Why Islamic debates over slavery matter to everyone.
为什么伊斯兰教对奴隶制的争论对每个人都很重要。
FOR ANY system of belief that vests ultimate authority in the past, slavery is a big moral problem.
对于过去赋予最终权威的任何信仰体系，奴隶制是一个重大的道德问题。
That goes for all three of the monotheistic faiths, and even for civil creeds such as traditional American patriotism, which is now wrestling hard with the fact that human equality’s most eloquent advocates, the republic’s founders, were also slave-owners.
这也适用于其他三种一神教信仰，甚至是传统美国爱国主义等民间信条，如今他们正在努力解决人的平等是最具有说服力的倡议，共和国的创始人是奴隶主的事实。（monotheistic：一神论或一神教，意指认为只存在一个“囊括一切的神”的宗教和思想。eloquent：给出一个明确，强烈的 信息。雄辩 Synonyms：articulate, fluent, silver-tongued, well-spoken，Antonyms：inarticulate, ineloquent, unvocal。）
For several reasons, this dilemma is an acute one for Muslims, as emerges in a scholarly but digestible new book, “Slavery and Islam”, by Jonathan Brown, a professor at Georgetown University and himself a Muslim convert.
出于几个原因，这种困境对穆斯林来说是一个严峻的问题，正如乔治城大学教授乔纳森•布朗和他自己是穆斯林皈依者的新书“奴隶制和伊斯兰教”中出现的那样。
He focuses on both theology and history right up to the mid-19th century—when slavery became a bone of contention between European imperial powers, full of new-found abolitionist zeal, and traditional Muslim authorities across the Middle East and beyond.
直到19世纪中叶，当奴隶制成为欧洲帝国主义的争论的焦点，充斥着新兴废奴主义者的热情以及中东及其他地区的传统穆斯林当局之间的争论之时，他一直关注神学和历史。
Like everything else about the Muslim encounter with European colonialism, this is a painful memory, and many Muslims insist that the European stance was patronising and hypocritical.
如穆斯林与欧洲殖民主义遭遇的其他事情一样，这是一段痛苦的回忆，许多穆斯林坚持认为欧洲的立场是高高在上的和虚伪的。
In certain cases, the Muslim sheikhs’ response to colonial pressure involved a tart recourse to Islam’s holy texts, in which the existence of slavery is taken as an inexorable feature of human society.
在某些情况下，穆斯林酋长对殖民压力的反应涉及到对伊斯兰教圣经的依赖，其中奴隶制的存在被视为人类社会的一个必然特征。
If God tolerated this system, the traditional Islamic scholars said, it was surely not for any human authority to abolish it.
如果上帝容忍这种制度，传统的伊斯兰学者说，任何人权当然都不能废除它。
Others told their Western critics that slavery, as practised under Islam, was a far more humane phenomenon than the bondage endured by say, American plantation workers; therefore the Westerners had no moral standing.
其他人告诉他们的西方评论家，在伊斯兰教下实行的奴隶制比美国种植园工人所承受的束缚更加人性化。 因此，西方人没有道德立场。
Although this lies outside the scope of Mr Brown’s book, present-day discussions about slavery are further complicated by the much broader sense in which the word has come to be used.
虽然这不在布朗先生的书的范围之内，但是现在关于奴隶制的讨论因使用这个词的广泛意义而变得更加复杂。
The term “modern slavery” now encompasses human trafficking, especially for sexual exploitation, as well as the bonded labour imposed for debts, for example in India.
“现代奴隶制”一词现在包括人口贩运，特别是性剥削，以及为债务征收的债役工，例如在印度。
The term also covers forced labour mandated by harsh states like North Korea.
该术语还包括朝鲜等苛刻国家强制执行的强迫劳动。
According to the United Nations, at least 40m people endure modern slavery of one form or another.
根据联合国的统计，至少有4千万人忍受着这种或那种形式的现代奴役。
However traditional slavery, in which humans are treated as chattels, and bequeath their status to their children, does still exist, even though all countries have abolished it.
然而，即使所有国家都废除了传统的奴隶制，其中人类被视为动产，并将其身份地位遗赠给子女的情况仍然存在。
The places where the social reality of servitude lingers on are mostly in a swathe across North Africa: for example Mauritania, Niger, the Central African Republic and Sudan.
奴役的社会现实依然存在的地方主要是在北非各地：例如毛里塔尼亚，尼日尔，中非共和国和苏丹。
In Mauritania, slavery was formally abolished by the French colonists in 1905, and by the independent republic in 1981, but last year the country was rebuked by the African Union for failing to stamp it out.
在毛里塔尼亚，1905年法国殖民者和1981年独立共和国正式废除了奴隶制，但去年该国被非洲联盟指责为未能加以制止。
Nasser Weddady, a Mauritanian-American activist who encourages civil-society movements across North Africa, says the subject is so emotional in his home region that it is hard to have a calm discussion.
毛里塔尼亚裔美国活动家纳赛尔韦达迪鼓励整个北非的民间社会运动，他表示，这个话题在他的家乡地区非常激动，很难进行冷静的讨论。
People either exaggerate slavery’s persistence or deny it ever existed. Many younger Arab Muslims have accepted the argument that Islam never endorsed slavery, and become upset when presented with evidence to the contrary, he has discovered.
人们要么夸大奴隶制的坚持不懈，要么否认它曾经存在过。他发现，许多年轻的阿拉伯穆斯林已经接受了这样的论点，即伊斯兰教从未认可过奴隶制，并且在得到相反的证据时会感到不安。
That makes it all the more important for scholars to examine the evidence through an objective historical lens, as Mr Brown sets out to do.
正如布朗先生所要做的那样，这使得学者们通过客观的历史视角来检验证据变得更加重要。
In truth, he writes, there can be no doubt that Islam’s founding texts accept and assume the existence of slavery.
事实上，他写道，毫无疑问，伊斯兰教的创始文本接受并假设存在奴隶制。
They also strongly encourage masters to free their slaves, as a way of atoning for sin or simply as a disinterested act of piety.
他们还强烈鼓励奴隶主释放他们的奴隶，作为一种赎罪的方式，或仅仅是一种无私的虔诚行为。
But keeping slaves is not condemned: it is considered to be a logical consequence of war, in which the men, women and children of the losing side are taken captive.
但保持奴隶制并不受到谴责：它被认为是合乎逻辑的战争结果，其中败方的男人，女人和儿童被俘虏。
It also seems clear from the texts that male householders are allowed to take female captives as concubines.
从文本中可以清楚地看出，允许男性家庭成员将女性俘虏视为妾。（concubine：妾）
On the other hand, it is also clear that in Islam, man’s natural condition is freedom; when an abandoned child is discovered, it is assumed to be free.
另一方面，同样清楚的是，在伊斯兰教中，人的自然条件是自由; 当一个被遗弃的孩子被发现时，他被认为是自由的。
But where a child’s parentage is known, the status of servitude passes down the generations.
但是，如果知道孩子的父母身份，奴役的状态会传承下去。（servitude：劳役，奴役，奴役状态）
Unless they are explicitly freed, the children of slaves can expect to spend their lives in bondage.
除非他们被明确释放了，否则奴隶的子女可以“期望”自己的一生将在束缚中度过。
Despite all that, the vast majority of today’s Muslim thinkers share the modern view that slavery is an absolute evil, whose abolition is to be welcomed.
尽管如此，今天的绝大多数穆斯林思想家都认同奴隶制是绝对邪恶的现代观点，奴隶制废除将大受欢迎的。
As Mr Brown carefully explains, they use many different arguments to reconcile this position with the older texts.
正如布朗先生所详细解释的那样，他们使用许多不同的论据来调解这一立场与较旧的教条。
Some stress that freedom for all was always the divine purpose, and that God only allowed slavery in the early days of Islam as a concession to the realities of the age.
一些人强调，人人享有自由永远是神圣的目的，上帝只允许奴隶制在伊斯兰教早期作为对当时的让步。
Others insist that God never really approved of slavery at all, and that regulating an evil phenomenon is not the same as endorsing it.
其他人则坚持认为上帝从未真正批准过奴隶制，而控制邪恶现象与赞同它并不相同。
Others still assert that Islam can evolve.
其他人仍然声称伊斯兰教可以进化。
They stress the entitlement of Muslim scholars, after due deliberation, to make fresh moral pronouncements through a process of ijma or consensus.
他们强调穆斯林学者在经过适当的审议后有权利通过ijima的流程或者共识从而发表新的道德声明。
Some scholars emphasise the right of legitimate rulers to make liberating reforms.
一些学者强调合法统治者进行解放改革的权利。
In other words, the adage that “man can never abolish what God allowed” has largely been dropped.
换句话说，“人永远不能废除上帝所允许的事物”这句格言已基本被抛弃。
To people outside the world of Islam, or indeed outside the world of revealed religion, it may seem unimportant which line of exegesis is used to reconcile modern thinking about slavery with Islam’s holy writ.
对于伊斯兰世界以外的人，或者在启示宗教的世界之外的人们，似乎并不重要的是哪种解释线用来调和关于奴隶制的现代思想与伊斯兰教的神圣命令。
The main thing, surely, is the conclusion: that slavery is now and always will be unacceptable.
当然，最重要的是结论：奴隶制现在并且永远是不可接受的。
But Mr Brown convincingly shows that theology matters, if only because any argument that can be constructed theologically can also be deconstructed.
但布朗先生令人信服地表明神学很重要，只是因为任何可以在神学上构建的论点也可以被解构。
The terrorist movement known as Daesh (or Islamic State) regards the legitimacy of slavery under Islam as axiomatic, and questions the right of anyone who thinks otherwise to be considered Muslim.
Daesh（或伊斯兰国）的恐怖主义运动认为伊斯兰教下奴隶制的合法性不言自明的和质疑那些有权利反对的人视为穆斯林。
Appallingly, it claimed scriptural authority for the right of its fighters to rape female captives of an alien faith, such as the Yazidis.
令人震惊的是，它声称其战士有权强奸异教信仰的女性俘虏，如Yazidis。
The ISIS “caliphate” may have been destroyed, but the group’s ideas also need to be opposed theologically.
ISIS“伊斯兰国”可能已被摧毁，但该组织的想法也需要在神学上反对。
Non-Muslims are unlikely to make much contribution to the minutiae of debate about what this or that passage in the Koran really means, but they can at least offer encouragement from the sidelines whenever the matter is being addressed in good faith.
非穆斯林不太可能对关于“古兰经”中这段或那段经文究竟意味着什么的辩论做出很大贡献，但只要善意地解决问题，他们至少可以在场外提供鼓励。
