islamic-jihad-legacy-of-forced-conversion-imperialism-slavery

Islamic SlaveryAncient China. In ancient China, rich families owned slaves for doing menial works in the fields andat home. The Emperor usually owned slaves in hundreds and even in thousands. Most of the slaves were bornto slave-mothers. Some became slaves for failing to pay up debts; others were captured in raids and wars.Ancient India. There are few mentions of slavery in ancient India, another great civilization sinceearly antiquity. Megasthenes (c. 350–290 BCE), the famous Greek traveler, who was familiar with slavery inGreece and other countries he had visited, failed to notice the existence of slavery in India. He wrote, ‘‘AllIndians are free. None of them is a slave… They even do not reduce foreigners to slavery. There is thus noquestion of their reducing their own countrymen to slavery.’’ 680 Similarly, Muslim chroniclers, who leftabundant records of large-scale Islamic slavery in India, never mention any incidence of slavery in the pre-Islamic Hindu society. However, slavery did exist in ancient India, because references of slaves are found inRigveda (ancient Hindu scripture) and other philosophical and religious literature, including in the teachingsof Buddha.Buddha (c. 563–483 BCE) enjoined his followers to assign only the amount of work to slaves thatthey could easily do. He also advised masters to attend to slaves when they fell ill. Kautaliya (aka Chanakya),a teacher of the Taxila University whose protégé Chandragupta Maurya founded the great Maurya dynasty (c.320–100 BCE), had prohibited masters from punishing slaves without reasons; the defaulters were to bepunished by the state. Emperor Ashoka (r. 273–232 BCE) of the Maurya dynasty, in his Rock Edict IX,advised masters to treat their slaves with sympathy and consideration. Ancient Hindu scripture Rigvedamentions of slaves being given as presents and rulers giving female slaves as gifts. Slaves in India served asdomestic servants in the palaces of rulers and in the establishments of aristocrats and priests. It is likely thatthose, who failed to pay up debts, were reduced to slavery in India. 681It, however, appears that the practice of slavery in ancient India was much lower and that slavesreceived more humane treatment compared to those in contemporary Egypt, Greece, China and Rome. InIndia, slaves were never considered a commodity for trading; there was no slave-market. Slave-trade wasnever a feature of India’s economic system until Muslims brought the practice to India.Slavery in Christianity. Slavery is clearly recognized, even sanctioned, in the New Testament [Mat18:25, Mark 14:66]. For example, Jesus advised people in debt to sell themselves along with their familymembers into slavery to pay up [Mat 18:25]. Similarly, a number of St. Paul’s verses, such as Eph 6:5–9, Cor12:13, Gal 3:28 and Col 3:11 etc., recognize slavery or slaves (the bonded) and the free man.These New Testament sanctions had likely encouraged Christians to enslave the infidels (non-Christians). Obviously, slavery was gradually declining in the pre-Christian Roman Empire; the condition ofslaves was improving. When Christians rose to imperial power after Emperor Constantine’s conversion in thefourth century, the trend reversed. For example, pro-Christian Emperor Flavius Gratianus (r. 375–383)enacted an edict that a slave, who accused his master of a crime, should be burned alive. In 694, the Spanishmonarchy, under pressure from the church, ordered the Jews to choose baptism or slavery. The church Fathersand Popes justified slavery in the medieval Christendom on religious grounds. They continued supporting theslave-trade even in the face of rising opposition against the institution in Europe. ‘The Churches, as everyoneknows, opposed the abolition of slavery as long as they dared,’ writes Bertrand Russell. 682680. Ibid, p. 5681. Ibid, p. 4682. Russell B (1957) Why I Am Not a Christian, Simon & Schuster, New York, p. 26208