The UK Should adopt Islamic Culture?
- Thread starter Astramax
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ViolentPanda said:I have. The Quran was definitely the better-written book, and was much more convincing than most of Rushdie's work.
I once started with reading Rushdie. In a translation. I fell asleep over it. Hence, since everyone seems to talk about him as such a great writer, I assume you must read it in English to get all that exited over his art.
salaam.
butchersapron
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Aldebaran said:
I disagree - the various rules prohibiting excessive profit alone are themselves indications of the pro-commerical nature of early Islam - it endorses this state of affirs as being those willed by Allah.
invisibleplanet
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Mercantile economies existed in that region for some 4,000 years before Islam came along, butchersapron.
butchersapron
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invisibleplanet said:
So early Islam developed out of a mercantile economy and mercantile assumptions.
butchersapron
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Of course not what?
And there's a glaring contradiction in your postion that Islam was a critique of certain economic conditions but at the same time has nothing at to with 'economics' or contains any economic influences.
And there's a glaring contradiction in your postion that Islam was a critique of certain economic conditions but at the same time has nothing at to with 'economics' or contains any economic influences.
butchersapron said:
Islam did not develop out of any economy (I really don't know where you get that). It rose within an environment where the ancient tribal affiliations and all that is connected with that system were undermined by the rise of a local ego-centrism focussed on mercantile profit with neglect of social obligations. Induced by the mere fact that Mecca over a rather short time span became a pre-Islamic religious centre of gods endorsed and promoted by those who had the most profit economical from the trade.
salaam.
invisibleplanet
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butchersapron said:
No. And it's likely that mercantile economies existed prior to Early Bronze Age, but I haven't got around to studying that yet
My hunch is that they did. Back to your point - you might attempt to say that is true of Judaism and Christianity also - but your hypothesis that Islam (or Judaism or Christianity) 'developed out of' mercantilism would be incorrect since they are not economic systems.
As a religious system guided in it's root by the holy books of Judaism (count the number of references to 'The Book' and 'The Taurat' in the Qu'ran), you'd be better to look at the Halachic governances, since that's where the religious edicts governing the attitudes of followers regarding charity is taken from. No surprises then that both Judaism and Islam adopt the same approach to social attitudes to welfare.
invisibleplanet
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Aldebaran said:
He does. Might butcherspron be better looking at the two centuries (approximate) of tribal wars between Arabian Jewish and Arabian Christian and Arabian non-Abrahamic tribal leaders in his attempt to discover 'what' it is that Islam 'developed out of'?
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Aldebaran said:
From what I can make out, Rushdie's work has the same soporific effect whichever language you read it in.
His prose is often beautiful, but beauty alone can't substitute for a good story (IMHO).
The only one of his books I actually enjoyed reading was "Midnight's Children", reading the rest felt more like a punishment.
butchersapron
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Aldebaran said:
This says that it did develp out of an economy you realise. Not that it doesn't.
butchersapron
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invisibleplanet said:
Islam developed out of real material conditions. You've agreed that mercantilism was one of those material conditions. I've not contended that there was not others.
butchersapron
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invisibleplanet said:No. And it's likely that mercantile economies existed prior to Early Bronze Age, but I haven't got around to studying that yet
Back to your point - you might attempt to say that is true of Judaism and Christianity also - but your hypothesis that Islam (or Judaism or Christianity) 'developed out of' mercantilism would be incorrect since they are not economic systems.
As a religious system guided in it's root by the holy books of Judaism (count the number of references to 'The Book' and 'The Taurat' in the Qu'ran), you'd be better to look at the Halachic governances, since that's where the religious edicts governing the attitudes of followers regarding charity is taken from. No surprises then that both Judaism and Islam adopt the same approach to social attitudes to welfare.
Again, the adaptation of Judaic roots to the material conditions (including mercantilism) of early Islam doesn't in any way mean that early islam was not influenced by mercantilism or that it didn't incorporarte pro-mercantile ideas and influences. I think it did. All those commercial laws and regulations meant something.
invisibleplanet
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Early Islam incorporated a similar approach to social duty as it's Judaic roots as a social necessity in order to attribute social responsiblity for welfare issues to it's adherents within the existant mercantile economic system. In political terms, Islam, in common with many other religions, could be considered to be an early form of socialism.
butchersapron
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invisibleplanet said:
A socialism that endorses private property and private ownership of the land and the means of social production - and further endorses the use of both of these for private profit. A blairite third way fabian type socialism at best - no type of socialism in reality. Surely an early socialism would attack the system that produces poverty and the need to give alms.
invisibleplanet
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*coughs* And with the co-operation that arose between Iberian Islamic and Judaic scholars during the early and middle Medieval age in Spain, this information was made available to the Christian west
Jonti said:
Exactly, many texts were lost in Greek and Latin fortunately some had been translated into Arabic and Persian. And there were great minds in the Islamic Empires, Ibn Khaldun and Avicenna (Ali Al Husayn Ibn-Sina) to name but two. Avicenna was discussed on In Our Time last week, he had a real fondness for wine and women.
Jonti said:
Only someone with no clue about European history would think otherwise.
To be correct though it must be said that several, mostly Syrian, Christians did their part of the translations leading to preservation and in later periods re-introduction in the West of Greek philosophy.
This is only one aspect of Muslim contributions to what today's Westerners most of the time take for their culture's achievements
salaam.
invisibleplanet said:
"Judaic roots" is from Islamic point of view completely incorrect.
Islam recognizes earlier prophets and earlier revelations of the other Abrahamic religions, but states that these messages were corrupted by human interventions. Hence Muhammed received a renewal of the revelations = the Message of God in its original form, and not for a defined group of humans but for all of humanity.
About the reference to socialism: A superficial interpretation I don't agree with, despite the fact that there are no doubt similarities between social aspects of Islam and those of socialist ideals.
salaam.
butchersapron said:
Islam developed out of the revelations the prophet Muhammed received and the traditions on and about his way of explaining and living them.
Even if you don't believe he was a prophet and/or don't believe in God, you can't trace Islam back to anyone else but Muhammed.
salaam.
butchersapron
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I just did. So did Invisible planet. So did you.
invisibleplanet
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Aldebaran said:
I did say 'could be considered', not 'should be considered'.
And yes, no doubt about it, there are similarities between social aspects of Islam and a developing socialist ideal (in an historical sense), but yes, there are also disparities.
butchersapron
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Aldebaran said:
I can, but i don't in this case because i think it's an utterly fatuous and false distiniction, based on idealistic assumptions that are simply not true in any real sense.
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