A Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and religious scholar redirects his lifelong focus on Christianity and takes open-minded look at the Qur'an, finding the original meaning of the sacred text and showing numerous parallels between it and the Old and New Testaments. -- Publisher's description.

Introduction : My Qurʼan problem -- Part I. Iraq : the cost of ignorance. Secular ignorance -- Religious ignorance -- Fearful ignorance -- Part II. The Qurʼan : searching for knowledge. A desert book -- Conversing with the cosmos -- The perpetual stream of prophets -- Peace to believers -- Zeal (jihad) -- The right path (shariʻah) -- Commerce -- Women : plural marriage -- Women : fighting back -- Women : the veil -- Envoi : Fairness in reading.