A Brief History of Islam

With the diatribes, fulminations, and promulgations surrounding terrorist concerns I decided to make up my own mind. If I had known how long it would take to learn so little I would have headed for the golf course and let the debaters’ twaddle rage on without me. But (sigh) I pressed on consuming so much time writing the following notes that I refused to jettison them. So here they are. Bless your critical thinking brain if you read them.

Muhammad born AD 570 into one of the poorest clans in Mecca claimed a revelation from Allah, “the one true God.” Muhammad’s religion became known as Islam, a word meaning, “to submit to God.”  The official designation of a believer became a Muslim.

Muhammad claimed that over a twenty-year period the angel Gabriel dictated the Quran (“the recitation”) to him. The illiterate Muhammad repeated the words from memory; they were later chronicled, reaching the final written form under the third Caliph, Uthman. 

The Quran, divided into 114 suras (chapters), contains four sections:

1. Doctrinal passages concerned with death, resurrection, and judgment.  Martyrs gain entry into paradise.  Rewards go to those who fight against infidels.  Hell consists of fire and acrid smoke.
2. Prophetic stories many of which are adaptations of pagan customs.  Others show evidence of Christian and Jewish influence with alterations to fit the Arabian point of view.  For example, according to the Quran Allah commanded Abraham to sacrifice Ishmael instead of Isaac.
3. Proclamations and regulations: The Quran prohibits alcohol and pork consumption, gambling, idolatry, image making, usury, and asserts that women are inferior to men. The Quran contains 109 verses calling Muslims to war with nonbelievers. Ethical admonitions include compassion and mercy.  The contradiction between mercy and killing infidels remains unresolved.
4. Religious duties, known as the Five Pillars of the Faith, consist of the following:

1.     Prayer must be said five times every 24-hours facing Mecca on clean ground.

2.     Alms giving are expected to represent one-fortieth of a man’s earnings.

3.     Fasting is ordained.  Eating and drinking and all worldly pleasure are forbidden between sunrise and sunset during Ramadan, the ninth month of Islamic year.  Because the Islamic calendar is lunar, Ramadan falls at different times of the year. 

4.     Pilgrimage to Mecca once in a lifetime at which time one must fulfill a series of rituals.

5.     Profession of faith in Allah and Muhammad.

Muhammad inspired his followers to battle by promising them slaves and booty for victory and threatening them with death, destruction, and damnation if they failed to follow his commands. Wanting to convert all Arabs to his teaching Muhammad attacked caravans and laid siege to towns. Convinced that war was a sacred duty his united tribes growing larger with each victory destroyed all who opposed Allah. Men were massacred, women raped, children enslaved.

On June 8, 632 Muhammad died at Medina where his mosque became the second holiest worship site in the Muslim world. At Mecca rests the holiest shrine, a black stone monument known as the Kaaba. 

The third most important Islamic monument, the Dome of the Rock, stands on the site of the original Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. This site commemorates the alleged occasion of Muhammad's ascent through the seven heavens to the very presence of Allah.

Soon after the death of Muhammad Islam split into three major sects:

1. The Sunnites maintain that representatives of the believers should elect the Islamic leader.  They believe that the Sunna –the traditions—supplemented the Koran as a valid source of belief.  Sunnites make up more than eighty percent of the Muslims.
2. The Shiites advocate that Muhammad’s successor, or Caliph, should be related to the Prophet by blood or by marriage.  They hold the Quran to be the only source of truth.  When Muhammad died, the Shiites rejected Abu Bakr, the Sunnite Caliph.  They argue that Muhammad had designated Ali husband of his daughter Fatima as leader.
3. The Sufis adhere to a mystical and ascetic ideal.  They deny the validity of rational judgment, maintaining that truth comes from divine revelation released by torturing the body.

Following the death of Mohammad a great wave of Islamic expansion swept over Asia, Africa and Europe.  When Muhammad died in 632 Islam authority extended over little more than one-third the Arabian Peninsula.  Within a hundred years of Muhammad’s death Islam dominated half of the civilized world.   

Islamic culture left a splendid legacy of original discoveries and achievements:

• Astronomy, mathematics, physics, chemistry and medicine advanced under Islam.  
• Europe adapted the Arabic system of numerals. 
• Muslims expanded algebra and trigonometry beyond Hellenistic times.
• They developed optics and the compass.
• Muslims found uses for alum, borax, sulfuric acid and sodium carbonate.  
• Muslims made paper.
• They developed the art of weaving pile carpeting and rugs and making brocaded silks and tapestries.  
• Muslims inlaid metal work, enameled glassware and painted pottery.  
• They improved farming techniques, terraced slopes and irrigated barren land.  
• They produced cotton, flax, silk, rice, wheat, spinach, asparagus, apricots, peaches, olives, banana, coffee and oranges.
• The songs of the troubadours and love poetry of medieval France were directly inspired by Muslim writings.  
• The Book of the Arabian Nights influenced Boccaccio and Chaucer.   
• The medical writings of Avicenna became the authoritative work in Europe until the late seventeenth century.  
• Medical progress included the description of smallpox, tuberculosis, stomach cancer, eye infections, pleurisy and a variety of nervous conditions.  
• The spread of disease through contamination of water and soil were described.  
• Under the Muslims commerce and manufacturing grew to an extraordinary degree.  
• Muslims developed checks, receipts, bills of lading, letters of credit, trade associations and stock companies.  
• They developed domes, minarets, horseshoe arches and built magnificent cities.

At the close of the first millennium the Muslem Turks (Seljuks) won control of Asia Minor.  The Turks defended Islamic civilization during the Crusades that began in 1096 as a series of military expeditions led by European Christians to drive the Muslims from Jerusalem.  In 1099 the Christian crusaders gained control over Jerusalem.  The Islamic warrior Saladin retook Jerusalem in 1187.  Five years later Richard the Lion-Hearted and Saladin made a truce that allowed Christian pilgrims to enter Jerusalem. 

The Muslin culture declined with the invasion of the Mongols in the middle of the thirteenth century.  By the fifteenth century the Muslim Ottoman Turks prevailed in the Middle East. 

            

During World War I the Ottoman Empire joined Germany to fight against the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Russia and the United States.  Following the war the League of Nations divided the Islamic lands into territories governed by the Allied victors.  Many of the current Middle East countries gained independence in the years between the two great wars.  

Currently several hotbeds of Islamic conflict exist giving the news channel commentators something with which to agitate, fret, and unhinge their viewers.            

Conclusion: It’s a mess. Recommendation: Pray, celebrate life, turn off the news and change the channel to I Love Lucy reruns.

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