The Qur’an is the sacred book of Muslims. It is a revelation from God, the Creator of the worlds, so He is the original author.
For Muslims, reading the Qur’an is a highly rewardable act. Abdullah ibn Mas’ud narrated the Prophet (PBUH) mentioned that “whoever recites one letter/word from the book of Allah, then for him is a reward, and a reward is multiplied by ten” [Reported in Tirmidhi].
But for Maryum, a Christian woman from Plymouth, South West England, reading the Qur’an actually opened her hearts to Islam, The Islamic Information reported.
Raised in a Christian home, she has always believed in God. In her teen years, she began to waver, no longer understanding the significance of going to church.
After returning to Christianity in her early 20s, she attended an Evangelical Church, which she found easier to access.
Her journey to Islam began after studying other Abrahamic faiths at university. Meeting an electrician who came to fix a problem in her house just after the Manchester bombing, she felt motivated to investigate Islam more deeply.
“I was scrolling through my phone, and commented ‘awful is awful,’ and he responded, ‘you think normal Muslims are like that?’ I replied, “I do not know any Muslims,” she said.
Reading Qur’an
This led Maryum to further investigate Islam. It was not until Ramadan this year when she read the Qur’an four times, then she took the shahada at Piety Islamic Centre.
“My initial interest was just in what the Qur’an taught; you get people who have taken bits of the Qur’an and interpreted them as violent and hateful,” Maryum said.
Islam is the fastest-growing religion in the world, with the number of Muslims set to grow at more than twice the rate of the overall world population between 2015 and 2060 according to research by the Pew Research Center.
Earlier this month, a French woman converted to Islam in Turkey after being impressed by her Muslim friend.
Another French 85-year-old man converted to Islam while he was on holiday trip to Turkey with his Muslim neighbors.