Jamal al-Din al-Afghani

Al-Afghani travelled from Kabul and Istanbul to Cairo, Paris and Tehran urging Muslims to unite against European domination, and argued that Islam was compatible with reason and science if freed from blind imitation of past scholars. His pan-Islamic answer to empire, a community of faith rather than separate nations, competed with the territorial nationalisms that eventually won. His debate with Ernest Renan over Islam and science is the best place to meet him.