The ConquestsHSTAFM 162, Class 2.2

January 14, 2016

MUHAMMAD’S MISSION AND CAMPAIGNS

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30° 35° 40° 45° 50° 55° 60°

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S A S A N I A N

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Qadisiya 636

624 632

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Isfahan

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Jafula

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Hamadan

Damietta

Aleppo

Raqqa

Gaza

Marash Samosata

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Dabiq

Damascus

HomsTripoli

Jerusalem

Medina

Ctesiphon

Wasit

Alexandria

al-Fustat(Cairo)

Heliopolis

Dumat al-Jandal

Muhammad’s Missions and Campaigns to 632

Muhammad moves to Medina

Conquered by Muhammad to 632

Battle site with date

Campaigns

Conquered by Abu Bakr 632–34

H A of Islam Spreads 01–07 21/5/04 9:06 AM Page 27

The Death of Muḥammad (632 CE)

• Crisis of succession

• Rebellion of Arab tribes

• Sustainability of the Arab state

The Conquerors Arrive

• 636: Battles of Yarmuk (Syria) and Qādisiyya (Iraq)

• 639–42: Conquest of Egypt

• 642: Battle of Nahāvand.

• 650: Merv in Central Asia captured. Last Sasanian king Yazdgird III (r. 632–651) killed.

• 711: Sind and Andalusia invaded

• 751: Muslims meet the armies of the Tang Chinese at Talas in Central Asia.

EXPANSION OF ISLAM TO 750

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Tripoli 647

Alexandria646

Rhodes654 Cyprus649

Constantinople673–77, 717–18

Damascus 635capital from 658

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Tiflis Derbend

Rome

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Erzurum

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al-Fustat 670 Heliopolis 640

Mecca 622

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Ajnadain 634

Jerusalem 638Qadisiya 636

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Isfahan

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Bukhara 710

Talas 751

Samarkand 710

Balkh 664

Istahar 648Basra656

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B U L G A R S

H U N G A R I A N S

Expansion to 750

Under Muhammad

Expansion of Islam:

Arab advance

Battle site

Under Abu Bakr (632–634)

Under Umar (634–644)

Under Uthman (644–656) and Ali (656–661)

Under the Umayyads (661–750)

K H A Z A RE M P I R E

SL A V S

TU

RK

I CP E O P L E S

H A of Islam Spreads 01–07 21/5/04 9:06 AM Page 29

HISTORICAL ATLAS OF THE ISLAMIC WORLD

The Dome of the Rock in

Jerusalem, built by the Caliph

Abd al-Malik in 691–92, is the

first great building to have been

constructed after the Arab

conquest. Embellished with

Koranic quotations proclaiming

the unity of God, the building

surrounds the rock from where

Muhammad is believed to have

embarked on his miraculous

“night journey” to heaven.

Muhammad’s death left the Muslim communi-ty without an obvious leader. One of his oldestcompanions, Abu Bakr (r. 632–634), wasacknowledged by several leaders as the firstcaliph, or successor. Under Abu Bakr and hissuccessor Umar (634–644), the tribes, who hadbegun to fall away on the death of Muhammad,were reunited under the banner of Islam andconverted into a formidable military and ideo-logical force. The Arabs broke out of the penin-sula, conquering half the Byzantine provincesas well as defeating the armies of SasanianPersia. Ctesiphon, the Persian capital, fell in637, Jerusalem in 638. By 646, under Umar’ssuccessor Uthman (r. 644–656), the whole ofEgypt had come under Arab Muslim control.Acquiring ships from Egypt and Syria, theArabs conducted seaborne raids, conqueringCyprus in 649 and pillaging Rhodes in 654.Religious differences between the Byzantinerulers and their subjects in Egypt and Syriaensured that the Muslims were met with indif-ference, or even welcomed by fellow monothe-ists embittered by decades of alien Byzantinerule. But secular factors were also important.The Arabs were motivated by desire for plun-der, as well as religious faith. In previous eras

nomadic preda-tors would havetaken the plunder orheld onto land, dispersingas landlords or peasantsamong the conquered peoples.In a farsighted decision CaliphUmar encouraged the tribes to settlewith a system of stipends paid from thecommon treasury, which took control ofthe conquered lands. The Arabs were keptapart from the population in armed camps thatevolved into garrison cities such as Basra andKufa in Iraq. Although the tensions over thedistribution of booty would erupt into opencivil war the overall control exercised by thefledgling Islamic government remained underdynastic rule. Though individual dynastieswould often be challenged as ruling contrary toIslamic principles of equality and justice, thedynastic system of governance fitted the pre-vailing form of social organization, the patriar-chal kinship group, and remained the normuntil modern times. Under the Umayyads theremarkable expansion of Islam continued, withthe Arab raiders reaching as far as centralFrance and the Indus Valley.

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Expansion of Islam to 750 10° 0°

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H A of Islam Spreads 01–07 21/5/04 9:06 AM Page 28

What Drove the Conquests?

• Ecological Thesis: The Byzantine-Sasanian Wars (602–628), along with the outbreak of disease (plague of 619) and climate change severely depleted the region’s resources.

• Nationalist Thesis: Concentrated effort of united tribes could be directed to conquest outside the borders of Arabia.

• Accidental Thesis

• Money:

– Spoils of War: ‘Umar establishes the dīwān, a list that divides the spoils of conquest up among the armies according to seniority in conversion

– Question of Centralization: centralized on a strategic but not tactical level

Islam and Taxes

• Muslim Isolation: – Miṣr (amṣār): garrison cities – Laws for non-Muslims (dhimmī): religious freedom, separate

dress, no weapons

• Non-Muslims & Taxes: – The jizya (poll tax) as ‘compensation’ for religious freedom taken

from non-Muslim adult males; exempted from zakāt (alms tax)

• Result: Conversion is Slow – In Iraq in 800 CE, only 18% Muslim – Majority of Egypt is not Muslim until the 11th century

Leadership and Authority

• Succession to Muhammad: religious and/or political authority?

• Caliph: ‘khalīfat allāh’ or ‘khalīfat rasūl allāh’ – Deputy of God or Deputy of the Messenger of God?

• The Partisans of ‘Ali

• First Civil War 656-660 – ‘Āʼisha (defeated at Battle of the Camel by ʻAlī in 656) – Muʻāwiya, a relative of the third caliph ʻUthmān and governor of Syria since 639 – Ali and his partisans (face-off with Muʻāwiya at Battle of Ṣiffin in 657) – The Khārijites: the first radicals, secede from ʻAlī’s party after arbitration with

Muʻāwiya (defeated by ʻAlī in 658, assassinate him in 661)

The Battle of Ṣiffīn, from a 13th century illustrated Book of History of Balʻamī

Qurʼān as a Book

• Types of material: – Hortatory/didactic: believe, do good deeds, fear God, beware the Day

of Judgment, obey God and his Prophet – Narrative: tales of Moses, Abraham, Noah, Yusuf, Zulaykha – Predictive/Eschatological: fate of believers and unbelievers, creation

and end of the world – Polemical: claims of Muhammad’s opponents, the failings of the

‘People of the Book’ – Doctrinal: the nature of God – Legal: less than 500 verses deal with law and ritual

• Structure of Quran: • Not a continuous narrative • Contextual: asbāb al-nuzūl = occasions of revelation’ • Ellipticalism: assumes audience knowledge • Person: God as beyond language… ‘He’, ‘I’ ‘We’ and ‘God’