Arab culture

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Arab culture refers to the culture in Arab countries of West Asia and North Africa, from Morocco to the Persian Gulf. Language, literature, gastronomy, art, architecture, music, spirituality, philosophy, mysticism (etc.) are all part of the cultural heritage of the pan-Arab world.

Language

The Arabic language is the largest member of the Semitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family (classification: South Central Semitic) and is closely related to Hebrew and Aramaic. It is spoken throughout the Arab and Islamic world. Arabic has been a literary language since at least the 6th century and is the liturgical language of Islam, in addition to widespread use as a vernacular language. Arabic is spoken in a variety of dialects. Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), the language of the media and of educated Arabs, is different from the everyday spoken Arabic.

Islam

It is sometimes difficult to translate Islamic concepts, and concepts specific to Arab culture at the beginning, without using the original Arabic terminology. The Qur'an is written in Arabic, and Muslims traditionally deem it impossible to translate in a way that adequately expresses its exact meaning; until recently,^[when?] some schools of thought maintained that it should not be translated at all.^[1] A list of Islamic terms in Arabic covers those terms which are too specific to translate in one phrase. While Arabic is strongly associated with Islam (and is the language of salah), it is also spoken by Arab Christians, Oriental Mizrahi Jews, and smaller sects such as Iraqi Mandaeans.

Most of the world's Muslims do not speak Arabic, but only know some fixed phrases of the language, such as those used in Islamic prayer. However, learning Arabic is an essential part of the curriculum for anyone attempting to become an Islamic religious scholar.

Religions

Before the coming of Islam most Arabs followed a religion featuring the worship of a number of deities, including Hubal, Wadd, Al-Lat, Manat, and Uzza, while some tribes had converted to Christianity or Judaism, and a few individuals, the hanifs, had apparently rejected polytheism in favor of monotheism. The most prominent Arab Christian kingdoms were the Ghassanid and Lakhmid kingdoms. With the expansion of Islam, the majority of Arabs rapidly entered into Islam and became Muslims, and the pre-Islamic polytheistic traditions disappeared.

At present, most Arabs are Muslims by religion. Sunni Islam dominates in most areas, overwhelmingly so in North Africa; Shia Islam is prevalent in Bahrain, southern Iraq and adjacent parts of Saudi Arabia, southern Lebanon, parts of Syria, and northern Yemen. Ibadi are primarily in Oman^[2][3] and are also present in Algeria and Libya.^[4] There are some religious minorities like the Druze, Ismaaili Shia and other offshoots of Islam.

Reliable estimates of the number of Arab Christians, which in any case depends on the definition of "Arab" used, vary. According to Fargues 1998, "Today Christians only make up 9.2% of the population of the Near East". In Lebanon they now number about 39% of the population,^[5] in Syria they make up about 10 to 15%, in the Palestinian territories the figure is 3.8%, and in Israel Arab Christians constitute 2.1% (or roughly 10% of the Israeli Arab population). In Egypt, they constitute 5.9% of the population, and in Iraq they presumably comprise 2.9% of the populace. Most North and South American and Australian Arabs (about two-thirds) are Arab Christians, particularly fromSyria, Palestine, and Lebanon.

Jews from Arab countries—mainly Mizrahi Jews and Yemenite Jews—are today usually not categorised as Arab. Sociologist Philip Mendes asserts that before the anti-Jewish actions of the 1930s and 1940s, overall Iraqi Jews "viewed themselves as Arabs of the Jewish faith, rather than as a separate race or nationality".^[6] Prior to the emergence of the term Mizrahi, the term "Arab Jews" (Yehudim ‘Áravim, יהודים ערבים) was sometimes used to describe Jews of the Arab world; the term is rarely used today. The few remaining Jews in the Arab countries reside mostly in Morocco and Tunisia. Between the late 1940s and early 1960s, following the creation of the state of Israel, most of these Jews left their countries of birth and are now mostly concentrated in Israel. Some also immigrated to France (where they form the largest Jewish community, outnumberingEuropean Jews) (see Jewish exodus from Arab lands).