Talk:Islam in Africa

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 28 August 2019 and 12 December 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Peer reviewers: Kimbravo99.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 00:51, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Number Nonsense

Those numbers in the percentage field makes absolutely no sense. 45% of South Africans are Muslim, neither are 35% of Zimbabweans for example. That section needs to be either removed in its entirety or fixed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.145.134.172 (talk) 05:07, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Are you insane??45% of SA muslim?🥵🥵🥵🥵 or 35% of Zimbabwe??? Where is your proof? Nlivataye (talk) 11:14, 23 June 2022 (UTC)

Please reference these statistics

This is a fairy important article. Google picks up this stuff, and next thing you know this is being spread as fact. I will attempt to find references, but if references are not found, the claims made here should be blanked pronto. Lets not spread disinformation. --Ezeu 01:32, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't know how things have been done since, but when I first made this article it was just to collect all the various statistics on individual country pages, maybe they should be checked out as well? --Horses In The Sky 01:48, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll check articles for individual countries, the stats and refs are probably there. --Ezeu 02:00, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Please give reliable informations about Islam in Africa ! This article is stating that Africa is 55% muslim, than... that Africa is 45% muslim. What should one belive? Please, more academic accuracy !!!

I just revised the intro to Religion in Africa. Regular editors here may want to coordinate with or add citations and change that article so that the two are in sync. I spend several hours trying to get reliable figures, but they are quite problematic, especially as some members of the Christian and the Muslim faiths seem engaged in point scoring. The short answer is we can't tell definitively which is the largest religion in Africa. Here's what I contributed:

Islam and Christianity contest which is larger, but many adherents of both relgions also practice African traditional religions, with traditions of folk religion or syncretism practised alongside an adherent's Christianity or Islam. start ref Encyclopedia Britannica. Britannica Book of the Year 2003. Encyclopedia Britannica, (2003) ISBN 9780852299562 p.306
According to the Encyclopedia Britanica, as of mid-2002, there were 376,453,000 Christians, 329,869,000 Muslims and 98,734,000 people who practiced traditional religions in Africa. Ian S. Markham,(A World Religions Reader. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 1996.) is cited by Morehouse University as giving the mid 1990s figure of 278,250,800 Muslims in Africa, but still as 40.8% of the total population. These numbers are estimates, and remain a matter of conjecture. See Amadu Jacky Kaba. The spread of Christianity and Islam in Africa: a survey and analysis of the numbers and percentages of Christians, Muslims and those who practice indigenous religions. The Western Journal of Black Studies, Vol 29, Number 2, June 2005. Discusses the estimations of various almanacs and encyclopedium, placeing Britannica's estimate as the most agreed figure. Notes the figure presented at the World Christian Encyclopedia, summarised here, as being an outlier. On rates of growth, Islam and Pentecostal Christianity are highest, see: The List: The World’s Fastest-Growing Religions, Foreign Policy, May 2007. Sunni Islam is the largest single sect, both in Africa and worldwide. See: Islam overtakes Catholicism in number of adherents, Reuters, 30 March 2008.
endref

Don't know if this helps, but it's a thought. T L Miles (talk) 19:07, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Extrem POV article. Should be revisited !

I've been looking on national statistics and population evolutions in Africa since last 25 years. The Islam in Africa - even after last conversions of several populations - can not be more than 45% of the continent's population. The tables shown hera are highly inaccurate and need revisiting. More seriosity for this article, Please ! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.105.123.228 (talk) 11:56, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

On Further Assessment =

On the other hand, the population statistics for each country is mentioned and exact percentages are given. If one was to add these numbers up, one does get the 45% mentioned in the beginning of this article. Additionally, these percentages are also accurate. Therefore, I respectively disagree with the previous comment.

Conflicting Numbers and Questionable Sources

The opening sentence cites the "World Book Encyclopedia", but after clicking on the reference the reader finds it cites Encyclopedia Britannica. What's more, it cites the same year edition and page as the article "Religion in Africa", but with different numbers. Further, there are issues with reference given for the table under the section "Muslim Population". The second page of the PDF file states that there are nearly 300 million African Muslims and that Muslims comprise nearly one-third of Africa's population. Then on page three, the table gives completely different numbers. The entire reference is of questionable credibility. I'm removing this entry. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.103.129.215 (talk) 03:35, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

Part of the problem was the <ref> tag was misplaced, giving the appearance Encyclopedia Britannica source was supporting the World Book Encyclopedia statement. I've fixed that. Regarding the second concern, that the source seems to contradict itself, the source explains these numbers are the conclusion of different sources. Much like how we've included different numbers in the article and attributed them to different sources. Akerans (talk) 19:45, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

Updated statistics to Britannica online 2010 statistics, which are the most up to date, of any of the others (reliable) given.

Hi, for everyone's information. I also noticed the 52% hugely inflated % of muslims in the opening paragraph of the article. Like the rest of you noticed. It is clear in wikipedia's other articles on religions by continent. And in all official and reliable sources that anyone can find (up to date encyclopedias, or totalling the statistics from UN, or CIA), in the world, that islam and christianity in Africa were about equal for the last decade or two. And each had only been in the 40s of %. With the few % remainder being other religions, which are neither Christianity or Islam. And neither religion being more than 48%.

The two previous main reliable sources, were Britannica (book edition) from 2003. And world book encyclopedia (i don't know which year). The Britannica one has now been updated. I have updated it to 2010 from the Britannica Online page. And the statistics are clearly showing that the single self published source (muslimpopulation.com) is totally inflated and fraudulently creates false statistics which can only be presumed to be intended as a propaganda tool to boost it's audience's ego. It also shows the Britannica 2003 source, if it was ever correct that it said islam was larger in 2003. Has now been obseleted, by the 2010 statistics which state Christianity as largest at 47.32%, and Islam as fallen as a percentage, to 40.84%.

I hope this satisfies everyone.

I also added a " or – adds: [unreliable source?]" tag, to the muslimpopulation.com unreliable source, in the opening paragraph, which has given the inflated and incorrect statistics. And which when you check it's sources which it claims to be based on, you can see that the sources it claims to be based on, do not give anywhere near the same statistics for any individual country, or continent, or the world, which it (muslimpopulation.com) gives.

For a general idea of the unreliability of the website (muslimpopulation.com) which is giving the 52% muslims in africa statistic. The last time I calculated a year or two ago, muslimpopulation.com were taking the source statistics they claimed to be based on, for the muslim population of individual countries, and inflated them by up to 30% for each country in the world. Also giving a world muslim population inflated by around 30%. Hence why their muslim world population statistic is currently stated as: 2,013,000,000 (2.1 billion). All reliable sources, including the UN, large news broadcast networks (e.g. BBC news), CIA, wikipedia, pew forum. State the muslim world population at an agreed statistic in 2012 of 1,600,000,000 (1.6 billion). This is how unreliable muslimpopulation.com is. It is intentionally inaccurate by a difference of more than 400,000,000 (0.4 billion) than the world consensus of reliable sources of statistics of muslim or world religions.

Deleted Contributions

I have also posted this to Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents Please continue the discussion there to resolve the problem.

I am trying to contribute to history and size of population of Muslims in articles such as Islam in Asia. I have several peer-reviewed articles in scientific conference proceedings and journals and a recent 600 page book [Kettani, Houssain (2014). The World Muslim Population, History & Prospect. Singapore: Research Publishing Service. ISBN 978-981-07-7244-4.]. So I added some results in Islam in Asia and other continent and cited by book. Interestingly, some editors such as AndyTheGrump, Jreferee and Dolescum keep reverting my contribution (basically deleting all of it and the source). They keep citing COI or self-publishing, none of which applies here. In fact, Self-citations are allowed per Wikipedia:SELFCITE#Citing_yourself. When I refute their allegations they come up with another excuse and keep threatening of blocking my account. Such "referees" or "editors" may have other motives that they are not disclosing. The job of an editor or contributor is to make the article better, not deleting all sources and information. Better means: checking facts, better reference, etc. May be mis-understanding is promoting such ill-informed editors to go to war! Someone needs to stop this as it degrades the content of articles. Experts like me will not put up with this and will give up easily (they are busy doing real research and real publications). However, bloggers and those who know less, in the long term will control the quality and content of WP articles. Something that no one wants for WP. Hkettani (talk) 17:01, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

My contribution was as follows (but got all deleted, either by an ill-informed editor or ill-intention):

Africa was the second continent that Islam spread into, which explains why almost one-third of World Muslim population resides in this continent. Muslims crossed current Djibouti and Eritrea to seek refuge in current Ethiopia from Pagan Arabs. On the advice of Prophet Muhammad, in Rajab 8BH, or May 614AD, sixteen Muslims migrated to Abyssinia where they were protected by its king, an-Najashi, who has also accepted Islam later. They were followed by 101 Muslims later in the same year. By Muharram 7H, or May 628AD, all those Muslims returned to Medina, but locals who embraced Islam remained there.

In 20H/641AD during the reign of Caliph Omar bnul Khattab, Muslim troops took over current Egypt and conquered current Libya the following year. Muslims then expanded to current Tunisia in 27H/647AD during the reign of the third Muslim Caliph, Othman bnu Affan. The conquest of North Africa continued under the Umayyad Dynasty, taking Algeria by 61H/680AD, and Morocco the fol-lowing year. From the latter Muslim troops crossed the Strait of Gibraltar to Europe in 711.

Islam then spread slowly in much of the continent through trade and preaching. By the ninth century Muslim Sultanates started being established in the Horn of Africa, and by the twelfth century the Kilwa Muslim Dynasty spread as far south as Mozambique. Islam only crossed deeper to Malawi and Congo in the second half of the nineteenth century under Zanzibar Sultanate. Then the British brought labor force from India to their African colonies towards the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries. Islam gained momentum during the tenth century in West and Central Africa with the start of Almoravids movement on Senegal River and as rulers and kings embraced Islam.

Thus, the Muslim population increased from 1.2 million or 4.5% of the total African population in 700AD, to 5.1 million or 17.3% in 800AD, to 9.2 million or 29.7% in 900AD, to 12.3 million or 38.2% in 1000AD, to 13.1 million or 37.6% in 1100AD, to 13.8 million or 36.5% in 1200AD, to 14.4 million or 35.6% in 1300AD, to 15.3 million or 35.1% in 1400AD, to 16.3 million or 34.9% in 1500AD, to 21 million or 37.4% in 1600AD, to 23 million or 37.9% in 1700AD, to 27 million or 37.8% in 1800AD, to 46 million or 40.4% in 1900, to 346 million or 42.8% in 2000, to 551 million or 42.0% in 2020, and is projected to reach 1.72 billion or 41.1% by 2100, then 1.60 billion or 42.8% by 2200, and then 1.74 billion or 44.2% by 2300. Hkettani (talk) 17:55, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

Does not belong in the lead.--Inayity (talk) 14:07, 24 November 2013 (UTC)

Lead Changes Per LEAD

The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it can stand on its own as a concise version of the article. This was not the case with the version prior to editing diff. The source of kettani seems to dominate more relevant sources so I hedged its influence.

I suggest the lead deal with historical and political significance of Islam, deal with African kingdoms, and Islam in modern Africa. When you think of this topic this article should be massive. In its current state it does not do justice to its name.

--Inayity (talk) 14:45, 24 November 2013 (UTC)

It also confused the regions. The CIA Factbook lists the religion/faith percentages [1]. Middayexpress (talk) 16:29, 24 November 2013 (UT)

I really like it23:44, 27 February 2015 (UTC)Tigresse2004 (talk)

I really like it!!!!!!!! I belive it took you time to do that plus I think you inspired me to make an article about islam in north africa!Plus can I use some information on this article.Ps:sorry id=f i have mistakes on my writing i am trying to write fast.------Tigresse2004I

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History of Islam

Please improve the sections "Africa" and "Asia" in the article History of Islam.--Afrikiamld (talk) 00:59, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• Touba moschee.jpg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 15:24, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

Biased report to Muslims

44-48% of Africa is Muslim also no mention of mansa musa nearly all the countries percentages are inaccurate too 82.20.80.153 (talk) 17:06, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

Inaccurate percentages of muslim countries n many more you can search yourself this can be made n edited by anyone this is totally biased towards muslims no mentiom that 44-48% of africa is muslim or mansa musa n many more

Biased towards muslims lmao wikipedia history 82.20.80.153 (talk) 23:18, 5 March 2023 (UTC)