From a "Closet At Utrecht" Adriaan Reland and Islam

Abstract

In 1705 Adriaan Reland published his De religione mohammedica. The work, a second Latin edidon of which appeared in 1717, was translated into Dutch, French, English, German and Spanish and was placed on the Roman Index in 1722. lts publication has been regarded as a turning point in western attitudes to Islam. With an objectivity remark able for the time, Reland presented a Muslim confession of faith, in the Arabic original and in an annotated Latin translation, and then systematically contraverted the various western misconceptions of Islam and the Prophet.1 His text is preceded by an epistle dedicatory and a preface. In the epistle he emphasizes the extent of the Muslim area: this alone is a reason for taking Islam as a serious object of study. The flourishing civilisation of the Arabs in the Middle Ages is an added proof that their religion was not simply the result of human folly, but should be examined in the light of reason. In his preface Reland admits that religions have always attacked each other. They have each created, and been the victims of, vicious campaigns of propaganda. He does not, he stresses, wish to defend Islam, but if it is ever to be attacked effectively this must be done with a true knowledge and understanding of its principles. It is a remarkably rational faith, and thus—he here quotes Ludovico Marracci—all the more attractive to idolators converting to monotheism. Only rarely does Reland express a negative opinion of Islam. Like his predecessors, particularly Edward Pococke to whom he was so indebted, he deplores the Prophet's attitude