No word in English evokes more fear and misunderstanding than 'jihad'. To date the books that have appeared on the subject in English by Western scholars have been either openly partisan and polemical or subtly traumatised by so many acts and images of terrorism in the name of jihad and by the historical memory of nearly one thousand four hundred years of confrontation between Islam and Christianity. War and Peace in Islam: The Uses and Abuses of Jihad aims to change this. Written by a number of Islamic religious authorities and Muslim scholars, this work presents the views and teachings of...