Note by the Saker: I was recently contacted by a reader of this blog who, while praising the overall contents of the blog, also expressed regret at what he perceived was a pro-Shia bias resulting from what, both my correspondent and I agreed, were a number of objective circumstances, including many legitimate ones. Still, my correspondent expressed regret at this bias and I decided to offer him a chance to present his point of view on historical Sunnism. He kindly accepted and we have agreed that I would post here a 3-part series on historical Sunnism, the first one posted today. I am deeply grateful to Anwar for the opportunity to educate me and many others on historical Sunnism and to help us all to better appreciate the immense diversity and richness of traditional Islam (as opposed to the maniacal takfirism of the liver-eating “moderate terrorists” of Daesh & Co.).