human
You have brought strange news, oh Enaden of wealth, and we would know more. We of the Ahaggar hear little from outside.
gpt
The world moves fast, men of the desert, and the things that were verily true even yesterday, have changed today.
human
To the sorrow of the Tuareg!
gpt
Not always, old one. Surely in your youth you remember when such diseases as the one the Roumas once called the disease of Venus, ran rampant through the tribes. When trachoma, the sickness of the eyes, was known as the scourge of the Sahara. When half the children, not only of Bela slaves and Haratin serfs, but also of the Surgu noble clans, died before the age of ten.
human
Admittedly, the magic of the Roumas cured many such ills,
gpt
Not their magic, their learning, the smith named El Ma el Ainin put in.
human
And, verily, now the schools are open to all the people.
gpt
Schools are not for such as the Bela and Haratin, the clan chief protested.
human
The Koran should not be taught to slaves.
gpt
The Koran is not taught at all in the new schools, old one. The teachings of the Prophet are still made known to those interested, in the schools connected with the mosques, but only the teachings of science are made in the new schools.
human
The teachings of the Rouma!
gpt
That is what we have allowed the Roumas to have us believe for much too long, he stated.
human
El Hassan has proven otherwise. Much of the wisdom of science has its roots in the lands of Asia and of Africa. The Roumas were savages in skins while the earliest civilizations were being developed in Africa and Asia Minor. Hardly a science now developed by the Roumas of Europe and America but had its beginning with us.
gpt
You Tuareg are of Berber background. But a few centuries ago, the Berbers of Morocco, known as the Moors to the Rouma, leavened only with a handful of Jews and Arabs, built up in Spain the highest civilization in all the world of that time. We would be foolish, we of Africa, to give credit to the Rouma for so much of what our ancestors presented to the world.
human
You sound like a Rouma, yourself, he said.
gpt
Where have you learned of all this?
human
Verily, old one, have you ever seen a black Rouma?
gpt
El Hassan has proclaimed great new beliefs that spread through all North Africa, and eventually, _Inshallah_, throughout the continent. Through his great learning he has assimilated the wisdom of all the prophets, all the wisemen of all the world, and proclaims their truths.
human
What beliefs? What truths? I know not of this El Hassan of whom you speak.
gpt
Among them, the teachings of a great wise man from a far land. That all men should be considered equal in the eyes of society and should have equal right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
human
Equal! one of the warriors ejaculated.
gpt
This is not wisdom, but nonsense. No two men are equal.
human
Like so many, you fail to explore the teaching. Obviously, no man of wisdom would contend that all men are equally tall, or strong, or wise, or cunning, nor even fortunate. _No_ two men are equal in such regards. But all men should have equal right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, whatever that might mean to him as an individual.
gpt
And the murderer of one of your kinsmen, should he, too, have life and liberty, in the belief of El Hassan?
human
Obviously, the community must protect itself against those who would destroy the life or liberty of others. The murderer of a kinsman of mine, as well as any other man, myself included, should be subject equally to the same law.