| To Dr. Peter de Souza: “To ignore the dimension of capital accumulation from the slave trade, and see it only as a behavior lapse, or perhaps an angularity…” You are attributing to me something I did not say. Read my posts again. I did not say anything about slave trade, let alone about seeing it as a “behavior lapse, or perhaps an angularity.” That is a different topic of conversation. I spoke only about having had slaves and compared Goans to non-Goans to having had slaves. People who had slaves contributed to the slave traffic but not everyone who had slaves engaged into slave traffic. More about this later. John M. de Figueiredo Sent from my iPhone There are two errors in the statement by Dr Figueirado. One concerns an impermissible logical leap and the other a crucial ignored fact.
The first, I believe, referring to the Dharmashastras, concerns to the concept of ‘apadharma’. This refers to an extreme situation, rightly specified as famine, when it was permitted to transgress regular norms within which one was located, one’s varnadharma, since survival was at stake. A Rishi was permitted to even eat dog meat in this extreme exceptional situation. But it was only in such an exceptional situation. To extrapolate this permission to a ‘normal’ situation is hence impermissible. Such transgression of norms/rules is also permitted in Islam and Judaism. I’m not sure about Christianity. In Islam the kindred concept is taqiyya. Hence to see the ‘sale of oneself as permitted during famines’ as a permission to sell oneself during normal time, and thereby own slaves is, I hold, an impermissible logical leap.
The second ignores the crucial distinction between ‘owning’ slaves, which was reprehensible, and ‘trading’ in slaves which produced an abominable system of commence. The Portuguese were slave traders. The enormous wealth of Europe was built on the slave trade. The book by Stephanie Smallwood ‘Saltwater Slavery’ recounts the horror of the trade. To ignore the dimension of capital accumulation from the slave trade, and see it only as a behaviour lapse or perhaps an angularity is, I believe, a fault in the argument. Europe and America, and the Christianity that endorsed it, have much to pay. Cambridge, Yale, Princeton and even Lloyd’s of London are convulsed with the issue of reparation for their involvement in the slave trade and working out the appropriate righting response. Yale initially resisted it but then had to even rename one of its colleges, Calhoun college.
Peter.r. The medieval Dharmashastras allowed the sale of oneself or one’s dependents, especially during famines. A case could be made that the Hindu caste system reduced some people to things. In the 16th century in Goa and elsewhere it was believed that in some cases, slavery was justified, the so-called “just slavery”. Until 1569 every religious order in Goa had slaves. My question is this: if the Goans, Christians and Hindus, had slaves, what grounds have the Goans to criticize the Portuguese for having slaves? The Portuguese did not introduce slavery in Goa and they were doing what everybody else was doing. Even Pombal could not abolish slavery in Brazil. What is regrettable is that centuries went by before slavery was viewed as it had been all along, an abomination, and the evil of human trafficking continues to this date in various parts of the world. John M. de Figueiredo Sent from my iPhone On Oct 6, 2024, at 2:50 PM, 'Pedro Mascarenhas' via Goa-Research-Net <[email protected]> wrote:
John(
..........In fact, the Island of Chorão, where many of them lived, was known as
“Ilha dos Fidalgos” (Island of Nobility........).
On the island of Chorão, the Portuguese colonizers had Goan
and African slaves. They were self-proclaimed aristocrats who left Portugal
where poverty was rampant. True aristocrats would never leave their land to go
to Goa and lose their lives and possessions knowing that the Mughals and
Marathas would attack whenever they could.
Nuno(............The
Portuguese difference was the willingness of mixing with other ethnic groups,
from the casual sexual intercourse to marriage and to the ability to "go
native"...........)
The English did not mix in India because they were from the
upper middle and upper class. Most of the Portuguese were from the lower class
and illiterate. They raped many women and abandoned them and their mixed race
children.
Here is a report that clearly explains what happened in a
certain colony, where even many Goans were settled:
https://acervo.publico.pt/mundo/noticia/quantos-milhoes-morreram-na-saga-do-colonialismo-1724884
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