The Handy Islam Answer Book. John Renard
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most notably St. Paul. Damascus was a natural choice for Muslim administrative purposes and Muslims had begun to rule Syria from there by the mid-seventh century. Among the many interesting features of Muslim appropriation of the ancient Christian city is that governors and eventually caliphs of the Umayyad dynasty enlisted the services of old Christian families for high administrative office alongside Muslim officialdom. John of Damascus, often called the last Father of the Church, was one such figure, whose father and grandfather had also served in earlier Muslim administrations.
What is known about how the Muslim conquerors treated those whom they conquered?
Early documents from the seventh century suggest that Muslim administrators allowed non-Muslims in the conquered territories to live unmolested, provided they rendered the taxes required of non-Muslim inhabitants of the territories and abided by the terms of a peace accord. One early document records the agreement of the Christians of Syria, an accord in which they listed the conditions to which they acquiesced. They would not teach the Quran to their children, build new institutions of religion, harbor anyone who intended harm to Muslims, make public displays of religion, engage in proselytizing, dress as Muslims did, carry weapons, sell intoxicating beverages, display crosses or books or other religious symbolism in Muslim public spaces, or attack a Muslim. They agreed that they would give lodgings for three days to any traveler, including Muslims, and dress in recognizably Christian attire. And in exchange for these and a handful of other very benign considerations, the Christians would receive “safe conduct” in all aspects of their daily lives. These contents of the so-called Pact of Umar, the caliph who was then in power, represent a policy remarkably similar in its general terms to European Christian treatment of non-Christians.
What was the general picture of Islam’s westward spread?
Rapid as Islam’s spread was during the reigns of Muhammad’s four immediate successors, the Rightly Guided Caliphs, it enjoyed still more dramatic expansion during the subsequent fifty years or so. Under the earliest caliphs of the Umayyad dynasty, Muslim armies pushed westward across North Africa, rooting out the last vestiges of Byzantine power in Carthage, and had crossed the Straits of Gibraltar by 711. In Spain they encountered and defeated the Arian Visigoths of King Roderick. Within eight years they had established an administrative center in the city of Cordoba, and by 732 the Muslim armies had crossed the Pyrenees into France. There Charles Martel halted their advance at the Battle of Tours and Poitiers and forced an eventual retreat into Spain. But the Muslim foothold in Andalusia (Southern Iberia) was firm and marked the beginning of a significant presence lasting nearly eight centuries.
Makkah Masjid is one of the oldest mosques in Hyderabad, India. Islam expanded quickly into what is now Pakistan, and over several centuries into much of present-day India.
What are some key events in Islam’s eastward expansion?
The very year the Muslims crossed into Spain, far to the east the Umayyad armies had conquered Sind in present-day Pakistan. The eastern campaign had consolidated earlier gains in Persia and moved further into Central Asia and on east through what is now Afghanistan. Muslim armies stood near the northwestern quarter of present-day India, but it would be several centuries before Islam would become a presence in India proper. Most importantly the process of Islamization was well under way in ancient urban centers of West and Central Asia such as Samarqand and Bukhara along the Great Silk Road.
Why were the early Muslims so successful in spreading Islam? Was it a political rather than “missionary” movement?
Back in the center of the caliphate, the Umayyads, buoyed by their capture of Sicily and the historic city of Chalcedon, laid a protracted but unsuccessful siege to Constantinople. Surviving yet another Umayyad attack thirty years later, that city would stand for more than another seven centuries. The first great Muslim dynasty had made extraordinary gains in one of the most spectacular three-front advances ever mounted. However, the rapidity of military conquest and expansive political domination should not lead one to conclude that suddenly the whole of the known world had converted to Islam. It was not primarily missionary zeal that motivated the troops, but the promise of adventure and booty. That is not to say that their leaders entirely avoided the rhetoric of heavenly reward for bringing the world into the embrace of Islam. But on the whole, desire for conversion was secondary at best. In fact the Umayyads established a system of taxation under which non-Muslims paid a revenue over and above that expected of Muslims; while it may have encouraged non-Muslims to convert for financial reasons, it gave the conquerors a like incentive to leave the subject (conquered) peoples a measure of religious liberty.
How did the early Muslim administrations deal with non-Muslim subjects? Did they allow freedom of religion?
Under the Umayyads Muslim rule developed a policy begun under Umar that defined the socio-religious category of dhimmi (also ahl adh-dhimma, protected minority). Non-Muslims who chose not to convert enjoyed basic rights and freedom of worship so long as they paid a “poll tax” (jizya, JIZ-ya) in addition to the universally levied land tax (kharaj, KHA-raj). The poll tax was a carryover from both the Roman and Sasanian practices. In addition, Muslims were required to pay the zakat, legally prescribed alms and one of the “Five Pillars,” while non-Muslims were not. For legal purposes this protected status meant that Jews and Christians were answerable to their own religions’ jurisdictions rather than to Islamic religious law. In the Iranian territories, the dhimmis included Zoroastrians as well, and eventually Hindus too were brought under the umbrella of “dhimmitude” because they possessed their own sacred scriptures.
The Great Umayyad Mosque of Damascus was built on the site where once stood a Christian basilica dedicated to John the Baptist (whose shrine is the small domed structure). Muslims consider John the Baptist to be a prophet.
How much freedom did non-Muslims enjoy under Muslim rule?
Non-Muslims were—and still are in some places—under a number of significant restrictions. They were forbidden to proselytize and had to wear clothing that identified their confessional membership. They could repair their ritual sites but could not build new ones, ride horses, or bear arms. In some historical settings the restrictions were enforced onerously, but in many cases dhimmis enjoyed considerable latitude. Dhimmis were distinguished from idolaters, who were indeed treated without religious toleration and left the choice of fleeing, converting, or fearing for their lives. Jews and Christians did not enjoy what is now considered wide open religious freedom under Islamic rule. Even so, it was in general a far better state of affairs than what Jews or even Christian minority groups often experienced at the hands of majority Christian regimes such as the Byzantine or Spanish Catholic.
What specific role did the Shia play in the fortunes of the Umayyad dynasty?
Animosity intensified between the Umayyads and the Shia, those who had supported the caliphate of Ali. Problems dated back at least to the suspicion that Ali had been involved in the murder of the third caliph, Uthman, who belonged to the Umayyad clan. But in 680, Shia-Umayyad relations degenerated still further. Ali’s son Husayn had decided to press his claim to rule by marching a small armed band out to meet the troops of the Umayyad Caliph Yazid. The Umayyad army slaughtered the badly outnumbered Shia entourage at Karbala just south of Baghdad and in the process made Husayn the Shi’i protomartyr.
Were the Shia the only major opposition to the Umayyad dynasty?
Still another faction had earlier separated from the Shia and were becoming a thorn in the side of the Umayyads. When Ali had contested the original Umayyad governor of Syria, Muawiya, to establish his legitimacy as fourth caliph in 657, the two sides fought to an apparent draw. At that point Ali decided to submit the case to human arbitration, inciting the ire of a group that insisted that the conflict should be decided by God through an appeal to the Quran alone. In anger the group decided to withdraw its support and came to be known as the “Seceders” (khawarij, kha-WAA-rij, plural of khariji, “those who secede”). The Kharijites had argued a hard line on membership