Muslim Slave System in Medieval India c6.7

c6.7

In short, slavery in Islam is a permanent and perennial institution. As Margoliouth points out, the abolition of slavery was not a notion that ever entered the Prophets mind.¹⁵ The fact remains, writes Ram Swarup that Muhammad, by introducing the concept of religious war and by denying human rights to non-Muslims, sanctioned slavery on an unprecedented scale (and on) such massive proportions. Zubair, a close companion of the Prophet, owned one thousand slaves when he died. The Prophet himself possessed at least fifty-nine slaves at one stage or another, besides thirty-eight servants, both male and female. Mirkhond, the Prophets fifteenth century biographer, names them all in his *Rauzat-us-Safa*. The fact is that slavery, tribute, and booty became the main props of the new Arab aristocracy.. ¹⁶ The Slavery of Islam is interwoven with the Law of marriage, the Law of sale, and the Law of inheritance, of the system, and its abolition would strike at the very foundations of the code of Muhaminadanism.¹⁷