Muslim and non-Muslim

This is a very nice story, with both Muslim and, if you will, “feminist” connections:

“Born in a refugee camp, she’s now flying solo around the world”

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I’ve come across a very interesting pie chart of the world’s languages, and of their proportional representation in the world’s population.

It can be slightly misleading, though.  For example, English is probably much more important than its raw number of principal-language speakers would suggest, because, right now, it’s the most important second language in the world by a considerable distance:  It will get you across Europe and around Latin America and Africa and across much of Asia in a way that Chinese simply won’t.  English will get you around in China itself in a way that Chinese just can’t do in America, Canada, Australia, Britain, New Zealand, or South Africa.  You can address a letter to a recipient in China using Roman letters, and it will get there.  Try, by contrast, using Chinese script to address a letter within North America.

This despite the many weird aspects of English, including its insanely irregular spelling.

I mean, really:  bough, cough, through, enough, bought, and so forth.

The representation of Arabic on this chart is also potentially misleading.  While it’s the primary language of an impressive number of speakers, its importance transcends them:  It’s the sacred language of scripture, scriptural commentary, law, and prayer for roughly 1.5 billion Muslims worldwide.  Virtually all Islamic scholarship is done in, or at least heavily relies on, Arabic, even in most of the globe’s Muslim nations — such as Indonesia, Turkey, Malaysia, Canada, China, Iran, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Mali — that aren’t Arab.

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Here’s a rather unexpected one:

“Why the Middle East Hated Obama but Loves Trump”

I’ll add another factor that may play a role:

Many years ago, I was walking with a friend and fellow graduate student — a Pakistani Muslim imam — across the campus of UCLA.  It was early on the eve of the 1984 presidential election, and Hashimi suddenly asked me for whom I would be voting.  I wouldn’t lie to him, though I expected that, for reasons of such issues as the Arab/Israeli conflict and other matters, he probably wouldn’t be pleased with my answer.  I told him that I was voting for Ronald Reagan.  He beamed.  “A strong man,” he said.  “A very strong man.  Good!”

My experience is that, on the whole, the Middle Easterners and Muslims that I’ve known respect strength.  And I suppose that they see it in Mr. Trump.  And Muslims also, of course, tend to be socially conservative.

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Did I ever mention this item?  I don’t think I did:

“Only in Egypt: Jewish Mother, Catholic Father and Two Muslim Daughters Under One Roof”

Magda Haroun’s last comment in the article, by the way, is virtually a paraphrase of Qur’an 5:48, which is one of my favorite verses in the Qur’an:

“And unto thee have We revealed the Scripture with the truth, confirming whatever Scripture was before it, and a watcher over it. So judge between them by that which Allah hath revealed, and follow not their desires away from the truth which hath come unto thee. For each We have appointed a divine law and a traced-out way. Had Allah willed He could have made you one community. But that He may try you by that which He hath given you (He hath made you as ye are). So vie one with another in good works. Unto Allah ye will all return, and He will then inform you of that wherein ye differ.”  (M. M. Pickthall translation)