Slavery The State And Islam

Slavery, the State, and Islam looks at slavery as the foundation of power and the state in the Muslim world. Closely examining major theological and literary Islamic texts, it challenges traditional approaches to the subject. Servitude was a foundation for the construction of the new state on the Arabian peninsula. It constituted the essence of a relationship of authority as found in the Koran. The dominant stereotypes and traditions of equality as promoted by Islam, of its leniency toward slaves, is questioned. This original, pioneering book overturns the mythical view of caliphal power in Islam. It examines authority as it functions in the Arab world today and helps to explain the difficulty of attempting to instill freedom and democracy there.

What happens when authorities you venerate condone something you know is wrong? Every major religion and philosophy once condoned or approved of slavery, but in modern times nothing is seen as more evil. Americans confront this crisis of authority when they erect statues of Founding Fathers who slept with their slaves. And Muslims faced it when ISIS revived sex slavery, justifying it with verses from the Quran and the practice of Muhammad. Exploring the moral and ultimately theological problem of slavery, Jonathan A.C. Brown traces how the Christian, Jewish and Islamic traditions have tried to reconcile modern moral certainties with the infallibility of God’s message. He lays out how Islam viewed slavery in theory, and the reality of how it was practiced across Islamic civilization. Finally, Brown carefully examines arguments put forward by Muslims for the abolition of slavery.

The African Diaspora was a consequence of the enslavement in the interior of West Africa. This work examines the conditions of slavery facing Muslims and converts to Islam both in the central Sudan and in the broader diaspora of Africans. It considers the consequences of European colonization.

Slavery in Islamic Middle East examines the institution of slavery in Islam in a range of cultural setti ngs. It includes partial translation of the memoirs of the F rench physician, Louis Frank. '

Publisher description

A remarkable research accomplishment. Ali leads us through three strands of early Islamic jurisprudence with careful attention to the nuances and details of the arguments.

Walking Qur'an: Islamic Education, Embodied Knowledge, and History in West Africa

In Possessed by the Right Hand, Bernard K. Freamon offers a comprehensive legal history of slavery and slave-trading in Islam, considering the impact of Western abolitionism, its failure, and the implications of the rise of ISIS and Boko Haram.