Are Somalis Ethno religous?

[Caadi iskadig]

People like @Username confuse me. They claim to hate Somali's and that they wouldn't want to be Somali, but they're on a Somali forum. How does that make sense?

It's a very weird and obsessive behaviour.

 

[adventurequestworlds1.0.2]

Would you consider an Somali Atheist to be Somali? Because I wouldnt. I belive Somalis are Ethno religous like the Amish, and Greeks etc. If you leave the deen your not Somali. Our idenity is just that deeply intertwined with our relgion.

Nope faith and identity are not same those non muslim somalis are somali like or not
Tht rule is made up by some ppl

 

[Regg]

What a stupid question. You can’t change ethnicity. A Somali will always be a Somali. Same for everyone who was born as one of them.

Do you see other Muslim ethnicities disowning their Christian, atheist and LGBTBBQ minority population and not recognizing them as their own?

 

[AMusee]

What a stupid question. You can’t change ethnicity. A Somali will always be a Somali. Same for everyone who was born as one of them.

Do you see other Muslim ethnicities disowning their Christian minority population.

It has been pointed out multiple times in this thread that we don't care about how other communities work. We are speaking on the Somali community specifically. What does that have to do with us and our culture?

 

[Sophisticate]

Can someone explain to me why Somali Christians are still Somali? Before you go on a tirade I know some multi-generation ones. And from what I gather they got protection under qabil. Do you mind reconciling this identity politic exception?

If the Ex-Muslim Somali only applies to Atheist and recent converts to say Christianity. What of those born into Christianity and were the great grand children of orphans taken in by missionaries? I knew one lady like this who reverted back to Islam later in life despite being born into Christianity. I guess she became a born again Somali according to the logic.

 

[AMusee]

Can someone explain to me why Somali Christians are still Somali? Before you go on a tirade I know some multi-generation ones. And from what I gather they got protection under qabil. Do you mind reconciling this identity politic exception?

If the Ex-Muslim Somali only applies to Atheist and recent converts to say Christianity. What of those born into Christianity and were the great grand children of orphans taken in by missionaries? I knew one lady like this who reverted back to Islam later in life despite being born into Christianity. I guess she became Somali again according to the logic.

I know one too, but that is not even a community but a rare case. Its a couple well known people, we can't changes our whole perception of who we are because of a couple cases like that.

The overwhelming majority 99%+ are muslims.

 

[Win]

People like @Username confuse me. They claim to hate Somali's and that they wouldn't want to be Somali, but they're on a Somali forum. How does that make sense?

It's a very weird and obsessive behaviour.

 

[Win]

Can someone explain to me why Somali Christians are still Somali? Before you go on a tirade I know some multi-generation ones. And from what I gather they got protection under qabil. Do you mind reconciling this identity politic exception?

If the Ex-Muslim Somali only applies to Atheist and recent converts to say Christianity. What of those born into Christianity and were the great grand children of orphans taken in by missionaries? I knew one lady like this who reverted back to Islam later in life despite being born into Christianity. I guess she became a born again Somali according to the logic.

Non-Muslims are Non-Somali. The same arguments that were presented can be applied to them as well.

 

[Win]

It has been pointed out multiple times in this thread that we don't care about how other communities work. We are speaking on the Somali community specifically. What does that have to do with us and our culture?

Bro these guys clearly can't read lol. Every argument they can come up with has already been addressed and refuted. A gaal cannot be Somali! Khalas!

 

[Sophisticate]

I know one too, but that is not even a community but a rare case. Its a couple well known people, we can't changes our whole perception of who we are because of a couple cases like that.

The overwhelming majority 99%+ are muslims.

They are exceptionally rare.

Non-Muslims are Non-Somali. The same arguments that were presented can be applied to them as well.

So the Chrstian of Somali ethnicity became officially Somali once she became Muslim. Even though she had a qabil a priori. And got favourable treatment from her clan. Somalis need to be consistent with their rules. I like things cut and dry. None of this cognitive dissonance.

 

[Shimbiris]

There are plenty of lowkey irreligious Somalis around. A few of my uncles were essentially such and were not ostracized for it. But the point with them was that they never paraded their beliefs or tried to turn against other Somalis or publically defame Islam. They just drank alcohol, didn't seem to pray or talk much at all about religion and everyone assumed they didn't truly believe but never confronted them about it. They'd deny it anyway if you did.

Can someone explain to me why Somali Christians are still Somali? Before you go on a tirade I know some multi-generation ones. And from what I gather they got protection under qabil. Do you mind reconciling this identity politic exception?

If the Ex-Muslim Somali only applies to Atheist and recent converts to say Christianity. What of those born into Christianity and were the great grand children of orphans taken in by missionaries? I knew one lady like this who reverted back to Islam later in life despite being born into Christianity. I guess she became a born again Somali according to the logic.

I've met "Somali Christians" who were born such myself and I never encountered Somalis in real life claiming they were not Somali for being Christian. They shook their heads and found it appalling (as did I) but there was never any question that they were Somali. They looked Somali, spoke the language, belonged to a clan and ate Somali food. What are we supposed to pretend they are? Amharas?

 

[Win]

They are exceptionally rare.



So the Chrstian Somali became Somali once she became Muslim. Even though she had a qabil. And got favourable treatment from her clan. Somalis need to be consistent with their rules. I like things cut and dry. None of this cognitive dissonance.

Nobody said we couldn't treat them in a good manner. The ones that are outcasted are the murtads but people who have qabiil but were not raised as Muslim don't get outcasted because they were never truly one of us to begin with. Being treated well doesn't mean they're considered one of us.

An Oromo Muslim that adopted our language and culture would be treated well despite him not having a qabiil. I've seen such cases myself, but that doesn't make him Somali.

This feels repetitive. Same arguments worded in a different manner and yes the Christian woman became Somali once she excepted Islam.

 

[AMusee]

They are exceptionally rare.



So the Chrstian of Somali ethnicity became officially Somali once she became Muslim. Even though she had a qabil a priori. And got favourable treatment from her clan. Somalis need to be consistent with their rules. I like things cut and dry. None of this cognitive dissonance.

A couple of people who won't really last into the next generation can not alter our understanding of who we are. Its irrelevant because of how rare they are, they too will fade out soon they mostly married out and their kids will too.

It means nothing really.

 

[Helios]

Did you read the whole thread or did you come just to dump your reply after everything has been decided?

I provided many proofs why Ex-Muslims are also Ex-Somali.

Do you even know the meaning of ethno-religious? We are ethno religious by definition.

Stop being pretentious do you think I'm going to waste my time reading 27 pages I read the OP and gave my two cents

You've quoted me now I'll give a counter argument

The major argument I see here is "What were our ancestors before Islam?" This argument has already been dealt with. It's just getting repetitive now.

I've answered that in this thread.

Here are the quotes:

Somalis aren't ethno religious simply based on the fact that we've been mostly the same people for several thousands of years most of it without the presence of Islam. You can't look at a gaal Somali and discern them from a muslim one unless you ask.

Jews on the other hand have never actually existed without their religion despite corrupting it or becoming heedless at times. From Ibrahim AS and his son Isaaq AS they come and their identity was always religiously linked.

Asking this question clearly shows your ignorance regarding our people. We don't share common traditions, customs and religion as our ancestors. The meaning of ethnicity is the fact or state of belonging to a social group that has a common national or cultural tradition. Using basic logic we can come to the conclusion that we aren't the same ethnicity. Just like the Copts of today aren't the same ethnicity as the ancient Egyptians despite having a genetic link to them.

They didn't call themselves Somalis. We do. That's basic logic. We do originate from them but we're not the same ethnicity, if we go by the definition of the word "ethnicity" which is:

the fact or state of belonging to a social group that has a common national or cultural tradition.

We're the same pastoralists & speak the same language and have retained some our old customs like gabay & dances. Unless you wanna argue that those are all new or 'didn't exist' back then.

Macanto. Something you should realize from the history of the Somalis is that whenever we were waring with foreigners. The Somalis never considered it a war between ethnicities but rather a war between religions. It was jihad for them. That's why they addressed their enemies as Gaal Madow(Oromo, Habash) and Gaal Cad(Portuguese, British, Italians, French) because what all these enemies had in common was their extreme desire to conquer us and make us subservient to them by striping us of our religion. This shows you how major the role of Islam was in the formation of our people.

What happened when we clashed with Afars they're 100% muslim as well


To conclude using your argument all muslim ethnicities who have been predominantly muslim for significant periods can qualify for this 'ethno religious' banner.

You can argue Arabs are ethno religious, so are Turks so are Fulani etc etc etc. The idea is that this identity needs to be UNIQUE to your group. Somalis aren't uniquely muslim but Jews are uniquely Jewish.

 

[Sophisticate]

Nobody said we couldn't treat them in a good manner. The ones that are outcasted are the murtads but people who have qabiil but were not raised as Muslim don't get outcasted because they were never truly one of us to begin with. Being treated well doesn't mean they're considered one of us.

An Oromo Muslim that adopted our language and culture would be treated well despite him not having a qabiil. I've seen such cases myself, but that doesn't make him Somali.

This feels repetitive. Same arguments worded in a different manner and yes the Christian woman became Somali once she excepted Islam.

So one can be a born again Somali. That's wonderous news. You are restoring hope to the browbeaten @Username who is displaying depressive symptoms. I pray he receives counselling and spirtual guidance from an understanding religious scholar with a dual background in psychotherapy. @Revolutionary certainly got the ball rolling.

 

[Win]

Good read. Better arguments than the rest.

You've quoted me, now I'll give my argument

Somalis aren't ethno religious simply based on the fact that we've been mostly the same people for several thousands of years most of it without the presence of Islam.

Walaal when I said Somalis were ethnoreligious by definition, I meant it. The meaning of ethnoreligious is:
An ethnoreligious group (or ethno-religious group) is an ethnic group whose members are also unified by a common religious background.

You mentioned somewhere later in your post that Somalis aren't uniquely Muslim. That shows that you didn't really understand what ethno-religious meant. We're not talking about ethnic religion, a religion associated with a certain group of people. No, that's different from ethnoreligious by its definition.

You can't look at a gaal Somali and discern them from a muslim one unless you ask.

The same argument can be applied with other Cushites. An Oromo can look hella Somali but that doesn't mean that he is. We're talking about the Somali identity here. Our identity is not based phenotype but rather lineage and religion.

We're the same pastoralists & speak the same language and have retained some our old customs like gabay & dances. Unless you wanna argue that those are all new or 'didn't exist' back then.

I didn't discount any of that. I just said that Islam itself is extremely intertwined with our culture. Islam is our way of life. We have traditions and customs grounded in Islam that radically separate us and our ancestors concerning how we lived on our day to day lives. You most likely acknowledge that fact as well.

You might bring up our nomadic culture and say that we weren't so radically different but don't the Afars also have that nomadic culture and a lot of customs that Somalis engage in, but we both know that doesn't make them Somali.

What happened when we clashed with Afars they're 100% muslim as well

I didn't discount the idea that Somalis had wars with other Muslims, but what the previous Somalis recognized is that unlike the Afars and Omanis, the non-Muslim foreigners were a threat to their entire way of life. So losing those battles would have stripped off from them a major facet of their identity. That's why the only times majority of the Somalis were united was when they were doing jihad.

To conclude using your argument all muslim ethnicities who have been predominantly muslim for significant periods can qualify for this 'ethno religious' banner.

You can argue Arabs are ethno religious, so are Turks so are Fulani etc etc etc. The idea is that this identity needs to be UNIQUE to your group. Somalis aren't uniquely muslim but Jews are uniquely Jewish.

I don't argue you with you concerning this. There are multiple other ethnoreligious groups in the Muslim world, but what you don't understand is that there 2 main requirements for being ethnoreligious. If you have any of them, then your group is ethnoreligious and if you lack any of the requirements, then you aren't ethnoreligious. These requirements are:
1. A group that entirely follows an ethnic religion.
2. A group whose ethnogenesis happened because of the religion they follow.

Somalis, Afars and Malays fall under the 2nd branch. Arabs and Turks don't fall under any of the requirements I've pointed above because:
1. Their ethnogenesis happened before Islam.
2. Islam is not an ethnic religion.

Somalis and Malays on the other hand, are different. Our ethnogenesis as the people we currently are, happened because of Islam.


The ethnogenesis of Malays:

The advent of the Malacca Sultanate in the 15th century triggered a major revolution in Malay history, the significance of which lies in its far-reaching political and cultural legacy. Common definitive markers of a Malayness – the religion of Islam, the Malay language and traditions – are thought to have been promulgated during this era, resulting in the ethnogenesis of the Malay as a major ethnoreligious group in the region.

The ethnogenesis of Somalis:

Religion plays a major role in our identity. The first documentation of the word Somali was during the Adal-Abysinian war when the king of the habash was writing a letter to someone. That was when Islam had a huge grip on Somalida and most of us were Muslim. Our ethnogenesis as a Somali people happened because of Islam and that's because the only time our people ever united was when we were fighting against gaalo. The use of the word Somali increased during the colonial era when Somalis needed to unite to successfully fend off these invaders that wanted to make us subservient to them by conquering us and changing our religion.

When reading about wars that were fought by Somalis, most would consider them wars that were between native Somalis and foreigners, but the old Somalis didn't see it that way. They considered it a war between religions. That's why they addressed their enemies as Gaal Madow(Oromo, Xabash) and Gaal Cad(Portuguese, French, British, Italians) because what all these enemies all had in common was their intention of sabotaging and changing our way of life and a major facet of our identity.....our religion. One of the roots/base/foundations of the concept of Somalinimo is Islam, because Islam is the one that helped in unifying our people.


Now tell me, how can an apostate call himself Somali when he has abandoned such a major facet of our identity? A facet of our identity that was one of the main causes if not the main cause of our ethnogenesis as a people. A Somali that has abandoned Islam has also abandoned Somalinimo. Simple as that.

Hope that cleared up everything brother.

 

[Win]

So one can be a born again Somali. That's wonderous news. You are restoring hope to the browbeaten @Username who is displaying depressive symptoms. I pray he receives counselling and spirtual guidance from an understanding religious scholar with a dual background in psychotherapy. @Revolutionary certainly got the ball rolling.

Of course you can be a born again Somali! We hope all our brothers and sisters that deviated get guided back to Islam by Allah and may Allah make us all steadfast in his religion

 

[bobsburger]

I'd rather sit with an Ethiopian muslim than an ex-somali murtad

 

[Win]

I'm now confident that we can say Ex-Muslim are also Ex-Somali. You can't be a gaal and a Somali at the same time.

Religion plays a major role in our identity. The first documentation of the word Somali was during the Adal-Abysinian war when the king of the habash was writing a letter to someone. That was when Islam had a huge grip on Somalida and most of us were Muslim. Our ethnogenesis as a Somali people happened because of Islam and that's because the only time our people ever united was when we were fighting against gaalo. The use of the word Somali increased during the colonial era when Somalis needed to unite to successfully fend off these invaders that wanted to make us subservient to them by conquering us and changing our religion.

When reading about wars that were fought by Somalis, most would consider them wars that were between native Somalis and foreigners, but the old Somalis didn't see it that way. They considered it a war between religions. That's why they addressed their enemies as Gaal Madow(Oromo, Xabash) and Gaal Cad(Portuguese, French, British, Italians) because what all these enemies all had in common was their intention of sabotaging and changing our way of life and a major facet of our identity.....our religion. One of the roots/base/foundations of the concept of Somalinimo is Islam, because Islam is the one that helped in unifying our people.


Now tell me, how can an apostate call himself Somali when he has abandoned such a major facet of our identity? A facet of our identity that was one of the main causes if not the main cause of our ethnogenesis as a people. A Somali that has abandoned Islam has also abandoned Somalinimo. Simple as that.

Macanto. Something you should realize from the history of the Somalis is that whenever we were waring with foreigners. The Somalis never considered it a war between ethnicities but rather a war between religions. It was jihad for them. That's why they addressed their enemies as Gaal Madow(Oromo, Habash) and Gaal Cad(Portuguese, British, Italians, French) because what all these enemies had in common was their extreme desire to conquer us and make us subservient to them by striping us of our religion. This shows you how major the role of Islam was in the formation of our people.

Asking this question clearly shows your ignorance regarding our people. We don't share common traditions, customs and religion as our ancestors. The meaning of ethnicity is the fact or state of belonging to a social group that has a common national or cultural tradition. Using basic logic we can come to the conclusion that we aren't the same ethnicity. Just like the Copts of today aren't the same ethnicity as the ancient Egyptians despite having a genetic link to them.

They didn't call themselves Somalis. We do. That's basic logic. We do originate from them but we're not the same ethnicity, if we go by the definition of the word "ethnicity" which is:

the fact or state of belonging to a social group that has a common national or cultural tradition.

Good read. Better arguments than the rest.

You've quoted me, now I'll give my argument

Walaal when I said Somalis were ethnoreligious by definition, I meant it. The meaning of ethnoreligious is:
An ethnoreligious group (or ethno-religious group) is an ethnic group whose members are also unified by a common religious background.

You mentioned somewhere later in your post that Somalis aren't uniquely Muslim. That shows that you didn't really understand what ethno-religious meant. We're not talking about ethnic religion, a religion associated with a certain group of people. No, that's different from ethnoreligious by its definition.

View attachment 154007


The same argument can be applied with other Cushites. An Oromo can look hella Somali but that doesn't mean that he is. We're talking about the Somali identity here. Our identity is not based phenotype but rather lineage and religion.

I didn't discount any of that. I just said that Islam itself is extremely intertwined with our culture. Islam is our way of life. We have traditions and customs grounded in Islam that radically separate us and our ancestors concerning how we lived on our day to day lives. You most likely acknowledge that fact as well.

You might bring up our nomadic culture and say that we weren't so radically different but don't the Afars also have that nomadic culture and a lot of customs that Somalis engage in, but we both know that doesn't make them Somali.


I didn't discount the idea that Somalis had wars with other Muslims, but what the previous Somalis recognized is that unlike the Afars and Omanis, the non-Muslim foreigners were a threat to their entire way of life. So losing those battles would have stripped off from them a major facet of their identity. That's why the only times majority of the Somalis were united was when they were doing jihad.




I don't argue you with you concerning this. There are multiple other ethnoreligious groups in the Muslim world, but what you don't understand is that there 2 main requirements for being ethnoreligious. If you have any of them, then your group is ethnoreligious and if you lack any of the requirements, then you aren't ethnoreligious. These requirements are:
1. A group that entirely follows an ethnic religion.
2. A group whose ethnogenesis happened because of the religion they follow.

Somalis, Afars and Malays fall under the 2nd branch. Arabs and Turks don't fall under any of the requirements I've pointed above because:
1. Their ethnogenesis happened before Islam.
2. Islam is not an ethnic religion.

Somalis and Malays on the other hand, are different. Our ethnogenesis as the people we currently are, happened because of Islam.


The ethnogenesis of Malays:

The advent of the Malacca Sultanate in the 15th century triggered a major revolution in Malay history, the significance of which lies in its far-reaching political and cultural legacy. Common definitive markers of a Malayness – the religion of Islam, the Malay language and traditions – are thought to have been promulgated during this era, resulting in the ethnogenesis of the Malay as a major ethnoreligious group in the region.

The ethnogenesis of Somalis:



Hope that cleared up everything brother.

 

[Invader]

What do you mean? It's part of the religion, why are you making it a cultural thing?

Apostasy is punishable by death.

No. It's if you harm Islamic society by making fun of Islam or threatening people to be Atheist.