The Worlds of Islam: Afro-Eurasian Connections

24 Pages·2012·0.14 MB·English

by  Erin Shelton

CHAPTER
9
The Worlds of Islam:
Afro-Eurasian Connections
600–1500
CHAPTER LEARNING C. Islam had already been prominent in the
world between 600 and 1600.
OBJECTIVES
1. encompassed parts of Africa, Europe,
• To examine the causes behind the spread of Middle East, and Asia
Islam 2. enormously significant in world history
• To explore the dynamism of the Islamic world 3. creation of a new and innovative
as the most influential of the third-wave civilizations civilization
• To consider the religious divisions within Islam 4. was the largest and most influential of the
and how they affected political development third-wave civilizations
• To consider Islam as a source of cultural 5. Islam’s reach generated major cultural
encounters with Christian, African, and Hindu encounters
cultures D. In the year 2000, there were perhaps 1.2
• To increase student awareness of the billion Muslims in the world (22 percent of
accomplishments of the Islamic world in the period the world’s population).
600–1500 C.E. II. The Birth of a New Religion
A. The Homeland of Islam
1. unlike most religious/cultural traditions,
CHAPTER OUTLINE
Islam emerged from a marginal region
2. Arabian Peninsula as home of nomadic
I. Opening Vignette
Arabs (Bedouins)
A. By the start of the twenty-first century, Islam
a. fiercely independent clans and tribes
had acquired a significant presence in the
b. variety of gods
United States.
3. Arabia also had sedentary, agricultural
1. more than 1,200 mosques
areas
2. about 8 million Muslims
4. Arabia lay on important East–West trade
B. The second half of the twentieth century saw
routes
the growing international influence of Islam.
a. Mecca became important as a trade
center
193
194 CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS
b. the Kaaba was the most prominent 5. jihad (“struggle”) is sometimes called the
religious shrine “sixth pillar”
c. the Quraysh tribe controlled local trade a. greater jihad: personal spiritual striving
and pilgrimage b. lesser jihad/jihad of the sword: armed
5. Arabia was on the edge of the Byzantine struggle against unbelief and evil
and Sassanid empires c. understanding of the concept has
a. so Arabs knew some practices of these varied widely over time
empires C. The Transformation of Arabia
b. Judaism, Christianity, and 1. Muhammad attracted a small following,
Zoroastrianism had spread among aroused opposition from Meccan elites
Arabs a. in 622, emigrated to Yathrib/Medina
B. The Messenger and the Message (the hijra)
1. the prophet of Islam was Muhammad Ibn b. created Islamic community (umma) in
Abdullah (570–632 C.E.) Medina
a. orphaned at a young age c. broke definitively from Judaism
b. became a prosperous merchant thanks 2. rapid expansion throughout Arabia
to marriage to Khadija a. military successes led to alliances
c. took to withdrawal and meditation b. large-scale conversion
2. beginning of revelations from Allah in c. consolidation of Islamic control
610 C.E. throughout Arabia by time of
a. revelations recorded in the Quran Muhammad’s death in 632
b. when heard in its original Arabic, 3. fundamental differences between births of
believed to convey the presence of the Islam and Christianity
divine a. Islam did not grow up as persecuted
3. radically new teachings minority religion
a. monotheistic b. Islam didn’t separate “church” and
b. Muhammad as “the seal of the state
prophets” III. The Making of an Arab Empire
c. return to old, pure religion of Abraham A. The Arab state grew to include all or part of
d. central tenet: submission to Allah Egyptian, Roman/Byzantine, Persian,
(Muslim = “one who submits”) Mesopotamian, and Indian civilizations.
e. need to create a new society of social 1. many both in and out of Arab Empire
justice, equality, and care for others converted to Islam
(the umma) 2. Arabic culture and language spread widely
4. core message summarized in the Five 3. Islam became a new third-wave
Pillars of Islam civilization
a. first pillar is simple profession: “There B. War, Conquest, and Tolerance
is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is 1. Arabic conquests were a continuation of
the messenger of God.” long-term raiding pattern
b. prayer five times a day at prescribed 2. new level of political organization allowed
times greater mobilization
c. generous giving to help the community 3. Byzantine and Persian empires were
and the needy weakened by long wars and internal
d. fasting during the month of Ramadan revolts
e. pilgrimage to Mecca (hajj) 4. limits of Arab expansion:
CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS 195
a. defeated Sassanid Empire in the 640s, 8. Others like the peoples of Iran, Turkey
took half of Byzantium and Pakistan have “Islamized” without
b. in early 700s, conquered most of “Arabizing”
Spain, attacked France a. Persian language and culture had
c. to the east, reached the Indus River enormous influence on world of Islam
d. in 751, Arabs crushed a Chinese army D. Divisions and Controversies
at the Battle of Talas River 1. a central problem: who should serve as
5. reasons for expansion: successor to Muhammad (caliph)?
a. economic: capture trade routes and 2. first four caliphs (the Rightly Guided
agricultural regions Caliphs, 632–661) were companions of
b. individual Arabs sought wealth and Muhammad
social promotion a. had to put down Arab tribal rebellions
c. communal: conquest helped hold the and new prophets
umma together b. Uthman and Ali were both assassinated
d. religious: bring righteous government c. civil war by 656
to the conquered 3. result was the Sunni/Shia split of Islam
e. tolerant of Jewish and Christian faiths a. Sunni Muslims: caliphs were rightful
6. conquest was not too destructive political and military leaders, chosen
a. Arab soldiers were restricted to by the Islamic community
garrison towns b. Shia Muslims: leaders should be blood
b. local elites and bureaucracies were relatives of Muhammad, descended
incorporated into empire from Ali and his son Husayn
C. Conversion c. started as a political conflict but
1. initial conversion for many was “social became religious
conversion,” not deep spiritual change d. Shias identified themselves as
2. Islam’s kinship to Judaism, Christianity, opponents of privilege
and Zoroastrianism made it attractive 4. over time, caliphs became absolute
3. Islam was associated from the beginning monarchs
with a powerful state—suggested that a. Umayyad dynasty (661–750) was a
Allah was a good god to have on your side time of great expansion
4. the state provided incentives for b. Abbasid dynasty overthrew Umayyads
conversion in 750
a. earliest converts included slaves and 5. basic religious issue: what does it mean to
prisoners of war be a Muslim?
b. converts didn’t have to pay the jizya a. Islamic law (the sharia) helped answer
c. Islam favored commerce the question
d. social climbers were helped by b. reaction against the distraction of
conversion worldly success: Sufis
5. resistance to conversion among Berbers of c. the ulama and Sufism weren’t entirely
North Africa, some Spanish Christians, incompatible—e.g., al-Ghazali (1058–
some Persian Zoroastrians 1111)
6. around 80 percent of the population of d. but there was often tension between the
Persia converted between 750 and 900 two approaches
7. some areas (Egypt, North Africa, Iraq) E. Women and Men in Early Islam
also converted to Arabic culture and 1. what rise of Islam meant for women
language remains highly controversial
196 CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS
2. spiritual level: Quran stated explicitly that a. at first, violent destruction of Hindu
women and men were equals and Buddhist temples
3. social level: Quran viewed women as b. Sultanate of Delhi (founded 1206)
subordinate, especially in marriage became more systematic
4. Quran helped women in some ways 3. emergence of Muslim communities in
(banned female infanticide, gave women India
control over their own property, granted a. Buddhists and low-caste Hindus found
limited rights of inheritance, required Islam attractive
woman’s consent to a marriage, b. newly agrarian people also liked Islam
recognized a woman’s right to sexual c. subjects of Muslim rulers converted to
satisfaction) lighten tax burden
5. social practices of lands where Islam d. Sufis fit mold of Indian holy men,
spread were also important in defining encouraged conversion
women’s roles e. at height, 20–25 percent of Indian
a. early Islam: some women played population converted to Islam
public roles; prayed in mosques, f. monotheism vs. polytheism
weren’t veiled or secluded g. equality of believers vs. caste system
b. growing restrictions on women h. sexual modesty vs. open eroticism
(especially in upper classes) under 4. interaction of Hindus and Muslims
Abbasids a. many Hindus served Muslim rulers
c. veiling and seclusion became standard b. mystics blurred the line between the
among upper, ruling classes two religions
d. lower-class women didn’t have the c. Sikhism developed in early sixteenth
“luxury” of seclusion century; syncretic religion with
e. practices were determined by Middle elements of both Islam and Hinduism
Eastern traditions much more than by d. Muslims remained as a distinctive
Quran minority
6. hadiths (traditions about Muhammad) C. The Case of Anatolia
developed more negative images of 1. Turks invaded Anatolia about the same
women time as India
7. Islam gave new religious outlets for a. major destruction at early stages in
women, especially as Sufis and in the Shia both places
tradition as mullahs b. Sufi missionaries were important in
IV. Islam and Cultural Encounter: A Four-Way both places
Comparison c. but in Anatolia by 1500, 90 percent of
A. The Arab Empire had all but disintegrated the population was Muslim, and most
politically by the tenth century. spoke Turkish
1. last Abbasid caliph killed when Mongols 2. reasons for the different results in the two
sacked Baghdad in 1258 regions
2. but Islamic civilization continued to a. Anatolia had a much smaller
flourish and expand population (8 million vs. 48 million)
B. The Case of India b. far more Turkic speakers settled in
1. Turkic-speaking invaders brought Islam to Anatolia
India c. much deeper destruction of Byzantine
2. establishment of Turkic and Muslim society in Anatolia
regimes in India beginning ca. 1000
CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS 197
d. active discrimination against Christians 3. high degree of interaction between
in Anatolia Muslims, Christians, and Jews
e. India’s decentralized politics and a. some Christians converted to Islam
religion could absorb the shock of b. Christian Mozarabs adopted Arabic
invasion better culture but not religion
f. Turkish rulers of Anatolia welcomed 4. religious toleration started breaking down
converts; fewer social barriers to by late tenth century
conversion a. increasing war with Christian states of
g. Sufis replaced Christian institutions in northern Spain
Anatolia b. more puritanical forms of Islam
3. by 1500, the Ottoman Empire was the entered Spain from North Africa
most powerful Islamic state c. in Muslim-ruled regions, increasing
4. Turks of Anatolia retained much of their limitations placed on Christians
culture after conversion d. many Muslims were forced out of
D. The Case of West Africa Christian-conquered regions or kept
1. Islam came peacefully with traders, not by from public practice of their faith
conquest e. completion of Christian reconquest in
2. in West Africa, Islam spread mostly in 1492
urban centers V. The World of Islam as a New Civilization
a. provided links to Muslim trading A. By 1500, the Islamic world embraced at least
partners parts of nearly every other Afro-Eurasian
b. provided literate officials and religious civilization.
legitimacy to state B. Networks of Faith
3. by the sixteenth century, several West 1. Islamic civilization was held together by
African cities were Islamic centers Islamic practices and beliefs
a. Timbuktu had over 150 Quranic a. beliefs/practices transmitted by the
schools and several centers of higher ulama, who served as judges,
education interpreters, etc.
b. libraries had tens of thousands of b. starting in eleventh century: formal
books colleges (madrassas) taught religion,
c. rulers subsidized building of major law, and sometimes secular subjects
mosques c. system of education with common
d. Arabic became a language of religion, texts, sharing of scholarship
education, administration, trade throughout Islamic world
4. did not have significant Arab immigration 2. Sufism: branches of Sufism gathered
5. Sufis played little role until the eighteenth around particular teachers (shaykhs) by
century the tenth century
6. no significant spread into countryside until a. development of great Sufi orders by
nineteenth century the twelfth/thirteenth centuries
E. The Case of Spain b. Sufi devotional teachings, practices,
1. Arab and Berber forces conquered most of writings spread widely
Spain (called al-Andalus by Muslims) in 3. many thousands of Muslims made the hajj
the early eighth century to Mecca each year
2. Islam did not overwhelm Christianity C. Networks of Exchange
there 1. Islamic world was an immense arena for
exchange of goods, technology, and ideas
198 CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS
a. great central location for trade CHAPTER QUESTIONS
b. Islamic teaching valued commerce
c. urbanization spurred commerce Following are answer guidelines for the Big Picture
2. Muslim merchants were prominent on all Questions, Seeking the Main Point Question, Margin
Review Questions, Portrait Question, and Documents
the major Afro-Eurasian trade routes
and Visual Sources Feature Questions that appear in
3. exchange of agricultural products and
the textbook chapter. For your convenience, the
practices between regions
questions and answer guidelines are also available in
4. diffusion of technology the Computerized Test Bank.
a. spread ancient Persian water-drilling
techniques
b. improvement of Chinese rockets Big Picture Questions
c. adoption of papermaking techniques
1. How might you account for the immense
from China in the eighth century
religious and political/military success of Islam in its
5. exchange of ideas
early centuries?
a. Persian bureaucratic practice, court
• For the first time a shared faith in Islam
ritual, poetry
allowed the newly organized state to mobilize the
b. ancient Greek, Hellenistic, and Indian
military potential of the entire Arab population.
texts
• The Byzantine and Persian empires were
c. developments in mathematics, weakened by decades of war with each other and by
astronomy, optics, medicine, internal revolts. The two empires also
pharmacology underestimated the Arab threat.
VI. Reflections: Past and Present: Choosing Our • Merchant leaders of the new Islamic
community wanted to capture profitable trade routes
History
and wealthy agricultural regions.
A. People look to history to understand the
• Individual Arabs found in military expansion a
world we now inhabit.
route to wealth and social promotion.
B. What can history tell us about the Islamic • Expansion provided a common task for the
world today? Arab community, which reinforced the fragile unity
1. reminds us of central role in Afro- of the Islamic umma.
• Arabs were motivated by a religious
Eurasian world for over 1000 years
dimension, as many viewed the mission of empire in
2. followed by several centuries of Western
terms of jihad, bringing righteous government to the
imperialism
peoples they conquered.
3. when breaking with Western dominance • Islam experienced success in attracting
more distant past an inspiration converts: Muhammad’s religious message was
a. fundamentalists see early Islamic attractive to many, while Jews, Christians, and
Zoroastrians could find familiar elements of their
community as model for renewal
own faiths in Islam.
b. Islamic modernizers look to
• Conquests called into question the power of
achievements in science and
old gods, while the growing prestige of the Arab
scholarship as foundation for more Empire attracted many to Allah.
open engagement with the West • Although forced conversions were rare, living
4. history reveals great diversity and debate in an Islamic-governed state provided a variety of
incentives for claiming Muslim identity. Merchants
in the Islamic world
found in Islam a religion friendly to commerce and
5. past points to considerable variation in the
in the Arab Empire a huge and secure arena for trade,
interactions of Muslims and others
while people aspiring to official positions found
conversion to Islam an aid to social mobility.
CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS 199
2. In what ways might Islamic civilization be 5. Looking Back: What distinguished the early
described as cosmopolitan, international, or global? centuries of Islamic history from a similar phase in
the history of Christianity and Buddhism?
• The Islamic civilization embraced at least
parts of virtually every other civilization in the Afro- • Islam differed sharply from Christianity and
Eurasian hemisphere. Buddhism because its founder was not only a
• It fostered a network of commerce and religious figure but also a political and military
exchange that facilitated the spread of crops, leader.
technologies, and ideas. • Moreover, from the start the Islamic
• The common commitment to Islam created an community found itself constituted as a state.
identity that transcended more local political and Because of this, Islam did not develop as clearly
cultural identities in the Islamic world. defined a separation between church and state as did
both Christianity and Buddhism.
3. “Islam was simultaneously both a single
• There were some similarities in their religious
world of shared meaning and interaction and a series
outlooks: all three religions were founded by single
of separate, distinct, and conflicting communities.”
historical figures who had powerful religious
What evidence could you provide to support both
experiences; all three provide a clear path to
sides of this argument?
salvation; and all three proclaim the equality of all
• At the core of a single Islamic world was a believers.
common commitment to Islam. The ulama through • However, Islam’s conception of monotheism
education and Sufis through their associations served was stronger than that of Christianity; and each
to bind the Islamic world together. It also cohered as religion was shaped in part by the cultural traditions
an immense arena of exchange in which goods, in which it emerged.
technologies, crops, and ideas circulated widely.
• However, Islam was separate and distinct in
that it was politically fragmented. It included Seeking the Main Point Question
numerous distinct and sometimes hostile religious
traditions, including Sunni/Shia and ulama/Sufi Q. In what ways did the civilization of Islam
splits. It embraced distinctive cultural traditions from draw on other civilizations in the Afro-Eurasian
sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia that resulted world? And in what respects did it shape or
in different attitudes toward social and cultural transform those civilizations?
norms, such as those concerning women.
• Islam drew on many pre-existing traditions
4. What changes did Islamic expansion generate during its first centuries including Abrahamic and
in those societies that encountered it, and how was Zoroastrian religious traditions, Persian language and
Islam itself transformed by those encounters? artistic traditions, and Greek philosophy.
• Wherever it spread it was adopted through the
• The populations of many regions converted
prism of local social and cultural traditions. In West
wholly or partly to the Islamic faith.
Africa for instance, many older customs concerning
• Regions of the Islamic world were tied more
women persisted in the new Islamic community.
closely together through trade and the exchange of
• Sufis in particular proved able mediators
technologies, crops, and ideas.
between local custom and Islamic principles. For
• Older religious and political traditions were at
instance, some converts in India practiced a “popular
times swept away or at least altered.
Islam” mediated by Sufi mystics that was not always
• Islam was transformed through these
so sharply distinguished from the more devotional
encounters, especially when the norms of those
forms of Hinduism.
societies that converted had an impact on the social
• In terms of transforming civilizations with
and cultural implications of the faith.
which it came into contact, in the first centuries of
• The Islamic world, and the understanding of
the new faith areas of Iraq, North Africa, and Egypt
Islam itself, was shaped by contact with intellectual
converted to Islam and adopted important elements
and cultural traditions like Greek philosophy.
of Arab culture.
• In other regions like Persia, widespread
conversion to Islam occurred but much of the local
culture was retained.
200 CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS
• In India a permanent Islamic civilization made • A distinctive society began to take shape that
up of 20 to 25 percent of the population was would serve as a model for Islamic communities
established along with an Islamic empire. Ultimately everywhere.
it led to hybrid faiths like Sikhism that mixed both
Q. Why were Arabs able to construct such a
Hindu and Muslim elements.
huge empire so quickly?
• In Anatolia, Islam arrived alongside Turkish
conquest leading to both conversion to the Islamic • For the first time, a shared faith in Islam
faith and also profound cultural shifts including the allowed the newly organized state to mobilize the
widespread adoption of the Turkish language. military potential of the entire Arab population.
• In West Africa, Islam had a profound impact • The Byzantine and Persian empires were
on trade and was used to legitimate political rule. weakened by decades of war with each other and by
• In Spain, Islam established itself but also internal revolts. They also underestimated the Arab
coexisted for a time with a pre-existing Christian threat.
culture. • Merchant leaders of the new Islamic
community wanted to capture profitable trade routes
and wealthy agricultural regions.
Margin Review Questions • Individual Arabs found in military expansion a
route to wealth and social promotion.
Q. In what ways did the early history of Islam • Expansion provided a common task for the
reflect its Arabian origins? Arab community, which reinforced the fragile unity
of the umma.
• Islam drew on an older Arab identification of
• Arabs were motivated by a religious
Allah with Yahweh, the Jewish High God, and Arab
dimension, as many viewed the mission of empire in
self-identification as children of Abraham.
terms of jihad, bringing righteous government to the
• The Quran denounced the prevailing social
peoples they conquered.
practices of an increasingly prosperous Mecca and
sought a return to the older values of Arab tribal life. Q. What accounts for the widespread conversion
• The message of the Quran also rejected the to Islam?
Arab tribal and clan structure, which was prone to
• Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians could find
war, feuding, and violence. Instead, the Quran sought
familiar elements of their own faiths in Islam.
to replace this structure with the umma, the
• From the start, Islam was associated with the
community of all believers.
sponsorship of a powerful state.
Q. What did the Quran expect from those who • Conquest called into question the power of old
followed its teachings? gods, while the growing prestige of the Arab Empire
attracted many to Allah.
• Submission to Allah was the primary
• Although forced conversion was rare, living in
obligation of believers. It was expressed in the first
an Islamic-governed state provided a variety of
pillar of the faith: “There is no god but Allah, and
incentives for claiming Muslim identity.
Muhammad is the messenger of God.”
• In Islam, merchants found a religion friendly
• The Quran outlined four further pillars that all
to commerce, and in the Arab Empire they enjoyed a
devout Muslims must adhere to: 1) prayer five times
huge and secure arena for trade.
a day at prescribed times, 2) generous giving to help
• People aspiring to official positions found
the community and the needy, 3) fasting during the
conversion to Islam an aid to social mobility.
month of Ramadan, 4) pilgrimage to Mecca (hajj).
Q. What is the difference between Sunni and
Q. How was Arabia transformed by the rise of
Shia Islam?
Islam?
• Sunnis held that the caliphs were rightful
• A new religion emerged which drew
political and military leaders, selected by the Islamic
widespread adherence amongst the Arab population.
community, while the Shia held that leadership in the
• A new and vigorous state emerged bringing
Islamic world should derive from the line of Ali and
peace to the warring tribes of Arabia.
his son Husayn, blood relatives of Muhammad.
CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS 201
• For Sunni Muslims, religious authority in • Negative views of women, presenting them
general emerged from the larger community, variously as weak, deficient, and a sexually charged
particularly from the religious scholars known as threat to men and social stability, emerged in the
ulama. Meanwhile, the Shia invested their leaders, hadiths, traditions about the sayings or actions of
known as imams, with a religious authority that the Muhammad, which became an important source of
caliphs lacked, allowing them alone to reveal the true Islamic law.
meaning of the Quran and the wishes of Allah. • Islam also offered new outlets for women in
• The Shia tradition included a messianic religious life. The Sufi practice of mystical union
element that the Sunni tradition largely lacked. with God allowed a greater role for women than did
mainstream Islam. Some Sufi orders had parallel
Q. In what ways were Sufi Muslims critical of
groups for women, and a few welcomed women as
mainstream Islam?
equal members.
• Sufism was sharply critical of the more • In Shia Islam, women teachers of the faith
scholarly and legalistic practitioners of the sharia; to were termed mullahs, the same as their male
Sufis, establishment teachings about the law and counterparts.
correct behavior did little to bring the believer into • Islamic education, either in the home or in
the presence of God. Quranic schools, allowed some women to become
• Sufis held that many of the ulama of literate and a few to achieve higher levels of
mainstream Islam had been compromised by their learning.
association with worldly and corrupt governments. • Visits to the tombs of major Islamic figures as
well as the ritual of the public bath provided some
Q. How did the rise of Islam change the lives of opportunity for women to interact with other women
women? beyond their own family circle.
• The Quran included a mix of rights,
Q. What similarities and differences can you
restrictions, and protections for women. It banned
identify in the spread of Islam to India, Anatolia,
female infanticide, gave women the right to own
West Africa, and Spain?
property and granted them rights of inheritance,
defined marriage as a contract between consenting • Islam spread to India, Anatolia, and Spain in
parties, granted the right to sue for divorce under part through force of arms of Islamic armies, while
certain circumstances, and regulated polygyny. It Islam arrived in West Africa with Muslim traders.
also allowed men to have sexual relations with • Sufis facilitated conversions by
consenting female slaves, but only under the accommodating local traditions, especially in India
condition that any children born of these unions were and Anatolia, but played a smaller role in West
free, as was the mother once her owner died. Africa until at least the eighteenth century.
• In practice, as the Arab Empire grew in size, • In India, West Africa, and Spain, Islam
the position of women became more limited. Women became one of several faiths within the wider
started to pray at home instead of in the mosque, and culture, while in Anatolia it became the dominant
veiling and seclusion of women became standard faith.
practice among the upper and ruling classes, with
Q. In what ways was Anatolia changed by its
special areas within the home becoming the only
incorporation into the Islamic world?
place where women could appear unveiled. Such
seclusion was less practicable for lower-class • A vast majority of the population converted to
women. These new practices derived far more from Islam from Christianity.
established traditions of Middle Eastern cultures than • Turkish conquerors also brought cultural
from the Quran, but they soon gained a religious transformation. The Turkish language predominated.
rationale in the writings of Muslim thinkers. Some Sufi religious practices derived from Central
• Other signs of tightening patriarchy, such as Asian Turkic shamanism took root. Turkic traditions of
“honor killing” of women by their male relatives for a freer more gender-equal life for women persisted.
violating sexual taboos and, in some places,
Q. Summing Up So Far: “Islam had a
clitorectomy (female circumcision), likewise derived
revolutionary impact on every society that it
from local cultures, with no sanction in the Quran or
touched.” What evidence might support this
Islamic law. But where they were practiced, such
statement, and what might challenge it?
customs often came to be seen as Islamic.
202 CHAPTER 9 • THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS
In terms of support, one could point to: practices. Rice, new strains of sorghum, hard wheat,
bananas, lemons, limes, watermelons, coconut
• the large number of conversions in places like
palms, spinach, artichokes, sugarcane, and cotton
Persia, Anatolia, and North Africa where earlier
came to the Middle East from India. Sugarcane and
religious traditions came to be practiced by small
cotton also came with knowledge of complex
minorities of the population.
production processes. Some of these Indian crops
• the role of Islam in facilitating long-distance
subsequently found their way to Africa and Europe
trade.
from the Middle East.
• the emergence in India of hybrid religions like
• Technology also diffused widely within the
Sikhism.
Islamic world. Ancient Persian techniques for
• the role of Islam and Islamic law in shaping
obtaining water by drilling into the sides of hills
political culture in regions from India to West Africa.
spread to North Africa. Muslim technicians made
In terms of challenging it, one could point to: improvements on rockets developed in China.
Techniques for manufacturing paper also arrived in
• the persistence of local social and cultural
the Middle East from China and later spread from the
practices such as those concerning women in
Middle East to India and Europe.
Anatolia or West Africa.
• Ideas also spread, with Jewish and Christian
• the survival of Persian artistic traditions.
precedents influencing Islamic thinkers; Persian
• the Christian reconquest of al-Andalus in
bureaucratic practice, court ritual, and poetry
Spain as an example of Islamic influence declining
influencing the elite in particular; and Greek and
in a region.
Indian scientific, medical, and philosophical texts
being systematically translated into Arabic and
Q. What makes it possible to speak of the
studied throughout the Islamic world.
Islamic world as a distinct and coherent civilization?
• Those traditions mixed and blended to
• At the core of that civilization was a common generate a distinctive Islamic civilization that made
commitment to Islam. many original contributions to the world of
• No group was more important in the learning—including the development of algebra as a
transmission of Islamic beliefs and practices than the novel mathematical discipline, original work in
ulama, an “international elite” who created a system astronomy and optics, and medicine and
of education that served to bind together an immense pharmacology.
and diverse civilization.
• The Sufi religious orders established an
educational network and organized a variety of larger Portrait Question
associations, some of which included chapters
throughout the Islamic world.
Q. What significance did Mansa Musa likely
• The pilgrimage to Mecca (the hajj) drew many
attach to his pilgrimage? How might Egyptians,
thousands of Muslims to Mecca each year from all
Arabians, and Europeans have viewed it?
over the Islamic world.
• The Islamic world also cohered as an immense • Mansa Musa likely viewed his pilgrimage as
arena of exchange in which goods, technologies, fulfillment of a requirement of his faith.
food products, and ideas circulated widely. • He may have seen it as an opportunity to raise
his prestige and legitimacy as a ruler both at home
Q. In what ways was the world of Islam a and in the larger Islamic World.
“cosmopolitan civilization”? • He may have expected it to convey baraka
(spiritual power) which would legitimate his rule.
• The Islamic world valued commerce and
• He may have seen it as an adventure.
fostered vibrant networks of exchange. Muslim
• In terms of Egypt, all the gold that Musa
merchants plied the Silk Roads, Sea Roads, and Sand
brought with him must have excited much interest
Roads of the Afro-Eurasian world, and the Islamic
even if it depressed gold prices.
world promoted long-distance economic
• His followers’ willingness to pay over the
relationships by actively supporting a prosperous,
odds for goods must have excited merchants and
highly developed, “capitalist” economy.
traders.
• Islamic civilization also facilitated a
substantial exchange of agricultural products and