ABSTRACT

Back in 1984, the Department of Theology in the University of Nottingham, under the leadership of Professor John Heywood Thomas, was the first in the United Kingdom to appoint a lecturer on Islam, entitled Lecturer in Islamic Theology. This was a response to the increasing religious diversity of the United Kingdom and reflection on the implications of this by different Christian churches, and particularly the British Council of Churches (BCC) under the leadership of (Methodist minister) Kenneth Cracknell, the Executive Secretary of the BCC’s Committee for Relations with People of Other Faiths (Cracknell 1996). It was also an acknowledgement of the fact that within this diversity the largest numerical presence was that of Muslims, so, given that it was impractical for a small department to try and teach all the religious traditions of the world, the obvious one to begin with was the Islamic Tradition.