MUSLIMS ARE NOT IGNORANT (I)

One point of agreement conspicuous in the Western publications concerning Islam and in the books which travellers wrote about Islam is that Muslims are extremely ignorant, that most of the Muslim people they contacted in Asia and Africa did not know how to read and write, and that there is not a Muslim nameamong the scientists who made a reputation in science or culture throughout the years covering the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Some of those Western sources make a narrow-minded diagnosis, alleging that the Islamic religion is an impediment to progress, while others reach the ungrounded conclusion that it is this ignorance that blindfolds Muslims from the greatness of Christianity and hampers them from accepting Christianty despite all the efforts of missionaries

A retrospective look into history will reveal that the truth is quite counter to the Christian allegations. For Islam always commends knowledge and encouragesMuslims to learn.The ninth âyat-i-kerîma of Zumar Sûra purports, “... Say: Are those equal, those who know and those who do not know? It is those who are endued with understanding that receive admonition.” (39-9)The following commandments of our Prophet ‘sall-Allâhu ’alaihi wa sallam’ are universallyknown: “Even if knowledge is in China, go and learn it.” “There is Islam wherever there is knowledge.” “It is farz (Islam’s commandment) for Muslim men and Muslim women to look for knowledge and learn it!” Islam holds knowledge equal with worshipping, and the ink used by scholars equal with the blood of Muslims.Muslims reject Christianity because the Islamic religion is much more logical and much more true than Christianity.