shah from power, signing a new constitution, and rebuilding parliament in Tehran. To this day, Baskerville’s tomb in the city of Tabriz remains a place of pilgrimage. Every year, thousands of Iranians visit his grave to honor the American who gave his life for Iran.In this rip-roaring tale of his life and death, Aslan gives us a powerful parable about the universal ideals of democracy—and to what degree Americans are willing to support those ideals in a foreign land. Woven throughout is an essential history of the nation we now know as Iran—frequently demonized and misunderstood in the West. Indeed, Baskerville’s life and death represent a “road not taken” in Iran. Baskerville’s story, like his life, is at the center of a whirlwind in which Americans must ask themselves: How seriously do we take our ideals of constitutional democracy and whose freedom do we support?

Little known in America but venerated as a martyr in Iran, Howard Baskerville was a twenty-two-year-old Christian missionary from South Dakota who travelled to Persia (modern-day Iran) in 1907 for a two-year stint teaching English and preaching the gospel. He arrived in the midst of a democratic revolution—the first of its kind in the Middle East—led by a group of brilliant young firebrands committed to transforming their country into a fully self-determining, constitutional monarchy, one with free elections and an independent parliament.The Persian students Baskerville educated in English in turn educated him about their struggle for democracy, ultimately inspiring him to leave his teaching post and join them in their fight against a tyrannical shah and his British and Russian backers. “The only difference between me and these people is the place of my birth," Baskerville declared, “and that is not a big difference.”In 1909, Baskerville was killed in battle alongside his students, but his martyrdom spurred on the revolutionaries who succeeded in removing the shah from power, signing a new constitution and rebuilding parliament in Tehran. To this day, Baskerville’s tomb in the city of Tabriz remains a place of pilgrimage. Every year, thousands of Iranians visit his grave to honour the American who gave his life for Iran.In this rip-roaring tale of his life and death, Aslan gives us a powerful parable about the universal ideals of democracy—and to what degree Americans are willing to support those ideals in a foreign land. Woven throughout is an essential history of the nation we now know as Iran—frequently demonised and misunderstood in the West. Indeed, Baskerville’s life and death represent a “road not taken” in Iran. Baskerville’s story, like his life, is at the centre of a whirlwind in which Americans must ask themselves: How seriously do we take our ideals of constitutional democracy and whose freedom do we support?

*Ten years on from 9/11, much of the Muslim faith remains largely unknown and misunderstood in the West. *While there have been a number of successful books on the topic of Islamic history - from Karen Armstrong's Islam: A Brief History to Bernard Lewis's The Crises of Islam - there is surprisingly no book for a popular audience about Islam as a religion, let alone one by an author from an Islamic background. *No God But God fills that gap, addressing issues of belief: the difference between the Quran and the Bible, the meaning of the Hajj, the Muslim relationship with Jesus, the Muslim attitude towards Jews, equality between the sexes and more.* This revised and updated edition includes a wealth of new material and new chapters covering recent uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya; the changing face of Islam in Europe and North Africa; and a number of topics of heated debate (the veil controversy; Islam & women; Iraq War as a Jihadi recruiting agent etc).

*Why do they hate us? An entire cottage industry has arisen to answer this question. But what no one has really figured out is, who exactly are they? Is it al-Qaeda? Islamic nationalists? The whole Muslim world?*HOW TO WIN A COSMIC WAR lays out, for the first time, a comprehensive definition of the movement behind and surrounding al-Qaeda and the like, a global ideology properly termed Jihadism. *Contrasting twenty-first-century religious extremism across Christianity, Judaism and Islam with its historical antecedents, Aslan demonstrates that while modern Jihadis may have legitimate social grievances - the suffering of the Palestinians, American support for Arab dictators, the presence of foreign troops in Muslim lands, to name a few - they have no real goals or actual agenda.*So, what do the Jihadists want? Aslan's answer is: Nothing. The Jihadists have no earthly agenda; they are fighting a metaphysical conflict, a theological war. And ever since 9/11, we have unfortunately been fighting the same cosmic war, the war they want: the so-called 'War on Terror'.*How do we win a Cosmic War? By refusing to fight in one. And in this stunning new work, Aslan reveals surprising conclusions about how we can deal with this predicament.

THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERIn God, Reza Aslan sheds new light on mankind’s relationship with the divine and challenges our perspective on the history of faith and the birth of religion. From the origins of spiritual thought to the concept of an active, engaged, divine presence that underlies all creation, Aslan examines how the idea of god arose in human evolution, was gradually personalized, endowed with human traits and emotions, and eventually transformed into a single Divine Personality: the God known today by such names as Yahweh, Father, and Allah.Bold, wide-ranging and provocative, God challenges everything we thought we knew about the origins of religious belief, and with it our relationship with life and death, with the natural and spiritual worlds, and our understanding of the very essence of human existence.

CHto est'' Bog? Bol''shinstvo iz nas dumayut, chto Bog — ehto prevoskhodnaya versiya nas samih, chelovecheskoe sushchestvo so sverh"estestvennymi sposobnostyami. Lyudi stremyatsya poznat'' Boga, pripisav emu cherty chelovecheskoj prirody, ehmocii i zhelaniya, prichem ne tol''ko polozhitel''nye, no i otricatel''nye. Izvestnyj religioved i gluboko veruyushchij chelovek Reza Aslan proslezhivaet istoriyu chelovechestva cherez prizmu vospriyatiya obraza Boga i pokazyvaet, chto v toj ili inoj forme podobnaya proekciya harakterna absolyutno dlya vsekh religij. Issleduya predstavleniya pervobytnyh lyudej, mirovozzreniya drevnih egiptyan, zhitelej Mesopotamii, grekov, rimlyan, indijcev i persov, dzhajnizm, buddizm, iudaizm, hristianstvo i islam, on prihodit k vyvodu, chto zhelanie ochelovechit'' bozhestvennoe v svoyu ochered'' privodit k obozhestvleniyu chelovecheskogo i chto nastalo vremya peresmotret'' ehti ubezhdeniya."My modeliruem religii i kul''tury, soobshchestva i pravitel''stva v sootvetstvii s nashimi chelovecheskimi trebovaniyami, pri ehtom postoyanno ubezhdaya sebya, chto ehti trebovaniya — bozhestvennye. EHto luchshe vsego ob"yasnyaet, pochemu na protyazhenii vsej chelovecheskoj istorii religiya porozhdala i beskonechnoe dobro, i nevyrazimoe zlo; pochemu odna i ta zhe vera v odnogo i togo zhe Boga rozhdaet lyubov'' i sostradanie v odnom veruyushchem, v to vremya kak v drugom — nenavist'' i zhestokost''…EHta kniga — ne tol''ko istoriya o tom, kak my ochelovechili Boga. EHto takzhe prizyv perestat'' navyazyvat'' Bogu nashi chelovecheskie strasti. Nezavisimo ot togo, verite vy v odnogo Boga, v neskol''kih bogov ili ne verite vovse, vazhno pomnit'', chto ehto my sozdali Boga po svoemu obrazu i podobiyu, a ne naoborot. I ehta istina otkryvaet nam put'' k bolee zreloj, bolee mirnoj, pervichnoj forme duhovnosti". (Reza Aslan)

Religiya – ehto ne vera, a istoriya very. Pozadi chetyrnadcat'' vekov neistovyh debatov o tom, chto znachit byt'' musul''maninom, razlichnyh tolkovanij Korana, plemennyh mezhdousobic, krestovyh pohodov i mirovyh vojn. V XXI veke islam vstupil v ehpohu Reformacii, oznamenovannuyu stolknoveniem mezhdu temi, kto otvergaet modernizm i fanatichno vozvrashchaetsya k "osnovam" svoej very, i temi, kto stremitsya primirit'' religioznye cennosti s realiyami sovremennogo mira. Po mneniyu Rezy Aslana, odnogo iz krupnejshih v mire specialistov po bibleistike i koranovedeniyu, imenno poslednie opredelyat budushchee musul''manskogo mira."Pered vami istoriya islama. EHto istoriya, zakreplennaya v vospominaniyah pervogo pokoleniya musul''man i sistematizirovannaya samymi rannimi biografami proroka Muhammada… Proshloe uzhe pozadi, kak i vremena idealizirovannogo i absolyutno mnimogo predstavleniya o nem, sformirovannogo puritanami i fundamentalistami, kotorye stremyatsya ego vossozdat''. Sleduyushchaya glava v istorii islama budet napisana isklyuchitel''no temi, kto zhelaet smotret'' v budushchee. Volnu reform nel''zya ostanovit''. Islamskaya Reformaciya uzhe zdes''. My vse zhivem v ee ehpohu". (Reza Aslan)

Vi vet inte mycket om Jesu liv, men vi vet säkert att han blev hängd och dog på korset. Och vi vet att det var ett straff som de romerska ockupanterna av Palestina reserverade för statens fiender. Det är utgångspunkten för Reza Aslans biografi över Jesus från Nasaret, mannen som efter sin död, i evangelierna, skulle bli Jesus Kristus. Aslan utgår från det vi faktiskt kan belägga om Jesus och hans tid, och beskriver sedan hur Jesu efterföljare byggde upp bilden av en Jesus som inte bara ville störta överheten utan lika mycket, eller ännu mer, sprida kärleksbudskapet. Av upprorsmakaren blev en religionsgrundare. Reza Aslan är född i Iran men bor sen länge i USA och har doktorerat i religionssociologi vid University of California. Han har flera mycket uppmärksammade böcker om religion och politik bakom sig. Han är troende muslim, men har berättat om hur han i tonåren blev helt överväldigad av berättelsen om Jesus. Hans bok blev en bästsäljare i USA direkt den kom ut sommaren 2013, bl a efter en famös intervju i den högerinriktade TV-kanalen Fox News.