#Culture

[Podcast] Can the Golden Age of Islam Save Us? | Sh Abdullah Mullanee

Published

April 21, 2026

Shaykh Abdullah Mullanee and Zainab bint Younus muse over the nostalgia of the Golden Age of Islam, and question the tendency to romanticize the past without living up to its spirit. This episode pushes us to stop resting on our historic laurels and to examine how we can take the lessons of the past to rebuild the Ummah today: with creativity, curiosity, and exciting new contributions. So can the Golden Age of Islam actually save us, or is it just another legend that we tell without doing anything about the state of our Ummah today?

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Stats not Stories: Problems with our Islamic History

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Related Topics:audio culture development Education Featured golden age of Islam history Inspiration islamic history podcast Society

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Zainab bint Younus

Zainab bint Younus (AnonyMouse) is a Canadian Muslim woman who writes on Muslim women's issues, gender related injustice in the Muslim community, and Muslim women in Islamic history. She holds a diploma in Islamic Studies from Arees University, a diploma in History of Female Scholarship from Cambridge Islamic College, and has spent the last fifteen years involved in grassroots da'wah. She was also an original founder of MuslimMatters.org.

1 Comment

Amer Rizvi

May 10, 2026 at 11:01 AM

“A single street had a hundred booksellers.”

Maybe, but what happened to those booksellers and their books, the details of which are often left out in discussions of Muslim history.

Those of us who went through Social Studies in high school know well the Eurocentric concept of the “Golden Age.”

We learnt about the rise and fall of civilizations, each reaching a peak before meeting a tragic end.

Unfortunately, the podcast tries to fit Abbasid history into this Eurocentric model. It back projects onto the Abbasids a narrative of successfully “absorbing” people from all over the world into their system, much like our country is often described as doing (Those of us who have chosen to stand up against systemic discrimination would beg to differ.)

The podcast proposes that the way forward is to invest in “soft sciences,” R&D, and to build our own “Muslim systems.”

But should we focus on creating parallel systems when we get “kicked out” as the podcast suggests?

Are parallel systems really a better option for Muslims?

And what guarantee is there that those same “Muslim systems” won’t also reproduce the same patterns of hierarchy, discrimination, and intolerance, as I unfortunately discovered in an “Islamic” school here in Virginia?

So what is the way forward according to Allah?

Allah defines it in the Qur’an:
“You are the best nation brought forth for mankind: you enjoin what is good, forbid what is evil, and believe in Allah.”

Not insular “Muslim systems,” but changing the systems we are living in in the West towards justice, tolerance, and inclusivity.

والله المستعان

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