Islam in America - Thesis Example

Order 327520 Topic: Islam in America: Communities and s In West Africa, when slavery assumed the form of trade, regular contacts were established between the local procurers of slaves and the plantation owners in America. Africans were forcibly taken, kidnapped to the slave ships. Islam has always been against the institutions of slavery. 2. Ancient civilizations of Greece, Rome and Egypt were built with the aid of slave labor and wars were fought using enslaved soldiers. Some sort of slavery existed in all countries. But slavery took off as a commercial venture in the 1400s when merchant adventurers from Portugal began to transport men, women and children from West Coast of Africa to plantation owners of America. In the next 400 years, more than 12 million Africans had reached the shores of America, forcibly uprooted and sold into slavery. 3. Ms. Diouf is sympathetic to and understands Islam. She loves Africa. She loves the people of Africa. She knows and respects the descendants of African slaves in America. She has provided a well-researched account of the African Muslims that were transported to America as slaves. Most of them were quite well-educated. A West African Muslim was literate, could read and write and in many cases was more educated than the purchaser. They had memorized Quran and the hadith and belonged to noble families. Some of them were knowledgeable teachers and students. Lack of knowledge of European languages was their handicap. America depended on exploiting the mage of the black man and woman as savages for the success of the slave economy. Muslims of Africa also participated in the slave trade, but that was under duress. For European countries, exploitation was the only criterion. 4. The first exclusionary act, Chinese Exclusion Act, was passed in 1882. It prohibited the immigration of Chinese laborers for ten years. 5. Catholic countries such as Spain and Portugal promoted the slave trade in America. Many bishops of the South America defended slavery. The Catholic Church’s record on slavery is not straightforward. The Second Vatican Council condemned slavery (i.e., chattel slavery): "Whatever insults human dignity, such as subhuman living conditions, arbitrary imprisonment, deportation, slavery . . . the selling of women and children; as well as disgraceful working conditions, where men are treated as mere tools for profit, rather than as free and responsible persons; all these things and others of their like are infamies indeed . . . they are a supreme dishonor to the Creator" (Gaudium et spes 27; cf. no 29).Opponents of Catholicism and Catholic dissenters say that it is Catholic hypocrisy. Prior to 1890, Catholic churches supported slavery. American Protestants were no better. 6. Once slavery took the form of trade, the worse things happened to the salves between the 15th and 19th centuries. The conditions were more less the same for the slaves. Difficult and humiliating in Africa and more difficult and more humiliating in America! Slaves were captured, kidnapped in Africa as if they were animals. Europeans took a big part in the transportation of the slaves. In America they would be sold at a slave auction to the highest bidder. West Africa also exchanged guns for slaves. Yet the essential difference between the African slaves and the American slaves was: In Africa slavery was a symbol of honor. African slaves were permitted to live normal lives. They can marry, own property, and had the customary legal rights. Many of them were educated. American slaves underwent untold miseries, beatings, hard labor and they had no respect in the society. 7. A profession of faith (shahada). All Muslims must proclaim "There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet." Note here that Muhammad is not God in Muslim theology but rather a spokesperson or mouthpiece for the divine. Malcolm X says, "I am and always will be a Muslim. My religion is Islam." He further explains, "I am not a racist in any form whatsoever. I dont believe in any form of discrimination or segregation. I believe in Islam. I am a Muslim and there is nothing wrong with being a Muslim, nothing wrong with the religion of Islam. It just teaches us to believe in Allah as the God. Those of you who are Christian probably believe in the same God, because I think you believe in the God Who created the universe. Thats the One we believe in, the One Who created universe--the only difference being you call Him God and we call Him Allah. The Jews call Him Jehovah. If you could understand Hebrew, you would probably call Him Jehovah too. If you could understand Arabic, you would probably call Him Allah...." 8. He is England’s Price Charles. He supports the Muslim world and chides America and finds America too confrontational after the 9/11 attacks by the terrorist groups on America. He is converted to Islam. 9. The Nation of Islam (N.O.I.) is a religious organization founded in Detroit, Michigan, United States by Wallace D. Fard Muhammad in July 1930. Its goal is to resurrect the spiritual, mental, social and economic condition of the black men and women of America. 10. During the later part of the last century, a Muslim writer from the village of Qadian named Mirza Ghulam Ahmad wrote a number of treatises. In 1880, he began an extensive work entitled Baharin-i-Amadiyah, which defended Islam from the onslaughts of other religions. The movement was part of the Islamic fold but soon the followers formed a separate group—Ahmadiyya. When the concepts of traditional Islam were challenged by Ahmadiyyas, the leading Pakistani theologians denounced them as non-Muslims. They have been barred from doing pilgrimage go Mecca. Ahmadiyyas deny the concepts of Jihad.They were proclaimed as Heretics. 11. Involuntary and voluntary migrants represent a dichotomy of international migration; all foreign-born people can be classified as either involuntary or voluntary migrants. Involuntary migrants are defined as any foreign-born people who have migrated to the U.S. because they have been displaced from their home country, have an established or well-founded fear of persecution, or have been moved by deception or coercion. Voluntary migrants, sometimes also referred to as “economic migrants,” include all other international migrants who have moved as a result of their own desires and motivations. The main difference, then, between voluntary and involuntary migrants is the reason they decided to leave their home country. 12. That was 603 years before Columbus. And that is not counting the actual physical evidence in the United States today that dates back even further; however, we do know, as De Lacy OLeary pointed out, that Muslims definitely had the scientific knowledge and skill to make journeys across the Atlantic Ocean. Muslims were in the Americas, hundreds of years before Columbus. Clyde-Ahmad Winters, Barry Fell, Alexander Von Wuthenau, Ivan Van Sertima-- they all provided evidence to the above statement; and it is a statement of fact, not an opinion, although many have chosen to ignore it in the past. 13. Malcolm X is an important Afro-American leader of the Black Nationalism movement in America. He resisted the white violence and laid strong foundations for the movement in the 1960s. The sterling achievement in his life was his big leap from an illiterate convict to minister the Harlem mosque, within a year of joining Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam. He was initiated to resistance through violent methods and religious rhetoric at a very young age. His father influenced him much as to how to conduct organized resistance. His skin was lighter than the siblings. His mother was more abusive of him on account of the color of his skin. 14. Marcus Garvey was born on August 17, 1887 at St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica. He was the founder of “back to Africa” movement. He owned a newspaper, Negro World. He traveled in Central and South America, and moved to England to continue his education. In 1914, he established the Universal Negro Improvement Association and spoke about worldwide black unity. He advised the African-Americans to return to Africa and establish their own country. He died in London in 1940. 15. Malcolms mother, Louise Little, is committed to the State Mental Hospital in Kalamazoo, consequently placing Malcolm in a juvenile home. Malcolm’s fair-skinned, black mother, who endured the worst of the Great Depression. For Malcolm, Louise represents the harm that the white government does even when it claims to be acting charitably. Welfare agents separate Louise from her children and put her in a mental hospital, and Malcolm’s insistence on visiting her regularly shows his strong commitment to her. 16. Ella Little - Malcolm’s half-sister on his father’s side. When Malcolm is an adolescent, Ella provides him with a model of female strength and black pride. She represents family unity. She welcomes Malcolm into her home in Boston and always supports him, later lending him money for his pilgrimage to Mecca. Earl Little - Malcolm’s father. A preacher and political organizer from Georgia, Earl is a tall and outspoken authority figure in Malcolm’s early years. Earl’s assassination by whites for preaching the Black Nationalist ideas of Marcus Garvey makes him a martyr for Black Nationalism. Louise Little - Malcolm’s fair-skinned, black mother, who endures the worst of the Great Depression. For Malcolm, Louise represents the harm that the white government does even when it claims to be acting charitably. Welfare agents separate Louise from her children and put her in a mental hospital, and Malcolm’s insistence on visiting her regularly shows his strong commitment to her. 17. Some FBI files on Malcolm X refer to him as Malcolm K. Little. As this is never claimed as his middle initial anywhere else, it could be confused from his use of the name "Malcolm X Little." During Malcolms criminal career he used many aliases including, Jack Carlton, Rhythm Red, and Detroit Red. The first Muslim name Malcolm X used in prison was Malachi Shabazz, but was later told by Elijah Muhammad that he was not yet ready for an "original name" and reverted to Malcolm X. He later used the name Malik El-Shabazz, although in most public appearances remained identified as Malcolm X. After his split from the Nation of Islam (NOI), he made a pilgrimage to Mecca and added El-Hajj to his name, after which he began to use this Arabic name in more public appearances. Shabazz is the so-called "lost tribe" of Asia from whom African-Americans were supposed to descend, based upon the teachings of NOI founder Wallace Fard Muhammad. 18. Malcolm X had his first religious enlightenment while serving time for crimes he had committed when he was young. While Malcolm was in prison, prison, he learned and adopted the teachings of Nation of Islam, a religious sect of Orthodox Islam which believes in strict moral codes and radical views about race led by Elijah Mohammed. By the time he left prison, Malcolm had completely changed himself from a drug dealing burglar to a religious priest for the Nation of Islam. Malcolm X had completely submitted himself to the racist teachings of Elijah Mohammed. It is through the Nation of Islam and Elijah Mohammeds teachings that Malcolm developed his radical views about race in America. 19. He was a leading figure in the Nation of Islam. He rejected integration and racial equality and instead advocated black power. He was suspended from the movement by Elijah Muhammad after he made a series of extremist speeches. About the assassination of John F. Kennedy he commented, “a case of chickens coming home to roost.” On April 13, 1964 he left USA t a spiritual journey to Mecca. In Saudi Arabia, he accomplished the Haji, the pilgrimage to Mecca, and discovered an authentic Islam of universal respect and brotherhood. Gone was the belief in whites as exclusively evil. Gone was the call for black separatism. His voyage to Mecca helped him discover the atoning power of Islam as a means to unity as well as self-respect: 20. He founded he publication Muhammad Speaks. In May 1964, he established Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU). His man objective was to initiate and unite anti-racist efforts. He was concerned about the most oppressed sections of the back community. His extremist views did have an impact on some sections of the black community. He was known for his anti-capitalist views. ************ Read More