Ben Franklin and Islam

midcan5

liberal / progressive
Jun 4, 2007
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A bit of history's debates I'm sure many were unaware of. Arguments for the status quo still dominant much of the dialogue surrounding important issues.

"In the last public act before his death, Benjamin Franklin parodied a proslavery speech in Congress by comparing it to a fictitious proslavery address "anno 1687" by a North African Muslim, a pirate named Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim. Like proslavery southerners, the Algerian argued that he could not countenance the end of Christian slavery because it would hurt the interests of the Algerian state, there would be no way to compensate the Muslim slave masters, and nothing could safely be done with the freed slaves." (from 2nd link)

""Erika" is the name of a religious sect that opposes slavery and has submitted a petition that slavery be abolished. "Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim," a member of the "Divan of Algiers," wishes that slavery continue and writes a letter explaining why it should not be abolished..."

""Have these Erika considered the Consequences of granting their Petition? If we cease our Cruises against the Christians, how shall we be furnished with the Commodities their Countries produce, and which are so necessary for us? If we forbear to make Slaves of their People, who in this hot Climate are to cultivate our Lands? Who are to perform the common Labours of our City, and in our Families? Must we not then be our own Slaves? And is there not more Compassion and more Favour due to us as Mussulmen, than to these Christian Dogs?"

The Madison Era: African-Americans: Attitudes of White Elite: Historicus

"Is it worse to follow mahomet than the devil?" Early American uses of Islam. | Goliath Business News
 
Newsflash, this just in;
Ben Franklin was mocking Southern Slave owners.
Not Islam.
Thanks for clearing that up.

I had read that post several times and was still confused as to what the letter was about and to who it was targeted.

Funny thing that gets forgot in the PC world is that the North African Muslims were some of the biggest slave traders during the colonial time! I could see Sunni Man selling Black Africans into involuntary servitude.
 
Newsflash, this just in;
Ben Franklin was mocking Southern Slave owners.
Not Islam.
Thanks for clearing that up.

I had read that post several times and was still confused as to what the letter was about and to who it was targeted.

Funny thing that gets forgot in the PC world is that the North African Muslims were some of the biggest slave traders during the colonial time! I could see Sunni Man selling Black Africans into involuntary servitude.
What you are saying is true.

But the rest of the story is that the slave trade was run and financed by Dutch Jews in europe.

And the Christians in the Americas bought them to use as slaves.
 
Thanks for clearing that up.

I had read that post several times and was still confused as to what the letter was about and to who it was targeted.

Funny thing that gets forgot in the PC world is that the North African Muslims were some of the biggest slave traders during the colonial time! I could see Sunni Man selling Black Africans into involuntary servitude.
What you are saying is true.

But the rest of the story is that the slave trade was run and financed by Dutch Jews in europe.

And the Christians in the Americas bought them to use as slaves.
Bullshit fucker! The muslims ran he slave trade and the Jews had nothing to do with it. So go fuck yourself.
 
Rabbi Marc Lee Raphael on Jews in the Slave Trade

The following passages are from Dr. Raphael's book Jews and Judaism in the United States a Documentary History (New York: Behrman House, Inc., Pub, 1983), pp. 14, 23-25.


"Jews also took an active part in the Dutch colonial slave trade; indeed, the bylaws of the Recife and Mauricia congregations (1648) included an imposta (Jewish tax) of five soldos for each Negro slave a Brazilian Jew purchased from the West Indies Company. Slave auctions were postponed if they fell on a Jewish holiday. In Curacao in the seventeenth century, as well as in the British colonies of Barbados and Jamaica in the eighteenth century, Jewish merchants played a major role in the slave trade. In fact, in all the American colonies, whether French (Martinique), British, or Dutch, Jewish merchants frequently dominated.


Rabbi Raphael is both a rabbi and a top historian of Jewish history. For the last generation he has been the editor of the quarterly journal, American Jewish History. He is the Nathan and Sophia Gumenick Professor of Judaic Studies, Professor of Religion, and Chair, Department of Religion, The College of William and Mary, and a Visiting Fellow of Wolfson College, Oxford University. He, and a visiting professor at Brown University, the University of Pittsburgh, HUC-JIR, UCLA, and Case Western Reserve University. He came to The College of William and Mary in 1989 after 20 years at Ohio State University. He is the author of many books on Jews and Judaism in America

Rabbi Marc Lee Raphael on 
Jews in the Slave Trade
 
:rofl:

with as many jews who owned jews in the OT alone you probably should check all that jew rage, hook.
 
GHook sure hasn't shown his face in this thread since I posted evidence from a top Rabbi and Jewish historian about the Jews domination of the slave trade in the Americas. :lol:

btw The Rabbi is also the editor of the quarterly journal, American Jewish History.
 
well, certainly EVERYONE gets to eat the shit of slavery loving ancestors. As a social mechanism slavery needed an array of cogs to work that whites, blacks, jews, christians and muslims participated in. I don't blame jews, specifically, at all for slavery. THAT would be antisemitism.
 
Thanks for clearing that up.

I had read that post several times and was still confused as to what the letter was about and to who it was targeted.
Glad to be a help. I'm fairly familiar with Ben Franklin's works.
Slavery was a worldwide institution from the earliest recorded history. Russia derives its name from a Scandinavian slave trading group, the Rus. Slav is an ethnic group whose name derives from their common enslavement. Every culture held slaves and the practice continued into the 19th century. Every race has ancestors who were both slaves and slave owners/traders. Black Africans were simply the last large group enslaved by Europeans.
 
Newsflash, this just in;
Ben Franklin was mocking Southern Slave owners.
Not Islam.
Thanks for clearing that up.

I had read that post several times and was still confused as to what the letter was about and to who it was targeted.

Funny thing that gets forgot in the PC world is that the North African Muslims were some of the biggest slave traders during the colonial time! I could see Sunni Man selling Black Africans into involuntary servitude.
Slaving and slave trade is still big business in all muslim held Territories , this will change.
 
Newsflash, this just in;
Ben Franklin was mocking Southern Slave owners.
Not Islam.

LOL I knew that, but my threads are often open ended. I realize now this was a bit too open ended as it went in the wrong direction.

My thought was how often even the most obvious solutions / conclusions / facts are met with the most absurd justification. The boundaries of thought remain.

PS my hope is that a reader check the links, too wishful I guess.
 
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A bit of history's debates I'm sure many were unaware of. Arguments for the status quo still dominant much of the dialogue surrounding important issues.

:confused:

I'm trying to understand your point.

That there shouldn't be "Arguements For the Status Quo?"

That these arguements shouldn't "Dominate much dialog?"

That this dialog shouldn't "surround important issues?"

Some or all of the above?
 

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