Given how people interpret the bible over in the west though, I'd be pretty skeptical of anyone's interpretation of any religious texts except your own interpretation.

I would just emphasize that Muslims are actually the absolute worst authority on Islam unless you are also a Muslim and you learn it from them from within your culture. If you're a westerner trying to understand Islam from scholars then Muslims scholars are you absolute worst source because they cannot be trusted more so than anyone else but frankly, everyone has an agenda so I'd say no one is trustworthy anyway regardless of their religious beliefs.

I have a Quran sitting on my desk and I've read a bit of it because of all the recent talk of Muslims lately. The Quran is 1000x easier to interpret than the bible. The Quran is very straight-forward in how it presents its ideas. There's very little open for interpretation. If you are not Muslim then Muslims are not your friend. It's as clear as day in the Quran.