ahmed-shakil@cs.yale.edu (Shakil Waiz Ahmed) (02/14/91)
This article was written by Sajjad Ahmed as a response to a posting on soc.culture.indian, but it has relevance to soc.religion.islam too. I would appreciate if you could could post it: In article <Feb.12.01.30.50.1991.18165@pilot.njin.net>, joolee@pilot.njin.net (Jooh Lee) writes: |> There are been a spate of articles on SCI recently about |> Islam. If the followers of Islam were really such |> nice guys are has been portrayed by some of the Muslim |> netters, could one our muslim brothers/sisters |> explain why the Zorastrians had to flee Iran, or why |> B'hai's are/were persecuted there (to virtual extinction), |> even today...or for that matter why 300,000 jewish population |> in Iraq a few decades ago has been reduced to mere 3000? |> Isn't it the same anti-other-religion trend in Islam that |> has driven the Hindus out of Pakistan since independence? |> Is this lack of religious tolerence towards non-believers |> a religious mandate in Islam? Is fanaticism synonymous with |> Islam? |> |> |> I am just trying to understand the religious behavior of different |> religions. |> So please stay with the issues. The article on hand describes alleged crimes that have been committed against non-Muslims in Muslim countries. This is then being attributed to the conclusion that Islam is intolerant towards other religions. There clearly seems to be a gap in logic somewhere, based on lack of knowledge and strong built-in prejudice against Islam. Let us clarify a few points. The alleged crimes against the non-Muslims were committed, if they were committed at all (let us, to the writer's sake's, assume for the moment that they were), by governments in certain Muslim countries. These governments - take the case of Iraq, or Saudi Arabia, are brutal and oppressive regimes, allowing no opposition to exist, not only oppressing non-Muslims but also Muslim "fundamentalists" alike. Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and many other Muslim countries have persecuted Muslim "fundamentalists" by torturing and massacring them. There are many cited examples of such happenings all of these countries - if anybody wishes to obtain them I will post them. The question therefore arises: what sort of Muslims are these indeed, who not only persecute non-Muslims, but also those Muslims who are the most fervent about Islam? The answer is obvious - these governments, these governments in all of these Muslim countries, are not considered to be Muslims by the masses of the people. Who set up these governments? Who set up these brutal and oppressive regimes? One only needs to look at history and analyze how the Western colonial powers set up puppet monarchies in the Gulf to suit their political and economic interests. One only needs to look at who it is that made Saddam Hussein the monster that he has become, who provided him active military and financial support to wage a bloody 8-year war against the Muslim brothers in Iran, and who made him so powerful as to now show his fist at everyone? What sort of a Muslim government would kill its own Muslim people. The answer is clear - such a government is not Muslim. All Muslims agree nowadays that there is no true Islamic state on the face of this earth. The true Islamic states were eradicated a long time ago by the Western colonial powers, only to be replasced by years of brutal colonial rule, and, after that, by not any less brutal puppet regimes. This, then, explains how non-Muslims have been persecuted in Muslim countries in recent history. The challenge remains to prove that Islam is intolerant and that the Muslim people are intolerant of other religions. Let us have a look at the situation when there was a true Islamic state, ranging in its vastness from Spain to India. The writer of the article is asked to provide just one example of any persecution of non-Muslims in the Islamic nation. On the contrary, Western books themselves admit to how Islam spread with amazing rapidity across all of the regions that the Muslims passed through without the lifting of a single sword. Finally, the West is beginning to acknowledge these facts after years of extreme stereotyping and production of ridiculous slander about Islam and Muslims. To cite but a few examples: "The picture of the Muslim soldier advancing with a sword in one handand the Koran in the other is quite false." (Basanta Coomar Bose, Mahomedanism, Calcutta, 1931, p.33) "History makes it clear, however, that the legend of fanatical Muslims sweeping through the world and forcing Islam at the point of the sword upon conquered races is one of the most fantastically absurd myths ever repeated." (De Lacy O'Leary, Islam at the Crossroads, London, 1923, p.8) Once under Muslim rule, the non-Muslims, according to Islamic law, were given total freedom to practise their own laws and were not subject to the laws of the Islamic state. What sort of persecution and intolerance is this? What sort of intolerance can be attributed to a people that gave absolute freedom to the non-Muslims to practise their own and religion and laws and live as freely as the Muslims with no bias or prejudice against them in any way? Where is this more evident than Spain, 800 years under Muslim rule, yet when the Muslims left not one person had been converted by force, not one had been persecuted because of belonging to a different religion? Not one church or synagogue had been destroyed, rather magnificent buildings were built next to them, revered to this day by the Spanish. Let's see what the Jews themselves have to say about their period under Muslim rule in Spain: "The Jewish historians of the 19th Century, as in the case of Graetz (the author of a classic ten-volume history of the Jews), who were deeply embittered by the contrast between enlightened ideas of that century and the denial of civic rights to the Jews in many European countries, pointed out most emphatically that the legal and actual position of the Jews during the Middle Ages was much better in Muslim-Arab countries than in Christian Europe; and the 'GOLDEN AGE' of Judaism in Muslim Spain has become a phrase which has found its why even to the most popular accounts of Jewish history." (S.D. Goitein in his "Jews and Arabs," p.7) So this is the condition that the Jews lived in under Muslim rule, admitted openly by the Jews. Little thanks do they give too - one can hardly call the present era the Golden Age of the Palestinians. What kind of intolerance is this indeed, I wonder? How does this compare to what the Christians did after reconquering Spain. The notorious Spanish Inquisition, that tortured Muslims and Jews alike, massacring them in many places. It seems the Christians never get blame for any intolerance when they crossed the oceans to the new worlds. They seemed to have found the most effective solution - they couldn't be bothered to convert the indigenous people, be they American Indians, Incas, Aztecs or Aborigines. So they just wiped them out in brutal massacres that lasted many years. Strangely enough, if the Muslims had used the same methods, entire Asia and Africa would have been Muslim lands, Spain would have become a completely Muslim country, Columbus would have been a Muslim, and the entire North America and South America would have been Muslim continents. I wonder in whose power the world would be now, and who would be blaming who for religious intolerance. Nay, but Islam prohibits religious intolerance of any kind, which is why the Muslim rulers of those days forbade any use of force or persecution against of non-Muslims. In the days of the Prophet (pbuh), non-Muslims used to come to the Prophet to settle disputes between themselves, and also between themselves and Muslims, because they knew that he was just and exercise justice equally, be it on Muslims on non-Muslims. He never favored Muslims over non-Muslims when it came to judging. This is openly admitted by everyone. So what kind of religious intolerance is this? How many Christian missionaries used such justice when dealing with the "backward" and "primitive" "natives" (as they called them) in Africa and the Americas? Let those who accuse Islam of being intolerant provide one example in the Qur'an or Hadiths that bring substance to their horrible and slanderous accusations. Rather, we invite them to overcome the centuries of prejudice they are accustomed to, and open the Qur'an themselves themselves and see with their own eyes with what beautiful words the Qur'an commands the Muslims to live in peace with the non-Muslims, not to treat them unjustly in any way, and never, ever, to begin any hostilities of any kind against them. Indeed, the prejudice is strong, as attacks against Muslims and Islamic institutions throughout the whole country are showing (especially after the outbreak of the war), but it is our duty to inform the people of the truth. (One immediately begins to wonder how tolerant this society really is when mosques across the whole country are getting bombed and others receiving bomb threats, and Muslims are being attacked by people waving American flags - then the Muslims really begin to understand the American dream). I end again with the famous Surah in the Qur'an: In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful, Say, O you disbelievers! I worship not that which you worship, Nor do you worship that which I worship, And I will not worship that which you are wont to worship, Nor will you worship that which I worship, To you be your way, and to me mine. I ask you, is this your idea of intolerance, of persecution? I sincerely hope not. Sajjad W. Ahmed