Increasingly Islam struggles against negative stereotypes as a religion of intolerance‎,‎ extremism and fear‎,‎ which has failed to meet the challenges of modernity‎.‎ Zidane Meriboute here proposes a fresh perspective on the crisis facing Muslims today‎.‎ His novel and original approach looks to the Islamic Sufi tradition and the progressive liberal thought of the 12th century philosophers Ibn Rushd ‎(‎Averroes‎)‎ and Ibn Sina ‎(‎Avicenna‎)‎ as holding the key to a successful transition towards modernity‎.‎ The humanity and questioning which both Sufism and this progressive thought engender can produce ‎- according to the author ‎- the foundations of a new Muslim world view contrary to the current and dangerous fundamentalisms‎.‎ Salafi thinkers and others who claim to be returning to an austere and ascetic interpretation of early Islam have‎,‎ in Meriboute‎'‎s view‎,‎ hijacked their faith and produced two negative outcomes‎.‎ Firstly‎,‎ they have blocked the path towards the evolution of any kind of modernist thinking among Muslims‎.‎ And secondly‎,‎ they have created a rhetoric and encouraged events ‎(‎most notoriously‎,‎ 9/11‎)‎ which have resulted in the demonization of their tradition‎.‎As the Muslim and non‎-Muslim worlds grapple to understand how Islam is likely to evolve in the 21st century‎,‎ the appearance of this book‎,‎ with its emphasis on the religion‎'‎s progressive traditions‎,‎ marks a vital contribution to a better understanding of one of today‎'‎s most intractable problems‎.‎