We in the Jewish community sometimes forget how much we owe Islam.
It was the great Islamic theologians and thinkers — among them al-Farabi, Ibn Sina (Avicenna), and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) — who recovered the classical tradition of philosophy,
It was the great Islamic theologians and thinkers — among them al-Farabi, Ibn Sina (Avicenna), and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) — who recovered the classical tradition of philosophy, leading the West out of the Dark Ages.
Maimonides, one of the greatest Jewish thinkers in the past 1,000 years, was also deeply indebted to them. Throughout his masterwork, The Guide for the Perplexed, he is in constant dialogue with the Mutakallimun, or the Muslim Kalamists.
Even his great religious law code, the Mishneh Torah, was inspired by Sharia codes.
Maimonides, in turn, influenced Christian thinkers like Aquinas.
Thus, both Judaism and Christianity are deeply indebted to the thinkers of Islam.
Furthermore, Maimonides’ son, Rabbi Abraham, felt a deep kinship with Islamic mystical traditions. Speaking personally, I learned much from Ibn Khaldun, who is sometimes described as the world’s first sociologist.
His insights into the processes of social decline remain deeply relevant to the West today.
Some years ago, I wrote an article in The London Times telling the story of how Averroes became the first person to make a religious argument for freedom of speech
He influenced the 16th-century Jewish sage, Rabbi Judah Loew of Prague, who quotes him on the subject. John Milton, a Christian writer, made the same point in his 1644 defense of free speech, Areopagitica.
Two centuries later, secularist John Stuart Mill reiterated the argument in his 1859 classic, On Liberty. I found it moving how first a Muslim, then a Jew, then a Christian, then a secular humanist, came together to agree on the importance of free speech & the dignity of dissent
Today, however, all religions face a challenge. The world is changing at an ever-accelerating pace. Meanwhile, societies in the West are abandoning the religious ethic that once made them great.
The dominant culture in Europe today is secular, consumerist, individualist and
consumerist, individualist and relativistic, offering little by way of moral guidance, and still less in terms of a sense of the sacred
Oscar Wilde once defined a cynic as a person who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. In that sense, ours is a cynical age
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By @TrevorPTweets: "The greatest tragedy in all of this is that the gurus of wokedom '
What amazes me is that y'all were supporting the same gurus of wokedom' the Queer Theory Activists
against a minority within a minority who you framed as reactionary & hateful extremists
In the interests of a real freedom, of speech and of conscience,
we stand with French educators under threat from this ideologically-driven attack by politicians, commentators and select academics.
We are concerned about the clear double standards regarding academic freedom in the attack on critical race and decolonial scholarship mounted by the manifesto.
In opposition to the actual tenets of academic freedom, the demands it makes portray any teaching and research into
portray any teaching and research into the history or sociology of French colonialism and institutionalised racism as an attack on academic freedom.
French liberalism as a rationale for the brutal colonisation of millions of peoples across Asia and Africa – what it called its “mission civilisatrice” (civilising mission). This violence is as much part of French history as its revolutionary triad
This violence is as much part of French history as its revolutionary triad of liberté, égalité, and fraternité (liberty, equality and fraternity).
It is only the latter, however, that is ever mentioned as France’s contribution to modernity.
There is seldom a reckoning with the dark underbelly of liberalism, and the unparalleled violence that was, and continues to be, meted out to its historic Others.
But Muslims – having borne the brunt of French (and other) colonialism, imperialism and racist violence –
'The march of wokeism is an all-pervasive new oppression
Culture Wars Do Matter'
Funny Our Trevor was in the Media Culture War against Birmingham Parents Rights Protesters 2019 who stood AGAINST this same march of wokeism
They got framed as hateful extremists
"40 yrs trying to ensure people weren't judged by their race or gender
I assured him I wouldn't hold his colour..."
what about religion Trevor ?
Not only were all the ' progressive'/ intellectual elite/Birmingham CC/Schools/MP's/DfE/Ofsted/ EHRC
all behind No Outsiders Queer Theory-led projects at both protests schools in 2019
Parents were framed by @TrevorPTweets 'enemy at the gates '
"So for me personally Ramadan not only represents surrender & submission to God
but also personal friendship & respect which for me goes beyond religious affiliation, race & gender
Connecting us with our deeper essence, our spiritual identity as servants of God"