Monday, September 24, 2007

Systematic Omission of Islamic Knowledge in the West

Today I was reading the wikipedia article about the stone city of Petra in Jordan. You know, the one used in the Indiana Jones movie. I read the article and there was no mention whatsoever in it about the theory many have that Thamud, oft-mentioned in the Qur'an, is the same city. The only sources mentioned were Roman or Christian.

That reminded me of numerous Discovery Channel or History Channel shows about religion. There was a series I remember in particular that was about Abraham and other prophets. The show referred repeatedly to what Jewish sources and Christian sources said about Abraham but they did not mention what the Qur'an says about Abraham at all.

This leads to two conclusions: 1. People are aware that Islamic sources (in particular the Qur'an) has something important to offer on these topics but choose to ignore it because it doesn't say what they want it to say or they do not want to use Islamic sources because they do not want to bring to light anything to do with Islam.
Or, 2. Even scholars are woefully ignorant about a huge field of sources for their topics, those sources that come from Islam and Islamic sources.

Either way, it leaves me thoroughly annoyed and saddened.

No comments: