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Assalam Alaikum. Although I did not read this particular book, I have read Brother Hofman's Diary of a German Muslim, which he presented to me upon visiting my house in Saudi Arabia. He also kindly gave me an interview, originally published in the Saudi English press. (After the dinner, we had spaghetti.)

The former German ambassador to Morocco chose early on to make his faith public knowledge. When he first converted to Islam, he published Diary of a German Muslim. When he put out this book, Islam, the Alternative, here featured in Arabic, it provoked an outcry in the German media. The attacks on Dr. Hofman were so serious that they were picked up and repeated, verbatim, by the international press.

What provoked the furor was the fact that an established German publish house was bringing out a book by a German Muslim. Vituperation and accusations plagued Dr. Hofmann and his wife for five weeks. For instance, it was claimed that every woman in the German Foreign Ministry working under Dr. Hofmann's authority was forced to wear hejab. Dr. Hofmann's suitability as ambassador (given his proclaimed faith in Islam and the public dismay over a book not yet on the market) was debated in Parliament. Detractors, (without having read the book) asserted it was a disgrace to have an ambassador representing the country abroad, given his views were unconstitutional. In other words, Brother Hofmann was maligned and ridiculed both at home and internationally.

The Foreign Ministry requested Dr. Hofmann to submit a written report on his views, for it was becoming increasingly difficult to defend him against the onslaught without such a document. Before the storm was over, the publishing house Evgen Diederichs Yerlag asked Dr. Hofmann if he would accept what is known in writers' lingo as a "kill fee," a reduced amount of money for work done for a manuscript that is not going to be published. Rather than haggle over the issue, Dr. Hofmann suggested to his publishers that they seek the opinion of an esteemed university professor, Frau Professor Dr. Annemarie Schimmel, who was based, then, in Cologne. Widely respected in German academic circles, Dr. Schimmel was a leading authority on Islamic studies. She was also, as it happened, not Muslim.

When Dr. Schimmel received the ambassador's manuscript, she read it in one night and was so favorably inclined that she wrote a nine-page introduction to the work before returning it to the publishers.

Son of a professor of mathematics and physics, Dr. Hofmann grew up to be a young man as diversified in interests and natural curiosity as his father--a man who besides being a serious scholar also painted in watercolors and played first violin with the local symphony orchestra. Wilfreid Hofmann, later to be known as Murad Hofmann, spent around 20 years in his own early career as a ballet critic, writing for such publications as Dance News, ballet Today and Germany's Dance Archives (Tanz Archive). He divided his time between new York, London, Paris and Germany, married to an American woman by whom he had one son. Dr. Hofmann is also a certified lawyer.

It was during his period as German vice consul at the Consulate General in Algiers during the War of Independence that Dr. Hofmann had his first contact with Islam. Despite the uncertain, bloody times they lived through, Dr. Hofmann couldn't help noticing and being impressed by the patience of the Algerians. This was enough to set him reading the Holy Qur'an, which he would reread many times before deciding become a Muslim himself.

After the endorsement by Dr. Annemarie Schimmel and the exoneration ultimately given by the German Foreign Ministry and German Parliament, the publisher couldn't have been happier. "A blessing in disguise" is no mere figure of speech when it comes to the public attention that Dr. Hofmann's book received upon publication.

It was a great honor to meet Murad Hofmann.

Peace.