‘MINORITIES’ IN ISLAMIC HISTORY: An Analytical Study of Four Documents (original) (raw)
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Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies
The concept of 'minority' has proven to be a difficult one to define. Indeed, to quote Ulrike Barten, 'Decades of discussions have not led to a legally binding definition of the term "minority".' 1 Even when, in 1992, the United Nations adopted the 'Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities', and even though a number of rights were guaranteed to minorities and to persons belonging to these minorities, a clear definition of 'minority' was never given. Similarly, a definition is not given in the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities adopted in 1995 by the Council of Europe. 2 Indeed, there have been different attempts in international law to define such a concept. The first attempt in this field was by Pablo de Azcárate, at that time director for the Minorities Questions Section at the League of Nations. In a study entitled League of Nations and National Minorities-an Experiment, de Azcárate proposed a definition of 'national minority' that, according to him, refer to 'a more or less considerable proportion of the citizens of a state who are of a different "nationality" from that of the majority'. 3 He went on to say that 'what in the last resort constitutes the distinctive and characteristic features of a national minority is the existence of a national consciousness, accompanied by linguistic and cultural differences'. 4 While the focus of this definition is clearly on national minorities, as the title of his study shows, it is interesting to note that de Azcárate mentions language and culture as distinctive elements that a national minority should have to distinguish itself, together with, obviously, a feeling of national consciousness. Language is also mentioned * Carlo De Angelo is the author of paragraph no. 2. Serena Tolino is the author of paragraphs nos. 1, 3 and 4. The conclusion has been written by both the authors. The Arabic transliteration system we used for this special dossier is ISO 233. Terms that are included in the Merriam Webster dictionary have been not transliterated.-We would like to thank Pat FitzGerald for her careful copy-editing of the special dossier. 1 BARTEN 2015b: 162. 2 COUNCIL OF EUROPE 1995. 3 DE AZCÁRATE 1945: 3. 4 Ibid.: 4.
Minorities as Subjects and Minorities as Producers of Islamic Law: Past and Present*
Journa of Arabic and Islamic Studies, 2017
The concept of 'minority' has proven to be a difficult one to define. Indeed, to quote Ulrike Barten, 'Decades of discussions have not led to a legally binding definition of the term "minority".' 1 Even when, in 1992, the United Nations adopted the 'Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities', and even though a number of rights were guaranteed to minorities and to persons belonging to these minorities, a clear definition of 'minority' was never given. Similarly, a definition is not given in the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities adopted in 1995 by the Council of Europe. 2 Indeed, there have been different attempts in international law to define such a concept. The first attempt in this field was by Pablo de Azcárate, at that time director for the Minorities Questions Section at the League of Nations. In a study entitled League of Nations and National Minorities-an Experiment, de Azcárate proposed a definition of 'national minority' that, according to him, refer to 'a more or less considerable proportion of the citizens of a state who are of a different "nationality" from that of the majority'. 3 He went on to say that 'what in the last resort constitutes the distinctive and characteristic features of a national minority is the existence of a national consciousness, accompanied by linguistic and cultural differences'. 4 While the focus of this definition is clearly on national minorities, as the title of his study shows, it is interesting to note that de Azcárate mentions language and culture as distinctive elements that a national minority should have to distinguish itself, together with, obviously, a feeling of national consciousness. Language is also mentioned * Carlo De Angelo is the author of paragraph no. 2. Serena Tolino is the author of paragraphs nos. 1, 3 and 4. The conclusion has been written by both the authors. The Arabic transliteration system we used for this special dossier is ISO 233. Terms that are included in the Merriam Webster dictionary have been not transliterated.-We would like to thank Pat FitzGerald for her careful copy-editing of the special dossier. 1 BARTEN 2015b: 162. 2 COUNCIL OF EUROPE 1995. 3 DE AZCÁRATE 1945: 3. 4 Ibid.: 4.
The Legal Status of Religious Minorities in Islam: A Historical Perspective
Hamdard Islamicus
This paper deals with the concept of Dhimmi (non-Muslims living in an Islamic state) and the laws formulated for them in Islam, which lie at the centre of the intellectual discourses on the Islamic legal and political system vis-à-vis the issues of tolerance, democracy, and human rights. The teachings of Islam, as revealed to the Prophet Muhammad (×aÌrat Muhammad RasËlullah KhÉtam un NabiyyÊn Øallallahu ‘alaihi wa ‘alÉ Ólihi wa AÎÍÉbihi wa Øallam) provide complete guidance for attaining success and glory in this world and the hereafter. As a comprehensive way of life, Islam encompasses a unique socio-economic and political system. It deals with all private and public life aspects and local and international affairs. However, the status and treatment of minorities in Muslim societies (especially in the context of Islamic law) have been of special concern to Muslim and non-Muslim scholars alike. It has also been a much-debated subject among Orientalists, who have created many misint...
Law and Religious Minorities in Medieval Societies: Between Theory and Praxis
2016
The articulation between sacred text and legal manifestations may vary according to whether a certain group constitutes a minority or a majority. For instance, Biblical principles on relations between Christians and non-Christians may take different forms in Christian societies, where they hold the majority and can design the policies of the state, than the ones they would adopt when Christian minority communities live in Muslim societies. Certain details of these aspects are addressed in the articles by Johannes Pahlitzsch, David Wasserstein, and Ana Echevarria. In a sense, and complementing this field of analysis, Echevarría's article discusses the role played by the quḍāt during the Mudejar period through the transmission and application of Islamic texts among Muslim communities living under Christian rule in the Iberian Peninsula. She concludes that the qāḍī is treated in greater detail in the Llibre de la çuna e xara, a kind of local law written for Mudejars under noble jurisdiction which even includes a formulary for their sentences, better than in a general royal code such as the Leyes de moros, or the more religiously oriented Breviario sunní. Monferrer-Sala's contribution focuses on the diachronic use of the terms namūs and sharī'ah among Christian authors embodying a double meaning, firstly, in relation to the figure of the Prophet Muḥammad, who is represented as a legislator, and secondly in relation to the Qur'ān, which is conceived as a legislative corpus. Those concepts prove the value that Christian authors gave to the nuances of law related to the Prophet and the Qur'ān. Wasserstein's contribution deals with the relationship between minorities, subjected languages, dominant language and legal texts. In his article he discusses what he calls 'refinements' , i.e. those cases where differences from the norm are to be expected but define the norm itself. These differences, according to Wasserstein are explained from their geographical location of the minorities under the strength of the Arabic language imposed by the conquerors. hundreds of medieval legal texts (fueros, fatwās, ḥisba manuals, legal treatises, parliamentary ordinances, etc.) as well as narrative texts (chronicles, hagiography, etc.) describe day-today contacts between Jews, Christians and Muslims. In the second section 'Negotiating daily contacts and frictions' , the authors give some examples of these dealings and their contribution to the demarcation of religious groups. Although distinctions were enforced between religious groups, they did not remain the same over time, as daily interactions changed in response to changing political and cultural mores. For instance wine-drinking, studied by Myriam Wissa and Arcas Campoy, seems to have been widespread among Iberian and Egyptian Muslims until the late eleventh century despite legal pressure, and the same was true for other food regulations. Marisa Bueno takes up this problem of evolution by analysing the regulations for the use of public bath-houses for dhimmīs in al-Andalus and contrasting them with Christian fueros in Iberia, to determine whether Christian uses were stricter than former Islamic ones. This volume is based on a conference organized by the Cordoba Near Eastern Research unit (CNERu), universidad de Córdoba; the project 'Los mudéjares y moriscos de Castilla (siglos XI-XvI)' (uNED/MINECO hAR2011-24915), and the European Research Council Project RELMIN. The sessions took place on the 28 th to 30 th April 2014 at the Casa Árabe (Córdoba), whom we thank for their warm reception. We thank all the institutions involved in the financial support of this endeavour. We are also grateful to all the chairs and contributors who accepted our invitation to participate even if for various reasons they could not attend the conference or participate in the volume. We also wish to express our
Muslim Minority Rights in North-Western Europe: Theory and Practice
Studies in Interreligious Dialogue, 2016
This paper deals with the challenges presented to Northwestern European states by Muslims in terms of minority rights. It shows that many of these states have acknowledged minorities, which are granted various kinds and degrees of territorial, political, and/or cultural rights. The variety of minority rights that matters most depends on whether the minority is national, ethnic, or religious. In general, the longer-established and less controversial the minority, the more generous the rights granted. It is thus unsurprising that although for historical reasons Muslims are sometimes treated as a minority in the Balkans, they are not at present acknowledged as a minority in Northwestern Europe. Instead, they are formally granted only individual rights, and the general public discourse is about integration, not minority rights. I argue that according to most definitions, however, Muslims in Northwestern Europe are in fact a minority, as they are objectively different from the majority population in terms of religion and ethnicity, and even to some extent language, consider themselves different, and have a 'relative lack of status or power'. I also argue that Muslims in Northwestern Europe in fact already benefit from many standard minority cultural rights, though very unevenly. Different states grant different cultural rights, and no state grants all of them. I conclude that the current status of Muslims in Northwestern Europe may not be as bad as is sometimes thought.