Nasr Hamid Abû Zayd

Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd (نصر حامد أبو زيد,) born July 10, 1943 and died July 5, 2010, was an Egyptian Muslim thinker, author, academic and one of the leading liberal theologians of Islam. He is famous for his project of humanist Quranic hermeneutics. Zayd argued that the Quran should be read in the context of the language and culture of the seventh-century Arabs, and could be interpreted in several ways. He also criticized the use of religion to exercise political power. Abu Zayd is considered one of the “big names” of the post-1967 Arab intellectual tradition.