29 April 2015

Difference Between Western & Eastern Slavery

The difference between Western & Middle Eastern slavery:

Blond haired blue eyed white Europeans and Americans enslaved people because of their skin color. Arabs and Jews didn't enslave people because of their skin color.

The definition of middle eastern slavery:

Before Islam, Arabs used to enslave people based on financial debt regardless of skin color. In Islam, a slave = a bonded labour. Islam encourages Muslims to free slaves by paying off their debt or bonds payable.

How middle eastern slavery works:

In the past, if a debtor was unable to pay off the money he owes to a creditor, the debtor had to pay off his debt by physical labour. In this case, the debtor was called a slave. And the debtor had to work for the creditor till he paid off the money he owed by his physical labour.

Sales of Middle Eastern slaves:

The creditor had a choice to sell his bonds receivable in the market if he needed money, but not physical labour of the debtor. If the bond receivable was sold in the market, the debtor had to work for the purchaser or new holder of bonds receivable.

This is a common practice in even today's modern society. For example, if you borrow money from bank "A", then the bank "A" has right to sell your debt to bank "B". Once your debt is sold, you have to pay your debt to bank "B" instead of bank "A".

Note: Islam makes it obligatory for the creditor to pay for his slave’s (debitor’s) all basic needs, such as shelter, food, & clothing as long as the slave (debitor) work for the creditor to pay off his debt by his physical labour. Islam also makes it obligatory for the creditor to offer the debitor the shelter, food, & clothing that is the same quality of shelter, food, & clothing the creditor use for himself.

Narrated Al-Ma'rur: At Ar-Rabadha I met Abu Dhar who was wearing a cloak, and his slave, too, was wearing a similar one. I asked about the reason for it. He replied, "I abused a person by calling his mother with bad names." The Prophet said to me, 'O Abu Dhar! Did you abuse him by calling his mother with bad names You still have some characteristics of ignorance. Your slaves are your brothers and Allah has put them under your command. So whoever has a brother under his command should feed him of what he eats and dress him of what he wears. Do not ask them (slaves) to do things beyond their capacity (power) and if you do so, then help them.' " (Sahih al-Bukhari, 1:2:30)

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