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Muslims in America came before Columbus (Admiral Zeng He), with Columbus (sailors fleeing the Spanish Inquisition in Spain), and on slave ships after Columbus. About one fourth of African Americans like Kunte Kunte were Muslim and are Muslim today. There are inscriptions in Arizona that show arrivals from the Middle East as early as the 8th century. Many of the Cherokees were Muslim before Columbus, and they still wear the head-dress and use an alphabet influenced by the Middle East.
It is a matter of historical record that Thomas Jefferson owned a copy of the Quran. When he lost it, he acquired another one. Jefferson was not one who kept books for decoration purposes. Haq e Qol (Freedom of speech), Haq e Insaan (Human Rights), Huq e Hurriat (Right of Freedom) were clearly enunciated by Ibn Haytaum, Ibn Tufail and Ibn Rushd (Averroes). These are right out of the Quran. Thomas Aqauinas and John Locke were heavily influenced by these writings. Jefferson, Hamilton, and Madison were heavily influenced by John Locke and that influence shows up in our constitution as the Bill of Rights.
Many historians believe that President Lincoln‘s mother was a Malinguen (progeny of the Moriscos–Muslim who escaped the tyranny of the Spanish Inquisition).
I also reproduce what Frankie Martin says about US Founding Fathers.
Islam, the Founding Fathers and the 4th of July. By Frankie Martin
Islam (Photo credit: rogiro)
This Fourth of July, Americans gathered at barbeques, watched firework displays and remembered the men who assembled in Philadelphia to sign the Declaration of Independence in 1776. For many, the celebrations serve as a reminder of the value of freedom, of a country forged by the people in direct opposition to monarchy and tyranny.
It is sometimes easy to forget, however, that America’s founders were also concerned with another kind of freedom: the freedom to worship.
For the Founding Fathers, religious freedom was at the very core of being American. As America’s first president George Washington wrote, America was open to receive “the oppressed and persecuted of all nations and religions”, including Christians, Jews and Muslims. However, throughout its history America has sometimes failed to live up to this ideal, most recently after the 9/11 attacks.
I saw this firsthand when I travelled as part of a research team headed by Professor Akbar Ahmed of American University to 75 American cities and 100 mosques for the new book, Journey into America: The Challenge of Islam, which explores how Muslim Americans are assimilating into American society and consequently delves into the question of American identity. We met Muslim American citizens who had been imprisoned on suspicion of planning or partaking in terrorist activities without trial and held in inhuman conditions, those whose mosques had been firebombed, and many others who had been subjected to attack and harassment by fellow members of their local communities.
And one has only to turn on the television to see that the media is full of commentators who ridicule and malign Islam’s holy book and prophet. Some Americans even told me that Muslims cannot be American.
These Americans should read the works of our own Founding Fathers. These great scholars and statesmen showed an immense respect for Islam and went out of their way to welcome Muslims. John Adams, America’s second president, named the Prophet Muhammad one of the world’s great truth seekers alongside Socrates and Confucius. Thomas Jefferson, the country’s third president and the author of the Declaration of Independence, learned Arabic using his copy of the Qur’an and hosted the first presidential iftar, marking the end of the daily fast during Ramadan. The Founding Fathers also drew upon principles from Muslim civilisations, among many others, in fashioning the American political and judicial system.
But perhaps the most striking writings on Islam by the Founding Fathers come from Benjamin Franklin, America’s great philosopher and scientist. Franklin expressed his respect for Islam and his strong belief in religious freedom when he wrote of his desire to see the Mufti of Istanbul preach Islam from a Philadelphia pulpit.
But he faced a challenge from his own countrymen in convincing them to be as tolerant.
In December 1763, a group of 50 Pennsylvania frontiersmen, seeking to prevent Native American attacks on their homes and frustrated that the government had not taken action against hostile tribes, tortured, mutilated and murdered a group of peaceful Christian Native Americans in the most horrific fashion.
The supposedly Christian frontiersmen, wrote an outraged Franklin, were more barbaric than those to which they claimed superiority.
Franklin went on to assert that Native Americans would have been safer had they been living in a Muslim country, as Islam shows even prisoners more humanity than the frontiersmen had shown free men. Franklin praised the compassion of the Prophet Muhammad, writing that the Prophet had applauded the humaneness of soldiers who treated their captives well. Franklin also spoke of his admiration for the 12th century sultan Saladin as a ruler who demonstrated both justice and compassion.
In a country where feelings against Islam are precarious, the outlook of the Founding Fathers could not be more significant. And at a time of tension between some people in the United States and the Muslim world, both Muslims and non-Muslims can benefit by considering both the American ideals of the Founding Fathers and the Islamic ideals for which they had such admiration.
These complementary ideals have been challenged to the core by post-9/11 confrontations. So as we settle back into our routines after the Fourth of July holiday, I hope we take time to remember the true America as envisioned by those extraordinary men in 1776 and work to make it a reality. The Founding Fathers would expect nothing less.
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* Frankie Martin is the Ibn Khaldun Chair Research Fellow at American University’s School of International Service. This article was written for the Commonground News CGNEWS
Thanks for really very usefull info that i have frwdwd to my friends. Islam of Prophet was founded on;
Freedom of conscience/religion ( lamum-denakum–)
freedom from Priescraft–free to pray alone
equal rights for all including non muslims.
Social justice to all
state protection of week,orphan,widows.
stress on education
NO gentic-racism ala biblical.
All these were in practice in spain, ottomans and mughal india.
These were well known and had impressed USA leaders.
There are no records of Zheng He going to America. But yes there is a record of how he became an eunuch ! He was captured by Muslim troops at the age of 11. Even though Zheng He was only a child the Muslims showed no mercy, tortured and finally castrated him and made him a slave. Maybe if such barbarism of Muslims would have been known by America’s founding fathers, they would dispose off any Islamic scripture (if they had one ) at the nearest garbage disposal.
I am writing the History of Islam in my facebook page, check it out.
And one more thing, besides Muslim slaves in Columbus’s ships there were also rats that landed in America. But you don’t see them bragging about this !
Good one Sneha:
As a matter of fact, two of the captains of Columbus were Syrian Arabs–and Columbus sailed with Arab maps. Rat worshippers and those who eat rats would know if there were rats on the ships
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACzWdSfZXmw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4DDFyFwWjU
Another victim of temple indoctrination–Raj is back under a new name….
Obviously you have not read the colossal evidence of Zeng He’s journeys to America.
http://www.amazon.com/1421-Year-China-Discovered-America/dp/0061564893
He was not the only Muslim who sailed to America!
Not sure where you get your information from but….here is what authentic sources like Gin, Ooi Keat (2004). Southeast Asia: A Historical Encyclopedia, from Angkor Wat to Timo. 1. ABC-CLIO Ltd. p. 324. ISBN 978-1-57607-770-2. say
Zheng, born as Ma He was the second son of a Muslim family which also had four daughters, from Kunyang, present day Jinning, just south of Kunming near the southwest corner of Lake Dian in Yunnan…
You can also check out Shih-Shan Henry Tsai: Perpetual Happiness: The Ming Emperor Yongle. University of Washington Press 2002, ISBN 978-0-295-98124-6, p. 38 (restricted online copy at Google Books)
He was the great great great grandson of Sayyid Ajjal Shams al-Din Omar, a Persian who served in the administration of the Mongolian Empire and was appointed governor of Yunnan during the early Yuan Dynasty.
Furthermore you can check out this ^ Chunjiang Fu, Choo Yen Foo, Yaw Hoong Siew: The great explorer Cheng Ho. Ambassador of peace. Asiapac Books Pte Ltd 2005, ISBN 978-981-229-410-4, p. 7-8 (restricted online copy at Google Books)
Both his grandfather and great-grandfather carried the title of Hajji, which indicates they had made the pilgrimage to Mecca. His great-grandfather was named Bayan and may have been a member of a Mongol garrison in Yunnan
The maps that led to the age of European Exploration were in Arabic :)
The maps were written by Arabs :)
Visiting the Topakapi Palace in Turkey you see a beautiful Ottoman Map and have a great understanding just how immense their armies were and navies.
While your kind were learning to wear stitched clothes and being taught etiquette and educated on covering your women by the Muslims, on the othe side Muslim sailors were visting the farthest regions.
Columbus used the Al-Adrisi maps of the world which clearly showed America as “Ard e Majhoola” (Unknown world)
I really dont know where to start here……………………
Firstly: there’s certainly no disproving evidence but thats not how SCIENCE works. You need to propose something and if it cannot be disproven by anyone who has a real understanding.. it kinda becomes fact.
OK so.
1. Its very possible that a muslim or fifty came across the Atlantic Ocean with Columbus …….. and? It’s not miles off that a Buddhist did too, and probably more likely that a jew did etc etc.
2. Columbus DID NOT GET TO ‘AMERICA’ or “USA’ as we know it, frankly if anyone in the USA says anything different they are wrong. Columbus only ‘perhaps’ got to what’s now Mexico, and that was round 3 at the earliest.
The vastly more likely (in terms of historical data) says: Columbus never set foot in whats now ‘USA’ and even if (its like 100:1 odds) he touched new new mexico/texas it was over 10 year later.
1492 was the discovery of haiti/cuba not the USA
god dammit <– perhaps he did
i meant ' a jew' not 'fifty'
whats up with this blog and its autocorrect!
Obvioulsy you have not read an article.
There were no Buddhists in Islamic Spain. There were millions of Muslims looking to escape the Spanish Inquistion of 1492.
When they say “Columbus discovered America”–they mean the continent not the country that ddint come into existence till 1776.
Actually if you had read the article you would have seen the names of the Arabs that came to America with Columbus–they were the Pnzone brothers from Syria
So what’s great in that? I hope pakistanis won’t claim electric bulb invented by muslims. All the editors and fans of this site may get free treatment by clinical psychologists of the US. Indians will only give electric shocks.