A world which is anti-Black must be anti-Islam, because Islam in the psyche of white civil society\u00a0has been a ![\"picy\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/673\/2016\/05\/picy.png\")
formidable\u00a0force in catalyzing\u00a0resistance among\u00a0Blacks to not acquiesce to\u00a0the position of the slave. \u00a0The historical record of European political theorists gives clear indication that the power of Islam\u00a0functioned \u00a0to them as a menacing impediment to\u00a0their attempts to secure\u00a0an unjust racial caste system that\u00a0marked Blacks as slave flesh to be dominated by whites.<\/p>\n
According to Calvin Warren in \u00a0Black Nihilism and the Politics of Hope<\/a>,\u00a0<\/em>the horrific Middle Passage voyage \u00a0trapped Blacks in a world of existential absurdity in which all, \u201cmeaning is lost for the black.\u201d In the\u00a0slave narrative of Abu Bakr,<\/a> he demonstrates an unbreakable conviction in Islam that actively ruptures the nihilism that the Middle Passage sought to solidify:<\/p>\n \u201d I tasted the bitterness of slavery from them and its oppressiveness. But praise be to God under whose power are all things. He does whatsoever he wills! \u00a0\u00a0He is our master. \u00a0In God, \u00a0therefore let all the faithful put their trust!\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Abu Bakr could be alienated from kinship structures and his culture, but not his relationship with God, whom he acknowledges as his true master. \u00a0As a hafi of the Qu\u2019ran, Abu Bakr would have been familiar with verses urging believers to be unwearied in the face of hindrances and to never let any worldly catastrophe disturb their peace of mind or purpose.<\/p>\n With firmness of purpose, Black Muslims enduring captivity in Brazil commemorated the projected anniversary of the Qur\u2019anic revelation to the Prophet(pbuh) \u00a0known as the Night of Power, \u00a0by initiating what historian Reis referred to as \u201cthe most effective urban slave rebellion ever to occur on the American continent.<\/a>\u201d Licutan, an Islamic scholar and the mastermind behind the revolt, would be placed under interrogation after the revolt was finally quelled.<\/p>\n When Licutan would be asked\u00a0for his name, court documents reveal that he continuously referred to himself as a\u00a0Bilal. Both the judge and the court prosecutors were infuriated by this action, insisting that they knew his actual name was Licutan, oblivious to the symbolic\u00a0significance. Licutan was identifying with a leading companion of the Prophet Muhammad(pbuh),\u00a0Bilal Ibn Rabah(RA)!<\/p>\n The Male\u2019 Slave Revolt and\u00a0The Middle Passage<\/strong><\/p>\n The aim of the Middle Passage was to trap Black into a world of existential absurdity by robbing them of any purpose outside of that of a tool. Despite this objective, historian Dr.Enrico Dal lago indicates that\u00a0the Black Muslim\u00a0slave rebellion in Brazil, \u201cfollowed a similar pattern to the jihad that characterized Sokoto expansion, almost to the point of being a transatlantic extension of the latter in the Americas.\u201d<\/a> If the Male\u2019 Slave Rebellion was a transatlantic extension of the Islamic movements that went into the establishment of the Sokoto Caliphate, then far from succeeding in robbing Black Muslim slaves of meaning,\u00a0 many who experienced the Middle Passage, merely saw it as a free voyage granting them to opportunity to struggle for Islam in the western hemisphere!<\/p>\n While the Middle Passage sought to destroy within its victims the ability to determine their own meaning, Islam provided slaves with active resistance to this process.\u00a0What was to be done about a belief set that still inculcated within its followers \u00a0meaning, purpose, and unending \u00a0determination even after the Middle Passage? \u00a0 Dr. George Junne notes that African Muslims were heavily persecuted and even African ethnic groups merely thought of having Muslim ties were treated by authorities with extreme caution.<\/p>\n Anti-Black Epistemology and Islamophobia:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Uncoincidentally, Anti-Black political treatise among Europeans often correlated\u00a0with\u00a0rampant Islamophobia. Meticulous in their ardent desire to maintain an anti-black world in the face of revolts, Stoddard Lothrop, a European political thinker \u00a0would publish the book\u00a0\u00a0<\/a>The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Suprema<\/a>cy.\u00a0<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>This book was not a fringe publication, rather it influenced \u00a0the elites in white civil society, having been read and even \u00a0recommended by\u00a0\u00a0President Warren G. Harding. <\/em><\/p>\n Stoddard gives an account of how the various religions of Blacks would impact the European quest for racial supremacy,\u00a0Stoddard writes, \u201cIn so far as he is Christianized, the Negro\u2019s savage instincts will be restrained and he will be disposed to acquiescence in white tutelage. In so far as he is Islamized, the negro\u2019s warlike propensities will be inflamed\u2026\u201d Though in Stoddard\u2019s analysis Blacks are \u00a0naturally bestial, savage, and warlike, he firmly believed that Christianity would be able to tame these tendencies and cause them to accept white dominance.<\/p>\n At the top of the priorities for Stoddard stopping the spread of Islam among Blacks, he writes, \u201cIslam is as yet unknown south of the Zambezi, but white men universally dread the possibility of its appearance, fearing its effect upon the natives.\u201d \u00a0In their mind, Blackness within Christianity came to represent Blackness tamed and unable to resist the anti-black world, whereas blackness with indigenous African faiths came to represent blackness in a savage, bestial, and primitive state but one that could potentially be open to Christian civilizing.<\/p>\n Thus, Blackness with Islam represented something untamable and irredeemable. \u00a0Blackness in opposition to white dominance and an amplification of the inherent warlike qualities they believed were already inherent in Blacks that would fiercely threaten their agenda for racial supremacy.<\/p>\n The universal dread of Islam that Stoddard speaks of existed among white civil society demonstrates that Islamophobia manifests as a fear that Islam would motivate Blacks to not accept the position of a slave and to actively resist it.<\/p>\n \u2014\u2013<\/p>\n In part two of the series, we will examine the cosmological significance of Black Muslims in Brazil choosing Layl Qadr to spark their slave rebellion and \u00a0Licutan\u2019s identification\u00a0 with Bilal Ibn Rabah(RA).<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Editor\u2019s Note: This is part one of a\u00a0ten part\u00a0series exploring how anti-blackness and Islamophobia are interconnected. \u00a0 A world which is anti-Black must be anti-Islam, because Islam in the psyche of white civil society\u00a0has been a formidable\u00a0force in catalyzing\u00a0resistance among\u00a0Blacks to not acquiesce to\u00a0the position of the slave. \u00a0The historical record of European political theorists […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2731,"featured_media":222,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[51,50,57,11,55,45,53,59,9,56,54,61,60,49,52,58],"class_list":["post-168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history","category-philosophy","tag-afroimenism","tag-afropessimism","tag-ant","tag-anti-blackness","tag-bahia-slave-rebellion","tag-black-muslim","tag-blackness","tag-calvin-warren","tag-islam","tag-islamophobia","tag-licutan","tag-nihilism","tag-ronald-judy","tag-servant-of-allah","tag-sokoto","tag-wilderson"],"yoast_head":"\n