Tripping with Allah: Islam, Drugs, and Writing

Didn't enjoy this book at all

"Tripping with Allah" is Michael Muhammad Knight's ninth offering to the adventurous reader who more than likely stumbles into his campsite drawn by hopes for wisdom on topics germane to Islam and an Amazon recommendation; or perhaps because of the edgy hipster coolness of images surrounding the book Taqwacores and the preposterous treats inside its pages that either delight the senses or pale the sensibilities with horror. Perhaps others still find their way to Knight's door because of the world of wrestling and the whole plethora of young guy stuff people of the younger generation were weaned on, or by Five Percenter lore and history. Doesn't matter. You either become addicted and eagerly await each new offering, or you find your life's new meaning: to mount an impassioned crusade to convince the world that not only isn't MMK a REAL Muslim, but that he's an absolute lunatic who should be ignored by everyone who values their eternal soul and good standing in the Ummah. And then along comes something like "Tripping with Allah" where the central theme that slithers through the narrative like a spinal cord is Knight's forage into the sinisterly alluring jungles of the soul promised by something with the utterly delicious Lovecraftian name: Ayahuasca. That's right. Go ahead and Google it. Google it now. Okay, got that out of the way? "Tripping with Allah" is nothing short of a Coyote Road Trip where Knight is wearing the pelt and you just sit back, shut up and keep your eyes open. Knight has been called, apparently too many times to count, the Hunter S. Thompson of Islam. I was weaned on Thompson and I'd say there's something appealing and not too far off about that comparison. But instead of saying what TWA is, let Knight show you. What he has done however, is drill down and bring up a bunch of core samples, rich ores from the bedrock of his own inner narrative of mystical/magical desire and shown you how he can build something at once darkly terrifying and magnificent, and then tell you to keep your hands off. That's his soul. But you've seen how he does it so go off and dig up the soil your own guts and find out what you're supposed to be growing there that's all your own. What separates Knight from a long list of intellectual wankers who just rattle off a bunch of their own crap on binder paper, is that, unlike them, he knows a bunch of stuff; real stuff not normally associated with one another that he manages to work into a seamless narrative that makes sense, even if it can't possible be true. Solid stuff he picked up on that old fashioned pass-time of bygone eras called a focused education on something other than an MBA. One section of the book covers an elaborate journey by the Master Farad Muhammad as he travels all over the world, through all the magico-mystical cultures and traditions of humankind and finds himself face to face with none other than the veritable Jamal al-din al-Afghani. Then before you know it, Knight is dipping down into the scholarly work of Nikki Kedde, one of the very few people who has published anything approaching thorough and credible (though questioned by Dabashi) work on al-Afghani. Other places we're squared off between Transformer characters and Ibn Taymiyyah and you can just HEAR the serious Muslims going "Huh? What, wait a minute!" And the kids going "Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's get onto the tripping man!" And it's just too delicious. If you really want to encounter this book in either a meaningful way or just plain fun all you can do is throw your hands up and sit back and let Knight have the wheel. But have a pen and paper handy. By all means. You will most definitely want to underline some of those names for later exploration. Because Knight has a way of allowing times and places and people, as well as discrete nontemporal mythos to collapse into an eternal now that often reveals the workings of history and its impact on current events in unique and interesting ways that are rock solid dead on. What Knight is doing you see, is leaving you crumbs in the dust. And if you stop thinking about it with your brain and trying to make sense of it, there's a good chance you'll shake lose the girders that keep us from seeing more than what we expect to see at any moment. "Tripping with Allah" is a delightful and at times hilarious read where I was slapping my knee with laughter one moment and thinking, damn, this book is a hell of a ride, and then at the next moment feeling that interior blush that says Aha! So you know, you Blue-Eyed Devil you, you know. His exquisitely powerful description of his encounters with Fatima and Ali, courtesy of Allah via the vine, are right up there with the likes of Jami, Abil Khayr, and Ibn ata'Illah.

Knight's drug journey uniquely takes us not only to a flip-out but also to an insight to the foundations of religious life.

This book is very important to me for many reasons; I stopped reading novels and went to reading abstracts, however, I got bored by time and started to concentrate only on my study readings. The way it's written is very simplistic and catchy, MM Knight succeeded in taking the reader with him through the trip. Additionally, as a Muslim, I got shocked from the information I have went through; the author made a great research and quoted both Westerners & Easterners scholars to provide descriptive and informative opinions about history of drugs in Islam; It's more of a narrative with a friend over a coffee (or pot smoking) conversation.It provides you with another perception on how to look at things and be more appreciative to your surrounding.I suggest everybody to read this book, especially those who looks for post-modern answers about our today's issues and how we may look at them in order to overcome our selves and current social structure.The 5 stars not only for the book itself, it included my astonishment about the book and its effect on me, so I'm very excited and probably this is how it will feel if you were looking for provocative texts so you can deconstruct, then construct, and finally mix & match your own religion or system(s).

This is a short review and a warning for this book by Michael Mohammad Knight. Recently, I was looking in to others experience with psychedelics and thought i'd read this to see what the author's experience has been. So I grabbed a copy and went through it over the next couple of days.The book starts off with Michael's experiences in life as an academic and as a muslim. The first 80% of the book is about various topics and how it ties in to Islam such as the black slaves in spanish south America and their role in propagating west African spirituality mixed with their Islam to the continent. It also touches upon issues of race and racial inequality in America as well as the plundering of the local traditions and knowledge by western pharma.However, its the actual experience of taking DMT via Ayahuasca that is the most insane part of the whole book. The visions described are extremely heretical and disturbing. After reading them, I can only come to the conclusion that a) Michael is a very disturbed individual who needs therapy b) the entire experience is made up to shock the reader.He talks about private parts of Fatima, about Allah being Fatima, about Ali having sexual relations with Fatima, amongst other insane things. The ones I mention are the least insane things. He builds upon this many times over and at the end of the book, I had no choice but to see Michael as a really disturbed individual who definitely needs therapeutic help to get over his thoughts and feelings.So folks, if you value your own sanity, do not read this particular book. I never thought I would be advocating against reading but there's really no other recourse. As for myself, I threw the book away.