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Greetings:

Muslim STAMPING, MUSLIM STAMPING, has to STOP

I guess we can say Bob Marley was a Muslim though he practiced Islam in secret.

America is a Muslim Country because Americans practice Islam in secret.

Eurabia will be the new name for Eurasia because Europeans practice Islam in secret.

CHINARABIA will be the name for China because all Chinese practice Islam in secret.

IndiaArabia because all Hindus practice Islam in secret.

ONE WORLD ARAB ORDER, ONE WORLD ARAB ORDER.

Arabs rule the world though the world just doesn't know it yet

Islam is NOT a true Religion because MUSLIMS tell TOO MANY LIES or un-truths.

Muslims have proven themselves to be the biggest LIARS.

Synopsis of the Jamaican Maroons!


Introduction

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The introduction of black slaves in the western world were the beginning of a new culture, more economic wealth and prosperity for whites and for blacks a life of poverty, enslavement and oppression. Thus, what would be the state of the economy in the Americas if Black people were not forcefully brought to this Continent from Africa?
The life and times of the Jamaican Maroons is a story of an indomitable foe, a people whose survival depends on their wit and tenacity, form a part of this terrible saga in the history of blacks in the New World and where we are today.

The struggle of the Maroons of Jamaica against the British colonial authorities, their subsequent collaboration with and betrayal by them. A story that took a circular voyage from West Africa to Jamaica, then to Canada and in the end returned to Africa. The Maroons of Jamaica originally came from West Africa. Some of them were IBO, a tribe from eastern Nigeria. On the 18th May, 1700 the slaver "Herietta Marie" sank off the coast of Florida on its way back to England. The ship voyage took it from England to Nigeria where the crew acquired slaves and then travel to Jamaica where over 200 slaves were sold in the market place.

Before 1655 the Spaniards occupied Jamaica. The island having been "discovered" by Columbus in 1494. At the time of discovery the inhabitants were the Arawak Indians who were enslaved by the Spaniards. But, by the time the British took possession of the island, spanish ill treatment; European deaseas; and the the introduction of cattle which destablized native agriculture cause all the Arawak Indians to be totally wiped out. So, the most reliable source of slave labour, even before the the Indian population was decimated was from Africa inline with the inexorable pattern of the enslavement process of the New World.

The Spanish and Portuguese explorers that occupied the island brought with them a cultural heritage of slavery as practiced in Iberia and the model of the institutional complex of the slave - run sugar plantation of Madeira. Columbus lived in Maderia for nearly 10 years. Also, in Columbus time the infamous Spanish Inquisition, authorized by Pope Sixtus IV in 1478 was entrenched in the Old World. Pope Sixtus tried to establish harmony between the inquisitors and the ordinaries, but was unable to maintain control of the desires of King Ferdinand V and Queen Isablella. Sixtus agreed to recognize the independence of the Spanish Inquisition. This institution survived to the beginning of the 19th century, and was permanently suppressed by a decree on July 15, 1834. Columbus and his men came to the New World to plunder and seek riches for the return voyage to Spain.

However, those Spaniards left in Jamaica by Columbus were subsistence farmers, they farmed domestic produce and was more interested in finding Gold and other precious metal. Consequently, by the time of the English conquests "not one hundredth part of the plantable land was in cultivation." The Spanish explorers frequent forays into the hills for Gold and their hunting habits contributed to their slaves becoming skilled hunters and backwoodsmen. The slaves were used more for hunting wild cattle and hogs than farming and so became masters of woodcraft. They learned the trails through the woods and mountains, an invaluable skill to them later on as guerrilla fighters. "It was these black slaves of the Spaniards who took to the hills at the time of the British conquest that were to form the nucleus of the first Maroon society in Jamaica under the British."

Mavis Campbell argued whether these Spanish blacks who ran into the hills could be properly called runaway slaves. She said that since the definition of slaves as property, then the Spanish blacks were by conquest now British property and, as such, runaway slaves. This species of property in perpetuity was also heritable by itself and through its progency. Thus, decendants to be born in the hills would also be slaves, legally subject to be reconsigned to slavery in the event of capture, whatever their perception of themselves or their notion of their freedom might be, so long as a slave society existed on the island. See Amistad Trials! for the idea of property.

We should also consider the fact that, Admiral Venables the Naval Commander of the British Navy set forth Article Eleven of the Terms of Capitulation upon capturing the island, said in paraphase, "All slaves and negroes were to appear on the Savanna near the town on the 26th when Venables would inform them of the favours and acts of grace concerning their freedom to be granted them."

It is said that none of them responded to this offer. "The majority took to the hills separating themselves from their late masters." The attitudes of the slaves is that white masters were the same regardless of nationality. Nevertheless, the word "Maroon" is a generic term to designate fugitive slaves from plantations in the New World. Popular opinions accept that the word is derives from the Spanish Cimarron which referred to domestic cattle that had escaped to a wild existence. Others like the Iberians had their own designation for runaway slaves, but since 1655, Maroon is a designation use to refer to runaway slaves under the British. So, we could look at the Spanish Maroons as separate and they does not form a continuum of Maroon society in Jamaica as developed from the turn of the seventeenth century to the first three decades of the eighteenth. The Spanish Maroons are called Maroons by virtue of an historical event (British conquest) and not from the usual runaway situation.

Another issue is that the Spanish Maroons were Creoles mostly from the northern part of West Africa and Angola, while their eighteenth century counterparts were mainly Akan speaking blacks. What is important is that their were hostilities between these two groups. The Spanish Creoles did not take kindly to the newly arrived African runaways who came to join them in the hills. One reason is that British slave traders concentrate mostly on the Gold Cost of Africa seeking slaves for the New World. The Akan blacks were from Ghana and, a cause for the open hostility and lack of unity between the two groups. In spite of this, the Spanish Creoles were an inspiration to plantation slaves, they showed resistance to slavery. They created a precedent of defiance of the slave master's authority and their presence in the woods gave cause to slaves running away from the plantations. Their skills as hunters help to show runaway slaves how to adapt to their surrounding, and later on in guerrilla warfare against the authorities.

Therefore, the history of Maroon societies in the New World is the history of guerrilla warfare. A question to keep in mind is why these former bitter opponent of the colonial authorities should have turned to collaborate with them? And, in so doing what effect this had on the plantocracy in Jamaica?

Within a year of the British conquest of Jamaica, "the rebellious slaves" in the hills, had made themselves so formidable that, like the Spanish officials of Panama, the British soon conceived that they were a greater danger that were the Spaniards. The Maroons' boldness, their prowess in guerrilla warfare, their knowledge of the terrain of the country were all too noted with apprehension. "Concerning the state of the enemy on shore here the Spanairds is not considerable, but of the Blacks there are many, who are like to prove as thorns and pricks in our sides, living in the mountains and woods, a kind of life both natural, and I believe, acceptable to them...." Certainly this were not true of Africans, but a life born of necessity.

Indeed, the early Maroons were "thorns and pricks" in the side of the British, they plunder and burn plantations, captured slaves and killed British soldiers who ventured out too far into the woods. The Maroons victories against the British were so numerous that in April, 1656, the British Governor D'Oyley reported "it hath pleased God to give us some success against the negroes. A plantation of theirs beeinge (sic) found out, wee (sic) fell on them, slew some, and spoiled one of their chief quarters." In another skirmish the British soldiers killed "seven or eight " negroes" but the Maroons retaliated by ambushing and killing forty soldiers. In a letter to John Thurloe, Major Sedgwicke said, "In two daies (sic) more than forty of our soldiers, were cut off by the negroes as they were carelessly going about their quarters."

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1. Many Afrikans sold into bondage were sold by Arabicized Afrikans or Arabs, though Muslims wouldn't want Afrikans to know this dirty little secret.

2.The specific Maroons in Jamaica were mainly related to IBO people of Nigeria whom were probably considered pagans by Arabs or Arabicized Afrikans which would make them prime targets for forced labor by Muslims though Muslims would NOT want that secret to be known either.

Maroons were Muslims fighting Jihad riiiiggghhhhtt



Hotep

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Ahmad b. Tulun (d. 884), the first independent ruler of Muslim Egypt, relied very heavily on
black slaves, probably Nubians, for his armed forces; at his death he is said to have left,
among other possessions, twenty-four thousand white mamluks and forty-five thousand
blacks. These were organized in separate corps, and accommodated in separate quarters
at the military cantonments. When Khumarawayh, the son and successor of Ahmad ibn Tulun
rode in procession, he was followed, according to a chronicler,

"by a thousand black guards wearing black cloaks and black turbans, so that a watcher could fancy
them to be a black sea spreading over the face of the earth, because of the blackness of their
color and of their garments. With the glitter of their shields, of the chasing on their swords,
and of the helmets under their turbans, they made a really splendid sight."

The black troops were the most faithful supporters of the dynasty, and shared its fate.
When the Tulunids were overthrown at the beginning of 905, the restoration of caliphal
authority was followed by a massacre of the black infantry and the burning of their
quarters:

"Then the cavalry turned against the cantonments of the Tulunid blacks, seized as many of them
as they could, and took them to Muhammad ibn Sulayman [the new governor sent by the caliph].
He was on horseback, amid his escort. He gave orders to slaughter them, and they were
slaughtered in his presence like sheep."

A similar fate befell the black infantry in Baghdad in 930, when they were attacked and
massacred by the white cavalry, with the help of other troops and of the populace, and
their quarters burned. Thereafter, black soldiers virtually disappear from the armies of the
eastern caliphate.

. . . .

Black soldiers served the various rulers of medieval Egypt, and under the Fatimid caliphs
of Cairo black regiments, known as 'Abid al-Shira', "the slaves by purchase," formed an
important part of the military establishment. They were particularly prominent in the mid-
eleventh century, during the reign of al-Mustansir, when for a while the real ruler of Egypt
was the caliph's mother, a Sudanese slave woman of remarkable strength of character. There
were frequent clashes between black regiments and those of other races and occasional
friction with the civil population.

With the fall of the Fatimids, the black troops again paid the price of their loyalty. Among
the most faithful supporters of the Fatimid Caliphate, they were also among the last to
resist its overthrow by Saladin, ostensibly the caliph's vizier but in fact the new master of
Egypt. By the time of the last Fatimid caliph, al-'Adid, the blacks had achieved a position of
power. The black eunuchs wielded great influence in the palace; the black troops formed a major
element in the Fatimid army. It was natural that they should resist the vizier's encroachments.
In 1169 Saladin learned of a plot by the caliph's chief black eunuch to remove him, allegedly
in collusion with the Crusaders in Palestine. Saladin acted swiftly; the offender was seized
and decapitated and replaced in his office by a white eunuch. The other black eunuchs of the
caliph's palace were also dismissed. The black troops in Cairo were infuriated by this summary
execution of one whom they regarded as their spokesman and defender. Moved, according to a
chronicler, by "racial solidarity" (jinsiyya), they prepared for battle. In two hot August days, an
estimated fifty thousand blacks fought against Saladin's army in the area between the two palaces,
of the caliph and the vizier.

Two reasons are given for their defeat. One was their betrayal by the Fatimid Caliph al-'Adid,
whose cause they believed they were defending against the usurping vizier:

"Al-'Adid had gone up to his belvedere tower, to watch the battle between the palaces. It is said
that he ordered the men in the palace to shoot arrows and throw stones at [Saladin's] troops,
and they did so. Others say that this was not done by his choice. Shams al-Dawla [Saladin's
brother] sent naphtha-throwers to burn down al-'Adid's belvedere. One of them was about to do
this when the door of the belvedere tower opened and out came a caliphal aide, who said: "The
Commander of the Faithful greets Shams al-Dawla, and says: 'Beware of the [black] slave dogs!
Drive them out of the country!'" The blacks were sustained by the belief that al-'Adid was
pleased with what they did. When they heard this, their strength was sapped, their courage
waned, and they fled."

The other reason, it is said, was an attack on their homes. During the battle between the
palaces, Saladin sent a detachment to the black quarters, with instructions "to burn them
down on their possessions and their children." Learning of this, the blacks tried to break
off the battle and return to their families but were caught in the streets and destroyed. This
encounter is variously known in Arabic annals as "the Battle of the Blacks" and "the Battle of
the Slaves.'' Though the conflict was not primarily racial, it acquired a racial aspect, which is
reflected in some of the verses composed in honor of Saladin's victory. Maqrizi, in a comment
on this episode, complains of the power and arrogance of the blacks:

"If they had a grievance against a vizier, they killed him; and they caused much damage by
stretching out their hands against the property and families of the people. When their outrages
were many and their misdeeds increased, God destroyed them for their sins."

Sporadic resistance by groups of black soldiers continued, but was finally crushed after a few
years. While the white units of the Fatimid army were incorporated by Saladin in his own
forces, the blacks were not. The black regiments were disbanded, and black fighting men
did not reappear in the armies of Egypt for centuries. Under the mamluk sultans, blacks were
employed in the army in a menial role, as servants of the knights. There was a clear distinction
between these servants, who were black and slaves, and the knights' orderlies and grooms, who
were white and free.

Though black slaves no longer served as soldiers in Egypt, they still fought occasionally -- as
rebels or rioters. In 1260, during the transition from the Ayyubid to the mamluk
sultanate, black stableboys and some others seized horses and weapons, and staged a minor
insurrection in Cairo. They proclaimed their allegiance to the Fatimids and followed a
religious leader who "incited them to rise against the people of the state; he granted them
fiefs and wrote them deeds of assignment."

The end was swift: "When they rebelled during the night, the troops rode in, surrounded them,
and shackled them; by morning they were crucified outside the Zuwayla gate."

. . . .

Toward the end of the fifteenth century, black slaves were admitted to units using firearms --
a socially despised weapon in the mamluk knightly society. When a sultan tried to show some
favor to his black arquebusiers, he provoked violent antagonism from the mamluk knights,
which he was not able to resist. In 1498 "a great disturbance occurred in Cairo." The sultan
(according to the chronicler) had outraged the mamluks by conferring two boons on a black
slave called Farajallah, chief of the firearms personnel in the citadel -- first, giving him a white
Circassian slave girl from the palace as wife, and second, granting him a short-sleeved tunic,
a characteristic garment of the mamluks:

"On beholding this spectacle [says the chronicler] the Royal mamluks expressed their
disapproval to the sultan, and they put on their. . . armour. . . and armed themselves with
their full equipment. A battle broke out between them and the black slaves, who numbered about
five hundred. The black slaves ran away and gathered again in the towers of the citadel and
fired at the Royal mamluks. The Royal mamluks marched on them, killing Farajallah and about
fifty of the black slaves; the rest fled; two Royal mamluks were killed. Then the emirs and
the sultan's maternal uncle, the Great Dawadar, met the sultan and told him: "We disapprove of
these acts of yours [and if you persist in them, it would be better for you to ride by night in
the narrow by-streets and go away together with those black slaves to far-off places!" The
sultan answered: "I shall desist from this, and these black slaves will be sold to the Turkmans."

In the Islamic West black slave troops were more frequent, and sometimes even included cavalry
-- something virtually unknown in the East. The first emir of Cordova, 'Abd al-Rahman I, is said
to have kept a large personal guard of black troops; and black military slaves were used,
especially to maintain order, by his successors. Black units, probably recruited by purchase via
Zawila in Fezzan (now southern Libya), figure in the armies of the rulers of Tunisia between the
ninth and eleventh centuries. Black troops became important from the seventeenth century,
after the Moroccan military expansion into the Western Sudan. The Moroccan Sultan Mawlay
Ismaili (1672-1727) had an army of black slaves, said to number 250,000. The nucleus of this
army was provided by the conscription or compulsory purchase of all male blacks in Morocco; it
was supplemented by levies on the slaves and serfs of the Saharan tribes and slave raids into
southern Mauritania. These soldiers were mated with black slave girls, to produce the next
generation of male soldiers and female servants. The youngsters began training at ten and were
mated at fifteen. After the sultan's death in 1727, a period of anarchic internal struggles
followed, which some contemporaries describe as a conflict between blacks and whites.

. . . .

In 1757 a new sultan, Sidi Muhammad Ill, came to the throne. He decided to disband the black
troops and rely instead on Arabs. With a promise of royal favor, he induced the blacks to come to
Larache with their families and worldly possessions. There he had them surrounded by
Arab tribesmen, to whom he gave their possessions as booty and the black soldiers,
their wives, and their children as slaves. "I make you a gift," he said, "of these 'abid, of
their children, their horses, their weapons, and all they possess. Share them among you.''

. . . .


Bernard Lewis
Race and Slavery in the Middle East
Oxford Univ Press, 1994

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Originally posted by Arwa:
Since Muslim slavery was characteristically associated with unlimited potential for social mobility and much less racialism, it is not surprising to find whole dynasties in Muslim history founded by slaves (e.g. the Egyptian Mamelukes) or the emergence to prominence of Africans as soldiers, poetys, philosophers, writers and statesmen.

Source: Black Marxism:The Making of the Black Radical Tradition
by Cedric J. Robinson

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Posts: 8014 | From: the Tekrur in the Western Sahel | Registered: Feb 2006  |  IP: Logged | 

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Catastrophic predictions of violence and civil strife have long been used by the far Right as an argument against immigration by nonwhite migrants from ‘alien’ cultures but these responses to the events in France from more ‘liberal’ commentators are another indication of the extent to which Eurabian concepts have passed into more mainstream political discourse. The spectre of an Islamic Europe has also been given more highbrow respectability by Bernard Lewis, the White House’s favoured Middle Eastern specialist, who told the German newspaper Die Welt in 2004 that ‘Europe will be Islamic by the end of the 21st century’. That same year, the outgoing EU Competitions Commissioner Fritz Bolkestein quoted Lewis in a speech to the University of Leiden in September, in support of his arguments against the rapid enlargement of Europe. Bolkestein warned that the integration of Turkey into the European Union risked transforming the Union into an ‘Austro-Hungarian empire on a grand scale’ in which Europeans would become a minority in an Islamicised Europe.

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Introduction


It was the romantic island of wood and water, Jamaica in the
Caribbean, which wassighted by the Morisco pilot who steered the
lead boat of Columbus from Spain to the West Indies in 1494.

The current invisibility of the Muslim ummah (community)
in Jamaica is overshadowed by the historic role played by the
al-Andalus Muslim mariners in the discovery voyages of
Columbus and the illustrious military feats of the historical Muslim
Maroons who had brought the world’s ‘mightiest’ Red Coats
to sue for peace.
The splendorous past of the Muslim ummah serves as a source of
spiritual inspirationto maintain its Islamic identity in the multicultural
and religiously diverse society of Jamaica. The country’s coat of arms,
‘Out of Many, One People’, embraces the ummah under the broad
spectrum of its historical diversity. Nonetheless, Christianity
is acknowledged as the most important part of the national
heritage within which various religious faiths exist. Although the
Muslim community remains constitutionally unrec-ognized,
the guarantee for freedom of religion and the democratic nature
of the parliamentary form of government have allowed the continuity
and growth in the number of adherents to Islam in Jamaica.
The acceptance of Muslim membership in the Jamaica Interfaith
Organization, which is patronized by the Governor General,
has provided the Muslims with a sense of recognition and a
wholesome basis for living together despite some popular prejudices.

Currently, numbering about 4000, the Muslims in Jamaica form 0.15% of the estimated total population of 2,590,400 persons. Jamaica has an annual population growth rate of 0.7% and the total fertility rate of 2.8 children per woman. The Muslims are predominantly of African descent. Approximately 50% of the Muslim population of Jamaica resides in the Kingston Metropolitan Region, where some 43.3% of Jamaica’s population lives. Kingston is the capital and the biggest seaport of the island. It is also the financial and commercial centre of the country. The other important cities of Muslim concentration are Spanish Town in Saint Catherine Parish, the island’s second oldest capital, and Montego Bay in Saint James, popularly known as the ‘Tourist City’ on the northern coast of the island. The parishes of St. Elizabeth, St. Mary and Westmoreland also have a good concentration of this tiny Muslim community. A few others are scattered throughout the country. Although invisible as a community, their presence in society is easily recognized by their mode of dressing and behavioural patterns. The Muslim community emphasizes the Islamic principles of equality and brotherhood and conforms with values such as those of honesty, collective sharing of knowledge and observance of religious festivities, respect for elders, close family relations, maintenance of legitimacy and mutual assistance. The Islamic greeting as-salaamu-alaikum and the essential Qur’anic prescripts have influenced the vernacular of the ummah, which is English, and the Arabic terms have become an integral part of their vocabulary.


The Advent of Islam in Jamaica


Islam made its first appearance in the home of the Tainos, Jamaica, with the undaunted Andalusian mariners who played the dominant role in navigating Columbus’ discovery voyage through the rough waters of the Atlantic Ocean into the Caribbean Sea in 1494. These Moorish sailors, schooled in Atlantic navigation to discover and dominate the sea routes, received Royal Pardon from the Spanish Crown and continued to be an integral part of the discovery and conquest entourage long after Columbus. Indeed the Muslims, as discoverers and conquerors, arrived for settlement in Jamaica since the coming of Columbus.

Subsequent to the importation of the Moorish slaves to Jamaica in 1503, the practice of Islam became more dominant as the number of Muslims increased with rapidity. Jihad (struggle) against the indignity of slavery took the form of hijra, the flight from servitude, in order to establish a community based on Islam. From among these Moorish or free Negro communities, referred to as Spanish Maroon communities, came leaders such as Don Christoval Arnaldo de Ysassi, who was appointed the governor of Jamaica by the Spanish King in 1655, and Don Francisco de Leyba, the Spanish lieutenant general of Jamaica. Ysassi is a corruption of the Arabic word ysassa, meaning ruler, while Leyba in Arabic denotes lioness or intelligent. With the Spanish Maroons came the aqueducts, water wheels, windmills, and the introduction of sugar- cane in Jamaica and the West Indies.

The Maroon societies of the Moors subsequent to the British occupation of Jamaica in 1655 became a source of refuge for the rebellious slaves from the plantations. Many of them came from Muslim nations of western and sub-Saharan regions of Africa. The 80-year jihad initiated by Spanish Maroon leaders such as Yuan de Bola and Yuan de Serras, in response to repeated attacks by the British ‘Red Coats’ on the Muslim community, ultimately compelled the authorities to conclude a peace treaty in 1739 with the Maroons recognizing their territories as separate entities beyond the jurisdic- tion of the British colonial government. The island-wide alliance of the Maroon communities of the Leeward and the Windward was united under the indisputable leadership of Cudjoe. Cudjoe’s power of endurance and his conspicuous worship of Allah are illustrated by his act of prostration on the occasion of the peace offer. This behaviour, of utmost humility, in appreciation of the reward of victory from Allah speaks of the inherent Arabic meaning of Cudjoe or Kwadjoe, ‘humbleness’. Cudjoe’s sister, Grandy Nanny or Sarah, is regarded by the Maroons to be the most illustrious woman, who never lost a battle with the British. Sarah’s deep devotion and dependence on Allah to establish human dignity were apparently answered by favours or karamat, which were misunderstood and regarded as obeah (witchcraft or sorcery).

The piety of the historical Maroon leaders is illustrated by their Arabic derived names, such as Ghani, Quao and Cuffee, which refer to the attributes of Allah. The deep profession of the faith also found expression through varied Islamic practices. Governance of the Maroons was based on consensual authority or shura. The pious beginning of the treaty—‘In the Name of God, Amen’, which in Qur’anic term is Bismillah—was never the precedent in Christendom Europe. The adoption of the Islamic greeting, as-salaamu-alaikum, which still continues to be the official Council greeting at Moore Town, and the presence of Qur’anic Arabic terms in present day Maroon vocabulary such as deen and dunya indicate the pervasiveness of Islam among the historical Maroons. Nonetheless, Islam has been in oblivion for long in the Maroon societies, despite their freedom from the British colonial government. The death of the historical Maroons, the absence of Islamic teachings, and the complacency of
the succeeding generations to preserve the faith of their forefathers in the face of
consistent and persistent efforts of the state machinery and the Anglican church to penetrate into the Maroon communities are the attributable causes for the Maroons in Jamaica to have become oblivious to Islam.


The mu’minun from Africa


Parallel to the Maroon ummah, thousands of mu’minun of African descent belonging to the Islamic nations of Mandinka, Fula, Susu, Ashanti and Hausa worked as slaves on the plantations in Jamaica. Approximately 57% of the enslaved African arrivants came from Muslim areas. The presence of Islam among the slaves is revealed through autobiographical pieces written in Arabic by the Muslim slaves and accounts left by His Majesty’s officials, plantation historians and British travellers. These slaves were gener- ally literate in Arabic and many of them could write with great beauty and exactness the Arabic alphabet and passages from the Holy Qur’an. They also displayed a gentleness of disposition and demeanour, which is believed to have been ‘the result of early education and discipline’.

Abu Bakr al-Siddiq, a Mandinka slave assigned to Magistrate Robert Madden, reveals himself through two autobiographical pieces written in Arabic, as the son of a learned family in Islamic Jurisprudence from the city of Timbuktu. He acquired advance Qur’anic learning initially in the city of Jenne and subsequently in Bouna, ‘a place of great celebrity for its learning and schools, in the countries of the Mo- hammedan Mandingoes’. So strong was Abu Bakr’s Islamic teaching that even after thirty years of bondage in Jamaica he still knew the Qur’an ‘almost by heart’. Like hundreds of other African Muslim slaves, Abu Bakr had different masters and had been baptized as Edward Donellan but remained faithful to Islam. He is perhaps one of the very few who returned to Africa upon his manumission in 1834.

The accounts left by Bryan Edwards, a planter historian, and Magistrate Robert Madden are clear testimonies that Islam was the religion of hundreds of African slaves who were brought to Jamaica from the Muslim nations of Africa. Bryan Edwards, writing on the national customs and manners of Muslim slaves, states as follows:

An old and faithful Mandinka servant, who stands at my elbow while I write this, relates that the natives practice circumcision, and that he himself has undergone that operation; and he has not forgotten the morning and evening prayer which his father taught him. In proof of this assertion, he chants in an audible and shrill tone, a sentence that I conceive to be part of the Al-Koran, ‘La Illa ill illa’! (i.e. La Ilaha Illallah, there is no god but Allah) which he says they sing aloud at first appearance of the new moon. He relates, moreover, that in his own country Friday was constantly made a strict fasting. It
wasalmost a sin, he observes, on that day to swallow his spittle; such is his
expression.


The narrative left by Magistrate Robert Madden further reveals the faithfulness of the Muslim slaves to Islam and their exertion in the Way of Allah, despite forceful baptism. He records the presence of a considerable number of Muslims in Jamaica in a letter written to J. F. Savory, Esq., Jamaica, on 30 March 1835:

I had a visit one Sunday morning very lately, from three Mandingo negroes, natives of Africa. They could all read and write Arabic; and one of them showed me a Koran written, from memory by himself—but written, he assured me, before he became a Christian. I had my doubts on this point. One of them, Benjamin Cockrane, a free negro was in the habit of coming to me on Sundays … His history is that of hundreds of others in Jamaica … [emphasis added by author] Cockrane says his father was a chief in the Mandingo country … I (Madden) have not the time to give you an account of his religious opinions; but though very singular, they were expressed with infinitely more energy and eloquence than his sentiments on other subjects. He professed to be an occasional follower of one of the sectarian ministers here, and so did each of his two friends. I had my doubts thereupon. I expressed them to my wife … and told her to prepare for a demonstration of Mohometanism. I took up a book, as if by accident, and commenced repeat- ing the well-known Mussalman Salaam to Prophet Allah (sic.) Illah Mo- hammed Rasul Allah! In an instant, I had a Mussalman trio, long and loud: my Neophytes were chanting their names with irrepressible fervour, and Mr. Benjamin Cockrane I thought, would have inflicted the whole of ‘the perspic- uous book’ of Islam on me, if I had not taken advantage of the opportunity for giving him and his companions reproof for pretending to be that which they were not.


Despite the systematic and brutal suppression of the West African Islamic heritage by the plantocracy, the metropolitan powers and the various established Christian churches, the community of the mu’minun nonetheless responded to the call for an island-wide jihad made through a wathiqah, a pastoral letter, in 1832. Slave leaders like Mohammad Kaba, Sam Sharpe and George Lewis were all crypto-Muslims working as local leaders, marabouts or imams. These marabouts were apparently the so-called ‘deacons’ in the less established or nonconformist churches such as the Baptist, Moravians and Wesleyen, 17 of which were destroyed following the outbreak of the rebellion in 1832 by the Colonial Church Union run by the Anglican Reverend George Bridges. Although ruthlessly suppressed, the Jihad of 1832, commonly known as the Baptist Rebellion, hastened the Emancipation Act of 1833.

The complete metamorphosis experienced by the once proud African Muslim slaves through the shock in the process of enslavement, the subsequent physical torture and the cultural and spiritual genocide led to the dormancy of Islam until it re-emerged with the arrival of the Muslims from Moghul India in the 1850s. Vestiges of Islamic practices, however, still persist in the cultural heritage of the African Jamaicans. It is customary to take off one’s shoes upon entering the house, indicating the importance attached to cleanliness of the abode, which was considered as the masjid for the performance of prayer by the Muslim forefathers. The observance of wudhu and night prayer, isha’a, by the pioneer Muslims from Africa are illustrated by the traditional practice of washing hands, rinsing mouth, washing face and feet, and offering prayer before going to bed. Women, mostly in the countryside, also continue to wear the head covering.

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he said, "of these 'abid, of
their children, their horses, their weapons, and all they possess. Share them among you.''

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ROFL

Ya wright!

He calls himself an Islam expert, but he doesn't know the basic principles of the religion.

No muslim should call other person, my slave (abid), which is a grave sin to say.

God is The Creator, and we're all His slaves.

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Robinson's conclusion is perhaps a little too
gratuitous and pollyana-ish about colour roles.

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Originally posted by ausar:
Kind of reminds me of the claim that Cherokee Indians were Muslims and that Tallahasse means ''house of Allah'' in one article I read.

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You on the otherhand are presenting yourself
as myopically Islamicist to the extent of
intentionally distorting African history just
to boost your particular choice in religions.

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Islam is no different than anything else.

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“the most effective urban slave rebellion eve[r] to occur on the American continent.”

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You can find the article in J-stor. I used "Accessibility Option - TIFF Format "

So you know now, it's not from Frontpage or Storm site

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Originally posted by ausar:

Kind of reminds me of the claim that Cherokee Indians were Muslims and that Tallahasse means ''house of Allah'' in one article I read.

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ROTFL

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(A Council of the Indies to the King in 1685 states, “The introduction of Mohammedan slaves into America is forbidden on account of the danger which lies in their intercourse with the Indians.”)

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The danger to teach dignity, equality and a white has no superiority over black nor a black has any superiority over white except by piety and good action?

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as Afroz quotes one Slyviane A. Diouf

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NOTES
1. Slyviane A. Diouf, Servants of Allah: African Muslims Enslaved in the Americas, New York: New
York University Press, 1998, p. 48.
2. Bryan Edwards, The History, Civil and Commercial of the West Indies (1819), Vol. 2, New York:
AMS Press, 1966, p. 72.
3. Diouf, Servants of Allah, op. cit., p. 6.
4. Mrs A. Carmichael, The Domestic Manners and the Social Condition of the White, Coloured and Negro
Population of the West Indies, Vol. 2, London: Whittaker, Treacher, 1833, pp. 251–252.
5. Edwards, The History, Civil and Commercial, op. cit., Vol. 2, pp. 71–72.
6. Robert R. Madden, A Twelve Months Residence in the West Indies During the Transition from Slavery
to Apprenticeship, Vol. 1, Philadelphia: Carey, Lea, and Blanchard, 1835, pp. 99–101.
7. Philip D. Curtin, ed., Africa Remembered: Narratives by West Africans From the Era of the Slave
Trade, Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1968, p. 106.
8. Ibid., p. 153.
9. Ibid., p. 162, and Madden, A Twelve Months Residence, op. cit., Vol. 2, pp. 128–130.
10. Madden, A Twelve Months Residence, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 129.
11. Ibid.
12. Michael Craton, Testing the Chains: Resistance to Slavery in the British West Indies, Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1982, p. 247.
13. Ibid.
14. Reverend George Wilson Bridges, The Annals of Jamaica, Vol. 2, West Port, CT: Negro University
Press, pp. 425–426 (originally published London: John Murray, 1828).
15. Abigail B. Bakan, Ideology and Class Con� ict in Jamaica: The Politics of Rebellion, Montreal:
McGill–Queens University Press, 1990, p. 66.
16. The Holy Qur’an, Surah Muhammad.
17. ‘Surah Muhammad’, Commentary 221, Verses 20–38, The Meaning of the Glorious Qur’an, text,
translation and commentary by Abdullah Yusuf Ali.
18. Curtin, Africa Remembered, op. cit., p. 164, and Madden, A Twelve Months Residence, op. cit., Vol.
2, pp. 135–136.
19. J. H. Buckner, The Moravians in Jamaica, London: Longman Brown, 1854, p. 52.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid., p. 63.
22. Richard Hart, ‘Slaves Who Abolished Slavery’, in Blacks in Bondage, Vol. 1, Kingston: Institute of
Social and Economic Research, 1980, p. 117.
23. Madden, A Twelve Months Residence, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 141.
24. Craton, Testing the Chains, op. cit., pp. 315–316, based on CO 137/185.
25. Reverend J. T. Dillon, 1824–1924 Centennial Review of the First Baptist Church, Montego Bay,
Jamaica, Kingston: Gleaner, 1923, p. 9.
26. Mary Turner, Slaves and Missionaries, The Disintegration of Jamaican Slave Society, Mona, Jamaica:
University of the West Indies Press, 1998, p. 136.
27. Muhammad Abdul-Rauf, Bilal Ibn Rabah, A Leading Companion of the Prophet Muhammad,
Washington, DC: American Trust, 1977, p. 58.
28. Sultana Afroz, ‘Islam and Slavery through the Ages: Slave Sultans and Slave Mujahids’, Journal of
Islamic Law & Culture, Vol. 5, No. 2, Fall/Winter 2000, p. 97.
29. Turner, Slaves and Missionaries, op. cit., p. 135.
30. The Holy Qur’an, Surat Al-KaŽ run.
31. Bakan, Ideology and Class Con� ict in Jamaica, op. cit., p. 52.
32. Diouf, Servants of Allah, op. cit., p. 48.
33. Ibid., p. 53.
34. Ibid.
35. Craton, Testing the Chains, op. cit., p. 301.
36. Madden, A Twelve Months Residence, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 140.
37. The Holy Qur’an, 2:101.
38. Buckner, The Moravians, op. cit., p. 51.
39. Madden, A Twelve Months Residence, op. cit., Vol. 2, p. 133.
40. Buckner, The Moravians, op. cit., p. 53.
41. Slave Insurrection, 6 January 1832, CO 137/181.
42. Al-Hadis, Mishkat-ul-Masabih, Vol. 2, commentary and translation by Alhaj Maulana Fazlul
Karim, New York: Islamic Book Service, 1994, p. 459.
43. The Holy Qur’an, 3:195 and 4:25.
44. Abdul Wahid Hamid, Islam the Natural Way, London: Muslim Education and Literary Services,
1989, p. 131.
45. Reverend Henry Bleby, Death Struggles of Slavery, London: Hamilton, Adams, 1853, p. 118.
46. Reverend Dillon, The Centennial Review, op. cit., p. 7; and Trial of Samuel Sharpe, 19 April 1832,
CO 137, 304–313 reveals slaves testifying the oath administered by Sharpe.
47. Edward Kamau Brathwaite, Nanny, Sam Sharpe and the Struggle for People’s Liberation, Kingston:
API for the National Heritage Week Committee, 1977, p. 27.
48. Bakan, Ideology and Class Con� ict in Jamaica, op. cit., p. 56.
49. Turner, Slaves and Missionaries, op. cit., p. 143.
50. Rev. Bleby, Death Struggles of Slavery, op. cit., p. 115.
51. Ibid., p. 115.
52. Turner, Slaves and Missionaries, op. cit., pp. 56, 63.
53. Brathwaite, Nanny, Sam Sharpe and the Struggle, op. cit., p. 23.
54. Michael Craton, ‘Emancipation from Below? The Role of the British West Indian Slaves in the
Emancipation Movement, 1816–34’, in ed. Jay Hayward, Out of Slavery: Abolition and After,
London: Frank Cass, 1985, p. 120.
55. Letter writtten by Sharpe addressed to the Managing Committee of the Jamaican Auxiliary Church
Missionary Society, 22 March 1830, Church Missionary Society, West Indies Mission Records,
1819–1861, C/WO, 3–12.
56. Governor Belmore to Goderich, 14 December 1831, CO 137/179.
57. Sultana Afroz, ‘From Moors to Marronage: The Islamic Heritage of the Maroons in Jamaica’,
Journal Institute of Muslim Minority Affairs, Vol. 19, No. 2, 1999, pp. 161–179.
58. Joao Jose Reis, Slave Rebellion in Brazil: The Muslim Uprising of 1835 in Bahia, trans. Arthur Brakel,
Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993, p. 156.
59. Rev. Bleby, Death Struggles of Slavery, op. cit., p. 120.
60. The Holy Qur’an, 3:105.
61. Rev. Bleby, Death Struggles of Slavery, op. cit., p. 117.
62. Rev. Dillon, The Centennial Review, op. cit., p. 8; and Narrative of Certain Events Connected with the
Late Disturbances in Jamaica and the Charges Preferred Against the Baptist Missionaries in that Island,
London: Mission Society, 1832, p. 2.
63. Rev. Dillon, Centennial Review, op. cit., p. 8.
64. Narrative of Certain Events, op. cit., p. 2.
65. Ibid.
66. Michael Craton, ‘Emancipation from below?’ in ed. Hayward, Out of Slavery, op. cit., p. 120.
67. Narrative of Certain Events, op. cit., p. 2.
68. Bakan, Ideology and Class Con� ict in Jamaica, op. cit., p. 64.
69. Diouf, Servants of Allah, op. cit., p. 160.
70. Quoted by Craton, ‘Emancipation from below?’, op. cit., p. 110.
71. Slave Disturbances, CO 137/181, King’s House Jamaica, 6 January 1832.
72. The Holy Qur’an, 2:191.
73. The Holy Qur’an, 3:170.
74. Bakan, Ideology and Class Con� ict in Jamaica, op. cit., p. 65.
75. Rev. Bleby, The Death Struggles of Slavery, p. 116; and for Mu-minun, see Asghar Ali Engineer,
Rethinking Issues in Islam, London: Sangam Books, 1998, p. 8.

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Who is Cedric J. Robinson? Was he not the guy who introduced Cheikh Anta Diop to wider audience thanks to when he was chief editor in Race & Class?

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Cedric J. Robinson

History, philosophy, rhetoric are claimed to be the very foundations of western scholarship: from them we construct our knowledge of the world, our understanding of that knowledge and our power of conveying that understanding; they are the root of all social conceptualisation. Yet what if history, philosophy, rhetoric have themselves been stunted at birth, diminished in their capacities, crammed into spaces too small to contain them? What would that mean for the ways in which we conceive and bring about the transformation of our societies? What would it mean for our understanding of how to effect social justice? It is a question that scarcely even occurs within the academy, let alone the busy workaday world of getting and spending and laying waste our powers. It is a question forbidden by the habits of thought, the presumptions, the assumptions that render us quiescent to power. But it is the question at the heart of Cedric Robinson’s life-work. It is the question that makes that work sometimes difficult – for how do you step outside the unthought thought patterns of a life-time, of generations – it is the question that makes his work so exciting – for what liberation to see the world in a new light – it is a question of increasing urgency in an increasingly unequal, increasingly ideologically driven world.

Only, perhaps, have mystics asked such questions; but there, the return is always, except fleetingly, to the divine. Here, it is to the divine and human agency, both at once, each inhering in the other. It is a truism that history is always written by its victors, but what has not been previously understood is how notions of political order, of the arrangement of the very fabric of society, of authority and obedience, of the movement of time and progress have themselves been written to a particular script, created out of a particular and not necessarily inevitable pattern of socioeconomic development. ‘I have sought to expose’, stated Robinson in Terms of Order, ‘from the vantage point inherited from a people only marginally integrated into Western institutions and intellectual streams, those contradictions within Western civilization which have been conserved at the cost of analytical coherence.’ Confronted with a chaotic, fragmented reality, the impulse of most analysts and commentators is, as Robinson shows, to impose a framework, by excluding what does not fit, in a process of self- or system-serving orderliness. Robinson, as this issue of Race & Class attempts to demonstrate, proceeds by incorporation, by recuperation of what is deemed outside the framework, whether political, sociological or philosophical, bringing the insights of each to bear on the other; celebrating the mystic and the rebel; the medieval peasant and the maroon in their attempts at turning the world upside down.

‘Thinking in order to do’ was one of Race & Class’s founding precepts, articulated in its first editorial. But thinking in order to do requires, as well, new ways of seeing not only what is to be done but also of what has been done. This is the hallmark of Robinson’s scholarship, whether in his conceptualisation, analysis and historical documentation of the Black radical tradition, as in Black Marxism; in his revelation of the wholeness of Black resistance in America (Black Movements in America); and in his restoration of a far older, wider and more varied socialism than is dreamt of in Marxist philosophy (An Anthropology of Marxism), for there is, indeed, more in heaven and earth. The lineage of black resistance in all its multifarious forms, the restoration of what was hitherto rendered invisible, is what gives his scholarship its dynamic thrust. It is Robinson who has made the understanding and tracing of that lineage crucial to all serious radical scholarship on the Black diaspora; it is Robinson who has given it a habitation and a name. It is Robinson who has inspired and influenced a community of scholars to take on that enterprise.

It has taken an unconscionably long time for the magnitude of his contribution to Black studies, to political philosophy, to history, to the study of culture, to begin to be recognised. This issue of Race & Class is one attempt to redress that – and, published in the UK’s Black History Month, to throw light on the true weight and significance of what is implied by Black History. Modest to a fault, Cedric Robinson could never, in Whitman’s words, celebrate himself and sing himself. But he could, with Whitman, say,

‘What I assume you shall assume, for every atom belonging to me, as good belongs to you’.

A. Sivanandan and Hazel Waters, Race & Class Vol. 47(2)

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Black Marxism is divided into three parts: the history of European capitalism and radicalism, the origins of black radicalism, and black radicalism's relationship to Marxism. The first section examines European socio-economic history, and its chief purpose is to analyze how "racial capitalism" developed. Now a familiar theoretical position, Robinson argues that the rise of industrial capitalism was built on a culture of racial construction. Emergent labor classes and ethnic minorities could be assembled through national identity formations--pitted against one another--to serve the dominant ideology. The Irish peasants' relocation to England during the Great Hunger of the 1840s, for example, occasioned the opportunity for "an ideological and physical drifting apart of the two 'races'": English and Irish (41). Thus "race" as a strategic mechanism for social control led to the immanence of "racialism" in Western civilization. Racialism ordered "the very values and traditions of consciousness through which the peoples of [End Page 368] these ages came to understand their worlds and their experiences" (66). Radicalism then rose in Europe as a revolt against capitalism but also as a resistance to nationalism, racialism, and racial capitalism.

Black Marxism's inquiry into the constructedness of both the "Negro" and whiteness in the next section, "The Roots of Black Radicalism," is also now familiar territory. Despite its early appearance in the trajectory of "race construction" theory, Robinson's study of slave ideology's arrogation of cultural identity cannot be classified merely as prologue, as this comment illustrates:


The "Negro," that is the color black, was both a negation of African and a unity of opposition to white. The construct of Negro, unlike the terms "African," "Moor," or "Ethiope" suggested no situatedness in time, that is history, or space, that is ethno- or politico-geography. The Negro had no civilization, no cultures, no religions, no history, no place, and finally no humanity that might command consideration. (81)


Having established the context for the development of race construction under industrial capitalism, slavery, and imperialism, Black Marxism then provides a concise history of black resistance in the Caribbean, Brazil, North America, and Africa (140-66), thus preparing the way for the final section on black radicalism's relationship to Marxist theory.

Part three recovers the history of a diaspora of the black intelligentsia, examining principally how such figures as Du Bois, James, and Wright responded to Marxism. Black Marxism argues not only for an awareness of the centrality of Marxist consciousness in black radical thought, but contends as well for a recognition of the centralization of black resistance and liberation struggle in the historical development of radical internationalist labor politics. In other words, while Marxism helped shape black radicalism, black resistance contributed significantly to the formation of twentieth-century Marxism. Robinson insists, moreover, that the formations of organizations like the African Blood Brotherhood (ABB) and even the United Negro Improvement Association "would have enormous consequence for the American Communist Party's efforts at organizing Blacks"(213). The ABB began as a black revolutionary nationalist organization; then, as Caribbean members like Cyril Briggs, Richard B. Moore, and W.A. Domingo grew to be Marxist in consciousness, the Brotherhood soon "came to be influenced by the socialism of Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, and state Bolshevism" (217). [End Page 369] Robinson also historicizes the rise of Caribbean Leftism, anticipating Winston James's Holding Aloft the Banner of Ethiopia: Caribbean Radicalism in Early Twentieth-Century America. 6 Black Marxism depicts how the Trinidad Workingmen's Association's agitation against imperialist-capitalist oppression would influence C.L.R. James's move toward Marxism (241-86).

Finally, Robinson recovers Richard Wright's Marxist orientation, characterizing Wright's complex disposition toward American communist orthodoxy in a way that sounds very much like one of the central messages of Black Marxism. That is, although Wright saw that the "Negro" was an invention of oppressive ideology, Robinson argues, Wright also understood that the enforcement of an institutionalized poverty and an alienation from bourgeois culture positioned blacks perfectly for engaging in radical proletarian struggle (305). At the end of Black Marxism, Robinson's champions are Du Bois, James, and though it may surprise those who have not encountered this book, Wright, a figure who, like Ralph Ellison, has for decades served as a source for many received assumptions about the "failure" of black Marxism.


Before concluding, a note is warranted on the attention Robinson's work deserves. Robin D.G. Kelley's newly added foreword to the 2000 edition of Black Marxism ponders why the book has not been conferred more critical attention, and indeed it is puzzling that Black Marxism has not been as influential as it deserves to be. Echoing Cornel West's review essay a few years after its publication, Kelley notes that few reviews of Black Marxism ever appeared; although West expresses somewhat mixed opinions of Robinson's work, he notes how the book unfortunately "fell through the cracks" (xviii). 10 Moreover, the foreword chastens Paul Gilroy and Winston James for slighting Black Marxism: Gilroy for his brusque criticism of Robinson's thesis in The Black Atlantic; 11 James for omitting any mention of Robinson's scholarship in Holding Aloft the Banner of Ethiopia. Kelley suggests that a "conspiracy of silence" cloaks the history of the text's public notice (xv). There is very likely something to this argument, as West himself suggests. The fact that both Gilroy and James have spent much of their time working in the U.K. does not absolve their inattention. Nonetheless, another, albeit probably ancillary reason in the regrettable lack of attention accorded this work is the reality that Black Marxism has been a bit challenging to locate. Published by Zed Press in the U.K. in 1983, availability has been limited in the U.S. (and, one suspects, limited even in Britain). The academic community should be grateful to the University of North Carolina Press for making this vital text finally so widely accessible.

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intentionally distorting African history just to boost your particular choice in religions.

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In my past reading experience the Outliers of the
southern USA, the Maroons of the Caribbean, and
the Palenques and Quilombos of South America,
were not in the least Muslim societies.

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"Slave Rebellion in Brazil: The African Muslim Uprising in Bahia, 1835,"
Joao Jose Reis; Arthur Brakel

Review author[s]: Thomas E. Skidmore

Review author[s]: Thomas E. Skidmore Current Anthropology, Vol. 36, No. 2. (Apr., 1995), pp. 389-390.


Religion and Slave Rebellion in Bahia
THOMAS E. SKIDMORE
History Department, Brown University, Providence, R. I. 02912, U.S.A. 28 vii 94
_________________________________________________
Slave Rebellion in Brazil: The Muslim Uprising of 1835 in Bahia. By Joåo José Reis. Tnanslated by
Arthur Brakel. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993 . 281 pp.

Slave Rebellion in Brazil is a major contribution to our knowledge of slavery, race relations, and the history of Africans in the Amenicas. The author, a leading Brazilian historian from the region about which he writes, is a pioneer in writing Brazilian social history. Translated and expanded from the Brazilian edition, the book focuses on “the most effective urban slave rebellion even to occur on the American continent.” The rebels numbered in the hundreds, and some 500 were given punishments ranging from death to deportation. The uprising alarmed authorities throughout Brazil and led to draconian new legislation governing slaves.

The revolt has long fascinated historians because of its Muslim component. Its leaders were all African-born slaves or freedmen, and the target of their anger was the rest of the society of Bahia—whites and all others born in Brazii, especially the mulattos who dominated the police force. The rebels were primanily Yorubas who had been converted to Islam, and it was their religion that had given them the sense of identity and dignity that facilitated the planning and execution of the conspiracy. Jewelry and documents found on the rebels confirmed that it was a truly Muslim-led movement which also swept up some discontented non-Muslim Africans. Reis argues vigorously that the revolt was not a “jihad” as some have claimed. Rather, he sees religion here as a means of bonding foreign-born slaves to resist the encircing society. The revolt did, however, serve to alert slaveholders to the need to verify the ethnic origins of any newly acquired slaves.

The picture presented here confirms the general view that slave rebellion was easier in urban settings, where slaves moved with greater ease than in the countryside. Furthermore, the Muslims were aided by their ability to use Arabic. Most interesting, the rebels not only did not seek to enlist Brazilian-born slaves but saw the latter as part of the enemy.

Rejs’s work also confirms that by the early 19th century the Brazilian elite was fixed on the idea of a “whiter” Brazil. This policy was evident in the justifications for repression and punishment after the revolt. Such an objective was ironic in view of the fact that Bahia was about 70% nonwhite at this time. The authorities came up with quaint language to describe the objects of their wrath. The rebellious Africans were termed “dangerous guests” and finally “treacherous guests.” It was surely a reflection of Brazilian elite culture to refer to slaves as “guests,” much in the tradition of Brazilian cordialidade.

Reis has produced a superb analysis of these important events that will be of interest to ethnohistorians and anyone interested in the development of modern race relations in the Americas.

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Some people are happy to serve their Massa.

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The accounts of Reverend Bridges reveal his anguish over the strong conviction of the Islamic faith of many of the slaves in Jamaica who had been baptized by him. The mere sprinkling of water had no effect on the SuŽfis who had become purged of self and its desires. Bridges writes:

… amongst the Negroes of Jamaica, who are natives of the northern coasts of Africa, many of its institutions (Islamic) may still be traced by the eye of a careful observer; and whatever maybe the in�fluence of Christianity upon their sable offspring, it is to be feared that they themselves will never change their conduct or their faith …The tribes of Foulis, Madingo, Ghiolofs, and Bambarra … practice the rite of circumcision, and observe the Jente Karafana or Ramadan, with much greater respect and awe than they feel when they allow themselves to be sprinkled with
the waters of baptism. Allah, the Mahometan appelation of the Deity, is still used in the different dialects of these tribes… The Friday is their Sabbath, and though they rank the mother of Jesus as one of the four perfect women of the prophet’s faith, they look upon her Son … as an inferior prophet, famous only for his miracles. They maintain a Marbut, or a priest, in every village; believe implicitly in the doctrine of predestination …

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Source: Reverend George Wilson Bridges, The Annals of Jamaica, Vol. 2, West Port, CT: Negro University
Press, pp. 425–426 (originally published London: John Murray, 1828).

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Furthermore, the presence of hundreds of Muslim slaves in Jamaica even during the apprenticeship period leading to emancipation, as confiŽrmed and authenticated by Special Magistrate Robert Madden, gives credence to the argument that the insurrection in 1831–1832 was a jihad' against the indignity of slavery. Evidence further suggests that the rebellion had been essentially rural and was led by mature slaves belonging to the slave elite group such as drivers, slave headmen, carpenters, masons, coopers and blacksmiths.

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Source: Craton, Testing the Chains, op. cit., pp. 315–316, based on CO 137/185.

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Intelligence, education, specialized skills, discipline and good disposition, which were the characteristics of the Muslim slaves, must have earned them these elite positions. The exoneration of the white Baptist Missionaries from all criminal charges of inciting their slave members to rebel for the purpose of effecting a change in their state and condition in open court by a jury is also indicative of the misnomer attached to this rebellion as a Baptist War. This is further strengthened by the testimonials of the rebel leaders as to the innocence of the white missionaries.

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Source: Reverend J. T. Dillon, 1824–1924 Centennial Review of the First Baptist Church, Montego Bay,
Jamaica, Kingston: Gleaner, 1923, p. 9.

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Neither did the white brethren come to the assistance of their black brethren during the trial or even before, when blacks were butchered for no other offences than that of coming to chapels like the Baptists, Moravians and Wesleyan Methodists.

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Source: Mary Turner, Slaves and Missionaries, The Disintegration of Jamaican Slave Society, Mona, Jamaica:
University of the West Indies Press, 1998, p. 136.

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Apparently, an uncompromising religious difference existed between the black and white brethren. Guided by the Holy Qur’an, the religious belief of the mujahids (Ž fighters) stood in sharp contrast to Christianity, the faith of the white missionaries and the oppressive slave masters. The Torah enjoins slavery, and Christianity is silent about it. Hence, neither Christianity nor the white Christian brethren had anything to offer to the slaves. However, Islam, according to the words of the Ž first muezzin in Islam, Bilal Ibn Rabah, ‘has left no chance except that it urged the emancipation of slaves, as a mandatory obligation or as a recommended action’

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Source: Muhammad Abdul-Rauf, Bilal Ibn Rabah, A Leading Companion of the Prophet Muhammad,
Washington, DC: American Trust, 1977, p. 58.

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To the Muslim slaves who
had been sprinkled with baptismal water, Christianity, the religion of the spiritually
fossilized bukra massa, represented oppression. Despite � ogging and severe punishments,
even privileged slaves enjoying yearly pensions remained deŽ ant and refused to
leave their religion.

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Source: Turner, Slaves and Missionaries, op. cit., p. 135.

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In my past reading experience the Outliers of the
southern USA, the Maroons of the Caribbean, and
the Palenques and Quilombos of South America,
were not in the least Muslim societies.

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If you bothered to actually read what
I wrote you'd see where I acknowledged
African Muslim presence in the Americas
and rebellions they were responsible
for and the best I know of for info
on African Muslim presense and
accomplishments in the Americas.

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Originally posted by alTakruri on 02 August, 2006 06:44 PM:

. . . all diligent
students of Africana already know, that Muslims
were captured and shipped to the Americas where
some retained high levels of Islamic education
and practice.

An excellent study on Muslim Africans in the USA is

Sylviane A. Diouf (clickable link)
Servants of Allah: African Muslims Enslaved in the Americas
New York: University Press, 1998

I strongly suggest you get a copy and study it so
as to educate yourself to historically documented
African Muslim accomplishments in the Americas. In
it you will learn in which rebellions African Muslims
actually played key roles.

Unfortunately, for those harboring prejudicial
hatred of Islam and the Africans who confess it
there is no immediate remedy. Such folk may one
day realize their bias is no different nor any
more noble than the bias, prejudice, and hatred
that many have for black people and Africans
regardless of religion.

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quote:

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Originally posted by alTakruri:

In my past reading experience the Outliers of the
southern USA, the Maroons of the Caribbean, and
the Palenques and Quilombos of South America,
were not in the least Muslim societies.

Excepting the Outliers the other resistance states
founded by self-emancipated slaves prominently
featured characteristics of traditional African
ethnies.

For instance Brazilian Quilombos displayed Angolan
cultures, their spirituality would reflect Condomble.
Jamaican Maroons had strong Koromantee cultural
elements, their spirituality was Obeah not Islam.

The dominant spirituality outside the USA was that
related to a Vodoun type strongly resembling the
traditional Yoruba model in practice and pantheon.

In Luso-Hispanic territories African spirituality
was hidden within and/or meshed with Catholicism.
In a place like Jamaica the Protestant Christianity
of the Africans loosely incorporated a very few
traditional elements best noted in "Pentacostal"
expression where roots, shout, and getting the
spirit were as close as they could get to the old
rites like spirit possession, etc.

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"What is the significance of Aug. 22? This year, Aug. 22 corresponds, in the Islamic calendar, to the 27th day of the month of Rajab of the year 1427. This, by tradition, is the night when many Muslims commemorate the night flight of the prophet Muhammad on the winged horse Buraq, first to "the farthest mosque," usually identified with Jerusalem, and then to heaven and back (c.f., Koran XVII.1). This might well be deemed an appropriate date for the apocalyptic ending of Israel and if necessary of the world. It is far from certain that Mr. Ahmadinejad plans any such cataclysmic events precisely for Aug. 22. But it would be wise to bear the possibility in mind.

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The Jihad of 1831–1832: The Misunderstood Baptist Rebellion in Jamaica

http://layncal.blogspot.com/2006/07/misunderstood-baptist-rebellion-in.html

Also, one of Cedric J. Robinson's masterpiece books, mentions, that there were many other rebellions in the new world; in the Caribbean, Brazil, lead by slaves from Africa--already in the first generations from Atlantic Slave trade.

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Posts: 13012 | From: Chicago | Registered: Jan 2006  |  IP: Logged | 

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Maroons were Muslims fighting Jihad riiiiggghhhhtt

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Ibrahim, the son of a Black concubine of the caliph Al-Mahdi (775-785) came very close to being caliph in 817-819 when a faction in Baghdad supported his candidature against the nominated successor of the caliph Al-Ma'mun. In spite of being 'excessively black and shiny' he was preferred by some 'Abasid loyalists to 'Alid candidate of Persian descent (Source: Hunwick, op.cit., p. 28)

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