The Trouble With Tarek Fatah

On the topic of jihadi terrorism and sharia law, Fatah is a reliable and brave observer. The trouble with Fatah is that, as a practicing (if "secular") Muslim, he is unwilling and/or unable to acknowledge that the problems re Islam stem, not from faulty "modern" interpretations, but from the religion's holy writ and from the requirement to follow the example of Islam's "perfect" founder. Fatah always feels the need to protect a core of the religion that he believes is holy and pure and true. Hence this bit of poppycock, from his latest Toronto Sun column:

In 1974, the Cornell-educated Indian Islamic scholar Hashim Amir-Ali translated the Qur’an and published it in its chronological order, the way it was revealed, as against how it was collated many years after the death of Prophet Muhammad. 

He wrote in the preamble: 

“The Qur’an is read parrot-like in most Muslim homes. … The religion that passes for Islam today – the Islam of the masses and of the ruling classes in every Muslim country – is the Islam of the Middle Ages and not exactly the Islam of the Qur’an or the Prophet. … The lines of thought laid down a thousand years ago have vitiated the entire course of Muslim thought and history. It is this legacy of the past that has to be faced today.”

Wrong.  The Islam of today is exactly the Islam of the Qur'an and the Prophet (a religion that was established in--yes--the Middle Ages). And, more than anything, that is the problem.