Muslim world

The terms Muslim world and Islamic world commonly refer to the unified Islamic community (Ummah), consisting of all those who adhere to the religion of Islam.

Quotes

• When the Imam said that "the relations with the America are like the relations between a wolf and a sheep," he meant that the tension in these relations would continue until America renounces its imperialist essence — and it is not about to do so for the time being. The Imam was talking about the struggle between Islam and America, not about compromising with America. He said: "We will not allow you to have interests in the world of Islam."
  • Hasan Rahimpur Azghadi, in an televised address Iranian leader: "We Are Stronger Than America and the West (June 2006).

• I think there is a massive gulf in the understanding and knowledge between Muslims and non-Muslims — I mean particularly the West and the Islamic world. What we are talking about in reality is a strong minority of people committed to their own particular interpretation of Islam, who seek to impose it on others. I do not believe that the totality of the Islamic world recognizes the Taliban interpretation of the faith as being representative of its own view. There is no unanimity in Islam with regard to this interpretation. Generally you will see as much diversity in the Islam as you do in the Christian world today. But the West does not really understand the pluralism of the Islamic world.
  • Aga Khan IV‎‎, in an interview with Robert Ivy (FAIA), in Architectural Record (31 August 2001).

• If we judge from Islamic history, there is much to encourage us. For century after century, the Arabs, the Persians, the Turks and many other Islamic societies achieved powerful leadership roles in the world — not only politically and economically but also intellectually... The fundamental reason for the pre-eminence of Islamic civilizations lay neither in accidents of history nor in acts of war, but rather in their ability to discover new knowledge, to make it their own, and to build constructively upon it. They became the Knowledge Societies of their time.
  • Aga Khan IV‎‎, in an address to the 2006 Convocation of the Aga Khan University, Karachi, Pakistan (2 December 2006).

• The Muslim world, with its history and cultures, and indeed its different interpretations of Islam, is still little known in the West… The two worlds, Muslim and non-Muslim, Eastern and Western, must, as a matter of urgency, make a real effort to get to know one another, for I fear that what we have is not a clash of civilisations, but a clash of ignorance on both sides.
  • Aga Khan IV‎‎, in his Closing Address by His Highness the Aga Khan at the "Musée-Musées" Round Table Louvre Museum, (17 October 2007).

• If there is much misunderstanding in the West about the nature of Islam, there is also much ignorance about the debt our own culture and civilization owe to the Islamic world. It is a failure, which stems, I think, from the straight-jacket of history, which we have inherited. The medieval Islamic world, from central Asia to the shores of the Atlantic, was a world where scholars and men of learning flourished. But because we have tended to see Islam as the enemy of the West, as an alien culture, society and system of belief, we have tended to ignore or erase its great relevance to our own history.
  • Charles, Prince of Wales, "Islam and the West" at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies (27 October 1993).

External links

• The Islamic World to 1600 an online tutorial at the University of Calgary.
• Islamic world travel guide from Wikivoyage