Not by a long shot was every Moroccan I met during my two-year stay interested in (a) converting me to Islam, (b) arranging a marriage to a Moroccan woman, or (c) enlisting me to obtain a visa to America, but on some days it seemed that way. I always assumed that such propositions were made in good faith, and I declined as politely as I could. And I confess, that when I was asked to describe life in America to my Moroccan friends, I never felt that I did a very adequate job. Moreover, the reality of life in America for a native-born American may be quite different than for a Moroccan immigrant.
One reason I found Paul Barrett's American Islam: The Struggle for the Soul of a Religion so fascinating is that it opened a little window into what life in America means for some Muslims. Particularly compelling I thought were portraits of former Black Muslim leader Siraj Wahhaj and Muslim scholar Khaled Abou El Fadl. The portrait of El Fadl, especially, limned a particularly humane and tolerant vision of Islam, one that made me eager to read some of El Fadl's work myself.
If there is a theme to Barrett's book, it is the contrast between a narrow traditionalism, propagated with Saudi Arabian money and espoused by many, but not all, immigrant Muslims, and a broader, more tolerant vision of Islam that comes to terms with secular American values, even if it does not always agree with them. Or course, in a book this rich, there are many additional tensions and contrasts, for example, those between Arabs and South Asians, those between African Americans and immigrants, and those between women and men. All in all, well worth reading for an insight into the contradictory lives of some Muslims in modern America.
(Disclaimer: I am an acquaintance of the author.)
