The religion of Islam has often been accused of being a system which organizes and legalizes slavery as a social system, and, thus, of violating the first principle of human liberty. Such a notion, suggests, on the first hand, a lack of an accurate understanding of Islamic laws and spirit in that connection and, on the second hand, it indicates ignorance of all social systems which prevailed before the rise of Islam.

Right from the beginning, it must be affirmed that Islam has never started or originated the social system called slavery. Islam was not the only social and spiritual order which the world has ever seen; it was preceded by multitude of religious and non-religious systems which had seen, organized and practised slavery. Slavery had existed everywhere and in very extreme forms before the existence of Islam.

The Greek philosophers thought that slavery was a natural state; for by nature, they said, some were born to be slaves and others were born to be free and masters. Judaism and Christianity also had practised it. Slavery was, as a matter of fact, a system upon which the economic conditions of many nations were dependent.

Hence, it was not wise for any reformer to abolish it all at once and by one stroke, otherwise, it would be strongly opposed and disobeyed. The wise and effective course was, therefore, to somehow recognize it, and to limit its resources, on the one hand, and to open wide the gates through which the slaves can escape from their bondages, on the other hand. That was the course which the religion of Islam has, wisely, taken.

It can, then, be said that Islam recognized slavery, not in the sense that it urged man to possess slaves, but in the sense that, by implication, it accepted that system which was already existing. But it was accepted under certain conditions and with some limitation; I said "by implication", for the Islamic recognition of slavery was indirect.

It was known through the demands which Islam imposed on slavery and was thus recognized, it was this that led to the recognition in such a way that it would lead, in the long run, to its extinction. The wisdom of such a policy is quite clear, for it achieves its end without being felt as a violent change in the social system; and it gives mankind a chance for transition from one state of affairs to another; and it is, thus, a kind of peaceful and gradual solution, which can be easily accepted and can be easily achieved.

Before and during the rise of Islam, the resources from which slaves could be obtained were numerous. We need not go further than to read a recognized text-book of Sociology to find how numerous they were: if one committed some certain crimes, he would be enslaved, if he was indebted and could not repay his debt, he was to be enslaved; if he was poor, he could sell himself or one or more than one of his children, and so they became slaves; the prisoners of war - civil or foreign, were to be enslaved; and those who were stolen or taken in plunder were to be enslaved. Such resources were sufficient to increase the number of the slaves manifold every year; and in some countries the slaves actually outnumbered the free men.

But Islam limited these resources, and discarded all of them with the exception of two, which it retained, but under some certain conditions: the slavery which comes through inheritance, and the slavery which comes through war. However, they were conditioned by some certain conditions, which, if rightly observed, would lead to its extinction. One of the conditions of the first is that the father of the child of a bondmaid should not be her master, but if he be the master the child gets its freedom at once, and the bondmaid cannot be sold or transferred to another hand, until after the death of the master, and then she becomes fully free. Such a condition sufficed to set free a great number of the actual and potential slaves; and we ought not here to forget that many of the scholars and of the leading personalities in the early days of Islam were the sons of bondmaids who won their freedom through giving birth to such sons.

The conditions limiting slavery obtained through war can be briefly determined in this way: firstly, the war must not be waged by a Muslim against another Muslim; but should Muslims fight one another, the prisoners of both sides were not to be, and could not be, enslaved. Secondly, the war must not be an illegal war: it must be declared in the cause of Allah.

In short, the religion of Islam has conditioned slavery obtained through war with many conditions, which are sure to make it less and less existent, if not completely extinguished.

It is historically true that before the rise of Islam there was only one way whereby a slave could be freed, and that was the will of the master; but the master was, in most cases, not absolutely free to free his slave. Before doing so, he had to go through some judicial and religious tasks, which he could not easily perform; and he had, sometimes, to be fined, for violating the principles of social welfare. All efforts and desires for freeing slaves were actually discouraged.

This is in absolute contradiction with the spirit and laws of Islam in this respect. For it has organized many gates from which slaves can escape and get freedom, and it has opened those gates wide to the extreme, and no effort to entice the masters to free their slaves was spared.

Moreover the religion of Islam regarded the act of freeing a slave to be one of the best deeds whereby man gains eternal happiness, for one of the ways whereby one passes by all obstacles safely "…is to free captive, or to feed, in the days of famine, the orphan who is of kin or the poor who is in need. Who does this, and is one of those who believe, and recommend perseverance into each other, and recommend mercy into each other; those shall be the companions of the right hand." (Qur'an 90:13-18)

It is, therefore, not true to say that Islam instituted, or was responsible for the institution of slavery; it is more correct to say that it was the first religion which put the first steps necessary for its extinction.

From the above discussion one can conclude that all forms of liberty, which modern societies nowadays cherish and fight for, have been clearly seen and completely realised by the religion of Islam, long time before the existence of modern states.

Islam is thoroughly democratic in character; it recognizes individual and public liberty; it respects freedom of thought; it ensures all those who believe in authority; it ridicules all those who do not use their reasons and intellects; it prohibits compulsion in respect of belief, and it appeals to no more than reasoning and mild exhortation. Had it been left alone it would have never raised a single hand in the face of the unbelievers. But it was not the fault of Islam that it had to defend itself and to use the same weapons whereby he was attacked.

In Islam, men are not to be treated as cipher or cogs in vast machines who can be directed, forced and regarded as dependable, they have rights which are much more than rights in secular law, and chiefly the right to be persons who matter, who count for something, who have a say in how they are to be governed, who form relationship, and who are accorded a consideration which justifies their existence, to themselves and to their fellows.
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