Long before Islam became a subject of political controversy in the United States, Muslim scholars were living on American soil, carrying with them centuries of Islamic knowledge, Qur’anic education and intellectual traditions. Among them was Omar ibn Said, a West African Muslim scholar enslaved in America whose remarkable Arabic autobiography challenges the widespread misconception that Muslims are newcomers to the country’s history.
As anti-Muslim rhetoric continues to feature in American political discourse, the life of a Muslim scholar who lived more than two centuries ago offers a powerful reminder of an often-overlooked chapter in United States history.
Omar ibn Said, also known as Umar ibn Sayyid, was born around 1770 in Futa Toro, a region in present-day Senegal known for its Islamic scholarship and religious education.
He was a highly educated Muslim who spent approximately 25 years studying Islamic sciences, including the Qur’an, before being captured, forcibly transported across the Atlantic and sold into slavery in the United States in 1807.
Despite spending the remainder of his life enslaved, Ibn Said left behind an extraordinary historical record: a 15-page autobiography written in Arabic in 1831.
The manuscript, now preserved by the Library of Congress, is recognised as the only known surviving autobiography written in Arabic by an enslaved person in the United States.
His story offers compelling evidence of the deep historical presence of Islam in America, revealing a legacy that existed long before modern immigration debates and contemporary political arguments about Muslim identity.
Islam Was Present in America Before the United States Existed
The history of Muslims in America did not begin with immigration from the Middle East during the twentieth century.
Historical records indicate that Muslims were present in parts of North America as early as the sixteenth century, well before the United States declared independence in 1776.
Many arrived against their will through the transatlantic slave trade, which forcibly displaced millions of Africans from their homelands.
Among those captured were Muslims from regions with established traditions of Islamic education, scholarship and religious institutions.
Historians estimate that a significant proportion of enslaved Africans brought to what became the United States were Muslim, although precise figures remain uncertain.
These individuals came from diverse West African communities and spoke languages including Fula, Wolof, Mandinka and others.
Some had received extensive Islamic education and were literate in Arabic, the language of the Qur’an and an important scholarly language across much of Muslim West Africa.
Their presence challenges the historical narrative that depicts enslaved Africans exclusively as people without established intellectual or religious traditions.
Many arrived with sophisticated knowledge of theology, jurisprudence, languages and established systems of education.
They were not introduced to religion or civilisation upon reaching America. They were forcibly removed from societies that already possessed their own institutions, scholarship and deeply rooted Islamic traditions.
A Muslim Scholar Taken From His Homeland
Before his capture, Omar ibn Said lived in a West African society where Islamic learning was an important part of community life.
He studied under Muslim scholars and became proficient in Arabic and the Qur’an.
His autobiography also describes his religious practices, including the five daily prayers and the giving of charity.
These details provide valuable evidence of the Islamic education he received before enslavement.
Around 1807, when he was approximately 37 years old, Ibn Said was captured during a period of conflict in West Africa and sold into the transatlantic slave trade.
He was transported by ship to Charleston, South Carolina, where he was sold into slavery.
In his autobiography, he described being taken across the sea and placed under the control of enslavers.
The experience represented a devastating transformation in his life.
A respected Muslim scholar who had spent decades pursuing knowledge suddenly found himself deprived of his freedom, separated from his homeland and subjected to a system that treated human beings as property.
His education, however, would become an important means of preserving his identity and documenting his experiences.
The Arabic Writing That Surprised His Enslavers
After arriving in the United States, Ibn Said was initially enslaved by a man identified in historical accounts as Johnson.
He later escaped but was captured and imprisoned in Fayetteville, North Carolina.
While detained, Ibn Said reportedly wrote Arabic on the walls of his prison cell.
His ability to write in a language unfamiliar to most Americans attracted considerable attention.
For those who encountered his writings, the sight of an enslaved African producing Arabic script challenged prevailing racial assumptions about education and intellectual ability.
He eventually came under the control of James Owen, a prominent North Carolina enslaver.
Ibn Said remained enslaved within the Owen household for decades.
During this period, he continued producing Arabic writings, including Qur’anic passages, prayers and reflections on his life.
His manuscripts would later become invaluable evidence of Muslim intellectual and religious life in early America.
The Autobiography That Preserved His Islamic Identity
In 1831, Ibn Said wrote his remarkable autobiography in Arabic.
The manuscript described his upbringing in West Africa, his Islamic education, his capture and his experiences under slavery.
Unlike many surviving narratives of enslaved Africans, which were written in English or recorded through intermediaries, Ibn Said’s account preserved his voice in a language deeply connected to his religious and educational background.
One of its most striking features is its opening with Surah Al-Mulk, the 67th chapter of the Qur’an.
The surah begins:
“Blessed is He in whose hand is dominion, and He is over all things competent.”
Surah Al-Mulk, 67:1
The following verse declares:
“[He] who created death and life to test you [as to] which of you is best in deed.”
Surah Al-Mulk, 67:2
The inclusion of these verses has attracted particular attention from historians studying Ibn Said’s religious identity.
At a time when American enslavers claimed ownership over other human beings, the Qur’anic declaration that ultimate dominion belongs to Allah carried profound theological significance.
Although historians differ over the extent to which Ibn Said intended his religious writing as a direct critique of slavery, the manuscript unmistakably demonstrates the influence of his Islamic education.
Even after decades in captivity, Qur’anic language remained central to the way he expressed his experiences.
Was Omar ibn Said Forced to Abandon Islam?
One of the most debated aspects of Ibn Said’s life concerns his religious identity during enslavement.
Historical records indicate that he was baptised into Christianity in 1820, while living under the control of the Owen family.
His enslavers and Christian missionaries subsequently promoted his apparent conversion as evidence of the supposed religious benefits of slavery.
However, Ibn Said’s surviving Arabic writings have complicated this narrative.
Throughout his years in captivity, he continued recording Qur’anic verses and using Islamic religious expressions.
His familiarity with Islamic scripture remained evident decades after his arrival in America.
Modern scholars have questioned whether his outward association with Christianity reflected a genuine change of belief, accommodation to the expectations of his enslavers or a more complex religious experience.
Because Ibn Said lived under coercive conditions, his personal convictions cannot be established with complete certainty.
Nevertheless, his continued engagement with Qur’anic texts provides important evidence that his Islamic education remained deeply embedded in his intellectual and spiritual life.
His writings also demonstrate why the religious history of enslaved Africans cannot be understood solely through the accounts produced by those who held them in captivity.
A Muslim Who Never Stopped Longing for Home
Despite spending decades in the United States, Ibn Said never returned to West Africa.
His surviving writings reveal a man who remembered his homeland and desired freedom from captivity.
In an Arabic letter written in 1819, he expressed his wish to return to Africa.
His longing was not simply for a geographical location.
It represented a desire to reclaim the life, community and independence taken from him through enslavement.
For a man who had once lived as a Muslim scholar in West Africa, the loss extended beyond physical freedom.
He had been separated from his family, familiar surroundings and the institutions through which he had received his religious education.
Yet the Arabic language and Qur’anic knowledge he carried continued to connect him to that earlier life.
Ibn Said died in North Carolina around 1863, having spent more than half a century enslaved.
He never witnessed the restoration of his freedom or the opportunity to return to his homeland.
How His Manuscript Survived Nearly Two Centuries
The survival of Ibn Said’s autobiography is remarkable.
After passing through private collections, the manuscript largely disappeared from public scholarly attention during the twentieth century.
It resurfaced in 1995 when it was discovered among historical materials preserved by a private family.
In 2017, the Library of Congress acquired the manuscript as part of a collection of Arabic-language documents associated with enslaved Muslims from West Africa.
The collection was subsequently digitised and made accessible to researchers and the public.
Its preservation has allowed historians to examine aspects of early American history that were frequently marginalised or omitted from mainstream historical accounts.
The manuscript is particularly significant because it demonstrates that Islamic literacy and scholarship existed among enslaved communities in the United States.
It also challenges assumptions that enslaved Africans arrived without written traditions or intellectual accomplishments.
Ibn Said’s autobiography is not merely a document about slavery. It is a surviving record of Islamic scholarship, African intellectual history and Muslim identity in early America.
Why Omar ibn Said’s Story Matters Today
More than two centuries after Ibn Said was forcibly brought to America, Muslims continue to face political rhetoric questioning their place in American society.
During the 2026 midterm election campaign, several political figures faced criticism for statements portraying Muslims as outsiders or as incompatible with American identity.
Such narratives frequently overlook the historical presence of Muslims in the country.
Ibn Said’s life offers an important correction.
He was not a recent immigrant seeking entry into the United States.
He was an educated African Muslim forcibly transported to American soil decades before the abolition of slavery.
His story forms part of a much broader history involving enslaved African Muslims whose religious identities were often obscured or erased in subsequent historical accounts.
Many were prevented from openly practising Islam, while others gradually lost the ability to transmit their religious traditions to future generations.
Yet surviving manuscripts, historical records and personal narratives confirm that Islam was present in America long before it became a prominent feature of contemporary political debate.
The contribution of these early Muslims should not be measured only through their suffering.
Their educational backgrounds, linguistic knowledge and religious traditions also form part of the country’s intellectual and cultural history.
An Islamic Legacy That History Could Not Erase
Omar ibn Said’s life is both a deeply painful account of human enslavement and an extraordinary example of the survival of knowledge across generations.
He was stripped of his freedom, transported thousands of kilometres from his homeland and forced to spend most of his adult life under the authority of enslavers.
Yet his Arabic writings survived.
Nearly two centuries later, his manuscripts continue to introduce readers to the Islamic intellectual traditions that existed in West Africa and travelled, often through unimaginable suffering, to the Americas.
His story also serves as a reminder that the history of Islam cannot be confined to the Middle East.
Islamic scholarship flourished across Africa for centuries, producing educated communities whose members contributed to a global tradition of religious learning.
Some of these scholars became victims of the transatlantic slave trade, bringing their knowledge to America under circumstances they never chose.
Today, the survival of Ibn Said’s autobiography challenges any attempt to portray Muslims as entirely foreign to American history.
Long before contemporary debates about whether Islam belongs in America, Muslims were already living, praying, studying and writing on American soil.
And through the words he left behind, Omar ibn Said remains one of the clearest witnesses to that forgotten history.
