Originally published in 1981.

This collection of essays by one of the best known contemporary Muslim scholars writing in English covers many facets of Islamic life and thought

Part 1 Law and Society; Chapter 1 Religion and Secularism, Their Meaning and Manifestation in Islamic History; Chapter 2 The Concept and Reality of Freedom in Islam and Islamic Civilisation; Chapter 3 The Shar?'ah and Changing Historical Conditions; Chapter 4 The Immutable Principles of Islam and Westernised Education in the Islamic World; Part 2 Cultural and Intellectual Life; Chapter 5 A Typological Study of Islamic Culture; Chapter 6 A Panorama of Classical Islamic Intellectual Life; Part 3 The Sciences; Chapter 7 The Cosmologies of Aristotle and Ibn S?n?: a Comparative Study in the Light of Islamic Doctrines; Chapter 8 The Meaning of Nature in Various Perspectives in Islam; Chapter 9 Hermes and Hermetic Writings in the Islamic World; Chapter 10 From the Alchemy of J?bir to the Chemistry of R?z?; Chapter 11 The Study of Natural History in the Islamic World; Part 4 Philosophy; Chapter 12 The Pertinence of Studying Islamic Philosophy Today; Chapter 13 Islamic Philosophy - Reorientation or Re-understanding; Chapter 14 The Life, Doctrines and Significance of ?adr al-D?n Sh?r?z? (Mull? ?adr?); Chapter 15 Mull? ?adr? as a Source for the History of Islamic Philosophy; Chapter 16 Mull? ?adr? and the Doctrine of the Unity of Being; Chapter 17 The Polarisation of Being; Part 5 Sufism; Chapter 18 The Interior Life in Islam; Chapter 19 Contemplation and Nature in the Perspective of Sufism;