audiobook Opening the Mountain: Circumambulating Mount Tamalpais; A Ritual Walk by Matthew Davis; Michael Farrell Scott in History

Description

The extraordinary life of the man who founded Islam; and the world he inhabited—and remade. Lesley Hazleton's new book; Agnostic: A Spirited Manifesto; is out now from Riverhead Books. Muhammad’s was a life of almost unparalleled historical importance; yet for all the iconic power of his name; the intensely dramatic story of the prophet of Islam is not well known. In The First Muslim; Lesley Hazleton brings him vibrantly to life. Drawing on early eyewitness sources and on history; politics; religion; and psychology; she renders him as a man in full; in all his complexity and vitality. Hazleton’s account follows the arc of Muhammad’s rise from powerlessness to power; from anonymity to renown; from insignificance to lasting significance. How did a child shunted to the margins end up revolutionizing his world? How did a merchant come to challenge the established order with a new vision of social justice? How did the pariah hounded out of Mecca turn exile into a new and victorious beginning? How did the outsider become the ultimate insider? Impeccably researched and thrillingly readable; Hazleton’s narrative creates vivid insight into a man navigating between idealism and pragmatism; faith and politics; nonviolence and violence; rejection and acclaim. The First Muslim illuminates not only an immensely significant figure but his lastingly relevant legacy.