Peace Be Unto Those Who Follow Right Guidance.

In an article entitled Islam: Religion or Ideology? published on 26 July 2006, Imam Zaid Shakir, scholar-in-residence and lecturer at the Zaytuna Institute, stated the following:

As Muslims we may well continue in our various struggles. However, those struggles would be better informed by the revolutionary teachings of Bakunin, Georges Sorel, Rosa Luxemburg, Lenin, Mao, Che Guevara, and others than by the revelation given to our Prophet Muhammad, Peace and Blessings of God upon him. In some circumstances, we could possibly muster a credible defense against any number of threats confronting us. However, at the end of the day, we may find that we have very little left to defend.

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Peace Be Unto Those Who Follow Right Guidance.

In what follows, I shall offer some brief observations on the necessity of retaining use of the 'race' concept despite recognition that the latter does not refer to a natural 'given', but rather a socio-political construct. I will do this by way of examining the position on 'race' articulated by Sherman [Abdul-Hakim] Jackson in Islam and The Blackamerican: Looking Toward the Third Resurrection (2005).

Commenting on proposals to move beyond 'race' as a marker, Jackson (2005) maintains that

rather than contributing to resolving the problem of racism in America, deracialising Blackamericans will only exacerbate it ... a deracialised black population will only ensure that no serious, organised resistance to American racism emerges, as individualised blacks, 'naked and alone', are placed before the overwhelming prestige, power, and resources of the dominant culture and the American state. (pp.14-15)

For Jackson, "commitment to the conservation of race" follows from recognition "of the reality of race as a set of sociocultural and political facts and as a tool for combating the debilitating hegemony of the most intractable American false universal [by which is meant a "phenomenon of history internalised, normalised, and then forgotten as history"]." (p.15)

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Peace Be Unto Those Who Follow Right Guidance.

In this, the last of my reflections on Sherman [Abdul-Hakim] Jackson's essay "Islam and Affirmative Action" (Journal of Law and Religion, Vol 14 (2) (1999-2000), pp.405-431), I want to present an extended quote which lends Qur'anic support to the analysis of "white privilige" under conditions of White Supremacy [=Racism] made by Charles W. Mills in the latter's seminal The Racial Contract (1997).

According to Mills,

All whites are beneficiaries of the [Racial] Contract [of white privilege], though some whites are not signatories to it [emphasis added]. (p.11)

A similar, if not identical, position is presented by Jackson who maintains that

While the Qur'an states on numerous occasions that, "[n]o soul shall be made to bear the burden of another", this must be understood only in connection with each individual's standing on the Day of Judgment, where neither ancestors nor descendents will be made to account for the sins one commits. This is entirely separate from the question of whether, on the level of everyday existence, you and I are affected by the deeds and misdeeds of our ancestors. (By ancestors, I mean of course not simply our bloodline but the entire network of community members from whom we inherit present reality.) Here the Qur'an is equally emphatic in pointing out that human beings are not born into social vacuums, and that the edifice of social, political, economic and religious reality erected by one generation can be so powerful as to nearly determine the predisposition of its successors, fundamentally informing their outlook and prejudices and the entire range of unearned advantages and disadvantages with which they go on to face life. (p.429)

Peace

Peace Be Unto Those Who Follow Right Guidance.

In what follows, I will offer some brief reflections on Sherman [Abdul-Hakim] Jackson's views on equality and justice as presented in his essay, "Islam and Affirmative Action" (Journal of Law and Religion 14 (2), (1999-2000), pp.405-431.)

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Peace Be Unto Those Who Follow Right Guidance.

In what follows, I will offer some brief reflections on Sherman [Abdul-Hakim] Jackson's essay, "Islam and Affirmative Action" (Journal of Law and Religion 14 (2), (1999-2000), pp.405-431.)

According to Jackson,

Islam's support for Affirmative Action is rooted primarily ... not in a concern for African-American's economic or political interests qua economic or political interests. It is rooted, rather, in Islam's emphatic opposition to white supremacy, as a system of domination, whose daily assaults on black consciousness bludgeon the human spirit and simultaneously undermine and abuse the fact of black humanity [emphasis added.]" (pp.410-411.

Jackson qualifies his reference to "Islam's emphatic opposition to white supremacy" by insisting that "this includes all systems of supremacy as legitimizers and instruments of domination, including Arab supremacy and domination [i.e. tribalism/complexionism], or even male supremacy and domination [i.e. sexism/masculinism]." (p.410) It might be argued that Jackson is here identifying white supremacy - more correctly, White Supremacy (Racism) - as a specific instance of the more general phenomenon of supremacism.

Jackson goes on to explore the [contingent] link between domination and the Qur'anic term fitnah which, as he correctly states, is characterised by The Qur'an as being worse than murder. According to him, fitnah is

a test, trial, provocation or act of oppression that seeks to draw on or expose human weakness. Fitnah from God seeks to expose human weakness for the purpose of nurturing a positive humility and a will to overcome. Fitnah from human beings [by contrast] is based on self-interest and aims at exploitation. (p.414)

Jackson maintains that "The Qur'an's preoccupation with domination is ... grounded in the fact that regimes of unbelief (kufr) (as opposed to individual acts of unbelief) require domination in order to sustain themselves." Importantly, on his view,

fitnah shows itself to be not only central to the Qur'anic message but far more sinister than brute injustice (zulm), persecution or even murder (qatl). For tyrants and murderers receive limited to no psychological cooperation from their victims. Institutionalised domination, on the other hand, is an all volunteer system. While the victims of oppression habitually fight against their oppressors, the victims of domination only fight against their selves. (p.415)

While Jackson might indeed be correct about the self-destructiveness of fitnah/domination, his assertion that "institutionalised domination ... is an all volunteer system" is problematic in that it could be construed as implying that the victims of domination (as opposed to oppression) are wholly and solely responsible for this domination.

Is Jackson saying this? I don't think he is because he goes on to say that "while [The Qur'an] holds individuals ultimately responsible for the choices they make, it never questions the impact of environment [emphasis added]." (p.418)

I wholeheartedly agree. While it is indeed the case that the system of White Supremacy (Racism) is responsible for physically and mentally enslaving non-white people, victims of White Supremacy (Racism) have a duty/obligation to "break free from the mental chains" of domination (fitnah) as well as from the physical chains of oppression (zulm), to use his terms of debate.

Peace