Angelika Neuwirth, a professor of Arabic studies at Freie Universität Berlin, has said that her country is not even close to appreciating the reality of Quran.
The German researcher of Quran has said that the book is a magnificent literary work which has not yet been viewed as a cultural work.
She said the book is of great significance to Germany and other European countries given the large number of Muslims living in the continent.
“We cannot ignore Muslims’ culture and pretend that their identity is unrelated to ours,” Deutsche Welle quoted her as saying.
Professor Angelika Neuwirth, born in 1943, studied Persian language and literature in Tehran and Semitic studies, Arabic studies, Islamic studies, and classical philology in Göttingen and Bayt al-Muqaddas.
After completing her doctorate in 1972 at the University of Göttingen and her habilitation in 1977 at LMU Munich, Neuwirth conducted research and taught in Amman, Jordan. She held positions in Munich, Cairo, and Bamberg before joining Freie Universität Berlin in 1991 as a professor of Arabic studies.
From 1994 to 1999 Neuwirth was the director of the Orient Institute of the German Oriental Society (Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft) in Beirut and Istanbul. In 2008 she was awarded an honorary doctorate in Catholic theology from the University of Bamberg. In 2009 she was named a member of Leopoldina, the German National Academy of Sciences, and in 2011 she was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (U.S.). Neuwirth’s research focuses on classical and modern Arabic literature and the Quran during Late Antiquity.