“An individual enters the final stages of the Way when the nafs begins to release its grip on the qalb, thus allowing the ruh—which is present in all humanity, but is cloaked in the veil of the self—to absorb the… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
Even the Quran, which Sufis respect as the direct speech of God, lacks the capacity to shed light upon God’s essence. As one Sufi master has argued, why spend time reading a love letter (by which he means the Quran)… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“Despite two millennia of Christian apologetics, the fact is that belief in a dying and rising messiah simply did not exist in Judaism. In… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
Religion doesn't make people bigots. People are bigots and they use religion to justify their ideology. — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“Scattered across the Roman Empire, it was only natural for the gospel writers to distance themselves from the Jewish independence movement by erasing, as… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“There is a term for this phenomenon—politicomorphism, or “the divinization of earthly politics”—and it is, to this day, one of the central features of… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
Obama has been the single worst president in modern American history in dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
There's no question that homophobia is rampant among the world's 1.5 billion Muslims - but that doesn't negate the fact that there are huge… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
Well, to be clear, I am a scholar of religions with four degrees, including one in the New Testament and fluency in Biblical Greek… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“There would be no more record of who was rich and who was poor. Everyone in this new and divinely inspired world order would… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
My biography of Jesus is probably the first popular biography that does not use the New Testament as its primary source material. — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“Pilate, as the histories reveal, was not one for trials. In his ten years as governor of Jerusalem, he had sent thousands upon thousands… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
Is it possible that Jesus, unlike 98 percent of his fellow Jews, was literate and educated? Yes, it's possible. — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“The choice between James’s vision of a Jewish religion anchored in the Law of Moses and derived from a Jewish nationalist who fought against… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
“Paul's portrayal of Jesus as Christ may sound familiar to contemporary Christians—it has since become the standard doctrine of the church—but it would have… — Reza Aslan Copy Share Image
