ive recently been reading books on kindle and listening to various podcasts whilst commuting to and from work. does anyone know of good islamic podcasts/talks i can listen to using podcast app? also any good books, ideally islamic if not non fiction.
curretly reading one about race and class following the british empire by akala. very good book. he says people like ibn kudama and few other well known famous islamic scholars of the past held very racist views. is this correct? akala generally is very accurate with his facts and very intelligent so hard to imagine him lying about it
I have not read anything related to Imam Ibn Qudama, but I have read a bit of Imam Ibn Khuldun's work.
From what I understood, he was speaking of the physical and behavioural differences between different races. Not that they are essentially backward and should be mistreated.
He spoke of the black tribals who were far removed from proper human civilization (and as i remember, similarly about white tribals in europe who were in similar situation back then). Also they were non-Muslims then, so you could mock their irriligion and resistance to accept Islam.
He said things like.. The were moved by music, dance often, less intelligent compared to the civilized Arabs and Berbers etc.
From what I understand racism is to mock other races and to prevent them from rising up socially. I don't think stating obvious physical differences between races should be counted as racism.
All men are equal in the spiritual sense, that is they all have an equal opportunity to attain a high status with Allah. But the physical worldy differences between races are obvious and undeniable. There are races some who are physically weaker than others, some who are more able in subjects like maths, others who are more able in subjects like literature, some races who look more beautiful than others etc.
For eg: We ordinary south Indians are very weak in physical strength compared to Arabs, less beautiful compared to Arabs, less intelligent in maths based subjects compared to the brahmin race here. I have found the last part true often. No matter how hard I study they always score better with less effort.
But we have our our own srengths and I am satisfied with that. (Alhamdulillah!)
I wouldn't say that its racism if someone says this aloud. Only that it should not be used to mock or stop that race from social status and opportunities.
sorry my bad he mentioned ibn khuldun not ibn qudama. things like this really do bother me as ive mentioned previously muslims like to paint this rosey image of us bieng non racists by quoting odd ayah and hadith but reality is different. fair enough sahaba and early ummah lived islam to the letter but i find it laughable when muslims today boast we are non racist
i disagree with your views about intelligence and beauty. first of all beauty is very subjective so how you prove what race or not is more beautiful is impoissible.
as for intelligence how is this determined? even most ardent supports of IQ test accept its a weak measure and as for being good at certain subjects, one needs a level playing field. average person from subcontinent is more worried about survival and know their timetables. does that make them less intelligent? yet these same people will outsmart anyone in making use of resources and coming up with innovative ways to survive or get things done.
u talked about maths, here in the uk indians are known for their maths and academia skills.
This cannot be undone and I am sure it will be greatly appreciated.
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