Thanks for the kind thoughts, mangeorge. There are lots better books already published than anything I can write. Karen Armstrong, for example, has a very sane, intelligent, and well-informed way of understanding these matters. See the Salon interview with her. Quite good. (Those Brits again…)
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I played host to Karen Armstrong once in 1992, when she visited the Islamic institute I was working at. I brought her tea.
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Truth Seeker, if I’m not mistaken, the medieval Church prohibited all interest, similar to Islam. The rise of capitalism got them to amend that rule. In Islam it remains (and a good thing, too!) Islamic banks work on the principle of shared risk (mudarabah) in which both lender and borrower become co-investors. Instead of the borrower doing all the work and the lender taking interest regardless of how the investment goes. I’m no expert on finance, but that’s the way I’ve heard it explained.
Thanks, Jomo Mojo for the answer on usury and Islamic banking.
You are correct, BTW, that the medieval church also prohibitted lending at interest. Aquinas wrote (Sorry for the long quote) “A lender may without sin enter an agreement with the borrower for compensation for the loss he incurs of something he ought to have, for this is not to sell the use of money but to avoid a loss. It may also happen that the borrower avoids a greater loss than the lender incurs, wherefore the borrower may repay the lender with what he has gained. But the lender cannot enter an agreement for compensation, through the fact that he makes no profit out of his money: because he must not sell that which he has not yet and may be prevented in many ways from having…”
This sounds very much like the principle of shared risk you outlined even though it is phrased in terms of avoiding loss.
The prohibition against lending at interest had begun to break down by the late middle ages, at least in part because, though it was forbidden to lend at interest, it was OK to borrow at interest! Aquinas again,
"It is lawful to borrow for usury from a man who is ready to do so and is an usurer by profession; provided the borrower have a good end in view, such as the relief of his own or another's need."
Is this also true under Islamic law?
BTW, I completely agree with mangeorge. This is no longer a thread, it’s a resource.
Apologies for briefly resurrecting this old thread, but I just wanted to post this link I came across while digging around for something else. It’s an analysis of the ‘Islamic’ content Osama bin Laden’s statements. It’s a roughdraft ( I haven’t found a cleaned up version yet ), but I thought it was pretty interesting. My apologies also if someone has already posted this earlier and I missed it.
Aaannnd since nobody else picked this one up, I’ll finally answer it as best I can.
I live in the Arctic, which is the sunrise/sunset thing. According to the local Muslims, they had a special ruling and they go by Meccan time.
I am going to go bug Shabir and Mo, though, because I want more details. Seems to me Meccan time would be an issue also, since we’re a hemisphere away.
I saw part of an interview with a Muslim leader on the tube the other night. Sorry I can’t cite, I didn’t get to watch it all. Maybe someone else did.
Anyway, the cleric said that Jesus was the only Prophet who would return (second coming) before The End.
Wow! I must say that I was surprised.
Is this a commonly held belief in Islam? And, I wonder how many christians are aware of it.
Hmmm… This is really more down Muslim Guy’s alley, but I think that at least in Sunni eschatology, Jesus is the one who will return to eventually slay the Anti-Christ ( Dajjal ). I’m not certain if the same holds for Shi’ites. In Shi’ism ( at least Imami and Isma’ili Shi’ism ) the final Imam ( the Mahdi ) will emerge from occultation to lead the apocalyptic end battle against the forces of evil. Whether that intersects and conflicts with the notion of Jesus’ return, I’m not sure ( although I note that objectively at least there is no reason it should - Jesus role may be limited to just that one act of removing the Anti-Christ ).
At any rate, to the best of my knowledge no other Prophets of Islam ( i.e. Muhammed, Moses ) are slated to make a return. Jesus holds a special place - But that place is of course not identical to Christian dogma. For one thing Muslims don’t consider Jesus to be the son of God. But I digress.
rjung, are you quoting this as ‘common belief’ or presenting the above as fact?
Tamarlane, please step in when I screw any of this up:
The middle-east countries won the crusades. I’m not excusing the Crusades, but it doesn’t seem like they were a major contribution to a permanent decline of conditions in the region. As this site puts it,
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Re: “…and Western imperialism, leaving the people and the land broken and poor as a result”. The Mongols had much more to do with this than the West. As this site puts it:
Re: “Several thousand years ago, the middle east was a region rich in culture and education and literature – many ideas of mathematics and philosophy were first developed there, long before the Greeks and Romans came onto the scene”.
rjung, squeegee: Well as to the above, yes I do think it is incorrect in its particulars, while being probably at least loosely accurate in terms of popular perception in the Middle-East. A few points:
#1 - Several thousand years is too long a span, insomuch as Islam only dates back to the 7th century C.E. .
#2 - By the same token, if we’re talking specifically about Muslim accomplishments, obviously they came after the classical Greek and Roman civilizations. Squeegee has it right that the 8th -9th ( actually I’d extend that to the 10th, myself ) centuries C.E. were the great periods of Islamic intellectual achievement, building on earlier works by the Greeks et al . But the Islamic world generally retained that level of superior intellectual discourse over Europe well into the 16th century.
#3 - I assume, squeegee, that rjung was speaking metaphorically of “crusades”, since he put that word in quotes. As opposed to The Crusades.
Both of your points on this are well taken, really. Squeegee is correct that from a strictly political standpoint both The Crusades and Christian assaults in general had little impact on the Islamic world except on the fringes ( Spain being the most significant “fringe” and even al-Andalus didn’t start contracting until the 11th century ) until the early Modern Era ( we could perhaps use the Treaty of Passarowitz, signed in 1718 I think, as an arbitrary dividing line ).
But rjung point has relevance in that the mythology surrounding The Crusades still has a lot of resonance in the modern Muslim world. It’s a bit silly IMHO, but then politics aren’t always rational.
#4 - IMO the economic and political decline of the “Muslim East” vis-a-vis the “Christian West” over the centuries has a lot more to do with internal processes than external influence - At least until relatively recently.
The changing climate in the Middle-East ( increasing desertification ). Rising water tables in Mesopotamia ( salination of the soil with concomittant drop in agricultural revenue ). The spread of pastoralism and decline of settled agriculture in response to both climate and more importantly the immigration of militarily elite nomadic Turcoman under the impetus of first the Seljuq, then the Mongol advance. Destruction of the qanat ( underground irrigation canals ) systems as a result of scorched earth war ( the Mongols in Khurasan that squeegee mentioned, the Banu Hilal and Banu Suleim incursions unleashed upon North Africa by the declining Fatimids ) or simple neglect ( from political disorder ). The retention of outdated and inefficient economic models like the Guild system and tax farming or extractive, parasitic classes like the Mamelukes of Egypt ( who survived the Ottoman conquest and continued bleeding Egypt dry until exterminated by Muhammed Ali in the early 19th century ). The bypassing of Asian land trade routes by more economical and European dominated sea trade starting in the 16th century. Internal political stagnation in the large land empires of Safavid Persia, Mughul India, and the Ottoman state owing to the peculiarity of later Turkic succession practices mixing poorly with absolutism. Etc., etc., etc. .
It is only in the 18th century that we begin to see wars with the Christian powers and ( much more importantly ) predatory European economic imperialism begin to penetrate the region in a serious way and start to have a profound impact. And for much of the Middle-East, actual European occupation was comparatively brief ( Algeria being about the first occupied and last relinguished ).
That said, I think in the mind of many Muslims in the region it’s that last phase of European exploitation that lingers in the memory. Not surprising since the aftereffects are still visible. And as rjung alluded, it’s perception that counts .
Tamerlane: Wow, thanks. Knew I could count on you for clarification. If you need me, I’ll have my nose in the encyclopedia most of today reading up on everything you brought up in point #4.
So this bizarre viewpoint (what rjung posted) really is the popular perception in the middle-east? How distressing.
re: 18th century imperialism. I was wondering if this were more relevant to middle-eastern resentment of the West, but I don’t know enough about that period to have much of an opinion. Thanks for clarifying.
Oh, one more thing: Tamarlane, can you clarify what you mean by “crusades” vs. The Crusades? Or rather, what the popular-perception means by this? I wasn’t aware that there is more than one definition, not just the (pointless, barbaric) European expeditions of the middle ages. Thanks!!
Hard to say how conscious and thought out it is ( Collounsbury would have a better handle on opinion on the ground in the region ), but yes, I do think a certain level of inferiority complex enters into the picture. The evidence of past Muslim dominance is all around these people and emblazoned across their history. To go from one of the great centers of civilization, one of the world’s mightiest empires, the fulcrum between Romanized West and the civilizations of the East, to just another collection of “oppressed third world countries”, I would think would rankle deeply. Especially since many Muslims ( maybe not all, but many ) are I’m sure still convinced of the innate superiority of Islamic society to “Christendom”.
And remember it really wasn’t to long ago that some of these states were still viable and formidable entities. The Ottoman state was in slow decline for a very long time. But they still were capable of fighting and winning wars at times ( they kicked the Austrian’s collective ass in 1737-1739 and at least were on the winning side during the Crimean War in the 1850’s ) and even reforming ( or trying to ). The Omani’s ousted Portugal from their most valuable East African properties in the 17th century and the succesor state of Zanzibar would prbably have survived as a viable independent if the “Scramble for Africa” hadn’t gobbled it up in the 1880’s or 1890’s. Egypt modernized under Muhammed Ali and very nearly usurped the Ottoman state - Under his grandson it carved out a new “mini-empire” in the Sudan in the 1870’s - the Mahdist state that succeeded it held out against British arms until 1896 ( 1898? ). In 1921 the Berber rebels in the Rif mountains of Morocco very nearly brought Spain to it’s knees ( really France saved Spain’s rear ) and paved the way for Franco ( long story ). Afghanistan, partly for geopolitical reasons, but partly because they were just tough motherfuckers in a godforsaken corner of the world, survived British and Russian expansionism. etc.
By The Crusades, I’m referring to the well-known expeditions to the Holy Land. By the “crusades” I’m being vague referring both to official anti- Muslim crusades elsewhere ( in Spain, against the Ottomans in the Balkans - the last of which ended in disaster at Nicopolis in 1396 ) and offensives against Muslim states by European powers generally, which while maybe not sanctioned crusades as such, were pretty much indistinguishable to the Muslims on the receiving end. I’m assuming that’s rjung was alluding to as well.
xanakis, in my life I have only met one Muslim who ate pork, compared to about ten thousand who drink.
I don’t know how true this is for Arabs, or even Bengalis (as pork is served in restaurants in Bangladesh), but Pakistani Muslims are raised believing that the pig is a filthy, disease-ridden animal which lives off its own excrement. Pork is not served in any Pakistani restaurants nor is it available in shops. I have heard rumours that wild boars live in certain areas of Pakistan but I’ve never seen them. I don’t think pork is officially banned but even the sight of it is revolting to some people. A lifelong distaste for pork is due more to cultural bias than religious guilt.
As far as the agnostic/atheist thing goes, I don’t know if I agree entirely, as I’ve met many agnostic Muslims. But one reason there aren’t many agnostic/atheist ex-Muslims could be that Muslim families tend to be rather more conservative regarding religion and less forgiving of those who declare themselves “ex-Muslims”. Also, some Muslims feel that their religion is part of their culture and are reluctant to renounce it entirely.
You know, I’ll cautiously retract that factoid. The last official crusade in the Balkans may have beeen the campaign that blew-out at Varna in 1444. My memory is not firing on all cylinders at the moment .
Tamarlane, thanks again for the treatise. I’ve really got to get up to speed on Mid-east history during the 17th-19th centuries. I’ll be in my reading cubby all day if you need anything.
I guess I was more asking, is the stilted view of past events (a golden age thousands of years ago predating the Greek & Romans, the West single-handedly destroying the entire region through thousands of years of persecution) a commonly held belief? Maybe we need Collounsbury to jump in here.
I was also curious about this, if someone can please explain:
Forgive my ignorance, but what events involving Americans, decades ago, caused Muslims to ask this? I’m assuming the overthrow of the Iranian government and installation of the Shah, but perhaps you meant something else…?
OBL mentions many times how “for eighty years” the region has been surpressed (or something, I forget the exact wording). Okay, so what happened around the 1920’s that the Osama-dude is referring to?
Again, forgive my ignorance, and sorry in advance if this has been covered already.
Well, since Tamerlane already addressed the particulars on my “Islamic psychology” post, I’ll just follow it up by noting my response was an off-the-cuff, no-research-book-by-my-side, top-of-my-head, Islam-for-Dummies summation of the real issues. If you want historical accuracy and great detail, we’ll have to bring in Muslem Guy for that.
I will note that some liberal Muslem scholars have recognized the limitations of the “blame everything on the Christians” mindset, and have spoken out against it. Unfortunately, I’m not sure if they are gaining much of an audience for their views.
Yes. (Except not predating the Romans and Greeks, I never heard anything that stupid. Just idealizations, sometimes ludicrous, sometimes not much worse than Western idealization of their own history)
Ditto. Frankly drinking is a lot easier to justify Quranicly than pork.
Above pretty much describes Muslim Arab cultural attitudes. Xtian Arabs differ. Sounds like the Pakis imported Muslim Arab attitudes. Conversely one can find some sub-Saharan African Muslims who’ll eat pork but largely I’ve encounted that among folks who are… well somewhat unorthodox.
Same.
Agree. It becomes something like the Jewish as culture thing, but largely society doesn’t permit people to be Atheists. Doubters, okay, not really ‘kosher’ per se but the odd free-thinker is usually tolerated. But athiesm per se? Uhuh.
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