Lesley Hazleton explores the Quran and finds much that is quite different from what is reported in commonly cited accounts. A psychologist by training and Middle East reporter by experience, British-born Lesley Hazleton has spent the last ten years exploring the vast and often terrifying arena in which politics and religion, past and present, intersect. Her most recent book, After the Prophet: the Epic Story of the Shia-Sunni Split, was a finalist for the 2010 PEN-USA nonfiction award. She lived and worked in Jerusalem for thirteen years -- a city where politics and religion are at their most incendiary -- then moved to New York. She came to Seattle to get her pilot's license in 1992, saw the perfect houseboat, and stayed. By 1994, she'd flown away all of her savings, and has never regretted a single cent of it. Now her raft rides low in the water under the weight of research as she works on her next book, The First Muslim, a new look at the life of Muhammad. Twitter: @accidentaltheo Blog: accidentaltheologist.com/ Arabic translation: Amineh Ayyad. TEDxRainier is an independently organized TED event held in Seattle Washington.

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