Clarification about my post

Submitted by Prashant (United States), Jan 4, 2022 at 17:40

Dear Dr Pipes, I thank John Harvey for reading my note about the, so called, golden age of Islam. It is great that we read each other's messages and learn from them. I agree that John was specifically addressing certain adjectives used by Dr. Pipes.

I want to clarify/answer a couple of points raised by John.

First, condemnation of Islamic imperialism will always be fundamentally different from any condemnation of the Western imperialism. The reason is simple: Islam is a religion while 'west' is an indicator of a direction/culture/economic-power/race. Any crime when done for a religion is more heinous than when the same crime is done for any other reason. By raising a sword you can force a person to change her religion but you can not force them to change their culture/geo-location/economic-beliefs/skin-color or race. So, I can be very unkind to Islamic looters but may be bit forgiving to Western imperialists.

Second, I doubt that there was any fundamental shift in the Islamic doctrines due to the golden age of Islam. While the golden age was happening at the core, massacres and loots was continuing on the fringe. What were Muslims doing in Jerusalem, North Africa, Turkey, and the then India while they were creating the golden age in Baghdad? The messages from Baghdad did not reach the colonies, I guess. And, the messages from Baghdad did not even stay in Baghdad for long (quran's indelibility is still intact). In fact, I see uncanny similarities between the methods used by Muslims invaders in India, Turkey, ME, Northern Africa, and Europe. It appears that these guys were following the same blueprint in different regions and centuries.

That said, I agree that work done by Muslims in collecting, translating and advancing the knowledge from the Indians, Greeks and the others was remarkable. I just wish that it had made a dent in the Islamic straightjacket.

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