MUSLIM FUN FACT OF THE DAY: While the chosen language for the Qur'an is Arabic, Arab culture is NOT representative of Islam. Far too often in "the West" Saudi Arabia is seen as the beacon or leader of Islam. While I can understand why that opinion exists, given that two of the three holiest cities in Islam are in present day KSA (1- Mecca; 2- Medina; 3- Jerusalem) - this assumption is incorrect. First of all "Arab culture" is pretty vague and covers a vast many countries. And before they were the countries we now know in the modern day - they were many, many ethnically diverse tribes before that. Culture in Egypt is not the same as it is in Morocco as it is in Saudi Arabia as it is in Iraq. Persians, Turks, Kurds, Basques, etc. are NOT Arab. So throwing all Middle Easterners and North Africans into one cultural bucket is also misleading as "our countries" and "our people" don't see eye-to-eye on many issues and many often disagree with the ultra-conservative spin Saudi clerics have on religious issues as well. However, the real reason it is wrong to confuse "Arab culture" with Islam is because what most Westerners don't know, is that MOST MUSLIMS ARE NOT ARAB! In fact, even though Islam is often associated with the Middle East (for the reasons I mentioned above), fewer than 15% of Muslims are Arab. By far, the largest populations of Muslims live in Southeast Asia (more than 60%), while the countries of the Middle East and North Africa make up only 20% of the total. One-fifth of the world's Muslims live as minorities in non-Muslim countries, with the largest of these populations in India, China, and Russia. There are actually more Muslims in India and Pakistan alone than there are in the ENTIRE Middle East and North Africa regions! So please be advised that Saudi culture doesn't speak for me personally, nor do Saudi laws; and quite frankly they don't speak for Islam either. While one cannot deny that the same religion can be practiced a little differently from place to place and the reason for that is the difference in cultures as one cannot deny that culture and the modern-day times both play a role on how we interpret religious texts, it is a big mistake to confuse the two. To quote one of my favorite Imams, "Follow the Qur'an, don't follow the Muslims because humans are imperfect and therefore fallible, but the Qur'an - what Muslims believe to be the word of God - that's where to find the heart of truth." #MuslimFunFactOfTheDay
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/06/07/worlds-muslim-population-more-widespread-than-you-might-think/