EO i CHAPTER SIX

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TheExpansionof IslamIraLapidusBetween the seventh and thirteenth centuries Islam spread

widely from its origins in: Arabia-west through much of

North Africa and southern Spain, and east to large portions

of Asia. 'Historians have often debated the causes for this ex~

traordinary expansion of Islam. In the following selection Ira

Lapidus analyzes the balance of forces responsible for Islam's

spread throughout the Middle East and suggests reasons why

so many people converted to Islam.

CONSIDER: How Lapidus's analysis differs from those of ear~

lier generations of European scholars; why the conversion of

. Arabian populations differed from that of other Middle East~

em peoples.

The expansion of Islam irivolved -different :forces. InNorth Africa, Anatolia, the Balkans, and India, it wascarried by nomadic Arab or Turkish conquerors. In theIndian Ocean and West Africa it spread by peaceful con~tacts among merchants or through the preaching of mis~sionaries. In some cases the diffusion of Islam dependedupon its adoption by local ruling families; in others, itappealed to urban classes of the population or tribalcommunities. Its appeal was couched in interwoventerms of political and economic benefits and of asophis~ticated culture and religion.

The question of why people convert to Islam has al~w.aysgenerated intense feeling. Earlier generations ofEu~ropeanscholars believ~d that conversions to Islam weremade at the point of the sword, and that conquered peo~pIes were given the choice of conversion or death. It isnow apparent that conversion by force, while not un~known in Muslim countries, was, in fact, rare. Muslim.conquerors ordinarily wished to dominate rather thanconvert, and most conversions to Islam were voluntary.

Even v01untary conversions are suspect to Europeanobservers. Were they made out of true belief, or for op~..portunistic political or social reasons? Surely there are

. innumerable cases of conversion to Islam by the illumi-nation of faith or by viltue of the perceived sanctity ofMuslim scholars and holy men, as w~ as by calculationof political and economic advantage. In most casesworldly and spiritual motives for conversion blendedtogether. Moreover, conversion to Islam did'not neces-

SOURCE:Ira M. Lapidus, Islamic Societies,2nd ed(Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress,2002), pp. 198-200.

sarily imply"a complete turning from an old to a totaliynew life. 'W'hile it entailed the acceptance of new reli~gious beliefs and membership in a new religious commu~nity, most converts retained a deep attachment to thecultures and communities from which they came. . . .

The first conversions to Islam occurred in the MiddleEast between the seventh and the thirteenth centuries.

These took place in two.phases, the first being the con~version of animists and polytheists belonging to the tribalsocieties of the Arabian desert and the periphery of thefertile crescent; the second was the conversion of themonotheistic populations of the Middle Eastem agrarian,urbanized, and imperial societies.

The conversion of Arabian populations waspart of theprocessof transmitting the civilization of the sedentarizedimperial societies to the nomadic periphery. Arabian peo~pl~, s~ding on the margin of the agricultural and com~mercial zonesof the Middle East, strongly influenced byMiddle Eastern commerce and religious thought, foundin Muhammad's teaching a way to formulate a kind ofMiddle Eastern monotheistic religion parallel to but dis~tinct from the established Christian and Zoroastrian reli~

gions. The conversion of pagan Arabian peoples to lsi~mrepresented the response of a tribal, pastoral populationto the need for a larger framework for political.and eco~nomic integration, a more stable state, and a more imag~inative and encompassing moral vision to cope with theproblems of a tumultuous society. Conversion, then, wasthe process of integrating Arabians into a new culturaland political order defined in monotheistic. religiousterms.

The conversion of sedentary Middle Eastern peoples.to Islam was a different process. In this case Islam wassubstituted for Byzantine or Sasanian political identity

. and for Jewish, Christian, or Zoroastrian religious affilia~tion. The transformation of identities among MiddleEastern peoples took place in two stages. In the first cen-tury of the Islam.ic imperium the Arab conquerors at-tempted to maintain themselves as an exclusive Muslimelite. They did not require the conversion as IT,luchasthe subordination of non-Muslim peoples. At the outset,they were hostile to conversions because new Muslimsdiluted the economic and status advantages of theArabs. Nonetheless, Muslim rule offered substantial in-centives for conversion. It formed a protective umbrellaover Muslim communities and conferred the prestige ofthe state on Muslim religious life. Political patronage al-lowed for the establishment of mosques, the organizationof the pilgrimage, and the creation of Muslim judicial in~

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II ~, - ..Tne Rise of Islam I 81

stitutions. The establishment of an, Arab empire madeIslam attractive to elements of the former'J3yzantine andSasanian aristocracies, including soldiers, officials, land-lords, and others. Arab garrison cities attracted non-Arab migrant~ who found careers in the army andadministration open to converts. Merchants, artisans,workers, and fugitive peasants seeking the patronage ofthe new' elite were also tempted to accept Islam.

Despite these attractions, the massof Middle Easternpeoples werenot soon or easily converted. Only with thebreakdown of the social and religious structures of non-Muslim communities in the tenth to the twelfth cen-

turies did the weakening of churches, the awakening ofMuslim hostility to non-Muslims, sporadic and localized

, persecution,and the destruction of the landedgentryofIraq and Iran destroy the communal organization of non-Muslim peoples. Muslim teachers were then able to takethe lead in the reconstruction of local communities onthe basisof Islamic beliefs and identities.

small section of the other tribe. In such circumstances it

was no disgrace to the persons attacked if they madetheir-escape; and so in many razziasthere was little lossof life. Occasionally, however, things might take a moreserious turn. After Muhammad went to Medina in 622

some of his followers, especially those who had emi-grated with him from Mecca, began to engage in whatwere really razzias.Perhaps itwas to encourage others tojoin in the razzias tharthe Qur'an spoke of this as 'fight-ing in the way of God'or 'striving\n the way of God.'The Arabic word for 'striving' or 'making efforts to se-cure a particular aim' is ja1wda.with the verbal nounjihad. While the latter can be usedof moral and spiritualeffort, it has come to be speciallyassociated with fightingagainst the infidel and is then translated 'holy war.' Al-though this translation is appropriate, I propose to retainthe term Jihadhere, since there are differences between

the Islamic conception of the Jiliad and the Christian

conception oftheCrusade.. . . '

From the standpointof th(Muslims, the crossingof

The MuslimPatternof Conquest the straits of Gibraltar in 711 ;'as part 6f the process of

WM t 1Mtt expansion that had been goingon for three-quarters of a. ongomery a century. It was ~ne more in a series of raiding expedi-

ThespeedwithwhichtheMuslimswere ableto conquervast tions which had been pushing ever farther afield. Theseareasofland, particularly in Spain, hasfascinatedhistorians. might be thought of asJihad or 'striving in the way ofIn the followingselection, W. Montgomery Watt, professor God,' but the acquiring orbooty was a large part of the

ofAmbic and Islamic studies at the Universityof Edinburgh, motive. After experiencing one or more such raiding ex-provides an explanation for the speed of the Muslim con- peditions the inhabitants of the countries traversed usu-quest. He points out that the Muslims haddeveloped a. pat- ally surrendered and became protected allies. Sin~e ittern of conquest that had proved successful in the first was too far for the Arabs to return to Arabia or even

, campaignsofMuhamrnad.Thissameprocesswasappliedto' Damascusafter each campaign,they established camp-Spain; thus the conquest may havecomeasa surpriseto the cities such as Cairouan. These often became centres ofSpanish inhabitants, but not to Muslims. 'administration and populous urban communities. From

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h . nd he '1-- J nd hthem further raiding expeditions went out, and in due

ONSIDER: e nature of t e raZZLaa t JU!W.La ow d d b " '

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course more a vance aseswere estabhshed. ThIS waswattre tes em to ep exp m conquest0 pam't e h h d . S . h . .

, ' w at appene m pam, except t at eXlstmg townsmonves for the Conquest of Spain accordingto Watt; the d b D

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. I' ,d h, were use as ases. espi e elr lmite manpower t e

process that occurred m transforming a military victory into' Ar b bl,

thin thr thtabli L -d 1.. 1 l

- a s-were a e Wi two or ee years to occupy ees sne po ItICa contro . h' f d h. f ifi' . Th

, c ie towns an ac ieve a measure a pac catIon. e

-,- ,~-_. Although to_the,inhabitants..~J Spain tb.~jnyasion,,9f- local population mostlysubmitted and received the sta-711 may have come as a ':Joltfrom the blue, to the Mus- "'-tUsotprotected'allies. ,,- "-'---' ,--",-limsit wasthe normal continuation of aprocessthat hadbeengoingon since the lifetime of Muhammad.Thisprocesscameabout through a transformationof theno~madie razzia:"For centuries nomadic Arab tribes had

been in the habit of making raids or razzias on othertribes. The usual aim was to drive off the camels or other

livestock of the opponents. The .favorite plan was tomake a' surprise attack with overwhelming force on a ,

The IslamicWorldAlbertHourani

Islam expandedrapidly during the seventh and eighth cen-turies, W'hereverIslamicpeoplewent, they carried their cus~toms and institutions, over time creating what would be

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SOURCE:Reprintedby permissionof the publishersfrom A HistoryoftheArabPeoplebyAlbertHourani,Cambridge,Mass.:The BelknapPressofHarvardUniversityPress.Copyright@ 1991 byAlbertHourani.

SOURCE:W.MontgomeryWatt, TheInfluenceof IslamonMedievalEurope(EdinburghUniversityPress,1972), pp.5-6,8.

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82 I CHAPTER SIX

recognized as an Islamicworld. In the followingselectionAlbert Hourani, a prominent historian of Arab history, ana,

lyzes the ways that a sense of identity was being established inthe Islamic world, focusing particularly on the buildings and

objects that allowed people to see and feel that they werewithin an Islamic land.

CONSIDER: How buildings, artifacts, and art might helpere,

a~ a sense of Islamic identity; in what other ways a sense of .

unity within Islam was created.

By the third and fourth Islamic centuries (the ninth andtenth century A.D.) something which was recognizablyan 'Islamic world' had emerged. A traveller around theworld would have been able to tell, by what he sawandheard, whether a land was ruled and peopled by Mus-lims. These external forms had been carried by move-ments of peoples: by dynasties and their armies,merchants moving through the worlds of the IndianOcean and the Mediterranean Sea, and craftsmen at-tracted from one city to another by the patronage ofrulers or the rich. They were carried also by importedand exported objects expressing a certain style: books,metalwork, ceramics and particularly perhaps textiles,the staple of long,distance trade.

The great buildings above all were the external sym-bols of this 'world of Islam.' At a later period regiop",lstyles of mosque building would appear, but in the earlycenturies there were some common features to be found

from Cordoba to Iraq and beyond. In addition to thegreat mosques were smaller ones for b~aars, quarters orvillages, where prayer was offered but the Friday sermonwas not preached; these were likely to be built of localmaterials and reflect losal taste's and traditions. . . .. A second type of building was that which expressedthe power of the ruler. Among them were great works ofpublic utility, caravanserais on the trade-routes, andaq\leducts or other waterworks; in the parched countriesof the Middle East and the Maghrib, to bring water tothe inhabitants of the cities was an act of sound policy,and irrigation of the land was a practice which spreadwith the expansion of the Arabs in the Mediterranean.It was the palaces, however, which best expressed impe-rial greatness: pleasure pavilions set amidst gardens andrunning water, emb~rhs of a secluded paradise, and offi-cial palaces, centres of governme~t and justice as well asof princely life. .'. .

The h01,1Sesbuilt in this period by the Muslim popula-tion of the cities have disappeared, but enough has re- .

mained of the artefacts used in them to show that someof them contained works of art similar to those in the

palaces. Books were transcribed and ill)lstrated for mer-chants and scholars; glass, metalwork and pottery were

made for them; textiles were especially important-.floors were covered with carpets, low settee-frames hadtextile coverings, wallswere hung with carpets or cloths.All these show, Qnthe whole, the samekind of decQra-tion as that of religiousbuildings, formalizedplants andflowers,geometrical designs and Arabic words. . . .

By the tenth century, then, men and women in theNear East and the Maghrib lived in a universe whichwas defined in terms of Islam. The world was dividedinto the Abode of Islam and the Abode of War, and

places holy to Muslimsor connected with their early his-tory gave the Abode ofIslarn its distinctive feature. TImewas marked by the five daily prayers, the weekly sermonin the mosque, the annual fast in the month of Ramadanand the pilgrimage to Mecca, and the Muslim calendar.

Islam also gave men an identity by which to definethemselves in regard to others. Like all men, Muslimslived at different levels. They did not think of Judge,ment and Heaven all the time. Beyond their individualexistence, they defined themselves for most daily pur-poses in terms of the family or broader kinship group, theherding unit or. tribe, the village or rural district, thequarter or city.-Beyond these, however, they were aware -of belonging to something broader: the community ofbelievers (the umma). The ritual acts which they per-formed in common, the acceptance of a shared v.iew of. .8

man's destiny in this world and the next, linked themwith each other and separated them from those of otherfaiths, whether living among them in the Abode of Is,lam or beyond its frontiers. . .

Within this 'world of Islam,' at an intermediate levelbetween it and the small cohesive units of everyday life,there were identities of a kind which. did not, on thewhole, create such strong and lasting loyalties. Serviceor obedience to a dynasty,particularly if it was long-last-ing, could create such a loyalty. Sharing a language toomust have created a sense of ease in communication,

and a kind of pride.

TheEasternOrientationof IslamPeterBrown

Westernersoften assume that Islamic civilization centeredaround the Mediterranean and that, if not for the resistance

put up by Europeans and the Byzanti~e EmPire, Islam wouldhave extended its control to the lands north of the-Mediter-

ranean. In the following selection, Peter Brown of Oxford

and the UniversitY of California disputes this view, arguing

SOURCE:PeterBrown,TheWorldofLate Antiquity(NewYork:HarcourtBrace,Inc.; London:-ThamesandHudson,Ltd.,1971), pp.202-3.

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that Persia acquired great economic importance as the. Mediterranean citiesdeclined. In tum, ..theIslamic EmPirebecame centered in Persia and was oriented toward the East

rather r}w.nthe West.

CONSIDER: How Persiapulled the Islamic EmPire eastward;

why, according to Brown, the foundation of Baghdad was

more important than military defeats in halting the Arab ad,vance on Europe.

Mesopotamia regained a central position that it had lost

since the days of Alexander the Great. Baghdad, with itscircular city wall, owed nothing to the great cities of the .

Roman empire: It was an avatar of the round cities of As,syria and central Asia. The Mediterranean cities declinedas the great caravans bypassed them, bringing trade bycamel along the oceans of sand that stretched from theSahara to the Gobi Desert. In North Africa and Syria, thevillages that had sent their oil and grain across the sea toRome and Constantinople disappeared into the sand.The Mediterranean coast, from being the heart of the civ,ilized world, imperceptibly diminished in significance, asthe numbed extremity of a great Eurasian empire.

For the new commercial opportunities were in Per-sian hands. And, in Persian hands, the eternal lure ofFurther Asia reasserted itself, as in the early Sassanianperiod. The mosque and the fire temple could be seen1?~sidethe marketplaces of Lohang and Canton. Chineseprisoners of war from central Asia brought the art of pa-permaking to Baghdad in 751. Sinbad the Sailor wouldnot have considered the Mediterranean worth his trou-

ble: for the wealth and interests of the Abbasid empirepoured eastwards, down the Tigris and Euphrates, to thesea route that linked Basra directly with Canton. .

The eastward pull of the vast mass of Persia in the Is,lamie empire was the salvation ofEurope.lt wasnot theGreek fire of the Byzantine navy outside Constantinoplein 717, nor the Frankish cavalry of Charles Martel atTours in 732, that brought the Arab war machine to ahalt. It was the foundation of Baghdad. With the estab-lishment of the Abbasidcalifate, the slow,moving ideals

The Rise of Islam ! 83

of an organized and expensive imperial administrationreplaced the fearfulmobility of the Beduin armies. In thenew civilian world, the soldier was as much out of placeas he had been among the otiose aristocratS of thefourth-century West. The bloodsucking relationships ofthe Holy War, by which the early Arabs had first im-pinged on the outside world, gave way to a meticulousdiplomacy modelled on the protocol of the Persian an,cienregime.At th~court of the califs,the worldappearedto revolve like clockwork rohnd Baghdad, as in thedreamlike ceremonial of the king of kings. Just before hewas crowned Roman emperor of the West in 800,Charlemagne received from Harun aI-Rashid a greatcloak and a pet elephant called Abul Abaz. Little did theFrankish monarch know it, but in this gift the calif hadmerely repeated the time-honoured gesture of Khusro IAnoshirwan when, at the great Spring festival, the kingof kings had lavished gifts of animals and cast-off cloth-ing on his humble servants. .

In the western imagination, the Islamic empire standsas the quintessence of ~'oriental power. Islam owedthis crucial orientation neither to Muhammad nor to

the adaptable conquerors of the seventh century, butto the massive resurgence of eastern, Persian traditionsin the,eighth and ninth centuries.

Chapter Questions

1. Explain the'appeal and the rapid spread of Islamduring these early centuries.

2. In what ways might it be argued that politically,m~litarily,and culturally, Islam owed its success toits qualities as an Arab civilization?

3. Drawing on sources from this and previouschapters, how might Islamic civilization becompared with the Cbristian and Indiancivilizations it was challenging?

-

The expansion of Islam Seminar

1. Listthe ways Islam spread.

2. How have European scholars described the spread of Islam?3. Is this view correct?

4. What two reasons did most people have to convert?

5. Describe the two phases of conversion in the Middle East?

6. How was conversion different for Arabs and the sedentary people of the Fertile Crescent?

7. How did the early Arab Muslims view converts?

The Muslim Pattern of Conquest

8. Describe the razzia.

9. What is jihad?

10. How did jihad lead to expansion of the Muslim Empire?11. What is the nature of the razzia and the Jihad and how does'Watt relate them to help

explain the conquest of Spain?12. What is the process that occurred that transformed Muslim military victory into

established political control?

The Islamic World

13. Listthe ways external forms of Islamic culture were carried around the empire.

14. What practical public works travelled with Muslim rule?

15. How did Islam affect the daily life of the people of the Near East and the Maghrib?

16. How did Islam connect the men of the empire?

17. Explain how buildings, artifacts, and art helped create a sense of Islamicidentity? In whatother ways was a sense of unity within Islam created?

The Eastern Orientation of Islam

18.Why did the great cities of the Mediterranean decline?

19. What evidence does Brown present to show that Islam faced East and not West?

20. What factor turned Islam away from Europe and towards the west and Asia?21. What Empire did the Muslim Empire model itself on?

22. What is the relationship between Baghdad and Europe in 800 A.C.E.?23. How did Persia pull the Islamic Empire eastward?

24. How did the foundation of Baghdad become more important than military defeats in

halting the Arab advance on Europe?