God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe, 570-1215 by David Levering Lewis

Feb 18, 2009 Elijah Meeks rated it 4 of 5 stars

While the book suffers in its early history of Islam, God's Crucible does an excellent job of describing Muslim Spain and the effect it had on the formation of modern Europe and the Catholic Church. What I find most appealing about this book is that it places Islamic history within the existing framework of Medieval European history. What's especially useful in understanding early Islam is Lewis' referral to the state of contemporaneous European and Christian history and theology. Most interesti...more

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Sep 20, 2010 Alex Telander rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-read-in-2008

In a time when Western involvement in the Middle East seems almost certain to last for the rest of this generation's lives, it is more important than ever to understand why. The Middle East is still a very misunderstood place, of whose deep and complex history most have little inkling; a history without which the development of disciplines like medicine, mathematics and astronomy would be severely retarded. God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe, 570-1215 by David Levering Lewis, a profe...more In a time when Western involvement in the Middle East seems almost certain to last for the rest of this generation's lives, it is more important than ever to understand why. The Middle East is still a very misunderstood place, of whose deep and complex history most have little inkling; a history without which the development of disciplines like medicine, mathematics and astronomy would be severely retarded. God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe, 570-1215 by David Levering Lewis, a professor at New York University, is a book that takes readers back to the very beginning of Islam, and the specific instances that led to its creation.

Lewis begins with the fall and breakup of the Roman Empire, explaining how the western known world devolved from a seemingly unstoppable empire to crumbling and divided countries. Lewis sets the stage with the western chunk of the Roman Empire being overrun by invading barbarian hordes, and the more successful eastern part consisting of Byzantium and nearby Persia. At a time of growing interest in Christian and Jewish beliefs, along with the less popular Zoroastrian faith, as well as other smaller cults, the Middle East seemed ready for a new prophet. In the beginning prophets are rarely seen as the great, world-altering people that they are, and Lewis points out that such was the case with Muhammad. He gives us a fascinating look into a religion and culture that has captivated and converted the hearts and minds of a considerable portion of the world population.

Along with the development of the growing faith of Islam, Lewis goes into detail on the genesis of the Muslim Empire, as it swept across the western world country by country, converting and conquering, ruthless in its unstoppable pace. Lewis does a good job of providing a quick history lesson of each people that the Muslim army faced in its conquest, but fails somewhat in going into depth on the complex culture of the Muslim Empire as it grew and developed over the centuries, focusing more on the important battles, winners and losers. Nevertheless, God's Crucible is a very important book to the modern world, one that at the very least gives some context to the status quo.

For more book reviews and exclusive author interviews, go to BookBanter.(less)

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Aug 07, 2008 Patrick rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: non-fiction

We are constantly bombarded by extreme portrayals of Islam, and associated references to the "perennial" conflicts among Islam, Judaism and Christianity. When I heard about "God's Crucible" and its promise to explain the history of Islam and depict a period of cooperation among religions in Europe, I was very enthusiastic. I finally got a library copy of it, and have now managed to plow through it.

For the first third of the book, I felt like I was reading prosopography - it is dominated by a li...more

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Mar 15, 2013 Harold Johnson rated it 5 of 5 stars

I gave this book top rating because it is a very well written popular history of the very civilized society which the Muslims produced in Spain during the early and mid middle ages and the relationship of this society with the then much more primitive society of feudal Europe.

Before I moved to Palermo I was aware that Spain, or most of it, had been Muslim at one point, but I knew nothing of the real history of the period. It was fascinating to discover just how the Muslims had taken over the old...more I gave this book top rating because it is a very well written popular history of the very civilized society which the Muslims produced in Spain during the early and mid middle ages and the relationship of this society with the then much more primitive society of feudal Europe.

Before I moved to Palermo I was aware that Spain, or most of it, had been Muslim at one point, but I knew nothing of the real history of the period. It was fascinating to discover just how the Muslims had taken over the old Alexandrian greek centers in Egypt, Syria, and other near eastern lands as well as the formidable and ancient old Persian empire with its civilization and learning. The author demonstrates how the western world, that is Rome and its eastern counterpart Byzantium had worn themselves out as well as the Persians in their attempt to take it all over, and were thus vulnerable to the primitive Arab societies that came pouring out of the Arabian peninsula to take their new religion to the west conquering everything in their path. The military might and the vigor of this new people plus the addition of the learned peoples in Persia, Egypt, Syria thus produced the world of islam with its emphasis on scholarship and learning, very different from the Islamic world of today.

Mr Lewis writes vividly and memorably of the men who ruled in Spain and what they accomplished there with their extraordinary learning, their architecture, and their ability to live with people of very different religious faith, that is the Christian and the Jews. It was thru the contact of scholars and people of Europe with the Muslims in Spain that the civilization of Rome and especially of ancient Greece began to enter Europe and started its awakening from the long night of the Dark Ages.

I really liked Lewis' comments about feudalism which "turned Europe into a vast protection racket wherein the strong obliged the weak to pay for being protected." Having now studied the history of Sicily which had a similar long period of civilising Muslim rule from the 9th to the 11th centuries with its emphasis on scholarship, agricultural advancements which benefitted small landowners, and a strong bureaucracy followed by the subsequent takeover by the Latin Christian Europeans who returned to feudalism with its terrible suppressive effect on commerce and individual development, I am quite in sympathy with his view of feudalism as a massive protection racket, a kind of legalized Mafia.

How it all ended is indeed a sad story. The world of Islam slowly began to be taken over by fundamentalist fanatics and it was the internecine warfare between groups of differing faiths in the Muslim religion which finally spelled their doom in Spain and also Sicily. That glorious early flowering of an advanced culture was then extinguished and unfortunately has not returned to this day in most of the world of Islam. We in the west, including Sicily, have all been much more fortunate, but that is another story for another day.

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Jan 13, 2013 Ichsan rated it 3 of 5 stars

Tak dapat disangkal, sebagian besar sejarah memang ditulis para pemenang, dan dalam pertempuran Poitiers, pemenang itu kaum "Europenses". Tapi, di mata David Lewis, dengan "menang" di Poitiers, Eropa kehilangan 300 tahun kesempatan untuk lebih awal mencapai tingkat ekonomi, ilmiah, dan budaya yang dicapainya pada abad ke-13. Pertempuran Poitiers malah menjadi momen penting bagi penciptaan Eropa yang terbelakang, terbalkanisasi, dan terpecah-pecah. Juga Eropa yang menarik garis pemisah tajam deng...more

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Jan 12, 2010 William rated it 4 of 5 stars

What could have been did not happen. What did happen should not have been.

There is a keen sense of historical disappointment that David Levering Lewis weaves through "God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe, 570 to 1215." If only the barbaric French Christians lost the Battle of Poitiers (Tours) to those advanced Arab invaders!

OK, this probably got your attention. Many narratives that look at "the sweep of history" are unabashedly "pro-Western." No matter how barbaric Medieval Europe was,...more What could have been did not happen. What did happen should not have been.

There is a keen sense of historical disappointment that David Levering Lewis weaves through "God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe, 570 to 1215." If only the barbaric French Christians lost the Battle of Poitiers (Tours) to those advanced Arab invaders!

OK, this probably got your attention. Many narratives that look at "the sweep of history" are unabashedly "pro-Western." No matter how barbaric Medieval Europe was, a case is made that this "conflict of many smaller states" was the competitive incubator of technological and cultural advancement while Islam could only offer stasis and eventual backwardness. Lewis doesn't buy it. He contends that cultural, commercial and scientific advancement, as well as tolerance of religious minorities, were the advantages Islam had to offer. His lab for this proof: Medieval Spain. His basis for comparison: Merovingian/Carolingian France.

Rather than succumb to "linear history," Lewis likes to dwell at its "hinge points," when things could have turned out differently if a factor was present instead of absent. Had a more assertive Ethiopian power maintained its grip on the Red Sea coastline of Arabia, perhaps islam never would have gained its first, fragile foothold when Mohammed experienced his revelation. But no greater power was there to enforce a religious orthodoxy, so in the barren desert a seed with portentous consequence was planted and took root.

The explosive rise of Islam had less to do with Arab ferocity and more to do with power filling a vacuum. Byzantium and Sassanid Persia were exhausted after a century of constant warfare, providing no force to contain the Moslem sweep coming out of the worthless wastes of Arabia--a land both "superpowers" ignored. Here Lewis lays down several chapters on Mohammed's life and the early history of Islam, the Ummayid Caliphate and the schism between Shiite and Sunni. The fact that Islam could not build a "second Roman empire" ringing the Mediterranean had more to do with political conflicts within the Caliphate and less to do with any valiant defense by a fragmented and barbaric "Christendom."

With the presence of this foreign "other" pushing into southern France, the birth of European identity came at an unpromising time. The more able strongmen who really ruled Merovingian France were able to hold their own against Islam's waning tide, but Lewis grants them little credit. The Arab failure to conquer leaves France and Church enough breathing space to make common cause, and in the simple act of building a polity turn a speed bump into a low wall.

Might makes right as Charlemagne spreads Christianity at swordpoint through Germany. (It was easier than trying to do the same in Islamic Spain.) But the peaceful pursuit of knowledge becomes a barren sprout in Charlemagne's court, while across the Pyrenees it reaches full flower under a kinder, tolerant, more multi-cultural Islamic caliphate.

Nothing lasts forever. Eventually orthodoxy and intolerance will hobble the strength of Islamic Spain, just as surely as it strengthens the petty Christian kings in the Iberian north country. The rest of the story goes downhill from there.

Lewis writes his book with a rich prose style deeply laced with well-chosen metaphors that describe much in a phrase or a sentence. Just the quality of his writing is enough to tempt a reader out of his complacent field of favorite books to try something new or different.

But Lewis will challenge the reader to reconsider the "Cross vs. Crescent" argument. Taken from the Western view, Christianity's survival against the Islamic tide is a cultural as well as a religious victory, seemingly inevitable. But history is a long and twisted path with many branches where the tale could have turned left instead of right if something different happened at the right moment. Maybe Europe would have been better off under a caliph instead of a king. Lewis raises this question with a skeptic's courage. Sadly, readers may answer this question with an understanding of today's headlines rather than yesterday's facts, making Lewis' book a hard sell indeed.

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Nov 23, 2008 Ray rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

If you're truly interested in this period of Islam and Europe, this book is fine. The audiobook edition suffers from an absence of maps to visualize the areas being discussed, and many of the names of Muslim leaders and long gone historical areas were unfamiliar to me, and therefore sections of this book were difficult to retain. It reads like a history textbook, and in audiobook form, a lack of supplemental information and visual aids makes it more difficult than a text version.

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Feb 12, 2009 David Roycroft rated it 4 of 5 stars

Reading this book filled a huge hole in my knowledge -- about Al Andalus, those parts of the Iberian Peninsula governed by Arab Muslims, and trans-Pyrenees Europe between 570 and 1215. The author argues that Roman preoccupation with the Sassanid Empire in pre-Islamic Iran created a power vacuum that allowed the Islamic Empire to flourish. He focuses on Al Andalus and its conflict with Christian trans-Pyrenees Europe and argues that this conflict and its resolution set the stage for relations bet...more

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Aug 03, 2011 Andre rated it 5 of 5 stars

Holy smokes that was a great book!!! It has a lot of great words in it that made the reading very challenging. I was a little annoyed about the amount of times that I had to go to the dictionary at first but as I read I began to enjoy learning tons of new words while getting one of the best history lessons that I have ever had.

You may be asking yourself what is a great word and why does this clown have to look so many of them up? Here is are a couple examples: Talmud - collection of Jewish law a...more

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Nov 21, 2009 Alli rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-2009, theme-2009-islam, islam, history

I found this to be a very good book, very well researched and presented. I've seen in other reviews complaints that it is too scholarly, and hard to read if you don't have any historical background in that era, but i thought it was a very good read. This is a time period I think few Westerners (outside of continental Europe anyway) actually are aware of, an important part of history that ends in Spain at the same time Columbus made his way across the Atlantic.

With all the focus on Islam in the...more

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Feb 07, 2013 Kaiser Dias rated it 5 of 5 stars

A história do Islã clara e detelhada
O livro é muito bom. O autor explica desde a guerra entre o Império Romano Oriental (Bizantino) e o Império Sassânida (Persa) até o colapso do Império Árabe, passando pelo declínio de Constantinopla, a conquista e ocaso da Espanha muçulmana e a fundação da França.
Tudo é descrito em detalhes mas com clareza e simplicidade.
O único porém é o capítulo final que é bastante corrido em comparação com os outros. Fica parecendo que o escritor se encheu do tema e quis f...more

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Mar 23, 2011 Andrew rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: history

How did Europe and the Islamic world as we now recognize it come to be? How did they influence each other's evolution? What are the roots of competition between Islam and Chritianity? How did they interact with Judaism?

These driving questions are addressed in this extraordinarily researched book. Some of the best sections describe Mohammad and the rist of Islam, the Islamic occupation of Iberia, and the rise of Charlemagne and he relationship with the Catholic Church.

The battles are horrible, bu...more

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Apr 17, 2012 Sarah Bringhurst Familia rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-i-aspire-to-own, history, europe, islam, christianity, middle-east

I'm constantly on the lookout for books that I want my homeschooled kids to read in high school so that they'll have a good understanding of Middle Eastern/Islamic history and its relation to Europe and Western history. And this is a great example of a book I will impose upon my now-seven-year-old in about ten years.

Lewis' prose is elegant and illuminating, although his encyclopedic coverage of so many historical figures during the first half of the book is a little overwhelming. He paints a viv...more

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Dec 10, 2012 Bibi shakoor rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is an excellent book documenting the rise and spread of Islam in Europe from the early eighth to the coming of the Crusades in the twelfth century. Most interesting is Islam's impact on Spain and its contributions in the fields of Science, Architecture, Mathematics and Philosophy. For the lovers of military history, it contains some of the most important battles. Included, is also information on the numerous Islamic Caliphate rulers, the enlightened and the despotic. A very enlightening boo...more

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Sep 12, 2009 Meri rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: lifelong-learners, middle-east, history

This book covers the rise of Western Europe and the Muslim Middle East in counterpoint, beginning with the civilizations of Rome and Persia and continuing through the halcyon days of Al-Andalus, a period of mutual prosperity in Muslim occupied Spain. To say that David Levering Lewis synthesizes large quantities of information would be putting it mildly. This book, though well written, is packed with information, and hundreds of years of history may be covered in a few sentences. The passages abo...more

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Jul 06, 2009 Toonvanelst rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: medieval-history

God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe is not a very good history book. Read it only when you have a deeper knowledge of this period of history or you will end up with a biased view of the 700 years described.

My 'danger' flag went up from the moment I read the part titled 'about the author'. D.L. Lewis previously wrote a book about antisemitism in France and British/European Imperialism/Colonialism vs African/Muslim resistance. With a background like that, you can't seriously write about...more God's Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe is not a very good history book. Read it only when you have a deeper knowledge of this period of history or you will end up with a biased view of the 700 years described.

My 'danger' flag went up from the moment I read the part titled 'about the author'. D.L. Lewis previously wrote a book about antisemitism in France and British/European Imperialism/Colonialism vs African/Muslim resistance. With a background like that, you can't seriously write about the crusades or the Reconquista, or you should be a very conscious and objective historian and forget all about the other periods, make tabula rasa and start all over again. Lewis seems to mix up eras, and that is unacceptable for any historian, certainly when you tackle a touchy subject like this.

Other than this serious flaw in historical practice, the book is also very dense and even an engaged reader might lose the narrative very easily through the endless summary of facts and names. Even a trained historian like me struggles to keep track of the main characters and events. That Lewis wants to bury his reader under learned words and crafty sentences does not help at all. Except for the lesson that the Christian West supposedly was backward and the Muslim East religiously tolerant and sophisticated, the other lines of thought don't come across clear.

I couldn't shake of the feeling that the author was completely siding with the Muslim occupation (something you tend to forget when reading this book: the Muslims are the aggressors in the conflict, not the other way around). For example, when Christian kings would remove a competitor, or even indulge in fratricide, Lewis opens up his full register of condescending words. When a Muslim ruler has his opponents beheaded -and yes, they did kill off family too-, it gets nothing more than a dry notification. It gets even worse, violence by a Muslim ruler is often considered a necessary political instrument, but how is it different than what the Christian rulers did? The act is the same, but the description is not. One is political astute, the other a base murderer. To me both acts are what they are: political murder. And as a historian, I wisely keep my personal opinion to myself. Lewis makes it a very black and white account of a much more subtle history.

My advice: Read other books first (like A vanished world. Medieval Spain's golden age of enlightenment by Chris Lowney). Then, when you read this book, keep the bias in mind and don't get overwhelmed by Lewis' Chrysostom speech. (less)

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Jul 21, 2009 Hotavio rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-on-france, books-on-spain, books-on-the-mid-east, books-on-religion

God's Crucible combines my fascination with history and religion in a chronicle of the early medieval battle over Spain. The lay person is unaware that Spain was controlled by the Umayyad dynasty, the result of a prince who fled from a dynastic change in the middle east. The result was a pre-Renaissance flowering of culture, intellect, and science in the otherwise devoid medieval Europe.

Lewis also details the forging of a united Germanic peoples beyond the Pyranees mountains of the current Sp...more God's Crucible combines my fascination with history and religion in a chronicle of the early medieval battle over Spain. The lay person is unaware that Spain was controlled by the Umayyad dynasty, the result of a prince who fled from a dynastic change in the middle east. The result was a pre-Renaissance flowering of culture, intellect, and science in the otherwise devoid medieval Europe.

Lewis also details the forging of a united Germanic peoples beyond the Pyranees mountains of the current Spain/France line. Carolingian Franks that soon became backed by the Catholic church successfully ebbed the northward Muslim expansion via the Battle of Poitiers in 732. The Franks launched subsequent efforts, mostly unsuccessful, to penetrate Muslim Iberia.

With both sides in a stalemate, the Spanish kings eventually came unto their own. The result being alliances between petty kingdoms and the formation of a more familiar Castillian Spain. This new Spainiard armed themselves with fanatic zeal and slowly began to push out the fracturing Muslim governance closing a half a millenia of Islamic auspice in Spain. Lewis argues that with the replacement of Islamic rule went virtual religious freedom (subjects were now sometimes forced to convert and often violently), cultural and progress slowed as Separdics were persecuted,and the Umayyad's magnificent architectural cities decayed.

God's Crucible is a mix of names, many unfamiliar and can be difficult to keep straight at times due to the writer's shifting to and from subjects north of Spain and Muslim Iberia. The range of time covered is also extremely large with a span from the Roman Empire circa the triumvirate and the battle with the Parthians to the rise of Islam and its capture of the Sassanid capital and former Roman territories. I feel that much of this is precursor to the history in scrutiny and was often covered in too much detail. Though, it is of course too important to leave out altogether as it sets up the theme of East versus West that perpetuates throughout the book (and history). To keep the names and times straight, Lewis has multiple addendums, including lineage and succession charts for the relevant kingdoms and a glossary of the Arabic terminology making the book valuable in quick research.

Among some of the more interesting tidbits of information provided by the book: Matamoros is literally "kill Moors" (Moor being the general name for the Arabs who dominated Iberia). A spectral St. James was actually believed to have taken up armor for the Christians in some of the religious battles over land. Algebra was brought over to Spain, via the Muslims as al Jabr in the ninth century. (less)

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Apr 17, 2009 Monte rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: history-general

This superb portrayal by NYU history professor Lewis of the fraught half-millennium during which Islam and Christianity uneasily coexisted on the continent just beginning to be known as Europe displays the formidable scholarship and magisterial ability to synthesize vast quantities of material that won him Pulitzer Prizes for both volumes of W.E.B. Du Bois.In characteristically elegant prose, Lewis shows Islam arising in the power vacuum left by the death throes of the empires of newly Christian...more

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May 16, 2009 Jennie rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: world-history, medieval, trashed-it

The story of the early spread of Islam is very interesting to me, and I was looking forward to reading this. However, David Levering Lewis, the author, seems to be more concerned with showing off his vocabulary and tossing out ridiculous analogies than he is with telling the story. It's a fascinating story that doesn't need fancy vocabulary and stupid analogies.

I forgave this:

"Yet, as much as the eudaemonia experienced in the hearing and the reading of its scriptures, as much even as the confid...more

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Jul 19, 2008 Mollie rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: history

Lewis tries to look at the clash between Islam and Christianity during the Middle Ages from a new (non-Western) perspective. According to European myth-makers and France's epic The Song of Roland, Christianity valiantly and miraculously repelled the barbaric, heathen Saracens and rescued Europe from Islam. According to Lewis, Europe and Dark-Age Christianity stood to gain quite a lot from the tolerant, thriving, accelerated culture of al-Andalus. Arab scholars maintained and translated countless...more

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Jul 11, 2008 Adam rated it 5 of 5 stars

This superb portrayal by NYU history professor Lewis of the fraught half-millennium during which Islam and Christianity uneasily coexisted on the continent just beginning to be known as Europe displays the formidable scholarship and magisterial ability to synthesize vast quantities of material that won him Pulitzer Prizes for both volumes of W.E.B. Du Bois.In characteristically elegant prose, Lewis shows Islam arising in the power vacuum left by the death throes of the empires of newly Christian...more

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Oct 15, 2008 A-ron rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: history, nonfiction

One of the few books recently that I didn't find lying on the street. This one is a Sandy Public Library find.

I like this history. The author engaged me throughout with a narrative that unfolded like a well paced story while maintaining a constant flow of relevant and significant information. I've read a handful of histories recently that were not particularly well organized or engaging, and this one clearly stands out from them. Here however is where I admit to being unqualified to truly rate t...more One of the few books recently that I didn't find lying on the street. This one is a Sandy Public Library find.

I like this history. The author engaged me throughout with a narrative that unfolded like a well paced story while maintaining a constant flow of relevant and significant information. I've read a handful of histories recently that were not particularly well organized or engaging, and this one clearly stands out from them. Here however is where I admit to being unqualified to truly rate this book as a History. Despite spending most of the past year reading history - I have not read enough to assess what in this book is a departure from past history nor what is generally well accepted.

However I am not a complete rube.

Contrary to popular sentiment about this book, the author is not twisting the truth to show Al-Andalus (Islamic Spain) as an enlightened place in which the quality of life and thought was far superior to the countries North of it. The marked superiority of al-Andalus is referenced frequently in many other histories. Its a generally well accepted fact. There are other, finer points that the author makes however about the cultural significance of the Song of Roland and the perception that European Civilization was saved at Poitiers. While these may be important to his thesis, I did not see them as particularly important to my digestion of the history. His "liberal agenda" is hardly distracting.

I suppose this exposes my real purpose for reading this book. I merely wanted to get at the history because prior to the past few years I have been largely ignorant of the sweep of history. I don't care about the particular frame the author is presenting - about the establishment of European/Western Identity within the context of struggle with an Arab Civilization. You'd need a larger book to do that argument justice as the cultural history revolving about this issue extends to the present. And the present situation in the Middle East has much more to do with the recent carving up of the Ottoman Empire than the Song of Roland.

Anyhow, this history was extremely well written, informative, and engaging. I recommend it to any that wish to learn more about the history in Western Europe revolving about Islamic Spain and Charlemagne's Franks circa 800 ad.(less)

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Sep 18, 2008 Evan rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: history buffs

Recommended to Evan by: Harper's Magazine

Of course, there have been a great many books published since 9/11 explaining the Islamic world to us Americans. And most of them acknowledge the limitations of American attention spans by summarizing hundreds if not thousands of years of history in one compact book. This book by Lewis (previously best known for a biography of WEB Dubois) belongs to this trend. That said, he does a fine job of it and far exceeds the 'why do THEY hate us so much?' mold of much of the extant literature by integrat...more

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Jul 04, 2010 Chin rated it 3 of 5 stars

Powerful read. Why am I drawn to this ancient times is perplexing? I am rather astounded on the brief section on Muhammed and his beginnings ... his call From GOD to tell the people, came out of his silent meditation.
It is interesting how the precepts were completely misconstrued and twisted once he was gone.
i have not finished this read, there is not much time in summer = That is why the low rating?

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Aug 27, 2010 Milton rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Yes

I always was curious about the period in history when Spain was controlled by the Moors and this book answered many questions for me. I like the way Mr, Lewis gave told Andalusia's history from both perspectives as well as showing how the politics of the peninsula affected the Muslim world as a whole. A well written and interesting book of history.

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Aug 12, 2008 Zoe rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people interested in Medieval Europe and Islamic history

Shelves: history, middle-east

This was a fabulous history of the interaction between European and Islamic cultures. While I've heard of the Song of Roland, I've never read it, and this book put that epic into context, basically analyzing its cultural significance the way that I might do the same with a contemporary film such as "Gladiator" or "Man on Fire".
The Islamic civilization in Iberia was generally religiously tolerant because that was politically expedient. The "European" culture on the other side of the Pyrenees was...more

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Dec 09, 2009 Marilaine rated it 3 of 5 stars

This book was heavy with good information about Muslim influence on Europe.
However Lewis's writing style leaves much to be desired. Many times I could not follow what he was saying because he switched back to previous people and times without giving a clue that he was doing so.
Also, his prose was much too ... well here's an example: speaking of Ibn Rushd "He died two years shy of the new century and six years after the failure of that disputatious, lumberingly lethal cavalcade commanded by...more

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Aug 25, 2009 Jesse Ynclan rated it 4 of 5 stars

Plenty of information, with good research. However the writing style was very tough too read. A scholar on Islam in Europe can follow the names, dates, and references that are found on every line. An average scholar, better have a dictionary and a history book close by...you will need it.

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Sep 10, 2012 Lisa Faye rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: unfinished

Far too textbook like and completely un-engaging. I found it impossible to focus on what I was reading and overwhelmed with long unfamiliar names. I think I need to start with something a little easier before I jump into this kind of a history text.

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Aug 10, 2011 Yuliani Liputo rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: penerjemah

Covering a wide and large historical background, to look into the influence of Islam in the shaping of Europe as a civilization and culture, this book is not an easy read at all. Full of difficult words and complex sentences. Horrible to translate.

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