This is a book about a proud, at times overconfident tradition that had its cosmology of truth shattered by a confrontation not only with a more powerful civilization but also with a new stage in human history. It is about how that tradition has responded, sometimes turning inward to defend its integrity and sometimes adopting the novel and the strange. This is a book about how Sunni Islam was constructed and reconstructed, about the scriptures on which it was built and the ulama who built it.
