An offer you cannot refuse. Literalism is out, metaphors are in. - Rated 
By and large I wouldn't disagree with the other reviewers. A few things had left me wondering though, and coming back here to read the review by B. Khan brought it back to me: Ziauddin Zardar with his personal conviction comes across as rather superior, artificially naïve and with several historical assertions I simply cannot connect to what I hold to be true. Ah well, I view it from a different angle, perhaps.
It has to be remembered that the author is an intellectual, an elitist. A member of a small group of like-minded believers who see themselves in the forefront of those seeking the parts of faith that fit in with modernity ....or was it the parts of modernity that fit in with faith? Sorry, I didn't bother too much with hair-splitting. He has realized that revelations really cannot be taken literally and that Paradise is to be found on and in this world of ours, once it is educated and islamized, but NOT along the lines of the Sharia; however, the convoluted explanations as to why shade in Paradise is not really a shade I soon gave up on.
Anyway I rather like the book. Mainly for what it simply has to tell me about people and what culture and religion does to people and the way they think - as do the books by Ed Husain and Irshad Manji - and also because of a line-up of some of the most bone-headed characters I've ever come across; but I've never really enjoyed comedy that ridicules real people who talk, act and maybe think funny: it's too easy and ...superior. And the author seems to be cutting the branch he's sitting on.
Right. There's a bit of ranting in the book when someone has to be shown the truth; mostly through the mouths of people our author has met, and thus he avoids being held directly responsible. Let's hope. He seems rather good at survival, if his sometimes rather tall tales can be believed.
The author has been to several places in which several crucial things happened, and several central persons popped up. Osama bin Laden: "A tall thin Saudi, with a turban and wispy beard" ..." obvious not only for his height but his manner , he carried himself with a certain majesty and decorum". Did he, now. The creature.
Ah yes, beards. Often mentioned. A man's beard is Very Important. It's a sort of code whereby you can read him at a glance, even if clean-shaven. I would agree: I have seen Tariq Ramadan on photo and TV and he looks EXACTLY like an author of "The Messenger".
There's a lot of instructing, a sharing of knowledge in the book. I often find it difficult to see clearly whether the author just repeats what he's being told, whether he agrees, whether it's a commonly held opinion, true fact or not.
The Ottoman empire: "They were successful in integrating communities of various ethnicities, religions, cultures and languages on three continents within one framework. They emphasized local identities and respect for ethnic and religious diversity ....it would be totally wrong to say naked imperialism or linguistic, cultural or religious assimilation was ever their policy." Whereas to a secular Turk "all that was Ottoman was degenerate and inhumane". The truth is probably somewhere in-between: notwithstanding The Bulgarian Atrocities, the Smyrna massacres, devshirme, and the reasons why so many Balkan peoples hate muslims to this day.
"Liberal humanism, of which Europe is so proud, ..is itself Islam's gift." Uhm, okay.
Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses is the cause of a MAJOR upset, wherein the outraged and deeply hurt author sets himself apart from liberal humanism. For me this single chapter is a sad let-down, too much Ummah.com having crept in.
9/11. A disaster admittedly so very un-islamic yet described in almost poetic sentences ("Swooping bird .." pah). A few words regretting the sheer human suffering of innocents would not have been amiss, instead of concentrating on discovering the whereabouts of family members and the harm done by twisted Islam to true Islam.
I noticed that muslim Chinese "tend to be tall and handsome; women slim and elegant". I hope I do not have to conclude that other Chinese are small, bent creatures. Nor that there was no Chinese civilization before the introduction of Islam. As much as the author longed for the no-longer existing Turkish public bath - almost inferring that secular Turks aren't as clean as they used to be, poor souls - he hated the communal toilets of the Chinese.
I think that's the bottom line: The author was brought up a muslim, a deeply Arabized muslim demonstrating the success and totality of Arab religious, cultural, linguistic dominance and imperialism among even those that try to keep a distance to Saudi Wahhabism. He loves and adores the places where he feels at home, in spite of all their faults. The rest of the world, Yours Truly included, and their accomplishments are ridiculed a bit too often, and despite all the wrongs that have crept in since the Golden Age of Islam there is no comparison.
Riveting yet doomed - Rated
Since most reviewers have covered what the book deals with in depth I shall only reiterate that it is engrossing and virtually challenges every so-called Islamic ideology and/or society that is being championed throughout the world today. My main worry is that for such a learned person the author often makes a poor choice of subject for ridicule and he comes across as smug rather than objective. For instance Zia-ul-Haq as a Shariah-obsessed dictator might amuse those unfamiliar with his reputation and career but for the average muslim hailing from the subcontinent he is a rather obvious and unoriginal target of scorn. Furthermore although he suggests it often enough Mr Sardar fails to point out the most basic truth discovered by all seekers of paradise: the journey is actually a personal one and it is doomed for failure and entanglement if you set about finding a collective parallel for your endeavours. Once again even though it is undeniable that he is extremely well-informed about his subject it often seems that he deliberately pretends to be shortsighted at the onset of some of his adventures just so that he can take us on a ride to discover how inadequate and often ridiculous the state of the Muslim world is today. Personally, I would admit that my grasp of my own reigion is rudimentary but at the same time I think I can resist the temptation to expose the glaring flaws in the struggles of those who are at the mere starting line of their own little journeys in search of paradise. Mr Sardar's barely concealed disdain for the Chinese villagers reeks of pompous arrogance and it is alarming that he hardly ever displays the very important quality of humility that the pursuit of this subject demands. In fact he often conveniently fails to point out that many of the societies that have gone astray are often victims of misinformation , lack of education, and the inability to shake off the deviant ideologies that have seeped into their culture. Sadly for that reason the average muslim reader might object to the portrayal of pitiable victims as villains or in some cases bumbling buffoons. The book is often overly concerned with semantics and definitions when this approach is quite redundant and only serves to confuse the ordinary reader. Overall, even though the author has put together a very readable account of his stagnation as a Muslim (surely there could have been no growth if such evils, shortcomings and even stupidity lurked in every corner) the very guarded tone, his use of humour to mask his true outlook in some circumstances, and his inabaility to offer any real conclusion after making us join him on his journey leaves the reader with a sour taste and does little to endear Sardar to us as a sensitive commentator on the this very sensitive subject.
Desperation indeed! - Rated 
Sardar is a deeply religious, indeed a passionate Muslim. He repeatedly excoriates secularism, of which he gives a highly subjective and partisan definition, and his account of its history (pp.249 to 251) is deeply flawed. He accepts the Qur'an as a revealed text (p.341), albeit one that has to be understood metaphorically rather than literally. He reveres Muhammad, and describes how emotionally shattered he was by Salman Rushdie's treatment of the Prophet in The Satanic Verses: "I felt that every word, every jibe, every obscenity [in it] was directed at me - personally" (p.281). Yet, as a liberal, he was equally horrified by the Ayatollah's fatwa calling for Rushdie's death. Our media do not often tell us that there are religious Muslims who also espouse modern knowledge, pluralism, and the principles of western democracies; so it is good to see in the book of this prominent Muslim journalist that such Muslims do exist, and we need to hear a lot more from and about them than we do. But it must be said that the picture which Sardar paints of most of the contemporary Muslim organizations, whether they are sects or the states he has visited, will provide ample evidence of how widespread is the rejection of modernity, pluralism and democracy in the Muslim world. Sardar sees all these as a perversion of Islam, as cases of rigidity and of arrested development and as a betrayal of the spirit of its golden age under the early Abbasids (roughly from the 9th to the 12th century) and from which the West learnt so much. In the course of his Search for Paradise Sardar engaged with one Muslim sect after another and visited one Islamic country after another. He paints a devastating picture of almost all of them. Even modern Sufism, to which he felt most attracted, has strayed from its original nature and tends to go in for the unquestioning cult of the local Sufi sheikh. Here, as elsewhere, he found a disturbing authoritarianism at work. Besides, he was troubled by the mystics' belief that a state of grace could be found only by withdrawing from the modern world, whereas for him the challenge was to bring a state of grace into the modern world.
The Iranian Revolution obviously failed to provide the paradise Sardar was looking for; and the atmosphere in Ba'athist Iraq and Syria was equally oppressive, though in a different way. Sardar's devotion to Islam can be deduced from the fact that he had five times made the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca. Each time he was more distressed at what was happening to Mecca: sacred old buildings were being torn down to make way for six- or eight-lane roads and new concrete buildings, out of the construction of which the Bin Laden family made huge amounts of money. These physical changes and the mass-tourism technology which was applied to these sacred areas, Sardar thought, increasingly destroyed the centuries-old rhythm of the hajj. "The Saudis," he writes, "approached technology as though it was theology. And in both, complexity and plurality was shunned", for of course the Wahhabi brand of Islam that dominates Saudi Arabia is as narrow, intolerant and antiquated as the fanatical brand of Shi'ism which dominated Iran. Disillusioned with all these experiences, Sardar was involved in setting up an institution and a journal devoted to working out an approach to a more liberal but still essentially Islamic approach to the intellectual disciplines of the modern world. They could make no headway against "Islamization", the name given to the attempt to force these intellectual disciplines into an Islamic straitjacket, and which Sardar describes as "an uncontrollable forest fire that consumed everything in its path." (p.213) What depresses Sardar is the realization that in so many parts of the world the rigidities and cruelties of the Sharia cannot be said to be imposed on the unwilling masses by the mullahs. Even in countries like China, which do not have Islamic governments, it appears that the desire of most Muslims is to be governed by the Sharia: they see it as defining their identities as Muslims. Only in post-Kemalist Turley and in Malaysia does Sardar find Islamic governments that accept pluralism, though he implies that in Malaysia it is under threat after its leading exponent, Anwar Ibrahim was forced out of office on trumped-up charges, imprisoned and tortured. Sardar is frequently depressed by the current state of the umma of which he cannot help but feel a member, and his book must be equally depressing for those readers who would like the efforts of the like of him to succeed. His book unfortunately confirms the impression of today's Islam which is presented to us by the media and which many of us would so much like to dismiss as illegitimate stereotyping. He presents himself and the little group of intellectuals around him as a gallant minority struggling against overwhelming odds (p.331) to shape a gentler, more tolerant, more pluralistic and above all a more intelligent Islam. If he is right, the outlook for convivencia, for a peaceful coexistence between Islam and the West, is bleak indeed. But perhaps he over-dramatizes: perhaps there are millions of devout but tolerant Muslims like himself. Perhaps especially in the West, many devout Muslims, just like devout Jews and devout Christians, have absorbed its respect for pluralism and a democratic society. But they would need to speak out, to assert themselves vigorously and openly against those who preach narrowness and intolerance. And if and when they do so, our media must report it, if only to give the lie to the vicious idea floated on p.311, that the West has a vested interest in demonizing Islam.
Inspiring - Rated 
As a young muslim I found this book inspiring in its gentle challenges to various approaches taken in Islamic interpretation. I would recommend it to anyone for a fine example of self-examination and discovery.
Journey of Islam through 300 pages - Rated
Desperately Seeking Paradise is a frank, sincere autobiography that takes the reader through the author's own journey through different forms of Islam. The first chapter dispelled the fairytale of what's known today as Islamic purism of the Jamaat el Tabligh by his own experiences in his youth. The following chapters explored Sufism, Islamic Militarism, Iranian Revolution, Secularism and Malaysian Multiculturalism. The book shown that throughout his long and winding road of critical thought, he was consistently thrown into self doubt and yet affirmed by his Islamic identity. His passion for pluralism in Islam was admirable, his writing lacked the certainties and the self-righteousness bigotry that is so prevalent in the Muslim world today. However, it is with sadness that I come to realise that neither his writing nor his ideas will be embraced by the masses of the Muslim world, for plurism entails acceptance of other forms of the same faith, questioned the certainties which made fundamentalism so attractive to the current generation of Muslims. Plurism is especially difficult in Islam, for one Hadith specifically mentioned that only one strand of Islam shall be the righteous path. I have found his accounts of many of his own personal experience through difficult times were somewhat sensational, such as being left alone in the desert after an disagreement with a friend comparing ayatollah khomeini to Hassan Al-Sabbah, or under interrogation in Iran declaring he do not like the Imam and the revolution. However, I found myself still inspired by his ideals, of forever self-questioning, belief in pluralism in such a divided faith, searching for an equilibrium between faith and modernity, and always seeking the truth or "paradise".
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