Islam Rediscovered
23. Conversion: An Intellectual Transformation
~ 400 ~
the author and that was the choice of title for the
book. I felt that it might more justifiably have been
called
The Politicisation of Conversion
. This would
have underscored the necessity to avoid the
sensationalism of giving a political hue to
something which was, after all, a natural reality.
What is conversion? Usually conversion is equated
with proselytism. But conversion, in its broadest
sense, is much further-reaching, in that it is a
universal principle of nature. It is a historical
process—healthy and inexorable—and attempting
to put a stop to it would be like trying to put a stop
to history itself. And who in this world has the
power to do so? Conversion, in reality, is the birth
of an entirely new entity resulting from the
encounter between old and new schools of thought.
This is a universal law established by nature itself.
The study of human history reveals that a certain
process is always at work, which Karl Marx had
wrongly called dialectical materialism. More rightly
this is a dialogue-conversion process. That is, when
two systems of thought clash with each other, an
intellectual revolution ensues.
