History! History is often said to be shaped by the actions of individuals; by that aphorism you can rightly conclude that it had its fair share of interesting individuals. Well this puts me in the beautiful place of selecting a person. Doing such a task is harder than one might see on the surface. I can’t speak for everyone else but for me one individual stick out in the wide crowd of excellence. Thomas Paine; his name will forever be etched in my heart. An average person will never give...

The Islamic World’s encounter with Modernity was and is at the same time an encounter with a powerful and expanding West. As Western countries industrialized during the Nineteenth century they also competed for hegemonic influence around the globe in the process spreading a secular theology sometimes referred to as Modernity. This theology, which entails the separation of the religious from the political, challenged the totalizing scope of Islamic doctrine. In rejection of the West, some groups...