Idris Mears's five books for Ramadan

Here's what the bookshop owner would suggest you read throughout the holy month

Signs on the Horizons: Meetings with Men of Knowledge and Illumination. Courtesy Michael Sugich

Idris Mears is the owner of the “Muslim world” bookshop located at the Alserkal Cultural Foundation in Dubai’s Al Fahidi Historical District which was opened in 2016. Here are his suggested readings for the holy month.

Muhammad: His Life Based on the Earliest Sources by Martin Lings

This is a masterpiece, one of the books I would always recommend. It's written by an English Muslim, who ended his career as keeper of the Oriental manuscripts in the British Museum in London.

Muhammad, Messenger of Allah: Ash-Shifa of Qadi ‘Iyad by Qadi Tyad ibn Musa al-Yahsubi

It's a completely different book from Lings's biography of the Prophet Mohammed. It's not "a life" but it's equally profound. It assembles the verses of the Quran that mention the Prophet Mohammed and goes into detail about his personal conduct and behaviour.

Signs on the Horizon: Meetings with Men of Knowledge and Illumination by Michael Sugich

Sugich's is a collection of stories about meetings with great saints. The reader is drawn in by the quality of the writing and the experiences of the author. It helps people to reach that point where they, too, desire to change themselves and have spiritual experiences.  

The Way of Muhammad by Shaykh Abdalqadir As-Sufi

This is the man who inspired me to convert to Islam. His book is about the spiritual path of Islam. The audience he was writing it for was the general western audience of the 1970s. At that time there was an awareness of a thing called Sufism and somehow people located Sufism as above religions, as if it wasn't grounded in Islam. What this book shows is that there is no Sufism without Islam and no Islam without Sufism.

The Lives of Man and The Book of Assistance by Abdullah ibn Alawi Al Haddad

The book explains the different stages of life: the life before conception, the life of the womb, this world. The Book of Assistance is a guide to help you deepen your spiritual experience.