Topic
The Quran makes colour and language signs of God’s creation, and no ground of superiority (49:13, 30:22).
What it means
“Among His signs is the creation of the heavens and the earth and the difference of your languages and colours” (30:22). “O mankind, We created you from a male and a female and made you peoples and tribes that you may know one another; the noblest of you with God is the most pious” (49:13). The Prophet said that no Arab is superior to a non-Arab, nor a white to a black, except by piety (Ahmad).
Often misunderstood as
That Muhammad was black, or that Islam is only for Arabs.
What the sources say
Muhammad was Arab, of Quraysh; the claim that he was black has no historical basis. The first muezzin, Bilal, was an Ethiopian former slave, and the Prophet rebuked Abu Dharr for insulting a man by his mother’s blackness, saying “you are a man in whom there is ignorance” (Sahih al-Bukhari). Muslim societies have also known racism, and the teaching is a standard against which they are judged.