The Quest for Meaning

The author of the thoughtful book is professor of contemporary Islamic studies at Oxford. He tackles a crucial issue of our time, namely how to develop a philosophy of pluralism in a globalised and multicultural context. He takes the reader on a journey of the heart, mind and imagination to consider various approaches to faith and reason, tolerance and respect, freedom, emotion and spirituality, education, tradition and modernity, the sense of belonging and a number of other feelings. His diagnosis is that we lack confidence in ourselves and our ideas, and he suggests that we adopt an attitude of modesty and humility, realising that we have points of view embedded in a particular context. No particular tradition can claim a monopoly on thinking on these perennial topics and we are invited to leave our own windows on the world and experience things from other perspectives, returning transformed at the end of the journey with our hearts and minds more open than they were.