Re-Defining Persians
as Arabs, March 2005
From: Manuvera@aol.com
Sent: Monday, March 21, 2005 8:50 PM
To: pgtf@persiangulfonline.org;
pgtf@iic.org;
Subject: Re-Defining Persians as Arabs
Greetings,
These statements (see your e-mail below) are typical of a plethora
of books coming out of mainly British inspired and Arab-Sheik
funded (from the Persian Gulf area) "history books"
that are doing their utmost to revise the history of Islam, by
essentially re-writing Persia out of history - actions consistent
with Arabian nationalism.
An upcoming paper of mine tabulates how the British arabists
have done much to foster historical revisionism in the name of
economic interests since 1920. British Arabists today are the
strongest they have ever been in British history. Arabs accuse
the Jews of having undue influence in the American government;
this is truly ironic, as they do not seem to mind their own powerful
Arab lobby in MI6 (British intelligence), commerce, media outlets
like the BBC (BBC Arab service has the longest broadcasting hours
of any foreign service in BBC) as well as British universties.
Note the follwing shocking observation by Parsons:
"There are few manufacturing, construction or service firms,
banks and finance houses in Britain which do not have interests
stretching from Kuwait to Muscat. The Gulf States have become
liberal patrons of British universities and medical institutions.
In short, the practical content of the interchange between Britain
and the Gulf exceeds anything which could have been envisaged
by previous generations."
(Parsons, A British Perception of the Gulf, p.38 - in "The
Arab Gulf and the West", Edited by B.R. Pribham, 1985, Centre
for Arab Gulf Studies, University of Exeter).
Note that the reference is from 1985 - things have gotten far
more intertwined since then. You may wish to read:
McLoughlin, L. (2002). In a Sea of Knowledge: The British Arabists
in the Twentieth Century. Reading, UK : Ithaca Press.
Arabs now fund a large number of programs and there are now many
western "academics for hire" in places such as Leeds,
Oxford, Cambridge, Exeter (which actually uses a parallel Arab
logo for identification), Durham, and Edinburgh. The latter is
home to Professor Emiritus Montgomery Watt, who has worked for
years to redefine all non-Arabs from non-Arab lands as "Arab".
Professor Watt has openly opined about the irrelevancy of Persians
to world civilization and Islam. I have had the pleasure of meeting
one of his close professor friends in Ephesos (near modern Izmir),
Turkey.
There actually is very little room for debate, as the primary
Arab sources contradict the statements of British Arabists (such
as Watt) and their Arab nationalist allies. Allow me to quote
the following from the greatest of all Arabian historians Ibn
Khaldun (1332-1406 AD):
"...It is a remarkable fact that, with few exceptions, most
Muslim scholars...in the intellectual sciences have been non-Arabs...thus
the founders of grammar were Sibawaih and after him, al-Farisi
and Az-Zajjaj. All of them were of Persian descent...they invented
rules of (Arabic) grammar...great jurists were Persians... only
the Persians engaged in the task of preserving knowledge and writing
systematic scholarly works. Thus the truth of the statement of
the prophet becomes apparent, 'If learning were suspended in the
highest parts of heaven the Persians would attain it"...The
intellectual sciences were also the preserve of the Persians,
left alone by the Arabs, who did not cultivate them...as was the
case with all crafts...This situation continued in the cities
as long as the Persians and Persian countries, Iraq, Khorasan
and Transoxiana (modern Central Asia), retained their sedentary
culture."
(Sources are The Muqaddimah Translated by F. Rosenthal -III, pp.
311-15, 271-4 [Arabic]; see also Richard Nelson Frye, The Golden
Age of Persia, p.91, for an English translation).
I have already quoted this in the following article:
Pan-Arabism's Legacy of Confrontation with Iran
http://www.venusproject.com/ecs/aFarrokhArab.html
or
http://www.ghandchi.com/iranscope/Anthology/KavehFarrokh/farrokh7.htm
On a personal level, I met one of Professor Watt's fellow academics
(as noted previosuly) from a distinguished British university
in Ephesos (near modern Izmir in Turkey) a few years back. He
has not given me permission to state his name, and you will shortly
see why. Here is my encounter with the gentleman.
As Professor "X" lectured to a group of western academics
about "Arab Sciences" and "Arab Scientists"
such as "Omar Khayyam", "Khwarazmi", etc.
and other such personalities, I politely quoted Ibn Khaldun to
him and the audience. The reaction was swift if not surprising
(if not outright illogical). Flustered, he shouted to me that
"British books have stated the facts" and that I should
not "rudely interrupt" the session. I simply retorted
(I assure you with calm and respect), that I was simply quoting
Ibn Khaldun, and just wanted to know what proof he had to support
his allegations, and why he was misleading the audience by not
referring to Ibn Khaldun. His incredible response was "I
was doing research when you were in diapers". The audience
was not amused.
Another contradiction quoted to Professor "X" was,
why every single "Arab" scientist quoted, was neither
born in or died in, an Arab country. This also surprised the audience.
He then mentioned that Ibn Sina is "buried in Arab lands".
My wife, whose ancestry hails from a region close to Hamadan,
stated that "Ibn Sina is buried in Hamadan in Meydan Bo Ali...I
offer to take you there myself at my expense...". An audience
member then joked that it was perhaps the weather of Iran that
transformed its Arab occupiers into instant scholars, as almost
every single "Arab" scholar quoted by Professor "X"
either hailed from Iran or from the Persian cultural relam (Afshana,
Central Asia, Afghanistan, etc.). The Professor was not amused.
At this juncture, the audience members (Professors from the UK,
USA, Greece and many parts of Europe), began to question the professor
regarding the veracity of the books he was citing (e.g. G. Farmer,
D.T. Potts, M. Watt, etc.). There were now questions regarding
as to how reliable this "information" was. One professor
also inquired as to "how much funding" is provided by
Arab political and business interests to university posts such
as those held by Professor "X". The audience was stunned
by the fact that none of the books discussed mentioned the Ibn
Khaldun reference. One audience member noted later to me that
had she not heard me speak, she would have been misled by Professor
"X"s speech.
Professor "X" then stormed out of the room and warned
me to never publically state his name. I am compelled to respect
the wishes of a man who is 35 years my senior.
There is a veritable beehive of activity in the halls of British
academe, to the delight of the pan-Arabists. These efforts are
nevertheless doomed to failure, as no amount of re-visionism can
re-write the truth of history. It is a shame that so much effort
has gone into "proving" that the entire Persian Gulf
and southwest Iran has been Arabian since pre-Achaemenid times
and that the entire spectrum of achievement in Islam is Arab.
These activities do not serve the interests of Arabs in general,
and only serve to promote the business interests of a select few
in the governing classes of the Arab states of the Persian Gulf,
as well as the growing cadre of high profile British Arabists.
I hope this humble commentary may be of use to you.
Regards
Dr. Kaveh Farrokh
=================================================================
Subj: RE: Fwd: Debate over if
Date: 3/21/2005 4:41:40 PM Pacific Standard Time
From: abibis@msn.com
To: Manuvera@aol.com
Sent from the Internet (Details)
Dear Dr. Farrokh,
Please take a look at the following e-mail that I received from
a friend of
mine. Please let me know what you think? I was going to write
a comment on
the Amazon website but I thought that your comment would be a
much better
one. Later, we may announce it to other people as well. This is
a clear
indication of Arab revisionism.
Eradatmand,
Amir
Amir jan,
A friend of mine send this email regarding Khayyam and Kharazmi.
I thought
you may want to post a response to Amazon since I know you love
these kinds
of debates. There are many evidences on the web, pointing to the
origins of
these two mathematicians: e.g.,
http://www.mssimmons.com/ms/Iran/Iran2002/Neishabour/Astronomony.com7.html
Babak
Note: forwarded message attached.
__________________________________________________
Sent: Monday, March 21, 2005 1:33 PM
In Amazon.com, go to the description of the book "Abel's
Proof : An Essay on
the Sources and Meaning of Mathematical Unsolvability". There
are three
reviews. One says that the author, Pesic, "..refers to two
Persian
mathematicians, Omar Khayyam and al-Khwarizimi, as Arabs."
and goes on with
good documentation to show they are Persians. Another reviewer
rebuts that
to say that "Those two Arab Mathematicians as well as many
more did live in
an Arab Empire...and goes on to claim they are Arabs" I think
we should
write a review to rebut this guy. What do you guys think?
Majid
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262661829/ref%3Dpe%5Farr%5Fd%5F0262661829%5F1%5Fbot/102-0825255-6779349
