0722 | Questioning Islam | Peter Townsend

Over the centuries during which thinkers have challenged Islamic claims, many thousands of authors have attempted to write books to help the average person respond to what Muslims say. It is lamentable then, that with so much experience to draw on, Townsend has managed to produce one of the worst books in the genre.

Unlike, Townsend, I’m going to nail my colours to the mast at the start. I’m a Christian and, as such, have beliefs which fundamentally disagree with Islam. In addition, I’ve spent over a decade living in the Middle East and have engaged with Muslims of many varieties. In other words, there is very little in Townsend’s book that I’m not already informed about, and I do not critique it on the basis of any pro-Islamic stance whatsoever.

From that vantage point, I recommend that you avoid his book and find an alternative. Anything at all by Gordon Nickel (tons of whose writing he’s made freely available on academia.edu) would be an excellent start as would Nabeel Qureshi. For those wanting a look at the historicity, try Did Muhammad Exist by Robert Spencer or, if you want something more academic, Robert Hoyland’s excellent work Seeing Islam as Others Saw It is also worthwhile, if pricey. Incidentally, Townsend lifts heavily from Hoyland with no acknowledgement at all which is disappointing. Townsend’s work is flawed and I would not recommend it at all. Here’s why.

In his introduction, Townsend makes a number of claims about his approach which any cursory reading will reveal are simply not true. For example, he states

I rely very heavily on primary Islamic texts in making my arguments

p. 3

In actual fact, despite quoting from Islamic sources, his arguments are not based on what they actually say but rather unreferenced material and his own presuppositions. For example, Muslim scholars claim that the Qur’an was perfectly preserved through memorisation. But instead of actually quoting Muslim sources to challenge this, he instead says

It is … highly doubtful that any one person memorized the entire text.

pp. 57 – 58

Now, while this may be true, it does the polemicist no favours because no Muslim will concede this. They believe that Allah has the power to perfectly preserve the Qur’an through memorisation. From a Muslim perspective, Townsend’s argument is particularly easy to refute. This is a typical example of the kind of issues you’ll run into if you try to employ the responses Townsend describes. A quick Internet search and you’re armed with Islamically-sound counter arguments that need dealing with. Sadly, he doesn’t ackowledge these.

In fact, as you read your way through Townsend’s work, you start to realise that his actual approach is the following: quote Islamic sources because that apparently makes your argument watertight, but then wildly misinterpret them to bend them to your agenda so you can get your point across. He doesn’t seem to understand that this approach undermines his credibility.

Take his logic here for example:

Those who would like to accuse me of thinking up slanders against the Muslim religion should, therefore, first examine whether I accurately quoted these sources. If I did, and I am utterly convinced that this is the case, their problem should not be with this author but with Islam itself.

p. 161

Sadly, this is meaningless. Accurate quotes are nothing without accurate interpretation; Townsend has a tendancy to derive inaccurate interpretations from accurately quoted sources.

A case in point, is how long it took Allah to finish the work of creation. Townsend quotes Qur’an 10:3, then, predictably, quotes Qur’an 41:9-12 and then, equally predictably says that there’s a contradiction in these two accounts.

Various Muslim writers have tried to resolve this contradiction … There is, however, once again nothing within the text to support this … the only reason why one would read the text in this way would be to resolve a contradiction.

p. 83

Townsend seems completely blind to the fact that by noting that people interpret a text for their own particular purposes, he might suffer from the same weakness. And he does so constantly. From my own cursory research, I discovered other verses which lend weight to the Islamic position he is so dismissive of here. Perhaps because they don’t support his position, he chooses not to quote them.

Unfortunately, it’s not only his selective use of sources that renders the book less than useful to the polemicist in the street but the bias clearly evident in his tone throughout.

On page 12, he says

My intention is … to present a dispassionate examination of a belief system.

You be the judge of how “dispassionate” Townsend actually is.

The austere non-miracle working figure of the Qur’an [Muhammad] has now turned into someone who could easily get his own top-rated miracle show on daytime TV. If this is not evidence of … falsification … I don’t know what is.

p. 34

But wait a minute. Isn’t Allah supposed to be the author of this book? Why does he not simply come out and tell us? This is a classic slip up by Muhammad (or whoever else wrote the Qur’an)…

p. 67

In a rather delicious irony, the menu of hell provides us with one of many opportunities to prove a contradiction in the Qur’an.

p. 85

Perhaps those who are so keen on the search for miracles in the Qur’an should cease looking for scientific miracles and instead concentrate on time travel.

p. 96

How good it must have been for Muhammad to have Allah on-call to constantly justify his questionable actions.

p. 145

These are not the writings of a man who is “dispassionate” about his subject. He has allowed his very clear passion to cloud his judgment of what is an appropriate way to communicate his message. That is a shame, because it belies a disrespect that has no place in interfaith dialogue. To employ sarcasm bordering on mockery in a book which claims to be neutral in its evaluation of the evidence is to completely undermine your position. Even worse is that Townsend models this to his readers as if it is somehow acceptable. It isn’t.

I won’t bore you with a detailed list of the typos, incorrect references, contradictions in his own writing and flat out misunderstandings of Islamic texts that litter the book throughout. As far as I can tell, Questioning Islam is self published. At least, if anyone did edit it, they’ve not been so bold as to own up to it on the cover. What it needs is a good edit and to be reissued in another, more polemically sound edition.

Townsend’s tagline is “Tough Questions & Honest Answers”. With Islam gaining air time in media outlets who do anythin but subject it to questioning, it can hardly be a more appropriate time for a book which helps us do this. Sadly, the answers Peter Townsend provides stretch the definition of honest in more ways than one. Only the most discerning reader will come away from this book with anything that is actually going to withstand a Muslim response.