New Texas social studies curriculum will teach role ‘radical Islam’ played in 9/11

The Texas State Board of Education has adopted a revised social studies curriculum that highlights the role of radical Islam in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and discusses Muhammad’s “brutal military campaigns against Jewish and Christian tribes” while stressing the role of Christianity in shaping American and world history.

At a Friday meeting(opens in new tab), the Texas State Board of Education voted 8-3 to approve revisions to the high school social studies curriculum, including several references to the roles of both Christianity and Islam in American and world history classes. The new curriculum is slated to take effect at the beginning of the 2033–34 school year.

Under the new curriculum(opens in new tab), students in world history are expected to “explain early Islam in terms of the Prophet Mohammed’s brutal military campaigns against Jewish and Christian tribes, the normalization of slavery, and the taking of female captives as harem slaves.” Students will also be expected to “describe conflicts involving Europe, including Christian efforts to reclaim lands conquered by Muslim powers through the Christians’ Crusades and The Reconquista.”

The new world history curriculum expects students to “explain the rise of radical Islam, including Iranian proxies, terrorism, Al Qaeda, September 11, 2001, and Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.”

In a joint statement(opens in new tab) Friday, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Texas chapter, as well as CAIR Action Texas, condemned the new curriculum as an “affront to our system of education and the First Amendment.” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott designated CAIR(opens in new tab) a terrorist group last November and accused it of supporting global terrorism, a label the organization is fighting in court.

“Texas students of every background deserve an education that tells the truth about their history and their neighbors’ history, not propaganda that teaches them to see each other as threats or erases them from the story altogether,” the groups stated. “The board has turned our classrooms into a place where prejudice is taught as fact and entire communities are written out of their own story.”

The current social studies curriculum(opens in new tab) informs students about the “development and use of radical Islamic terrorism in the second half of the 20th century and the early 21st century” as well as “the impact of geopolitical influences on the development of radical Islamic terrorism,” “the impact of radical Islamic terrorism on global events,” and “other acts of radical Islamic terrorism.” However, it does not include language referring to specific groups such as “Iranian proxies,” Al Qaeda and the Islamic State.

The reference to “Mohammed’s brutal military campaigns against Jewish and Christian tribes” is also not included in the current curriculum.

The new curriculum includes multiple references to Christianity’s role in establishing Western civilization.

Under the new curriculum, world history students are expected to understand the “roots of Western civilization in Christianity” by describing “the origins and early spread of Christianity,” including “the life and teachings of Jesus, Christianity’s roots in Judaism, the role of apostles in spreading Christianity throughout the Roman Empire, and moral teachings from the Old and New Testaments that influenced Western civilization.”

Additional topics students are expected to study in world history include “the persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire beginning with Nero” and “the effect of the legalization of Christianity, including the conquests of Emperor Constantine, The Edict of Milan, and The Nicene Creed.”

Students will also be expected to “identify the contributions of Christianity to Western civilization and early America, including the universality of human dignity that resulted from Christianization of the Roman Empire.”

The revised world history curriculum requires students to “describe the influence of Christianity in medieval society, including monasticism, missionary activity, hospitals, and orphanages” and “describe the teachings of jihad and how these teachings led to the expansion of Islam and the conquest of Christian lands.”

Another topic of study in world history will focus on how “William Wilberforce’s belief in the inherent dignity and rights of all people based on his Christian faith motivated his efforts to abolish the slave trade and influenced movements to end slavery around the world.”

At Friday’s meeting, the Texas State Board of Education highlighted how the U.S. government curriculum will discuss “Sir William Blackstone’s view that human law should conform to the law of nature and God’s revealed law found in the Hebrew Scriptures and New Testament.”

U.S. government teachers are encouraged to cover “Religious Literature, including the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament) and New Testament, and its impact on history and literature.”

U.S. government students are expected to “describe religion in relation to America’s core ideals, including civic virtue, limited government, rule of law, and preservation of liberty” in addition to understanding “the relationship between religion and civic virtue.”

Texas’ U.S. history curriculum will touch upon “domestic anticommunism movements, including the role of Billy Graham, and the use of ‘under God’ as a way to highlight America’s moral and spiritual foundations distinguishing the United States from atheistic communist governments.”

U.S. history in Texas will also cover “the religious influence of the Second Great Awakening on fueling major antebellum reform movements, including temperance, early women’s suffrage, and abolition.”

Critics of the new curriculum contend(opens in new tab) that it will violate the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment, which bars establishing a state religion.