Top 108 Quotes & Sayings by Reza Aslan

Every single interview I have ever done on TV or in print says I'm a Muslim.

In the 5,000-year history of Jewish thought, the notion of a God-man is completely anathema to everything Judaism stands for.

It is the job of the historian to say what is likely, and of faith to say what is possible.

Whether you're talking about MSNBC or Fox or CNN, it's all about getting enough interest out there, sensationalizing the story in such a way that people are compelled to tune in.

The Revolutionary Guard controls almost everything in Iran, and this is hurting the people.

'Zeal' is essentially a compromising devotion to God, a commitment to cleansing the Holy Land of all foreign and pagan presences and to re-establish the kingdom of David as God had intended.

The key to recognizing who Jesus was is to recognize this fundamental truth: He was a Jew.

The truth of the matter is that when you write about religion like I do, you're writing about something that people take very seriously.

My biography of Jesus is probably the first popular biography that does not use the New Testament as its primary source material.

I am a scholar of religions with four degrees, including one in the New Testament and fluency in Biblical Greek, who has been studying the origins of Christianity for two decades, who also happens to be Muslim.

There's no question that homophobia is rampant among the world's 1.5 billion Muslims - but that doesn't negate the fact that there are huge groups of Muslims who have easily reconciled their faith and sexual orientation, like LGBT people in other faith communities.

There's nothing more distasteful than an academic having to, like, trot out his credentials. You really come off as a jerk when you do that.

Whether or not you believe that after three days of being dead and entombed, Jesus got up and walked out of his own accord, what you cannot argue about is the fervent belief of the followers that this happened.

The Muslim community is completely fractured - it doesn't really exist anymore; the only place it does exist is online.

I have watched Muslims chant 'Death to America!' on the streets of Tehran, then privately beg me to help them get a visa to the United States.

Nobody, absolutely nobody, straps a bomb on their body because they were recruited from the Internet. It takes an enormous amount of personal face-to-face contact and time in order to recruit a young person into the cause of jihad.

The more I started studying the historical Jesus, the man who lived 2,000 years ago... the more I started to realize that there was this chasm between the historical Jesus and the Jesus that I had been taught about in church.

The idea of literalism in the Bible is a very new phenomenon. In many ways, it's a product of the scientific revolution.

There's only one reason to be crucified under the Roman Empire, and that is for treason or sedition. Crucifixion, we have to understand, was not actually a form of capital punishment for Rome. In fact, it was often the case that the criminal would be killed first and then crucified.

Religion is never going to go away, and anyone who thinks it will doesn't understand what religion is. It is a language to describe the experience of human nature, so for as long as people struggle to describe what it means to be alive, it will be a ready-made language to express those feelings.

When you forcefully suppress religious nationalism, you radicalize it.

Is it possible that Jesus, unlike 98 percent of his fellow Jews, was literate and educated? Yes, it's possible.

There were dozens of people who walked through the Holy Land claiming to be the Messiah, curing the sick, exorcising demons, challenging Rome, gathering followers. In a way, there's nothing unique about what Jesus did. In fact, many of these so-called false Messiahs we know by name.

I wouldn't call myself a Christian because I do not believe that Jesus is God, nor do I believe that he ever thought that he was God, or that he ever said that he was God.

I believe in God, which means I am open to some absurd possibilities. But I understand the power of that faith, and I understand the metaphor of that belief.

I'm interested in the origins of the religious experience, how the history of religion has evolved over the last umpteen thousand years, and where religiosity is going in the future. I think that's a topic I've been chewing on for a few years; I would love to eventually work on and produce a book out of it.

Islamophobia has become so mainstream in this country that Americans have been trained to expect violence against Muslims - not excuse it, but expect it. And that's happened because you have an Islamophobia industry in this country devoted to making Americans think there's an enemy within.

You can be a follower of Jesus and not necessarily be a Christian.

Few Iranians these days go through the fiction of calling themselves 'Persian.' Calling yourself Persian is a way of distancing themselves from Iran.

The Jews integrated themselves into American life to the point that the argument that the Jews aren't American sounded so stupid, that people stopped thinking it.

American Muslims - young American Muslims in particular - are starting to understand that unless they are willing to stand up for all the other oppressed communities in this country, including those discriminated against for their gender or sexuality, then no one will stand up for them.

Religion doesn't make people bigots. People are bigots and they use religion to justify their ideology.

Mike Huckabee and indeed many of the Christian conservatives in the U.S. have far more in common with the Muslim Brotherhood than they'd like to admit, in that all of them very much want to see a role of religion in society.

I think if you place Jesus firmly in the historical context... you can make very educated hypotheses and guesses about how he lived.

Many poets in Iran have learned to speak almost a secret language, where political issues are talked about in allegorical ways.

Many of the prophets of Jesus's time were thought to just be mad men, just sort of crazy people who were claiming to channel the divine. Perhaps that means we should be a little less judgmental of some of our own crazies talking about God on the corner. They might actually have found a pretty comfortable place in Jesus's time.

The idea that education will lead to a lessening of bigotry is just factually incorrect.

A cosmic war is like a ritual drama in which participants act out on Earth a battle they believe is actually taking place in the heavens.

I'm a person of faith, and the language that I use to define my faith, the symbols and metaphors that I rely upon to express my faith, are those provided by Islam because they make the most sense to me.

Literature offers not just a window into the culture of diverse regions, but also the society, the politics; it's the only place where we can keep track of ideas.

What the printing press is to Christianity in the 16th century, that's what the Internet is doing to Islam now. It has opened up the monopoly over the interpretation of Islam that used to solely belong to the religious class.

It is no exaggeration to say that Syria holds the key for nearly all of America's foreign policy goals in the Middle East. As Syria goes, so goes the region.

In the history of the prophetic biblical canon that starts with Genesis, the Koran is by far the most tolerant of the views of other religions.

The New Testament is not a historical document.

Anyone who says that Iran will commit suicide with its nuclear power is a moron and has no business in discussion.

The west is very concerned and actually afraid because the media is not informing them. There are too many moderate Muslims who are trying to whitewash the fears and concerns of the West. It's time for us to face reality - nobody is against Muslims. When I'm speaking about this situation, it's about Islamic doctrine. Islamic doctrine promotes violence and hatred against non Muslims. 60% of the Koran is dedicated to cursing and spreading hatred and violence against non-Muslims who are called 'Kaffir'.

If you ask a Saudi Imam why women in Saudi Arabia can't drive, he'll say, 'Because Islam demands it.' But that's absurd, because - first of all - Islam demands no such thing; and secondly, the only country in the world in which women can't drive is Saudi Arabia. The inability to understand the difference between a cultural practice and religious belief is shocking among self-described intellectuals.

Well, to be clear, I am a scholar of religions with four degrees, including one in the New Testament and fluency in Biblical Greek who has been studying the origins of Christianity for two decades who also happens to be Muslim.

Religion, it must be understood, is not faith. Religion is the story of faith.

We have to remember that the United States has certain principles, certain values that bind us all together, that make us all American. And if we allow those values, those rights to be rescinded for one group of individuals, then we are essentially opening the door to having all of our rights, all of our privileges rescinded.

As with all journeys, the Way has an end, though it should not be imagined as a straight road leading to a fixed destination but rather as a majestic mountain whose peak conceals the presence of God. There are, of course, many paths to the summit-some better than others. But because every path eventually leads to the same destination, which path one takes is irrelevant.

It took many years to cleanse Arabia of its “false idols.” It will take many more to cleanse Islam of its new false idols-bigotry and fanaticism-worshipped by those who have replaced Muhammad's original vision of tolerance and unity with their own ideals of hatred and discord. But the cleansing is inevitable, and the tide of reform cannot be stopped. The Islamic Reformation is already here. We are all living in it.

Over the last few years, the Islamic world has produced more female presidents and prime ministers than both Europe and North America combined.

Bill Maher is right to condemn religious practices that violate fundamental human rights. Religious communities must do more to counter extremist interpretations of their faith. But failing to recognize that religion is embedded in culture — and making a blanket judgment about the world’s second largest religion — is simply bigotry.

Religion is, by definition, interpretation; and by definition, all interpretations are valid. However, some interpretations are more reasonable than others.

Islam is more than a religion, it's much more than a religion, it's a way of life, it is a one party political system that has a very elaborate legal system that can put you to death if you leave it.

There's this notion that Republicans are the party of Jesus and the Democrats are the Godless party. Let's be clear for a minute. One party wants to give health insurance to the poor and the weak and the dispossessed, and one party wants to take away that health insurance and give tax breaks to rich people. You tell me: which side would Jesus fall on that argument?

But perhaps the most important innovation in the doctrine of jihad was its outright prohibition of all but strictly defensive wars. “Fight in the way of God those who fight you,” the Quran says, “but do not begin hostilities; God does not like the aggressor” (2:190). Elsewhere the Quran is more explicit: “Permission to fight is given only to those who have been oppressed ... who have been driven from their homes for saying, 'God is our Lord' ” (22:39; emphasis added).

Islam doesn't promote violence or peace. Islam is just a religion, and like every religion in the world, it depends on what you bring to it. If you're a violent person, your Islam, your Judaism, your Christianity, your Hinduism, is going to be violent.

[Islam] is the dynamic conviction that a person's spiritual and worldly responsibilities are one and the same, that an individuals duty to the community is indistinguishable from his or her duty to God.