Why do self-respecting Black people submit to Islam? Islam is the religion, the ideology, that came up with the most derogatory names for black people. Horrible. Arab Muslims laughed at the Africans. For centuries.
Are black Americans, who convert to Islam, aware of this history of slavery? That the dark-skinned Arab Muslims could not believe that Africans would sell their own family members into slavery?
The Arab/Muslim slave trade of Blacks in Southeast Africa predates the European transatlantic slave trade by 700 years as Islam spread into eastern Africa in the seventh century. Muslims were selling goods to the African kingdoms and the African kingdoms were paying with their own people. In most instances, no violence was necessary to obtain those slaves..
It’s estimated that between 650 CE and 1900, 10 to 20 million people were enslaved by Arab slave traders. Others suggest more than 20 million enslaved Africans had been delivered through the trans-Sahara route into the Islamic world. At the beginning of 10th century the calipha in Baghdad had 7,000 black eunuchs and 4,000 white eunuchs in his palace.
As casual association with Black skin and slave began to be established, racist attitudes towards Blacks began to manifest in Arabic language and literature. The word for slave – Abid – became a colloquialism for African. Other words such as Haratin express social inferiority of Africans.
To the Arab Muslims, African, black skin, and slave came to mean the same thing. The symbolism is astounding. And in Islam a slave is a dhimmi, if that. Freedom was not guaranteed even if an African chose to convert to Islam, his children now born to a Muslim were still not guaranteed freedom. There was and is no escape from that dhimmitude.
Today, Arab Muslims belittle black people.
“Yet year after year, racist mockery and derogatory language against Afro/black Arabs and black African migrants make it to the TV screens of millions of Arab families gathered to enjoy TV series produced especially for Ramadan.” Think about. The holiest month in the Muslim calendar and black people are stigmatized and dehumanized.
“The Egyptian comedy series “Azmi we Ashgan” (Azmi and Ashgan) created by controversial Egyptian producer Ahmed el-Sobki, featured the lead actors donning blackface repeatedly throughout the series, as well as the use of racist language (allegedly including the use of the n-word- The video is in Arabic so I am taking the word of the journalist who wrote the article), and the portrayal of black people as servants who speak in broken Arabic and practise sorcery.”
Saudi Muslims sell castrated Africans.
PEACE BE UPON YOU …I HAVE A [MALE] SLAVE I BOUGHT FROM AN AFRICAN COUNTRY AND ARRANGED FOR HIS VISA AND STAY TILL I GOT HIM TO SAUDI [ARABIA]
HIS DESCRIPTION:
1 – BLACK SKIN. TALL 172 SM. WEIGHT 60 KILOS.
2 – CASTRATED (EXCELLENT FOR WORKING WITH A FAMILY) YOU CAN CHECK HIM WITH A DOCTOR OUR YOURSELF IF YOU HAVE EXPERIENCE IN THE MATTER.
3 – [HIS] HEALTH IS QUITE UNDAMAGED AND HAS NO IMPERFECTIONS.
4 – AGE 26 YEARS.
5 – RELIGION MUSLIM AND [HE IS] OBEDIENT AND WILL NOT DISOBEY YOU EXCEPT IN WHAT DISPLEASES GOD. PLEASE, THE MATTER IS VERY SERIOUS AND IS NOT A JOKE.
The dehumanizing language against black people that exists in Arabic language and literature should make the blood boil. Where is Black Lives Matter? The words to describe black in Arabic are as demeaning as the n-word. A word that is being scrubbed from the English language. I would be excoriated for writing the word but no problem with Abid or haratin. Black Americans would never tolerate being called by the n-word by another, yet black Americans convert to Islam.
Why?
From the Ethics of the Fathers: “Rabbi Tarfon used to say, it is not incumbent upon you to complete the task, but you are not exempt from undertaking it.”
