Al-Mu'tamid ibn Abbad Quotes
If I have to chose, I would rather tend camels for the Almoravids than pasture swine under the Christians.
Yusuf was the ruler of the Almoravids, a Berber empire of North Africa and Mauritania. The Almoravids were a particular zealous group of Muslim fundmentalists. Al-Mutamid and the other Muslim petty kings of Spain asked help from the Almoravids who invaded Spain in 1090 and unified the then Islamic state. By that time al-Mutamid had evacuated Seville and passed away.
al-Mutamid, ~1014-1086, Islamic Moorish King of Seville, Spain and Poet, Asking for help from Yusuf ibn Tashfin, ?-1106, against the Christians who were trying to dislodge the Moors from Spain
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Toleration is a relative term. The Muslim Moors made Christians (and Jews) pay a special tax. At times they were forced to wear special clothing so that they could be readily identified. And they could not build churches larger or taller than the smallest mosque in the community. At times, their occupations were restricted but at other times Christians and Jews were appointed to the highest positions like Vizier. The Inquisition, in contrast, forced all Muslims (and Jews) to leave the country without any of their property or money or be tortured and killed—usually by burning at the stake unless of course that they converted to Christianity.
1st Earl of Balfour
Patton was leading troops in north Africa in world war two. They came into much contact with the Arabs and Patton thought that his officers should know more about them. He wrote this memo.
The Sultan responded (see related quote): The King should have worried. The Sultan’s troops soundly defeated the French and then beheaded tens of thousands of French prisoners. The King was captured and ransomed.
In some countries political candidates run on religious platforms to convert the part of the population that is not of their religion and turn the nation into a theocracy.
A force of 4,000 Spaniards, aided by Irish Catholics attempted to thwart the English Protestant Reformation forces in Ireland. They were defeated in their war by Lord Mountjoy. This is one of the many wars in history that was described as “holy” by one or both of its participants.
At the time, the Muslim culture was far more advanced than the Christian. Also, the Roman Catholic Church was very sexually prudish compared with the more modern Arabs, To the distress of the Christian leaders, the Christians of Spain were attracted to the more modern Islamic society. This was just the opposite of today. Since the 9th century, the Muslims have become much more restrictive and prudish in their religion while the Christians and the West have eclipsed them and greatly modernized. So today, it is the Islamic leaders who worry that the Muslims are attracted to Western culture.
He was referring to Joseph ibn Naghrela, the son of Samuel ibn Naghrela ({623786} & {623774}) The father had been the vizier the King and the son was appointed Secretary to the Muslim King. He was one of the Muslims who were jealous that Jews should have influential positions in a Muslim society.
From a religious point of view a Christian or Jew was cursed, but ibn Naghrela had the respect of most (See {623787} ) and was the most influential citizen of a Golden Era of Muslim Spain. In 1056 he was assassinated by jealous Muslims.
In most countries those who identify with the economic views of Mises also tend to be strong supporters of orthodox religion—usually Christianity. American conservative Republicans are typical. However they rarely are aware of views and quotations of their intellectual guru that are evidenced by this quote. See {632408} for another quotation that distressed many European conservative devotees of Mises.
1st Earl of Strafford
This is an excellent example of the many public insults that the Irish religious leaders hurled at each other exacerbating the intercommunal tension between the Catholics and Protestants. There were amost no Irish leaders of either religion who tried to dampen the animosity and conflict.
The French were culturally not very warlike or militaristic and in the past two centuries had not been very aggressive like the British or the Germans. The Kaiser showed is ethnic ignorance in that the Anglo-Saxons were the merging of two people the English Saxons and the French who under William the Conqueror had defeated the Saxons. However, that was a common perception in racist Germany at the time. Most important however was that the Kaiser and the German military believed it and the fact that France may enter WWI against them was not taken as a serious threat so the German aggression proceeded. The French military gave Germany much more difficulty in the battlefield than they anticipated.
al-Mu'tamid Muhammad ibn Abbad Ibn Ismail al-Lakhmi, lived 1040–1095, was the third and last ruler of the taifa of Seville in Al-Andalus. He was a member of the Abbadid dynasty.
