stress on knowledge ilm in arabic devotion taqwa the good action amal alsalih as the path to knowing god of course islam approaches the path to god through the principle of tawhid or an uncompromising belief in the oneness of god however as a muslim i can see the spark of tawhid in the gita as albiruni pointed out over a thousand years agoi have read both iliad and odyssey the two western epics in the original greek mahabharata in my opinion is as profound as its greek and latin counterparts and it teaches us how to uphold the principle of justice and truth in a world of unbridled quest for power and prestige my plan is to bring out a readable and beautiful translation of the gita in contemporary italian one of the challenges that i am facing is my lack of knowledge of sanskrit however i hope to overcome it to a certain extent based on my years of training in classical languages such as greek latin hebrew and the experience i gained through translating classical western works the quran i have produced two translations of the quran into italian including abdullah yusuf alis 1934 english quran commentary and other religious spiritual and philosophical texts into italianyou are working on raja ram mohan roys tuhfatulmuwahhidin a gift to monotheists he was one of the pioneers of the hindu reformation do you think islam too needs a reformation todayram mohan roy was ahead of his time i think in the current communal polarization in india rediscovering the true spirit of hindu philosophy as taught by ram mohan roy is very crucial his life teachings and works can unite hindus muslims and christians in their belief in the common human heritage rooted in the faith in one god i think what is fascinating about roy is that he knew a number of languages like sanskrit persian arabic latin and greek apart from of course his mother tongue and he wrote extensively about three of the greatest religions hinduism christianity and islam yet he was a hindu who deeply believed in vedic hinduismtuhfatulmuwahhidin is one of his earliest works in persian with a brief introduction in arabic and the book though it is a monograph shows his deep knowledge of islam the quran the hadith and classical methodology of muslim scholarship there can be no doubt that roy was deeply influenced by the monotheism of islam he was of course a hindu and he did it by reaffirming the monotheistic and the universal values of the vedas by discarding superstitions and mere formalism and he also tried his best to situate hinduism in the modern eraindeed muslim ulema scholars now face the difficult challenge of situating islam in the 21st centurys complex globalised world we now need a fresh rethinking on islam and the reconstruction of many of the muslim approaches to islam in the light of the intellectual spiritual and social crises that muslims are facing today though we often