Rumi's great book of wisdom-infused poetry contain myriad lessons on the importance of faith, with the culture and lessons of spiritual, Biblical and Islamic teachings featuring strongly. In authoring his masterwork, Rumi quoted the Qu'ran, the Bible and several spiritual forebears. Wishing to align his poetry in order to tell tales of man and man's place in the world, Rumi drew upon a variety of religious and spiritual sources to create a poetic compendium of supreme profundity and depth. The Masnavi was praised as one of the finest works of mystical literature ever seen. It is in the Masnavi that Persia's place between the spiritual cultures of Asia and the Middle East is evidenced. Rumi himself, while undoubtedly an Islamic scholar of great ability, did not feel confined to the faith; he saw spiritual value in a range of disciplines, and asserted that the light of Mohammed's prophecy does not leave faithful Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians or other denominations behind.

Due to the long presence of Muslims in Islamic territories (Al-Andalus and Granada) and of Muslims minorities in the Christians parts, the Iberian Peninsula provides a fertile soil for the study of the Qur'an and Qur'an translations made by both Muslims and Christians. From the mid-twelfth century to at least the end of the seventeenth, the efforts undertaken by Christian scholars and churchmen, by converts, by Muslims (both Mudejars and Moriscos) to transmit, interpret and translate the Holy Book are of the utmost importance for the understanding of Islam in Europe. This book reflects on a context where Arabic books and Arabic speakers who were familiar with the Qur'an and its exegesis coexisted with Christian scholars. The latter not only intended to convert Muslims, and polemize with them but also to adquire solid knowledge about them and about Islam. Qur'ans were seized during battle, bought, copied, translated, transmitted, recited, and studied. The different features and uses of the Qur'an on Iberian soil, its circulation as well as the lives and works of those who wrote about it and the responses of their audiences, are the object of this book.