According to the Pew Research Center, Islam is the world's fastest-growing religion, with its population expected to increase by 70% between 2015 and 2060, compared to the global population growth of 32%.[1] = *According to The Jerusalem Post, in the United Kingdom and France, up to 100,000 people converted in the last decade in each country.[2]
The following is a list of notable people who converted to Islam from a different religion or no religion(who have individual Wikipedia articles). This article addresses only past professions of faith by the individuals listed, and is not intended to address ethnic, cultural, or other considerations. Such cases are noted in their list entries. The list is categorized alphabetically with their former religious affiliation, where known.
Hasan Akbar (born Mark Fidel Kools) – American citizen, and Sergeant, diagnosed with psychiatric problems, later sentenced to death for an attack of resentment.[15]
Shaheed Akbar (a.k.a. The Jacka, born Dominick Newton) – American rapper.[16]
Campbell Mustafa Ağa – Scottish convert to Islam who from 1775 was the chief instructor in the new Ottoman naval mathematical academy (the Hendishâne).
Claude Alexandre, Count of Bonneval – French army officer who later went into the service of the Ottoman Empire, eventually converting to Islam and becoming known as Humbaracı Ahmet Paşa.
Edoardo Agnelli – was the eldest child and only son of Gianni Agnelli,[1] the industrialist patriarch of Fiat S.p.A.,He converted to Shia Islam when he was living in New York City
B
David Benjamin – Chaldean Catholic priest known for his book Muhammad in Bible.[25]
Maurice Bucaille – French family physician of King Faisal. It is disputed whether he ever converted, and if he did, whether he publicly declared his conversion. He is reported in a 2013 Arab News newspaper article, "In his excitement, he stood before the attendants and loudly said, 'I have converted to Islam and believed in this Qur'an'"; however, no references are given.[42] In other articles and videos he was normally very careful not to claim allegiance to any one faith.[43]
Abdullah ibn Buhaina (born Arthur Blakey) – American musician, also known as Arthur "Art" Blakey, American jazz drummer and bandleader; stopped being a practicing Muslim in the 1950s and continued to perform under the name "Art Blakey" throughout his career.[44]
Berke – grandson of Genghis Khan, a Mongol military commander and ruler of the Golden Horde, who was responsible for the first official establishment of Islam in a khanate of the Mongol Empire.
Robert Dickson Crane – American activist. He was an adviser to President Richard Nixon and was the deputy director for planning of the United States National Security Council.
D
Uri Davis – Middle East academic and activist who works on civil rights in Israel, Palestinian National Authority and the Middle East[54]
Dutchavelli (stage name for Stephan Allen) – British rapper.[62]
Nooruddeen Durkee – Muslim scholar, thinker, author, translator, and the Khalifah (successor) for North America of the Shadhdhuli School for Tranquility of Being and the Illumination of Hearts, Green Mountain Branch.
Maria Massi Dakake – American scholar of Islamic studies and associate professor of Religious Studies at George Mason University.
Merryl Wyn Davies – Welsh Muslim scholar, writer and broadcaster who specialised in Islam.
Michael Finton – radicalised individual, attempted to bomb the Paul Findley Federal Building to protest the Afghan war. Finton's local mosque condemned and disassociated from his ideologies.[72][73]
Patrice Lumumba Ford (of the Portland Seven) – part of a group based in the U.S. Arrested for charges of terrorism, Ford's representative claimed the arrests were a governmental strategy to cover-up America's activities in foreign wars.[75]
Gigi Gryce – American saxophonist, flutist, clarinetist, composer, arranger, and educator[86]
René Guénon – French perennial philosopher, first adopted Islam in 1912, he insisted on recalling that the purely religious concept of an immediate conversion did not apply to his case, indicating he had previous acquaintance with the Islamic faith.
Roger Garaudy – French philosopher, French resistance fighter and a communist author. He converted to Islam in 1982.
Faris Glubb – was a British writer, journalist, translator and publisher.
Bruno Guiderdoni – He is a French astrophysicist ,He converted to Islam in 1987 after being introduced to it in Morocco.
Abu Izzadeen (born Trevor Brooks) – English-born extremist and hate-preacher, spokesman for Al Ghurabaa[101]
Muhammad Hussain Inoki (born Kanji Inoki) – Japanese retired professional wrestler, martial artist, politician, and promoter of professional wrestling and mixed martial arts.[102]
Kyrie Irving – American professional basketball player for the Dallas Mavericks of the NBA.[103]
Antoni Aleksander Iliński – Polish-Ottoman military officer and general. A Polish independence activist and insurgen
J
Fatimah Jackson – American biologist and anthropologist, professor of biology at Howard University and Director of its Cobb Research Laboratory.[104]
Jan Janszoon – Dutch pirate, later sent his son to America, to become one of the first settlers of modern-day Brooklyn (called New Amsterdam at the time)[110]
Thomas Keith – Scottish POW who converted to Islam and joined the Ottoman army. He died in 1815 as governor of Medina while fighting the rising power of the Saudi dynasty
Halima Krausen – is a German Muslim leader, theologian and scholar.
Nuh Ha Mim Keller – American Islamic scholar, teacher and author,studied philosophy and Arabic at the University of Chicago and the UCLA, converted to Islam from Roman Catholicism in 1977.[132]
Kōhan Kawauchi – Japanese screenwriter who created various tokusatsu series; Kawauchi converted to Islam in 1959.
Yuri Kochiyama – American civil rights activist,In 1971, Kochiyama secretly converted to Sunni Islam.
Ayyub Axel Köhler – Köhler converted to Sunni Islam in 1963 at the age of 25 during his student days.
Aisha Lemu – British-born author and religious educator who converted to Islam in 1961.
Alexander Litvinenko – British-naturalised Russian defector and former officer of the Russian Federal Security Service,allegedly converted to Islam in Britain and was rumoured to have told his father he had converted to Islam on his death bed.[143]
Umar Lee – American writer, media personality, and political activist.
Khalid Masood (born Adrian Russel Elms) – British citizen, with a history of once heavy-drinking and drug-use, later adopted extremist beliefs; perpetrator of the 2017 Westminster attack[145]
Rebecca Masterton – British Islamic scholar, author and television presenter,She converted to Islam in 1999.
Jean-Louis Michon – French traditionalist and translator who specialized in Islamic art and Sufism.
Ingrid Mattson – Canadian activist and scholar. A professor of Islamic studies.
Eva de Vitray-Meyerovitch – French scholar of Islam, a researcher at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS), and a translator and writer.[155]
Ryoichi Mita – Japanese Muslim who is considered the first-ever Muslim to translate the Quran into the Japanese language.
Jeff Monson – Mixed martial artist, boxer, and submission grappler who converted to Islam in June 2024 [156]
N
Adam Neuser (c. 1530 – 12 October 1576) –Protestant pastor of Heidelberg who held Antitrinitarian views. He later converted to Islam[157] and traveled to Istanbul where he served the Ottoman Sultan.[158]
Susanne Osthoff – German archaeologist and aid worker who had worked in Iraq since 1991, and was abducted en route to Abdil, for 3 weeks. She was later quoted to have said her kidnappers did not want ransom, but German humanitarian aid[162]
Occhiali – Italian farmer, then Ottoman privateer and admiral.
P
José Padilla – born-American citizen, known for controversial Rumsfeld v. Padilla case. Padilla was arrested on allegations of intended terrorism, but was refused a trial in civilian courts, as well as a defense counsel and civilian court review; he was later convicted for 21 years in prison. Economist Paul Craig Roberts criticized the sentence as having "overthrown" the Constitution[163][164]
Omar Pasha – Ottoman field marshal and governor. Born in Austrian territory to Serbian Orthodox Christian parent
Abd al Wahid Pallavicini – was a leading figure of Sufism in Europe ,his spiritual quest led him to convert to Islam in 1951 thanks to the teachings of Titus Burckhardt.
Q
Abdullah Quilliam (born William Henry Quilliam) – British convert from Christianity to Islam, noted for founding England's first mosque and Islamic centre.[176]
R
Raekwon – American rapper, born as Corey Woods[177]
Rakhi Sawant (born Neeru Bheda) – Indian dancer, model, actress.[178]
A. R. Rahman – Indian composer, musician, singer-songwriter, producer and philanthropist; he converted to Islam along with other members of his family in 1989 at age 23, changing his name from A. S. Dileep Kumar Mudhaliar to Allah Rakha Rahman[179][180]A. R. Rahman
Richard Reid – British citizen, who adopted militant ideologies. Popularly known as the "Shoe Bomber" after unsuccessfully attempting to blow up an American Airlines flight[182]
Nicky Reilly – resident of Plymouth, England, known for the 2008 Exeter attempted bombing; his psychologist says his mental disabilities (which included Asperger syndrome) made him vulnerable to radicalisation[183][184]
MC Ren (born Lorenzo Patterson) – American rapper and hip-hop producer[185]
Jack Roche – British-born migrant in Sydney. Former member of the Jemaah Islamiyah sect, involved in its militant schemes, Roche later chose to divulge his information (of plots such as the September 11 attacks, the 2002 Bali bombings, etc.) to ASIO officers, but his calls were dismissed. Later convicted for 4-years, Roche has left the lifestyle behind but remains critical of the ASIO's failure to prevent the attacks[188][189]
Rodtang Jitmuangnon – a Muay Thai fighter who converted to Islam shortly after marrying his Muslim wife, Aida Looksaikongdin.
Christian Rontini – Filipino footballer, he decided to convert to Islam from Catholicism[190]
Leda Rafanelli – Italian publisher, anarchist, and prolific author, her experience living briefly in Alexandria, Egypt, cemented her interest in Eastern ideas and led to her studying the Arabic language and converting to Islam
Kabir Suman (born Suman Chattopadhyay) – Indian singer-songwriter, musician, music director, poet, journalist, political activist, TV presenter, and occasional actor; he stated, "I wanted to keep the name my parents gave me, so I kept Suman. I took the name Kabir after Sheikh Kabir, a Bengali Muslim poet who wrote Baishnab Padabali."[207]
Valentine de Saint-Point – French writer, poet, painter, playwright, art critic, choreographer, lecturer and journalist. She is primarily known for being the first woman to have written a futurist manifesto. She converted to Islam and moved to Egypt where she died and was buried right next to Imam al-Shafii.
Ahmad Faris al-Shidyaq – A Maronite Christian by birth, was an Ottoman scholar, writer and journalist who grew up in what is now Lebanon
Dewi Sukarno – Japanese-born Indonesian; she was one of the wives of the first President of Indonesia, Sukarno.
Conrad Tillard (born 1964) – American Baptist minister, radio host, author, civil rights activist, and politician; later converted back to Christianity
Hamza Tzortzis (born Andreas Tzortzis) – British public speaker and researcher on Islam. He is known for his book: The Divine Reality: God, Islam and the Mirage of Atheism.[216][217]
Danny Thompson – He is an English multi-instrumentalist best known as a double bassist ,He converted to Islam in 1990.
U
James Ujaama (born James Earnest Thompson) – social activist/entrepreneur from Seattle, known for helping black youth; established the Bly training camp; accused of militant intentions, but allegations were negated; later convicted for violating IEEPA, by installing software for a friend, to use on a computer owned by the Taliban[218]
V
Joram van Klaveren – former Dutch politician who attempted to ban mosques and all Islamic practices from Netherlands; after working on a book to conclusively 'disprove' Islam, Joram's research (and discussions with Timothy Winter) drastically changed his views, he later converted to Islam[219]Joram van Klaveren
Bryant Neal Vinas – Hispanic American, once joined al Qaeda training camps, later turning on them to help the US, in attempt to turn his life around; his prosecutors called him the "single most valuable cooperating witness" about Qaeda activities; his judge was angered when, after a 3-month sentence, the FBI refused to provide him witness-protection[221][222]
Jason Walters – Dutch citizen, former member of the Hofstad Network, convicted on acts of terror; currently writing his Master's thesis about de-radicalisation, and is an active speaker against radical zealotry, as an Analyst at Blue Water Intelligence[225][226]
^Association for Asian studies (Ann Arbor;Michigan) (1976). A-L, Volumes 1–2. Columbia University Press. p. 817. ISBN9780231038010. Retrieved 29 June 2010.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^Bradshaw, Richard; Rius, Juan Fandos (2016). Historical Dictionary of the Central African Republic (Historical Dictionaries of Africa). Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. p. 430.
^*Vitray-Meyerovitch, Eva de; Cartier, Rachel; Cartier, Jean-Pierre (1995), Islam, l'autre visage : Entretiens avec Rachel et Jean-Pierre Cartier (in French), Albin Michel, p. 39, ISBN978-2226077530
^Hellen, Nicholas; Morgan, Christopher (22 February 2004). "Islamic Britain lures top people". The Sunday Times. London, UK. Archived from the original on 10 July 2010. Retrieved 8 May 2010.
^"Jason Walters". Blue Water Intelligence. Retrieved 16 August 2020.
^Pinverbod voor terrorist, the Dutch foreign minister bans convicted Hofstadgroep terrorists from any financial transactions, by Rien Meijer and Bart Mos, De Telegraaf, 20 April 2006 (Dutch)
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